Authors: Jay Budgett
I circled the building. It was more like a fortress, really, except for the windows. The tall, bare concrete walls appeared to wrap all the way around the island. Clearly whoever had built this place hadn’t been concerned with aesthetics.
As I turned another corner, I came upon a section of New Texas where the ocean looked smooth. No megalodons. The water barely rippled.
Another dart whizzed past me. Mila was closing in. My heart beat hard.
I stared at the water. It was the megalodons or the Lost Boys. The megalodons had teeth; the Lost Boys had guns.
The thought of the calmness that filled my chest whenever I swam made my choice. I dove headfirst into the water. The cuts on my hand stung and bled again in the salty water. As I ducked beneath the surface, I saw that the trash-compacted island was only about eight feet thick.
Massive shadows hurtled toward me. Megalodons swarming. One snapped open its jaws as it approached.
No running. No hiding. Something in my gut told me to
just swim
. I kicked straight toward the monster’s open jaws and aimed for the back of its throat.
Its jaws clamped around me.
No light. No air. It had swallowed me whole.
The world went black.
A ringing sounded in my ears like bells between classes. My fingertips and toes tingled and blistered. Voices echoed around me, whispering my name. I caught only fragments, like wisps of smoke through fingers.
“—should’ve let him die—”
“—too bold and too stupid—”
“—need bold, stupid, and brave—”
“—worried about Tim—”
“—can’t tell him the truth, or he’ll—”
“—like Bugsy, just Bugsy. Balls, the poor kid wasn’t ready—”
“—well, dear, that’s what we’ll tell him, then—”
“—putting a damn iris scan on the next one—”
The voices melded together in a symphony of sound. One ran into the next. All of them drowned beneath the ringing.
“—he’ll stay. That’s final. We need a spark—”
“—Sparky’s been asleep for two days, dear—”
“—Bertha’s got the bag ready for Newla. We’ll leave this afternoon. I suspect he’s already awake.”
I tried to slow my breathing, but it was too late.
“Unlock his wrists,” ordered Phoenix. “On second thought, wait until he’s fully conscious.”
Kindred sat herself at the edge of my bed. “How are you feeling, dear?”
“Toes,” I said. “T-toes and fingers. B-burning.”
Cold metal pressed against my wrists—handcuffs. They hadn’t been so kind this time. I guessed it was fair, considering I’d tried to kill them.
“Bertha, dear, could you grab some algae and eucalyptus from the stores?”
Bertha grumbled something under her breath and then left. Kindred checked to see if Phoenix was looking before she undid the locks.
“There you are, dear,” she whispered. “Our little secret.”
Mila stood silent at the back of the room. Her bright green eyes glowed like a cat’s.
I glanced around at the eyes in the room. Dove, Phoenix, and Kindred had the familiar blue eyes. So Mila and I were the only ones unvaccinated. I blushed when I realized I was probably the youngest person in the room.
Phoenix caught Kindred pretending to fiddle with the cuffs. “I suppose you can take them off,” he said. “In fact, I’ll bet you already did.”
She smiled innocently. “There we are, dear.” She let the shackles fall. “Pardon our precautions. We just wanted to be a bit more—”
“Prepared,” finished Phoenix.
I nodded. My fingers and toes still tingled. Why hadn’t they killed me? What were they planning? Where were the megalodons? I rubbed the burns on my fingertips.
“So,” I said, “what, uh… happened?”
The three terrorists exchanged nervous looks. “What happened,” called Bertha as she climbed down the ladder, “is that you shot us up like a moron and damn near killed yourself in the process.” She handed Kindred the algae and eucalyptus. “Far as I’m concerned, we should kill you right now.”
“Really, dear?” said Kindred, spreading the crushed algae between my toes. “That’s how you make friends?”
“That’s how
he
makes friends!”
“You’re seventeen, dear,” said Kindred. “He’s twelve—”
“Fifteen,” I interrupted.
“You should know better by now, Bertha. I mean, really! I thought we’d have a nice day. Silly Kindred thought we’d have a nice, memorable day—”
“
I’ll
give you memorable,” said Bertha. “Just hand me a gun—”
“You swam into the mouth of a megalodon,” said Mila, stepping from the shadows. “I shot the beast with Bertha’s gun, and you rolled out like a marble. Another went after you, but I got that one too. They floated to the surface and I filled them with bullets. I grabbed your body away from them. Ran inside and turned on the island’s extra engine. A feeding frenzy broke out as we drove away. They devoured each other like rats.” She looked sick. “Then I waited for the others to wake up. Only these three did.”
