by JM Butcher
This is J.A.K. coming to you. All U-F’s and sympathizers, tune to the feed.
Feed 12:
Looks like the GWNT is in. We have us a Thinker.
Anonymous, 15 October, 2040
A soft, persistent knock, wakes me up. I must have fallen asleep pretty quickly because my brain didn’t keep me awake. Finally showering probably helped the cause. Still, I feel like I haven’t slept that long. It can’t already be morning. I hope not. I put my pillow over my head. If they really want me awake, they’ll come in.
“Maggie,” someone whispers. “Maggie, wake up. Maggie, are you there? Maggie, can you hear me? Maggie, Maggie. Maggie, may I come in?” Whoever is at the door is determined.
“What?” I growl. “It can’t be time to get up yet.”
“Maggie, I’m coming in.” The door opens and someone steps into the room.
Once I see that it’s Hayden, I turn my body away from him and close my eyes again. “Get out,” I mutter. “I’m sleeping.”
“Come on, Maggie. We’re going out.” Hayden nudges me, repeatedly. “Get up. Let’s go. They’re waiting for us.”
“Who? Jack and Gia? Tell them I’ll do the Think Tank when I’m ready.”
“Maggie. Get your butt up right now.” Hayden exclaims at the loudest level a whisper can be. “I’m turning on the light.”
I hear the click of the lamp switch and roll over. I open my eyes and see that Hayden looks ridiculous. He’s dressed in a long-sleeve black shirt and black jeans. He has a black beanie on. Under his wide, excited eyes, there is that black stuff that sports players smear on. It covers part of the scratch he received during his mission earlier.
“Here.” Hayden hands me a set of black clothes. “Put these on. I’ll be outside the door. Hurry! They’re waiting.” He doesn’t look as if he’ll take “no” for an answer. “Come on, Maggie. Get up.”
“Ugh. Fine.” I drag myself out of bed.
“Put on the eye paint too.” He sets a small tube of black makeup on the nightstand.
“No way,” I say.
“Such a party pooper. Don’t make me come back in, ya hear?” Hayden isn’t good at pretending to be threatening. He walks out of the room, leaving the door cracked.
I throw on the black shirt and black leggings Hayden gave me. The matching beanie completes the burglar outfit. Hopefully, it’s okay that my shoes are blue. Hayden’s probably uptight enough for that to irritate him. The thought of him rushing off somewhere to find me black shoes is amusing, and it would let me get a few more minutes of sleep.
The door opens a couple inches. “You coming?” Hayden whispers.
“Yes!” I forget to use my inside voice.
“Shh. Come on.”
When I open the door, Hayden grabs my hand and starts to pull me forward. “Hold on,” I say.
He lets go. “We need to go.”
“I know,” I say, “but I want to say something first.”
“Okay.”
“You saved that boy today.” I wish I could see his facial expression in the dark hallway. I want to read his face, to see if he feels proud or happy or anything. Since I can’t, I wait for his response.
“Billy helped me,” Hayden responds. “It was Billy’s idea. He saved Dade.” The humility in his answer warms my heart. Now, I’m glad it’s dark so that he can’t see me tear up. Happy tears.
“Maybe you are a good person,” I say.
“I’m okay,” he says. “We need to go, though.” He grabs my hand again and pulls me. I let out a playful gasp. Maybe even a quick laugh.
As I’m forced to keep up with his pace, I realize how out of shape I am. I’ve jogged about twenty yards, and I’m already breathing heavily. We go down the passageway opposite the power room. I haven’t been down this way before.
“Where are you taking me?” I notice the fluorescent lighting ends a little way up.
“We’re going out.” Hayden answers and drags me into the depths of the dark tunnel.
“I can’t see. I’m going to fall.” I hope Gia doesn’t have a hidden camera somewhere in here.
“Just a little farther. Keeping holding on.” Hayden doesn’t slow down. “You should’ve put on the eye grease. It helps you run faster. Ask the pros.”
“Yeah, I bet,” I say. I laugh again. “You would fit in with the jocks at school.”
“Is that a good thing?”
“No.” I want to call them impotent jocks with a superiority complex, like Olivia said to Grant, but I can’t get all that out between breaths.
