He looked at her, at her kind face. How, in all the big wide world had he stumbled upon someone who could play the role of a big sister? He’d known her for... what? A week? And yet he felt for her some of the same warmth he had begun to feel for his family—his mom, dad, sister—who were coming out of the misty dark of the memory swipe.
“Thanks, Keisha,” he whispered. “You could’ve dumped me here and kept going. You could’ve been there by now, even. Thank you.”
“Nonsense,” she replied with a fake look of reproach. “You promised to get us there, and I don’t wanna screw up your pride in your manly abilities. So we decided to wait and let you pretend to save us.”
He laughed, a scratchy sound that came up through his throat. “No one’s saving anybody. All we’re doing is taking a long walk to the family reunion.”
“Amen,” she said. “Now get your ass up and let’s go.”
* * *
An hour later, they reached a neighborhood of old homes, most of which were in terrible disrepair—broken windows, shutters hanging by one nail, peeled paint, roofs with only half their tiles. The trees were giant—half of them dead—meaning the place had been there for a very long time. Weeds had replaced lawns a decade or so earlier.
“Perfect place for a grandma house,” Jonesy said.
Grandma’s. That’s where they were meeting Keisha’s brother and Jackie. At the entrance to the neighborhood, cracked brick walls still bore signs that said, “Norman Downes.” The place sure didn’t look as fancy as it sounded, even if it had been brand new.
Keisha hadn’t moved since arriving, staring ahead with a blank look. Newt put his arm around her shoulders and gave a squeeze, then pinched Dante on the cheek.
“We made it,” he said. “We actually—”
She shushed him hard. “Are you crazy? Don’t jinx it.” She closed her eyes and bent her neck, putting her chin on the top of Dante’s little head. “I’m so scared to walk in there, Newt. Terrified.”
He didn’t know what to say. He searched for something, anything. “You want me to do it? Tell me which house and I can go check. I’ll run.”
Instead of answering she handed Dante over, almost pushing him into Newt’s chest. Then she slipped her backpack off of her shoulders and lowered it to the ground, bending over it as she unzipped the main pocket.
“Keisha, don’t!” he whispered harshly. She had pulled out the cell phone, suddenly not caring that Jonesy and everyone else would see it. “What are you doing?”
“Checking one last time,” she said with a dead voice. “Then it won’t matter.”
“Where’d you get one of those?” a woman in Jonesy’s group asked. “I didn’t even know those things worked anymore.”
Jonesy was the one to answer since Keisha had ignored the question, waiting for the phone to power up. “Only for special people. Uppity-ups and the like. Looks like Newt isn’t the only fancy-pants we’ve been galavantin’ with.”
The words could’ve been taken as threatening, but Jonesy had a deflecting look of innocence on his face. More than a few of his pals were whispering to each other, however, and that made Newt nervous.
“Let’s just go check,” Newt urged. Why was the thing taking so long to wake up? “We’re practically there, anyway. Come on.”
She didn’t respond. The glow of the phone finally lit up her face in the fading twilight.
“Lord have mercy,” she whispered.
“What?” Newt asked. “What does it say?”
Instead of responding, she started sprinting down the street that lead into the neighborhood, leaving her backpack, her child, and everyone else behind. Newt stood frozen in stunned confusion for a second, then took off after her, Dante held firmly in his arms.
* * *
They passed dozens of houses, dilapidated, roofs falling in, dark as black water on the inside, hovering like another dimension behind broken windows. Keisha turned a corner, then another one. Soon she came to a stop in front of a home that looked in much better shape than its neighbors. There were even lights shining from within, the cough of a generator disrupting the still air of the coming night.
Newt reached Keisha and, gasping for breath, had to put Dante down for a second.
“What did you see on the phone?” he managed to ask.
She looked at him. “It just said, WICKED is here.”
“WICKED?” It was so unexpected and his chest hurt so much from sprinting that he felt nothing when he heard the word. “What the hell? Why would they be here?”
