The Fox Inheritance (23 page)

I look down at my bare chest. Besides dried sweat mixed with dirt, there are a few scratches. Wait until she sees my back. "I had a wrestling match with a spider."

"You didn't--"

"Yeah. I did." But none of that matters.
They made it
. Dirt, sweat, and all, I walk over to Dot and Miesha and hesitate for only a second before I hug them. Miesha is caught off guard and stiffens for just a moment, but then she hugs me back. I really don't care what we have or haven't done before. Today I almost went over a cliff, and I'm glad to see them.

"Mission accomplished, Customer Locke!" Dot says. "We shopped ourselves all the way down to Mexico!"

I pull up an empty chair next to them and run my finger along the rim of Dot's sombrero. "I can see that, Dot. Looks like you got some new wheels too."

"And then some," Miesha says. "It took a hefty chunk out of the money card, but it was worth it. She was becoming quite a load to push."

"And it does everything," Dot says. "I can even go up and down steps. It's almost as good as legs."

"I like it better than legs," Kayla says.

Dot beams.

"We were able to get her recharged too," Miesha says. "She's good to go for at least another three weeks."

"And speaking of good to go--" Jenna excuses herself and Kayla, saying Kayla needs a bath. Kayla protests that it's too early, but Jenna is firm, promising more playtime later. I know she is trying to protect Kayla from hearing too much and there probably are plenty of things she shouldn't hear. When they're both out of the room, I turn back to Miesha and Dot. "How did you find the place?"

"We were just telling everyone about it when you walked in. We found out you have to be very careful about the Network in these parts. There are
infiltrators
." Dot says the word like she is talking about aliens from another planet.

"We were nosing around at the station and were just about to ask a CabBot when we were intercepted by someone from the Network," Miesha adds.

"Good thing too," Dot says. "He told us that some of the CabBots are bounty hunters. You would never see that sort of thing in Boston. The Network contact didn't know you, of course, but as soon as we mentioned your friend Jenna, he knew right where to take us. She's a regular stop for them."

A regular stop? Allys looks sideways at me. I return her glance by raising my eyebrows. Jenna's questionable circle of friends continues to grow. I look back at Miesha. "What about Gatsbro? Do you think he followed you down to Mexico?"

"Oh, he followed us all right, like a shark after bloody chum. We saw him twice when we had delays at two of the stations. The last time was in El Paso. Once we crossed the border into Mexico, we rented a car and abandoned it in a small town about a hundred miles away. We left the code on the seat so anyone could take it. Hopefully someone will--all the way to South America."

Dot jumps in. "That was
my
idea. That should keep your pursuer guessing for a while."

My pursuer. It would almost sound romantic if it wasn't so deadly. I remember the cold, detached amusement in Gatsbro's eyes in the alley, and then when Miesha locked the doors and he pounded on the windows, I saw the sputtering rage. He's not just pursuing product anymore--he's after vengeance too. How dare anyone as low as us interfere with his carefully calculated plans. "Let's hope it keeps him guessing forever."

Miesha leans forward on the table and says in a low voice, "What about Kara?"

I knew it was only a matter of time before we got to that. I shake my head. "She hasn't shown. I don't know what to think. It's been too long. She had no money. Nothing--"

"Don't worry, Customer Locke. Your friend--there was something different about her." Dot confidently nods her head. "I am very good at figuring out customers, and she had what we call
drive
. Like a sweeper. One set course, and nothing gets in their way. She will make it."

I cringe and am almost glad Kara's not here for that analogy. If she heard herself being compared to a mountain of mindless metal--little more than a glorified vacuum cleaner--it would set her on a rampage. But Dot is right. One course. That's Kara. Once she sets her mind on something, there's no stopping her.

Miesha and Dot tell me more about where they went and the trail they left and the sights they saw. There is an odd moment of quietness among us as we all witness Dot describing the wonders she saw for the first time, from the mystic orange sunsets of Santa Fe to the jewel blue sea of the Gulf. Jewel blue. I think her description makes us all pause. Is that standard CabBot vocabulary? What is the blueness of blue for a Bot? It makes me wonder, Whose blue is bluer, mine or hers?

