Revolution (Replica) (15 page)

As was inevitable whenever she allowed herself to think of her old life, Nadia couldn’t help wondering if her parents were all right.

Well, no. Of
course
they weren’t all right. They were both locked up in Rikers Island, and who knew what horrors they had to face inside that infamous prison. But she hoped they were at least alive. That they hadn’t been tortured. That they hadn’t been broken.

The heat of her little make-out session with Dante was long gone, replaced by guilt that she’d been indulging herself while her parents were locked up in Rikers because of her. Tears dribbled down Nadia’s cheeks and dripped on her pillow. Thinking about what her parents were going through made her miserable; and yet
not
thinking about it made her feel like the worst, most uncaring daughter ever. There was no winning. In the direct aftermath of Dorothy’s murder of Chairman Hayes, Nadia had bolstered herself with the image of her and Nate gathering and leading a new resistance movement, one that would somehow topple the government and bring Thea to justice. Now, it turned out their great resistance activities consisted of hiding out in a gang lord’s apartment and doing absolutely nothing.

“Are you awake?” Agnes whispered.

Nadia drew in a shaky breath. She was pretty sure her tears had been quiet—and that Agnes wouldn’t scorn her for them if she knew—but she surreptitiously brushed at her face and rubbed her eyes in hopes of erasing all traces.

“Yeah,” she admitted. “It’s hard to sleep knowing what kind of monster we’re trusting our lives to.” Not that that had anything to do with the little pity party that had been keeping Nadia awake.

The bed shook and creaked as Agnes turned over. Nadia wiped her face with her hand one more time before turning over to face her in the darkness. The blackout drapes were effective enough that she could barely see the other girl’s form.

“I can’t sleep because I can’t stand the thought that we’re letting her win,” Agnes said.

Nadia groaned softly. “I hate it, too. I wish we could at least do
something,
even something tiny, to help bring her down. But I think Maiden made it pretty clear that he won’t put up with anything that might cause trouble.”

Beside her, Agnes propped her head on her hand, and though Nadia couldn’t see the expression on her face, she could almost feel her intensity. “So maybe Maiden isn’t who we need to talk to.”

There was only one other person Agnes could have in mind. “I’ll admit Shrimp seems pretty decent, but I can’t see him helping us behind his brother’s back. He does a good job of fronting, but I’m pretty sure Maiden scares him almost as much as he scares the rest of us.”

Agnes let out a frustrated huff. “He does,” she confirmed. “Evan’s told me some stories that make my blood run cold.”

“Evan?”

“That’s Shrimp’s birth name. I like it a lot better than ‘Shrimp,’ don’t you?”

Nadia smiled at the hint of smugness in Agnes’s voice. It seemed that she and Shrimp were getting on even better than Nadia had thought.

“Absolutely,” Nadia agreed. “But somehow I don’t think he’d be too happy if
I
called him that.”

She would bet everything she owned—which, granted, was almost nothing—that Agnes was blushing.

“Probably not. And, uh, it’s probably best if you don’t let him know I told you.”

“I won’t. Promise.”

“Anyway, you’re right that he’s kind of scared of Maiden, but he has a heart. And he can see the bigger picture.” Propping her head on her hand was apparently no longer enough, because Agnes sat up and crossed her legs. Once again, Nadia could feel the intensity wafting from her. “We all know Thea’s not going to let up anytime soon. Maiden can sit up there in his gaudy tower room with his slave girls and live like he thinks a king should, but if Thea keeps escalating, a lot of people are going to die. Maiden might not care as long as they’re not
his
people, but Evan does. And Evan knows it’s only a matter of time before Red Death people start getting hurt anyway.”

Nadia sat up, too, putting her back against the headboard and wrapping her arms around her knees. “And yet you don’t see him volunteering to help us. I think he was pretty clear that he wanted us to be good little children and do nothing.”

“That’s what he thinks is
safest
for us to do. But how long do you think Dorothy can keep the lights out before her ‘austerity measures’ start causing riots? And how do you think she’s going to proceed once those riots start?”

Nadia grimaced, because she could see the future that was creeping up on them all too clearly.

