The Revealers Read Online Free

least—calls it KidNet. Everyone in school has an account, and a password that you keep to yourself. You can access your account from any computer in the school, or from your computer at home, if you have one. You can send any other kid e-mail, and you can send mail to your teachers—you can ask about homework, or other questions. If you’re sick they e-mail your homework to you. (Isn’t that great?) You can also access encyclopedias, and you can download practice problems for math tests, challenge quizzes for social studies, stuff like that. There’s a lot you can do.
    One thing is MidStream. We called it Streaming. That’s where you and other kids get on together and talk by typing. Other networks call it Chat, or Instant Message, or whatever.
Nobody can break into or eavesdrop on your conversation without everyone else knowing about it. I guess that’s why Elliot wanted to talk this way: he could tell if anyone else was lurking and listening, like if I was the front person for some new plot to humiliate him.
    For your address on our system you get up to five letters. Mine was RussT, which I thought was pretty good.

     Are you there?
Yes. What predator?
A guy. Eighth grade.
Oh.
So when someone’s after you, what do you do?

    For a minute there was nothing. Then finally:

     I don’t know.
You don’t KNOW?
Best thing is not to be there.
What if he’s always watching? If he always knows
where you go?
Who IS this?

    I sighed. Finally I typed:

     R Tucker.
Whoa. Tyrannosaur!
Yes. Why’s he do it?
Don’t know. Ask him?
Oh right. How can I get him to stop?
You can’t.
I CAN’T?
Tyranno doesn’t stop. Maybe you can get him to find somebody else, but tyrannos don’t STOP.

Must be SOMEthing I can do.
Don’t be where tyranno is.
But he’s everywhere. Outsmart him? Somehow?
Tyrannos are smarter than people think. Proportionately larger brain cavity than any known tyranno prey.
What?
True.

    Like I said, Elliot pretty much lived in the reptile ages. I realized if I was going to get anything out of him, I had to go there, too.

     What DID tyranno prey do?
Depended on what they could do.
Did tyranno prey survive?
Not many, but hey. Did tyranno survive?
But how DID some prey survive? I want to know.
Meet me in school library tomorrow. After school.
Why?
I can show some stuff.
What about tyranno?
Tyranno never goes in library!

    I thought for a minute.

     OK. After school.

    At least I’d be safe, for a little while. And maybe, just maybe, there might be something I could figure out.

POP QUIZ
    When I came into the library, Elliot already had a table spread with dinosaur books. I wondered if anyone else ever got to look at the dinosaur books. But who else would want to, in middle school?
    He had each book open to a picture. When he looked up, his eyes were bright; then he quickly checked to see if I’d come alone. I thought how Elliot really does look like a bird—especially those tiny birds you see on beaches, darting back and forth on stick legs inches from waves that you think are going to drown them, but never do.
    â€œLook at this,” he said before I was even sitting down. He was pointing to a picture of a scrawny dino. It looked like an underfed naked chicken.
    â€œThat’s gallimimus,” he said. “He didn’t have teeth or claws, but he could run at forty miles an hour.”
    â€œWish I could,” I said, slumping in the chair.
    â€œNow these guys, the really big sauropods—the brachiosaurs and the diplocids—they could swing their tails at attackers.”

    â€œElliot …”
    â€œI mean probably.”
    â€œHuh?”
    â€œWe don’t know