Free Code Orange by Caroline M. Cooney Page A

sequences so why risk restarting the disease, and besides, we need to set a good example for rogue countries. But some people want to keep the virus. They say what if smallpox comes back? Then we need our virus supply to make the vaccine again. Plus, the thing about rogue countries is that they don't care about good examples. Rogue states and rogue people want a universal killer to spew over the world. In fact, you don't have to be very rogue. There are plenty of hate-filled half-insane countries who claim to be non-rogue and are still in the United Nations pretending to care about peace. Then finally there's the save-our-smallpox bumper-sticker crowd. They don't think we should extinguish a living creature.
    Mitty certainly had no problem extinguishing the creature that was smallpox.
    He dug out his DVD to watch
Spider-Man
.
    His father found him sound asleep under a pile of books and papers, his laptop having put itself to sleep too, the remains of a snack spilling gently off a tilted plate while Spider-Man leaped across burning rafters.
    Mitty's father turned off the DVD and tucked a blanket around his sleeping son.

    It had now been four days since Mitchell John Blake had inhaled the particles of a smallpox scab.

CHAPTER SEVEN
    T hat night Mitty had smallpox dreams.
    He woke up sweating and shivering, unable to catch his breath or slow his heartbeat. He was lying on the bare floor of his bedroom, like a prisoner in a cell. Of course, it was a really well-furnished cell with great electronics.
    In the entire world, he thought, I am the only person dreaming of smallpox.
    The apartment was always hot; the Blakes rarely turned on the heat, even on the coldest days, because the building was so warm from all the apartments that did have their heat on. But even in bed, under blankets, Mitty could not get warm. He lay staring wide-eyed at the ceiling as if he had lockjaw of the eyelids.
    Facts and fears slammed into him like so many tennis balls lobbed into his face.
    He was still awake at three a.m.

    “Mitty Blake!” screamed his mother. “It's nine-forty-four!”
    Mitty dragged himself out of sleep. He hoped it was a Saturday.
    “The school just called! Mitty, you promised you would never cut school again!”
    He huddled under the blankets. “I'm not actually cutting, Mom, I just didn't wake up.” Smallpox, he thought. I had smallpox. Mom had it, Dad had it.
    “Mitty!” she cried. A major rant about his shortcomings was about to begin.
    “Now, Kathleen,” yelled his father from the other end of the apartment,“it wasn't intentional. Mitty didn't—”
    Mitty had to be careful of events like this. His parents had radically different ideas about how to treat Mitty's failures and might battle each other instead of him, so Mitty said quickly, “I was a jerk, Mom. I forgot to set my alarm. I can get dressed in a second and be at school in ten minutes, okay?”
    “Is this going to happen again?” his mother demanded, as if Mitty had chosen strip-mining national parks for a career.
    “It happened once last fall, Mom,” he said, “and once now. Therefore my failure-to-wake-up rate is actually one morning per semester. So, yeah, it might well happen again. Possibly as early as May, probably not till next September.”
    She didn't laugh as she left his room. Mitty slid down from the top bunk and landed on an annoying assortmentof books and papers. He put only his laptop into his backpack.
    “Orange juice!” shouted his mother from the other end of the apartment. “Socks!”
    Mitty surrendered on both fronts. “Love you, Mom,” he said, kissing her good-bye. She melted. She always did. He hugged her again for good measure and tore out of the apartment.
    He was halfway to school when he realized he had not said good-bye to his father.
    He felt an odd tearing at his heart. He paused at the corner of Broadway and Seventy-fourth and half turned to catch his dad before he left for the office—then shook his head to