The Sovereign Era (Book 2): Pilgrimage (12 page)

“Take your time, dude. Don’t choke.”

Byron finally swallowed. “You’re new.”

“Am I? I mean, I’ve been around…lemme see…sixteen years and…” She counted off on her thin fingers. “Four months. Newer than some, I guess. Not as new as others.”

Was this chick crazy, or just being lame?

“I mean…you’re new here. Obviously. Jeez.”

"’Obviously. Jeez.’" She laughed. “Relax, man. I’m just having fun.”

That made one of them. “Good for you.”

“You’re Byron. The famous kid with the jackoff dad.”

“Hey, you can read a newspaper.”

“Faster than you, I bet.” She smiled, showing a mouthful of big teeth. “I’m Haze.” She stuck out her hand.

It would be rude not to shake her hand. Byron took it.

Her hand was very, very warm. Like picking up a rock on the beach on a hot day. Byron didn’t flinch, and the skin on his palm quickly adjusted to it.

“Nice to meet you.”

Her light eyebrows bounced once. “You’re curious…aren’t you?”

Byron shrugged. “Sure.”

She poked the garlic toast on the edge of his plate. “You gonna eat that?” She pushed her finger in and kept it there.

Byron thought that was kinda rude. “Not now, I guess!”

“Heh.” Haze pulled her finger away to reveal a dark, charred circle on the bread. A thin tendril of smoke twisted up from it. It smelled like a fresh oven.

“Huh!” Byron picked up the toast, held it to his nose, and sniffed. He loved the smell of fresh toast. It was a thing. “You’re a…what’s it called, a pyro…pyrotech…”

“You’re thinking ‘pyrokinetic.’” She sat back a little. “That’s what the mad scientists say, anyway.”

“That’s pretty cool…”

She shrugged. “I guess.”

“So is Haze your…y’know, your real name?”

She rolled her eyes. “You mean, is it, like, my call sign, or, whatever, my ‘Sovereign’ name, or is it the name on my birth certificate?”

Byron knew he had offended her, but he was damned if he knew how. “Well, yeah. I just thought, you know, a girl who starts fires, smoke, haze, all that…”

“I’m not one of your SCET goose-steppers, dude. Yes, it’s my real name. Haze, short for Hazel, which you are never to call me, not ever…get it? Hazel’s a maid on TV, not your new best friend.”

His new best friend?

“Okay, sure. Cool. Whatever.”

“All right.” She had a cruel twinkle in her eye. “You gonna call yourself something stupid when you’re a full-on Sovereign enforcer? Got your call sign all picked out?”

Byron felt himself redden. “It’s not like that. And they’re not goose-steppers, either.”

“So you don’t have a name yet.”

“You don’t get to pick your own nickname. That would be…lame.”

“Oh,
that
would be lame.” Her grin was three parts irritating and one part…something Byron couldn’t name. “I see. Okay.”

“What do you have against the SCET?”

She looked to the left and stretched her arms above her head. Byron couldn’t help watching the bottom of her half-shirt move up her torso. She had so many freckles…

He brought his eyes up as her arms came down. “Same problem I have with all cops.” He was sure she hadn’t noticed his looking, but there was something in her eyes that unnerved him.

“Um…” What was he supposed to do? He was a guy! “Is that why you’re here? Trouble with the cops? Did you…set something on fire?”

She shook her head. “Huh-uh, soldier boy. Not on the first date.”

The drill team and cheerleader girls back home were not like this. Byron wasn’t used to feeling so off-balance with a girl. Why didn’t his adaptive power work for
this
?

“First date?”

She winked. “Close enough. We’re the only teenagers here…and least for now, far as I know. There’s that glowing girl, but she’s just a kid. We’re supposed to be buddies; it’s right there in the script.”

“What…script?”

“Figure of speech, Byron.” She made googly eyes at him. “Like, a joke…?”

He shook his head and tried to get back to eating his spaghetti while it was still warm. “You are one weird chick.” He took a bite. It was too late. The pasta was rubbery and the sauce was cold.

“I get that a lot.” She must have seen the look on his face as he ate the cold spaghetti. “Here, let me.”

She put her hands around the sides of his plate. A wave of heat, like opening an oven door, rolled across him.

Haze let go of the plate and stood up. “I’m outta here. See you around, solider boy.”

She stretched again, all ribs and freckles and sharp elbows. Byron could not help noticing that she wasn’t wearing a bra under the cut-off T-shirt.

