Ali Cross

After school, Ali continues to hand out flyers on the street. He then takes the bus to his church, where he sits in a back pew and prays. He thanks God for keeping Gabe safe, and asks if Mr. Qualls can cease causing trouble for Gabe. Ali looks up and finds Nana staring at him. She’s there praying for Alex. She sits with him, and they pray for Mr. Yang.

They stop at Lola’s for takeout burgers, and then they Uber home, which is rare for Nana, who’s careful with money. On the way, Ali asks how the trial is going; Nana says all the prosecutor cares about is “winning,” but that the truth will out. Ali wonders why the police are taking so long to look into Mr. Qualls or offer an update. Nana says, “People in your dad’s line of work have to keep a lot of secrets […]. It doesn’t mean they’re sitting on their behinds” (242-43).

The police find Mr. Qualls’s fingerprints on Ali’s ID card. Alex sits in the back while Detectives Sutter and Olayinka drive to the Qualls’ house. Alex waits outside, but soon an ashtray crashes through a front window. Alex hurries to the door; it opens, and he sees Sutter on her knees, holding her bleeding head. Olayinka is helping Mrs. Qualls to her feet. Dante Qualls rushes out the door, bowls Alex over, and runs away. Olayinka yells, “Stop him!” Alex gives chase.

Qualls darts through honking traffic, but Alex keeps pace. Qualls turns down an alley; he tips a trash can, which trips Alex, but he rolls and comes up running. He finally corners Qualls in a backyard, where they fight. Alex lands a hard punch to Qualls’s temple; Qualls drops and lies still. Alex cuffs Qualls and starts to read him his rights, but Qualls is out cold.

Ali’s father arrives home with Olayinka and Sutter. Sutter has a bandaged head, and Alex’s clothes are torn. Alex holds an ice pack to his damaged hand. Ali is stunned.

Dante Qualls had been running a burglary operation, using his sons Ramon and Gabe to do the work. The sons lived in a place only known to them so that Qualls couldn’t turn them in. They communicated via the Outpost online game. Qualls’s mistake was leaving his prints on Ali’s stolen ID card.

Neither Gabe nor Ramon will be charged, but the police must inform them so they can come out of hiding. The detectives ask if Ali will contact Gabe via Outpost. He agrees to do it as long as Ruby, Mateo, and Cedric can be there, too. They OK it, and Ali quickly texts his three teammates.

It turns out that Olayinka plays Outpost, so he’s familiar with it. Online, they head for Gabe’s bunker and find Ruby, Mateo, and Cedric already there: They’d been playing together when they got Ali’s text. Ali leads them downstairs to Gabe’s lair, where each kid writes a letter telling Gabe he’s safe and can come out of hiding.

At school, Ali is back with his friends at lunch. Ruby has signed up 20 kids who are ready to search the streets. The friends pore over Ali’s DC map, but Ruby thinks Gabe is hiding near Ali’s neighborhood instead of his own, which explains why Gabe was so touchy about Ali searching for him: “Maybe he was afraid that if you looked hard enough, you’d actually be able to find him” (267).

Mateo hands out search assignments to Ruby’s volunteers, and everyone knocks on doors in Ali’s neighborhood until dark. They get no leads, and Gabe hasn’t answered their Outpost messages.

Late in the evening, the team texts back and forth, brainstorming. Ali hears his dad’s ringtone up in the attic office, so he signs off, sneaks over to the attic stairs, and listens.

Day two of Alex’s trial was for the defense. Alex’s team and witnesses explained that Mr. Yang’s front steps weren’t up to code and that his injuries could have been acquired entirely during his fall. According to Alex, “None of it was a slam dunk, but it helped, anyway” (271-72). Up next is the verdict.

Alex gets a late-night call from Detective Olayinka, who says the Qualls sons have committed three more burglaries. Ramon, 20, has a long rap sheet as a juvenile. The latest theft happened quite near Alex’s house. He heads to the crime scene.

As his father leaves through the front door, Ali sneaks out the back door. He hopes Gabe is still in the neighborhood and that, by starting at the crime scene, he might be able to locate his friend.

