“Saving. The. Country.” Ms. Falmouth flipped off the video segment as Elliot launched into promoting Nobridis. “The next time you think you have too much homework, I want you to consider the burden on this young man’s shoulders. Elliot Ramirez is out there forging a future for our nation, securing the solar system’s resources for us, and you don’t hear him complaining, do you?”
The bell filled the sim. Ms. Falmouth didn’t even get a chance to dismiss them. Students began fizzling away.
Tom was normally among the first to sign off. He wasn’t this time because just as he raised his hand to yank off the VR visor, Heather spoke up. “Are you signing off already?”
She sounded disappointed about it. Tom dropped his hand again. “Not yet.”
She scooted her desk over so they were sitting right next to each other. Despite himself, Tom felt his hands grow sweaty in his wired gloves.
“Can you believe Elliot Ramirez?” Heather said, tossing her dark hair out of her eyes. “His ego almost explodes out of the screen, doesn’t it? I felt like ducking and covering.”
“I can’t believe you’re a real girl and you’re not in love with Elliot Ramirez,” Tom said appreciatively. Then it occurred to him: she might not even be a real girl. For all he knew, she was a guy with a voice modifier who’d hacked the school feed.
“Let’s just say, I feel like I know enough about Elliot not to buy the hype.” There was something coy in her voice that made him wonder if he was missing a joke.
“And you really are a girl?” Tom couldn’t resist asking.
“I am so a girl!”
“Yeah, well, I won’t believe it till I see it.”
“Is this your way of asking me to video chat?” Heather bantered.
Tom hadn’t thought to ask her to do that. He recovered from his surprise quickly. “Yes?”
Heather twirled a lock of her dark hair around her finger. “So, this is an online school,” she said coyly. “Is video chatting Rosewood’s version of a date?”
Tom opened and closed his mouth. She didn’t sound like she hated the idea. He broke into a grin. “Only if you’re gonna say yes.”
Heather smiled. “What network address will you be at tomorrow, Tom?”
HE WAS ONLY half in the moment as he gave her his network address, as he promised her he’d be right at the same network address tomorrow when they met. He didn’t care if they were meeting at an obscenely early hour of the morning. Heather said it was because of the time zone she was in. Tom decided he’d stay up all night if he had to. His brain was whirling. He had a date . . . kind of. With a real, live girl . . . he hoped.
After she logged off, his avatar remained by his desk, his real body sitting stock-still on the couch in the VR parlor, the enormity of asking a girl out for the first time and having the girl say yes beating through his brain. He’d thought this would be just another ordinary day. . . .
A throat cleared.
Tom noticed suddenly that he and Ms. Falmouth were the only ones left in the virtual classroom.
“I was just logging off,” Tom said quickly, and reached up in the real world to snatch off his visor.
“Not quite yet, Tom,” Ms. Falmouth said. “Stay a moment. I think we need to talk.”
Oh.
A heaviness settled in Tom’s chest, because he’d half expected this, and it wasn’t good.
“Let’s go to my office.” Ms. Falmouth twitched her fingers to alter the program, and the landscape shifted around them into a private office. She settled at one side of the imposing desk. Tom navigated himself into the seat opposite, and waited for some hint of what she needed to hear before she’d let him off the hook this time.
“Tom,” she said, folding her hands on her desk, “I am concerned about this attendance situation.”
Tom let out a breath. “I figured.”
“You were referred to this institution because your father somehow let you reach age eleven without enrolling you in school. We’ve worked to catch you up, but I don’t feel you’re making the same progress as the rest of the class. In fact, considering that you’re very rarely in class, I am finding this situation outright unmanageable.”
“Maybe I need an alternative school,” Tom suggested.
“This already is an alternative school. This is the end of the line.”
“I try.”
“No, you don’t. And what’s more, your father doesn’t try, either. Do you realize you missed two quizzes and a history paper last week?”
