Troy growls a little and frowns at the candy.

I lean over and take one. "Yes. No. I don't know." I twist open the cellophane wrapper. "It's more than camp, I guess."

Popping the butterscotch between my lips, I let the smoothly sweet taste melt over my tongue.

"Like what?" Nic asks.

Oh, everything. It's that I can only control my powers when I'm not trying to. It's that I'm afraid my boyfriend is getting back with his ex-or that I'm having an overreaction of jealousy. It's that I'm stuck at home with Stella, with her taking me on as her pet project. It's that I'm suddenly doubting what I learned about my dad's death, my boyfriend's loyalty, and my own sanity. It's a million things and nothing.

Not that I say any of that. Don't need to expose my friends to the insane ramblings of my brain. They might never recover.

"Like this." I lift one hip and pull two pieces of paper from my back pocket.

Nicole snatches them from my hand.

After unfolding them, she says, "They're blank."

"I know," I slide the butterscotch against my cheek so I can talk. They're not supposedto be blank. They're supposedto be e-mail printouts. I slip the butterscotch back onto my tongue and mutter, "Thtupid, curthed e-mails."

"They wouldn't print?" Troy asks.

I shake my head. When I received the second e-mail last night,almost identical to the first, I wanted a printout so I could I analyze them. Maybe find a clue to who sent them.

Forty-seven attempts later, all I had was blank paper.

"Huh." Troy's brows scrunch together. "Who were they from?"

"The same person who sent the note," Nicole suggests.

"Probably." Unable to resist, I crunch the butterscotch. Someday my teeth will be dust. "The sender's address was blocked."

"Blocked?" Troy's eyes get all wide. This was to your Academy e-mail?" When I nod., he shakes his head. "The Academy e-mail system doesn't allow blocked senders."

I shrug. As if I can change what happened.

"Show me." He leaps up from his desk chair and waves me over. "Log on to your e-mail."

With a heavy sigh, I push off the bed. It's not that I don't want to find out who sent the message, and how they managed to block the sender andkeep it from printing. I am just running low on motivation.

When I'm slow to move, Troy takes my shoulders, urges me into the chair, and shoves me closer to the desk. Grabbing the mouse, I click the Academy e-mail logo and enter my user name and password.

"See." I point at the blocked messages, still at the top of my inbox.

Troy leans over my shoulder, squinting at the screen. "I can't believe it. Academy e-mail is impenetrable. No one can bypass the security system without major repercussions."

"What about last year," I ask. "when Griffin messed with my e-mail? Every time I deleted his message a new one popped up."

"That's different." Troy rubs a hand back and forth over his shorthair. "Anyone can create a simple hack on their own computer to automatically resend a message. But this messes with the Academy server. It's impossible."

"Maybe," I say, thinking. Clearly not."But that doesn't change the fact that-"

"Let's take this to Urian," Nic says, "He'll figure it out."

"She's right. The kid's a genius." Troy jerks the desk chair back, with me in it. "Let's go."

He hurries out into the hall. Nicole shrugs, like we both knowhe's overreacting, but follows him through the door. When I getinto the hall. I see Troy knocking on a door three rooms down.When there's no answer, he rolls his eyes and knocks again, thistime with a knock-knock… knock knock-knock-knockpattern.

"Password?" a muffled voice says through the door.

"Chimera."

No answer.

"Shoot," Troy whispers. "That was yesterday's password." To the door, he says. "Scylla's strait."

Nicole rolls her eyes.

The door swings open silently.

"Don't," Troy whispers through clenched teeth, "laugh."

We walk into a room straight out of Star Wars.Complete with crossed lightsabers over the desk, black curtains blocking out the window, and a life-size Han Solo cutout in the comer.

A giggle bubbles its way to the surface. Troy cuts me a harsh look and I stifle my humor. But seriously, a life-size Han Solo?

"State your purpose?"

Turning toward the voice, I see a short, dark-haired buy pushing the door closed. I can't tell for sure-like I said, the window is blacked out and the only light in the room is coming from the glow of a computer monitor-but I don't think I know him.

"Academy e-mail," Troy says.

"Familiar," the dark-haired boy says, leaving his post at the door and sliding into the chair in front of his computer. "Situation?"

"Blocked sender." Troy moves farther into the room and sits on the unmade bed, on the edge nearest the desk.

"Impossible." Dark-haired boy clicks rapidly on his keyboard.

"Not-impossible." 'Troy says, leaning forward so he can see the monitor. "I've seen it."

Nicole leans close to my ear and whispers, "Urian's a little psycho, but he knows computers better than anyone."

Dark-haired boy stops typing. "Additional inconsistencies?"

"The message won't print."

