The Dark Shore (Atlanteans) Read Online Free PDF Page A

jumped up and ran to the wreckage. “That’s why I was disconnecting it, you idiot!” She slid onto her knees and started picking up the pieces.
    “Disconnecting it isn’t enough,” said Leech. The sight of Paul seemed to have gotten to him even more than it had rattled me. He looked so different from the cocky kid I’d known in Eden. His hands were shaking, fingers fluttering. He caught me noticing and made fists. “If they hacked into that pad, that means they have the unique network ID it creates when it connects to the gamma link. They could reverse link to the pad anywhere and determine its location.”
    “Gamma link is only identifiable when it’s connected,” I said, remembering what I’d heard about data hackers back at Hub.
    Leech rolled his eyes. “Maybe where you come from,” he said. “How do you think he appeared on it just now? Lilly, didn’t you disconnect the link before you went to sleep?”
    “Yes,” Lilly muttered.
    Leech looked at me. I thought I’d see his slopey, know-it-all grin, but instead he had a serious expression, like he really wanted me to understand where he was coming from. “See?”
    “Fine.”
    “Besides,” he added, “we have Aaron’s subnet pad.”
    Lilly thrust the broken parts down on the sand. She got up and stomped over to Leech, glaring down at him. She was a good ten centimeters taller. “Yeah, but then we need a subnet connection. And where are we going to find one of those out here ?”
    Leech just shrugged.
    Lilly spun away. “That’s what I thought.” She threw herself down on the blanket.
    A silence passed over us. There was only the gentle shush of wind slipping along the contours of the canyon. The sight of Paul had shattered the slight sense of safety I’d been feeling and reminded me of what we were running from, and what would happen if we were caught.
    I glanced at Leech, wondering about his behavior. It was one thing to not want Paul to track us, but Leech had seemed so furious at the sight of him. Maybe it was because of Paul’s comments about me being the only one who mattered. What could he have meant by that? Leech was just as important. Maybe Leech was still wounded by Paul’s betrayal. Paul probably knew those comments would upset Leech, just like his comments about Evan had been designed to upset Lilly.
    She stared off into space, biting her lip. The thought of Evan cut open like Anna had been . . . no matter how I felt about him, he didn’t deserve that. No one did, and . . .
    “It was our fault,” said Lilly.
    “Yeah,” I agreed. The thought sunk deep into me. Evan and Marco and Aliah had saved us from Paul. If it wasn’t for them, we’d be in that lab, and now they were paying for it.
    And of course that would torment Lilly. I thought about going over and trying to do something supportive, like rub her shoulder, but I found myself hesitating. I couldn’t stop thinking about the other thing Paul had said: a night in the boathouse. . . . What had that been? Lilly had his T-shirt in her bag. . . .
    I hated how the thought of them burned me. I needed to just deal. They hadn’t even been going out anymore when I showed up. But maybe it also felt like more evidence that our connection was no longer the same—or worse, that it had never even been what I’d thought it was in the first place. After all, she’d lied to me about seeing the siren.
    All of these thoughts crowded in my head, spinning wildly and feeding off one another. Maybe that had been Paul’s plan. If so, it had worked. Lilly, Evan, Paul’s cryptic comments about me, and on top of all that, now we couldn’t go to Hub. And Dad was going to hear these allegations against me. What would he think of his son, the escapee and accused murderer? Would he be brought in for questioning?
    Paul had cut us off from the world, given us nowhere to go that was safe. It all felt like too much, but I tried to push through the storm of doubt and focus.
    “If he hacked