Thirteen

The first installment in a thirteen-book young adult series, the story opens inside a nightmare. Fifteen-year-old Sam stands on a city street facing a shimmering figure in black body armor and a wire-mesh mask. Sam's companion, a redheaded woman named Lora, cannot see the creature, which mockingly addresses Sam as "the great Sam, finder of the last 13" (2), a prophesied group of Dreamers whose visions can shape reality. The figure demands a dark crystal sphere Sam discovers in his pocket. Sam tosses the crystal into the air rather than surrender it. The figure catches the sphere, raises a hand, and sends fire radiating outward, destroying everything in sight.

Sam wakes drenched in sweat in his Vancouver bedroom. His psychiatrist, Dr. Dark, has prescribed a dream journal, but fragments slip away almost as fast as he can write. He records what he remembers, including the red-haired woman and the phrase "the last 13." At breakfast, his parents, Mike and Jane, press him for details. When Sam mentions Bill, a best friend killed in a fire the previous year, his parents link the nightmares to unresolved grief.

At school, Sam's science teacher, Mr. Cole, who also taught at his previous school in Toronto, quizzes him, but Sam cannot concentrate. The classroom walls shake as three military helicopters descend onto the sports field. Armed soldiers pour out alongside a man in a gray suit. Mr. Cole urgently tells Sam to leave, adding, "We'll find you" (21). Soldiers breach the wall with explosives, Taser Mr. Cole, and carry Sam to the helicopters.

Aboard the helicopter, Sam meets two other abducted teenagers: Alex, a broad-shouldered teen with a cavalier personality, and Eva, a girl their age who foresaw these events in a dream the previous night. Eva confirms she dreamed the entire sequence, then checks her watch and warns them to brace. A missile shears off the tail, and the helicopter spirals into a backyard swimming pool. All three survive.

Before the soldiers regroup, a woman with flame-red hair arrives with armed companions. She introduces herself as Lora. Sam recognizes her from his nightmare but says nothing. Lora's team tranquilizes the soldiers and hustles the teens into an SUV, revealing they are hunted by the Enterprise, an organization that exploits gifted dreamers. The group boards a hidden driverless train, where Lora questions Sam and Eva about their dreams. Sam recounts his nightmare but omits Lora's presence.

At a second station, the group meets Sebastian, a blond operative from the Academy, a secret mountaintop school for gifted Dreamers. When the teens refuse to board a waiting jet, Sebastian tranquilizes all three. Sam wakes as they land in Switzerland, where the Academy sits atop a snow-covered mountain.

The Professor, the Academy's headmaster, welcomes them to a campus resembling an ancient monastery. Uniformed students wear dream catcher emblems, and armed Guardians patrol the grounds. In a portrait gallery celebrating historically significant Dreamers, people whose dreams can reveal or influence reality, Sam sees his own face briefly appear on a blank canvas before it flashes to the masked figure from his nightmare.

In the Professor's office, the teens learn that their parents are Enterprise Agents assigned to raise potential Dreamers and report on their development. Lora plays intercepted phone recordings in which Sam's "mother" states that Sam has "activated," meaning his dreaming abilities have manifested, and that he may be one of the last 13. The revelation leaves all three feeling profoundly betrayed.

The Professor explains that the Academy teaches true dreaming: the ability to see past, present, or future events in dreams and to use that foresight to affect reality. He presents an ancient Egyptian prophecy from half of a broken tablet dating to the era of Ramses II, a pharaoh of ancient Egypt: "Dreaming of their destiny, / Minds entwined, thirteen will be. / Falter not, the last cannot fall, / Or Solaris shall rule over all" (89). The race to locate these Dreamers has begun with Sam's dream, and they represent the world's last hope against Solaris, an evil force seeking ultimate power. The Professor departs for a meeting with the Dreamer Council, a governing body of senior Dreamers.

That night, Sam encounters his former science teacher, Tobias Cole, who reveals he is an Academy operative assigned to watch over Sam for years. The next day, Sam enters the Dream Machine, an interface that records and replays dreams. Having disclosed that Lora appeared in his original nightmare, Sam re-enters the dream with her as his guide. He meets a mysterious contact named Shiva in a New York cafe, where Shiva leaves a dark crystal sphere and departs. When Solaris appears, freezes time, and demands the crystal, Sam tries to alter the dream, but Solaris catches the crystal, raises his hand, and incinerates everything.

Under pressure from Eva and Alex, Sam reveals the source of his fire trauma: He and Bill once stole a firework, lit it in Bill's bedroom, and lost control. The fire killed Bill, and Sam escaped with burns. Lora explains that this trauma likely distorts the dream's ending; the inferno may not be a genuine prophecy but Sam's mind projecting its worst fear. The Professor reveals that the crystal is the Star of Egypt, an ancient sapphire about to go on public display at a museum gala in New York. Tobias adds that the Enterprise created Sam, Eva, and Alex through DNA experimentation, splicing genetic material from powerful Dreamers to produce children with heightened abilities.

The team dons Stealth Suits, bulletproof holographic garments that change appearance at the wearer's command, and flies to Manhattan. The Academy has arranged a rendezvous with Shiva, an Enterprise insider turned double agent, but heavy Enterprise activity at the museum forces the meeting to the cafe from Sam's dream. There, Shiva produces a crystal Sam recognizes as a fake. Enterprise Agents attack, and Shiva vanishes. In the firefight, an Agent fires a rocket at Sebastian's hovering stealth jet. The aircraft crashes, killing Sebastian. Lora insists they press on to the museum.

Using their Stealth Suits to disguise themselves as gala guests, Sam and Lora enter the Museum of Natural History. Dr. Dark unveils the exhibition's centerpiece: the long-lost top half of the Dream Stele of Ramses II, the tablet bearing the prophecy. Lora explains that reuniting both halves could reveal everything needed to defeat Solaris. Then all electronics fail. Academy Guardians, who should be allies, detonate explosives that destroy the Stele and blast a hole through the floor. Enterprise Agents disguised as firefighters storm the building. Sam spots the genuine Star of Egypt on a lower level.

Sam and Lora descend, but Lora is struck by a dart and collapses. Sam dives through the hole, grabs the crystal, and lands in a deserted subway station. A figure has fallen with him. As it rises, Sam recognizes the shimmering black bodysuit and mask: Solaris. Sam sets the crystal aside and assumes a fighting stance. They battle as a train roars through the station. Solaris catches Sam in a chokehold and declares, "this is where you die, Sam" (207). The story ends on this cliffhanger, with Sam's fate and the race for the last 13 left unresolved.