by Kelly deVos
PRAISE FOR DAY ZERO
“A high-octane thrill ride.”
—Laurie Forest, author of The Black Witch Chronicles
“A fascinating, fast-paced thriller. Don’t miss this memorable, refreshing book.”
—Adrianne Finlay, author of Your One & Only
“Gripping, bold, and infused with real heart.”
—Jessie Hilb, author of The Calculus of Change
“An ambitious, caffeine-infused buzz-ride!”
—Nancy Richardson Fischer, author of The Speed of Falling Objects
“A riveting tale full of heart and adventure.”
—Laura Taylor Namey, author of The Library of Lost Things
Books by Kelly deVos
available from Inkyard Press
Fat Girl on a Plane
The Day Zero Duology
Day Zero
Day One
Kelly DeVos
DAY ONE
Kelly deVos is from Gilbert, Arizona, where she lives with her high school sweetheart husband, teen daughter and superhero dog, Cocoa. She holds a BA in creative writing from Arizona State University. When not reading or writing, Kelly can typically be found with a mocha in hand, bingeing the latest TV shows and adding to her ever-growing sticker collection. Day One is her third novel.
Contents
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Quote
MacKenna
Quote
Jinx
Letter #2 Endings And Beginnings
And Then...
Acknowledgments
Excerpt from Fat Girl on a Plane by Kelly DeVos
JINX
Tomorrow.
I will save my brother.
Of course, I’ve been telling myself that every night for the past month. I’m no closer to my goal than when Mom shot my father and then kidnapped my little brother, Charles, off the beach in Puerto Peñasco.
Lately, it’s been getting cramped down here.
It feels like we’ve been in my father’s underground doomsday bunker for an eternity. The bunk beds, the dried emergency food kits, the command center, the indoor garden, the paranoid alarm systems—these things have become our whole world. Like a prison we’ve sentenced ourselves to remain in.
We’re starting to snap at each other, the way people do when they spend too much time in one cramped place sharing a tiny bathroom. Jay Novak, my stepfather, is running out of reading material. Gus Navarro, my kind-of-boyfriend and my father’s protégé, and MacKenna, my stepsister, are running out of political arguments. Toby, my stepbrother, barely says anything at all.
Things have gotten worse since last week, when I cracked Dad’s code storage system. Dad was nothing if not meticulous, and he chose to store his complicated algorithms on dozens and dozens of old floppy disks. Each one had its own puzzle that had to be solved, and each disk could be used only once. I used to love antique computers, but I find myself missing modern laptops. Missing e-tablets and lightning-fast networks.
I could barely work on the encryption key for a couple hours each day. It was exhausting, and the thought of making a mistake kept me awake most nights. It’s the type of thing I would have asked my dad about.
Except Dad is gone.
Forever.
We buried him in Rocky Point.
Now that we have the key, now that we know we can leave, things are more tense. Somehow, everyone was happier when we believed we were trapped here forever.
The weather has been getting warmer. The ocean is still cold. Too cold for swimming, but the March temperatures are perfect for sitting on the beach. The breezy days are a reminder of when I thought I’d have another future. One where I might be in Mexico on vacation and not hiding to save my life.
Tonight, it’s my turn to watch the command center. I switch on the camera feed and stare at the stacks of video monitors. It’s the same as always. We’re alone. The Xcalak beach in Quintana Roo is deserted. The waves come in and out, brushing the sand smooth, creating a hypnotic black-and-white motion across the screen.
Navarro is asleep, snoring in the bunk nearest the desk, his dark head of hair turned away from me. I close my eyes for a moment, try to avoid looking at him. He saved my life. And here I am, lying to him. Keeping things from him.
But I have to.
Trying not to make too much noise, I lightly press a few keys on the ancient beige box of a computer that Dad had left behind for me to use. I wait until I can see the sun poking above the horizon line on the video monitors before I type the last line of code.
AT
!Allow up to 10 seconds to get a response from radio
Timeout 5000
AT&F
AT+XMM
AT+CXATT=0
Wait 25000
!Wait 25 seconds to allow for recalibration lag
AT+CXDCONT=1,”IP”,”“
AT+CXYQRYQ=1,0,64,384,0,0,0,0,”0Y0”,”0Y0”,3,0,0
AT+CXYQMIN=1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,”0Y0”,”0Y0”,0,0,1
AT*YIAAUW=1,1,”“,”“,00001,0
My arms are heavy with resignation as I press the last key to bring the satellite online.
After a while, everyone wakes up and we go through our morning routine.
