Impulse

by Steven Gould

  I was turning over the side vegetable with a plastic fork when someone said, “I think they’re supposed to be Navy beans.”

  I jerked, surprised, and looked to my left.

  The girl was not so much dressed as draped. She was hidden in baggy jeans and a hoodie sweatshirt so oversized it reached her knees. The sleeves were pushed up to free her hands, making the cloth bunch in thick folds from her wrists to her elbows. I could barely see her face. Most of her head was covered by the hood of the sweatshirt and the rest was obscured by dark bangs that dropped over her eyes.

  Tentatively, I said, “I saw something like this once in a tidal pool. It was moving.”

  She was poised there, on her toes, not quite facing me, her body language saying “just passing, don’t mind me.”

  I took a deep breath and said, “Sit down.”

  She turned a little more and let her heels touch the floor. “You don’t mind someone else sitting here, too?” She gestured at the lunch line. “I sit with Jade.”

  “The more the merrier,” I said.

  She still hesitated. “We’re not very popular,” she said. “This is your first day, right? You don’t want to get off on the wrong foot.”

  “Why aren’t you popular?” I asked. “I mean, you’re not going to beat me up and take my lunch money, are you? Or is it to be a food fight? I’ve never been in a food fight,” I said wistfully.

  Her shoulder dropped slightly, relaxing. I hadn’t been aware they were hunched until then.

  She said, “You have discovered Our Evil Plan.” I could hear the initial caps. She put her tray down and slung her backpack under the bench seat.

  “It’s not much of a plan,” I said. “It’ll need work. The ‘evil’ part’s all right but the food fight bit really doesn’t go with it. You’re going to need something with neurotoxin darts or a bucket of pig blood, you know?” I tasted the beans. “Oh. Never mind. These beans are as good as a neurotoxin dart any day.”

  She snorted, jerking her head, and the hood slid back and dropped to her shoulder. She was Hispanic or Native American, with her hair cut short in back and long in front. “I’m Tara.” She gestured back behind me. “This is Jade.”

  Jade was a Goth girl—black clothes and black lipstick, white eye shadow and mascara so thick, I marveled that she could keep her eyes open. The right side of her nose was pierced.

  “I’m Cent,” I said.

  “Like a smell or like a penny?” said Jade. She spoke in a breathy monotone with hardly any inflection.

  “Like a bad penny,” I said.

  “It’s short for Millicent,” Tara said. “But it’s her mother’s name, too, so she goes by Cent instead of Millie.”

  I stared at her.

  “I’m in your biology class. I heard you tell Mr. Hill.”

  I blushed—maybe because of the overlong answer I’d given in class, or because she’d noticed me but I’d completely spaced her. There’d only been a few people in the room when I’d told him that. “For a second there I was afraid of your madd mind-reading skilz.”

  Jade breathed, “People say I’m psychic.”

  “No, they don’t,” said Tara. “People say you’re psycho.”

  “Oh, yeah. I get those confused.”

  I laughed, which, apparently, was the right thing to do.

  Tara was a sophomore and Jade was a junior. They weren’t the least popular kids in school.

  “That would be you, once you’ve had lunch with us.”

  But they certainly weren’t the most popular.

  “Goth is on its way out,” said Tara, “As well as being alt. So, Jade is not only a freak, she doesn’t even get credit for being trendy.”

  Jade stuck her tongue out at Tara before saying, “And Tara just doesn’t belong. Nonwhite half-Hispanic, half-Diné, which wouldn’t be so bad if she’d been raised on the rez but she wasn’t, so she doesn’t fit in anywhere.”

  They looked at me and Tara said, “So what’s your damage?”

  I raised my eyebrows. Raised in paranoid isolation by super powered freaks? “Homeschooling,” I said. “Never been in a real school before.”

  “Harsh,” said Tara.

  “Lucky,” said Jade.

  Tara got a wary look on her face. “Uh, why’d you do homeschooling?”

  Because we’re hunted by governments and secret multinational organizations? “International travel.”

