“We don’t need Chatterjee’s rules. Having no adults is the only good part of this. Of course we stay alert, stay ready. But when we’re not on lookout, we can do whatever we want. Eat ice cream all day, play floor hockey in the gym, practice fighting.”

Finally his talk got too much for me. I threw down my notebook and stood up. “What happens when we run out of ice cream?” I said.

“We raid the supermarket and get more.”

“There’s no electricity there. You know, to keep ice cream cold.”

“We’ll get cookies.”

“And when those run out?”

“We’ll worry about that then,” he said. “We’re all gonna die anyways. Why not enjoy ourselves while we’re here?”

“So you just want to give up also?”

“It’s too big, Chance. It’s everywhere. It’s the air we breathe. You can’t give up if you’ve already lost. Might as well enjoy the ride.”

“We can’t just sit around and wait for them to come get us. We have to do something.”

“What? Fix the entire world?”

Now Ben was laughing at me, and his lackeys were, too. I looked around for Patrick and Alex, but they had left. My brother’s shift had ended. Alex was on lookout next in the math-and-science wing, so off they’d gone. They’d even taken Cassius.

“You gonna do that, Little Rain?” Ben continued. “Beat all the adults in the world and an entire alien race or supervirus or whatever? You can barely go to the bathroom without your big brother holding your hand.”

I got up and stormed out before I said something that would get me into trouble I couldn’t get out of. Eve shook her head, as annoyed by Ben as I was.

“Without big bro backing you up, you’d better walk away,” Ben called after me. “And you’d better get used to the feeling, too.”

I stopped before the double doors, fists clenched, my heart banging in my chest. Then I turned. I ran at Ben, yelling, and though Eve and Chatterjee stood up, no one could get to me in time.

Unlucky for me.

I tackled Ben from the side, knocking him down. He rolled over, swinging with his elbow and clipping my temple. I smacked into the base of the dry-erase board, and then he was on me, punching me, snapping my head against the floor. Pain flared in my eye.

Chatterjee hurried toward us. I saw his hands clamp Ben’s shoulders, and then Ben whirled and shoved him. Chatterjee fell down hard, his leg braces clattering against the floorboards.

All at once everything stopped.