Allies (6 page)

H
ER CHANCE CAME
sooner than she expected.

Tom had somehow managed to make another enemy in Karl Marsters, a large Combatant who frightened most people with common sense into staying clear of him. As soon as Wyatt emerged from the elevator that Sunday, she found Tom in Karl’s death grip in the middle of the plebe common room, Karl’s friends encircling them. She felt a ripple of sheer happiness, because this was her chance, finally! This was her opportunity to pay him back for covering for her—and accomplish with a program what her attempts at saying thanks never could.

When her computer virus hit Karl and his friends, Tom jerked to his feet. She realized with some surprise that he was as tall as her now. He threw a frantic look around, obviously trying to put the pieces together about where his attackers had gone.

Then he saw Karl and his friends on the ground, and Wyatt explained, “They’re chickens.” She’d tried to mimic the computer virus Blackburn had used on Tom a few days earlier, the one that convinced the victim they were a dog. She’d modified it a bit, and just for fun, changed it to a chicken, but she hadn’t had the chance to test it out on anyone yet.

Tom looked at her with an amazed smile, like she’d just offered some present he’d always wanted but never expected to obtain.

“Wyatt, you seriously helped me out there. Thanks, I owe you big-time.”

She squirmed inwardly, uncertain how to handle genuine gratitude. Some part of her was soaring; another part of her knew she’d say the wrong thing from here and just wanted to flee. She settled with, “I just wanted to try the program. It’s not like I went out of my way to save you.”

But when she raised her eyes, expecting Tom to have cooled, she found him laughing, still gazing at her like she was something incredible. “This is where you say, ‘You’re welcome.’ It’s okay to take credit.”

The situation grew better when Heather Akron strolled out and tried to play innocent, even though she’d apparently handed Tom over to get beaten up by Karl. Wyatt stared on, amazed, as Heather spun the situation, claiming she’d actually tricked Karl by agreeing to help him grab Tom for beating-up purposes, but planning all along to call some of Tom’s friends to come help him.

She even had an excuse for not letting Tom in on her grand scheme beforehand. “You had to look all hurt and betrayed for Karl to trust me,” Heather simpered, gazing at Tom from under her lashes. “I didn’t know how good of an actor you were.”

Wyatt couldn’t stand to listen to another word; she couldn’t stand here and just watch someone get suckered by Heather the way she had once.

“That’s so easy for you to say now that it’s all over,” Wyatt cut in, “but if you were going to call one of Tom’s friends to tell them he needed help, why didn’t you do it at the same time you called Karl so they’d be ready to come help him? For all you knew, they weren’t even in the Spire today.”

There was something so satisfying about the anger flashing over Heather’s face. “I’m sorry, but I don’t really know you . . . Wyatt, isn’t it?”

Wyatt’s blood felt like it was going to boil into steam and come shooting out of her ears, because Heather was really going to do this. She was actually going to treat her like she was such a nonentity that she didn’t even remember her name, much less sit next to her in Programming every day for weeks, wheedling one profile change out of her after another. She was only half-aware of Tom looking blankly between the two of them, and Wyatt remembered then a scrap of what she’d told him the day before.

He knew she’d changed the profile for someone who’d gotten into CamCo, someone who’d never bothered talking to her again.
Let Tom know the truth,
she decided.
Let Heather try to fool him once he hears about
that
.

“That’s weird,” Wyatt told Heather, staring directly into her eyes. “You knew my name a few months ago when I helped with your profile.”

She noticed the sharp swing of Tom’s head, because he was quick enough on the uptake to realize what she was referring to, and Heather turned white with anger. Even as she sputtered indignantly about Wyatt being presumptuous, Wyatt felt a sense of vindication. Heather had tricked her all those months ago, but she hadn’t let Heather trick
him.

Later that night, Wyatt found herself in her bunk, closing her eyes and replaying for a moment Tom’s grin for her when she’d saved him.

Even though she hadn’t truly seen people before the neural processor, she was
sure
she’d never had someone smile at her like that before—not a smile just to humor her, not because they pitied her, not because they were amused by how strange she was . . . but simply because they admired her strength. And if she was totally honest with herself, she’d surprised herself. She’d taken down four trainees with one computer virus. Large as he was, even Yuri couldn’t have rushed in and easily pried them off Tom, especially Karl Marsters, who was as big as he was.

But
she’d
done it.

Wyatt remembered how pathetically grateful she’d been as a brand-new plebe when Heather Akron just talked to her, when she treated her like she wasn’t a freak. She was stronger than that girl now. She was sure of it.

Perhaps a day would come when she’d be stronger still—when she’d finally have faith in herself just the way she was.

T
HE
I
MPOSSIBLE
I
S
J
UST THE
B
EGINNING
.
R
EAD ON FOR A SAMPLE OF

INSIGNIA

AS THE ADVENTURES OF

W
YATT
, T
OM
, Y
URI, AND
V
IK CONTINUE
.

Chapter One

N
EW TOWN, NEW
casino—same old plan. Arizona’s Dusty Squanto Casino made it easy for Tom Raines, since he didn’t even have to pay his way into their virtual reality parlor. He slipped into the room, settled onto a couch in the back corner, and looked over the crowd of gamers, taking them in one at a time. His gaze settled on the two men in the opposite corner, and locked onto target.

Them,
Tom thought.

The men stood with VR visors on, wired gloves clenched in the air. Their racing simulation blazed across an overhead screen for anyone who wanted to bet on the outcome. No one would bet on
this
race, though. One man was a good driver—he navigated the virtual track with the skill of an experienced gamer—and the other was pitifully bad. His car’s fender dragged across the wall of the arena, and the fake onlookers were screaming and dodging out of the way.

