Jacked (23 page)

“Tar! Are you all right?”

He caught Nataly’s hand as she reached out to shake him. They met, palm to palm, and his hand tingled stronger than he had ever imagined. Her eyes grew wide and he jumped into them, his body a beam of light racing along inside her. Suddenly, another light appeared and they moved together, leaping along her body and then abruptly over to his. The beams raced, one surging ahead before the other bounded past. They moved toward each other and touched…

Tar let go. They were both breathing hard, sweat dotting their skin.

“What…what was
that
?” Nataly panted, her chest heaving.

Despite the intensity of what had just happened his mind had only one thought. “I can do it,” he said, his voice steady and strong. “I can save them.”

“Who? Tar, save who?”

“Everyone who ever went zom.”

#

“Whoa, whoa.” Dr. Pierinski shook his hands above the sink, throwing droplets of tea off his fingers. “Slow down. Tell me again.”

“Sorry about the tea, Doc, er, Roger,” Tar said. He and Nataly had sprinted up the stairs, yelling the whole way, and ran into the kitchen. They had startled the doctor, causing him to spill half a cup of tea on the counter top.

“Don’t worry about it. Just…” The doctor’s hands hung in the air, tea falling from his fingertips. He looked for a towel, but then dried them on his shirt and turned. “Slow down and tell me what you just said.”

Tar slowed his breathing as much as his racing mind would allow. “I can save the people who went zom.”

The doctor’s mouth moved several times before a small croak came out. “How?”

Tar held up his hands. “With these.” He sat down on the stool. “You told us that we have the virus killer inside these apps in our hands, right? All these years I’ve been fixing apps but they don’t have Polly in them. They’re just bricks. They can’t talk to the Mind anymore. So all we’re really doing is clearing a path so they can work without talking to the air.”

Sally had entered the kitchen and offered the doctor a towel.

“Yes, that makes sense,” Roger accepted the towel and kept nodding his head as he dried his hands. “You’re re-establishing communication inside the machine. There is really no pathway to connect remotely with the Mind.”

“Okay, but what if I kill the virus in the Mind? All the zoms would be able to connect remotely again.”

“No.” Roger shook his head. “No, it wouldn’t work. That’s…it’s too dangerous. We don’t know what that virus could do to you if it gets access to your implants. It could kill you…or who knows what.”

“It won’t,” said Tar.

“How do you know, honey?” Sally said, laying her hand on Tar’s arm. “It’s an awfully big risk to take.”

“Besides, there’s no way of even knowing if it will work,” Roger said.

“It will work,” Tar said, “because it already has. On you.”

The doctor blinked and leaned back on his counter stool.

“You told me you were rocking Nataly to sleep the night of The Crash. Where did she have her hands when you woke up?”

Roger reached up and put his hands behind his ears, turning his head for a moment so he could smile at his daughter. “Right here. She would do that to pull us in for a kiss.”

“Where’s your implant?”

Roger let his left hand drop but his right never moved. “Here.” His voice was quiet.

Tar glanced at Nataly, then looked back at the doctor. “You were right, Roger. Nataly protected you that night. Just not in the way that you thought. She kept the virus out of your head because her tech was touching yours. She killed Polly before Polly killed you.”

Silence fell over the kitchen.

“So what’s the plan?” Toby said from behind Tar, having entered at some point without being heard.

“If Polly was gone the Mind would work again, wouldn’t it?” said Tar “Everyone who went zom should come back.”

Roger slowly nodded his head. “Theoretically…sure. If the virus was purged from the system it should work just fine. We would need to reboot the main drive but that would be all it should take.”

“Chilly.” Tar nodded. “Then I’m going to kill Polly…inside the Mind.”

Chapter 31

The shouting was over and the tears were dry by the time Tar, Toby and Roger slipped out into the street before dawn two days later. Tar had wanted to leave the day before but Roger insisted on scoping out downtown Santa Clara first. He returned with a report of Black Shirts roaming the streets in groups of five and six, searching shops and breaking down the doors of buildings that had long since been boarded shut.

