Athel (15 page)

“Be careful!”
Wes yells, but Jada is already skipping away. “Mom’s going to kill me,” he
adds, rolling his eyes.

I sit on
the log and look around. Light streams from the treetops, making the
leaf-covered slopes glimmer. The scent of damp earth and moss seems stronger
down here. Water trickles somewhere in the distance, and birds I’ve never heard
before chirp their songs.

Jada comes
running down the slope, her awkwardly straight frame wobbling side to side, and
yet, miraculously, she manages to get to the bottom without falling. I’m
beginning to see why she doesn’t want prostheses. This girl is so awesome she
probably wouldn’t know what to do with them.

She stares
at the log I’m sitting on, cheeks flushed with excitement, and says, “Follow
me.” She climbs over the log, jumps, and vanishes.

Wes shoots
to his feet. “Freaking Kawa! Jada!”

I lean
across the log, but all I can see are the ferns still swaying where she just
stepped through. “Jada!”

“I’m down
here!” Her voice comes from somewhere below the leaves. I stretch my arms and
move the vegetation away until Jada’s happy face appears at the bottom of a
pit.

“Jada! Did
you do that on purpose? You freaked the hell out of me,” Wes scolds.

“Sorry,”
she replies. “Jumping felt harmless in my dream.”

“Well, is
it?” Wes asks.

“Pretty
much.”

Wes and I
pull away the leaves and finally uncover the hole she’s jumped into, a pit
about three feet wide and five feet deep. She sits at the bottom, looking like
a little comma, her big eyes smiling at me as light shines on her dirt-caked
face.

“That’s
cute, Jada,” I say. “Thanks for showing us your dream. Now come out and let’s
go look for the door.”

She looks
at me and frowns. “The door? It’s right here. I just found it. The Ingenuity
door!”

Chapter
Fourteen

Athel

Day Number: 1,587

Event: Lukas lost the rocket.

Number of Mayakes left: 428

Goal for today: Unlock the Prudence door.

A loud roar splits the air as I’m
riding back to the barn. Taeh hears it a second before I do and panics. She
rises on her hind legs, whinnies, and then sprints like a fury through the
forest, jumping over logs and ravines. I clutch the reins, squeeze my thighs,
and duck, as branches whip my face and arms. One bough strikes me in the chest
and almost knocks me off the saddle. To no avail I pull the reins to stop the
horse, the leather strips digging into my flesh.

When Taeh
finally calms down, we’re miles away from the trail. My clothes are torn and
ripped, and my hands burning.

“What… the
hell… was that?” I wheeze, catching my breath. Still frightened, Taeh shakes
her head and runs in circles. The rumble is gone, replaced by a familiar wake
of smoke that now mars the sky.

Could that be…? The rocket
!

I steer Taeh
back to the trail, thinking about what just happened. Lukas has obviously fixed
the rocket and decided to test it, but if that’s the case… why fly it over the
forest, in the opposite direction from the gorge? The droids will never come to
this side of the river, and if they don’t get it back by tomorrow morning…

Taeh still
has a lot of energy in her legs. Fueled by adrenaline, she whips through the
forest at a brisk pace, her hooves thumping on soft, mossy turf. Once back on
the trail I stall, unsure whether I should go after the rocket or back to the
barn to find out what happened to Lukas.

Voices
trail in the distance. They come and go, half-panicked, half-angry. I click my
tongue and gallop in their direction, wondering if people have come out here after
the rocket. Pain seeps through my body as the slashes and bruises I got during
Taeh’s panicky flight start to take a toll on my riding. I close my eyes and
will the nanobots to release molecules of analgesic into my bloodstream.

Taeh jumps
over a stream and suddenly the voices I heard earlier become louder. They’re
not happy voices.

“Let go of
me!”

“Not until
you tell us what the heck that was!”

“I
would’ve told you if you’d let me explain instead of firing the thing off!”

As soon as
I hear Lukas’s screams, I whip the reins and prompt Taeh to a gallop. I find
him a few hundred yards down the trail, and not in good company: Metal Jaw Yuri
and his brother Cal walk at his sides, escorting him like two guarding dogs.
Cal holds Lukas by one arm and pushes him along the trail.

“Oh,
look,” Yuri says as soon as I emerge from the trees. “I’m sure the goofball on
the horse will tell us the full story.”

“Let go of
Lukas!” I yell, pulling Taeh to a stop.

“Why?”
Yuri challenges. “The nerd wouldn’t tell us what the rocket’s for. He claimed
it didn’t even work and look how far it got!”