Dot tilts her head to the side, noticing the silence, and immediately turns the conversation back to me, wanting to know about my arrival here. I share with them my encounter with the bounty hunter CabBot. Dot winces when I describe taking his arm off, but then comes to my defense and says it served him right. I tell them about having to run and walk all the way here in the rain, and tell Miesha the coat worked well, like she said it would.

"He's quite attached to it," Allys adds. "He wore it this morning, just as a fashion statement."

I roll my eyes.

"He never cared much for fashion before," Miesha says.

"Exactly," Allys replies.

Miesha looks back and forth between Allys and me, but says nothing.

Jenna and Kayla return, and Allys orders me to go wash off at least one layer of mud because dinner will be ready soon, and then she shows Miesha to the room where she and Dot will stay.

As I strip my clothes off and turn on the shower, my thoughts return to Dot's earlier words about Kara.
She will make it
. When? What is taking her so long? But one thing Dot said plays over and over again in my head.
Your friend--there was something different about her
. Something different. There always was.

Chapter 55

I've been at this job for twenty-two years. I've heard it all. I know what you're thinking before you even say it. Don't try me.

He thought he knew it all, but Dean Witters didn't know Kara.

She, Jenna, and I had ditched seminar. It wasn't our first time, but it was the first time we had been caught. We should have been afraid as we lined up on the bench outside his office. And part of me was. If I looked down at my shoes and thought about where I was and what I would tell my parents, my blood rushed from my stomach to my head like it was going to shoot out my ears.

But when I looked up, and Kara widened her eyes in mock terror and Jenna stifled a nervous laugh and shrugged her shoulders, I thought I was going to split apart with laughter, and the more I tried to hold it in, the funnier it became.

It was all my fault, Dean Witters. I told them seminar had been canceled. They didn't know.

When we opened our mouths to protest, Kara shot us a look that clearly said,
Shut up
. Jenna and I both knew there was no stopping her. This was her call, her moment. She owned it.

Kara took the fall for us that day.

Chapter 56

I hear Kayla and Dot out on the porch. As promised, Jenna gave Kayla more playtime after her bath. Even over my shower I hear Kayla's squeals and Dot's hoots as they take turns going up and down the porch steps. I smell the casserole Jenna has baking too. I could eat two. I scrub the dirt from my chest and pull a washcloth over my back to undo the damage from the spider. The soap stings the scrapes and scratches. The pain is nothing compared to the damage that Gatsbro's goons did, or maybe I have readjusted my sensitivity levels just as Hari feared I would. Yes, Gatsbro, be very afraid. I am becoming something you never planned on. Something I never planned on, either.

Jenna offered to clean and bandage my back. The thought of her touching and bathing me while I was fully awake was tempting. Before the world turned upside down for all three of us, when we were just friends at school, I wanted so badly for her to notice me, not in the friend way that she already did, but in the same way I noticed her. The way I thought about her at night when I went to bed, thinking about her skin, her lips, her hair and how it smelled when I got close. Our friendship meant everything to me, but I couldn't help wondering about more. And sometimes at school, on the bench at lunch, sometimes she would linger, her shoulder touching mine more than it needed to, her eyes watching me a second longer than a friend's would, and I would wonder if maybe she was noticing me in more than the friend way too.

Hmmm.

I drop the washcloth and spin around in the shower. I wipe away a circle of steam on the glass door. The bathroom is empty. I open the door to be sure. Steam pours out into an empty room. Did I only hear the hum in my head? I grab the washcloth from the floor and hurry to finish washing, letting the shower spray in my ears.

I listen to Jenna out on the porch laughing at the antics of Dot and Kayla, and I turn off the water, grabbing a towel to dry myself. I don't want to keep her waiting. As I pull on my pants, I remember a line from a poem that Jenna always liked--
all I could see from where I stood
--and I wonder if she remembers it too. Or was it Kara who liked it? It's hard to remember.

