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pleaded. “Not that, anything but that.”
    â€œI’m sorry, Evie,” Mom said, sitting back down at the controls.
    Rick watched his mother disable the autopilot and enter new coordinates. His heart sank. “Geneva?”
    â€œThat’s right.” Mom looked tough, focused, and all business. “The oceans are in danger, and it’s my duty to clean up that stain. I’m sorry that all of these terrible things are happening at once, but we don’t have time to take you back to your father on the eighth continent. And it’s too dangerous for you to go on a mission alone without me or 2-Tor, so there’s only one option: I’m taking you to school.”
    Evie groaned.
    Rick tugged on his mother’s arm. “Mom, if we don’t go meet Professor Doran now, what will happen to Australia and the eighth continent?”
    She rubbed his back soothingly. “Don’t get discouraged, honey. We aren’t giving up yet. Let me keep trying to reach your father while I evaluate this stain situation, and then I’ll reconnect with you later tonight. Meanwhile, do what you can to keep the mission going after you arrive at the International School for Exceptional Students. Research more ways to root the continent. Do a cross-analysis of all the goos, glues, and gruels we may be able to use as waterproof adhesives.”
    â€œI’ll get right on it, Mom.” Rick didn’t like this at all, but maybe he’d be able to use the time at school to find an even better way to stop the continent from moving.
    Evie tried once more to make her mother reconsider. “Mom, please, I’m begging you, in the name of all that is scientific and awesome, please, PLEASE, don’t make us go to school.”
    Mom was hearing none of it. She filled one of the
Roost
’s acorn-shaped escape pods with her luggage and other business papers, kissed her children goodbye, and was off to clean up the stain.
    When the acorn had flown out of sight, Evie sprinted back to the bridge. Rick chased after her. He opened the bridge doors to find his sister aggressively punching new coordinates into the navigator.
    Oh no.
Rick had a bad feeling about this. “Evie, what are you doing?”
    She glanced over her shoulder at him and grinned. “I’m, uh . . . programming the
Roost
to take a shortcut to school. Well, more of a long cut. You see, I put us back on our original course to Texas.”
    Rick had no interest in getting between Mom and Evie on this. He wanted to do what his mother had ordered, but they urgently needed to root the continent. According to his Continent Collision Counter, they had less than thirty-five hours before the big crash.
    â€œBut Mom said to go straight to school,” he moaned feebly.
    â€œWe will go to school,” Evie said, “. . . eventually.”

A FEW HOURS EARLIER
 . . .
    â€œEyes front, agents.” Mister Snow’s stern command came from the cockpit of the lead hovership. “The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is straight ahead.”
    Diana’s heart was beating as fast as it used to on missions with Vesuvia. She hadn’t seen the Great Pacific Garbage Patch since it had been transformed into the eighth continent. There was no telling what kind of traps George Lane would have waiting for them.
    Diana had been issued one of Winterpole’s iceberg helmets, but it was so big it sank over her shoulders. She removed the helmet and peered out the hovership window at the continent below.
    The Eden Compound had done its work. A whole continent had appeared where previously a garbage dump had been. The spongy earth of the continent stretched past the horizon, the greenish-brown plain broken only by the occasional rocky outcropping and a few twisting rivers and streams.
    Near the shore Diana could make out a small encampment where campfires and a couple of temporary wooden shelters were laid out. There was