Six (Countdown book 1)

Chapter 10

I didn't have any more nightmares after that. 

Time seemed to fly by as I trained and learned at the castle. My favourite lessons were Mythology and (of course) Science, and I was learning so much more than I had in my old school in London. I was getting better with my shots in Weapons, even snagging a good few more bullseyes. Wyatt gave me private lessons with my knife, I was soon pretty handy with that, as well. My hand-in-hand combat got better, and I learned how to use my powers in a healthy and effective way. 

I learned my way around the castle. 

I found that the little ball of light that always seemed to get me into trouble didn't appear for a while, which was both surprising and worrying. There was no further news as to who the traitor was, or what their plan was. Me and Ben worked hard on the Cure, and I figured we nearly had it. We just had to tweak it a bit. Our theory was that if you didn't have your powers, then you didn't disappear, so we were working on something to block the abilities. 

We didn't really have 'friendship groups' in the castle. Everyone was everyone's friend and everyone was everyone's family. The only person I didn't talk to was Tony. Before I knew it, we were celebrating my first six months at the castle. Everyone joined in the celebrations, even Scarlett, who now had six months to live. Of course, by then, I should have had the formula sorted, and everyone would be fine. 

The only person who seemed upset or annoyed was Tony, and I could guess why. He just kind of sulked in the corner, refusing to talk to anyone. 

A few more weeks passed. Tony and Scarlett barely talked, and she seemed unsure of whether or not she should tell someone. She kept looking at me like the only thing that she wanted in the world was to tell me everything, but her loyalty to Tony stopped her. She seemed more distracted, uneasy. Her levels started dropping, and she almost got herself killed one weapons class when she accidentally knocked over the whole weapons rack, sending guns and knives and other pointy things in every direction. Luckily, no one was too badly injured. 

Tony mostly kept to himself, but he seemed worried, and he kept trying to talk to Scarlett, but she continuously ignored him. He stopped working on the Cure with me and Ben, and so did Scarlett, which made it harder to crack, because we didn't have people to fetch tools and chemicals for us anymore. 

On the sixth of March, exactly three months before my birthday, me and Ben finished the Cure. It was one of those moments, where everything you've ever worked for is over, everything you've worked your butt off for for the last year is done. 

It was Ben that done it. We were down to the very last component. We needed one more chemical element. Or maybe it was that we needed more or less of a element we already had. Either way, we were really struggling. 

It was late at night, or, to put it more correctly, very early in the morning. We had both been staring at the formula so wrong, trying to find the mistake, that our eyes were starting to hurt. We decided to stop for a coffee break. 

"Got a new kettle the other day." Ben said conversationally, pouring the coffees. "Quite nice, don't you think? It's made out of copper." 

"Hm." I muttered, rubbing my eyes tiredly. "Very nice. What happened to the old one?"

"I don't honestly know. It just exploded. Nothing to do with me, of course. But I got this new one pretty cheap. It's got quite a nice bronze tinge, don't you think-"

"BRONZE!" I shouted so loudly that Ben dropped his new kettle. 

He stared at me wide eyed for a moment. "You're a genius!" he shouted back. We both ran over to the whiteboard. I wiped off the last number with my hand (which I never usually did), and replaced it with Cu+ Sn, which was copper and tin, the chemical formula for bronze.