“It couldn’t be helped.”
“Russo-Chinese hackers, right?” she said. “Or perhaps you were taken hostage by terrorists again, or washed out to sea and stranded on a desert island without internet access?”
“Not quite.” But he’d really get a kick out of using that one sometime in the future.
“Tom, you are not taking this seriously—and that’s your problem. This is not some silly game: this is your future and you are throwing it away with both hands. You promised me a month ago that you would never miss class again.” Ms. Falmouth’s avatar gazed at him with an unnatural, unblinking intensity. “We signed a learning contract, don’t you remember?”
Tom didn’t point out that she’d demanded that he promise not to miss class again. What had she expected him to tell her, the truth? Should he have outright admitted he probably wasn’t going to show up at school? She would’ve just yelled at him for “being insolent” or something.
“This is not about me,” Ms. Falmouth went on. “It’s not about your father, even: it is about you, Tom. You realize that whatever actions I take from here, they’re for your own good. I cannot sit back and allow a fourteen-year-old boy’s entire life to be sabotaged by an irresponsible parent who will not even ensure he gets a proper education.”
Tom sat up in both the sim and the VR parlor. “What does that even mean—‘whatever actions you take from here’?”
“It means you’re under court order to attend school, and you have not been attending. Last week, I reported your absences to Child Protective Services.”
Tom slouched back, feeling like he’d just been socked in the stomach. This was not going to end well. Maybe he wasn’t reaching great heights of achievement with Neil, but life in foster care wouldn’t be a land of hope and opportunity either.
And no way could he stay at his mom’s.
No way, no way.
Dalton, her boyfriend, paid for her fancy apartment in New York City. Tom had visited her once, just once, and he’d met him. Dalton Prestwick was this rich, yacht-owning executive at some big multinational company, Dominion Agra. His job was to talk to politicians or something.
Dalton had looked him over like he was something nasty smeared on the bottom of his leather shoes and said, “My attorneys have documented everything of value in this house, punk. The second something goes missing, I’ll have you in juvenile hall.”
Oh, and Dalton already had a wife. And another girlfriend. Yeah, and Tom’s mom.
“I don’t have anywhere else to go, Ms. Falmouth. I know that you think you’re doing me a favor, but you’re not. I promise you.”
“You’re fourteen, Tom. What do you expect to do with yourself in a few years when you need to make a living? Do you plan to be a roving gambler like your father?”
“No,” Tom answered at once.
“A roving gamer?”
He wasn’t quite sure how much Ms. Falmouth knew about his gaming, but he didn’t say anything. If she’d asked him what he planned to be, he might’ve said he’d make his living one day the same way he was doing it now.
Hearing it said by her made him think of living like this forever, of going nowhere in life . . . of turning into his father . . .
Suddenly Tom felt kind of fuzzy and clenched up inside like he was getting sick.
Ms. Falmouth leaned back in her seat. “You’re competing in a global economy. One out of three Americans is unemployed. You need an education to be an engineer, a programmer,
or anything of use to the defense industry. You need an education to be an accountant or a lawyer, and you need connections to go into government or corporate work. Who do you think will hire a young man like you when there are so many high-achieving candidates out there who are desperate for work?”
“It’s years away.”
“Pretend it’s tomorrow. What are you going to do with yourself? What are you good for?”
“I’m good at . . .” He stopped.
“At what?”
He couldn’t come up with anything else, so he just said it. “Games.”
The word sat on the air between them, and to Tom it suddenly sounded utterly sad.
“So is your father, Tom. And where is he now?”
BOONIE
by Richard Masson
One
The Silver Men
JD sat on a tuft of sawgrass and watched the smoke rise over the remains of the old shack. From time to time some piece of grey, bleached wood cracked in the heat as a new, orange fireworm crept over it. JD watched all day ’til there was nothin’ left ’cept a pile of hot ash and that small twist of smoke. Then he watched the purple sun sink through the chemical haze and the dark shadows stretch out from the red hills. He watched until the whole Dry Marsh was dark.
