“So do we tell the CSM? The president? The New York Times?”

“I don’t know,” I said slowly. “I’ve been going back and forth on that all week. I can’t think about it anymore right now,” I said, suddenly feeling tired. “Hey, why’d you come in here, anyway?”

Fang’s too-long black hair fell over one eye. “Just checking on you. You’ve been getting wound tighter every day.”

“I guess I have. I just … don’t know what to do, and I feel like I don’t know enough about anything to figure out what to do.”

“It’ll come to you,” Fang said confidently. “For now, why don’t you try to get some sleep? I’ll stay till you’re out, if that’ll help.”

“That would help a lot,” I admitted.

I collapsed sideways on my bed and pulled the blanket over me. Fang sat at my side, holding my hand and rubbing my back between my wings.

Chapter 20

20

FANG WAS RIGHT. It came to me. The next day I presented my plan to the flock.

“You want us to what?” Gazzy stared at me with horror.

“I want us to learn more,” I said. Plus, I needed a big project to focus on. “I’ve been thinking about this since Africa. We know some stuff — how to hack computers, break locks, et cetera. But I’ve realized there’s a lot we don’t know. And here we are, living peacefully in our new house, tons of time to spare, hours to fill up — so we should be putting that time to good use!”

“What do we need to learn?” asked Iggy.

“Oh, I don’t know… . Like, why was Chad in such a mess? Why were the locals suspicious of Americans?” I paced up and down our living room. “And where did the Romans go, and how did they get replaced by Italians? I mean, the Greeks are still around!” I went on enthusiastically. “There’s so much to learn. It’s never bothered me till now — we always knew enough to get along. But now I’m thinking, How can we fight evil scientists without understanding science? How can we save the world if we hardly know anything about it?”

“We don’t have to know about something to save it,” Iggy argued. He had one foot on a window ledge, ready to jump out. “I mean, we know evil scientists really well, but we don’t want to save them.”

“Okay, that example doesn’t even make sense,” I said. “But, like, these CSM missions we’ve been on — we’ve relied on other people to tell us what we need to know. Mostly, we’ve been able to trust them. But what if they weren’t trustworthy? What if we knew enough to judge for ourselves? We could stay totally independent!”