The Defiant (27 page)

Our plan is to stay off the giant twelve-lane Megaways and try to take smaller roads whenever possible.

The police must be looking for us already. I'm stunned they haven't stopped our car. There must be a reason.

“Looks like we have a problem,” I hear Gadya say, as she gestures to the dashboard.

I glance down. A light is on. The car needs more gas. I've been so transfixed by driving that I didn't notice how low we were getting.

“What do we do?” I ask. “We don't have any money.”

Liam leans forward. “We get gas anyway.”

I glance over at Gadya and then down at the rifle in her lap. “We rob someplace?” I ask. “That's a pretty big risk. It might be easier to just take another car.”

“But there's no guarantee it will have enough gas in it for the journey.”

I nod. “Fair enough. Then we do it.”

I hear Gadya take the safety off the gun in eager anticipation.

“No shooting unless they shoot first,” Liam says. “I don't want either of you getting hurt.”

I stare up ahead at the road. We are nearing a service station and a row of other small shops. Most of the shops are closed down. Some of them are burned out, just empty black shells.

“I'm going to pull in here,” I say to Liam and Gadya. I begin slowing and prepare to come off the road. I switch lanes and take the first exit, heading toward the gas station.

“They'll have cameras watching us,” Gadya says.

“Everywhere has cameras,” I reply.

I pull into the gas station and glide up to a pump. I bring the car to a stop. The gas station is almost deserted. Another gray sedan is pulling away in front of us. I see an old heavyset woman sitting inside the empty station behind a cash register. “Make it fast,” I say.

Gadya glances at me. “Oh, I will.”

Liam gets out of the car and opens the gas tank. He puts the nozzle in it.

Gadya swings out of the car with her rifle in her hand.

She strides toward the old woman in the gas station, ready for action.

I sit in the car, prepared to gun the engine and get us out of here once the car is full of gas and Liam and Gadya are back inside.

“Tell her to let us fill it up for free,” I call out.

Gadya kicks open the door to the gas station and holds up the gun. I can see her through the glass. The old woman looks shocked and afraid.
Is this what the UNA is making us do? Attack and scare innocent people?
Citizens who have probably been brutalized and lied to by the government just like us. Or is this woman going to turn out to be like the man in the suit? Someone on the UNA's side. Someone who wants us dead.

It makes me feel sick, but right now there is no option other
than violence. The UNA is turning us into criminals. I don't know whether this woman at the gas station sees us as monsters or potential liberators. But after what happened with the man and the briefcase, we can't afford to trust anyone.

Gadya holds the rifle up and points it at the woman. Gadya starts yelling. I can't hear it; I can only see it. The woman presses some buttons on the register.

“It's working!” Liam calls out, as gas begins to flow. He starts filling our car, keeping a lookout for any signs of danger.

I continue watching Gadya.

The woman at the gas station isn't making any abrupt moves. She's just sitting there. She looks emotional, like she's about to cry. Gadya has lowered her gun a little so that it's not pointing directly at the woman. The two of them are talking.

“Almost done!” Liam calls out loudly.

Gadya glances our way.

He signals to her. Right then I hear the click as the gas stops pumping. We're ready to go again. Gadya is already rushing out of the station toward us. I keep expecting that the woman is going to unleash an alarm. But nothing happens. She just watches as Gadya hops back into the passenger side of the car and I gun the engine.

Within seconds, we are back on the road, and the gas station is receding in my rearview mirror.

“That woman is going to call the police on us,” I say nervously. “She looked terrified.”

Gadya turns to me, as she hides her gun on the floor of the car.

“She's not calling anyone. Her son got taken and sent to Island Alpha two years ago. That's what we were talking about in there. I told her we were rebels, trying to fight the UNA.”

“What did she think about that?” I ask.

“She wished us good luck.”

“Did you see any signs of government surveillance in there?” Liam asks. “Or anything else weird?”