When night wrapped around him JD tucked his hands under his armpits, stared at the heap of ash that had once been home and set to figurin’ what to do next.
He sighed a deep sigh. He couldn’t have known what was going to happen. Why, just that morning, same as every morning when the temperature got too high to stay in bed, he’d dressed in his dungarees and shirt, pulled on his cracked leather boots, tied his leggings up to his knees, put his old cap in his pocket and shuffled into the big room to see if Pa had left anything to eat. Pa was pretty good at getting stuff to eat and JD found two or three twisted roots and some crickets laid out on the box by the stove. He picked up one of the crickets, took its head between his finger and thumb, snapped it off and put the body and legs into his mouth, crunching them into small pieces. JD liked crickets; they tasted good.
When Ma had been around, JD remembered, she’d boil all the grub together in a big pan which made everything taste the same but, while he preferred his crickets raw, it was tough chewing uncooked roots. But now Ma was gone and Pa had no time for cooking. He was out from dawn ’til dusk hunting over the Dry Marsh, scraping and digging for things to eat. He never got back to the shack ’til after dark except once, way back when he’d come in before noon with the biggest insect JD had ever seen. He said he’d found it buried in the wet green. Ma said it was called a crab. JD thought it looked like something from another time. Ma put the crab straight into the pan and boiled it up right then and there without waiting for supper time and when it was done they’d all three sat on the floor and pulled bits off it, cracking the shell with rocks and sucking out the meat. When Pa said it was like Yule in the old times, Ma had winked at him and reached down a glass jar from the top of the dresser. She and Pa swigged from that jar ’til it was all gone and they were laid out flat on the floor. Little JD took the empty jar out of his Ma’s hand to see if he could get some of the golden fluid for himself but it was quite dry. All he could do was sniff at the heady fumes. It was just like the smell you got if you found one of the old petrol cars abandoned someplace.
But Ma was gone and now Pa was gone too. When the Silver Men came last they’d found him half-buried out back. Pa always buried up when the vibrations came. He’d scrape out a spot near some sawgrass, lie in it and cover himself with dirt. He had a hollow stem to breathe through, but JD could always tell where he was by the hump in the ground and the different colour dirt where he’d dug it. The Silver Men knew that too. A while back, when two or three of them had done what they came for in the shack, they took Ma out to where Pa was hiding and did it a couple of times more right next to where he was buried, just so’s he could hear. Then they put their silver suits back on, replaced their helmets and took off. When they’d gone JD made himself scarce while Ma and Pa fought in the dust.
After dark JD crept back into the shack, crawled into bed and lay with his face in the sacks hoping everything would be OK by morning. But next morning Ma was gone. Pa said she’d gone to the City.
The next time the vibrations came Pa was away digging so JD ran inside, opened up the dresser in the big room and climbed in. He lifted up the loose floorboards and squeezed through the hole underneath, just like Pa had showed him, and lay quiet under the shack.
He heard the Silver Men come in. He heard their heavy boots clumping on the boards above his head. He heard them call and when they saw that Ma wasn’t there he heard them cuss and throw things around. They kicked over the stove and it shook the floorboards right over where he lay, making him cower down.
Then they went out back to find Pa. It took them a while but with their jet-packs and all they could cover ground fast. They brought him back to the shack and hit him with things that whistled and cut the air. They hit him a lot but Pa never made a sound. He didn’t cry out or nothin’ though what they were doing must have hurt like hell. JD guessed that the Silver Men were drinking too because he could smell that smell again just like the time of the crab. He reckoned they must have had a real big jarful too because the fumes that came down through the cracks in the floorboards were so thick and heavy they made him dizzy.
