Codes and Histories
- Kate, of course, loves the idea of being a secret agent. The others are a little more cautious.
- Sticky wants to know what, exactly, Mr. Benedict wants them to do (good question), and Mr. B says he needs them to acquire secret knowledge, to learn "how the Sender's messages accomplish such profound effects, what the particulars of his plans are—anything [they] can uncover [that] may help us find a way to defeat him" (7.6).
- The Institute is located on Nomansan Island in Stonetown Harbor, so once the kids are there they'll have to communicate via Morse code. Which Sticky, of course, knows. The others will have to learn it. Immediately.
- While outside practicing their Morse code, the kids learn Sticky's backstory.
- He ran away from home because he believed that his parents didn't want him around. One night when he was hiding near the house to see how they were handling his disappearance, he heard his father say something about being "better off now," so he left for good and never looked back. That was a few weeks before he saw Mr. Benedict's ad in the paper, and it was the ad that brought him to Stonetown.
- After hearing Sticky's story, Constance demands that Milligan tell them why he always looks so sad, and we get his backstory, too.
- Apparently several years back Milligan awoke to find himself blindfolded and tied to a chair. He had no memory of how he came to be there, but when a sinister voice asked him how his memory was, something inspired him to lie. He said his memory was perfect, which caused the person to strike him. That turned out to be good, because it loosened Milligan's blindfold, which eventually allowed him to escape.
- He swam back to shore and realized that the place where he had been kept was Nomansan Island. And the men in the maze? Yep—they were two of his captors. Which is why Milligan recognized their cologne when he smelled it. Spooky, huh?
- Milligan hasn't been able to recover any of his memory, but it was in the course of trying to figure out who he really is that he met Mr. Benedict, and he's been with him ever since. If anyone can help him get his memory back, it's Mr. B.