Blood
pulses through my head. “You’re the one who flew the rocket?”

He smirks.
“What better way to prove he was lying?”

“I’d just
fixed it,” Lukas mutters under his breath.

Yuri’s
reckless behavior has now endangered all of us. I hop off the saddle and throw
my arms at his neck. “Bastard!” I yell. “Why did you do that?”

We roll
several feet through moss and dead leaves, twigs poking my skin everywhere.

Yuri sinks
an elbow into my ribs and wriggles away from my grasp. I pounce back, trying to
stop him. “Leave Lukas alone and fight me instead. The guy wouldn’t hurt a
fly!”

“What?”
Lukas protests. He flails his arms, but Cal grabs him and pins him to a tree.

Yuri
throws a right hook, but I duck and his knuckles sink into fresh dirt. I
quickly roll away and leap back to my feet.

He stands
up again, his eerie metallic jaw smeared with moss. “Is that how you fight,
coward? By running away?”

“You’re
the coward,” I retort. “You just attacked a helpless boy.”

“I’m not
helpless!” Lukas shouts.

Cal grunts
and grabs Lukas’s arms from behind. I’m sure Lukas could free himself with a
rapid kick, but he’s clueless when it comes to fighting. He just stands there,
cringing and looking away.

Taeh feels
the tension and keeps a cautious distance. The rest of the forest is silent,
birds and chipmunks suddenly muted.

Yuri bares
his teeth and balls his fists at me. The small barrels sprouting out of his
knuckles look increasingly threatening. “Helpless, my boot,” he hisses. “I know
you guys are up to something. Who made the flying rocket?”

“Why are
you so obsessed with the rocket?”

He grabs
the collar of my shirt and breathes into my face. “You’re a liar, Athel. I
don’t trust a thing you or your freckle-faced sister do. You told people not to
give up their prostheses to make more weapons like mine, and then you go off
and make a rocket. Where did you find the stuff to make it, huh?”

“I didn’t
make it,” I snarl, holding his spiteful stare.

“Of course
you didn’t. Your nerdy friend did.”

“I wish,”
Lukas replies, and I’m sure he really means it.

The whole
thing would be comical if it weren’t for the fact that the rocket is now gone
and the droids will never find it. Which puts us all in a very, very bad place.

“I’ll tell
you where the rocket comes from,” I say, trying to muster a deep, low voice.
Because people listen to deep, low voices. Or so I believe. “But you’ll have to
let go of Lukas. And you’ll have to cooperate.”

Yuri’s
right brow shoots up, taken aback. “Cooperate? With
you
? Why?”

The way he
said “you,” as if we were the most disgusting things on the planet, when in
fact he’s the one who viciously attacked my sister. I swallow my pride and
explain.

“Because,
believe it or not, we’re in the same boat. We need to have a serious
conversation, but no serious conversation can take place while one of the
parties is pinned to a tree. Let Lukas go.”

Yuri’s
face hangs between a sneer and a frown. He lets go of my shirt, hooks his hands
on his belt, and studies me very carefully. Somehow my approach seems to have
triggered his curiosity. “And you’ll tell us what’s up with the rocket and what
the hell you were gonna do with it?”

I nod.

A jay
screeches from the high branches. Taeh stomps her hooves on the soft terrain of
the forest.

Yuri
clenches his jaw and lowers his fists. “Let him go, Cal.”

“Really?”
the boy protests. “You’re gonna let these traitors—”

“I said
let him go.”

As soon as
Cal releases his grip, Lukas scrambles away, massaging his wrists.

I point to
the ground. “Let’s all sit and attempt a civilized conversation, shall we?”

I sit down
and cross my legs, my eyes on Yuri, hoping he’ll do the same. He does, and we
all stare at one another for a good thirty seconds, me and Lukas on one side of
the trail, and Yuri and Cal on the opposite side.

I try not
to think too much about the rocket because if I do, anger will muddle my
thoughts. I need to be rational now. The rocket booster—as Lukas likes to
call it—is lost somewhere in the forest and there’s nothing I can do
about it. The Gaijins will attack us in less than twenty-four hours. We need to
act soon, and bickering and fighting will only make things worse.

I dip a
hand into my pocket, take out the empty cylinder, and hand it to Yuri. “Show me
how you opened it.”

He blinks
and flashes me a skeptical look.

Cal juts
out his lower lip. “Don’t trust him. Dad said—”

“Shut up,”
Yuri interjects, slamming a hand over his brother’s mouth.