At last the shouting died down and JD heard the Silver Men leave the shack. He hoped they’d start their machines quick so’s he could get out and go to Pa; see if he was OK. But JD was having trouble breathing. Sweet, sickly fumes poured like treacle into the narrow space where he lay, filling his lungs and making his eyes sting. But JD kept still, listening, hoping and praying the Silver Men would go quick.
After a while it got real quiet but just when JD thought they might have gone he heard a click. Then one of the Silver Men shouted, there was a big flash and a brilliant orange and blue fireball, swirling and roaring like a dragon, ripped through the cracks in the boards.
JD fell flat to the ground and straight away his back began to burn and his head grew real hot. The hairs on his arms shrivelled into tiny black spirals and his skin began to scorch. He whimpered and tried to crawl away but hot smoke coiled and swirled through that shallow space under the shack, seeking him out, burning his eyes and filling his nose and throat.
He headed for the back of the shack where he knew there was a gap in the boards by the step. Gasping and choking on the hot, grey fog he wriggled and elbowed his way across the dirt. His hair was on fire, his arms were burned and bleeding but he struggled on, digging his fingers into the rough ground, grabbing at it, scratching at it, pulling himself towards that little opening. The flames roared and burned above him, stealing the air, making him keep his mouth close to the dirt, desperate for breath. The heat was so intense it boiled the strength from his limbs, sucking it out until at last he fell flat, spread out, gasping, his chest heaving fit to bust. It was no good, he could go no further. He could only lie still now and wait for the hungry flames to burn him right up where he lay. Lifting one arm, JD tried to push away the blanket of hot smoke that was wrapping itself around him. But his knuckles struck something hard and, raising up his streaming eyes, he saw a patch of light above his head. For a moment the smoke thinned and JD saw he was right under that gap by the back step. With one last frenzied effort he pushed his hands into the hole and, gripping the edge, hauled himself up, forcing his head and shoulders into the air outside. Bit by bit he squeezed through until he fell in a heap by the back step.
JD struggled to his feet and, bent low, he half-scrambled, half-ran to the nearest hollow where he dropped, panting and choking, behind a hump of sawgrass. He pushed his burning face into the dirt and beat at his hair to put out the flames, while all the while the blazing shack roared and crackled and the air vibrated and buzzed from the Silver Men’s machines.
JD pressed his thin body against the ground and covered his ears. At any moment
those Silver Men would take off and fly right overhead. Then they would surely see him, they must see him. He pushed himself as flat as he could and stuck his head into the sawgrass which cut and stung the raw flesh on his face. The jet-packs revved up and one by one the Silver Men took off. In a matter of moments they would see him stretched out in his shallow hideaway and would swoop down and carry him off for sure.
JD started to sob.
TRANSPARENT
by Natalie Whipple
Prologue
I nearly died the second I was born. The doctor dropped me, but it wasn’t his fault. When I smacked the floor and let out a screeching cry, all anyone could see was the semi-transparent umbilical cord. The poor guy scooped me up, gasping in shock at my invisible body.
I spent a year in the hospital—not because of injuries. They had to study me, cure me. Mom wanted a normal baby, one with a non-dangerous ability like glow-in-the-dark hair or breath that smells like chocolate. Then I wouldn’t have been so important to my father. Instead, she got the first ever invisible child.
Not only was I famous, but I was infinitely, dangerously useful.
When they gave up on a cure, Mom took me home. The paparazzi tried to get pictures, which was stupid because they couldn’t actually see me. They wanted a glimpse of the girl with no face, but my dad’s people made sure that didn’t happen. He made sure the world saw as little of me as possible, and more importantly, that they never realized what I could really do.
Hiding an invisible girl. Go figure.
Chapter 1
It’s a good thing summers in Vegas are so hot, considering how often I walk the streets naked. Even at night the dry heat lingers, especially on the strip where lights and people and cars move nonstop. Mom walks beside me, her gold dress one sequin short of overkill. With her auburn hair doing that blowy model thing, people can’t help but look at her. No one looks at me.
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