“That’s Blackburn trying to scare us. Look, I get it, Beamer. I was actually worried about some of this stuff, too, back before I got the neural processor.”

“You. Worried.”

Tom shrugged, trying to remember his conversation with Heather back when he was making up his mind about whether to enlist. It was funny how much murkier his memories before the neural processor felt—not time-stamped at all, not perfectly detailed. Like a different person had those experiences.

“Yeah, I was worried. About the brain surgery being a surprise and the way the military was—well, just some of the same stuff you mentioned. But … come on. Come on, Beamer. Look around you. Who else gets to do what we do? Who else gets to be what we are? We’re important. We can learn any skill with a download. We can speak any language we want. We’re faster and smarter than regular people. We can do anything now.”

Beamer rolled onto his back and stared up at the ceiling. “I could’ve done anything before if I’d tried really hard. I started a business, you know. I figured out how to make some things, so I sold water filters and grills at tent cities. I mean, ever seen one of those places? They’re not completely poor. A lot of them have jobs, but they just can’t afford a real place.”

“Yeah, I’ve seen a few.” Neil always pointed them out to him. He said they were the only alternative to moving from casino to casino.

“Well, people bought my stuff there. I made money. I was doing just fine before the neural processor. You could’ve done anything before the processor, too. You won spelling bees, remember? That must’ve taken a lot of work.”

Tom didn’t say anything. He knew he hadn’t won spelling bees before, or even contributed to the world’s largest ball of earwax. The old Tom Raines couldn’t even make it at a reform school.

“I see you, Vik, and even Yuri, who doesn’t have a chance here and has to know it,” Beamer said. “You guys are just devoted to this thing. And I came here, and I wanted to do well, but I just don’t care about it anymore. Ever since that thing happened with my girlfriend and I got stuck on restricted libs, it’s like it’s all gone into perspective. I keep wondering why I’m still here. I don’t want to be Camelot Company. I hate it here. I keep thinking about high school and all those movies I saw about it, and wondering if I’m missing out on something. I want to get older and go to college. And buy a house. And have kids and marry some woman and have block parties and barbecues.”

“Barbecue?”—Tom latched on to that—“Beamer, you and me, we can go have a barbecue right now, okay? Forget restricted libs. We’ll reroute your GPS signal to the bathroom, then we’ll go outside and barbecue anything you want.”

Beamer gave a pained sigh. “You don’t understand, Tom. You can’t.”

He turned around to face the wall and buried his head in the covers.

Tom realized it, then: he didn’t understand. He couldn’t. Beamer wanted to be normal. Tom couldn’t imagine ever wanting to be nothing.

Tom would never willingly give up what he had here. He would never willingly lose the neural processor, the life full of possibilities.

He couldn’t bear to be worthless again. He’d rather be dead.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

MOST OF THE viruses on the second full day of the war games came courtesy of Wyatt, but there were a few exceptions. Franco Holbein of Hannibal Division wrote one called Icy Night that caught a few Machiavellis when they hooked into neural access ports in their bunks. They spent all of lunch huddled together, teeth chattering, bellowing out demands for someone to turn up the Spire’s thermostat. Then Nigel Harrison pulled off a virus called Food Face that caused people sitting in the mess hall to smash their own faces into their meal trays. By the end of the day, Britt Schmeiser of Napoleon Division had retaliated with a Trojan named Nigel Harrison that triggered whenever an infected trainee’s vision center registered that Nigel Harrison was nearby.

The Trojan infiltrated the homework feed overnight and managed to infect most of the Spire. On the third day of the war games, Nigel strode into the mess hall for lunch, and the Trojan triggered in almost a hundred trainees at the same time. A sea of faces began twitching just like his face always did.

Nigel stared around the room, looking like he’d entered some surreal nightmare, and then he lost it. “Stop it,” he shrieked. “Stop it!”

But getting upset made his face twitch harder, and his facial twitch triggered their facial twitches. And a whole debacle ensued where Nigel began threatening to hit people with his meal tray. Eventually, he fled the room in tears of rage, pursued by laughter and shouts of “Go cry to the social worker!”

Tom and Vik missed the incident, though they both passed Nigel Harrison outside the Lafayette Room, and therefore spent the next hour irritated by continual facial twitches. They skipped lunch altogether, too busy putting together their program for the duel with Karl. It was beautiful. They called it Frequent Noisome Farts.

“You ready for this, Doctor?” Vik asked Tom.

“I’m ready, Doctor. Let’s go.”

They marched out into the plebe common room at 2000 to face Karl. From the fiendish pleasure emanating from Karl’s jowled face beneath his new haircut, he had something nasty ready, too.

“On three.” Vik’s eyes were locked on those of Karl’s companion Lyla Martin. It was the first time Tom had really seen her up close, and her profile flashed before him.

NAME: Lyla Martin

RANK: USIF, Grade IV Middle, Genghis Division

ORIGIN: West Palm Beach, FL

ACHIEVEMENTS: Amateur flyweight winner of six world and national boxing championships

IP: 2053:db7:lj71::275:ll3:6e8

SECURITY STATUS: Top Secret LANDLOCK-4

“One-two-three,” Lyla shouted all in a jumble, and Tom was too startled to react right away.

Karl cried, “Ha!” and struck first.

Nothing happened. Datastream received: program Rabid Fido initiated. Value null, flashed across Tom’s vision center.

“Nice try, buddy boy.” Tom launched Frequent Noisome Farts.

Karl waited. And waited. Then laughed. “Value null, Plebe.”

“Secret Indian ninja attack!” Vik raised the portable keyboard he’d snuck behind his back and unleashed their supersecret, superexperimental backup program.

“Ka-pow!” Tom cried triumphantly.

Karl and Lyla looked back at them questioningly.

Lyla scratched her nose. “My nose itches. Does your nose itch?” she asked Karl.

Karl shook his head. “Nah.”

“Secret Indian Ninja Attack doesn’t make your nose itch,” Vik said.

“Okay,” she said. “That’s all I’m noticing. The itchy nose.”

“Another null, Plebes,” Karl announced.

They all looked at one another for a long time. Karl pounded one first into a meaty hand, visibly longing for a chance to pummel them the old-fashioned way. Then they headed off their separate ways.

“Worst duel ever,” Tom decided.

“Tom,” Vik said as they entered their bunk, “we suck so much it’s depressing.”

UNFORTUNATELY, BLACKBURN AGREED with them. The next day, he played their duel on the overhead screens for the class, and even he had to smother his palm over his mouth to fight his laughter.