Nataly had been surprisingly vocal against Tar and Toby going to the Mind. Like One Shoe, she suggested they go as far away as possible, up into the mountains. Tar tried to explain why they needed to do this but she turned her back to them and stared at the kitchen wall.

Roger did not join the discussion. At first, Sally had begged him to convince the boys to stay.

With no memories of his parents talking and arguing and doing all the things husbands and wives do in their daily lives Tar had wondered if all couples developed that sixth sense to know one another’s thoughts. It didn’t take long for Sally to realize what her husband was thinking: Roger meant to go with them.

The yelling that followed was all aimed at Roger, a double-barreled shotgun firing desperate slugs of love and emotion. Eventually Toby had tapped Tar on the arm and motioned at the stairway to the basement. They escaped below, Tar catching a brief, troubled glance from Nataly, a precursor to the same look she gave them just prior to them leaving.

Now they made their way down dark streets, backpacks filled with food and extra clothes. They stayed away from the main routes. Roger led them down side streets and through block after block of houses. Many homes were deserted and showed signs of being broken into. Others were occupied in defiant solitude, the yards somewhat kept and the doors still on their hinges, but the farther north they traveled the more desolate things became.

When they crossed into Sunnyvale they saw the worst of the remnants of The Crash. Roofs had caved in and knocked down walls on homes, exposing the insides to the weather. Vines encapsulated whole buildings, turning them into green blocks. While plenty of birds and small animals roamed the area no people walked the streets.

They ate quietly in the shadows of an abandoned grocery store, the glass in the windows a distant memory and any scrap of food that had been left behind long since stolen or rotted away. They sat in a dark aisle near the back of the building, only the rustling of their clothes gave off any sound, until Roger sighed and leaned his head back against the metal shelf.

“Why’d you come with us?” Tar asked in a loud whisper. “No reason for you to go 404. I’ve been greppin’ on my own for years and Toby knows what it’s like out here.”

Roger looked up but Tar could only see his dark outline, not his eyes.

“Your mom and I were best friends. We were close. My wife—Nataly’s mother—I think she couldn’t handle that kind of friendship. She accused me of having an affair with Hisa. Ciana had quite the imagination. She was an artist, painted these lovely abstracts, but she could also be pretty insecure, well,
very
insecure, and when she got something into her head it stayed there. So one day she shows up at the lab and lays into your mom. I went to intervene but Hisa waved me off. She let her go on and on until Ciana wound down like an old toy. Once she was done Hisa finally took her by the arm and led her to one corner. Next thing I know they’re hugging and laughing, and the very next day Marty and Hisa announced their engagement to the project team. Your mom had told Ciana to allay her suspicions, you see, and then swore her to secrecy. And, uh, well, we were both in the wedding.” Roger sighed, his breath making the floating dust dance in a swirl. “Hisa was my best friend…your father, as well, so you can understand why I couldn’t let you and Toby just go off and do this on your own. But even forgetting all that the Mind will likely need a hardware fix before we reboot and I’m probably the only person alive who can still do it.”

“I’m glad you’re here, Doc,” said Toby. “I don’t even want to think about trying to do this without you.”

“But,” Roger said, “Tar’s right. I don’t know the streets like you two. What we’re doing is way too important for us to get captured so you boys lead and when the time comes I’ll do my part. What do you want to do now?”

Tar did not hesitate. “I think we stay here until dark. Travel mostly at night.”

“Do you think that’s safe?” Toby looked worried.

“Safer than being out there during the day. We haven’t seen anyone else on this street for a long time. I’m thinkin’ the only people here are us and the Black Shirts. Am I right?” Tar looked at the doctor.

“Well, yes. We are on the north side of Sunnyvale.” He sighed again. “So many people died here during The Crash. It’s basically deserted. All the bodies made it uninhabitable around here for a long time. I think we head up to Highway 101 and go around Mountain View and then on to Palo Alto. We should probably avoid people, if at all possible.”

“I’m not worried about people,” said Tar. “I’m worried about the men chasing us. One of them most of all.”

“Ludler,” said Toby with a nod.

“And we know he uses horses. We can hear them coming at night, gives us time to hide.” Tar stopped for a few seconds. “How long will it take us to get to the Mind?”

