As I smuggle it out in my backpack—grateful that the alarms are off-line and can’t sound—I tell myself it’s okay. That saving the world trumps stealing a book any day, but it still makes my stomach hurt a little. Stupid, I know, but there it is. The lines between black and white are blurring more with every second we’re on the road, on the run, until distinguishing the varying shades of gray has become next to impossible for me. Fleeing the authorities, breaking and entering, stealing. And even worse is the knowledge that there’s nowhere to go but down. When Eli and I get back to the car, Theo’s already there. He’s sitting in the backseat, legs up, computer in his lap. “What are you doing?” I ask. He doesn’t even bother to look at me. “Searching for the AR gate in level two, so once we get to Albuquerque we can plug in the password, solve the task, and move on.” “Have you found it?” Eli swings up next to him, grabs a few granola bars from the stash in the back, and tosses one to me.