A streak of moonlight signals the end of the tunnel. Someone holds the door open. “Hey, slowpokes,” a voice says. “Hurry up.”
It’s Makayla, also dressed in black. The tiny bit of fun I was having with Hayden quickly turns into disappointment. I release myself from Hayden’s grasp and bend over.
Panting, I manage to say, “Her? No way.”
Hayden says. “We’re already here.”
“You have a lot of nerve…” I’m too tired to push him.
“Please, Maggie,” a different voice says, almost pleading. I look past Makayla and see Billy.
“Him too?” I ask, feeling a little guilty for how I treated him in the food hall, especially after thinking that he did something good today. “This isn’t some mission or something, is it?”
“No,” Hayden says, placing his hand on my shoulder. “We’re going out on the town for a little bit. To have a little fun. It will be good for you.”
I have been stuck inside this compound for a couple of days, and fresh air sounds like a good idea—even if I have to stomach Makayla for a little bit. In a way, it’s even thrilling. It must be what sneaking out feels like. I wonder if Jack knows about this. At least he’s not here.
I sigh and make my way to the door. I refuse Makayla’s hand and pull myself up.
“Fair enough,” she says.
“How’s your head?” I ask, hoping her wound still hurts. Makayla said herself that she deserved it.
“You got me pretty good. It’s all right, though.” She reaches down and helps Hayden out.
“What’s up, guys?” Hayden asks. “You ready for this?
“Did you really put on that black eye stuff?” Makayla asks.
“You know it.”
We aren’t on the deck that Jack and I met on. I ask, “Where’s the river?”
“Back there,” Makayla says. Apparently, the tunnel passes under the Cuyahoga. “Let’s go.” Makayla twirls with her arms spread out like she’s performing a ballet routine for eager onlookers. Only there isn’t an audience other than the deserted skyscrapers and us.
“A little chillier than Columbus, huh?” Billy says. He’s right. Despite being October, a brisk breeze cuts through the air. “They call it the ‘lake-effect.’”
I don’t respond, despite his attempts to be friendly. It’s not that I want to be mean to him. I just don’t know how to act. I can’t reconcile the differences between the two Billies. He hurt a lot of people. At the same time, maybe he has been helping others. Like Dade.
Makayla asks, “Want to break into the baseball stadium?” She’s not joking. She’s already on a dead sprint toward a steel fence surrounding the outside of a ballpark. Billy’s on her tail.
We have a ballpark in Columbus, but it’s not nearly this big. I’ve never been to a game; baseball’s definitely not my thing. Dad takes Tyler sometimes.
Hayden crouches down like he’s a track star. He waits for me to make a move.
I say, “You’re so weird.” I haven’t seen this playful side of Hayden before. It’s kind of refreshing. “Whatever.” I play along and break into a sluggish jog. I peek behind me as Hayden tracks me down.
Hayden passes me easily without saying anything. About twenty yards from the fence, Hayden faces me while jogging backwards. He points his fingers at me and says, “I just wasted you, hotshot. Wooooooo!”
“Oh, don’t you even start.” By the time I make it to the fence,
Billy and Makayla are on the other side. Billy stays behind to boost me up the vertical steel rails. “Should we be doing this?” I ask. This time, I let Makayla help me up.
“Too late now,” she huffs while pulling me up. “Besides, this was Johnny’s idea.” She jerks me to the top of the fence. “Well, not the baseball stadium. Probably don’t tell him about that. But he said to get our asses out tonight.” We jump down.
The fact that Jack knows about our little escape lessens the excitement of going out. Still, being outside is nice, and maybe a little distraction is what I need before the Think Tank tomorrow.
“Oh yeah?” I say while Hayden makes his way over the fence without help. “What? He wants you to warm me up so I join your little rebel group?”
Makayla answers, “Not everything is about you, Maggie.” She pats my shoulder and is off again.
Jack probably persuaded Hayden to take me out with Makayla and Billy, to make things awkward and potentially to make things right between us. Just like he had Gia escort me around, although he might have overestimated the likelihood that she and I would become friendly toward one another.
