Hunger_A Gone Novel

by Michael Grant

  running and waving his arms like a crazy person.

  “What do I do?” Edilio asked.

  Sam cursed under his breath. “Pull over. Let’s see what

  it is.”

  Edilio hit the brakes. Zil rushed over, breathless, panting,

  flushed. He leaned on the window as Sam rolled it down. “It’s

  Hunter, man. The freak killed Harry.”

  Dekka made a sort of growling noise in her throat that

  made Zil take a step back. But he wasn’t apologizing. “That’s

  right, he’s a freak. One of you people. And he used his freak

  powers to kill Harry. For nothing.”

  “Have you found Lana?” Edilio asked.

  “I don’t know where she is.”

  “Funny how you don’t call the Healer a freak,” Dekka

  pointed out.

  “Lana’s at Clifftop,” Sam said. “Great. Now I really could

  use Brianna. Okay, we’re going to have to hope I’m just being

  paranoid about the power plant. Edilio, drop me at Hunter

  and Zil’s place. Tell your crew to head back to the plaza, hang

  around there, wait for us. Then you’ll have to head up to

  Clifftop and see if you can find Lana. All right?”

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  “Yep.”

  “Dekka, why don’t you stay with me to see what this is

  about.”

  “I’m going to go get some other normals,” Zil said. “Normals gotta know what’s happening.”

  Sam pointed his finger out of the window at him. “You’re

  going to run around waking people up out of a sound sleep?

  No. You come with us.”

  “No way, man. You and Dekka? You’re both freaks. Freaks

  always back each other up.”

  “You’re being an idiot, Zil,” Sam said. “I’m not going to

  have you running around and stirring up trouble.”

  “What are you going to do? Fry me?” Zil spread his hands

  in a gesture that was simultaneously defiant and innocent.

  “This is bull,” Sam said. “Get in, Zil. We’re wasting time

  arguing.”

  “No way, man. No way.” Zil turned and began to walk

  quickly away.

  “You want me to stop him?” Dekka asked.

  “No,” Sam said.

  “He’s going to make trouble.”

  “Sounds like Hunter already made trouble. Let’s get going,

  Edilio. Hopefully Breeze gets to the plant and at least wakes

  them up. The more I think about it, the more I think I overreacted. I don’t think Caine will start a war tonight.”

  “We may have our own war, right here in town,” Edilio

  said.

  EIGHTEEN

  18 HOURS, 47 MINUTES

  P A T R I C K F I G U R E D I T was all a party. His master was up

  in the middle of the night, and that was fun. Plus, now she

  was climbing into a pickup truck.

  Quinn was behind the wheel. Albert sat beside him. The

  backseat would normally have been a little cramped for Lana

  and Cookie, who was a very big kid, but Quinn had his seat

  pulled all the way forward so he could reach the pedals. Patrick climbed in and lay across Cookie’s lap.

  “You want to put the dog in the back?” Albert suggested.

  “And have him bark at everything we pass? Wake everyone up?”

  “Okay,” Albert said. He gave the dog a dirty look. Lana

  didn’t like that about Albert, that he didn’t like dogs, but this

  wasn’t the time to have that argument.

  At least Albert wasn’t joking about eating Patrick. She’d

  heard that from more than one person.

  The four of them—five, if you counted Patrick—had met

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  up at a muffler shop on the highway. There was a heavy-duty

  four-by-four, extended-cab pickup parked there that Albert

  figured would be just right for the cross-country travel and

  the gold.

  “Guess I better see if I know how to drive this thing,”

  Quinn said.

  “You said you know how to drive,” Albert accused.

  “I do. I’ve driven Edilio’s Jeep, anyway. But this is bigger.”

  “Great,” Albert muttered.

  Quinn turned the key and the engine roared. It seemed

  way too loud, like it would wake up the whole town.

  “Yikes,” Quinn said. He put it into drive, and the beast

  lurched forward, bumped across a curb, and fishtailed out

  onto the highway.

  “Hey, let’s not get killed, huh?” Albert yelled.

  Quinn steadied the truck and it went off at a sedate thirty

  miles an hour straight down the center of what had once been

  a busy highway.

  “You seem a little cranky, Albert,” Quinn said playfully.

  “Are you going to tell me what this trip is all about? I mean,

  it’s, what, three a.m.? We’re not going to kill a guy, right?”

  “You’re getting paid, aren’t you?” Albert snapped.

  “You haven’t told him?” Lana said from the backseat.

  “Albert, he has to know what’s going on.”

  When Albert didn’t answer, Lana said, “We’re going after

  gold, Quinn.”

  She saw Quinn’s eyes framed in the rearview mirror.

  “Um. What?”

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  “Hermit Jim’s shack. The gold,” Lana explained.

  Lana saw Quinn’s eyes again, more worried. “Excuse me,

  but last time we were out there, we were getting chewed on

  by coyotes.”