Gadya shakes her head. “No. She told me there's a security system but no one has monitored it for the past few weeks. Apparently the UNA doesn't have the time for civilian robberies anymore. They only care about protecting the government, and hunting rebels. She thought we'd get away with it. And she promised not to tell anyone.”

“Nice,” Liam says.

“I hope she's telling the truth,” I say.

“I think she was,” Gadya replies. “She told me she keeps a dartboard with Minister Harka's face on it hidden in a closet at home.”

We keep driving.

We don't sleep that night. There is no time for anything but travel. We just stay on the roads. Certain stretches now have very low speed limits. Our journey takes much longer than it should. I watch the sunrise through the windshield. Unlike when we arrived in New Texas, there are no soldiers on the roads, and no police.

We drive the rest of that morning. Finally, around noon, we reach the exit for New Dayton. I feel relieved. We have made it here in time.

A large metal sign saying
WELCOME TO NEW DAYTON
has been vandalized—tagged with unidentifiable marks of graffiti. The graffiti looks fresh. Before I got sent to the wheel, graffiti would have been cleaned up instantly, and the perpetrators thrown in jail for life. The presence of the graffiti is reassuring to me. It means that people are finally starting to take a stand.

I turn off the road and onto a smaller one. There are more cars
here. The sky is an oppressive shade of dark gray. We continue to drive.

Suburban houses line the roadway. Most of them look like they're in decent shape. I wonder what it would have been like to grow up in one of these homes, instead of in a tower block and then an orphanage.

“Looks pretty nice,” Gadya murmurs. “Who would have thought it?”

“Probably homes of government workers,” Liam adds. “People who sold out. People in league with the UNA.”

These could also be the homes of regular people. It's hard to tell. I don't sense a strong government presence here, at least not yet.

“How far are we?” I ask.

“Let me look,” Liam says. He consults the map on the car's display screen. “Not far. Ten minutes.”

“Do you think Dr. Urbancic—whoever he is—knows that we're coming?” Gadya asks, sounding oddly thoughtful.

“Anything's possible,” I tell her. “But I hope not. Element of surprise, remember?”

Gadya smiles. “It's certainly worked for us before. At least some of the time.”

After a few more minutes of driving on winding asphalt roads, we reach Woodbourne Trail. Moments later, at the bottom of a gentle curve, we find the house. The house number is visible in bronze on the side of the wooden mailbox.

A lot of the houses look the same here. This one is a large two-story brick home with a blue door and an awning covering a side patio. Ivy grows up one wall of the building. It's the kind of place that only rich people live in.

We drive past it and park several doors down, under the shade of a large tree. The neighborhood seems deserted. People are probably at work.

“I'll handle this one,” Liam says, looking at me and Gadya. Any lingering sign of the chemicals have finally worn off completely during the drive, and he's back to his usual self. “Stay here in the car in case there's trouble. We might need to make a quick getaway.”

I nod. I remain behind the wheel, and Gadya covers him with the gun through the partially open window.

Liam gets out of the car. He jogs across the street toward the house. When he reaches it, he pauses for a second. Then he raises his hand and presses the doorbell. He stands there waiting.

Gadya is next to me with her eye pressed to the sight of the rifle. I feel nervous. Anything could happen next. Seconds tick past.

Liam rings the doorbell again. But nobody answers. He looks back at us again and shrugs.

“Looks like Dr. Urbancic isn't in,” Gadya says, relaxing her finger on the trigger a little bit.

Liam presses the doorbell again and knocks on the door a couple of times.

Still nothing.

“We're gonna have to break in and wait for him,” Gadya says.

“Maybe,” I tell her. “Give it one more second.”

Liam hovers at the door for a moment longer. He's just about to jog back to the car when I see the door open slightly. Just a crack.

Liam hears it too. He spins back to the door. It starts swinging open. Gadya's finger tightens on the trigger again. The door
keeps opening as Liam moves back, ready to fight whoever is in the house if he has to.