“I’m not
trying to trick you,” I say. “You took something from us, now we want that
something back from you. Show us how you opened it. It’s important, and many
lives may depend on it.”

He sneers
at that. “What is this, some kind of puzzle?”

“Technically
it is,” Lukas says.

I flash
him a pointed look. “Let him show us how to open it first.”

Yuri takes
the cylinder and pokes a finger through the iris opening. “It’s already open.”

“It wasn’t
when you took it.”

Cal stirs.
“They’re trying to trick us.”

“I knew
how to open it,” Yuri says.

I nod.
“Because you
remembered
.”

The word
“remembered” seems to resonate with him. “Why is this so important to you?”

I decide
there’s no point in keeping him in the dark. Violent or not, we need him on our
side. “The Gaijins are going to attack the Tower in less than twenty-four
hours. These cylinders—there’s five of them—are our only hope to
escape. The key you found inside is one of five. Once all five are in place
we’ll have access to a safe place, a place where the Gaijins’ bombs won’t be
able to harm us.”

Cal’s eyes
widen. “That’s not what Dad—”

“I said
shut up!” Yuri yells. He scrutinizes me, his dark eyes narrowed to slits. “How
do you know all this?”

“A sniper
droid delivered the message. They want their rocket back, which is why we were
trying to fix it. Given how fast it took off, I doubt we’ll be able to find it
in time to eliminate the threat.”

“You
didn’t make the rocket?” Cal asks.

Lukas
squirms. “Guys. This is no joke. We need the key. And we need to find the other
ones, too.”

Yuri
juggles the cylinder in his hand, pondering. At last a smile escapes his lips.
“You know what I think?”

I tilt my
head. “What?”

He tosses
the cylinder back at me. “I think you’re all full of crap. Let’s go, Cal.”

The two of
them stand up again and look down on us with a spiteful glare.

“You
stole, Yuri. My sister found the cylinder and you stole the key from us. The
least you could do, if you have a grain of dignity left in your overgrown ego,
is to return it to us.”

Yuri
pounces, grabs my collar, and slams me against a tree. He levels his fist with
my eyes and presses his phalanges against my air pipe. “Take that back, you
filthy liar.”

I swallow,
suppressing the urge to punch him back. I need him on my side, damn it, not
against me.

“The key
is our only chance to survive the Gaijins’ attack,” I croak.

“I know
how to survive the attack,” he snarls. “I blow up those stupid droids with my
lasers. You have a problem with that?”

“It’s you
against an army.”

“My
brother will have his own soon.”

“In less
than twenty-four hours?”

He clicks
his metal jaw, pondering.

“Do the
right thing, Yuri, and give us the key. You may have the memory of how to
retrieve it from the cylinder, but you don’t know what it’s for. We can show
you.”

Somehow my
lack of physical reaction opens a tiny breach. I can see in his eyes that he’s
finally considering the offer.

“What’s in
it for me and my brother if we help you out?”

“Your own
life.” I swallow. “Because if you don’t give us back the key, we’re all gonna
die.”

*
 
*
 
*

A family of chipmunks argues over a
stack of acorns on top of a rock. As soon as they hear our steps, they scatter
in all directions. A spotted dove hoots from a tall branch. The screeches of
the jays echo her call.

Yuri and
Cal walk behind us, keeping a cautious distance from Taeh. They stare at one
another from time to time and flash us suspicious glares, as if unsure whether
to trust us or not. I’m not sure either, but at this point I feel like there
are no other options. Lukas claims he can find the Prudence door, and the two
brothers have the key to unlock it. Once they realize the danger, they’ll
cooperate.

I know
they will.

We come to
the clearing where Tahari and Aghad unearthed the map of Astraca. Dottie found
the cylinder with the Prudence
chavi
not too far from here, and now Lukas is convinced the Prudence door is nearby,
too. If he’s correct, we’ll finally be able to unlock the first of the five
doors.

 
I walk Taeh by the reins and wade through
tall vines while Lukas explains what we’ve learned about the five Astraca doors
and the
chavis
that unlock them.

Yuri
stops, crosses his arms and stares at us defiantly. “With a fifty-square-mile
forest and plenty of places to choose from, why do you think they’d hide a key
in the vicinity of its door?”

“Because
it makes sense,” Lukas replies. “The doors were built for emergencies. They had
to be secured so that no one would breach them, which is why no door will open
unless all five are unlocked. Still, in an emergency, you want to be able to
reach those keys fast.”