Page 10 of Gunpowder

“Dr. Evans will discuss his care with you and a nurse will handle his discharge. More often than not, fevers dissipate before blood samples come back. A couple days of ibuprofen and fluids will probably have him back to normal.”

“Thanks a lot, Sunshine,” Blair mumbled to his back as he pushed the curtain aside. If Wren heard him, he didn’t acknowledge him.

Dr. Evans explained that the lab results wouldn’t be back for three to five days, but that she suspected Salmonella as the cause for Tristan’s illness. She echoed Wren’s suggestion of ibuprofen for the fever and keeping Tristan hydrated.

Tristan came back from the bathroom shortly after Dr. Evans left, looking pale and more than a little disappointed that Mr. Maxters wasn’t coming back, but he perked up at the mention of getting to leave soon. A nurse in Scooby Doo scrubs came to sign them out and send them on their way.

They walked outside together, Tristan moving sluggishly from weakness, and Blair limping next to him. What a sorry sight they must have made.

The glow of the EMERGENCY sign above them tinted Tristan red in the twilight. Blair watched the approaching cab with indecision. His mom wouldn’t resort to medicine until she’d tried every natural remedy in the book first, so taking Tristan home wasn’t going to do him any favors. He was hesitant to have his little brother around with the fight against Phantom looming close, but those master hackers could just as easily find out where his family lived and seek them out if Isaac wanted to target them. His place would be more secure than Aradia, anyway, and he could make sure Tristan got the care he needed.

“How about I call Mom and see if you can stay over for a couple days?”

3

GASOLINE

“We don’t know where they run the computers out of because they—Spence, what the fuck do they do again? Fluff it?”

“They spoof the IP address to keep us from getting a lock on it. I’m not bad with a computer but I’m not on their level,” Spencer said.

Felix huffed. “We can’t let them go to ground. We may have a lot of unanswered questions, like why they deliberately sacrificed one of their own or what they hoped to accomplish by throwing the gauntlet down and then running, but we know this much: they came for blood, our blood. We ain’t gonna let the bastards live.”

There was a murmur of agreement throughout the group that Spencer cut through with a swipe of infuriating logic. “That’s great and all but that doesn’t help us find them.”

Blair shared a worried look with Julian as Felix glared at the strategist. He couldn’t imagine shutting down the boss like that. Marie, who had been tracing the grains in the dark hardwood with the toe of her shoe, spoke up. “Jake is good with computers, and you know he wants in.”

Felix opened his mouth, undoubtedly to refuse her as he’d done every other time she mentioned initiating Jake, but Spencer spoke first. The glass ashtray rattled on the bar as Spencer forcefully stubbed his cigarette out. “We need a plan that doesn’t hinge on a high school student. Thank you for the suggestion, Marie, but this is too precarious a time to be depending on a potential new member.”

Julian raised a hand. “Couldn’t we try to get a message to them and see if they want to surrender before anyone else is hurt?”

“No,” Felix and Spencer said.

“If we could get a message to them we would know where they are, and the fuckers would be dead by now,” Blair said.

Spencer’s flaxen hair fell forward as he took his glasses off to clean them. It was more a habit than anything, as far as Blair could tell. They never looked dirty. “The best lead we have is Jinx’s apartment. I’m gonna send Adam and Nolan to scout it but knowing Jinx, we aren’t going to be able to tell if it’s a trap until it’s too late.”

“Then we hit it from a distance,” Felix said.

Marie sat up a little straighter. “Wait until they’re home and get them with a sniper round through the window?”

Felix rolled an unlit cigarette between his fingers. “Torch it.”

“No,” Julian and Spencer said in unison.

“Ben being inside the PD isn’t going to make a difference if you start burning things down again. The chief of police would love to put you back in for arson,” Julian pointed out.

Spencer flattened his palms on the bar and leaned across, glasses forgotten next to the ashtray. “Julian’s right. We’ve managed to keep our noses pretty clean since you got out, but if the chief sees smoke, he’s coming for your head.”

“Let them come. Let Phantom come, too. We’ll burn them all.”

The silence that fell over the room spoke louder than any threat. Most of them shared a variation of the same look of defeat, as they knew that tone. Felix had made up his mind. The traffic outside was the only sound for a while. Felix’s gold eyes were alive with excitement and Blair could only assume he was seeing the boss as he was before he joined, before Felix did his time in prison. There was a feral edge to his gaze as he watched the cigarette smoldering between his fingers.

Spencer lowered his head. “I believe we can call this meeting concluded.”

Blair was still seeing the mad gleam in Felix’s eyes when he put dinner on the table that night. Tristan’s favorite, stir-fry with pineapple. He went easy on sauce and seasoning since the kid’s stomach was still torn up. His fever was staying higher than Blair liked, too, but at least Tristan was trying to eat. Blair’s dinner table also happened to be his coffee table but he didn’t entertain enough people to need more than that. Plus his couch was way more comfy than a stiff chair, threadbare though it may be with the red material fading into a weird pink in the areas where the sun got to it.

Tristan ate one piece of pineapple before he wrapped his arms around his stomach. “I’m sorry. It tastes good but...”

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