Rebel Nation Page 4

  —

  Freeing the birds from the Dinosaur took the better part of an hour. Jude got ahead of them and opened the sixth-floor door, and then Clover, Tim, and the other boys chased them through it, into a room, and out a window.

  The geese flew away, probably at least as grateful to be out as Clover was to see them go.

  Without that time spent working together, Clover probably would have put up a fight about taking the boys up to the fifteenth floor. But she could see that Jude and Tim really knew each other, and working toward a common goal with the boys smoothed her feelings toward them. All she really wanted after the geese had flown away was to figure out what was going on before it was time to talk to her brother.

  “You can’t be mad, Jude,” the younger boy, Wally, said.

  “Why would he be mad?” Clover asked.

  “Never mind that right now.” Jude led the way as they trudged up the stairs. “Why were there Canadian geese in here?”

  “Canada geese,” Clover said. Jude lifted his eyebrows. “Well, that’s what they’re called. Technically.”

  “We were going to eat them,” Wally said. “Do you know how much meat is on a goose?”

  “Are there any more geese inside?” Clover asked.

  “No, those were the only ones we caught.”

  “We needed food.” Tim shot Wally a look. “Obviously catching geese wasn’t the answer.”

  “We have some food upstairs,” Jude said. “It’s not goose, but it should fill you up.”

  “Thank God, ’cause I’m so hungry. I could have eaten a whole Canada goose by myself.” The boy ticked off the parts of the bird on his fingers. “Feathers. Bones. Beak—”

  The third boy was Wally’s older brother, David, who swiftly backhanded Wally on the shoulder. “Jesus, shut up about your stomach.”

  Wally shoved his brother. David. “Don’t tell me to shut up!”

  Jude took Clover’s hand and pulled her up, away from the boys. Tim got between the brothers and said, “Both of you shut up. Right now.”

  The rest of the walk was less eventful. Now Clover almost didn’t want Jude to open their door and let these boys in. More than almost, if she was being honest. “Is this how you felt when me and West first came here?”

  Jude squeezed her hand, then let it go without answering her. There was something he wasn’t telling her, but she filed that away until they were alone.

  Jude walked to the utility room at the end of one hallway and flipped a couple of breakers. A few minutes later, they went into room 1528 and he switched on the light. The three new boys exploded with questions about how the lights came on, all at the same time, but Jude held up a hand to quiet them.

  “There’s electricity? We’ve been living in the dark, and there’s power here?” David asked.

  “Later.” Jude opened the food closet. They kept preserved fruits and vegetables, some jerky, bags of stale cookies and crackers stolen from the Academy dining room, and mason jars filled with dry rice and beans. “Eat. We’ll be next door. We have something we have to do, and then we’ll be right back and we’ll answer your questions.”

  “Not all of them,” Clover said.

  None of the boys were listening. They were fighting for space in front of the food closet. Jude led her to his old room, retrieved a duffel bag from under the bed, and then they locked themselves into the adjoining room.

  For the first time that Clover could remember, Mango was more rattled than she was. The fight to stay with Clover rather than follow his instincts and chase the geese had upset the dog. Clover took his lead off, gave him a bowl of water, and let him catch his breath.

  “What aren’t you telling me?” she asked.

  “Clover.” It sounded like there was more, there had to be more, but he didn’t go on.

  “You weren’t surprised they were here,” Clover said, feeling the pieces slip into place.

  Jude hesitated, then said, “No.”

  “You told them to come here.”

  “I told them about this place,” Jude said, as if there were some distinction there. “I told them how to find food.”

  “Yeah, it doesn’t look like they’ve figured it out yet.”

  “No, it doesn’t.”

  “Do you know what would happen if they got caught and gave you up?” It hit Clover, all of a sudden. So far, Jude was under the radar. If Bennett found out about him—that he’d been out of the city with her and Bridget—it would be bad. Very bad. “Jude.”

  He sat on the edge of the bed. “I had to do something.”

  “What are we supposed to do about them? We can’t just leave them here, can we?”

  “We can’t send them back to Foster City.” Jude took the laptop and illegal wireless modem from the duffel. He’d stolen both from his abusive house father when he escaped Foster City several months before. The scar that ran down the left side of his face was evidence of why he felt so strongly about sending anyone back there.

  As hard as Clover had fought to return to the city with Bridget and Jude, six weeks in she was almost desperate with homesickness for her brother and the other Freaks. She couldn’t stop feeling like she wasn’t doing what she’d set out to do.

  She pulled a chair next to Jude’s and waited for West to reach out for her across the miles.

  I not only use all the brains I have, but all I can borrow.

  —WOODROW WILSON,

  “REMARKS TO THE NATIONAL PRESS CLUB,” MARCH 20, 1914

  We have room here.

  Jude looked at the words on the screen, and then at Clover. “That was easier than I expected.”

  Clover was clearly not as happy about that as he was. We don’t know these kids, she typed. And we don’t have a way to get them out of the city.

