Tales of the Republic (The Complete Novel)

by M. G. Herron

  Po stood, slowly this time. She refused to be intimidated. Captain Wallace straightened, and looked away, obviously embarrassed.

  “You forget,” Po said, the low embers of her rage blooming in her core, keeping her warm and calm, “that my parents were murdered that night. By Citizen. The same rebels who took me prisoner. And you think I wanted to leave my sister there, alone in that cold dark water? I will not be intimidated by the same people who failed to protect us. To protect me, and Jia, and my parents. The blood of my father and my mother is on your hands as much as it is on mine! And just because you think I’m hiding something doesn’t make it true.”

  Po’s balled fists shook. Her jaw throbbed as she unclenched her teeth and took a deep breath. “I stand by what I’ve told you, captain. Believe me or don’t—that’s up to you. Now, I think we’re done here, yes?”

  CHAPTER 42

  GO

  As Po walked out of the corner office ahead of Captain Wallace, the door to the precinct burst open, the back of it slamming into the wall.

  “Captain?” a distraught voice called. “Captain Wallace, are you here?”

  A round-faced, dark-haired man walked in and wandered in a tight circle, repeating the captain’s name. Several officers quickly closed in on him, cutting off Po’s view of the man.

  Wallace swore under his breath. Po moved aside to let the captain and his detective go ahead of her. The detective hesitated, glancing back at Po.

  “She’s free to go,” Wallace said.

  Grumbling under his breath, the detective obeyed his captain and followed Wallace away.

  Po craned her neck to spot the newcomer in the crowded precinct. It was hard to see the man’s face with all the officers packed around him. Po moved closer, toward the bank of desks where two dozen officers were furiously busy processing incoming perps.

  From a new angle, Po could see that the distraught man near the front door wore a disheveled suit, wrinkled like he’d tried to sleep in it. When he turned his face, she saw him in profile, and in a flash knew who it was. His hair was an unkempt, ratted mess, but he was unmistakably the man who visited their farm the day her world changed—Magistrate Kai Ming, who Ari used to work for. The little hairs on Po’s arms stood on end. What was he doing here?

  It looked like Ming had aged a decade since she had last seen him. Did he have those grey hairs at his temple that day on the farm? Po couldn’t recall. The look on his face now was familiar—a near-tangible admixture of worry and fear that carved furrows through his brow. Puffy bags under his eyes were the color of bruises.

  Po stood. She must speak with him. He was an old friend of her father’s, and she had seen his name in the news concerning Minister Joseph Khan and the corruption charges. Ming knew Ari better than almost anyone. He would be able to prove that Ari wasn’t working with the rebels.

  Po glanced around. Kylie was wringing her hands and following Uncle Bohai with her eyes. Her uncle was pushing through the officers to get to Ming. The stock Euro officer who had been brawling a minute ago stood from his cubicle with a few of his colleagues and craned their neck around to see the disturbance at a better angle. A slight Indian boy sat with his back to Po on a nearby chair, along with a dozen other young perps who had been brought in this morning.

  “Move back!” Captain Wallace said. “Give the man some space to breathe.”

  The half dozen officers crowding around Ming stepped back two paces. Bohai moved to Ming’s side, and put his hand on his arm to steady the man.

  “Is it true?” Ming asked. “Is it really Ari? He’s alive?”

  Wallace held a hand out palm forward, in a placating gesture. “Yes. But we don’t know the whole story. We’re still trying to locate him.”

  “Impossible,” he said, shaking his head firmly. “No. How? How is he alive?”

  “Sit down, and I’ll tell—”

  Ming cut him off. “I watched him die!” He swayed on his feet, his eyes rolling into his head. Ming tilted to one side, lost his footing, and Uncle Bohai caught him as he fainted. Po cursed out loud. Lousy timing. Wallace held him up from the other side. Together the three men staggered to the side and set the limp Ming down in a chair.

  “Po,” someone whispered. “Po!”

