Doomed (15 page)

“So you guys really planned all this out in the three hours since I saw you last?” I ask Eli.

“Yeah.”

He sounds like a little boy, totally pleased with himself, and I can’t help laughing. “You know, you’re really good at all this fugitive stuff.”

He laughs a little. “It’s not like this is my first time.”

I stumble over a raised tree root, bang into a nearby tree. I scrape my arm on the bark but barely notice. I’m too busy trying to wrap my head around what Eli just said.

But before I can think of anything to say, he laughs and says, “Relax, Pandora. I was just joking.”

My breath rushes out in one gigantic sigh. “Well, thank God. I was already imagining the headline for when the police found my dead, rotting corpse.”

“Oh yeah? And what would that be?”

Even though he can’t see me in the dark, I wave my hand in front of my face like the words are on the world’s largest banner. “Modern-Day Pandora Found Naked in Ditch After Unleashing Cyber-Armageddon.”

“Huh. That’s kind of catchy.”

“I thought so.”

We walk in silence for a while, and every step I take is an agony. Now that the adrenaline has worn off, I can feel my blisters again and they are killing me. Once this night—once this
nightmare
—is behind me, I swear I’m never wearing these boots again.

“Theo?” I say.

“Yeah?”

“How did you know?” I can’t help remembering that moment on the street when he decided to take off, demanding that Eli go with him.

“I’m a good guesser.”

I think about that for a second. “You knew they were going to arrest me, and you didn’t warn me?”

“I figured they were going to want to talk to you. I just
didn’t have a clue that they were going to bring with them the world’s biggest pot of alphabet soup when they did.”

“Alphabet soup?”

He shakes his head a little. “How many agencies were in your house, anyway?”

I laugh a little as I finally get the joke. “Four, if you count the APD.”

“That little birthday present of yours sure pissed off a lot of people.”

That gets my back up, but then I remember that he doesn’t know. Nobody does, except me. That knowledge makes me want to say it out loud—if for no other reason than to make myself really believe it.

“My father did this.”

It’s Theo’s turn to stumble. “What are you talking about?”

“Just what I said. He’s the one who created the worm. He just relied on me to upload it.” I tell them the whole story as we walk, about the website and the twelve pictures. About how I haven’t seen my father in ten years. Everything.

Neither of them says anything for a long time, then Eli whistles softly. “And I thought my dad was an asshole. Suddenly, living with him doesn’t seem so bad.”

“Why did he do this?” The question bursts out of me and I try to sound strong, but my voice breaks and I end up just sounding pathetic. But it’s been circling my brain since Lessing told me about how the worm was uploaded, and I want an answer. I
need
one.

“Because he’s a bastard, Pandora.” Theo speaks up for the first time since I started telling the story. “But his choices have nothing to do with you.”

“He made them about me. He brought Homeland Security to my door. Shit, it’s like he had this in his head all along. Why else would he insist that I be named Pandora when I was born? This game, this worm … He created a box of evils and then gave me the only key to open it. And I did. I did.”

My breath hitches on a sob and Theo snaps, “Knock it off, Pandora! We don’t have time for you to have a breakdown.”

“Chill, Theo. Not everyone’s a robot like you, you know.” Eli wraps an arm around my shoulders and pulls me against his side in a one-armed hug. His warmth feels strange after Theo’s deep freeze, and I can’t help being a little pissed. Theo makes me sound like a crybaby or a crazy person, when I have every right to be upset. Maybe this isn’t the best time for me to lose it, but Theo doesn’t have to be so obnoxious about shutting me down. This has been the worst day of my life.

“How much farther?” I ask, my voice stilted by anger and by my determination not to cry.

“Look, Pandora, he didn’t mean—” Eli starts, only to be interrupted by Theo.

“I don’t need you to interpret for me, Eli!”

“Well, someone needs to. You’re acting like a bastard.”

“Stop it!” I tell them. “He was right, Eli. I do need to quit whining.”

A charged silence hangs over the three of us, and for a second I’m sure that Theo is going to say more, but then he just sighs. Lets it go like I want him to, but for some reason that just makes me angrier.
You’re being irrational, Pandora.
I try to tell myself to chill, but it doesn’t work. That part of my brain is on serious overload. So, in the end, I do the only thing I can do. I shut down completely.