  “Oh,” said Tara. “Not religious reasons?”

  Religious about avoiding capture or death. “No, not really.” I frowned. “Uh, why?”

  She shrugged. “There’s a bunch of fundamentalists in town. Some of them homeschool. Didn’t know if you were of that stripe.”

  “We’re not exactly churchgoers,” I said. Dad was an outright atheist. Mom was an amateur student of comparative religions, but it was far more anthropological than spiritual. I’d been in mosques, synagogues, churches, and temples of every stripe and flavor from India to Japan. “What about you?”

  “Christ, no!” said Jade.

  Tara was less emphatic but she also shook her head. “That table over there is the evangelical bunch.”

  I glanced over at a table on one side of the lunchroom, where some of the kids were reading, which I was pleased to notice earlier. Now I saw that there were white crosses on the covers of their books.

  “Any other groups I should be aware of?”

  Jade started gesturing around the room. “Football team. Basketball team. Pep squad. Cholos. Gangstas. Wangstas. Geeks. Nerds. Gradeworms. McClaren’s Pets. Slackers. Skateboarders.”

  Tara said, “But it’s more complicated than that, of course. Joe, there, gets straight A’s and he’s a skateboarder, and he’s also a jock since he’s on the school snowboard team. Perry is on the football team but is a wangsta. Felipe is on the basketball team but he’s a gangsta—I mean the real deal. He runs with a gang that’s associated with the Sureños.” She tilted her head to the side. “A lot of the geeks get straight A’s but they don’t act like the gradeworms, like they’re already doctors or lawyers. Some of the nerds are also potheads.”

  I’d been doing my research. “What about the economic stuff?”

  Tara looked at Jade, puzzled. They looked back at me.

  “Rich kids? Welfare kids?”

  “Oh,” said Tara. She colored slightly and I wondered if I’d struck a nerve. “Some. Colleen Crossman is one of McClaren’s Pets. Her father owns the Crossman Oilfield Services which is all over the southwest. Another big employer is John Chanlee’s dad, who owns the quarry. He wouldn’t have made the team if his dad hadn’t donated all this new equipment. Now he’s the alternate quarterback.”

  Jade’s face twisted. “He likes ’em young. Don’t ever let him get you alone.”

  The bell rang. I slung my backpack and grabbed my tray.

  Jade touched my wrist. “I mean it.”

  I nodded seriously. “And I heard it.”

  * * *

  I should just pass over the horror that was PE class.

  I’d thought PE would be fun. I mean, games and sports. I’m fairly athletic. I like to run and jump. What’s not to like?

  I’m not used to changing clothes in front of strangers. In front of anybody, really. Sure, we’ll use the hot tub at home without a swimsuit, but otherwise Mom and Dad are careful to give me my privacy, knocking if my door is closed and all that.

  The locker room … well … the collected mass of my classmates, smelled a bit, but I’d smelled worse. Once, on a bus trip between Kathmandu and Dhunche, on the Chinese border, I was on a bus with livestock and passengers who smelled bad before the first case of motion sickness. They tried for the windows and some didn’t make it. Mom and I were on that bus for six hours—Dad bailed after the first upchuck.

  “Flat-chested thing, aren’t you?”

  I was already hunched over as I dressed, facing the wall, trying to change from jeans to gym shorts as quickly as possible. I didn’t turn until I�
��d pulled my T-shirt over my head.

  The speaker wasn’t flat chested at all. She was at least a C cup if not a D. She had green eyes and hair bleached almost white with a half-inch of pitch-black roots. She was a full head taller than I.

  “I’m Cent,” I said.

  She turned away. “Who cares?”

  Another girl, balanced on one foot as she pulled on one of her athletic shoes, was between the blonde and the door. The blonde shoved past her, causing her to fall forward against the locker, just barely getting her hand up in time to avoid banging her face. The taller girl didn’t even look back.

  “Not very nice,” I commented, neutrally.