  The hairs on the back of her neck stood straight up. She turned toward the familiar voice. The slight Indian boy being processed by the Euro officer—no longer paying attention to him, but watching Ming and Wallace with his back to them both—was Nando, the orphan who had led her and Ari into a trap.

  “You!” Po whispered, incredulous.

  Most of the officers were rubbernecking to get a better view of the magistrate. No one seemed to be paying attention to Nando or Po, not even Aunt Kylie.

  A small metal bracelet where the boy’s wrist had been locked a moment ago now swung loose at the desk.

  “You little shit, I ought to skin you alive for leaving Ari and I to those skinheads. They nearly killed us!”

  “Listen, I can explain—”

  “Fat chance,” Po said. “I don’t know what grift they caught you up in this time, but you deserve whatever punishment you get.”

  “I’m sorry,” Nando said. “Really. I was just doing what I had to do to survive.”

  Po took a deep breath to cuss him out again, but caught it in her throat. Isn’t that what she told herself? She was just doing what she had to do to survive?

  “I owe you. I owe you big time,” he said. “Let me make it up to you. I can get us both out of here.”

  “No tricks,” Po said.

  One side of Nando’s mouth twitched up. “But Po, tricks are my specialty.”

  He picked up a pen from the officer’s desk and threw it across the room. It bounced off the jowls of the rotund Chinese officer, who was also watching the commotion with Ming.

  The Chinese officer turned and grimaced. “Hey!” he shouted. “You throw that at me?”

  “I’ve had about enough of your crap,” the Euro officer near Po snarled back. “Piss off.”

  The bulky Chinese man crossed the space between them in three big strides, cocked back his fist, and nailed the Euro officer right in the jaw. The man’s head snapped back with a sickening sound, but it didn’t take him out. He lowered his already significantly lower center of gravity, picked the larger Chinese officer up by his legs, and body slammed him against the ground.

  Po watched all of this with utter fascination, like a slow-motion film. The fighting quickly disintegrated into a dozen-person brawl, fists swinging, fabric ripping as they tore at each other’s uniforms. Wallace was forced to turn away from Ming to break up the fight. Uncle Bohai gently slapped Ming in the face, trying to get him to wake up. Meanwhile, Kylie had taken Jia and retreated back into the safety of Wallace’s office, closing them both in.

  Through the glass of the office window, Po met Kylie’s eyes. Kylie beckoned for Po to join her in the office. Po shook her head.

  “Let’s get out of here!” Nando whispered. He had moved off a few feet and was halfway to a side door marked for emergency exit only, crouched low and ready to flee, like a frightened forest animal. Po pursed her lips. She still didn’t trust the little urchin.

  She looked down at the desk of the Euro officer. A set of keys lay there, ripe for the taking.

  Nando couldn’t lead her astray if she was driving, now could he?

  Po reached her hand out. Hesitated. She looked back at Kylie one last time. Kylie was shaking her head and mouthing “No,” although Po couldn’t hear her through the glass.

  Po could just see the dark top of Jia’s little head. Her sister was as safe as she could possibly be with Kylie and Uncle Bohai. There was no chance to talk to Ming any more, even if he could vindicate Ari from the false accusations. It was up to Po then—and this was her one opportunity to search for Ari on her own.

  How am I supposed to find him? she wondered. He’d promised to find her, but that was before she knew that Captain Wallace and his lead detect
ive would be hell bent on hunting him down. If Ari came looking for her, or tried to contact Po, they would catch him and possibly kill him in the process, and it would all be her fault. Ari didn’t have people to help him like Po did.

  She had to warn him. Somehow. She was his only chance.

  Po swiped the keys off the desk, then followed Nando out the door of the precinct while the officers were distracted by the fight. The emergency bell sounded, but everyone was too caught up in the commotion to notice two kids running out the side door.

  The heat of high noon hit Po like she had walked into a wall. The muted sun glared down through a mid-day haze.

  Nando, down the street, beckoned her to follow him. She fumbled the keys in her hand until she found the key fob. She pressed the lock button, pointing in both directions up and down the street.