He takes the long way to the burgled house so his dad can get there first. From the shadows, Ali observes the location, with its teams of police and forensic experts going in and out. From there, he walks a spiral pattern in the streets around the house, widening his search at each lap. This nighttime search is the most dangerous thing he’s done, but he doesn’t care: “Nothing was going to stop me from trying to put eyes on Gabe” (277).

Ali doesn’t expect to find Gabe—his search is a long shot—but he sees someone holding a heavy white garbage bag. It’s Gabe. Ali wants to cry out to him, but he remembers his dad’s techniques and instead watches. Gabe walks up to the front door of a house, rings the bell, sets down the bag, and runs away.

Ali follows. Gabe walks to the freeway underpass. He’s headed beyond it, just as Ali suspected days earlier.

Gabe goes under the freeway with Ali not far behind. On the other side, Gabe sneaks through a chain-link fence and walks to a building made of storage units. He unlocks an outside unit, pulls up the rolling door partway, and enters. A light goes on. Ali hurries over, ducks under the door, and steps in.

The unit is filled with all kinds of stolen merchandise, plus two sleeping bags next to two PlayStations, some space heaters, and a mini-fridge. It all looks like the upstairs room in Gabe’s Outpost bunker.

Ali calls to Gabe, who whirls, stunned. Ali tells Gabe he can come home. Gabe says he can’t, and Ali must leave immediately. Gabe looks beyond Ali. Ali turns and sees an older guy. It’s Ramon Qualls. Ramon glares at Ali “like [he] was just some trash that needed to be taken out” (285).

Gabe says Ali is there merely to tell him he can come home. Ramon doesn’t buy it. He grabs Ali, whirls him around, and shoves him down to the concrete. He tells Gabe to leave. Gabe protests, but Ramon puts a knife to Ali’s neck and threatens to hurt him. Gabe steps outside.

Ramon stands; Ali turns over. Ramon says Ali will help them move all the storage items to a truck, and then they’ll drop him off somewhere outside the city. Ramon takes Ali’s phone, unplugs the lights, and locks him in.

It’s pitch-black inside the storage unit. Ali yells for a while, but then realizes it’s pointless. He feels panic, then calms down and tries remembering the room’s layout. He feels around, finds a TV, and follows its attached HDMI cable to the PlayStation console. He switches it on, and the TV lights up. The light helps him find the controller, which he uses to sign on to Outpost.

He leaves messages for his teammates and Detective Olayinka, telling them the location of where he’s trapped and the phone number to call his father. He knows it’s a long shot that any of them are still up playing Outpost. All he can do is wait.

After an hour of fear and yelling, Ali hears a bang, and his father calls out to him. Crying, “Dad! Dad! Dad!” Ali hurries to the door (297). It rattles up, and Ali and his dad embrace. Gabe is there, apologizing, but Ali hugs him, too.

Gabe explains that his dad told him they’d lose their house unless he helped with the burglaries. If Gabe refused, he’d get a beating on a regular basis.

Alex says Cedric alerted him to Ali’s location, and a police officer arrested Ramon trying to steal a truck. With Ramon and Mr. Qualls in jail, Gabe can return to live with his mom. Ali tells Gabe he won’t be alone: He has friends who care about him.

The Cross family goes to the courthouse to hear the verdict in Alex’s assault case. The jury finds him not guilty. Overjoyed, Cross family members hug each other. Judge Lautner says the case is “an unfortunate detour in an exemplary career” (304), thanks Dr. Cross for his long service, and sends him home a free man.

Outside the courthouse, a throng of reporters asks for Dr. Cross’s comments. He says he told the truth and that justice was done. As for fears of police brutality, he says it’s a real problem, and he’ll contribute by setting the best example he can. In addition, he’s starting a campaign to raise funds for the Yang family.

Ali feels supremely proud of his father. More than ever, he wants to follow in his dad’s footsteps. One part of that journey is already accomplished: “I don’t have to wait to become a detective. Because, see, I already am one” (310).