Escape to Eden (22 page)

“But my father did, right? Otherwise he would’ve been caught by now.”

Colt doesn’t say anything for a long time. He shifts in his seat like it’s suddenly too small. “Your father didn’t outrun it,” he says. “I killed it.”

This startles me. “When?”

“About a week after the raid on your house. Of course I didn’t know it was your house at the time. I just knew a Canine was after the founder of HOPE, the man I had turned over to the Institute. For months and months I searched for the Canine. His name was Erik, and he had been working for the Institute for over five years. Whenever I heard about his whereabouts, I’d try to find him, but I never could get the jump on him. Eventually I found out where he lived, and decided the only way I was going to get him was if I waited for him at his house. He was rarely there, probably because he was always tracking your father. After spending weeks in front of his house, I finally got lucky. He showed up and we fought.” He swallows and takes a breath. “I obviously won, but just barely.”

I’m too stunned to say anything. My mind is racing, swirling all sorts of directions. He turned my father in for money, but ended up saving him? Everything I think about him is so confusing, and it’s giving me a headache.

“I know you may never forgive me,” he says, “but I am sorry. I was at a dark place in my life when I did what I did. I know that’s no excuse.”

“Thank you for stopping the Canine from getting my father,” is all I can say.

Colt doesn’t say anything after this, and neither do I. In a few minutes, my eyelids grow heavy and finally close.

I don’t dream, which makes me think I haven’t been sleeping long when a frantic voice wakes me. The sun is up, just barely, and its light filters through the breaks in the trees. I bolt awake when I realize Anthony’s hands are grasping at the air, and he’s struggling to sit up.

“Hold still,” I say. “It’s okay. We’re in the car.”

“Water,” he says and coughs.

I unzip my backpack and open a water bottle. Very carefully I pour it though his cracked lips. After a couple of gulps, he pushes my hand away.

“Thank you,” he says.

“How are you feeling?” I ask.

“A little better. Where are we going?”

Colt takes a few minutes to tell him what happened. During
this time Jenna wakes up and swivels around in her seat to listen. Max is breathing peacefully next to me. I reposition his head to make him more comfortable.

When Colt finishes, Anthony shakes his head. “You shouldn’t have come back for me. The Canine would never have known about you otherwise.”

“But then you would’ve been shipped off to Purgatory Island where you would surely die,” I say.

“But you and your brother would be safe.”

“Oh shut it, Anthony,” Jenna says. “Patch did what we wouldn’t, even though she had more to lose.” She turns to me. “I’m only saying this once, so listen good. You showed more bravery than anyone I’ve ever known. Thank you. You taught me something, big surprise I know, but you did. I wish I would’ve had the courage to do it.”

“I only did what I thought was right,” I say, not even bothering to correct her on my name. “What’s our next move?”

“What direction are we heading?” Anthony asks.

“South,” Colt says. “Toward Providence so we can charge the car.”

“Good. From there we can go to New York City. There’s a safe house there where I’m told your father is staying.” Anthony shifts uncomfortably in the seat, favoring his left side.

“But what about the Canine?” Jenna asks. “He won’t give up until he finds Patch, which means we’re all in danger.”

Anthony takes another sip of water. “We need to get far enough ahead of it that he loses her scent. As long as he doesn’t come within a hundred miles of her, she’ll be fine.”

“Unless he goes looking for her,” Colt says.

I close my eyes, thinking how I might need to be on the run for a very long time. What would that mean for Max? I need to find my father, let him take Max to be sure he’ll be kept safe, and then I can figure out what to do about the Canine.

“Why don’t we just kill it?” Jenna says. “Use Patch to lure it in and then slice its head off.”

“Because Canines never come alone. The Institute’s Prime army will be right behind it,” Anthony says.

Jenna begins to argue, saying something about tricking the Institute, but I can’t listen anymore. I lean back and snuggle against Max. Bad things are coming for me; it’s only a matter of time.

