Read Paladin Prophecy 2: Alliance for Free Online Page A

waving around in the air like … living underwater dreadlocks … and I think they’re what killed the statue.”
    “How?” asked Will.
    “By squeezing it to death,” said Nick, squinting. “Which, by the way, saved yours truly’s bacon, lettuce, and tomato. And then all these little ropy dreadlock dudes handed me the phone, and I think they dialed it for me, too. By which time I was totally messed up.”
    “You don’t say,” said Ajay.
    “Which phone?” asked Will.
    “The one on the counter,” said Nick. “Outside the cage.”
    “Nepsted’s cage?”
    Nick nodded. “And when I say dialed, I mean they only had to push the big C in the middle.”
    “And where did the dreadlocks come from?” asked Will.
    “From behind the cage or … through the cage,” said Nick, and then he gasped. “Wait, so you’re saying that if Hobbes is Mr. Bonehead … and he’s in this picture with Nepsted … then Nepsted could be Mutant Squid-Dude ?”
    “Something like that,” said Will.
    “Awesome,” said Nick, grabbing the photograph and heading for the door. “I am all over this.”
    They followed Nick downstairs to the vast locker room, nearly empty now that the day was done. Will and Ajay hung back around the nearest corner as Nick approached Nepsted’s equipment cage alone.
    “Are we absolutely sure letting him handle this is a good idea?” whispered Ajay.
    “No,” whispered Will.
    “And the argument in favor?”
    “If Nick really did see Nepsted in Beast Mode, he should be the one to bring it up. Nepsted spooks easily. Better not to confront him with all three of us at once.”
    Ajay whispered back. “If Nepsted leads us to Hobbes, we can’t complain about style points. And Nick is occasionally capable of a certain … persuasiveness.”
    Will remembered something else Nepsted said to him the first time they met:
    “I’m the guy with the keys.”
    Will peeked around the corner and watched Nick bang the bell on the steel counter a few times. “Yo, Nepsted! Need a moment of your time, dude!”
    After a few moments, Nepsted’s squeaky motorized wheelchair rounded a corner into view inside the cage and glided past the deep rows of sports equipment on his side of the counter. His stunted body and withered limbs made him look like an eight-year-old with an adult’s head. His hands were the only other grown-up-sized part of him, and his right one, looking surprisingly powerful, gripped the joystick that drove his chair.
    “Don’t tell me, McLeish,” said Nepsted in his high-pitched, wobbly voice. “You trashed another pair of sweatpants.”
    “I’m not gonna lie to you, man,” said Nick, leaning on the counter and looking him in the eye. “I’m here ’cause I need to talk to you about what went down in this room with us last fall.”
    “No idea what you’re talking about—”
    “The rumble in the shower that ended up in here? The details were a tad fuzzy for me when it went down. Multiple blows to the head, massive concussion, right? All I could remember was that the statue dude drove the bear dude away and it was just about to punch my ticket … when some other dude came right through this cage and saved my life.”
    Nepsted’s large unblinking eyes widened slightly but betrayed no other reaction.
    “How or why this whole deal happened I can’t explain,” said Nick, leaning in and lowering his voice. “But as more details come back to me, you and I need to chat about it.”
    “Why should I?”
    “’Cause I think you’re the only dude who can answer this question: like, dude, WTF, tentacles? I mean, that was you, right? As in, you’re the only dude back there.”
    The left side of Nepsted’s face twitched a couple of times, like he was struggling to decide how to respond. Then he nodded, ever so slightly.
    “So why’d you stick your neck out like that to help me? Or whatever parts of you that was that you stuck out?”
    Nepsted still didn’t answer.
    “Take your time,”