“I was already awake,” said Dove with a dumb grin. “But the sand felt good on my back.”
Kindred patted his hand.
“Sparky never woke up,” said Mila. “In fact, he still hasn’t.”
I pointed to my back. “The one with the—?”
“Sloth?” said Bertha. “Christ, kid. Let’s use our words.”
I glanced around the room. There were no guns. No instruments of torture, as far as I could tell. Just my bed and the Lost Boys.
What did they want from me? I took a deep breath. I couldn’t think about what they had planned. I just had to get through the day—focus on the conversation at hand. “Sparky never woke up?”
Mila shook her head.
The tingling in my fingers and toes now made sense. I’d been inside the megalodon when she’d hit it with the Paralyzer. I’d been electrocuted, though the monster’s thick skin took most of the blow.
“Now that I think about it,” said Dove slowly, “Sparky hasn’t slept in, like, two years. I mean, the rest’s probably good for him.”
Bertha tightened her jaw. “Doveboat, what have I told you about thinking?”
He stared off into space. “I forget.”
“Think, Dove!”
“I thought I wasn’t supposed to—”
“
You can think when I tell you to!”
“I believe,” said Phoenix, “we can attribute Sparky’s continued unconsciousness to his use of Cafetamines. You can’t stay awake for two years straight and not expect it to catch up with you. Batteries only last so long.”
“Car Battery is already burnt out,” said Bertha, looking at me. “And we didn’t even get to use him.”
Use him?
For what? What had they intended to use me for?
I had to change the subject. If they thought they couldn’t use me for whatever it was they’d planned, then they might just kill me instead.
“Can I see him?” I asked.
“Who?” said Bertha. “Sparky?”
I nodded.
“Why? So you can try to kill him again?”
Kindred rubbed eucalyptus over the algae. “Maybe he wants to apologize?”
Bertha made a face. “And maybe I want to be chancellor.”
“Take him to Sparky,” said Phoenix. He was wearing a shirt now, but beneath it his muscles still rippled.
“But he’s already got Tim in there,” protested Bertha.
“Just take him,” said Phoenix.
Bertha grumbled and motioned for me to follow her up the ladder. We passed a room with metallic walls and tables.
“The armory,” Bertha said with a smile. “My lab.” She pointed to a set of weapons laid out across the main table. “Recent inventions,” she said proudly.
I scanned the table. A black pen, a small silver box, a three-pronged projectile jammed into a gun, and a bundle of chewing gum wrappers.
“They’re—uh—well, they’re something,” I said.
She showcased them from left to right. “Laser Pen, Video Loop Fractalfyer, Grappling Gun, and some Gum Wrapper Bombs. Or,” she winked at me, “as I refer to the four: oh shit, deep shit, deeper shit, and
holy
shit
.”
“How refined,” I muttered. I noticed a stack of paper clips also rested on the table’s corner. “And those are?”
“I call ’em ‘Paper Clips,’” said Bertha, “but they’re top secret.”
“Let me guess: they have an uncanny ability to hold multiple documents together with ease?”
“Shut up, Car Battery.”
As we exited the lab, I noticed a pair of pink flip-flops resting against the wall. “Highly specialized weaponry,” I muttered.
Bertha flared her nostrils. “ENOUGH! Time to see Sparky.”
She hustled me down the hall to Sparky’s room. When we entered, the first thing I noticed was Tim, hanging from a bar beside the bed. He chewed leaves with a mournful expression.
“Tim hasn’t slept in three whole hours,” said Bertha gravely. “We’re really worried about him.”
“Poor guy,” I said, trying to look concerned. “Three whole hours without sleep… Just imagine.”
Sparky had no such problem. His head was propped up on a feather pillow, his cheeks rosy and his complexion clear. His lips were even turned up in a slight smile.
“Doesn’t he look just miserable?” Bertha said.
“Absolutely awful,” I agreed.
Bertha sat herself on the edge of Sparky’s bed. “So you really think we’re terrorists?
My heart pounded. This was it. This was when they’d kill me. I stepped back and feigned surprise. “What?” I said. “Why would you think that?”
“Well for starters, you tried to kill us all.”
I nodded—it was a fair point.
“Also,” she continued, “you muttered ‘Terrorists. The Lost Boys are terrorists, Charlie!’ in your sleep.”
