Enders (16 page)

“Get outta here,” he said with a small smile.

He waved us off and we got back in the SUV. I watched as an orderly came out of the hospital with a wheelchair for Ernie.

“He’s tough,” Hyden said, pulling onto the freeway and heading east. “He’ll contact me when he can.”

I perceived a note of doubt in his voice. Hyden gripped the wheel as if it were grounding him. Maybe not being able to touch people also meant it was harder to let them touch your heart. I knew he cared about Ernie—and Redmond—but he sure wasn’t letting himself show it.

I looked at back at Michael. He looked about as shell-shocked as I felt. My face felt itchy. I scratched my cheek.

“Don’t,” Hyden said. “Don’t touch your face.”

He opened a panel near the ceiling and pulled down a slim medical kit. He took out two white packets, each about the size of my palm. He tossed them to me. “Open them.”

I handed one to Michael. The only thing printed on the packet was a long chemical name I didn’t recognize. I tore mine open and pulled out a wet cloth.

“Wipe your face first. Be sure to get your nose. Then do your hands, legs, any exposed skin.”

I pressed the cool cloth to my cheek. “Feels good.”

“It neutralizes the residue from most gases.”

Michael wiped himself with his cloth. “What would it do to us?”

Hyden shook his head. “You don’t want to know, trust me.”

“Poor Redmond.” I wiped my face and the rest of my exposed skin.

“If it helps,” Hyden said, “he would have taken himself out before he’d ever work for my father.”

A hollow feeling ate away at my insides. It was like when our building was smoked and we lost everything, including the last pictures of our parents. A desperate feeling came over me to go to my little brother immediately, grab him, and hold him tightly.

“I need to be with my brother,” I blurted out.

“You’ll lead my father’s men right to your cabin.”

“He’s right, Cal,” Michael said.

Hyden opened the scanner.

“What’re you doing?” I asked.

“Scanning.” He said it like it was obvious.

He punched a button and the car went into autodrive, allowing him to let go of the wheel.

“Is it really the time for this?” Michael asked.

“I’m trying to see if we can grab their signals,” Hyden said as the airscreen came on. “They’ve got all our Metals. This thing should light up like Christmas.”

“You mean we might get them back?” I asked.

“That would be the idea,” Hyden said.

I watched the screen as Hyden plucked it, widening the search area. Michael leaned forward from his backseat so he could also focus on the screen.

But the grid was quiet. After a bit, Hyden ran his hand through it, sending the display into disarray for a moment.

“They’re too smart,” Hyden said with an edge of cynicism in his voice. “They’ve got protection the way we have.” He sighed. “They’re gone.” He slapped the steering wheel. “All those Metals, they depended on me.”

“What’re we going to do?” I asked.

“I don’t know. We can’t go back to the lab.”

He took the autodrive off and we continued for a few miles. I turned and saw that Michael had fallen asleep.

“Can you raise the panel?” I whispered to Hyden.

Hyden glanced in the rearview mirror, then pressed a button. A plexi-panel slid up to meet the roof, making it impossible for Michael to hear us if he woke up.

“What’s up?” Hyden asked me.

“Back at the Hall of Records, when your father got in my head, he did something new.”

“What?”

“He was able to control me.”

“How?”

“He moved my little finger. Against my will.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“We haven’t exactly had a quiet moment, you know.”

“But it shows he’s advanced. I need to know these things.”

“Well, now you know.” I touched the back of my head a moment and then stopped. “And there’s something else I haven’t had time to tell you.”

“What?” He looked at me with narrowed eyes.

“He didn’t claim to be doing my father’s voice, when I confronted him.”

“That’s just him.”

“No, he always takes credit for what he’s done.”

“He’s messing with you. Forget about it.”

Hyden got off the freeway. After a short time, we drove alongside the dry riverbed of the L.A. River. Hyden pulled his SUV over the curb and through a hole in the entrance. We drove down a steep embankment until we were on the cement of the riverbed.

“Hyden?” I asked, holding on to a hand grip.

Michael woke and banged on the panel between us. Hyden lowered it.

“What are you doing?” he shouted.

“The Department of Water and Power built us this nice little ramp years ago. We’re going right down it.”

He drove down an auxiliary shaft in front of us.

“But why? Where are we going?” I asked, holding on even tighter.

“Someplace low and safe,” Hyden said as he wound his way down, level by level. “With a restroom.”

When we got to the bottom, it was like another world. There was a large makeshift market with all kinds of Starters and Enders.

A scrappy Starter ran up to our car with a bottle and rags in his hands.

“Look out!” I said to Hyden so he wouldn’t hit him.

“It’s okay,” Hyden said. “He’s getting rid of any possible spore dust.”

The Starter wiped down Hyden’s car, wetting it with his spray while we were still moving into a parking space.

We got out and Hyden gave him a dollar.

“What is this?” I asked.

“The People’s Flea Market. We’re only going through it because of the restroom at the end,” Hyden said.

“What are we waiting for?” Michael asked as he walked toward the entrance.

An Ender woman wearing a head scarf in a green flowery print sat at a table with a sign reading
Pay Here
. Hyden put three bills on the table and she held open the entrance gate, made from a No Right Turn sign.

“Enjoy,” she said with a twinkle in her eye.

There was something familiar about her. But it wasn’t the woman; it was the scarf. My mom used to have the same one.

