What was wrong with Rover? Whatever his abilities were, they were cool, but they were also kind of scary. And at the end of the day, she couldn’t rightly name her project that, because, well, she had no idea. Was he some sort of strange experiment gone wrong?

Maybe instead of showing her teachers his abilities, she thought, she ought to show Dr. Chevram. Maybe instead of a medal, the government was going to storm in and try to cut Rover open.

After her last class, she went to her locker and dug out her phone. She searched for animal telepathy with the hopes of finding out this was a common experience. Her results were pretty much what she expected—self-help gurus teaching courses on horse whispering and downloadable powers for video games. Nothing serious or practical. She searched for some other options—animal telepathy computer, animal using technology—and got equally unhelpful results.

“Stormy telling you to do things?”

Amy whirled around. Marguerite took a step back and bugged out her eyes at the speed with which her friend spun.

“Sorry,” said Amy.

“Yeesh, it was a joke,” said Marguerite. “But seriously, that’s a weird thing to be reading in your downtime.”

“My science fair project—” Amy caught sight of Valerie Starr a few lockers down, and her mouth snapped shut.

“Your science project is on talking to animals with your mind?” asked Marguerite, nice and loud. Amy thought she saw Valerie pause midway through putting a book away.

“It’s nothing,” Amy said. “Just something I saw on TV while I was working on my project.”

“What show?” Marguerite asked.

“Black Mirror,” Amy answered.

“Oof, that’ll do it,” Marguerite said.

As they headed toward the school’s exit, Valerie called out Amy’s name. Amy stopped, trying her best to look busy, like she couldn’t hang around long because of some super-important appointment she had.

“Did I hear from someone you’re doing an animal-based science fair project?” asked Valerie in a bright, cheery voice that Amy knew she didn’t use during sleepovers or field-trip bus rides.

“That’s right,” Amy replied. You probably just overheard it while you were eavesdropping, she thought.

“That’s great,” said Valerie. “Jake and I are doing one, too! I mean, I probably shouldn’t say too much, you’re the competition or whatever, but it’s all in the name of science, right? Anyway, the point is, if you’d like to compare notes sometime, we’d be happy to.”

Amy bristled. She felt angry at Valerie’s sweet attitude, her tone making it sound as though she were doing Amy a big favor. There was a trick here. Amy wouldn’t fall for it.

“Thanks,” she said to Valerie, and headed out the front doors.

“That was intense,” said Marguerite. “The science-nerd war has officially begun!”