  A light electric motorcycle at the end of a row of police-marked cruisers flashed its lights in time with the buttons Po pressed on the fob. She ran to it, fumbled the ignition until the dashboard blinked on. Her father used to keep dirt bikes at the farm to get around in a hurry if there was a need, and also for fun when they had friends over to visit. A motorcycle wasn’t so different from a dirt bike. Just bigger.

  It lurched forward. She found the rear brake with her right heel and stopped it. The bike’s electric engine hummed pleasantly where her thighs gripped the body of the bike.

  “Hop on,” Po said.

  Grinning like a madman, Nando jumped on the back and gripped her torso tight with his wiry arms. “Go. Gogogo!”

  Po opened the throttle, and the police station fell out of sight behind them.

  CHAPTER 43

  IN SEARCH

  She accelerated away from the police station and banked the bike hard right around the corner. Nando grabbed two fistfuls of her shirt as they tilted, hugging the turn, and yelped when he nearly lost his seat.

  Had Nando fallen off, she would have left the little bastard in the street. He deserved it. Po couldn’t wait until they got out of dodge so she could wring his little neck. For now, she satisfied herself with scaring the crap out of him, taking several more hard turns.

  “Is anyone following us?” Po shouted into the wind.

  She felt Nando twist in his seat to look back. “I don’t see anyone,” he said.

  After a couple miles more, Po slowed the bike to a normal speed that wouldn’t draw any more unwanted attention. Identical row houses and chain stores on this street had the blasted, skid-row look of a place that recently bore witness to several firefights in the vicinity. These buildings fared better than many that Po had seen, but few parts of this city, especially here in the poorer districts, had escaped unscathed.

  They pulled onto a major highway that led down around the overpopulated sprawl of Fields to the downtown core. Traffic was light, but many abandoned vehicles lined the sides of the road. At several exits closer to downtown, traffic had backed up, the vehicles abandoned, and no one came back to clear them. Here, Po was forced to slow the bike and weave between the cars. Luggage and hurriedly packed dry goods filled the back seats of cars, and some even overflowed onto the street.

  “I found a couple new shirts here last week,” Nando said. “And these shoes! Pretty nice, eh?”

  He wiggled his black and red sneakers at Po. They looked almost new. She snorted and shook her head. “You’re resourceful, I’ll give you that much.”

  As they came over the next overpass, the skyscrapers rose out of the core, stalwart and unbending. A calico mass flowed out from the feet of the buildings—the thousands of protestors still packed into Telerethon Square and the rest of the core. From this distance, the people lost their individuality and seemed like one creature, undulating like an ever-changing growth that coated the floor of the city.

  The massive plaza of Telerethon Square could be seen plainly at this distance. And just east of it, the mass hit a wall where the army had set up their new barricades.

  To the right, the army’s lines bent around the gilded Capitol building. The dozen Doric columns on its front face were angled toward downtown, toward the city. The deep gorge of Enshi river at its back wrapped the whole scene in a soft embrace. Away on the opposite side, all the way to the west, across the river at the edge of Fields, a lone green spot stood out from the black and brown and grey monotony of the cityscape—Po’s home, the soft, rolling hills of King Valley.

  Ahead, the highway branched. She could go left, and it would take her down through Fields to King Valley.

  But Ari would not be there. He didn’t remember the farm and would have no reason to go all the way out to King Valley.

  Where would he go? Where would he be safe?

  Po closed her eyes and pictured him running away from the police in the middle of the night, after leaving her aunt’s house in Rose Petal. The only way he would be likely to go was the way he knew—the way they had come, which she only told Wallace much later. He must have crossed the river at some point. He would be looking for somewhere dark and safe, somewhere familiar to hide for a while…

  She groaned when she realized where he must have gone. Underground, where the cops and drones couldn’t find him. She spit onto the ground, trying to get rid of the bitter taste in her dry mouth. She recalled his words before he jumped out the window: “It’s all my fault. I was working with them.”

