Captives (31 page)

The road widened before the wall to the Midlands, splitting into four lanes with a tiny booth and gate at each. Levi took the lane on the far left, still a little shaky steering around so many moving vehicles. He stopped before the gate and fisted three squares on the dash before he found the one that rolled down his window. The man in the booth stared. Levi stared back.

“ID?” the man said, pointing to a black pad sticking out from his booth. “You’re not vaping and driving, are you?”

“No.” Levi reached out the window and fisted the pad. “I don’t even own a vaper.”

The man chuckled as the gate started to rise. “Find pleasure in life, shell.”

“Yeah, you too.” Levi steered through the gate. A black car honked as it raced by on his left, nearly crashing into him. Levi took a deep breath, looked over his shoulder for other vehicles, waited for two more to go by, then steered back into the single lane that tunneled through the wall to the Midlands.

Going from the Highlands into the Midlands, Levi left behind the wonder and color of the magical city and returned to stark black-and-white reality. The buildings were clean, but shorter and shabby: rows of houses, shops, and apartment buildings. And where the buildings in the Highlands were crammed together, there was more land out here.
More open space. There also seemed to be more billboards. Levi tried to read one of the signs but ended up swerving out of his lane.

He passed a graffiti-covered wall. He managed to make out the words,
Virus, FFF,
and what looked like
Black Arm
, though some street cleaners were painting over it.

The GPS led him nearly to the next wall. To the Lowlands, perhaps? Or outside? Before he came to the gate, the GPS told him to turn right, which sent him parallel along the wall.

The Larkspur was a log building, four stories high. He found a slot to park in and got out of the truck. There was a spinning door in the front, but Levi found a regular one and went inside. The lobby looked like it came out of an Old Western movie: roughhewn furniture and wagon wheel chandeliers. The place smelled like woodchips.

A doorman met him inside and checked his ID on a handheld computer. “Welcome home, Mr. Justin. My name is Colter. If you need anything, please use the help on your Wyndo.”

Whatever that meant. “How do I find my room?”

“You’re in room 206. You can take the elevator or stairs to the second floor. Your apartment will be to your right. If you’d like something simple, the Hunter serves a great hamburger. There are also two restaurants down the block: Wingers and Café Eat, if you don’t mind InstaFood.”

“What’s InstaFood?”

“It’s frozen. Already been cooked, then they heat it up. No waiting.”

Bizarre. Levi took the stairs to the second floor. His new home was a hotel room of Old: narrow and clean. It had a bed, one of those glass-wall TVs, a separate indoor bathroom, a sink, and a small refrigerator.

Seeing no reason to hang around, he decided to find food. He took the stairs back to the lobby, and as he descended, his gaze caught sight of the words
Black Army
that someone had written in dark ink on the back of the steps above his head. He’d eat, and afterwards he’d see if he could find out what some of this graffiti stood for. And maybe he could find Bender, like Lonn from the RC had suggested. He had to be careful, though. He couldn’t afford another X.

“Is everything okay, Mr. Justin?” Colter asked when he entered the lobby.

“Just looking to get some food,” Levi said. “How do I get to that instant café?”

“Café Eat is to the left. It’s on the corner before the next light.”

Levi started for the door. “Hey, how do I send a letter to a friend in the Highlands?”

“I can call a messenger for you, sir. They do charge a fee.”

“Will they read it?”

“Certainly not, sir.”

“Where can I get some writing materials?”

“There’s a G.I.N. store just before Café Eat.”

“Thanks. Hey, one more question. How can I look someone up, to see where they live?”

“You could use your Wyndo to access to the grid, or you could leave the individual’s name with me and I’d be happy to try and locate them.”

“Yeah, okay, well, his name is Bender. I don’t know if that’s his first or last name.”

Colter’s eyes widened. “For the record, Mr. Justin, residents of the Larkspur are law-abiding nationals. I hope you aren’t involved with the Black Army.”

“Bender is connected to the Black Army?”

“Oh, yes. He’s one of their leaders. But I must warn you …” He glanced at Levi’s cheek where the two Xs were bared for all to see. “Spending your time with people who associate with the Black Army will only get you liberated before your time.”

