“Did either of you see Senator Bentilius’s little stunt?” Jacey asked.
“Um, yeah,” Meow Meow said. “That was weird.”
Dante stopped chewing. “What about Mad Maxine?”
Jacey started to explain, but Meow Meow stopped her. She pulled up the interview on her tablet. Dante continued with his meal as he watched. His face grew more thoughtful the longer the senator blathered on.
“She didn’t recognize me?” he said, indignantly when the senator got to that particular part. “I donated money to her campaigns. Often.”
“Why would you do that?” Jacey said.
“It made her amenable to some trade deals I needed. Business.” He shrugged it off. “But for her to say that . . .”
The interview wrapped up and Meow Meow put the tablet away. “Can we go now? If we head down the alley, we can cross the next street and then cut through the hospital. Maybe we could get a driverless to take us somewhere with fewer cameras.”
A blue light strobed at the window, then something plasticky tapped on the glass.
Meow Meow ducked. “They’ve found us.”
Jacey started to turn, but Dante threw his arm around her shoulders. “Don’t look back. Just stay calm. If they can’t see your face, they can’t identify you that easily. Especially with that odd hairdo you’ve got going there.”
Jacey allowed her elbow to sink into his gut. “Get your arm off of me, Silvio.”
He complied and returned to his noodles.
They sat in silence for a few moments, listening to the ancient woman harangue her husband about customers who didn’t order food. A rather uninspired idea popped into Jacey’s mind.
“Maybe we could bash the drones with that lady’s wok.”
Dante let out a snort. “Not a bad idea, actually.”
“Drones do make a satisfying clunk when you smack them,” Meow Meow said. “Don’t ask me how I know. But they’ll see us before we knock any out of the air. We’d never take them all out, and it’s impossible to outrun them on foot.”
“So we are truly trapped,” Dante said. “Can I borrow your tablet, Meows?”
“What for?”
“I’ll call my lawyer. Maybe she can workout some beneficial terms if I turn myself over to the IPA.”
“And what about Jacey?”
Dante set down his fork. His face aged ten years merely from the seriousness of his expression. “If we’re going to be arrested one way or the other, Jacey’s fate will be the same. I have to consider my own skin. You should, too.”
Jacey gaped at him. “After all the risks you’ve taken to help me, you’re giving up now? Why did you even bother?”
Dante lifted a shoulder. “Helping you amused me, my darling. Besides, our interests were aligned for a while. But now Senator Bentilius has exposed the whole game. SNN has already identified me as being a carbo like her and Vin. The situation has changed.”
Meow Meow made a growling sound in her throat and kicked Dante’s shin under the table.
“Ow!” He rubbed his leg and scowled at the scrawny girl. “That hurt.”
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Meow Meow said.
Jacey was going to ask the same thing but realized she didn’t care about the answer. She had to get out. Now.
She shoved Dante again. When he refused to budge, she pinched his thigh. That made him jump.
He slid out of the way and stood, rubbing his wound. “Damn, you girls can be mean.”
Jacey put on a false smile and went into the kitchen. She bowed to the old woman. In her most formal Chinese, she complimented the restaurant and her husband’s hospitality.
“He is a toothless moron,” the woman said in English. “I should divorce him and move to Paris, where my skills as a chef would be appreciated.”
There was no point in contradicting the woman. She was right, about her husband anyway. Regarding whether she was a chef or not, Jacey would have to defer to others more expert in the culinary arts. “I apologize for not ordering food, but I’m not feeling well today.”
The woman threw a fistful of sprouts into her wok, making a cloud of steam rise to the ceiling. “Get out of my kitchen.”
“I was hoping to ask a favor.”
“I already did you a favor, letting you sit in my restaurant not ordering food.”
The conversation was not going at all how Jacey had hoped. She decided to appeal to the woman’s interests. Namely, greed. If she dreamed of Paris, then surely the woman merely lacked the means to get there.
“I have rich friends. If you help us, I’m sure they could take you to Paris.”
