"How could you have been recruited? As far as I know, I'm the only rebel to get into the school, and you would have had no way to before..."

I raised an eyebrow. "Well, I overheard Maddi and Liam talking about recruits, and it definitely seemed like some sort of rebel group. I wouldn't be surprised if they were one and the same. In fact, I'd be surprised if they weren't."

Mr. Hart stood up and turned away from me, putting his hand on his forehead. "All this time there's been someone else. And she must have known I was one of them, I'm a teacher and everyone in the rebels knows me. Knows I'm a part of them. Why didn't she do the signal or something?"

"I don't know, but I'm invited to a meeting tonight in the kitchen. Maddi was the one who told me about it. She, um, caught me when I was, um, spying on her, after she dropped a note that said to go to the kitchen at 11 pm. " I shuffled me feet, still sitting down. My teacher chuckled, which was really weird considering how unfunny he usually was. Serious. That was the word.

"You certainly are the adventurous type."

"Tell me about it." Mr. Hart's eyes drifted up behind me, and I turned around. It was almost 3:30.

"I need to go. Don't look around, don't touch anything, and shut the door behind you," he said, blunt. He grabbed a jacket from a hook on the back of the door and took off, leaving me standing in his room. Alone. He was gone.

I did need to find out more about this rebel thing...

First, I looked in Mr. Hart's closet. Always a good place to look. And always a good place to hide things. It looked like he had marked that off as an obvious place, though, because it was empty of anything remotely interesting (not including a neon orange jacket which looked to be, suspiciously, from the 70's). So was under the bed, the dresser, under the pillows, inside of the pillows and-

Scratch that last one, I thought, lifting the last pillow off of his bed. I shook it, and a small bell rang out. A smile spread across my face.

I practically ripped the pillowcase off (making sure not to literally tear it) and shook it out.

Two things fell onto the bed.

A) a small bell. One of those ones kids use when they're putting on a production of Jingle Bells for the school. And:

B) an envelope. This intrigued me much more than the bell. Envelopes could hold a lot of things inside them. Birthday cards, cheques, spam... Letters too, I supposed. It was open, not licked shut (which was disgusting) but tucked in. I pulled the flap out and a white piece of paper folded in thirds fell out.

Dear Mr. Hart, the letter said. Thank you for your latest information passed on to the rebels. But remember, taking the rock is only half of it. On the first day of school you must give it to someone when you do the activation, the last one. When you tell them they are a sub tell them that they must never show anyone. They will likely be curious about it. Say what you need to about the rebels, but no more than what is nessecary. If they make a good candidate, ask them to be a recruit.
Good day, The Leader.

"That was a set of very specific instructions," I murmured. Also, who was the Leader? I continued in my head. Were they actually on the 'good' side? Could I trust them? Why hadn't Mr. Hart mentioned them before? Well, I supposed he had been mentioned, but he hadn't said that he was receiving orders directly from the Leader. I'd thought my teacher was a lot farther down the line than that from way he said it.

Was Mr. Hart lying?

I slid the letter back into the envelope, folding it back into thirds, and put it back in the pillow, along with the bell. In exactly the same spots. After a quick check to make sure everything was as it had been before I'd searched it, I walked out of the room.

Should I trust him?