  “I know Tim.” Jude tried to push down his guilt over not telling Clover sooner that he’d directed Tim to the Dinosaur. He’d come back to the city to help these kids. He couldn’t let himself feel sorry for doing it. “He can’t go back to Foster City. I wanted him to come with us when we left.”

  Clover looked at the door. No one had tried to open it. The three boys either were eating everything in their food closet or were very good at following directions. “Why didn’t he?”

  “His sister couldn’t leave with him.”

  “I don’t see his sister here now,” she said.

  Jude waited for her to realize what that probably meant. He saw it on her face, her green eyes widened and her mouth opened in a silent O.

  Does Jude know them? West wanted to know.

  He does, she typed.

  We have room for three more.

  Jude leaned over her and typed, it’s not just three.

  “What are you talking about?” Clover asked at the same time that West typed, how many then?

  She didn’t understand how important this was, because she’d never been in Foster City. She had West to take care of her when their father moved to the barracks. “Tim came and asked me about the Dinosaur. He knew about it before I told him. That means that other kids do, too. That means that we’re going to keep on finding kids here.”

  “There have to be hundreds of kids in Foster City. There isn’t room for all of them at the ranch.”

  “A little more than three hundred,” Jude said. “But only a couple dozen in real danger.”

  Clover?

  Clover exhaled, her lips twisting to the side before she typed, Leanne wants to talk to me and Jude, at our house. We’ll have to spend the night there. We’ll talk to you early in the morning. About eight?

  West didn’t answer right away, and Jude wondered whether he was talking to Christopher. If wishing made things happen, he and Clover would be at the ranch right now. They didn’t belong in the city anymore. That became more apparent by the day. Hell, by the minute.

&nb
sp; If he could just get the kids who had it the worst in Foster City out, he could take Clover and leave.

  Fine. Let me talk to Bridget for a minute.

  “What do we tell him?” Clover asked.

  This wasn’t the right moment to tell West that his girlfriend had gone all strange on them. Bridget was spending a lot of time with West’s best friend. Isaiah Finch had been assigned to guard her personally so that her father would feel confident that she was safe going back to school. Something else was happening there, Jude was sure of it. And it was going to come to a head sometime, Jude was sure of that, too. But not now. He moved the computer toward himself and typed, She wasn’t feeling well.

  Is she okay?

  She will be. How many more do you have room for there?

  Another long silence, and then: Six, maybe. We have space for more, but if we don’t want to have to worry too much about food, six.

  They signed off with West a few minutes later. Jude was pretty sure that none of them felt particularly satisfied with this week’s meet-up.

  He was in the middle of loading everything into his pack, which would be less conspicuous than the duffel on the way to Clover’s house, when the door between the rooms jiggled and one of the boys knocked on it.

  He finished putting the computer away and stashed his pack in the closet. Clover was right, these boys weren’t Freaks. Not yet, anyway. He wasn’t ready for them to know about his stolen equipment, or that he and Clover were hacking into a forbidden wireless signal to talk to West and the others.

  Jude expected the boys to be happier and fuller than they were before. They might be fuller, but none of them looked real happy. Tim stood in front of the younger boys, chin lifted in defiance.

  “We’re staying here,” Tim said. “You can’t make us go back.”

  Clover sat on the bed. “We weren’t—”

  “You don’t own this place.” Tim glared at Clover. “You can’t make us leave.”

  “I never said I wanted to.”

  “You can stay,” Jude said. “But there are rules.”

  Wally pushed in front of Tim. “You can’t give us rules.”

  “Yes, we can,” Clover said.

  “No, you can’t!”

  “Okay, okay, wait.” Tim pulled Wally back. Food had made the boy feisty. “Jude showed us this place. We’ll listen.”

  “Come with me.”

  Jude led the way to the room where he and the others had set up a group meeting space, before Clover and West turned everything upside down. The boiler room, he’d called it then, as a joke that only Clover had watched enough old movies at the library to get. Tim, Wally, David, and Clover all took seats. Mango settled under the table.

  “I told you before, you have to be careful,” Jude said. “If you get caught here, it won’t do anyone any good.”

  “We know that,” Tim said.

  Clover lifted her eyebrows. “Is that why we found you chasing geese through the hallways?”

  “You needed food,” Jude said, before they could answer her accusation. “There’s enough here to last the week, if you’re careful. You should stay inside until next weekend, except for when you go to get dosed. We’ll have a plan by then.”

  “Don’t let anyone see you coming in and out of here,” Clover said.

  Tim crossed his arms over his chest. “We ain’t stupid, hoodie.”

  Clover opened her mouth in indignation at the derogatory term Foster City kids used for kids from the neighborhoods, then shut it again when Jude shot her a look.

  “Listen to me,” Jude said. “You stay out of sight. You go into the bar, you keep your head down, you get your dose, and you get your asses back here.”

  Wally put his hand back and rubbed around the edge of the port hidden in his hair at the base of his skull. “You gonna help us get more food? Like meat?”

  “This week, you’ll have to eat what we have here.” Wally’s thin face dropped, and Jude added, “I’ll see what I can do. But no more geese.”

  “How many more like you are there?” Clover asked.