At breakfast, we take up our usual places. Almost in the center of the bunker, there’s an old kitchenette set that, at one time, was probably in some hamburger diner. The chipped, yellowing Formica tabletop has seen better days, and its aluminum legs are dented and dinged.
Jay gives me an encouraging smile before he sits in the faded turquoise chair at the head of the table, and I exhale. I’m grateful for my stepfather’s kindness, especially considering my mother framed him for a crime he didn’t commit and left him for dead. My stepsiblings, Toby a
nd MacKenna, crowd on either side of their father. Navarro slides into his chair at the opposite side of the table, and I sit between him and MacKenna. That leaves an open chair across from me.
Where Charles should be.
It’s green pepper omelet day, which is one of my least favorite meals. There’s something about canned, reconstituted scrambled eggs that never turns out quite right. The peppers have an odd metallic aftertaste. But Navarro insists we keep the meals in rotation.
I look out into the space behind the table, at the bunk beds that line the walls, the racks of dried enchiladas and bottled water, the planter boxes flanked by pulsing, hydroponic lights.
Toby lets his spoon fall into his empty bowl, and a shadow falls across his face as he leans back in his chair. “We’ve been here long enough. It’s time. We have the key.”
“We don’t know if it works,” Navarro says.
I frown at him. My dad made the key. “It works.”
On the mess of old floppy disks and ancient computers, my father left two things. The code that formed the encryption key we need to hack into the computers of First Federal Bank—
MacKenna glances up from the paperback book she’s using as writing paper. “And we have the name.”
—and a message.
Take the key to Esmerelda Ojos.
The name.
Jay rubs his eyes. “We don’t even know who that is. If she’s dead or alive. Or how difficult it will be to find her.”
Navarro is silent for a few seconds before adding, “One of us should drive south. Into a town. Get a computer with network access. Do some research. Report back.”
In some ways, Navarro was the best prepared for our new way of life. He’d done tons of disaster drilling with his own family and trained with my father. In other ways, though, he’s had it rough. He hasn’t been able to contact his family. And he’s having a hard time adjusting to life without the drills. That’s what he’s doing how. Trying to write the next chapter in Dad’s book, Dr. Doomsday’s Guide to Ultimate Survival.
My pulse quickens as I spend a second too long staring at Navarro’s handsome, chiseled face. He thinks we have no way to communicate with the outside world.
I know I should have told him. Told him that I found the satellite dish hidden in the shed above the bunker, behind a retractable panel. That I knew how to bring it online. That we could get the information we need without leaving the bunker.
Navarro would have tried to stop me from activating the dish.
But I also know that operating the dish would be risky. Best-case scenario, my old “friend” Terminus, who now works for The Opposition, would be monitoring network traffic and watching internet searches. Looking for patterns. Looking for us.
And the worst-case scenario? That was my mother.
“I don’t want to stay here,” Toby comments. “We can’t stay here forever.”
Jay doesn’t say anything. Some days, I think he and Navarro would like nothing better than to stay here. To wait. To hide. To see if the coming war is a storm that will pass.
But he should know better than anyone.
Rule one: Always be prepared.
My father would never have left us without a plan.
MacKenna’s ponytail bounces as she gives me a small nod of encouragement.
This is our plan after all. We’re in uncharted territory. No more master plans from my father. No more chapters in Dad’s book. MacKenna and I are calling the shots, and maybe we don’t know what we’re doing.
I suck in a deep breath. “We have a satellite dish.”
For the first time in weeks, Toby sits up straight and his shoulders aren’t slumped down. “Does it work? Do we have internet access?”
An expression of horrified betrayal settles onto Navarro’s face. “How long have you known this?”
Jay gestures toward the corner where the computers and monitors are clustered together on a steel desk. “Jinx, what does that mean? We can contact people? Or they can find us?”
They. The Opposition. The government. The National Police.
I hold Navarro’s tense gaze.
He chews on his lower lip. “Susan. Tell me you didn’t bring a satellite online and connect a computer to it. Tell me you wouldn’t do that without at least discussing it with me.”
Jay shifts his weight in his chair and clears his throat. One of our ongoing problems is that Navarro keeps forgetting who ought to be in charge.
Behind us, from the corner of the bunker, the old NeXT workstation beeps, and the black radiation-shielded monitor flickers on.
“Susan...” Navarro says. “What did you do?”
But I’m not going to play by the old rules anymore.
The plan is in motion.
“What did you do?”
My teacher said journalists have to be fair, to be open-minded and to support the civil exchange of ideas. But what’s happening isn’t at all civil, and I can’t tell this story in a way that goes down smooth with your oatmeal.