Levi definitely needed to find this Bender fellow. “Look, I’m an outsider who just moved here. Some guy told me to see if I could find Bender. I didn’t know he was trouble, and I certainly don’t need any more. Sorry if I upset you. And thanks for setting me straight.”

“Not at all, Mr. Justin. Enjoy your lunch. And find pleasure in life.”

“Yeah, I’ll do that.” Levi walked to the truck but could see the Café Eat sign from where he stood, so he decided to walk. A wall of cement lined the sidewalk. Thick gray paint had recently covered large
sections of the wall. He strained to make out the covered-up words but couldn’t tell what had been written underneath. Street cleaners in the Midlands did good work.

He waited at the intersection for the light to change. The G.I.N. store sat kitty-corner from where he stood. He’d stop in there on his way back to his apartment.

Café Eat had a very different atmosphere from the Marcellina Steakhouse. No fancy tablecloths. Everything was red and white plastic. The patrons were loud, laughing and yelling across the room at people on the other side.

Levi waited inside the door, but when no waitress showed up, he wandered to one of two vacant seats at a counter where he could see the cooks cooking and a waitress on the other side. She set a plate of food in front of a man, then stopped in front of Levi.

She was wearing a short red dress with a white apron. “Know what you’ll have?”

“Beef with ranch sauce?”

“How about a bacon ranch burger?”

“Sure.”

“You’ll have it in three, or it’s free.” The waitress walked away.

Three what? Minutes? Could that really be safe? Levi inspected the man sitting at his left. He was tall and bony, and his arms were covered in tattoos. He had two Xs on his cheek.

“How’d you get
your
Xs?” Levi asked.

The man glanced Levi’s way and grunted.

The waitress stopped by Levi again. “What can I get you?” She wasn’t looking at Levi, though.

A kid had claimed the stool on Levi’s right. He looked about Omar’s age, and was wearing black gloves, had brown hair like a trimmed porcupine, three tiny gold hoops on one side of his nostrils, and was missing his left ear. Bummer. A five was inked onto his face. The only thing he seemed to lack was an X.

“Chicken sandwich with honey mustard and some onion rings,” the kid said.

“Back in three, or it’s free,” the waitress said.

Levi tried not to look at the kid’s ear when he asked, “Know where I might find Bender?”

The kid started to laugh. “Seriously? Look, peer, you’re going to have that third X by the end of the day if you go around saying that name.”

“Bender?”

“No, bacon ranch burger,” the kid said, still chuckling.

“Well, how am I supposed to find the guy?”

“Don’t know why you’d want to, you dim shell, but unless you want to end up in this month’s liberation ceremony, you’d better think of a plan B.”

“Live here all your life?” Levi asked.

“Yep.”

“How did you manage to lose an ear and not get at least one X?”

The kid’s jaw twitched. “You really have to burn someone to get one X, let alone three.”

“Yeah, but I’d guess you’d really have to burn someone to lose an ear too.”

Levi’s burger came then, as did the kid’s chicken sandwich and onion rings. Levi figured he’d done enough damage with his mouth and stuffed his face.

The food satisfied but didn’t compare to the steak from Marcillina’s. The man on Levi’s left finished long before he did and left without saying a word. Levi was only half done eating when the earless porcupine got up to leave. He’d eaten barely half his food.

“Another time, shell,” the kid said. “If you last that long.”

Levi finished eating and headed for the G.I.N store. The place resembled Old stores he’d scavenged over the years, but this one was bright, clean, cobweb free, and filled with fresh products. Levi found a rack of greeting cards and grabbed a few different ones, including one for Jemma with kissing birds that looked like hearts. He wondered if a messenger would deliver it to her.

By the time he left G.I.N., it was dark. From the sidewalk, he could see the tops of some Highlands buildings over the wall. He hated that
Jemma was so close but he couldn’t get to her. He prayed she was safe, that all the Glenrock people were. He needed to learn how things were done here. He needed a friend who could explain. The earless porcupine had been nice enough but obviously didn’t want to associate with Xed people.

Levi went back to his apartment, where he wrote cards to Jordan, Mason, and Jemma, and took them down to Colter for delivery.

Patience and wit was what Lonn had told him he needed. Perhaps he’d go out and watch for graffiti artists, follow them to see if they led him to Bender. If he didn’t see anyone, he’d take his truck back to the Highlands and look for his backpack.

