Out of This World (27 page)

A flicker of something flashes in Nanuq's eyes—not exactly fear, more like a moment of unease. Then it's gone.

“Don't make me ask you a third time,” he says. “You don't really think you can hurt me, do you?” Canejo asks, the edge in his voice growing sharper.

Nanuq shrugs. “Sooner or later we'll find out, but not today. Today you should consider your students. Continue with this stubbornness and I'll do more than let my hounds tease them with the odd torment. Though of course, I'd rather they stay in your warren with you, never again to dare to venture out of doors. They are lucky to be contained in Dainnan, otherwise I would have already dispatched them.”

Canejo stands a little taller.

“If that's your final word,” he says, “there'll be no ‘later.' We'll find out where we stand right now.”

“This is bullshit,” Lionel says. “Just give him the girl and they'll leave us alone.”

Nice, I think. The fear I've been trying to hold at bay starts up a trembling in my legs and I feel like I have to pee.

“Exactly,” Nanuq says. “Be smart for a change.”

“And if he tells us he wants you next,” Canejo asks Lionel, “we should just give you up as well?”

“I won't,” Nanuq says.

Canejo ignores him, his attention still on Lionel. “Then where does it stop?” he asks. “How many is a reasonable number before we take a stand and say enough?”

“He doesn't
want
anybody else.”

“For now,” Canejo says, turning back to Nanuq. “I say one is too many.”

“Well, I don't,” Lionel says.

Before I know what he's doing, he gives me a hard shove and I go stumbling forward. I'm too off balance to dodge Nanuq's big meaty hand as it closes over my shoulder and hauls me toward him.

“Now, was that so hard?” Nanuq asks.

Got you, I think as I let my spirit dart through the worlds, aiming for a half mile away from where the light pulse is blinking.

I'm there in an instant, high above a wooded landscape with a ribbon of road cutting through the treed hills from east to west. To the east I can see what looks like a village or an encampment before I zoom down in among the trees and reclaim my body from the earth.

I stand there, waiting to see if anything's going to happen. I half expect to snap back to where I left Tío Goyo, but I seem to have gotten the hang of this.

I call up the map in my head and look a mile or so all around me. There are hundreds of birds everywhere, big and small. An owl, crows, cardinals, jays … mammals, too. Deer, rabbits, a fox.

And cousins, in human form. A half-dozen of them are hiding in the woods, just before a bend in the road that leads to the encampment. They're canid—I'm guessing dogs—and I assume they're guards. I look at my map more closely, then follow a game trail that runs through the forest in the general direction I want to go, but avoiding the dog people.

Through a break in the tree boughs, I note a hawk drifting
high above the forest's canopy and nod to myself. Tío Goyo followed me.

It's cool here under the canopy, the air crisp. The trees are thick with ferns and underbrush, but the game trail lets me move quietly at a good pace. I'm just congratulating myself on how I'm playing this so smart when I'm suddenly pulled up into the air, entangled in I don't know what.

It takes me completely by surprise and I start to thrash until I realize I got caught by the oldest trick in the Looney Tunes cartoon playbook. I stepped into a hidden net, and now I'm dangling six feet or so above the trail. I could rip this thing apart in moments, but I decide I want to see who comes to collect me.

I don't have long to wait.

I hear excited voices and track the approach of three of those guards I noted when I first arrived. It doesn't take them long to reach me.

They're tall, with that muscular leanness you see in a barrio dog. Their skin is darker than mine, their hair thick and a glossy black, hanging down their backs like braided ropes. They kind of remind me of extras from a Spaghetti Western: barefoot, dressed in cotton shirts and pants.

Their excitement dies down once they see me.

“It's just a kid,” one of them says, clearly disappointed.

“Not just any kid,” another replies, his excitement growing again. “It's
him
.”

“Well, fuck me. You're right. He doesn't look like much, does he?”

“Should we cut him down?” the third asks.

“No,” the first one says. “Bobo's gone to get the boss. She'll know what to do.”

I just hang there letting them talk.

She, I think. Call me sexist, but I didn't take Vincenzo's boss to be a woman. Maybe it's because the two biggest role models in my life are my mom and Marina, and they're so nurturing.

The one who spoke first is talking. “What's he doing here? I thought Vincenzo said this is the kid who's going to strike the first blow of the revolution.”

When he says the word
revolution
, a big dose of déjà vu fills me. I almost don't need my mental GPS to know who's approaching. But then Elzie comes around a turn in the trail, her stride loose and confident.

It hits me like a punch in the gut. She's not a prisoner. She's the boss.

Of course Auntie Min's gotta have her center of operations on the bluff overlooking Tiki Bay. Where Lenny died. Where Vincenzo also killed Tómas, threw Cory off the cliff and broke my back.

Man, I'm really starting to hate this place.

But I lead the Feds up the Pacific Coast Highway and pull into the dirt parking lot. I phoned ahead to tell J-Dog what was up, and it looks like he called in all the troops. There must be thirty, forty bikes in the lot.

Up on the cliff I can see Auntie Min's crew of crow men standing guard at the edge of the bluff, with more in their bird shapes patrolling from the sky above.