“I know where there’s a hole in one of the entrances,” Makayla calls from somewhere ahead of the rest of us. Billy’s on her tail. Hayden and I run to catch up. We cover about a third of the outskirts of the stadium.
The hole Makayla mentioned is not necessarily a hole. It’s an opening where two bars in the center of the gate have been bent apart. She passes through the opening quite easily. Billy, on other the hand, struggles to get his head through. Hayden and Makayla work together to pry one of the bars open a little further. Billy gets through. Then me. Then Hayden.
We cross a cement porch and march forward to a railing. Over our left shoulders is a giant screen hovering over bleachers. I can only imagine the hologram show that it plays during games. That is, if they still played games. I look over the railing, and about twenty feet down, noxious weeds litter the field. It doesn’t seem that anyone has played in this stadium for a long time.
“They don’t play baseball in those weeds, do they?” I ask.
“Nah,” Billy answers. “This used to be home to the Cleveland Indians. In the late twenties, the owner moved the team to Las Vegas. They were never really good. I guess they’ve just let the grass grow for the past decade or so.”
“Such a waste of space,” Hayden says. “Need to bring the team back.” He mimes throwing a pitch, swinging a bat, and catching it.
“You play all positions, huh?” Makayla asks.
Hayden laughs and nudges her. “You know it.”
My eyes circle the field. Faded business names are plastered on the wall. Cleveland Clinic. Verizon Wireless. Key Bank. None of these businesses exist anymore, thanks to u-NIVERSE.
“Let’s go on the field,” Billy says to Makayla.
“You’re on,” she replies. “Catch you two later.”
Billy and Makayla disappear into the seats. I detect their position by the sound of their laughs and Makayla’s occasional screech. I locate them with the help of the moonlight. They jump a railing and enter the forest of weeds. This obviously isn’t their first time here.
“I’m not going down there,” I say. “There are probably ticks.”
“Me neither. The bugs love me.” Hayden points to the top of the bleachers. “There shouldn’t be any ticks up there.”
I search for a set of stairs. “How do we get up there?”
“This way.” Hayden grabs hold of my hand.
We walk under a ceiling into a semi-open corridor. Sure enough, there is a set of out-of-order escalators. We ascend the metal steps that seem to never end. We eventually reach the top and walk through an opening that leads to the seats.
“Want to go all the way up?” Hayden says. He’s on his way before I answer. “Hope heights don’t scare you.”
I don’t know if heights scare me. The highest I’ve been off the ground is in a tree Melli and I used to climb, until I fell and almost broke my arm. Since then, Dad never even let me help him on the roof when he cleaned the gutters.
The gusts of wind are a lot stronger at the top row of seats. The changing wind directions make it feel like the stadium is rotating. I peek out of a space between the roof and the safety block behind the seats. The Cuyahoga River’s ripples are accentuated by the moon. From here, it’s hard to believe how gross the river actually is. It’s beautiful.
Hayden and I sit down in neighboring seats and look down at the field. Being up so high does make me uneasy, but I feel safe in his presence. A lot has happened since this morning. I hope I can trust him. Dade trusted him.
Hayden’s the only boy I can remember who has treated me like I’m normal. Like I’m not some sort of freak. Maybe it’s because I’m vulnerable and just really need a friend. Maybe it’s because emotions are making me human again. Whatever it is, I want to trust Hayden.
“It’s chilly up here,” I say, crossing my arms for warmth.
Hayden wraps his arm around me. My first reaction is to slide away. I don’t, though. Instead, I move closer.
“Thanks, Hayden.”
“For what?”
“For asking me my name. For defending me at lunch. For dragging me out of bed tonight. For helping Dade. For looking at me normal. Even if with just one eye.” I playfully nudge him with my elbow. I hope he can see me smiling.
“So you noticed my eye?” he says, giving me a little squeeze. “I should be thanking you. I mean, I need someone with both her eyes to give me the scoop on the kindergarten game of tag down there.” He points to the field and laughs. “Those two are great.”
I take some time to watch the scene going on down below. I don’t know why they call the top the “cheap seats”; it’s a spectacular view from up here. And the entertainment of two lit-up black beanies floating around a deserted field is perfect.