Chapter 57

"I'm sorry about your back," Jenna whispers.

"My fault. I was warned. And you were right about the work. It did distract me."

We sit on a bench near the pond. The others have all gone to bed. When Jenna said she was going to take a walk to the greenhouse to get something, I said I would walk with her. We never made it to the greenhouse. I spotted what I thought was an enormous bright star, but Jenna told me it was the Galactic Radar Defense satellite. "Here, let me show you some of the new stars in the night sky." We whisper in the quiet about the twinkling lights above us.

"There. See that bluish one? That's the quarantine and border station for Mars travelers. Sort of an Ellis Island in space." She tells me that Mars was colonized a hundred fifty years ago, but only a couple of hundred thousand live there so far. It's a long trip and expensive, with a six-week quarantine period each way, so not too many people can be persuaded to make the journey.

"And over there, that reddish star is the remnants of Z65, an asteroid that was intercepted before it collided with our moon." She leans back. "But most are the same stars, same orbits, same everything, that our parents and grandparents and even Galileo looked at."

"Nice to know that at least some things don't change."

She doesn't respond for several seconds. "There's a lot that doesn't change, Locke."

Not from my perspective. Not right now. People, especially. "Why didn't you tell me you were part of the Network?"

"I'm not part of any--"

"Jenna, come on. I could shine a light in your face right now and see the backtracking all over it. You're trying to figure out how I know. I'll help you out. Dot spilled it. Allys confirmed it. And your meeting with Father Andre nailed it."

"Really, Locke. I'm not part of it. At least not anymore. I quit all that when I had Kayla."

"Just what is 'all that'? I really don't even know what the Network is. I only know some shady basement types helped us in Boston with some fake IDs."

"That's a good description. Shady basement types. That's basically it in a nutshell. The Network is just a very disorganized group of undergrounders who try to help others out."

"Since when did helping others have to be done in secret?"

"When you're helping people that others would prefer you didn't help."

"Like Non-pacts?"

"Among others.
Non-pact
has evolved into a catchall term for anyone who doesn't fit into the so-called norm."

Like me. "Are land pirates Non-pacts?"

"Who?"

I realize that's my own label for them. "I met what I thought were Non-pacts out in the middle of nowhere, and they called themselves pirates."

She nods like she understands exactly who I am talking about. "Yes, those would be Non-pacts," she says. "They choose a lot of different names for themselves. I can't say I blame them. Who would want to be given a label that makes them sound like they're a nonperson?"

"How does the Network help them?"

"Mostly they provide new IDs. Non-pacts are excluded from most public life. Buildings, transportation, even most roads. When they violate public space, they're tagged. The third violation results in removal to a camp in the desert for R and R--Reformation and Reassignment. But it's rare that anyone ever gets out of there or is heard from again."

I think about the man next to me at the train station who was grabbed by guards. Was he tagged like an animal that roams too close to human habitats? Or is he on his way to the desert for R and R? Is that where I would have ended up? Or maybe I don't even rate as high as a Non-pact, since I don't have that magic ten percent.

"Sounds like a decent cause. Why'd you quit?"

She sighs like it is a tired thought. "I worked for decades with Ethan and then Allys for legalization for those like us who didn't meet FSEB number standards. And then I worked decades after that on education because laws don't instantly change minds. I thought I was finally done for a while, but after the Civil Division, the Network contacted me for help, first with Non-pacts who were Runners, then with Bots who were Escapees, and then--"

"Bots? You helped Bots escape?"

"There's actually not that many who want to escape. But every now and then ... sometimes..." She looks up at the stars like the words she needs are there and then she shakes her head. "I don't know what happens. I can't explain, and I don't judge. I don't even know if I'm right in helping them escape. But..."

She doesn't finish. She doesn't have to. I can fill in the blanks. Dot.
Sometimes
.