“It’s all right. They’ll fix him.”
Even as he said it, Theo knew nothing would erase the consequences of her actions. The Deps would remember what Hannah did. They’d probably shoot her on sight next time.
Zack moved behind Melissa and rusted the chain of her handcuffs. She broke them apart.
“Thank you. Now I know you can simulate a juve. What about a reviver?”
His mind flashed back to the dead deer in Nemeth. “No.”
“If you could heal him, Zack, it would go a long way—”
“If I could heal people, I’d be healing David.”
Melissa ran to Ross and checked his vitals. “It’s all right. There’s still time to get him help. We can still fix this, Zack. Everything I said still applies.”
The cartoonist took Hannah’s free arm and helped Theo escort her away. As the Silvers moved up the hill in two hobbling trios, Melissa shouted after them.
“We can protect you! With enough time and cooperation, we’ll even free you! We’ll give you a life on this world! Citizenship! Identity! What do I have to do to convince you?”
Theo turned around to face her. “We believe it’s what you want, Melissa. We don’t believe it’s what we’ll get.”
“If you think you’re better this way, then you don’t know a damn thing about the future. You’re walking to your own deaths! Please listen to me!”
They disappeared over the dark crest. Melissa closed her eyes and pressed a fist to her forehead. “Goddamn it.”
Soon she heard an electric engine start. She watched a boxy white minivan swerve onto the road, kicking a cloudy trail of dust as it sped to the east. She couldn’t read the license plate from her vantage. It didn’t matter anyway. The fugitives would ditch the vehicle before Melissa could get a trace warrant. She wasn’t dealing with amateurs anymore.
THIRTY
The old man wasn’t happy to have guests. The moment the minivan rolled into his garage, he threw an antsy scan around the neighborhood, then closed the power gate. Zack had barely stepped out of the driver’s door when a gnarled and stubby finger poked his chest.
“You the leader?”
The cartoonist stammered. He’d never considered the title before and he didn’t enjoy wearing it now. “I’m Zack.”
“I don’t want to know your name. I just want to know if you’re the man to talk to.”
In his recent portal delivery, among all the notes and handcuffs, Peter included directions to a house in Quinwood, West Virginia, seventeen miles east of the highway ambush site.
His name’s Xander. He’ll be expecting you. He won’t be pleasant but he’ll hide you. He has no love for Deps.
He stood just a thumb taller than Mia, with a scrubbed pink face and the flawless gray bouffant of a news anchor. Despite the early hour, he wore a sharp blue blazer ensemble with a red silk ascot and matching pocket square. Zack figured the man stood out like neon in this rustic little town, a Truman Capote in a sea of John Waynes. Not that the Silvers were any less conspicuous. Four of them were dressed like burglars while two sported the blue prisoner jumpsuits of DP-9.
Xander covered his mouth at the sight of David’s gory hand, which had already bled through its dressing and now dripped a crimson puddle.
“Oh, Lord no. He didn’t tell me you’d have injured people bleeding all over my rugs.”
Amanda narrowed her eyes at him. “Peter didn’t know. If you have towels—”
“Take what you want,” he said, his palms raised in high dither. “I was never here. You’re merely robbers who broke in while I was visiting my sister.”
The hair-dryer whirr of an aerocar motor turned all heads to the door. Theo peered through the glass.
“Get away from the window!” Xander yelled.
“A taxi just pulled into your driveway.”
“It’s mine. I was hoping to be gone before you showed up.”
He thrust a set of keys in Zack’s hand, then gestured at his small red sedan.
“You have three days before I report it missing. If you’re still driving it by then, it’s your problem.”
“I understand. Look, we have money. We’ll pay for whatever we—”
Xander cut him off with a scoffing hiss. “You people never change. You think you can buy your way out of any fix.”
Zack blinked at him in dark wonder. He thinks we’re Gothams.
“Listen, if you talk to Peter—”
“I won’t,” Xander insisted.
“—tell him the Deps are watching him.”
He snorted a chuckle. “The Deps are all fools to a man. If they’re watching Peter, it’s only because he’s letting them.”
The cab honked. Xander lugged his suitcase to the door, then turned around one last time.
“Don’t bleed on my rugs. Don’t abuse my cat. Don’t be here when I get back. And when you talk to Peter, you tell him, ‘No more favors.’ My debt’s officially paid.”
He sneered at Amanda’s thick metal collar, a remote-triggered gas dispenser that the Deps typically used on lunatics twice her size.