Swipe

looking at a bunch of idiots . . . but I don’t believe I’m working with traitors. So that makes me just about stumped, people. Now, the intelligence gathered so far is in our favor, so there’s reason to think whoever’s using our stuff is doing so with our interests in mind. There’s reason to think this little sleuth’s on our side. But I don’t like surprises. And I’m not one to eat a pie if I don’t know who’s cookin’. Do you catch my drift, agents?”
    There was a general nodding of assent.
    “I wanna know what this person is up to. Now, I think they’re up to tracking Peck. Just like us. And maybe they’re even a couple steps ahead. Maybe they want the little miser just as badly as we do. So more important than what , the thing I wanna know is— why .” He looked at every one of his DOME agents again, and now he was seeing some excitement among them, an eagerness to please. “ Why is this little go-getter on our side, risking life and limb for a cause that’s not, as far as the public is concerned, anyone’s but ours? After all, as far as I’ve been briefed, we’ve done a pretty good job o’ keepin’ Peck’s crimes a secret. Don’t want to alarm the Marked, after all . . . and don’t wanna give any of the more . . . impressionable types any bright ideas. So how could anyone out there even know to look for this little piker? I’d love some answers to these questions, folks. The whats , the hows , and the whys— those sure would be nice. I sure would love to have ’em.” The agents looked just about ready to bound out the door by this point. “But most of all,” Mr. Arbitor said, grinning, proud of his speech, proud of the results he knew it would yield, “what I want to know, boys and girls—is who .”
    3
    It wasn’t until the next day that Erin came back with the news. She’d visited the stadium the night before, like every night, exactly according to plan, but in the morning, her look across the hallway was different. She didn’t say hi to Logan, and she didn’t say a thing about how the night had gone. Then at lunch, in the open space of the lawn, she called him over, and when he arrived by her side, she gave him a great big hug, rocking back and forth and not letting him go. It was the most affectionate Logan had ever seen her act, anywhere. And everyone was watching.
    “What are you doing?” Logan asked.
    Erin nuzzled her face against Logan’s cheek, her mouth to his ear. Murmurs and laughter spread across the field, but Erin didn’t care. With Logan grounded and things as they were, she couldn’t figure out any other way to do it. So Erin smiled wide for the whole lawn to see, and then she whispered horribly through clenched teeth, “Act happy. Don’t look alarmed. There’s a spy in the school. They’re watching us.”
    Logan tried to pull away, confused and overwhelmed, but Erin wouldn’t let him.
    “We’ve been careless. Acting too suspiciously. Revealed too much. Time to make everyone think there’s been nothing between us but romance. No more talking business at Spokie Middle. Nothing more in writing. I don’t know who they are . . . but they see our every move . . . and they’re bringing you to Peck.”
    Logan desperately wanted to hear more of what Erin had found out the night before. But he couldn’t ask about any of that, because already Erin was reaching out to hold his hand. She forced her smile tight and said excitedly, in the best acting voice she could muster, “Now, isn’t that great !”

    In science & tech lab that afternoon, Ms. Dirkin was teaching about nanotechnology. Logan and his current lab partner, Tom, had been given vials of nanosyrup, nanosleep, nanosolvent, nano-gas, and nanoink, and it was their job to isolate and determine the effects of the technology in each. The nanosyrup was easy— it’d been engineered to taste sweet electronically, without the need for calories or chemicals. The nanosleep was a little more complex, seeming to attack first the cerebral cortex, then the hippocampus, and then the cerebellum: judgment, memory, and motor skills, in that order. But beyond identifying the glowing green sections of the brain scan, Logan was having trouble deciphering what exactly the stuff was doing to the rats they’d been given to try it on, and testing the nanosleep on themselves had been strictly forbidden.
    “This is stupid,” Tom said. “Do you hate lab as much as I do? Because I really hate