They knew I was on to them. There was no time to play games. “Why don’t you just kill me, then?” I asked. “Like all those other people?”
Bertha threw up her hands. “For Christ’s sake, I’ve been TRYING! It’s the damn management around here…” She pointed to my shirt. “I see you’ve been worrying your little skirt about it.”
Crap. I was still wearing nothing but the long shirt.
“Maybe try some pants next time, eh, buttercup?”
My face flushed red. I was suddenly more concerned with my modesty than with my life being in jeopardy. “You—you guys are the ones who put me in this thing.”
She gestured toward my body. “I sure as hell didn’t put anything on
that
.”
“Right,” I stammered, the word clinging to my throat like peanut butter. “I—I’m gonna go look for some pants.”
Bertha stared at me with her brown eyes and nodded. “Try not to shoot anyone.”
Wait—brown eyes? Hadn’t Kindred said Bertha was seventeen? Her eyes shouldn’t have been brown; they should’ve been blue like the others. Why hadn’t she been vaccinated?
I thought about the way Bertha had obliged when Phoenix had ordered her to take me to Sparky. Phoenix was the one calling the shots. He would have been the one to decide whether or when a Lost Boy got vaccinated.
I wandered down the hall. A warm breeze wafted through a broken window and lifted my shirt-skirt. I smashed it down on my thighs. Was a pair of underwear so much to ask for?
“Hey!” called Bertha from down the hall. “I—I didn’t mean to embarrass you.” She paused. “Well, yes, yes actually I did. But look, I don’t think anyone’s seen anything except maybe Kindred, and hell, she’s been looking at blueberries so long you don’t have anything to worry about.”
Bertha had just compared my junk to blueberries. Things couldn’t get much worse.
“If you want pants,” she said, “you’ll have to steal them. We don’t have extras lying around here. New Texas isn’t big enough for that kinda thing.”
I pulled down the edges of my shirt. “Then let’s steal me a pair of pants already.”
She raised an eyebrow. “You don’t mind being a thief?”
I shrugged. “I’ve already been robbed of my dignity. The universe owes me a pair of pants, at least. What’s a thief, anyway?”
She grinned. “Then welcome aboard, Car Battery.” She walked down the hall to me and offered me her hand. “We aren’t terrorists at all. We’re thieves: Phoenix McGann and his merry gang. The one and only Lost Boys. Like Robin Hood, but with fewer arrows and more wetsuits. Lots of wetsuits. Like really tight wetsuits. Like really,
really
tight wetsuits. Dove wore one the other day—you know, ’cause he’s Dove—and I thought,
Wow! I’ve seen you naked.
I mean, it’s probably good you’ve been wearing your little kilt the past few days because the second you put on a wetsuit, we’re gonna see everything.” She paused. “Both your little blueberries.”
Phoenix appeared in the doorway. “I think he gets it, Bertha.”
But I didn’t get it. I didn’t understand who the Lost Boys were or who they said they were supposed to be. Nothing made sense. The world was spinning. I wanted Mom and Charlie.
“I get the wetsuits,” I said. “But thieves? I’m not really—I’m not following you. So you’re not terrorists? You’re just… thieves?” Phoenix nodded. “But, like, what kind of thieves? Do you steal diamonds? Guns? Bombs?”
Phoenix shook his head. “More dangerous. We steal Indigo. We’re Indigo thieves.”
“Indigo thieves?” I asked. The world was spinning. “You steal Indigo vaccines? From the Hawaiian Federation?”
“They deliver an incredible profit,” said Phoenix. “Imagine doubling your lifespan. Beating the Carcinogens a while longer. People will pay big money to escape their own mortality. And the rich can afford it.”
“But… how do you do it?”
Kindred joined him in the doorway, giggling. “It’s all Phoenix, dear. He’s the mastermind,” she said. She passed me a brown bag with “Kai” written on it in curly letters. “I wasn’t sure what sort of sandwich you’d like, so I just packed you blueberries. Can’t go wrong with blueberries.”
Bertha rolled her eyes.
I stared at the bag now in my hand. “Are we, uh, going somewhere?”
Bertha shook her head. “Not we. You. With Phoenix and Mila. All the way to Newla, princess.”
I felt queasy. Why did they want me to travel with them?
“Newla?” I asked, still confused.
“Yeah,” said Bertha. “Newla. You know, New Los Angeles? The capital of the Hawaiian Federation? Home to two million people, all crazy or homeless? Christ, what do they teach you in school?”