  The girl who’d been shoved shrugged. “Caffeine. If my locker wasn’t next to hers I’d stay as far away as I could.” She looked around like she was afraid someone would hear her and didn’t say anything else.

  Caffeine? I wondered if that was the girl’s name or the cause of her behavior?

  Class activity was basketball but when Coach Taichert found out I’d never played, he had me do dribbling exercises up the side of the gym while the rest of the class split into teams and played a game. I had no trouble dribbling while I was standing still but when I tried to run I ended up booting the ball with my foot and having to run after it. Several of the girls laughed and my ears felt hot.

  “Never mind, Cent,” said Coach, taking the ball from me. “Work it out to the side, or if you’re really running, you’ve got to bounce it forward so that you meet it when it comes up again.”

  Ten minutes later, I was doing well enough that he had me go shoot baskets from the free throw line on the unused court. There was more laughter as I missed or overshot but then I got the range and, by luck, made four baskets in a row.

  “That’s better,” Coach said. He turned and called to the bench where the extra girls rotated out of the game were sitting. “Paula, and, uh Caffeine. Passing drills with Cent here. Paula and Cent, you’re moving the ball up the court. Dribble up. Caffeine puts the pressure on, pass. Caffeine switches. Pass. When you pass the key, whoever’s clear takes the shot. Then head back the other direction. Got it?”

  I nodded.

  Coach went back to refereeing the game.

  I threw the ball to Paula, a short Native American girl with muscular legs and waist-length hair. She began dribbling up the court. I started moving up the other side but Caffeine, instead of pressing Paula, blocked me. I started to go around her and she shifted. I stopped.

  “Aren’t you supposed to be after the person with the ball?” I asked.

  She slammed into my chest with her shoulder, knocking me back onto the floor.

  It hurt.

  Caffeine turned her back and ran lightly after Paula. Paula waited until Caffeine was almost to her and threw the ball back toward me. I scrambled to get it but I was still on the floor. The ball passed just beyond my fingertips.

  More laughter from the girls on the bench. My ears burned. I chased the ball down and started dribbling up the court. Caffeine came for me and I passed, but she kept coming. I feinted right and she threw herself forward, trying to knock me down again, but completely missed when I went left instead. She was ten feet behind me by the time she was able to stop. Paula, seeing me clear, passed. I dribbled some more and, hearing Caffeine’s footsteps closing in, passed again.

  Paula took the shot, made it.

  Caffeine’s footsteps kept coming and I stopped and dropped to one knee, bending over as if I were going to tie my shoe. Caffeine didn’t quite fall, but she had to jump over me and then take several steps, flailing with her arms to keep upright.

  Paula snorted and I looked over at her, but her face was expressionless, and I might have imagined it.

  Someone on the bench giggled, but when Caffeine glared in that direction it stopped like it was cut off with a knife.

  Paula threw the ball to me and then Coach blew his whistle and class was over.

  * * *

  Caffeine came at me in the shower.

  I was nervous enough, bathing with strangers, but Coach had made it clear that everyone showered. Most of the girls were in and out in the time it took me to undress, wrap myself in the tiny school towel, and get over to the large communal shower.

  “You little bitch!”

  Caffeine was standing in the shower entranceway in her bra and panties. The two girls still showering scurried out past her, snatching their towels from the hooks by the door and leaving mine hanging all alone.

  I stepped under the water and turned so my back was to the wall with the water spraying out between me and Caffeine.

  “What’s up?” I said, voice level. Worse came to worst, I could jump away, but I certainly didn’t want to do that in front of anyone. The calm voice freaked her a little. She jerked her head back and even checked behind her. Coach Taichert wouldn’t come into the girls locker room, but there was a female PE teacher I hadn’t met yet who could wander through at any time. Caffeine looked back at me and glared. She started across the wet floor.

  “Showering with your clothes on?” I said. I reached over and turned off the hot tap on the shower. I wasn’t standing in the stream but the spray around the edges was icy.

  “Turn off the shower,” said Caffeine.