Roger snorted. “It’s not far to the campus. We can get there on foot overnight if we keep moving.”

Tar nodded, not sure if the other two could even see him. “Chilly,” he said. “We’ll leave when it’s good and dark.”

Chapter 32

A hand shook Tar’s shoulder, snapping him awake.

The familiar sound of hooves on the street resounded through the store’s huge broken window. Tar reached carefully under his head for the strap of his backpack. If they had to run for their lives he could not leave behind Jahn’s app folded so neatly into one of his shirts.

He squinted into the gloom. The hand shook his shoulder again, this time accompanied by Roger’s hushed voice.

“Tar, horses. Wake up.”

He sat up and looked toward the front of the grocery. The setting sun cast its last golden rays through the empty window panes and reflected off the shards of glass scattered on the floor. Except for the first few feet beyond the window Tar imagined they were obscured by darkness. “You think they see us?” he asked.

“Not that I can tell. A few have gone back and forth in front of the store but no one has come in here yet.” Roger stood and helped Tar to his feet. “Toby went to see if there is a back door.”

Tar leaned down and grabbed his backpack from where he had been using it as a pillow. “Chilly, let’s go.”

They slowly made their way down the aisle, farther into the shadows. At the back Tar reached for the swinging door when it quickly opened toward him, jamming his fingers. He nearly cried out but clenched his teeth and made a fist.

Toby stuck his head around the opening. “Hurry. Nobody is back here yet.”

Tar wiggled his fingers and followed his friend into the grocery storage area with Roger close on their heels. Toby’s flashlight, the battery all but dead, barely gave off enough light to navigate through the empty boxes and trash strewn everywhere.

“Right up here,” Toby whispered over his shoulder.

He led them to a concrete block wall. To their left were two large overhead doors, the metal rusted at the joints where the panels met. In front of Toby, however, was a normal-sized door.

“How’d you get it open?” asked Tar.

“It’s just got a bar that slides to lock it. No tech on it.”

Toby put his hand on the bar and turned off his flashlight. Tar heard the sound of metal grating against metal, a small wail of mechanical protest, then it stopped and the outline of a door appeared in the dark, letting in a hint of pale light.

Toby put his face to the crack and peered out for a few seconds. “I don’t see anyone,” he whispered. “You know they’re pinging for us. Do we go?”

“Yes,” Tar said, surprising himself that he was the first to speak. “We’ve seen them pinging through buildings. They’ll come in here sooner or later. We’d better go now while we can.”

“Tar’s right,” said Roger. “But if the Black Shirts spot us don’t wait on me. Get back to Sally and Nataly. You two have to get them someplace safe.” The silence hung heavy between them. Roger put his hand on Tar’s shoulder. “Promise me, boys. Help them. Don’t let the Black—”

“We promise, Doc,” Toby said. “Right?”

Tar looked from Toby to the doctor. “Only if you promise to do the same if I’m caught. Nataly may be the last of the fixers if that happens, the last chance for the zoms to be app again.”

“I promise,” said Roger.

“Okay. Let’s go.”

Toby pulled the door open and stepped into the dying light. Tar would have felt better if they could wait another hour, when the streets were full dark. Of course he would have felt a
lot
better if Black Shirts weren’t crawling all over the place, too.

The back of the store was much the same as the loading dock at the mall and thoughts of that place led Tar to memories of watching Shovel die. He shook his head a little to clear it and they went down some concrete stairs into an area lower than ground level, sloping up to where it met the street. In the distance—or at least it sounded like they were far away—the clip-clop of hooves echoed.

“There’s an alley across the street,” said Roger. “We can try to make it there.”

Tar was too short to see over the lip of the rise. He took the doctor’s word for it and nodded. “Lead the way,” he said to Toby.

His friend made his way to the triangular-shaped wall and walked carefully down its length. Tar followed a few feet behind with Roger a couple steps farther back. They stopped moving when Toby rose to peek over the retaining wall, then squatted down and waved them forward.

“There’s two men at the corner but their backs are to us. I think if we go one at a time and hurry across quietly, we can make it.”