M
ax finally wakes. I’m surprised he slept through all the arguing. I stayed out of the conversation, lost in my own thoughts of how I can protect those around me. Canines are ruthless, driven more by animal instincts than human emotions.

After some time, the others grow tired of the debate and fall into an uncomfortable silence. Max tugs on my shirt.

“Are you hungry?” I ask and smooth his messy hair.

He pats my arm.

I reach into my backpack and remove a cereal bar. I open it and hand it to Max. Colt’s muttering under his breath, his back muscles tight.

“What’s wrong?” I ask him. We’re in another city, my guess Providence. It looks similar to Boston, but smaller and shinier, if that’s possible.

“Colt?” I ask again.

“I can’t find an active charging station,” he says.

I look at the screen on the dashboard. Where I’d normally see images of many small, lit-up batteries on the map, there’s nothing. “Maybe the dash screen is broken?”

Jenna sits up in her seat and looks around. Anthony’s eyes are closed, and I wonder if he’s fallen back asleep.

“It’s not. I drove by a couple. They’re all shut down.” Colt’s fingers twist around the steering wheel then straighten. “Do you know the odds of that happening?”

“What are you thinking?”

Colt pulls over on the side of the road, parking in front of a newer-looking, blue home with shiny, black metal trim. He
swivels in the driver’s seat, his expression grim, but when he sees Max, he smiles. “Hey little man. We haven’t properly met. I’m Colt and this moody girl is Jenna. Don’t worry about remembering her name. She’s very forgettable.”

“Ugh! I can’t stand you!” Jenna says then turns to Max. “Don’t listen to this mean guy. I’m the nicest, smartest person you’ll ever meet.” She ruffles Max’s hair, but he immediately withdraws into me.

I wrap my arm around him. “Max doesn’t like to be touched.”

“Then Max and Colt will get along well,” she says.

Anthony moans and looks around. “Why are we stopped?”

“I can’t find a live charging station,” Colt says.

No one says anything, making the air feel thick and heavy.

“What’s going on?” I ask.

Jenna collapses back into the seat, her head dropping back. “We are so screwed.”

“We don’t know anything yet,” Anthony says, but his hands have tightened into balls. “Go to the north side, on the outskirts. They might be active there but not showing on the city’s map.”

Colt faces forward and maneuvers the car back onto the road while Jenna turns on her wristpad and expands a virtual keyboard into the air. It’s good one of us has one. Colt had ours deactivated after the party to make sure we wouldn’t be tracked. Jenna types fast, soundlessly clicking and swishing through various screens.

“I still don’t understand what’s going on,” I say again. My heart is pounding, telling me that whatever it is, it’s bad.

“Charging stations are on their own power grid. My guess is someone has shut it off,” Anthony says. He’s staring straight ahead, looking stronger somehow. Maybe it’s because he’s leaning forward, seemingly oblivious to the wound on his chest.

“Does that happen often?”

“They’re off,” Jenna says. “The announcement is all over the net. The government is claiming they don’t know what happened, but promises to restore power as quickly as possible. In the meantime, if someone needs a charge they can go to one of five battery-operated stations provided by the Institute.”

I turn to Anthony. “They did this, didn’t they? To catch us?”

“But how would they know what direction we went?” asks Jenna.

“The Canine,” Colt says and turns a corner too fast. I rest my arm against the back of the seat to keep Max and me from sliding into Anthony.

“And Providence is the closest city to Boston,” Anthony says. “They probably guessed we would be driving.”

I reposition myself into the seat, holding tightly to Max. “How much charge is left?”

Everyone’s quiet, waiting for Colt to answer. “Maybe another thirty minutes.”

Jenna shakes her head. “What are we going to do? If we stay, the Canine will find us in a matter of days.”

“We keep traveling to New York,” Anthony says.