“We’re about to find out.” She picked up Dante and moved toward the front door, which was wide open.
Newt grabbed her arm. “What? No. We... Let’s just think for a second.”
“They have my daughter, Newt. And my brother. There’s nothing to think about.” She glared down at his fingers, gripped tightly around her wrist. He let go; his hand flopped to the side as if it had lost its bones. “What’s there to lose? Maybe you should leave, though. Seriously. You kinda have a past with them.”
Newt shook his head, trying to clear the cobwebs. “I was just a control subject. They shouldn’t care about me anymore. Why would it matter? Why are they here?”
Keisha sighed. “That’s a lot of questions. I’m going in.”
“So am I.” When she made to push back, he stopped her. “I’ve got nothing to lose, either. Not one bloody thing.”
“Hard to argue with that one.”
She marched across the lawn toward the open door, which stood above three wooden steps and a rickety porch. Newt fell into line right next to her. Up the steps, which creaked with every footfall. She didn’t pause at the threshold, walked right in, showing a bravery that reminded Newt of some of the things he’d seen in the Maze. Although terrified out of his wits, he followed her.
They stepped into a wide living room, the kitchen behind it. Two lamps warmly lit the air on either side of a couch that had seen better days, lumpy, torn, collapsed in the middle. In that sunken part sat a man and a pre-teen girl. Behind them, dressed in black and shiny armor similar to the people who’d taken them to the Crank Palace, stood two representatives of WICKED, that fine establishment that had stolen Newt from his parents and treated him like crap ever since. To alleviate any doubt, they wore WICKED insignia on their chests.
“Mom!” the little girl cried, leaping from the couch.
“Jackie,” Keisha said almost under her breath; she then rushed forward to meet the girl halfway, pulled her daughter into her arms. The brother then joined them, all four family members squeezing each other in one giant hug. The two guards did nothing to stop the reunion, and they appeared to be staring at Newt through their protective visors.
His heart sank. They were taking him back, weren’t they? Of course they were. But why all the fuss over Keisha and her family? They could’ve taken him at any point. He didn’t know what to say so he only looked at the floor, ashamed that he was thinking of himself when this sweet reunion had just happened right in front of his eyes.
After a minute or so, Keisha pulled back a little from her family and looked up at the strangers in their strange gear.
“Why are you in my grandma’s house?” she asked them. “What were you planning to do with my daughter and my brother?”
For the first time, one of the unwanted visitors spoke.
“His friends are up to no good, that’s why,” he said in that filtered, slightly mechanical voice.
The other one pointed at Newt. “We’re here for a little collateral.” A woman, her voice as hard as the walls of the Maze. “And because the boss said so.”
Chapter Nineteen
“What do you mean?” Newt asked. “What’s going on with my friends?”
The woman answered. “You know very well what they’ve been up to. And we might’ve looked the other way until they started messing with the Right Arm. That’s a no-no, Newt. Chancellor Paige has had enough, especially when they pulled the trick with getting thei
r implants taken out. Good thing you still have yours, right?”
Newt didn’t need the virus to make the rage boil in his veins. “Why do you people always talk like that? What is so wrong with you that it makes you enjoy this stuff?”
“Enjoy?” the woman replied, throwing all the disgust she could into the single word. “You think we like wasting the precious little time we have left in this world dealing with the Munies? Munies who are too selfish to make a few sacrifices to save the whole damn human race?”
It was Newt’s turn to repeat her words. “A few sacrifices? Easy for you to say.” He didn’t know how he said the words so calmly—he wanted to scream them. But no matter what, he couldn’t ruin things for Keisha and her family. No matter what.
“Just get on the couch,” the man said. “All of you. We’re going to record a nice little message for your friends. And don’t argue. Please don’t argue. I am not in the mood.”
“What kind of message?” Keisha asked. “What do we have to do with this?”