I followed Hyden, as did Michael, dazed, numb, and no doubt in shock from the shootout. We sleepwalked past the sellers sitting on blankets or folding chairs behind tables displaying odd pieces of life, some from many years ago.

Michael noticed a large, flat piece of metal lying on a table. “What’s that?”

The seller was an eccentric Ender with his long white hair in many tiny braids. He perked up at our interest.

“It’s called a laptop,” the seller said. “It’s a computer.”

“You mean that big thing is an airscreen?” I asked. “That’s how they used to access the Pages?”

“They didn’t call them Pages then,” Hyden said. “Back then they didn’t document every second of their lives the way we do.”

“Not all of us,” Michael said.

The seller smiled and touched the metal, popping it open. It was even bigger.

“Look at the keys,” I said. “Like a typewriter.” I gave the seller a nod. “Thanks for showing us.” We moved on.

“What’s a typewriter?” Michael asked.

“You haven’t seen the old movies?” I thought of the ones my dad had shown me. The next time I saw one, he wouldn’t be there.

“Why did they call it ‘laptop’?” Michael asked.

“Because it was meant to be used on your lap,” Hyden said. “But no one ever did.”

“Why are they here and not outside?” I asked.

“They’re part of the underground people,” Hyden said.
“Starters and Enders afraid of another attack, or of spore residue.”

“But aren’t they vaccinated?” Michael asked.

“Not all. And the vaccine can’t protect from a new bio-weapon attack,” Hyden said.

Bio-weapon. Attack. Spore residue. I felt dizzy.

I washed my face in the restroom and wiped my hands with the paper napkins neatly stacked on the counter. The scarf woman must have swiped those from hot dog stands. As I stood there alone, the deaths at the lab finally hit me like a punch to the gut from an unfriendlie. It was surreal being here at the flea market after what we had just gone through.

Redmond. Ernie.

I joined the guys in the refreshment area. They had bottles of water and cheap chocolate patties trying to pass for Supertruffles. Minimal amount of vitamins just so they could say they had them.

Hyden tossed one to me. “Here.”

I grabbed the chocolate. He threw the water bottle, but I missed and it thudded onto the ground. Michael picked it up and handed it to me. I stood there, not moving.

“What’s wrong?” Hyden asked.

“What isn’t wrong?” I said.

He came closer and carefully plucked the chocolate from my hand, opened it, and held it out for me to take. I took it without touching him, broke off a small piece, and chewed it slowly.

“Come on,” he said.

The fake Supertruffle was dry in my throat.

“I want my life back, okay?” I said.

Hyden stared at me. So did Michael.

“I only had a couple of weeks with my brother as a normal family, living in a home, and now he’s up there on that mountain, and I’m down here, underground, wondering if I’ll ever get to see him again. I was supposed to give him a life, not a nanny. And the way things are going, we might not all live to see tomorrow anyway.”

Hyden took a step closer. “I want the same thing you do—to be untethered. I want all of us to be free. But not now. We just have to take it one step at a time, okay?”

I looked away.

“It’s not like we’ve lost everything,” Hyden said.

I swallowed hard. How could he say that?

“We haven’t, Callie. Redmond is gone and we’ve lost the Metals. Lily and Savannah and Jeremy and the rest.”

I thought for a moment about the danger they were in—no matter what that dying Ender said, Hyden’s father could always turn them into human bombs.

“But we’re going to work to get them back. I have a bag packed with essentials. And cash.” Hyden gestured toward the car, where he’d put the large black duffel bag. “Research I can re-create.” He pointed to his head.

“But your lab, the computers,” I said.

“They didn’t get my computers,” he said. “I had a panic button set up to destroy the computers.”

“But then you lost them.”

“Let me show you guys something,” Hyden said.

We followed him out the flea-market exit and walked toward his SUV.

“I have the scanner. And I have backup.” He pointed to his car. “This is a portable lab.”

“Where?” I asked.

He opened the back. A black leather lounge-style seat was carved into the cargo panel, running across the width. It was shaped so a person would sit back in it with their legs bent. Hyden reached over that and lifted a panel, revealing a megacomputer.

Michael let out a low whistle. “Not just an old Metal detector.”

Okay, it was something. But no cause for celebration.

Hyden cocked his head. “You’re right, Callie, it’s bad. For the Metals. And Redmond. But don’t give up.”

I looked from Hyden to Michael. Their strength grounded me. And gave me a little hope.

We slept in the SUV—Hyden in the front, Michael and I in back. I’d drifted off after what seemed like hours trying to get comfortable with no blanket and no pillow, only to wake up disoriented in the dark. I could hear Hyden’s and Michael’s rhythmic breathing. It was dim, with just some small lights on the dashboard and around the interior of the car, glowing like luminescent bugs in a cave. Through the smoked windows I could see the handwritten Closed sign the scarf lady had propped up at the entrance. This was a permanent market, and many of the vendors had draped towels and rags over their wares. Other spaces were now empty. Several of the sellers slept in their parked cars so they could monitor the market.

As I looked through the window, my eyes focused on the window itself, and my vision became blurry. When it refocused, it was like the window was a screen, and across it played a scene that soon enveloped me. I was in Club Rune, moving
across the dance floor, past the glamorous “teens,” mostly Ender renters in donor bodies, the way Helena had rented me. I glided up to the bar and showed the bartender a small holo of a girl. It was Emma, Helena’s missing granddaughter—blond and regal, with Helena’s noble nose and strong chin.