“Okay, okay,” I said irritably. “Whatever. Hey, anytime it’s too much for you, pal . . .”

Angel wrapped her arm around his neck.

Total drew himself up proudly. “And leave you on your own? I’m not a traitor! You need me!”

I was about to retort with a scathing “For what?” when Nudge interrupted.

“Total, just be nice to Akila,” she advised. “Don’t grovel. Just be yourself, but extra thoughtful, polite. Act more like a dog, you know, strong and silenter.”

Total seemed to take this in, nodding thoughtfully.

“Now, about the mission,” said Nudge. “I’m all for it! I mean, it’s cold here, which sucks, but I like these people. I say we stay for a while.”

“Me too!” said Gazzy.

They were all waiting for me.

I didn’t want to argue with them about jumping on the global warming bandwagon. What the hey. We had food and beds. “All right,” I said, and they erupted into cheers. “Let’s stay for a while.”

Chapter 36

36

“YOU NEED A JACKET,” I told Total the next day. We were on the upper deck, and it was, hey, really cold! The scientists had all sorts of cold-weather gear for us kids, so we were okay. They hadn’t even minded us slicing long slits in the backs.

Total was shivering, watching the endless ocean through the metal railings.

“Akila doesn’t wear a jacket,” he said through chattering teeth.

“Then go below before I have to chip ice off your nose,” I said.

Turning with great dignity, he trotted over to the stairs and jumped down them.

“I can’t get used to a talking dog,” said Melanie, coming up next to me. “Or even flying kids, really.” She gave me a friendly smile, then went back to making notes in a log.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“We document weather conditions every day,” she explained. “Air temperature, barometric pressure, water temperature. Wind direction and speed, what the seas are like.” She flipped through the pages in her log to show me month after month of meticulously graphed weather conditions. It was cool that someone was doing this, but it would have made me gonzo by the fourth day.

“You gotta check out their computers,” Nudge said, running up to us. “They are so cool! They can show you what the earth will look like in fifty years, or what would happen if there’s an earthquake. Gazzy just ran a demonstration of what would happen if a tsunami hit Los Angeles!”

“Cool,” I said. “What’re Fang and Iggy doing?”

“Scalping Brian and Brigid at poker,” she said matter-of-factly. Melanie looked up in surprise.

“What about Angel?”

“She’s ahead by about thirty bucks.”

Here’s a freebie: Don’t play poker with a kid who can read minds. Well, they would have to learn sometime.