The old woman cackled and dumped a clump of rice into the wok, followed by peas and some tiny corn cobs. “What would I do in Paris?”
“But you just said—”
“And leave my family in Chicago? I’d never see my grandchildren again. Perhaps you and your rich friends can sub-orb back and forth all day, but what use is a one-way trip for me?”
Allowing a hint of exasperation into her voice, Jacey said, “I’m trying to reach a child. She’s been kidnapped by her . . . uh, wicked uncle. I need to get out of Chicago, and there’s all sorts of people after me.”
“I know.”
“You do?”
The woman tilted her head to a blank monitor on one wall. It was small and flat, and the screen glistened with the sheen of cooking oil spatters. “I turned it off when you came into my restaurant. I recognized you right away.”
Of course she had.
The woman turned back to her cooking, pushing the frying food around with a wooden spoon and vigorously shoving and flicking the wok to toss everything together. “If my husband saw, he would turn you in. He does not know one celebrity from the next, because all he cares about is reading about cars he cannot have. Cars, cars, cars. Who needs a car? Nobody.”
With the expertise of several decades’ practice, she dumped the hot food into a paper box and clanked the wok onto the stovetop.
“I don’t like the world,” the old woman said.
The woman’s face bunched into a grimace that Jacey realized was merely her resting expression. Her words lay in the steamy kitchen like a cold carcass; Jacey didn’t know how to react.
“I called my cousin Lily,” the old woman said. “She’ll get you out of town.”
The offer made Jacey’s heart race. “Truly?”
“I told you. I don’t like the world.”
Jacey wondered if there was something particular to the woman’s phrase that didn’t translate to English quite right. But when Jacey translated it back to Chinese, it didn’t make any more sense. So maybe the woman meant exactly what she was saying. She didn’t like the world. If she saw the IPA and the news reporters as the faces of what she hated, she just might help three fugitives out of spite.
“I’m not what Senator Bentilius said.” Jacey didn’t know why she said it. Just that she didn’t want to be another aspect of the world that this woman didn’t like.
Her husband barged in and let out a rapid-fire burst of Chinese. Did his dear wife know, he asked, that they harbored three fugitives in their establishment?
The old woman told him that if he blabbed to the press or the IPA she would bludgeon him with her wok while he slept. “Cousin Lily will fetch these customers before the cops barge in here. It’s bad for business, having customers arrested.”
Wringing his hands and whining, he shuffled out of the kitchen.
“Never marry for money,” the old woman said. She handed Jacey the box of food.
“Thank you.”
“I do this only for your child.”
Keeping her mouth shut, Jacey accepted the gift. If the woman believed the child was Jacey’s daughter, then so be it. “There are drone swarms waiting for us outside.”
Making a spitting noise, the woman waved a hand, dismissing both Jacey and the drone swarms from her life. Jacey returned to the booth. A stare-down was in progress between Dante and
Meow Meow. Dante used Jacey’s arrival to look away. He noticed her box of food. “You going to eat that?”
She was. And she did, sharing a few bites with Meow Meow until the waif muttered that she was stuffed.
“Well?” Dante said. “Did you get her recipe for egg drop soup or what?”
“Her cousin is going to get us out of town.”
“And the drone swarm?” Meow Meow asked.
“She didn’t think it was a problem. I think she’s got something up her sleeve.”
“Why should we trust her?” Dante said, scraping up the last of his own meal with the edge of his fork. “Her husband robbed us blind for three beers and fifty cents worth of noodles and rice.”
“She thinks I have a daughter I’m trying to save.”
Dante froze with a fork in his mouth and shared an odd glance with Meow Meow. He plucked the fork out and chewed, face speculative. Meow Meow looked nervous. Clearly the pop starlet didn’t like relying on strangers for her escapes from the public eye.
Flummoxed at their lack of enthusiasm, Jacey leaned onto the table and glared at them. “Did either of you come up with an alternative while I was arranging transportation?”
Neither offered one.
Jacey noticed Meow Meow’s tablet was sitting next to Dante. “Did you let him call whoever it was he was going to call?”
