Read Sabotage (Powerless Nation Book 3) for Free Online Page B

their hands.  
    “Harvey is the smartest guy in my class,” Jeremy explained. “If he says it’s going to burn, it’s going to burn.”
    “Watch,” said Harvey, unable to wait any longer. He squirted some of the glycerin from the plastic container onto the powder.
    Nothing happened.
    “Don’t feel bad,” said Dee, turning away.
    “Wait, look!” McKenna squealed. Dee looked back and saw that the substance was boiling. Suddenly it burst into a bright flame.
    “Wow!” said Harvey. “That was awesome!”
    The kids were laughing and clapping and watching the flames in the grate. They stood nearby, reaching their hands toward the warmth.
    After a few minutes, the flame began to flicker and die and the children let out a combined sigh.
    “Well,” said Dee, relieved. “That was fun. I bet it’s almost lunch time now though. Let’s clean up our books and get ready.”
    “I have some paper we can burn,” said Jeremy, producing a notebook from his back pocket.
    “Hang on,” said Dee. “That’s your school notebook. You can’t burn that.”
    “It’s made of paper, it’ll burn,” said Jeremy. He ripped out a piece of paper and set it on the flame. The chemical reaction was fading quickly and the paper almost smothered it.
    “Not like that,” said Harvey. “You have to crumple it up so it can burn the edges first.”
    “Yeah,” added Kylie. “Here, use this tissue.”
    Dee wanted to cry when the crumpled tissue was tossed on the fire. She hadn’t seen a tissue or square of toilet paper in months. The fire burned quickly through the fuel the kids tossed onto it.  
    “That’s enough,” said Dee, trying to sound firm. “It’s time we put out the fire. We all learned something new and useful from Harvey about starting a fire. Now we need to let it burn out.”
    They watched the fire for a few minutes, but it didn’t look like it was going to burn out. Dee stepped closer and looked again. The fake wood logs in the gas fireplace were on fire.
    Great , thought Dee. How am I going to put those out?
    The room was filling with smoke. “Hey, Jeremy, run and open the window, let’s see if we can get this smoke out of here.”
    She hadn’t even thought about smoke. What if it ruined the library books?
    Jeremy opened the window and a cold breeze swirled powdery snow into the room. Instead of blowing out the fire, the draft added power to it. It burned brighter, and began to lick along the bottom of the grate.
    A terrible smell filled the air. “I don’t think those logs are supposed to burn,” said Kylie, holding her fingers over her nose.  
    “This isn’t good,” said Dee. She dumped her bottle of water on the fire. It hissed, but didn’t go out. “Does anyone else have water?”
    None of the students did. Clean water was hard to come by, and most of them only had what the town supplied with their lunch.
    The flames were starting to lick at the bricks of the enclosure.
    “Guys, I think we need to get out of here,” said Dee. “Get your things. No wait, leave them. Come on!”

CHAPTER SIX

    T HE KIDS WERE SCARED now, covering their mouths and coughing in the foul smelling, smoke-filled air. “Follow me!” Dee shouted, and headed for the door. She turned to look, but no one was following. The fireplace was near the exit and no one wanted to go near it. The panicked kids were hiding under tables or throwing books at the glass windows. It was pandemonium.
    The door flew open and Max stood there, a cardboard box of lunches in his hand.
    “What in the blazes!” he shouted. “Dee, get those kids out of here!” He dropped the box on the floor and tore it open, grabbing two gallon jugs of water. He raced over to the flames and poured all of the water into the fireplace, quenching the fire and filling the air with inky black smoke.
    Sena appeared in the doorway and told Dee’s class to follow her. They evacuated through the front door of the library, huddling together in a small group near the