“If we sit here quietly and do what Maiden wants,” Agnes continued, “then a whole lot of people are going to die.”

“You don’t have to convince
me,
” Nadia said. “I’m totally with you. It’s just that we can’t do it without help, and Shrimp has already said no.”

“And that means we should stop asking?”

“Well, no. I guess it doesn’t.” She smiled at Agnes, not sure the other girl could pick out her expression. “And if you’re the one doing the asking, I suppose it’s always possible he’ll have a change of heart.”

Agnes hesitated a beat before speaking. “We do sort of get along well.”

Nadia tilted her head to one side. “You make kind of an odd couple, you know.”

Agnes waved a hand vaguely. “We’re not a couple. We just like each other is all. And even if we were, we’re not any odder than you and Dante.”

It was true that Dante and Nadia came from very different worlds, and she supposed that made them something of an unlikely couple. “Nate was the only Executive boy I ever met who I genuinely liked,” she said. “The others were all too pompous, or too ambitious, or too phony. Dante’s as genuine as they come, and he’s not the kind of guy who sits on the sidelines critiquing someone’s outfit while people are being oppressed. He’s everything those Executive boys weren’t, so I’m not sure we’re really all that odd a couple after all.”

“Evan’s the only guy I’ve ever met who hasn’t seen me as a chess piece on his game board,” Agnes said. “I’ve never seen that look in his eye that says he’s putting my looks on one side of the scale and my status as a Chairman’s daughter on the other and trying to figure out if they balance. He never nags me to talk when I don’t have anything to say, never expects me to be witty and entertaining.” She sighed heavily. “Add to that that he’s funny, and kind, and good-hearted, and, well…”

Nadia nodded. “I can see that,” she said, though she wondered how Agnes managed to ignore his status as a gang member. He was a whole lot nicer than Nadia would ever have expected someone like him to be, but she couldn’t help speculating about what it was he did while he was out all night. He often came back with satchels of money or goods, and Nadia wasn’t sure she wanted to know what he did to get them.

“What do you suppose is going to happen to us when this is all over?” Agnes asked.

Nadia lay back down with a sigh. “To tell you the truth, I never put a lot of thought into it.” Partly because of her pessimistic view of their chances of being alive when all was said and done, but also because she had trouble imagining ever returning to her old life. It seemed impossible that she might once again find herself standing around at some stuffy Executive cocktail party making small talk with VIPs while fending off the backhanded compliments and outright insults of the Terrible Trio.

Agnes lay down also, rolling onto her stomach and hugging her pillow to her chin. “I think about it all the time,” she said. “Even if we get out of this alive, we’re both of us damaged goods.”

Nadia made a face, but she couldn’t argue the point. She’d already been socially ruined herself, and that was
before
she’d supposedly been an accomplice to murder and fled to the Basement. As far as the public knew, Agnes was a victim of kidnapping, and if it ever came out that she had gone with Nate voluntarily and spent weeks unchaperoned in a Basement-dweller’s apartment, she would quickly acquire a label less appealing than “victim.” No matter how unfair that might be.

“Ten to one we both spend the rest of our lives hidden away in some Executive retreat where our families can pretend we don’t exist,” Agnes continued glumly. “And that’s the best-case scenario. So, you know, if I want to spend time with someone like Evan—and
you
want to spend time with someone like Dante—seems to me it can’t make our situation any worse.”

“I am
not
going back into a retreat,” Nadia said with conviction. “And you’d better not let them do that to
you,
either. If our families are embarrassed by us, then that’s
their
problem, not ours.”

Agnes’s silence said she was unconvinced. Maybe she was right, and there was no way either of them could return to Executive society after hiding out in the Basement. Nadia had allowed herself to be locked up in a retreat once before, but she was never going to do it again. And though Agnes was shy and timid, Nadia thought their time spent on the run had gone a long way toward giving her a backbone.

No. If they emerged from the Basement alive, Nadia refused to accept any disgrace society might want to foist on her. She had awakened her inner honey badger, and unless she was very much mistaken, so had Agnes. Their lives might never be the same if they survived, but they were going to carve out their own places. If society didn’t like it, well, that was just too damn bad.

