I Am Number Four

In the beginning, there were nine of us. Three are gone, dead. They are hunting us, and they won't stop until they've killed us all. I am Number Four. I know that I am next. The third scar burned itself onto my ankle an hour ago, a searing ring of pain that meant Number Three was gone. It happened on a pontoon boat in the Gulf of Mexico, the water boiling around my leg as my secret was exposed. I dove into the sea and swam for shore, leaving behind the only life where I'd almost felt normal. By the time I reached the house, my guardian, Henri, already knew. We torched our identities - Daniel Jones, his father - and fled the Florida Keys in the dead of night, our only guide an old atlas crisscrossed with the lines of our past lives. Our new destination: a small, forgotten town called Paradise, Ohio.

Another new identity, another new school. My name is John Smith now, and Henri's rules are the same as always: Don't draw attention. Don't get close to anyone. But on the first day, I see her. Sarah Hart, a girl with kind blue eyes and a camera, who smiles at me as if we're already friends. I also meet Sam, a lanky kid with thick glasses and a belief in aliens, and Mark James, the school's quarterback who seems to think Sarah still belongs to him. I try to be a fly on the wall, but trouble finds me anyway. In the middle of class, a strange heat builds in my hands. I flee to an empty darkroom as my palms begin to glow, an uncontrollable, brilliant light pulsing from my skin. My first Legacy has arrived. “Thank Lorien,” Henri sighs when he finds me, pulling gardening gloves over my luminous hands to hide the impossible.

Henri explains it is called Lumen, a resistance to heat and fire. He begins my training, using a smooth Loric crystal from the Inheritance Chest he has guarded all my life. As he works, visions flood my mind - memories not entirely my own. I see Lorien before its fall: a vibrant world of lush jungles and twin moons. I see the invasion, the sky filled with fire and Mogadorian ships. I see the beasts they brought with them, creatures of nightmare and scale, tearing our people apart. I see my father, a powerful Garde, fighting until he is overwhelmed. Through it all, I hear Henri's voice guiding me, explaining the war, the flight to Earth, the charm that means we can only be killed in order. The training is brutal, but a strange comfort arrives in the form of a stray beagle who appears at our door, a dog I name Bernie Kosar.

Life in Paradise becomes a delicate balance. By day, I fall deeper in love with Sarah, sharing secrets and stolen kisses. A true friendship forms with Sam, who confides that he believes his missing father was abducted by aliens. But the threat of Mark James always lingers. It comes to a head on a haunted hayride, when Mark and his friends trap us in the woods. When they drag Sarah away, something inside me snaps. I unleash my power, my hands glowing like searchlights in the oppressive dark as I throw his friends through the trees. I am stronger than them, faster. I am not human, and for the first time, I don't try to hide it. Sarah sees what I can do, and her only question is, “Do you know kung fu or something?”

The fragile peace shatters when Henri investigates a conspiracy magazine Sam reads, *They Walk Among Us*. An article mentions the Mogadorians and their plan to conquer Earth. Henri tracks the publishers to Athens, Ohio, promising to be back in a few hours. He never returns. His phone goes straight to voicemail. At Thanksgiving dinner at Sarah's house, a new Legacy emerges under the crushing anxiety - telekinesis. The lens on Sarah's camera shatters in her hands without anyone touching it. I know then that Henri is in danger. With Sam's help, I drive his father's old truck to Athens, where we find Henri captured. We rescue him, but not before learning the Mogadorians are terrifyingly close.

A video of me saving Sarah from a house fire goes viral online. A reporter begins digging into my past. Then the fax arrives at the school principal's office, a single, chilling question printed on the page: ARE YOU NUMBER 4? I run, crashing through the office window, but it's too late. The Mogadorians have found us. They surround the school, cutting off the power, creating a dome of darkness. Just as we are cornered, help arrives in the form of a fierce girl with dark hair and powers of her own. “I am Number Six,” she says, making herself invisible to fight the scouts in the hallway.

The school becomes a battlefield. Henri, armed with a shotgun, fights beside us. Mark James, showing unexpected courage, joins in. The Mogadorians unleash their beasts - towering, monstrous creatures that tear through the school's walls. Henri is stabbed, a mortal wound from a Mogadorian blade. Out on the football field, under the swirling chaos of a storm summoned by Six, I face a soldier alone. It's stronger than me, armed with a glowing sword and a cannon that drains the life from the very trees around us. As I'm about to be killed, Sam appears and shoots the soldier, saving my life.

But another beast emerges from the woods, even larger than the first. As it closes in, Bernie Kosar, my loyal beagle, charges to my defense. Before my eyes, he transforms, growing into a massive, scaled creature - a Chimæra, a shapeshifter from Lorien. He fights the beast to protect me but is mortally wounded. In a final act of desperation, I jam a fallen Mogadorian dagger into the beast's eye, killing it. Henri finds me in the aftermath, bleeding and broken. He presses a Loric salt pebble under my tongue, giving me a final burst of energy. He is dying.

“You are Lorien's Legacy, John,” he whispers, his life fading as I hold him in my arms. “Everything you need to know, it's all in the Chest. The letter.” His hand falls, and he is gone. I am lost in grief until Sarah appears, killing a scout that was about to finish me. She, Sam, and Mark carry me, Six, and Bernie Kosar from the ruins of the battle.

At a hotel miles away, we piece ourselves back together. Six is wounded but alive. Bernie Kosar, though gravely injured, will survive. I read the note Henri left me: “Just in case,” it says, attached to seventeen new identities. In the woods, we build a pyre for Henri, and I collect his ashes, vowing to one day return them to Lorien. The hardest part is saying good-bye to Sarah. “I'll come back to you,” I promise, my heart breaking. “I promise you, if it's the last thing I do.” With Sam now one of us, the four of us - me, Six, Sam, and Bernie Kosar - climb into the truck and drive south, away from the only home I've ever loved. We are fugitives again, but we are not just running anymore. We are hunting. We will find the others. We will fight back. We are all that is left.