  Them. Felix and the rebels. Citizen.

  Of course. Of course he would have gone back underground, in search of safety. In search of answers.

  Po adjusted her grip on the bike’s handlebars and let out a slow, trembling breath.Then she opened the throttle once again and steered down the branch that led right, toward Telerethon Square, toward the people’s occupation.

  Back on city roads, Po rolled through a stop sign, then came upon a straggle of people, and coasted into what once might have been a pleasant small park. The grass had been trampled into mud. Something like fifty dirty people wearing rags wandered aimlessly. Several young people slept in the spotted shade under the bare trees. Near the sidewalk at the far end, a publicly managed row of garbage and recycling bins seemed to have overflowed across the whole park.

  Po swerved through the assembled malingerers, and nudged Nando to hop off. He did so, and Po swung her leg over, running beside the bike until it slowed down. Nando began to move away. Po set the bike down and grabbed his shirt to stop him.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” Po said. “You owe me an explanation. And an apology.”

  “For what? Didn’t I just help you get away from the cops?”

  “I got us out of there by taking this bike. But I would have gotten out just fine without you. In fact, I helped you get away. So now you owe me an apology and a thank you.”

  “Sorry, thanks.”

  Po grabbed at his shirt and pulled Nando close. This twerp was barely older than her little sister! Where did he get off talking to her like that? In her anger, the bike dropped to the ground, but she didn’t care. Nando’s eyes bulged in his head, and he squirmed. Po dug her fingernails into his biceps, and though he struggled mightily, she refused to let go.

  “That didn’t sound like you meant it.”

  “What do you want from me?”

  “You owe me,” she said. “What would Noura think if she knew what you tried to do to Ari and I?”

  He looked everywhere but at Po’s face. She shook him, hard.

  “Ow! Come on!”

  “You almost got us killed!” Po yelled. Other people in the park were looking at them now, but Po paid them no heed. She shuddered with the memory. “Those sick bastards would have raped me and then roasted me on a spit. Did you know they were flesh eaters?”

  Nando cast his eyes down and sullenly shook his head.

  “You don’t know what it’s like,” Nando said.

  Po could see the guilt in his face, but it was hidden behind a desperate, sulky anger. Anger she could understand. And guilt. Memories of her mother correcting her stance while she pr
acticed her katas flooded her mind. What would her mom think if she saw her like this?

  Po loosened her grip on Nando. She held him more softly, but didn’t let go of him. “Why were you there in the police station?”

  “Got caught stealing food.”

  That did it. Her desire to claw her sweet revenge from this urchin’s hollow cheeks broke in half. She didn’t feel generous enough to forgive him completely yet, but she didn’t want to break his neck anymore, either. What would her father have done in this situation? Probably given Nando a boring lecture. She decided there was a better way—she intended to make use of him, instead.

  “You seem to know the city pretty well,” Po said.

  His chin lifted. “I do.”

  His pride would be useful here. Po clutched at her stomach.

  “I need to find my friend, but I won’t get far on an empty stomach. Do you know where we can find food around here right now?”

  He shook his head. “The lines in Telerethon Square are too long. It would take us six hours just to get a bowl of hot broth.”

  “Have you been down there lately?”

  He nodded. “The cops picked me up near the square last night.”

  “They can’t arrest everyone,” Po said, a little confused at the tactic.

  “They sure seem to be trying.”

  “I’ve got a bit of money left from my Aunt,” Po said. “Would that help?”

  Nando worked his mouth and swallowed, then rubbed one hand against a dirty cheek. “Won’t get much for it. But I’ve got some friends who might be able to help.”

  Po squinted at him. “No tricks this time.”

  CHAPTER 44

  THE RUNNING GIRL

  Po figured that if Nando was distracted, she would be able to tell if he was trying to pull a fast one on her. So as she walked the bike toward a bridge that crossed over a large drainage ditch, being sure to keep Nando at her side or slightly in front, she told him about her family’s farm and her parents. Nando seemed most interested, however, in her little sister, Jia.