  “You know how to handle a gun now. And you have a gun

  with you,” Albert said calmly. “And Cookie has a gun. You’re

  both trained.”

  “That’s right,” Cookie agreed. “But I don’t want to shoot

  no one. Unless they mess with the Healer.”

  “And we need gold why?” Quinn asked a bit shrilly.

  “We need money,” Albert said. “You can only get so far

  with barter. We need a system, and the system works better if

  you have a basis for the currency.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Okay, look, take the fish business, right?” Albert began.

  “It hasn’t been much of a business,” Quinn grumbled. “I

  barely caught enough yesterday to make bait.”

  “You’ll have good days and bad days,” Albert said impatiently. “Some days you’ll have a lot of fish. So let’s say you want to trade some fish for oranges.”

  “Sounds good, actually. You know someone with

  oranges?”

  “You have enough fish that you want to trade some for

  oranges, and some for bread, and some for a kid to clean your

  room for you. That’s three different places you have to go

  with your fish in your hand to pay someone.”

  “Is anyone else really starving right now?” Quinn joked. “I

  mean, dude: oranges? Bread? Stop.”

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  Albert ignored him. “What you do if you have money,

  instead of just trading things, is you can have a market where

  everyone brings what they have to sell, right? All in one place.

  And everyone is walking around with pieces of gold, not

  their fish, or a wheelbarrow full of corn or whatever, trying

  to make deals.”

  Quinn said, “Either way, I’m standing around with my

  fish.
Either I’m walking around selling them at this market

  of yours, or I’m standing still and people are coming to me to

  trade, but either way—”

  “No, man,” Albert interrupted impatiently. “Because you’re

  selling your fish to someone who sells it to other people. You

  need to be out fishing, because that’s what you’re good at. Not

  selling fish. Catching fish.”

  Quinn frowned. “You mean, I’m selling them to you.”

  “Could be,” Albert agreed. “Then I sell them to Lana. That

  way, Quinn, you’re doing what you do and I’m doing what I

  do, and to make all that work out easy peasy we need money

  of some kind.”

  “Yeah, well, since I’m doing this all night there may not be

  any fish tomorrow, either,” Quinn grumbled. Then he asked

  the question Lana expected. “Why are you coming along,

  Healer?”

  The use of her “title” bothered Lana; she wasn’t quite sure

  why. And the question on top of the title bothered her. She

  didn’t like the question. She shifted in her seat and stared out

  of the window.

  “She’s coming because I need a guide,” Albert said. “And

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  I’m going to pay her. When I get the gold. Which brings us to

  a little something called credit.”

  Poor Albert, Lana thought as Albert launched into a lecture on the usefulness of credit. Smart kid. He’d probably end up owning the FAYZ some day. But he knew nothing of her

  reasons for going on this trip.

  All the gold in the world wouldn’t be enough to pay her

  for what she was planning to do. Gold couldn’t touch the cold

  dread that filled her heart. And gold wouldn’t be any use to

  her if she failed.

  “There’s more than money in the world,” Lana said, thinking she was speaking only to herself.

  “Like what?” Albert asked.

  “Like freedom,” Lana said.

  At which point Albert went on, talking about how money

  could buy freedom. Lana supposed he was right, in most

  cases. But not in this one.

  Not in this case.

  She couldn’t bribe the Darkness. But maybe, maybe . . .

  maybe she could kill it.

  Caine sat silent, biting his thumb, chewing at the ragged nail.

  Panda was driving. Computer Jack was squeezed in the

  backseat between Diana and Bug. They were the lead car. The

  second car, an SUV, was behind them, Drake and four of his

  soldiers. All were armed.

  They drove cautiously. Caine insisted on it. Panda had

  gotten better at driving, more confident, but he was still just

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  thirteen. He still drove scared.

  The SUV behind, urged on no doubt by Drake, practically

  hung on their bumper, impatient.

  Down Highway 1, past abandoned businesses, weaving

  around crashed cars and overturned trucks. All the debris of

  the FAYZ, the litter left behind by all the disappeared.

  They turned onto the power plant road.

  “Don’t drive us off the road,” Caine cautioned. “It’s a long

  drop.”

  “Don’t worry,” Panda said.

  “Uh-huh,” Caine said. There was a cliff to the left, a hundred-foot drop to the ocean rocks below. Caine wondered if he could use his powers to stop the car falling in the event

  that it did topple over. That kind of thing might be worth

  practicing, to see if he could use his telekinetic power to suspend a falling object with him inside. It would take just the right balance.

  “What was that?” Panda cried.

  “What was what?”

  “I saw it, too,” Diana said.

  “Saw what?” Caine demanded.

  “Like a blur. Like something shooting past us.”

  There was silence. Then, Caine cursed. “Brianna. Faster,

  Panda!”

  “I don’t want to run off—”

  “Faster,” Caine hissed.

  The walkie-talkie crackled. Drake’s voice. “You guys see

  that?”

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  Caine keyed his own set. “Yeah. Brianna. Either that or a

  tornado.”