I rest my head on Hayden’s shoulder. He pulls me closer and lays his head against mine. He doesn’t tense up like I do.
How someone else’s presence can cure years of loneliness is an indescribable marvel. In such a huge empty space, where I should feel so small, I feel whole. I feel enormous. I feel alive. I close my eyes to take in these precious seconds. The shouts of joy coming from the field stimulate my thoughts. My night thoughts. I imagine the sad freshman turned angry Transgressor beaming with light, having the time of his life.
I grasp what Billy meant when he said he feels at home here with his fellow brothers and sisters. He knows lonely. But here, he’s wanted. He’s welcomed here. I wonder if Billy has ever felt that way before—even when sharing his night thoughts in front of the crowds at school. No matter what horrible things Billy’s done, I’m happy that he’s happy in the moment.
A gust of wind sends a chill down my spine. Actually, it isn’t the wind out all. I shiver at something that Makayla said outside of the stadium: Not everything is about you, Maggie. This outing is not for me.
My eyes shoot open.
Without looking at Hayden, I ask, “So how long until Billy loses his eye?”
“Soon,” Hayden says. Hayden doesn’t ask me where my question comes from. With Billy’s face on every media outlet in the country, there’s no way Jack will risk his operation. If the Coats haven’t already hacked back into Billy’s thoughts, they’re close to it. He’s a liability. His thoughts will lead them right to Jack.
I hope that the eye is all that’s taken from Billy. Jack fits the paranoid persona. “Does he know?” I ask. It’s a rhetorical question. This is his last hurrah as a whole person. Everyone knows it.
I should feel sad for Billy, but I’m not. Hearing the joy pouring from his lungs, so loud that it reaches the last row in the stadium, makes me realize the importance of living in the present. The importance of acceptance. I never truly accepted my sad plight in this world. I need to. It’s the only way I’ll find Tyler. It’s the only way I’ll make Dad proud.
“And Dade’s?” I ask.
�
��What do you mean?”
“Will he lose his?” Lifting my head from Hayden’s shoulder, I look into his eyes and say, “I heard Jack yelling at you.”
“I don’t know,” he says and looks to the ground. I sense he feels some guilt, despite how happy that boy was when Hayden and Billy brought him in. Jack said that Hayden cost Dade his eye.
“I hope not. That boy looks happy. I want him to be happy.” Hayden doesn’t respond, so I change the subject. “What brought you here? Did Jack hunt you down too?”
“No,” Hayden answers, “I actually hunted him down.”
“What do you mean?” I take his silence as a sign that he’s uncomfortable talking about this. “I’m sorry. We just met, really. You don’t have to tell me.”
“No,” Hayden responds, “it’s okay. I want to tell you, Maggie Gordon.” He smiles.
I lay my head back on his shoulder and wait for him to speak. It seems like forever before he’s ready.
“Johnny and I grew up together. Right here in Cleveland. I’ve known him for as long as I can remember. He’s always had my back. Always. He stuck by me when I was chipped.”
I put it together. When Jack said he was doing all this for his best friend, he was talking about Hayden.
“Yeah, about that…” I say. “How did the son of Patrick Mills get labeled as an Unfavorable?”
“When Dad struck gold, the government would only consider approving his chip under one condition: he had to chip his son. It served as proof that he wasn’t plotting against the government. Maggie, I know you were young when you were chipped. Eleven, right? I was five or six. I don’t remember exactly.”
I want to tell him a million things—a million ways to tell him how sorry I am. I can only muster a couple of words: “That’s awful.”
Hayden continues, “I was too young for it to really matter, probably like you. But as I got older, and started to develop adolescent night thoughts, my dad became concerned. You see, Johnny was not the most upstanding citizen, but he was my best friend. Because I spent so much time with him, my night thoughts replayed memories and conversations I had with Johnny. I’d think about him stealing candy from the store. I’d think about him cheating on tests. I’d think about his anti-government propaganda. I stopped hanging out with Johnny for a while. Not for my safety, but for his. It was too late. My dad and the government were monitoring us both. My dad was so angry. You do not make Patrick Mills look bad.”