She hugged Nikola tightly. She had thought that if they got the embryos stored someplace safe, she and Jillian would have years to plan. Now she wanted to find a way to make them real as quickly as possible.
Nikola tilted his head as if listening to something distant. “Oh, my, that can’t be good.”
“What?”
“The monkey just looked up ‘how to build a bomb.’”
29: FLYING MONKEY DOES WHAT FLYING MONKEY DOES
Tristan waited for them at the train station. Except for one yawn, there was no evidence he’d been up late, endlessly digging through the Internet. The twins tried to act surprised and not annoyed at all by his presence; they’d suspected he might be lying in wait. Their plan was to tag-team him so they could take turns reading over his search history.
“So does your family have plans for next Friday?” Jillian started her distraction run. Louise slid on her gaming goggles so Tristan couldn’t see what she was accessing. He’d started the night by hacking into the school’s computers and pulling up student records. No surprise there. But he’d also tapped the records of all the employees too. Odder yet, he did detailed background checks on a weird selection of them. Mr. Howe. Miss Hamilton. Those made sense. Miss Gray. Less sense. Teachers whose names she didn’t recognize. No sense at all.
“Next Friday?” Tristan seemed completely confused.
So was Louise. She went back and checked which student records he’d pulled. He had only looked at seniors and juniors. He’d ignored the fifth graders completely.
“Next Friday is the Fourth of July!” Jillian said. “It’s why we’re having the play on Wednesday instead of Friday. Everyone who goes on vacation leaves early Thursday so the school made the last day on the second.”
Actually they were supposed to get out of school the second week of June. By law, the school had to hold classes for a hundred and eighty days. A broken water pipe in the fall, a blizzard in February, and then the bombing had pushed the last day into July.
The babies said Tristan had been researching bomb-making.
Earth for Humans said that the bomber Vance Roycraft had gone rogue from their organization and claimed that he’d built a terrorist network totally separate from them. Police had confirmed that they found evidence that he hadn’t worked alone but so far hadn’t released any information on the other bombers.
To find a bomber, someone would need to know the basics of bomb-making. Tristan obviously thought that Roycroft’s accomplice was a teacher or one of the older students. But why did Tristan think someone at Perelman was a terrorist? Pure location? Or did he know something more? And why had Ming sent Tristan alone to Perelman to find the bomber?
“The Fourth! Oh, yeah, I forgot. Jetlag and everything.” Tristan yawned again, this time wider. “It’s still in the middle of the night for me.”
“The fireworks are a big deal around here,” Jillian babbled, hopefully intending to work around to something more interesting. “We go to our Aunt Kitty’s place in Hoboken; she has a balcony overlooking the Hudson River. We have chicken and corn on the cob and apple pie.”
“How cliché,” Tristan said.
“Not cliché, traditional.” Jillian kicked the platform, obviously wanting to kick him. “The chicken is Jamaican jerk, not Southern fried, and we have black beans, rice and peas, and ginger beer.”
“You don’t look Jamaican.” He teased because he knew exactly what they were, at least as far as their mother’s side. Did Anna know who their father had been?
“Our grandmother was,” Jillian stated. “And she was a very wise woman. She always said that family meant what you made it to mean.”
The train squealed into the station. Louise pushed up her goggles and focused on following Jillian onto the train. All the cars were crowded and they had to huddle together around Tesla.
Louise’s phone vibrated and she checked it, careful to keep the screen angled away from Tristan.
“We want to see the fireworks!” the text read. “Take us with you!”
She glanced down and Nikola gazed up her, face surprisingly hopeful for it being robotic. His tail thumped against her leg.
She typed “Ok” and put away her phone. She had no idea what to tell their parents, but there was no way she was going to leave Nikola alone. She patted Nikola on the head and he leaned against her, tail thumping with happiness.
* * *
“He’s looking for the bombers.” Louise explained her theory while they camped out in the girls’ restroom before homeroom.
“Here?” Jillian cried and dropped her voice back to a whisper. “At the Perelman School for the Gifted? Are they nuts as well as morally retarded?”