  I opened the cold water tap more. With nobody else showering, the high water pressure splashed cold water onto Caffeine’s lower legs. She flinched.

  “Oops,” I said.

  “I’m going to pound you,” Caffeine said. She stepped forward, raising her fists.

  I reached up and flipped the shower head up, spraying her from head to foot.

  She screamed and charged through the water at me. I jumped past her—and I don’t mean “hopped”—to the doorway. Behind me I heard her slam into the wall, slip, and fall to the floor.

  I didn’t look back as I grabbed my towel, but listened carefully as I went to my locker, dressed quickly, and left.

  SEVEN

  Millie: Roadblock

  Millie checked her e-mail every morning, but it wasn’t as simple a matter as booting up her computer.

  First of all, they didn’t have network access in the Yukon. They could’ve done something with a satellite dish, but that could be tracked back to the general area of the cabin. They did have Internet access in New Prospect, but if their enemies ever connected Millie, the fugitive jumper, with one of her e-mail accounts, checking those accounts from that IP address could lead them directly to the new house.

  Instead, each morning she used a program to randomly choose from a list of open WiFi access points across the world, then jumped her laptop within range, downloaded, and returned to the cabin. It usually took less than thirty seconds.

  If she needed to answer an e-mail, she composed it offline, had the program spit out another access point, and jumped there to send. This morning, when she read her e-mail, she answered it in person.

  * * *

  Patel’s office was in one of the few permanent structures in the camp, a brick building with a metal roof. She knocked and entered. It was a bit warmer inside, but not much.

  Patel was sitting behind his “desk,”—two boards across two cut-down oil barrels. His eyes widened when he saw her. “How did you get past the roadblock?”

  Millie shrugged. She was wearing a hijab and a heavy wool coat over that. It was colder than her last visit, when she and Cent had dished lentils in the camp.

  “I came a different way. Where is the roadblock?”

  Patel stood and took some binocular hanging from a nail in the wall and said, “I will show you.” He led the way back outside.

  There had been some snow on the mountains the last time. Now the hills were solid white, and crusted snow crunched under her feet in the camp itself.

  “They’ve been there all week. The refugees can just detour through the hills or along the river below, but the trucks can’t. The militia won’t let the aid convoy by unless they can divert half the supplies.” He rounded one of the tents
and pointed, then handed her the binoculars. “They don’t have enough men to just take the supplies, but they can keep them from passing.”

  She focused the binoculars. The roadblock was where the road cut into a steep hillside. Above, the hillside rose steeply to the ridge top. Below, it dropped off cliff-like, fifty feet above a rocky, but mostly dry, riverbed. “What is that? A tank?”

  “It’s an old Soviet armored car. Amphibious. But that turret has a heavy machine gun for shooting armored targets—14.5 millimeters. If they have ammo, it could tear the convoy to pieces.”

  “Where did they get it?”

  “Over the border, I’m sure. The Soviets abandoned hundreds when they left. The Afghan army still operates a lot of them, but I’m sure some ended up on the black market.”

  “How many men?”

  “Eight.”

  “What does the Pakistani army say?”

  Patel shook his head angrily. “I think they paid off the regional commander. His forces are ‘otherwise’ committed, and I should talk to the militia’s commander! If something isn’t done soon, we’ll have to concede and give them a cut.”

  Millie handed back the binoculars.

  Patel wrapped the neck strap around his hands. “I was hoping we might be able to get some supplies in your way, to hold us over. My people are working on the army from Islamabad.”

  Millie mentally reviewed the contents of the warehouse. They could help, but if there were rations just ten kilometers away, waiting … if something could be done about the roadblock … She thought about moving those supplies, instead, with Davy’s help.

  One way or the other.

  “Let me see what I can do,” she said.

  * * *

  “How about tear gas?” Millie suggested. “To flush them out?”

  She couldn’t see his face but she thought Davy sounded appalled. “How about not? With my luck, they’d have asthma, and I don’t want to haul any of them to a doctor.”