—MacKENNA NOVAK,
Letters from the Second Civil War
MacKENNA
The inverted pyramid.
That’s how we write stories.
I’ve got a draft going of my first field report.
Okay, MacKenna. Let’s go. Let’s do this thing.
FIELD REPORT #1; QUINTANA ROO, MEXICO
Dr. Charles Maxwell Marshall II, more popularly known by his hacker alias, Dr. Doomsday, was killed last month at the beachfront home of a deceased operative for The Spark in Puerto Peñasco, Mexico. Dr. Marshall, author of the bestselling survivalist book, Dr. Doomsday’s Guide to Ultimate Survival, was shot once in the abdomen by his ex-wife, Stephanie Maxwell Novak. Sources believe that Ms. Novak is a high-ranking undercover agent for The Opposition’s secret paramilitary force who had been covertly assigned to frame her second husband, Jay Novak, for detonating a series of explosions at First Federal Banks. The attacks, which targeted locations responsible for storage of the banks’ paper records, backfired and triggered widespread financial and political instability. Mr. Novak had been serving as security director at the First Federal Bank in Rancho Mesa, Arizona, one of five buildings destroyed.
Okay. Okay.
Those were the major points.
The widest part of the pyramid.
LEAD: Dr. Doomsday killed by wife. Jay Novak framed for domestic terrorism.
But if Mr. Johnson were here, he’d already have kicked this back to me.
Fact check: Jay Novak hasn’t been cleared of charges.
Bias check: Where’s your evidence that Jay Novak was framed?
Fact check: Who are your sources?
Bias check: You can’t use yourself as an anonymous source.
But Johnson wasn’t here and, anyway, no more teachers, no more books.
One of the few fringe benefits of being on the run with your dad, your brother, your stepsister and some total weirdo you picked up along the way is that you never have to go back to high school. No more dress codes. No more book reports. No more grades.
No more rules.
But also, no more school dances.
No graduation day.
My life is basically over.
Like, how does this even happen? One day I’m at my desk imagining myself at the White House Press Dinner, and now...
What would all my friends at school think if they saw me looking like this? These days, I choose the pants I wear based on how many pockets they have. Some family of moths is dying of starvation now that I’ve pulled this horrible cardigan out of the closet.
I scowl at the flap of Comanche Moon.
Dr. Doomsday built this bunker, and he thought of everything. Except office supplies. So...no e-tablets. No old-fashioned writing paper either. There are precisely two pens, one che
wed-up pencil and a stack of dusty paperback books.
So... I’m stuck writing my reports in the margins of a dead man’s books.
Dr. Marshall’s death occurred during a confrontation between Ms. Novak and Marcus Tork, a consultant for the National Police, ostensibly assigned to track and capture Mr. Novak.
Fact check: What was Tork’s actual job title?
Like, who the hell knows? How would I ever find out?
Does it even matter?
However, sources now believe that Ms. Novak and Mr. Tork were working together to...
Fact check: To what? Did I even really know?
Okay. Keep it together, MacKenna.
...to recover digital bank data encrypted by Dr. Marshall. As an accomplished systems engineer, Dr. Marshall successfully implemented a zero-day exploit designed to corrupt financial records stored on First Federal’s mainframe computers. The hack was timed to coincide with Ammon Carver’s presidential inauguration, which took place in January prior to the explosions.
Fact check: First Federal Bank hasn’t identified the hacker.
Source check: Who is available to explain a zero-day exploit?
I glance at Jinx, who’s staring out into space, poking at a bowl of scrambled eggs. Checking out Navarro when she thinks I’m not watching.
Navarro is pacing around, glaring at Jinx for hacking or fixing or whatever she did to the satellite. He’s clearly pissed we didn’t ask for his permission. But we all know he would never have agreed with a plan to leave the bunker. Neither would my dad for that matter.
First Federal Bank is the country’s largest and oldest financial institution. Facing the loss of both its paper and digital records, First Federal has struggled to pay deposits and properly collect payments. Congress has frozen electronic payment processing networks and authorized banks to remain closed if necessary. The situation has triggered widespread panic, including a series of “run on the bank” type altercations that have become increasingly violent.
Source check: The Dallas Herald.
Aha! Take that, Mr. Johnson. I have a citation.
I pull out a piece of folded printer paper. It’s a news report, complete with pictures that show a bloody scene in First Federal’s Houston branch. National Police in body armor are beating back men in jeans and sweaty shirts and pushing against women in housedresses as a mob presses into the interior of the bank lobby. The place was designed to have a charming, country-western vibe to it.