The Feds have slowed right down, stopping at the entrance instead of following me in. When they step out of the car, Solana is carrying a pump shotgun. His partner's hands are empty, but I know he's got at least one revolver at his belt, probably another in an ankle holster.

I shut off my bike and give J-Dog a nod before I walk back to the Feds' car.

“You think this is funny?” Matteson says. “You think you can get away with ambushing Federal agents?”

“This look like an ambush to you? Nobody's even got a weapon in their hands—except him.” I look at Solana.

“Don't get smart with me, Washington,” Matteson says.

I put up a hand before he can go on. “You're the one that's being stupid. If your partner's going to keep waving that shotgun around like a big dick, there
is
going to be trouble. Get your panties out of your ass-crack and take a couple of deep breaths.”

He takes a step forward and grabs the front of my T-shirt. “Listen, you piece of shit—”

He breaks off as a lot of guns come up and point in his direction. Solana brings up his shotgun, but
come on
. What's he going to do? We've got them way outnumbered and outgunned.

“Told you,” I say as I swat his hand away. “We wanted you dead, it'd already be over.” I point up to the bluff. “That's where you're headed if you want to hear what Auntie Min's got to say.”

“And your gang just happens to be here?”

“No. This is how we survive when the shit storm hits—by sticking together. Now tell your partner to put down his gun and come talk to the old lady.”

Matteson has a sour look on his face. “This is bullshit,” he says, then spits on the dirt beside him.

I turn to Solana. “Is it? You think
los tíos
set you up for an ambush? You think I'm using their name just so that we can blow your asses away?”

Solana glares at me for a long moment before he finally lowers the shotgun.

“He's right,” he tells his partner.

I give a small shake of my head at J-Dog. He makes a motion
with his hand and all of the gang's weapons disappear back into waistbands and the holsters on their bikes. I turn toward the bluff and give J-Dog a nod over my shoulder. He breaks away from the others and joins me, then we start to climb up the hill.

“I've got this,” I say to J-Dog. “Let me do the talking.”

He doesn't look happy, but he gives me a nod.

The Feds have taken a moment to have a little confer with each other, but now they tag along behind us. Like I knew they would.

Going up the incline, I remember the last time I was here, walking hand in hand with Marina. It was dark; now it's day, and she's not here. I feel a pang of loneliness. The only thing that's the same is the sound of the waves pounding on the rocks below, the salt tang in the air.

We pass through the perimeter guarded by the crow men and keep going through the tall grass until we reach the top of the bluff. There's a bunch of cousins up there and I don't know any of them except for Rico, who was locked up with Josh in the ValentiCorp labs before they escaped. He and Auntie Min are facing off, and I've never seen her so pissed. But Rico isn't backing down. He's not a big guy—paler than most of the cousins I've seen, except for Vincenzo, with short-cropped yellow hair—but he's tall on attitude.

“—doesn't matter,” he's saying to Auntie Min. “It's done.”

“Of course it
matters
!”

“You weren't there. You didn't see what they did to the kids in the labs and those guys knew it all along. But they still rounded us up and dumped us there to be diced up. They cut off my freaking leg!”

“I know, but—”

“They deserved a harder death than I gave them.”

We're far enough away that only I can hear what he's saying, but I shout out a warning anyway: “Hey, Auntie Min! I brought those Feds you wanted to see.”

Rico immediately gives me a look to let me know he registers the warning. The tension's still thick between him and Auntie Min, but at least they're not talking about whether or not the guys from Black Key deserved to die.

Do I need to tell you whose side of the argument I'm on? I don't know Rico all that well, but if he's the one who's been hunting down those sons of bitches, I'd like to pin a medal on that skinny little chest of his.

We climb the rest of the way and make the introductions. Several of these cousins are unfamiliar to me, and I can't tell what their animal skins are, either. The older cousins can just look at each other and know, but I haven't got that trick figured out yet. I do see—maybe
feel
is a better way to put it—the rattlesnake that's a part of Rico, and Auntie Min's big-ass moth, but I already knew their animal shapes.

The others? Not so much. One guy looks a lot like the crow men guarding the perimeter, so I figure he's one of them. Maybe he's the boss, if they have that kind of hierarchy. Crow boy is Lalo. Then there's a pair that look like twins—a Native American cast to their colouring and features. Male and female, but they both have long black hair hanging in braids. They're dressed in plain white tees, jeans and pointy-toed cowboy boots with a lot of fancy tooling on them. She's Ana, he's Jimmy and they're both glowering. It's hard to tell what they're so pissed off about—our arrival, the other cousins or maybe the whole world.

The last one's standing with his back to us, looking out over
the ocean. When Auntie Min calls his name and he turns, I realize he's not a cousin. He's an old Mexican man, long grey hair tied back in a ponytail, his brown features heavily creased with age lines.

“Tío Benardo,” Solana says, surprise in his voice.

I'm not surprised to find out he's one of the hawk uncles. It's not just that he looks like he's related to Tío Goyo—he's got that same “there's more to me than meets the eye” vibe going for him. But I was under the impression that
los tíos
and the cousins aren't exactly BFFs, which makes me wonder what he's doing here.