Dark-haired boy grunts and starts typing faster than ever. Images flash across the monitor at warp speed.

I feel like I've entered nerd-ville.

I stick to my spot just inside the door. From what I can see in the flickering light, the rest of the room looks like a hurricane, tornado.,andtsunami took turns messing with the contents. I'm suddenly very glad I had to wear pants and closed-toe shoes for camp today. Who knows what's living in those piles.

"Access codes?" dark-haired boy finally asks.

"Phoebe," Troy says, "tell Urian your user name and password."

"No way," I say. I don't know this guy. I've read about those identity thieves who hijack your e-mail and use it to send spam about discount prescription drugs and pirated computer programs.

"Urian's all right," Nicole says.

I stand my ground. "I don't know him."

"Phoebe, this is Urian Nacus." She nods at the dark-haired boy. "Urian, Phoebe Castro."

Urian spins in his chair faster than an Olympic sprinter. "Castro?" he asks, brows raised. "The aponikos?"

The what?" I asked, thinking I might need to get offended.

"Descendant of Nike," Troy says quickly, as if he can sense I'm upset.

Urian leaps to his feet and bows politely. "A pleasure." Flashing me a smarmy smile, he takes my hand-which I didn'toffer-and kisses my knuckles.

"Uh, thanks," I say, retrieving my fingers.

I glare at Troy over Urian's head. What has he gotten me into?

"Please," Urian says, waving at the flickering computer screen. "Key in your user name and password. Your access codes shall remain your own."

After giving Troy one more who-is-this-guy? look, I plop into the desk chair, and access my e-mail. A split second later, my in-box is on the screen.

"That was fast," I say, impressed.

"I installed a signal enhancer," Urian says, leaning over my shoulder to read the screen. "It quadrupled my connection speed."

Figures. He probably spends all his time downloading episodes of Herculesand Xena.

Before Urian the Curious can read all my other messages, I click open the blocked e-mail.

"There it is," I say, nodding at the screen.

Urian studies it for a minute. His bushy eyebrows keep scrunching and unscrunching, as if he's physically processing with his forehead. Weird

"May I?" he asks, nodding at the chair.

I shrug and get up.

"First, I need to access the Academy mail server," he says. A new window opens up on the computer. "The original file might still contain the metadata from the-" he smacks his mouse down on the desk. "Blast! It's blocked, as well." More furious typing. "The source file didn't even log the originating IP address."

Before my eyes permanently roll back in my head from trying to follow the computer-speak, I ask, "What does that mean?"

"In plain English?" He glances up at me. "Whoever sent this is very, very smart."

"Or very, very powerful," Troy says. "Bypassing Academy e-mail security is anything but easy."

"True." Urian squints at the screen. "This isn't a simple hack job. It's going to take me a while."

"Sometime before midnight Tuesday would be nice," I say. "I'd like to know who I'm meeting."

"You're not seriously going?" Troy asks.

As if there was any doubt?

"Of course I'm going," I say. "What other choice do I have?"

"Um… not going."

"Troy, I have to find out what happened to my dad."

"We knowwhat happened to your dad. He got smoted. End of story."

"Not," I snap, "end of story. At least, not anymore. I can"t just let this go."

"Fine," Troy crosses his arms over his chest. "I'll go with you."

"Chill, Travatas." Nicole says. Then to me she says, "I think what Tarzan here is trying to say is that whoever pulled off this e-mail stunt-and snuck into the secret archives-has to be pretty powerful. And pretty devious. You shouldn't meet this person alone."

"No." I can't believe she's siding with him. "The e-mail says I have to come alone. I'm not going to blow this."

Troy glares at me, looking like he reallywants to say something more. But, instead, he turns to Urian and asks, "Can you find out before then?"

"One hundred and twenty hours, give or take?" He looks like he's crunching numbers in his head-my brain hurts just thinking about it-and then finally says. That's cutting it close. Fifty-fifty chance."

"Great, I say.

"I copied the source file into my e-mail account," Urian says. "But I may still need to access your-"

"No way." He may be helping me out, but I still only met him like two minutes ago. Besides, a girl needs her privacy.

"Not a problem," he says with a grin. "My computer recorded your keystrokes. If I need access, I have your codes."

"Great," I say, less enthusiastically than before.

"Let's meet here on Tuesday night," Nicole suggests. "Eleven o'clock?"

"Excellent," Urian says.

"Fine by me," I say, still annoyed at Troy. Since when did he become my guardian and protector?

"See you Tuesday," Troy says as we leave.

"The countdown has begun," Urian returns.

Geek melodrama. I roll my eyes.

"And, Urian," Nicole says, "you might try doing laundry once in a while."

As we step into the hall, she pulls the door shut with a slam.