Oliver hurried to the crate and squinted to find the nails. It was hard in the darkness to find the small glint of metal, but finally he did, and he worked quickly, prizing out the nails and discarding the planks to the side. He worked feverishly, the darkness making his task even harder. But one by one he managed to tear off the planks. Until, finally, he stepped back.

He was staring at the bomb.

Seeing it in reality was more bone-chilling than hed ever expected. This wasnt just a plan or design anymore. This was the real thing. The real bomb. A complex machine of burnished metal. Six feet tall. Egg-shaped. Covered in wires. Filled with deathly power.

Oliver shuddered at the thought of the twisted mind that had created itLucas. Olivers determination to destroy the bomb before it could destroy anyone grew even stronger.

Quickly, he reached into his overalls pocket and pulled out all the plans hed stolen from Lucass secret room. It was so dark he had to hold them very close to his face. He studied them, comparing what was on the page to what he was looking at, trying to figure out how it had been designed and in turn, how it could be dismantled.

To his distress he found that it had been extremely well designed. Impeccably. Clearly, Lucas had poached ideas from Armando and twisted them for his dark means. The bomb was born not from the mind of a brilliant human, but from the disturbed mind of a terrifyingly evil Seer. It was filled with tricksextra wires and switchesthat made it near impossible to decipher, as well as shields like Esthers and the invisible wall around the school. One wrong move and the whole thing would blow right here, right now.

Oliver would need days to decipher it. But it would only be hours before the plane reached Germany. He felt overwhelmed and suddenly desperately alone. If only he had the support of his friends, the wisdom of Armando, and the experience of Professor Amethyst and the other teachers at the School for Seers.

But no sooner had he thought it, than Oliver realized that he did. All those people had given something to him over the time hed known them; their encouragement, their knowledge, their experience. This was a quest designed for him. In him, all that information converged. Other than Lucas, he was the only Seer whod been trained by Armando Illstrom. The person most able to dismantle this bomb was Oliver himself. That was why the universe had called to him in the first place.