Jenna’s mouth drops open. “Are you crazy? New York City is 180 miles away, and what with the little charge left, we’ll only make it another twenty or thirty miles before we have to hike through the woods and no one does that!”

“Why not?” I ask her. The thought of returning to the forest is the best news I’ve heard in a long time.

She scowls. “Because that’s where wild animals live.”

“They are no more wild than the Primes I’ve met.”

“It’s our only option,” Anthony says. “What supplies do we have?”

Colt glances back at the trunk as if trying to remember what we had packed. “A few blankets, food for a couple of days, but not much water.”

Anthony taps his fingers against the seat in front of him. “We need to stop somewhere and get a few more things. If we can walk three miles an hour for ten hours a day, then we could be there in five days or so.”

Jenna folds her arms and says, “I said I would go with you to New York, but I didn’t say I’d run around in the forest, sleep on the ground, and live off the land!”

Colt presses a button, making Jenna’s door open even though we’re still moving.

“Then get out. Right now.”

“Are you crazy?” she asks. Wind tears through the car, stirring up Jenna’s hair and a few papers that are near her feet.

“Close the door, Colt,” Anthony says, his voice tired-sounding.

Colt does as he says. “I don’t know what moron lowered the adult age to twelve. It’s obvious you’re still a child.”

Jenna faces forward and sinks into the seat, mumbling, “You’re the child.”

All the commotion has made Max scramble on top of me and bury his head into my shoulder. I hold him tight and say to Jenna, “The woods aren’t that bad. I promise. Besides, I’m sure Anthony will let you get one of those air mattresses to sleep on.”

Her head lifts. “Like on the commercials?”

Colt lets out an exaggerated moan, but before Jenna can react, I say quickly, “Yes. They’re lightweight and small enough that it won’t take up much room. We can spare the room, right, Anthony?”

“Fine,” he says, “but Jenna you’re going to have to buy our supplies. The Institute has probably flagged all security cameras to detect our faces, but it will take awhile for them to connect you to me.”

Jenna sits up straight and smiles. “I can do that.”

Colt glances at her sideways. “You can only get what we need.”

“Sure. Right. No problem,” she says but is smirking.

“Is there a sports store nearby?” Anthony asks.

“Almost there,” Colt says and turns right at a stoplight.

A few minutes later he parks in front of a huge shopping mall at least six stories high. It’s the most architecturally interesting building I’ve ever seen. On the roof are several tall twisted, cone-shaped spikes that spiral many feet into the air, and the entire structure is covered in the same shiny metal as the other buildings.

“Don’t take forever,” Colt tells Jenna as she reaches for the door.

“Wait,” I say, stopping her. “Isn’t there some kind of portable battery charger we can buy?”

Anthony shakes his head. “They stopped making them years ago when flying became the main means of transportation between cities, but you can still find them occasionally on the black market.
Had I known this was going to happen, I would’ve been more prepared.”

“None of us thought any of this would happen,” Colt says.

“Any last requests?” Jenna asks, placing her hand on the door handle.

Anthony hands her a list of several items he’s written down on a sheet of paper. “Get these.”

“Can I add one thing?” I ask.

Jenna hands it to me. I borrow Anthony’s pen and scribble the words “Universal Snaring Pack” and hand it back to her. She reads it and wrinkles her nose. “I don’t even think this is a real thing.”

“Just ask someone.”

After she leaves, I turn my attention to Max, who keeps pushing his head into my shoulder. I think he wants out of the car. So do I. Fresh air sounds so good right now, but we can’t risk it.

To calm him down, I talk about our time in Maine, specifically when we would go fishing with our mother and father. This works and his whole body relaxes. Anthony has fallen back asleep. Colt, who has slid into the seat, his head against the headrest, has fallen asleep too, but every once in a while his eyes open and then close.

Almost an hour later, Jenna returns, pushing a full shopping cart.

“She’s back,” I say.

Colt sits up and looks over. “I’m going to kill her.”