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protestors,” Colin said. “They seemed plenty crazy.”
    â€œTakes one to know one,” Becky muttered.
    Lisa laughed, then glanced at my mom and stopped.
    â€œAll right, you guys, that’s enough.” My mom sighed. “Now we have to go to the hospital to get that cast—or what remains of it—taken care of. I’ll let you tell the doctor what happened.”
    Becky turned in her seat and smirked. “Monk Puncher. That’s your new name. Monk Puncher Curse.”
    â€œHmm, Monk Puncher Curse,” Colin mused. “Actually, that has a bit of a ring to it. Sort of sounds like a boxer.” He smiled. “You should keep it.”
    I sighed. “Oh, shut up, Colin.”
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    ***
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    Hospitals always seem to have one of those smells that hit you in the face like a brick and overwhelm your senses so that one second you’re ready to puke, and the next you’re fine. I think the people who run hospitals create that smell on purpose just to distract you from the pain that brought you there in the first place.
    I breathed through my mouth while I waited to see the doctor.
    The only good thing about all this was finally I’d be getting my cast off. Not that it was really on at the moment. Maybe seventy-five percent was still intact, and if I’d had a pair of garden shears, it would have been off in a flash. When I suggested that to my mom in an attempt to lighten her dark mood she gave me a silent withering look.
    Becky, though, had insisted on staying in the car to go over her coprolite notes and scroll through her museum pictures, which I figured was one of those little silver lining moments that greeting cards always talk about.
    â€œTake a seat,” Mom said, pointing to the waiting area. “I’ll go fill out the paperwork.”
    Every other time I’d been in the hospital, the waiting room had been packed or very nearly packed. This time, though, there were only three other people. Two of them were asleep, and the third was reading a magazine in the corner. We took seats well away from everyone else and discussed the situation.
    â€œThe guy you saw,” Lisa asked, “are you sure he was at the mall?”
    â€œA hundred percent,” I said. “He had on white pants and a white button-up shirt.”
    â€œLike an ice cream man?” Lisa asked.
    â€œActually, yeah,” I said. “Exactly like an ice cream man.”
    â€œWe saw an ice cream truck driving away from the museum,” Colin said.
    â€œDo you think,” Lisa began hesitantly, “that he’s from the Society?”
    â€œAn ice cream man?” Colin said. “No way.”
    I looked at Lisa. “I don’t know. I guess it could be a coincidence.”
    A janitor wearing a faded blue hat and dark coveralls entered the room and set up CAUTION signs around where we were sitting. He pulled a dry mop from his yellow cart and started making his way down the aisle we were in. When he was a couple paces away, he pulled out a scraper and knelt. “Your leg looks like it’s in rough shape,” the janitor said. He kept his head down so I couldn’t see his face, but his voice sounded like he was smiling. “I hope you’re okay.”
    â€œI’ll be fine, thank you,” I said. “I’m, um, getting it, or the rest of it, off today.”
    â€œThat’s good,” he said. “Fighting monks will be a lot easier when you’re not in a cast.”
    â€œI don’t expect that to happen again. Wait—how did you know about the museum?”
    The janitor looked up and smiled. “The name’s Astley, Archer Astley.” He looked a bit different—darker hair, no white clothes—but there was no mistaking his face.
    Lisa gasped. “You’re the guy Dean saw at the mall. The ice cream man.”

Chapter 7
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    Colin gave a frightened yelp, grabbed a magazine, and lightning-fast,