The Fog Diver Read Online Free

feeling about everything, ” I told him. “If you ever had a good feeling, you’d get a bad feeling about it.”
    â€œKeep laughing,” he grumbled. “That’s what they want.”
    â€œThey who?”
    â€œThem,” Swedish said ominously.
    Swedish was convinced that they were watching us—not Kodoc, some other they . He’d been paranoid about it for years, though he’d never managed to explain who they were or why they were so fascinated by a bunch of slumkids.
    â€œYou always say they ’re watching,” I told him. “But you never say who they are.”
    His eyes narrowed cunningly. “If I knew who they were, they wouldn’t be them .”
    Arguing with Swedish always made me dizzy. “So—because you know absolutely nothing about them, you’re absolutely sure they exist.”
    Swedish nodded. “Now you’re getting it.”
    â€œThat doesn’t make any sense!”
    â€œThat’s what they want you to think,” Swedish said.
    â€œA few wisps to the left, Swede!” Hazel called.
    â€œCan you see the buoy?” I asked her.
    â€œNot yet,” she said. “But it’s close.”
    I didn’t ask how she knew. Hazel charted the Fog better than anyone. Just like Swedish was the best pilot, and Bea kept our raft in the air better than anyone could.
    â€œClose is good,” I said.
    I tugged my goggles over my eyes. Bubbles of excitement rose in my chest and I started rolling my shoulders.
    â€œTake a hard left, Swedish,” Hazel said. “And stop fidgeting, Chess!”
    â€œI’m not fidgeting,” I informed her. “I’m limbering.”
    â€œThen stop limbering! You’re making me nervous.”
    â€œWhy?” I asked innocently. “Because if there isn’t great salvage even this far from home, we’ll never escape the slum?”
    â€œAnd you’ll never afford those pink boots you want,” Swedish called to Hazel, tapping on the steam organ.
    She glared at him. “I don’t want pink boots.”
    â€œYeah, Swede,” I said, crossing to the plank, “she wants yellow boots and pink ribbons .”
    We teased Hazel about ribbons and dresses because she was such a weird combination of “girly” and “commanding.” She wore long, flowing skirts, dreamed of fancy dances, loved pretty sunsets . . . and could bark outorders faster than the toughest junkyard boss. She was about fifteen, a few years older than me and a dozen times smarter. And pretty, with light brown eyes, dark brown skin, and dozens of silky braids.
    I looked like every other tetherkid who ran with a salvage crew. I was compact, wiry, and undersized. My boots were stained and my goggles were scraped, and the leather bracers I wore on my wrists to catch the tether were scarred. The only difference was that I always kept my head down and my hair over my freak-eye.
    Swedish looked more like a thug or a bootball player than a raft pilot. He was so burly, shaggy, and bearish that he barely fit in the thoppers—sleek, narrow airships—that he flew in drag races to earn extra money. And Bea was our kid sister, with short red hair, big green eyes, and smears of grease on her face. She didn’t dream of roast meat and conspiracies like Swedish, but of gears and pistons and building crazy new thoppers that looked like demented dragonflies and flew like hunting eagles.
    â€œOn Port Oro,” Swedish said, trying to mimic Hazel’s voice, “everyone wears yellow boots.”
    â€œAnd there are no junkyard bosses,” I added.
    â€œPigeons lay scrambled eggs,” Swedish said.
    â€œIt rains soup,” I added, “and snows rice!”
    â€œAnd apples grow on trees!”
    I gave him a look. “Um, actually, they kind of do. . . .”
    â€œOh,” Swedish muttered. “Right.”
    â€œIf you two are done,” Hazel said, eyeing