The Gathering (Darkness Rising 1)

"A mountain lion?" the woman cut in. "What happened?"

"This is Mina Lee," Corey said. "She's a reporter doing a story on Salmon Creek."

"Cool," I said. "What paper?"

"It's an American one," she said, as if kids from hick-town Canada wouldn't recognize the name. "We're doing a series on unusual small towns, and this one certainly qualifies. I'm particularly interested in getting the point of view of young people like you. Your opinion of this place must be a lot different from your parents'."

When we didn't react, she leaned forward, conspiratorial. "It can't be easy living out here. Two hundred people ..." She shook her head. "It must be so isolating."

"It is." Corey turned to Daniel. "If there were more kids here, I wouldn't need to hang out with you. And we wouldn't need to hang out with girls. Even if they are hot girls, and, well, being such a small town, there's not a lot of competition for dates, so they're stuck with us and--" He looked at Mina. "I like isolated."

Mina studied us, trying to figure out if we were making fun of her. Honestly, unless it was a rainy Saturday night and no one had wheels to drive into the city, we didn't mind living here. I could tell that wasn't what she wanted, though, so I played along.

"It can be a bit much," I said. "No Starbucks. No clubs. No Aeropostale. Hell, we have to drive an hour just to hang out at the mall. Epic inconvenience."

The guys struggled to keep straight faces as they nodded.

"And then there's the"--I lowered my voice--"medical research."

Her eyes glinted. Bull's-eye.

"How do you feel about that?" she said. "Living with such secrecy and under such intense security. I mean, they built an entire town to hide their work."

"I worry that they're hurting bunnies," I said.

"We aren't supposed to talk about the medical stuff." Daniel looked around, mock-anxious. "We get in a lot of trouble for that."

Mina nodded. "I understand. But I'd love to chat. Privately."

She set a time and place for us to meet her after school, then handed me her card and told us to bring along any other kids who wanted to talk.

EIGHT

AS SHE WALKED AWAY, Corey rubbed his temple, grimacing.

Daniel glanced at him. "You got your--?"

"Headache meds? Yes, Dad. I'll take one when I get inside."

I handed him Mina's card. "Your mom will want this."

"I texted her before you guys showed up. Even snapped a photo. She'll pass it on to Mayor Tillson and Dr. Inglis."

Dr. Inglis was as much a part of town politics as Chief Carling and the mayor. Mina Lee wasn't the first "reporter" to come sniffing around Salmon Creek. From the time we were little, we'd been told how to deal with them.

As far as we knew, no actual reporter had ever come to cover Salmon Creek. We might be an unusual little town, but we're definitely not worthy of a feature in an American newspaper. We were, however, worthy of attention from activists and competing medical companies. Over the years, we'd had a few activists posing as reporters, searching for evidence of animal testing or stem cell research. Of a bigger concern to the St. Clouds, though, were the corporate spies.

Drug research is a huge business, with potentially huge profits. Imagine how much you could make if you developed a cure for cancer. Or even the common cold. The St. Clouds built Salmon Creek so they could develop new drugs without rivals peering over their shoulders. But that doesn't mean their rivals don't occasionally send spies to see what they're working on.

Still, it doesn't take us long to sort out the troublemakers from the tourists. An alert about Mina Lee would go through Salmon Creek before lunch, shutting down all her potential sources of information.

I told the guys I'd catch up with them later. I had to go in early and prep Mrs. Morris's classroom. No, I'm not a teacher's pet. There's a rule at our school that if you aren't on a sports team, you need to do extra work. Being temporarily off the track team meant I was on teacher-helper duty two mornings a week.

"Watch out for Rafe," Corey said. "I saw him in the smoking pit."

"Phony," I muttered.

"She thinks he's not a real smoker," Daniel explained.