*   *   *

As
usual, Shrimp was already up and cooking by the time Nadia was dressed and ready to meet the day. And as usual, Agnes was in the kitchen with him. Nadia didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but she found herself stopping in the hallway, watching the two of them for a moment without announcing her presence. The way they moved around the small kitchen with such careless, familiar ease reminded Nadia almost of a dance, especially when you added in the way Agnes kind of lit up from the inside.

She looked genuinely happy, and more relaxed than Nadia could ever remember seeing her before. And the person who made her look that way was a gang member, someone who had lived all his life in the squalor and crime of the Basement.

Shrimp said something that made Agnes giggle, and she laid her hand on his shoulder in a way that would have scandalized Executive society. And the warmth in Shrimp’s eyes when he looked at her said that the touch was more than welcome. Nadia decided she’d better announce her presence before things got uncomfortable.

Trying to make a little extra noise as she walked, Nadia sailed into the living room and tried not to notice how Agnes and Shrimp jumped apart.

“Good morning,” Nadia said cheerfully, though of course it was way closer to sunset than to dawn.

Thanks to the power outage, Shrimp had to do some serious improvising in the kitchen—the stove required electricity—but he’d done a pretty good job of it. He’d created a makeshift grill out of a large soup pot, and he was preparing steaks he’d kept cold in a cooler packed with ice.

“This’ll probably be our last fresh food for a while,” he commented as he and Agnes toted the makeshift grill and the food over toward a table near the window. “The ice is pretty much history, so from now on, it’s gonna be canned everything.”

Agnes opened the window to let the smoke out while Shrimp lit the charcoal in his grill. Even with the window open, the room would fill with smoke, so Nadia picked up a pillow from the sofa and started fanning the smoke in the direction of the window. Shrimp nodded his thanks, then retrieved a beer from the fridge. Nadia doubted it was even vaguely cool after all this time, and she shook her head when he offered her one. She couldn’t abide beer even when it was cold.

Nate, Bishop, and Dante had a knack for showing up in plenty of time for dinner. Shrimp was keeping a close eye on the grill when they knocked, so Nadia let them in, and they joined the little campfire circle that was forming.

“Do we still have to stay inside tonight?” Nate asked. “I’m going out of my mind being cooped up like this.”

Anyone who knew him could see he was going stir-crazy without him having to say it. Nadia had never seen him so fidgety, constantly in motion.

Shrimp shrugged. “Nothin’ stopping you from going out. ’Cept common sense.”

Nate grimaced. “Can you at least give us some idea what’s going on out there?” He nodded toward the open window. “You’re out in it every night, and without the TV we’re completely blind.”

“It’s getting ugly,” Shrimp replied. “Lotsa people on the street who shouldn’t be. Tempers even shorter than usual. I cruised into the free territory last night, out near Angel’s. Some dumb-asses lit a bonfire in the middle of the street, and people were gathered around it, throwing shit in.” Another swig of beer. “If they don’t turn the lights back on soon, it’s gonna go from ugly to the kind of dangerous where people die.

“That ain’t the worst of it,” Shrimp continued. “I went to see if the checkpoints were still up—I mean, you’d think if the government was so hard up for cash they’d have better things to do with their money than park Employees all the way around the Basement twenty-four hours a day.”

Nate shook his head in disgust. “But they were still there.”

“Worse than that. There were
more
of them. They’ve put up sawhorses across the streets and sidewalks, and they’re not letting anyone in or out, even with ID.”

Grim news indeed, Nadia thought, wondering if she should have accepted that beer after all. Shrimp seemed to have the same idea, finishing off his beer with a few quick chugs, then grabbing the whole six-pack from the fridge and bringing it into the living room.

The flames in the “grill” had died down, and most of the smoke was now obediently making its way out the window, but Shrimp pronounced that the charcoal wasn’t ready yet. Nate and Bishop sat on the couch, leaving just enough room for Nadia and Dante to squeeze in beside them. Agnes sat in the armchair, and Shrimp plopped down onto the floor, sitting cross-legged.

“You don’t have to sit on the floor,” Agnes said. She moved over and patted the seat of the armchair she was sitting on. It was a seat meant for one, but two could probably squeeze in if they didn’t mind sitting real close.