The man shrugged. “I don’t know, lady. Let’s just not make this any harder than it has to be, okay? We’re just doing our job, and we hate our job. So don’t piss us off.”
“Okay, but—”
A sharp hollering sound cut her off, coming from the front yard, a mocking, yoo-hoo type of catcall. It was followed by another, and then another, this time from the backyard, evident through a broken window in the kitchen. Whoever it was kept it up, shouting and whistling and screaming out things that made no sense, just noise, all of it.
“You gotta be kidding me,” the female WICKED guard said. “Are those your Crank friends out there? The ones who came with you from the Palace?”
“I have no idea,” Newt said, honestly. He hoped it was Jonesy and the others, but who knew? “What’s this video you want us to make? If Tommy and them—”
A booming crash like the end of the world shattered his line of thoughts; he yelled and spun around to see the source of it. A truck—a big beast of a thing with a grill on the front end—had busted through the windows at the front of the house, broken glass and chunks of wood flying in all directions. Even as Newt looked, even as he gaped at the explosive intrusion, a bed plummeted from the ruined ceiling in a rain of plaster, bounced off the top of the truck’s cabin, and slid off to the side.
The driver’s side door opened and another black-clad WICKED soldier leaned out, most of his body still in the cabin.
“Get in!” he yelled. “There’s a whole horde of Cranks out here and more coming!”
Something hit Newt in the middle of his back, sharp and strong. He fell to his knees, looked up at a black visor that reflected a distorted view of his face.
“You have one chance of doing this without being killed,” the female guard said. “All of you, in the back seat of the truck, now. Now!” Her companion had run to the passenger side of the vehicle and opened the back door, shooing them toward it like they were his children.
“Just do it,” Keisha said, seeming to anticipate Newt going off the wall again. “Just get in the damn truck.” She was already ushering her brother and daughter toward the open door. “Sounds like there’s a lot more out there than Jonesy and his fool friends, anyway. Come on.”
Newt couldn’t feel his hands or feet, felt numb all over. He also felt like he couldn’t move, kneeling there on the floor like a repentant priest. The guard took care of things for him. She grabbed him by the arm and lifted him with surprising strength, then dragged him to follow Keisha and the others to the truck. Once they were all crammed into the backseat, the soldier slammed the door. She and the other guard quickly got into the front of the cabin. Even before their door was closed, the driver had revved the engine, reversing the vehicle back through all the destruction and debris and into the front yard. The tires spun and all kinds of things crunched, and Newt got a queasy look at faces and arms and hair and wild eyes out in the yard until the truck swerved its way back onto the road. The engines roared as the vehicle barreled down the street toward the exit of the neighborhood.
What in the world just happened? Newt thought to himself. Couldn’t just one thing go right in my life?
He was scrunched against Keisha, who had both of her children held tightly in her lap. Her brother hadn’t made a peep since they’d first arrived; now, he blankly stared out the side window as if he’d given up on life long before this latest turn of events. Keisha didn’t say a word; her kids cried as silently as possible. Newt was so enraged he thought every blood vessel in his body might burst from the strain on his nerves, and he didn’t think the virus was to blame for much of it. He shook from anger, from all the things WICKED had done to him. It never stopped and it never would.
Three guards in the front, their backs to him, facing forward. Surely there was a way.
The truck slammed on the brakes, throwing Newt forward. His nose crunched against the right headrest, and Keisha and her kids pressed hard against him from the force of the stop. He peeked out the front windshield, saw a line of people in the road, their hands clasped like a thread of paper dolls. Jonesy was in the middle, his eyes lit up with something like ecstasy.
“Why’d you stop!” the female solder yelled.
“Why’d I stop?” the driver yelled back. “Why the hell do you think I stopped? There’s people in the road. Are you blind?”
“Well run over them!”