Don’t think.

Don’t feel.

Ignore the pain.

Ignore the fear.

Eye on the prize—isn’t that what they say?

We tromp in silence for a little while longer—I’ve lost total track of time out here, so I can’t even hazard a guess at how much more time passes. Ten minutes? Twenty? Exhaustion dogs my every step, and I want nothing more than to be back home, back in my bed. If things had gone as planned, Emily and I would be in the middle of an all-night movie marathon right about now.

And then, abruptly, the forest ends. One second we’re in the trees and the next, with no warning whatsoever, we’re standing by the side of the road.

Theo curses again, pulls me back into the trees.

“What’s wrong?”

“Here, put this on.” Using his flashlight to help him see, he reaches into the small bag, pulls out a Dallas Mavericks hat. It’s a measure of just how desperate I am to get someplace else that I actually let him put it on my head. Still. “The Mavericks?” I ask, just a little outraged.

“It’s Eli’s.”

“Yeah, well, Eli has crappy taste in basketball.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Hey, I resent that!”

“Resent it all you like. Facts are facts.”

Theo laughs, a startled—and startling—sound out here where everything is still and silent, and the tension from earlier dissolves in the face of this little bit of normal conversation. I can feel it draining out of me, my shoulders and stomach relaxing. We’re all on edge. There’s no reason for me to hold it against him, especially when he and Eli did all this to save me.

I glance up at the sky. With no lights anywhere, the stars look a million times more brilliant. I study them, neck bent and circling, as I look for it. The North Star.

Except for Venus, it’s the brightest light in the sky right now, and it’s been my favorite star since I was six. My father had taken me on a camping trip, and I’d wandered off from him when he’d been pitching the tent, and I’d gotten lost. He found me about forty-five minutes later, sitting cross-legged on a log and scratching at a bunch of fire-ant bites that I’d gotten during my adventure. I wasn’t crying—I was trying to be brave—and he’d respected that.

He’d pulled me onto his lap and pointed at the North Star. Told me that I could always follow it to find my way back to where I belonged. “The earth,” he’d said, “provides everything we need, Pandora. We just have to know where to look.”

At the time I didn’t know what he meant, but his words stuck with me. Through the years, I’ve developed a habit of looking for the North Star, not just for physical directions, but for help with decisions when I’m at a crossroads. I know it doesn’t actually help, but somehow it makes me feel better.

At least until tonight. Now everything I know about him—everything I remember—feels tainted.

“You ready?” Eli asks after a minute, and though I’m not—I don’t think I’ll ever be ready for this—I whisper, “Yes.”

As one, we step out of the trees, tromp toward the road. When we get there, Theo once again checks his compass. “Which way are we going?” I ask.

“North.”

Of course. I look at my star again, then turn to the right, start walking. “This way.”

It’s all uphill. By now, I’m not even surprised.

We walk for about a mile more—until dawn is just beginning to touch the sky—before we get to a big apartment building. We’re at the edge of a large, crowded parking lot, and Theo whips out the tiny flashlight again, tries to scan the cars, but Eli just laughs, shakes his head.

“It’s over there.” He leads the way to the very back of the lot, stopping next to a silver Odyssey that’s half-hidden by a fenced-in Dumpster.

“No comments about the minivan,” Eli tells me with a grin as he unlocks the doors. “Theo insisted on taking his mom’s ride instead of mine.”

“Yours seats two people,” Theo responds as he pops the tailgate and sets his backpack inside the cargo hold. “Did you get the gas, like I told you to?”

“The car and both containers are all filled up.” Eli slides into the driver’s seat.

“Good.” Theo opens the door behind Eli, gestures for me
to get in. Then walks around to the front passenger seat and climbs in.

I get my first good look at both of them in the interior light of the car. They’ve cleaned up since the accident, but Eli has one hell of a black eye while Theo’s left cheekbone is swollen. At least the dozen or so cuts on his face and neck have stopped bleeding, started to scab over. I wonder how the one on his side is doing.

