“Something changed with your parents, like they had a new dream.” This was something an old man, who did a lot of business with Cade’s parents, told him. A big part of that dream was climbing Izmad Peak, the highest mountain in DarkCorner Land. No one knows whether they reached the summit, but the aliens ranked them as WhiteStar after that, and invited them to take on a high position in their city, Arapreshday. His parents gained a lot of respect and admiration from the people, and the aliens, after climbing the highest and most dangerous mountain. The mountain is too far north and iced over to mine. The mountain has no resources so there would be no other reason to climb it, or would there?
A spark was lit during the play at Lincon Bereen School when Cade led the students out. The spark might be enough to start the fire of the DadeStar Revolution. The next schoolyear brings a lot of anxiety for students in DarkCorner Land, worried about the intense days at school, being watched by aliens. They dread the piles of schoolwork and high expectations for behavior and grades. BlackStar Students worry about whether they can meet their standards or be sent to the Dathmore, the cold underground prison. Austin, Ryan, and Cameron are on a mission to go to the other schools and set more students free. Cade Mayson is on his own mission, but there’s something holding him back, something he can’t yet overcome. Can you figure out what it is? The clues will be there. Through the summer the rumors spread to every school. They begin to whisper about escaping and becoming free. But others begin to whisper about taking back their schools, and kicking the aliens out…
So why did Cade’s parents go to Izmad Peak? That’s what Cade will be trying to find out. His mission is to go there and climb to the top. In the summer following the play at the Coldor Auditorium in Dayascade, Cade began preparing for the big climb by developing his mountain climbing skills. He believes his parents may have left a secret message there for him. But it’s that line, what the old man said about his parents having a new dream, that plays in his mind over and over and over again…
Cade Mayson has an unusual method in deciding which mountains he wants to climb. Does he pick the tallest ones? Does he pick the most challenging looking ones? Does he pick the ones that are most safe from the aliens? You would think he would do that last one for sure, but you would be wrong. No, Cade picks his mountains by which one has the best name, not the name it’s actually called, the name he comes up with. But that’s not the strangest part, it’s the names he comes up with. Cade has come up with such amazing names as Twisted Sister Happy Shoe, Upside Down Clown Face, Sad Tangerine Giraffe, Clapping Fat Cat, and Dancing Left-Eyed Cow. Let me explain that last one…well…I can’t. How he comes up with those names is really the greatest mystery.
No one prepares for a mountain climb the way Cade does. Discovering what’s in Cade’s backpack is more of an adventure than the mountain climb itself. What will you find in his pack? Some things are what you would expect, like bottles of water, sometimes a ridiculous amount of them. Yet somehow, some way, he always runs out. Cade has solved some complicated puzzles and mysteries, but figuring out how to save enough water for the whole climb is just too hard to solve. Cade knows he might run into trouble on a mountain climb. He knows he might get stranded, so does he bring extra food or water? No. Does he bring a blanket? No way. Does he bring some kind of first aid kit? Not so much. But he does bring a few model horse-drawn carriages, because of course his biggest concern is what if he’s stuck out there with nothing to play with?
One of Cade’s favorite things about a mountain climb is finding his way to the top, and I mean his way. Late in the summer, he decided to try climbing a mountain called, well, to be clear, a mountain he called, The Tombstone Snake. Don’t ask. The clear path to the top is a slow rising ridge lined with tall, spiked rocks that shoot up into the sky. But Cade doesn’t take the clear path. Instead, he blazed a slanted path from the start toward the top, then climbed up a complicated cluster of large black stones on the back side. The stones were really slick, so how did he make his way up? Did he wear special shoes? Did he find footholds and work his way up? No and no. Instead, he would slide between two rocks, get wedged in so he had a strong position, solid footing, then with a burst of bright energy he would lift his way up between them. He did this fifteen times until finally reaching the top. It usually takes about an hour to reach the top. It took Cade three hours.
One question that haunts Cade is, why didn’t his parents warn him they were leaving him behind to join the aliens? They could have at least told him, without revealing the real reason why they were joining them. But they didn’t tell him anything. They didn’t prepare him for that day he would come home to an empty house. Cade wonders if maybe everything that’s happened so far has led to this moment, to going for the highest mountain. He believes his parents have been leaving him clues, beginning with leading him to go to Daylustar to bring down the alien weapon. After all, it was in Daylustar where Austin heard Cade’s playing which led to him seeking out Cade to help him get the fountain back and lead the students out. That in turn led to finally finding someone who worked closely with his parents, someone who may have seen hints of what their new mission might be. But Cade isn’t really going to Izmad Peak to see some kind of message left by his parents. He’s going there to see what they saw, to discover the secret of the aliens…