Before he could respond, the front windows on both the driver’s and passenger’s sides exploded inward with a crack and crash. Arms and hands—it seemed like there were way more than accounted for the number of bodies that could fit in such a space—reached inside, grabbed at the soldiers, pulled on the inner door handles, popped the doors open. The soldiers fought and kicked but all three of them were soon dragged out of the truck, trying to prevent the intruders from ripping off their helmets. The female guard failed and hers came off, revealing a pale white face covered in scars. She screamed as jagged fingernails tore at her to make new ones.
This wasn’t just Newt’s group from the Crank Palace. There were dozens of people out there, some looking past the Gone, others looking sane but angry. With nightmarish sounds and unbridled energy, they attacked the three WICKED guards with something like primal glee. Clothes were ripped, helmets broken, bodies beat with fists and sticks and rocks found from the side of the road. Newt stared out the window, his disbelief only matched by the rising storm of the Flare in his mind. It was taking over again, triggered by the sights and awful sounds.
“Newt!” Keisha yelled.
He looked at her, barely able to see through the spots that swam before his yes.
“What,” he whispered.
“I have my kids and my brother is shell-shocked. Get your ass up there and drive this thing away!”
Shell-shock. Newt didn’t know what that was, but he couldn’t imagine it would disable a person more than the tide of red rage that swept through his brain and nerves. The roar and buzz of static overtook his hearing again. But he fought through it, held onto whatever he could hold onto. A Crank slipped into the front seat, swinging his legs under the steering wheel, and that’s what finally snapped Newt into action.
Roaring like a sprung animal, he heaved himself forward and scrambled over the back of the front bench, reaching for the Crank who’d stolen his way into the truck. Newt grabbed his shoulders, used the man’s body as leverage to pull the rest of his own body into the seat. Just as his legs landed in a heap, Newt punched the man in the face, barely connecting since he didn’t have his balance yet.
The intruder said nothing, just snarled an inhuman sound that Newt heard as if it came through a wall. Newt got his feet to the floor of the cabin and braced himself, swung another punch at the Crank. The man blocked it, laughing as if he fought off a toddler. He said something, shouting by the looks of the veins popping from his neck, but Newt heard nothing, the words blocked by the crackling buzz in his ears. Something grabbed him from behind; he turned to see a wom
an had entered from the passenger door, pulling on his shirt. Static electricity frizzled her hair into a furry cloud, framing a filthy face with a huge gash across one cheek.
“Newt!” Keisha yelled, her voice somehow making it through the cacophony of interference caused by his burgeoning madness.
Newt unleashed a buildup of frustration, unsure of what he was even doing. His legs kicked out violently, slamming into the face of the woman, even as he grabbed the man behind the steering wheel and went for his eyes, thumbs poking with all his strength. The Crank swatted at his arms but Newt doubled down, pushing, pushing, kicking again with his legs to add impetus to the effort. He felt his foot connect with flesh behind him, felt his thumb sink through a burst barrier in front. Both Cranks were screaming, clutching at their faces. Newt pushed the man out the driver’s door then flopped onto his back to kick at the woman again. He kept at it until she gave up and fell away.
Enraged, on fire, exploding from within, his skin burning, his ears filled with smoldering cotton, his vision blurred by white fog, the air around him seeming to crack like streaks of lightning, Newt fumbled his way upright and sat behind the wheel, put the truck into drive. Then, without worrying about the two open doors, he slammed his foot onto the accelerator.
Tires slipped, then the back of the truck fishtailed. Rubber finally caught on pavement, and the vehicle leaped forward with a burst of speed. They roared away, and Newt was only distantly, peripherally aware of the thumps and bumps of bodies beneath them until they hit clear, open road.
“Jonesy!” Keisha screamed from the back seat. “What about Jonesy!”
Newt heard her, just barely, but he didn’t slow the truck. In some other universe he may have felt pity or guilt over leaving Jonesy and the rest of them behind. He even felt a pang thinking that he may have just run his truck over someone who had sworn to help him. But it didn’t matter. It didn’t matter. The world was Hell, and in Hell things were different.
Crank Palace Page 10