“Let’s get going,” Theo says as he turns out the overhead light.

“I’m already gone.” Eli creeps out of the parking lot and then turns left, heading back down the road we just came from.

I put on my seat belt, then slowly ease off my boots and socks, trying not to disturb the blisters. It’s still mostly dark, so I can’t see anything, but as I touch my heels I feel a telltale wetness, along with shocks of electric pain. The blisters have all popped, and if I’m not careful I’m going to get an infection. When we stop I’ll have to go in and get some Band-Aids and Neosporin.

“Where are we going?” I ask as we barrel through the night. Eli’s driving fast, but his hands are strong on the wheel, confident.

The guys exchange a look. “That depends,” Eli says.

“On what?”

“Namely on what states you have relatives in,” Theo answers this time. “I figure with your mom in Alaska, the first place they’re going to look for you is a neighboring state where you have family.”

His words bring it all back, and suddenly the safety of
this air-conditioned van with its bright, welcoming headlights, doesn’t feel so absolute anymore. “How long do you think they’re going to look for me?”

“Until they catch you, or until they fix the damage done from this worm. Even then, I’m sure they’ll want to find you.”

“Do you think they’ll be
able
to fix the damage?” I ask.

“Sure, eventually,” he says, but he doesn’t sound very confident.

“I was listening to the radio while I waited for you,” Eli pipes in. “AM’s the only thing working, and it sounds like things are even worse than before. The blackout is spreading. It’s rolled over most parts of the US, Canada, and Mexico already, and they expect the worm to reach the rest of the world by morning. People are freaking out, and at midnight, central time, that damn Pandora’s Box counter hit nine.”

My stomach drops. “What does that mean?”

“I’m not sure. But I’ve got to say, seeing what this worm can do, I’m a lot more concerned with the total-annihilation claim not being a metaphor than I was when this thing first started. Especially since people are screaming that this is the end of the world. Looting’s already begun, if you can believe it.”

I don’t say anything after that pronouncement and neither does Theo. But then, what is there to say? This worm—or blended threat, whatever that means—has done more damage in twelve hours than any other I’ve ever heard of. I can’t even imagine what the world is going to look like in nine days. If there even is a world, I mean. Maybe the religious zealots have it right for once.

“I don’t have relatives anywhere. Just my mom. And my dad, but I have no idea where he is right now, so I can’t exactly tell you which state to avoid if we don’t want to run into him.”

“Actually, he’s the one relative of yours we do want to run into,” Theo says.

“Yeah, right.”

“I’m serious. How else are we going to fix this thing?”

“Fix it?” I ask incredulously. “We’re on the run from every federal agency there is. We can’t even fix our own lives, let alone the mess my dad’s created.”

My stomach growls before either of them can answer. Embarrassed, I suck it in. Try to get it to stop.

“Sorry, Pandora, I forgot.”

Theo crawls into the backseat and leans into the trunk to retrieve a medium-size cooler, which he puts on the floor between us. He opens it up, pulls out a couple of sandwiches, and hands one to me and one to Eli.

At the sight of the food, my stomach growls again—so fiercely this time that it hurts. Theo smirks, but it isn’t a mean smile. More like he’s sharing the joke with me. Then he hands me a cold bottle of water before helping himself to a sandwich as well.

I devour the food in about three minutes flat, and when it’s gone, I’m still hungry. It must be obvious, because Theo hands me another sandwich. I eat this one a lot more sedately, then turn so my forehead rests against the cool glass of the window.

The world outside our car is beautiful. It’s started to rain again, and the road gleams, slick and shiny, in the glare of
our headlights. If I focus on it, focus on the raindrops falling like whispers onto the back windshield, I can almost pretend that things are normal. That this is any other day.

But if this were any other day, if the end of the world didn’t beckon with frighteningly close fingers, I wouldn’t be sitting here in this van. Racing the dawn with two boys who have risked everything to be with me.

I wish I knew why they’ve done it. Why they’ve chosen helping me over safety. Perhaps they didn’t know how much work it would be to rescue me. Maybe they didn’t think it would be this difficult.

That explanation doesn’t seem to fit, though. Not when they have everything planned down to the last detail.