“No. He was just re-watching that stupid interview with Senator Palpatina.”
“Who?”
“Never mind. I keep forgetting you’ve never seen the movies everyone in history has seen a million times.”
“And you,” Jacey said to Dante, “are you coming with us or not?”
“I never said I wanted to turn myself in.” He pushed his empty plate away and sighed contentedly. “I’d prefer to stay out of the IPA’s clutches. There are other . . . indiscretions . . . in my past they may or may not have forgotten about.”
Jacey finished her beer and used the tiniest—and most disgusting—bathroom she’d ever seen. When she emerged, the old man was standing next to an enormous woman in a lily-patterned muumuu.
“This Lily,” the man said. “She take you the hell out of here.”
Dante noticed the woman’s dress pattern. “A little on the nose, don’t you think?”
Jacey silenced his chuckles with a glare, then smiled at the woman. She had blond hair, cut short. Her flattish nose, almond eyes, and pale skin spoke of a diverse ancestry. The most striking thing about her, though, were the thick, muscular arms jutting from the short sleeves of the dress. Her skin was almost translucent, exposing veins and striations of muscle tissue.
Lily spoke, voice soft. “Su Lin’s husband said Jackie and Meow Meow were in her restaurant. I didn’t believe him because he is a renowned moron. But here you are. In the flesh.”
The old woman—Su Lin—called from the kitchen. “Get them out of here. Drone swarms.”
“This way.” Lily led them through the kitchen and out a narrow door in the back. It didn’t lead outside, but into a long corridor going left and right. Lily took them left, then down several flights of a stuffy stairwell. They came out in a parking garage similar to the one beneath the hotel.
“Keep your head down,” Lily said. “Drones might come in here.”
The enormous woman with muscular arms led them to a truck-like vehicle she called a van. There were no seats or windows in the back, just a bare metal floor and stacks of fabric, all floral-patterned.
They piled in, Meow Meow sighing with relief as soon as the side door slid shut. Darkness engulfed them, relieved only by the dimness shining through the windshield. Lily jabbed a screen next to the steering wheel. It flickered a while, but nothing came up until Lily smacked it with her knuckles. A map appeared.
Dante whistled. “This beast is an antique. Does that GPS even work anymore?”
Without looking back, Lily said, “There are still some positioning satellites broadcasting, thanks to the GPS Club. They teamed with a couple of the rocket gangs in Chile to launch some new ones a few years back.”
Lily started the engine and pulled out. They climbed a few ramps and came onto a brightly lit street. A break in the storm clouds allowed yellowish light through, bathing the buildings and sidewalks a sickly yellow. It was midday, Jacey realized.
“See any swarms?” Meow Meow asked Lily.
“Nothing unusual. I doubt they’ll have much interest in an old van like this.”
Dante sniffed. “What’s that smell? Is that gasoline?”
“It is indeed,” Lily said, obvious pride in her voice. “I modded her to hold an extra hundred gallons. My suppliers are far apart, and I need the range. I don’t like charging batteries because the charge stations keep track. I don’t want them knowing where I make my deliveries.” Lily looked at the roof of her van and shivered.
“Where are you taking us?” Jacey asked. The smell of fuel was a bit thick, making her light-headed.
“Out of the city.”
“But where?”
“There is only one ‘out of the city,’ Jackie. The barrens.”
“Well, shit,” Dante said. Meow Meow nodded in agreement.
“What is the significance of ‘the barrens’?” Jacey asked.
Dante shrugged slightly, then leaned his back against the steel side of the van and stretched out his legs. “The land between the edge of the metropolis and the fence is called the barrens. You’ll see why. It’s a good place to go because there won’t be as many cameras out there. But there isn’t much of anything else out there, either. Including law, order, or restaurants.”
“How about a way to contact Dr. Carlhagen’s old holodesk on Aphrodite?” Jacey really needed to talk to Humphrey. Maybe he could help her make a reasoned decision. She was starting to consider turning herself in to Captain Wilcox. She desperately wanted to go to Dr. Carlhagen and get Livy released. The problem with that plan was that she doubted the old man would actually do it. He had all the leverage, and she had none.
