Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports

91

Fang paused a moment, his fingers over the keyboard in the Internet caf #233;. Next to him, Iggy and the Gasman were sucking down lattes like there was no tomorrow.

Which maybe there wasn't.

"I feel like I could fly, like, to the space station!" the Gasman said enthusiastically.

Fang looked over at him. "No more caffeine for you, buddy." He glanced around to make sure no one had heard the Gasman. But they were off in a corner of this run-down coffee shop, and there weren't that many other people in here anyway.

Iggy drained his cup and wiped the foam mustache off his lip. "I liked it farther south," he complained. "The sunshine, the beach bunnies. Up north here, this place has too much of the damp-mist thing going on."

"It's really pretty, though," the Gasman said. "The mountains and the ocean. And the people look more real." He glanced over at Fang. "Are kids still reading your blog?"

Fang nodded. "Tons."

He scrolled down quickly, scanning the entries, and then he felt someone's eyes on him. Instantly he looked up and tracked his gaze left to right, taking in the whole caf #233;. It was times like this he missed Max the most-because she would have felt it too, and they would have exchanged glances and known what to do in a moment, without speaking.

Now it was just him on this coast, and her and that cretin wherever they were.

Fang saw nothing, so he moved his eyes more slowly this time, right to left. There. That guy. He was headed this way.

Fang shut the laptop and tapped Iggy's hand. The Gasman saw it and looked up, on alert. Eight years old and his fists were clenched, muscles tight, ready to fight.

When the guy was about fifteen feet away, still beelining for them, Fang frowned.

"We know this guy," he murmured. "Who is he?"

Casually the Gasman turned and looked over his shoulder. "Uh..."

"His footsteps," Iggy muttered. Fang couldn't hear his footsteps. Iggy went on, face pinched with concentration. "Those footsteps...We heard them...in a subway tunnel."

Fang's eyes widened, and he sharpened his focus.

Of course.

Now the guy was six feet away, and he stopped. Fang had never seen him in daylight before, only in flickering reflections from oil-can fires in the train tunnels below New York City. He was the homeless computer nerd who carried a Mac everywhere he went, the guy who'd claimed that Max's chip was screwing up his hard drive. When they'd asked him about her chip, he'd gone wiggy and run off. What was this guy doing here?

"You." The guy frowned and pointed at them but pitched his voice so only they could hear him. "What are you doing here?"

"Take a seat," Fang invited him, pushing one out with his foot.

The guy looked around suspiciously. "Where's your girlfriend? The one with the chip inside her."

"Not with us."

He seemed to relax, fractionally, and edged warily into the seat, looking around. Fang smiled to himself. Finally, someone more paranoid than they were. It was refreshing.

"What are you doing here?" Fang asked, gesturing to the coffee shop. "Above ground. On the West Coast."

The guy shrugged. "I get around. I see people here, there, all over. I just like to hang in New York mostly-it's easier to blend."

"Yeah," Fang agreed.

Then the guy's eyes fell on Fang's closed laptop, and Fang saw him shift his alert level from yellow up to orange.

"Nice 'book," he said.

"Thanks." Fang waited.

"Don't usually see one like that around."

"Guess not."

The guy seemed to make a decision, and he leaned forward across the table. "Where'd you get it? Or do I not want to know?"

Fang almost grinned. "You probably don't want to know."

The guy shook his head. "You people get into some serious stuff."

"Yeah," Fang acknowledged with a sigh. He looked up. "Would you know how to get a message through to every kid on the 'net, everywhere in the world?"