It felt mad good to have a plan.

He forced himself out into the night. He walked the opposite direction from Café Eat, came to an alley, and decided to explore it, but without streetlamps it was too dark to see anything. As he started back for the main road, bright headlights startled him. He moved to the right. The vehicle passed by, and he saw that it was a taxi. Just as he continued on, tires skidded over gravel behind him. Car doors creaked open.

Two masked men ran toward him. He sprinted for the main road. No way was he going back to the RC. Another vehicle turned down the alley, lights blinding him. Levi paused only for a moment, trying to decide what to do, but it was all his pursuers needed. Stun wires bit into his back, and he hit the ground.

The masked men taped his hands and ankles and put a fabric sack over his head, and he felt his body lift off the ground and plunk on a somewhat soft surface. A door slammed. Apparently he was inside the car, which quickly sped away. Levi lay across the seat on his stomach trembling and trying to think of how he’d get free before they inked his third X.

The car turned once and stopped. The sound of car doors opening, then someone climbed on Levi’s back and several sets of hands grabbed him, pushed him down against the seat. Someone cut the tape on his hands and squeezed his right wrist.

“Get off me you filthy, depraved maggots!” Levi tried to wiggle free, but he may as well have been buried alive.

“Don’t move, and this won’t hurt as bad,” a man said.

A scratch tickled Levi’s hand, then throbbed like a bee sting.

“What are you doing?” Levi yelled. “Get off me!”

The same man said to someone else, “Here, go have a drink at the Hunter. And don’t lose that.”

“You got it,” a younger voice said.

“One drink, Rewl,” the man said.

“Yeah, yeah.”

The man on top of Levi pressed something over the sting on his hand, then wound tape around Levi’s wrists again. The weight left his back. Both car doors slammed. The car lurched forward. Several minutes passed this time. Levi tried to calm down. To think. Enforcers wouldn’t do whatever this was. He just needed to stay calm and be smart.

The car turned at least five times before stopping again. Levi allowed himself to be pulled out and dragged between two people, his boots scraping over a smooth surface until one of his abductors said, “Sit.” A different man’s voice. Older.

Levi squatted carefully until he felt the edge of a chair press against the backs of his legs. He lowered himself onto the chair. “Bender?” It had to be.

A man chuckled. “What makes you ask?”

Levi’s breath made the fabric stick to his face. He blew it away and said, “I’ve been a guest in the RC twice now. This isn’t how they do things.”

“Right you are, boy. Sorry we had to cut you, but they track SimTags these days. Take off the bag, Zane.”

The sack came off Levi’s head. He sat on a metal folding chair in front of a desk in a dark office that had Old wood paneling. The place looked as old and forgotten as the man sitting behind the desk—older than was allowed in the Safe Lands. The man’s face was wrinkled and shaded with a few days’ growth of a gray beard. A burn scar pinched
his left eyebrow down over his eye so he looked as if he were winking. Levi glanced over his shoulder and saw a kid standing in the corner, arms crossed.

Turned out Zane was the earless porcupine.

“Chicken sandwich,” Levi said.

Zane nodded once at Levi. “How’s it going, bacon ranch burger?”

“You following me?” Levi asked.

Zane grinned. “How’d you guess?”

“I hear you’re looking for me,” Bender said, pulling Levi’s attention back.

“Lonn told me to. I met him in the RC.”

Bender took a deep breath. “I don’t suppose he sent a message?”

A message? Who was Lonn anyway? “He said you’d help me if I told you ‘Rose.’ I thought it was a code or something.”

“That’s it?”

“Yeah.”

Bender sighed and rubbed his eye. “We can do that for Lonn, but since he’s not here to tell us why, we’re going to ask a favor. See, we’ve been watching you. Got our own surveillance tapped into the grid. Saw you came in carrying a rifle. Lost you in the park, but we know the rifle didn’t come out. You didn’t have it, the enforcers didn’t have it, so where is it?”

“I hid it.”

“That’s what we figured. But even with my excellent trackers, we haven’t found it.”

“That’s what this is all about? You want my rifle?”

“Not exactly,” Bender said. “Very few enforcers are trained as snipers in the Safe Lands. And with Lonn in the RC, I don’t have a sniper. So I want to know if you can shoot.”