She pointed casually at his food. “Oh…is that hot enough?”

“Uh…totally. I’m sure.”

Nope. Not like the Abbeque Valley girls at all.

From The Journal Of Nate Charters – Ten

Thankfully, I didn’t have a lot of time to wallow in my insecurities. A car horn I didn’t recognize blared from out in front of the house (need I mention what a shitty sound that is when you have ears as sensitive as mine?), and I went to the window to investigate.

Jason’s dad’s big Bonneville was in my driveway. With Jason behind the wheel. Curious, I stepped outside. Jason leaned out of the driver’s side window.

“Come on!” His eyes were full of mischief.

“Two secs!” I went back into the house, grabbed my sweatshirt and backpack, went back out, locked up, and slipped into the passenger seat.

Jason nodded to me. “What’s up!”

I looked around. “Since when does your dad let you drive around in the family car?”

“Since never!” He shifted into reverse and backed into the street like he’d been driving for years instead of months. I was a little envious. With my senses and reflexes, I was sure I’d be totally fine driving on my own, but my mother was sticking to the letter of the law. I wasn’t allowed to use the car unless she was in it.

“Since…huh?”

He grinned maniacally. “I stole it!” He maneuvered away from the house and turned at the corner, headed out of the neighborhood and down to Los Gatos Parkway. “Technically.”

“You stole your own family’s car.” This was totally Jason. I was feeling better already.

“Technically.” He laughed lightly. “My folks had to leave town—my aunt is having a kid, and the guy who knocked her up isn’t around, so they’re helping her out for a few days. I’m supposed to watch Reggie.”

Reggie was Regina, Jason’s twelve-year-old sister. “I bet she’s stoked about that.”

“She’s got a new boyfriend.” Jason shrugged. “They’re playing Intellivision.”

“Sure they are.”

Jason wrinkled his nose and bunched his shoulders. “Gross, man. It’s my sister.”

“Yeah. And when did you lose your virginity, again?”

“I was fourteen.” He smiled and sang, “Frances Gallagher…”

I didn’t know who she was. No one did. Jason claimed she went to Dana Cove High. Now and then, Mel and I teased him, telling him she might as well be “from Canada.” But I could tell: Jason wasn’t lying.

I didn’t really hold it against him, but the fact that he’d lost it so long ago and I still hadn’t done it with my steady girlfriend of nearly a year brought me down.

Jason drove a few blocks until he must have noticed my silence. “Something up?”

I sighed. “I—yeah.”

“Is it the thing with Lina? Have you talked to her yet?”

“Yes. And no.” I turned my head to look out the passenger window, then turned back to face front. “I saw the guy. Eric Finn.”

“No fuckin’ way. What’d he—no, hold on. I want to hear this with no distractions. Hold on.”

“He’s—"

Jason took a hand off the wheel to wave it at me. “Wait! Wait-wait-wait!”

I waited. He turned left at the next light and headed back the way we had come, but instead of making a left toward my house, he went right, up to Romita Park. He parked at the curb, turned off the ignition, and pulled the parking brake.

“Okay.” He shifted on the bench seat to face me. “Hit me. Hit me.”

I told him about Sunrise Import Shop, about how Eric Finn was all…adult, and stuff. I didn’t tell him about my little meltdown in the park.

“Dude sounds like a putz,” Jason said helpfully.

I huffed. “What was she doing with him, when she was, like, fifteen years old? He must have been almost eighteen! What if he was eighteen?”

Jason nodded sagely. “Statutory rape, that’s what.”

A rush of unfocused anger flowed in me. “Except, not, right? If he never went through with it.”

“Right.” Jason scratched his temple. “You ever talk to that one chick? The one you said pulled this asshole off of Lina?”

“Crystal? No. I didn’t get the chance at their last practice.”

“Oh. Huh.”

“What?”

“Well…dude, I don’t want to be a dick, but…maybe that’s not how it went down, right? Maybe the guy…sorry, but maybe the guy really did it, and Lina doesn’t want anyone to know. Especially, like, you.” He made clawing motions with his hands. “Considering.”

“Considering…what?” My guts shook. “Considering I’d kick his ass?”

Jason sat back and looked out the windshield. “Fuckin’ A. I would.”

Was he judging me?

“You think I should…go after him. Like, really. Go after him.”