I catch a glimpse of an old man standing there at the door. He takes a shuffling step forward so that the sun catches his face. He has a thick salt-and-pepper beard, glasses, and he's wearing a blue bathrobe. He is bone-thin—nearly skeletal. He is also unarmed. Both his hands are empty. He says something to Liam, but I can't hear it.
This must be Dr. Urbancic.

I see Liam start talking back to him. I can't hear what he's saying either.

Gadya's finger remains tight on the trigger, in case Dr. Urbancic makes any sudden moves. But he doesn't. He just looks in our direction slowly. Then back at Liam.

Liam gestures toward us, motioning for us to join him.

“It's safe,” I say. “Let's go.”

Gadya opens the car door, and I open mine a second later. She keeps her gun up and pointed at the doorway.

We dart across the road toward the house. I know that leaving the car here is a risk, but I'm hoping it will go unnoticed for now. It's partially hidden by the oak trees. And there are other cars parked on the street too, so it doesn't seem out of place. Gadya has her gun aimed at the man, and I have my knife in my hand.

We make it across the street and reach the doorway where Liam is waiting for us.

“You okay?” I ask him, just to make sure.

He nods. “Fine.”

Dr. Urbancic has already stepped back inside his house. Liam quickly ushers us through the doorway and into the vestibule. Then he closes the door behind us and locks it.

We stand there for a second. The air inside is cool and clean.
The house is spacious, with green tile floors, wood-paneled walls, and plush black leather furniture. This is not a world that I am familiar with. I see Gadya looking around too.

“So the rebels have arrived,” Dr. Urbancic says to us. His voice is thin and reedy. His thinning hair is disheveled. I'm guessing he's in his late sixties, or perhaps older. He looks at each of us in turn. “Not what I expected, but good enough.”

“David Aberley sent us here,” I say.

Dr. Urbancic nods. “I already know that.” He motions for us to follow him. “Come down to the basement with me.” He begins heading down a hallway. I notice that he's wearing ratty old comfortable slippers. “No need for guns in this house,” he calls out behind him. “You can put that rifle away.”

Liam and I exchange glances and then we follow. Gadya still holds her gun on him. We've been through way too much to trust anyone—especially someone we just met.

“This way,” he calls out again, as we keep walking down a hallway. His house is large and lavish. To get a house like this in the UNA, you usually have to be working for the government, in some capacity or another. That thought doesn't exactly put me at ease.

We keep following him until we reach a steel door. He punches in a combination and it opens up. He looks back at us. “I told you to put down that gun,” he says to Gadya, more firmly this time.

“Make me,” Gadya says.

He chuckles dryly. “I wouldn't expect anything less from a rebel, I suppose. No matter. You won't be needing it either way.”

He starts heading jauntily down the stairs. For an old man being held at gunpoint, he seems remarkably spry. The three of us follow him cautiously.

“Close the door behind you,” he calls out.

Liam swings it shut.

As we get closer to the bottom of the stairs, I see that the basement is much less lavish than the house. It's large, but it's not finished, and it looks like a homemade machine workshop, combined with a science lab.

“This is where I spend most of my time these days.” Dr. Urbancic says, gesturing around. “Come, have a seat.”

A few minutes later, we're sitting around a folding card table in Dr. Urbancic's basement. Electrical equipment surrounds us, along with mysterious, half-constructed machines.

He sees me looking at everything and says, “My real job. Ways to defeat government technology. I always try to stay one step ahead.”

“Are they weapons?” Liam asks.

“No. Communication devices. Designed to intercept satellite signals and then disrupt—”

“We don't have time for small talk,” Gadya interrupts. “We're here because David gave us a key, and we're on a deadline.”

“I don't know anything about that,” Dr. Urbancic says.

I hold the key up for Dr. Urbancic to see. “We're here because we need your help. At four p.m. today, we're supposed to set off a controlled nuclear device in the atmosphere—” I begin.

Dr. Urbancic raises his hands. “Let me stop you right there,” he says. “I'm afraid that whatever David might have told you—and no matter how deep my involvement with the rebels runs—I can't be involved in such business.” He shakes his head in dismay. “A controlled nuclear explosion is madness.”