Dangerous by Shannon Hale

she took a loud, grating slurp
    of her slushie.
    GT noticed me. His gum chewing got louder.
    “Maisie Danger Brown.” He shook his head and smiled,
    and I got the feeling he was accustomed to charming people
    with his smile. “You could change Earth’s technology forever.
    What do you say we work on something really valuable? Cold
    fusion? Faster-than-light travel?”
    I laughed. “I’m not a gumball machine of inventions, just
    put in your coin and out comes a prize!”
    GT’s smile vanished.
    “I mean,” I said softer, “the techno token doesn’t work that
    way. Mostly I just have an understanding of how some machines
    work. When I come up with a new idea, it’s not something ran-
    dom I want but something I need . . . or . . . I don’t know how
    to explain.”
    He nodded as if interested, but I guessed he still hadn’t
    recovered from being laughed at.
    “I have noticed your regard for my boy.”
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    “He’s our fireteam leader, that’s all,” I said, busying myself
    with Fido.
    “I think it’s sweet that a girl like you caught his eye.” He
    held out a unwrapped stick of gum. I shook my head. “You’re
    not his usual type, but of course you figured that out. I’m sure
    he’s confided in you about his expulsions, his time in juvenile
    detention, his dozens of disappointed ex-girlfriends. Thanks
    for overlooking all that.” He put an arm around my shoulders
    and whispered close to my head, “I know he can be frustrating
    sometimes. If you ever need to talk, think of me as a second
    father?”
    I glanced across the lab and found Wilder watching us. He
    didn’t look away until his father had left the room.
    “I don’t like him either,” Mi-sun whispered, and it took me
    a moment to realize she meant GT.
    “It’s like he wants to recruit us to work for him,” I said.
    Mi-sun shook her head. I knew she felt as I did, that we
    wouldn’t leave the team for anything. Couldn’t, perhaps. If I
    was a prisoner—or a zombified caterpillar—for the moment I
    was a willing one.
    She stirred her slushie, the straw making a rustling sound
    as quiet as her whisper. “I think I’m going crazy. Maybe what
    my dad has is catching.”
    “Or maybe it’s the token.”
    “Have you been having crazy dreams too?” Her eyes looked
    hopeful. “I dream about pink things. All the time.”
    “Pink things?”
    “Pink floaty things. You don’t dream of them?”
    “I don’t think—”
    “They don’t like me, the pink floaty things. They want to
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    take my body.”
    I patted her shoulder and hoped that would count as
    comforting.
    At least we didn’t have to deal with GT much longer. He
    flew out the next morning.
    Wilder started us on a schedule that made astronaut boot
    camp look frivolous. Up at dawn for a group run. Ruth ran cir-
    cles around us. Literally.
    Back to HAL for breakfast (Ruth and Jacques ate an entire
    ham each) and then fireteam training. We began to redo all the
    fireteam exercises from boot camp, shattering every previous
    record. Wilder’s strategies were scary-good. I wasn’t too shabby
    myself. Our model rocket flew eight thousand meters and broke
    the sound barrier.
    In the afternoon we had time to hone our individual skills.
    I installed the guts of a GPS and satellite phone into Fido that I
    could control the same way I controlled the arm, dialing with a
    thought. But I wanted to offer more help than the ability to call
    911. So like any reasonable teenager in my situation, I designed
    a robot suit.
    A few days into the build, Wilder rushed into the workshop
    my lab groupies and I had taken over.
    “We’ve got a training mission. Come on.”
    He took off, and I dutifully followed.
    “Some of the security guys were Special Forces,” Wilder
    explained over our headsets as Dragon flew us in a helicopter to
    the site. “They set up a simulated rescue. All we know is there
    are two VIPs trapped by enemy gunmen. They’re instructed
    to fall down as