“Dude.” Jason turned back to me. “You are…you, man. Who gives a shit if this fucker’s all whatever you think he is? You’re a fuckin’ Sovereign—"

“I am not a Sovereign.” My voice was a little louder than it needed to be. Jason knew better than to put that on me.

He pushed. “You might as well be, dude. You know those guys would back whatever you wanted to do. You’re untouchable.”

I laughed. He was crazy if he thought that. “Seriously? You haven’t been watching the freak show I’ve been living since last year? Dude…seriously?”

He shook his head. “Huh-uh.” He held up his middle finger and flipped off the world outside the window. “They’re going through the motions with that bullshit, man, you ask me.”

Jason had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. But there was some kind of sense, sort of, around what he was saying.

I said, “I’m so fucking sick of it.”

Jason looked at me for a second. “You should be, dude.”

We sat in the car a few minutes.

“I mean…if she was with that guy…what’s she doing with me?”

Jason shook his head. “Nope. Don’t even.”

“Makes me wonder.”

“My ass. She digs you.” He smiled. “Fuck knows why, seein’ as how she met me the very same time as you…but Lina’s lousy taste aside, the situation’s the same. It’s MYOJ time, dude.”

Was it?

Could I?

“You think so?”

“No doubt.”

“What about Lina?”

“What about her?” Jason scoffed. “That fucker did her wrong, and it’s obviously totally fucked her up. You’re the guy who’s supposed to do right…right? MYOJ. Totally MYOJ.”

Eric Finn’s Stray Cats knock-off male-model Sha Na Na reject face floated in my mind. I wondered what he’d look like scared out of his mind.

“I…I fought monsters.” I looked at Jason. “I mean, they were like monsters.”

“And here you are. And where are those monster guys?”

“You know.”

“Tell me.”

“They’re dead.” They died horribly, in fact. “But I didn’t—"

“They’re dead. And here you are,” Jason said again. “You’re a fucking badass, dude.” He shook his head and laughed. “I never got why
you
don’t just get that.”

It was hard to.

I considered. “I wouldn’t even really have to do anything, right? I mean, I could just freak him out. Scare him. Make him know…someone knows.”

“Someone who could fuck him up,” Jason said, “any time you wanted.”

I shifted on the seat. “I was just thinking, someone who could turn him in, any time.”

“Either way. It’s MYOJ time.”

I thought about it.

Eric Finn was just a guy.

Eric Finn was just a fucking bully.

Eric Finn…was just human.

I took a deep breath.

“You think it is?”

“Totally.” He nodded. “You do, too. Say it. MYOJ time. C’mon.”

I looked out the window at the movie in my head of Eric Finn blubbering at my feet.

“Okay.”

“Say it.”

I took another deep breath.

“It’s make-your-own-justice time.”

Marc Teslowski – Six

The restaurant next to the hotel had a dim wood-paneled lounge that was nearly empty. It did not have a television or a jukebox. That suited Marc fine.

Two hours ago, he had found the corner farthest from the entryway to the restaurant and set himself up in a booth. He gave his credit card and instructions to the waitress: set him up with a steak, french fries, and a new beer and fries every time either one was depleted.

So equipped, Marc proceeded to kill his hunger and sobriety. He heard activity in the main restaurant rise and fall through the dinner hour, but the lounge never attracted more than a few old men, who sat at the bar, and a few tourist couples, who came and went.

They all seemed human, not that that made any difference anymore. What was happening to the world?

It was three days until Declaration Day. A little over two weeks later would be the anniversary of Byron going to the Donner Institute.

“Not ‘going,’ damn it,” Marc muttered into his beer. “Taken. Taken.”

He wanted to punch himself in the face. Was he starting to believe what everyone else wanted him to think? That Byron wasn’t the victim of a Sovereign kidnapping and propaganda campaign…that he just…left?

“Taken,” he said again, probably louder this time, as an old-timer at the bar looked curiously over his shoulder at Marc.

Marc ignored him, putting his attention solidly on the ruins of his dinner. He picked at his fries. Where was the waitress? The damn things were soggy and cold.

He sensed someone near the table. He looked up.

It wasn’t the waitress. It was a couple of guys, one older, one younger.

Great. Someone had recognized him.

The older guy took off his white cowboy hat and extended his right hand. “Mister Teslowski, my name is Ray Greene. This is my boy, Arby. We’d very much like to buy you a drink, sir.”