  The room went quiet and Tim looked at Jude before answering. “Like us?”

  “You know,” she said. “Kids who need to get out of Foster City. Really need to get out.”

  “We could have brought at least four more housefuls with us.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “Clover,” Jude said, under his breath.

  Tim’s face turned red and he narrowed his eyes into a glare. “We’re having a hard enough time feeding ourselves. We can’t save everyone.”

  “No one said you have to.” Jude needed to talk to Clover and figure out their next step. It wasn’t time to tell Tim, David, and Wally where the Freaks were. Or that the Freaks existed. Not yet.

  “Me and David, in a few years we’ll be old enough to work and get into the Bazaar for our own rations,” Tim said. “Then we get the others out.”

  Jude did the math—six kids to a house. “A couple dozen more real bad. Yeah, that sounds right. Make a list. You’ll be okay here, until next Saturday.”

  “West said six,” Clover whispered to him. The other boys were standing right there, though, and heard.

  “It’ll be okay,” he said, to all of them.

  “We’re leaving them here?” Clover asked. “Are you sure?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Who are you anyway?” Wally asked.

  “This is my friend Clover.”

  Tim’s eyes widened, and he shared a look with David. “You’re the girl left the city and came back. What’s it like out there?”

  “Later,” Jude said. “We have to get somewhere before curfew. You got some power up here. Shut the curtains before you turn on the lights. Anyone sees your windows shining, you’re in big trouble, yeah? And ration that food.”

  “Meat,” Wally said. “Don’t forget.”

  “Won’t.” He’d go vegetarian this week, if he had to.

  —

  Jude hadn’t exactly forgotten how early dark came in November, it was more like he’d lost track of time. It surprised him that Clover had as well. It was a good thing they were going to her house, because they wouldn’t have made it back to campus on time.

  They were late enough coming into the bar that the man at the booth just inside the door lifted his eyebrows in mild condemnation. Coming in late, though, meant there was no wait. The dosers needed to get home by curfew, too.

  He and Clover took seats next to each other and waited. Mango sat on the floor between them.

  Clover looked at him. “How could you—”

  Jude picked up Clover’s hand. Not here, he thought, and hoped she could read his mind. She threaded her fingers through his instead of letting go, which made him smile.

  She was still holding his hand when the doser inserted a syringe full of ice-blue, thick, cold suppressant into the portal implanted at the back of her neck. Her fingers tightened when the gel-like liquid burned its way through her veins. He had time for a burst of anger before he felt his own dose spreading down his spine and over the back of his head like fire.

  They didn’t need the suppressant. No one did. He and Clover and Bridget knew it, and they still let themselves be injected every day with the painful, addictive substance. They had no choice, as long as they were in the city.

  When they were outside again, the sun was nearly gone behind the mountains. They had only a few minutes before the curfew bells rang. Jude thought they’d make it on time. He quickened his pace, just in case, and Clover had to almost jog to keep up.

  —

  Leanne was already there. Jude didn’t know her, but she looked to him like she was close to coming completely unraveled. She stood on the porch, but in the shadows so that Jude saw her only because he was looking for her. Her arms were wrapped tigh
t around her chest, like she was holding in some kind of pain.

  “Leanne?” Clover knelt and pulled her house key from the pocket in Mango’s service-dog vest. “You look terrible.”

  Leanne drew a hand through hair that probably hadn’t been washed in at least a week. “You’re late. I almost left.”

  “You wouldn’t have gotten anywhere before curfew,” Clover said. As if on cue, the curfew bells rang. One came from a church on the other side of the river. Another from an abandoned high school a couple of blocks away.

  “Can we go inside?” Their arrival wasn’t doing much to ease Leanne. She looked like a frightened, skittish animal.

  Jude watched Clover unlock the front door, then hesitate in the doorway. She hadn’t been home since the night they came back into the city. The house was dark and empty. And cold.

  “I’ll start a fire,” he said.

  Clover inhaled sharply, as if he’d physically pushed her out of her contemplative state. “Good idea.”

  Since Clover was at the Academy and, as far as anyone in the city knew, West was dead, no energy was allotted to this house for them to use for lights or heat or cooking or anything else. West had taken all of their candles to the Dinosaur.

  Jude gave a small hand-cranked flashlight that he’d put in his pack at the Dinosaur to Clover so they wouldn’t be left in pitch dark while he got a fire going in the living room. “Do you have wood?”

  “In the backyard.” She sat on one end of the sofa and cranked the light, then shined it down the other end for Leanne, who really looked like she needed to sit.

  Jude went for wood, picking up some kindling as well as larger, dry pieces. They would need the fire overnight, to stay warm while they slept. He kept an eye on the house next door, where Isaiah’s grandmother lived. Would she notice the smoke coming from the Donovan chimney? Would anyone? It was possible, but he didn’t think anyone would come to investigate until curfew lifted with the sun in the morning. And even if they did, this was Clover’s family home. They weren’t doing anything wrong.

  At least, not by being here.

  Several times he looked through the window into the living room, and in the dim light he saw Clover and Leanne sitting on opposite ends of the couch not talking.