“A holodesk?” Lily laughed and eyed Jacey in her rearview mirror. “You’ll be lucky if you get more than a gigabit of bandwidth out there. And that won’t be cheap.”
“Maybe we shouldn’t leave the city,” Jacey said. “I need to talk to my friends. They could be anywhere right now. And they need to know about Senator Bentilius.”
“Meow Meow?” Dante asked with feigned curiosity, “you know Chicago better than either of us. Tell us, in the whole Indie-Minnie corridor, isn’t there someplace safe for three celebrities wanted by the IPA, two of whom are carbos?”
Jacey sighed at his sarcasm. “Point taken.”
Meow Meow seemed to consider the question anyway. “Siggy was my main fixer in Chicago. Everyone else I know in the Corridor worked for him. I have a lot of friends here, but I can’t bring this crap down on them. Their idea of lying low is grounding their drone swarms for an afternoon while they get massages. If we head north toward Minneapolis, we’ll have to go through the Viking toll checkpoints.”
“Nobody strip-searches Lily,” Lily called from the front. The windshield wipers swung side-to-side, barely keeping up with fat drops splattering onto the glass. The sun was still cutting through, though it appeared to be a losing its battle with dark clouds.
Sounds of revving engines, horns, and squealing brakes surrounded the van as it pushed through traffic. Jacey sprawled across a pile of fabric bolts. The van crept forward, then stopped, crept forward, then stopped. Exhaust fumes tainted the air.
Meow Meow huddled by the rear doors, knees up, tablet in her hands. “South toward Indianapolis are the corn families and cattlemen. I hear the range riders tend to shoot first. The highway is fenced on both sides, anyway. If someone does get wind of us, IPA can close lanes with pop-up cones to funnel us anywhere they want.
“Like I said,” Lily muttered. “I’m taking you out of the city. Where you go after that is not my problem. But it is a big problem, ha ha.”
Jacey was having a difficult tim
e caring. Her eyes kept closing. All the running and hiding had finally caught up to her. “Wake me up if we get caught.”
Dante found a scrap of fabric and tied it into a mask over his eyes. “Me too.”
Lily turned on some music, an odd throbbing style with a man shouting rhymes about how amazing he was in bed.
Jacey dreamed of Isaac’s Beach, of floating on her back and watching the gulls soar.
19
Two was Good
The pixel wall showed real-time images of the western coast. Ranks of waves curled toward shore, piling against each other as they met the shallow reef bordering the southern reaches. Mist rose from the rocks as the mighty sea beat herself against the unmovable land.
Dr. Carlhagen tipped up his glass of iced tea. The early lunch of salad with avocado and smoked salmon was what he needed, but not what he wanted. Mixed greens never tasted good, no matter what icky oil-and-vinegar concoction you put on them. Maxine seemed to be enjoying her salad.
“You seem rather chipper,” he said to her, taking a small forkful of food meant for rabbits. “I’m glad to see you are adapting to the new way of things.”
She smiled, lips pressing together as she swallowed. “I’m a pragmatist, Christof. I did not get to where I am by beating my ahead against brick walls. Besides, we were never on opposite sides. The Scion program is even more useful now that you’ve revealed the full scheme to me.”
“It is powerful. But your usefulness is limited, Maxine. Soon I won’t have to rely on your influence in government affairs.”
She paused her chewing and regarded him. One eyebrow lifted a fraction. “I suppose not. However, it is senseless to throw the baby out with the bathwater. I have a great depth of experience. Use it. Let me counsel you.”
“What, are you offering to be my Gandalf?” He snorted in derision. “Wormtongue is more like it.”
“You’re immune to my charms, Christof. I recognize that. But my fate is tied to yours. The ATR assures that.” She had selected a white wine to accompany her salad. She took a delicate sip. “I know you don’t trust me. You shouldn’t, given our past. But there are ways I can assist you that don’t require you to trust me.”
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