  “She’ll get there before us,” Diana said.

  “She’s already there,” Caine agreed.

  “Don’t you think maybe we should do this some other

  time?” Diana asked.

  Caine laughed. “Just because Brianna is zipping around?

  I’m not worried about that girl.” It was phony bravado. Brianna “zipping around” could mean that an ambush was waiting. Or it could mean that Sam had been alerted and was

  already on his way.

  He keyed the walkie-talkie. “Drake. They may be ready

  when we get there.”

  “Good. I’m in the mood for a fight,” Drake answered.

  Caine twisted halfway in his seat to see Diana. Her nearly

  bald head was distracting. It had the strange effect of focusing

  his attention on her eyes and lips. He winked at her. “Drake’s

  not worried.”

  Diana said nothing.

  “You worried, Panda?” Caine asked. Panda was too terrified to answer. His fingers were white from gripping the wheel.

  “Nobody’s worried but you, Diana,” Caine said.

  Caine hadn’t asked Jack. He was going to be careful with

  Jack for a while. At least until the computer genius had given

  him what he needed.

  “Coming up on the gate,” Bug said.

  There was a brick guardhouse beside a tall chain-link

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  fence. Lights were blazing everywhere. Spotlights atop the

  guardhouse, trained down along the fence line in both directions. And beyond the gate the vast bulk of the power plant itself, humming, vibrating, a sinister presence in the night. It

  was bigger than Caine had imagined, and was comprised of

  several buildings, the largest of which looked like a prison. It

  could almost be a small city of its own. The parking lot was

  half full of cars, glittering in the glow.

  “There’s Brianna!” Caine cried, and pointed at the girl,

  doubled over, clutching the fence, tugging ineffectually at

  it. She glanced back fearfully at them, face blue-white in the

  headlights. She shouted something that Caine did not hear.

  In obvious frustration she rattled the chain link, unable to

  open it, unable, it seemed, to get the attention of anyone in

  the guardhouse. If anyone even was in the guardhouse.

  Panda slammed on the brakes and the car skidded.

  Caine leaped out and raised his hands toward Brianna.

  But in a blur she was gone only to reappear halfway up the

  hill to the right.

  “Hello, Brianna, long time no see,” Caine called to her.

  “Hello, Caine. How’s that leg where Sam burned your skin

  off?”

  Caine smiled at her. “Everyone out of the car,” he said in a

  whisper. “Now!”

  Panda, Jack, and Diana piled out. Bug may have piled out

  or not, Caine didn’t see him, but with Bug, that didn’t mean

  much.

  “Whatcha up to?” Brianna asked. She was chewing gum,

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  trying to act nonchalant. But Caine could see that she had not

 
yet recovered from the exertion. She would be tired. Hungry,

  too, no doubt. He wished he had some food to offer her. Like

  a bone for a dog. Test her loyalty.

  But they had not brought any food.

  “Oh, not much, Brianna,” Caine answered. He dropped

  his hands to his waist, arms crossed over his chest, and

  turned his palms toward the car behind him. Then, in

  a swift motion he rotated his arms up over his head and

  brought them down.

  The car jumped up off the ground. It was yanked into the

  sky like it was a giant’s yo-yo that had run out its string.

  The car inscribed a tight arc, twenty, thirty feet in the air,

  and hurtled down toward Brianna.

  The car smashed the dirt with shocking violence. The

  windshield and all the other windows shattered into a million

  glittering pieces. Like someone had set off a hand grenade

  inside. Two of the tires blew out. The hood popped clear off,

  twirled in the air, and crashed.

  Brianna was standing twenty feet away from the impact.

  “Wow. That was cool, Caine,” Brianna mocked. “I’ll bet

  that seemed really fast to you, huh? Car flying through the

  air all lightning quick? Why don’t you try again?”

  “She’s baiting you, Caine,” Diana said, stepping up beside

  him. “She’s stalling. Not to mention that whoever is on guard

  inside may have heard that.”

  Drake’s car had come to a stop just behind theirs. He leaped

  from the car and went racing toward Brianna, unspooling

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  his whip hand as he went.

  Brianna laughed and gave Drake the finger. “Come on,

  Drake, you can catch me.” Drake lunged at her, but suddenly

  she was behind him.

  “Knock it off, Drake,” Caine yelled. “You can’t catch her.

  And all we’re doing is making noise and wasting time.”

  “The gate’s locked,” Brianna taunted, suddenly just out of

  arm’s reach in front of Caine. When she came to a stop she

  quivered like an arrow hitting a target.

  “Gate?” Caine said. He aimed his hands at the shattered

  car. It came up off the ground and flew, tumbling, through

  the air, spraying bits of glass like a comet’s tail.

  The car smashed into the gate, ripped the gate from its

  mooring, wrapping chain link around itself, and carried the

  twisted mess for forty feet before hitting the parking lot and

  skidding into a parked minivan.