The winning racer gave a triumphant laugh as his car plowed across the finish line. He turned to the other man, chest puffed with victory, and demanded payment.

Tom smiled from his solitary spot on the couch.

Enjoy it while you can, buddy.

He timed it just right, waiting until the winner started counting up his bills to rise to his feet and wander into his line of sight. Tom noisily rattled one of the VR sets out of its storage container, then made a show of putting on the gloves the wrong way, before painstakingly adjusting them so the cloth and mesh wiring clasped his arms up to his elbows. Out of the corner of his eye, he became aware of the winning racer watching him.

“You like playing games, kid?” the man said to him. “Wanna have a go next?”

Tom gave him the wide-eyed, innocent look that he knew made him appear a lot younger than he was. Even though he was fourteen, he was short and skinny and had such bad acne that people usually couldn’t guess his real age.

“I’m just looking. My dad says I’m not allowed to gamble.”

The man licked his lips. “Oh, don’t you worry. Your dad doesn’t even have to know. Put down a few bucks, and we’ll have us a great race. Maybe you’ll win. How much money do you have?”

“Only fifty bucks.”

Tom knew better than to say more than that. More than that, and people wanted to see it before taking up the bet. He actually had about two dollars in his pocket.

“Fifty bucks?” the man said. “That’s enough. This is just car racing. You can race a car, can’t you?” He twisted an invisible wheel. “Nothing to it. And think: you beat me, and you’ll
double
that fifty.”

“Really?”

“Really, kid. Let’s have a go.” A condescending chuckle. “I’ll pay up for sure if you win.”

“But if I lose . . .” Tom let that hang there. “That’s all my money. I just . . . I can’t.” He started walking away, waiting for the magic words.

“All right, kid,” the guy called. “Double or nothing.”

Ha!
Tom thought.

“I win,” the man said, “and I’ll get fifty. You win, you get a hundred. You can’t beat that. Take a chance.”

Tom turned slowly, fighting the laughter rising in his throat. This guy must already taste his easy fifty bucks since he’d fallen for the act so readily. Most casinos had one or two gamers who practically lived in the VR parlors, fancying themselves gods among men who could beat any chump luckless enough to enter their territory. Tom loved the way they looked at him: as some scrawny, stupid little kid they could easily con. He loved even more seeing their smiles disappear when he wiped the floor with them.

Just to be safe, Tom kept up the act. He made a show of fumbling as he strapped on the VR visor. “Okay, you’re on, I guess.”

Triumph rang in the man’s voice. “We’re on.”

They were off. Their cars roared to life and tore furiously down the track. Tom mentally ticked off the laps, taking it all very deliberately. He made a few token mistakes here and there. They were never enough to slow him down much, just enough to ensure he was lagging behind the other car. The man, puffed up with confidence and certain of winning, whirled his steering wheel with great, lashing sweeps of his wired gloves. As the finish line appeared and the man’s car turned at the right angle, Tom finally let a grin blaze across his lips.

One flick of his glove did the trick. He rammed his car forward and clipped the guy’s back fender, then floored his gas. The man bellowed in rage and disbelief when his car swerved off the road in a rain of sparks.

Tom’s car sailed past the finish line while the other car crashed and exploded in the arena’s side ditch.

“What—what—” the man sputtered.

Tom flipped up his visor. “Whoops. I think I
have
played that game before.” He tugged off his gloves. “Wanna fork over my hundred bucks?”

He watched, fascinated, the way a vein began popping out and fluttering in the man’s forehead. “You little—You can’t—You’re . . .”

“You’re not gonna pay me, then?” Tom cast an idle glance toward the man’s recent victim, now sitting on a nearby couch. The bad driver was suddenly interested in their exchange. Tom raised his voice to make sure the man could make out every word. “I guess no one’s playing games for money in here. Is that it?”

The gamer followed Tom’s gaze to his victim, catching the implication: if he wouldn’t pay Tom, then the other guy shouldn’t have paid
him
.

The man spluttered a bit like the engine of his wrecked car, then jerked a hundred bucks out of a wad from his pocket. He crammed the bills into Tom’s hand, muttering something about a rematch.

Tom flipped through the bills, completely enjoying the man’s outrage. “You want a rematch, I’m game. Double or nothing, again? I could really use another two hundred dollars.”

The man turned a curious shade of scarlet, cut his losses, and fled the room. As for the newbie on the couch, he gave Tom a grateful thumbs-up. Tom returned it, then stashed the bills in his pocket. One hundred dollars. Usually he had to pull off the bet with a few more gamers to make enough for a night’s stay—VR sims involved such low stakes, after all—but at a dive like the Dusty Squanto Casino, a hundred would be enough for a room.

Tom’s mind already whirled with the promises of the night ahead. A bed. Television. Air-conditioning. A real shower. He could even come back here and play games
just for fun
.

The ghastly realization hit just as he reached the door: he was at a casino with a VR parlor.

He had absolutely no excuse for missing school this afternoon.

T
OM STAYED IN
the VR parlor and logged into the Rosewood Reformatory sim for the first time in two weeks. In four years at Rosewood, he’d never skipped such a long stretch of school before, and he’d already missed most of class today. Just the sight in his visor of Ms. Falmouth’s avatar and her virtual chalkboard killed any lingering satisfaction over his victory.

She immediately focused her attention on him. “Tom Raines,” she said. “Thank you for gracing us with your presence today.”

“You’re welcome,” Tom said. He knew it would just annoy her, but it wasn’t like she had a good opinion of him to be ruined.

To be fair, he missed class a lot. Mostly not on purpose. Mostly he missed school due to losing access to an internet connection. It was just another hazard of having a gambler for a father.