The Debt Collectors War

Chapter 28

They drove. They travelled a little further on the winding local road, twisting and turning along beside the river, then they suddenly crossed an overpass bridge, and went down what was obviously a curving on-ramp, and joined a wide smooth highway.

It was the highway on the map, and it seemed in fairly good repair. Ellie hadn’t expected that. Even at night there was a fair amount of traffic, though, which might explain why. Much of the traffic was heavily-guarded convoys of debt-recovery freight-drone trucks, but there was a substantial amount of local traffic too, Měi-guó traffic, older cars and trucks with human drivers moving along one vehicle at once, the same way they were. The road surface was smooth, and the concrete over-bridges seemed well-maintained, and there were far fewer potholes than Ellie expected.

Joe sped up, and they began to make good time.

“It’s a good road,” Ellie said.

“Surprised?” Joe said, grinning.

Ellie ignored him.

They went south and then east, heading inwards, towards the middle of Měi-guó.

After a while Ellie glanced back at Sameh and said, “Get some sleep if you like.”

Sameh nodded, and leaned her head against the door.

Ellie stayed awake. She and Sameh didn’t know Joe, so for now they would take turns sleeping, or at least keep a locked door between him and themselves while they did.

Sameh slept, and Ellie watched the highway as they drove, and it was oddly, surreally calm. All this traffic, and all this peaceful busyness, in a country which had fallen apart so completely it wasn’t even a country any more.

                                                            *

Later, Ellie slept.

Sameh woke on her own after a couple of hours, so Ellie took the chance to sleep. She got comfortable the same way Sameh had, with her head on the door on a rolled up jacket and her hand underneath her shirt, resting on her sidearm.

She slept, deeply, needing the rest, until Sameh woke her by reaching around the seat and putting her hand on Ellie’s shoulder.

Ellie woke, and looked around. It was close to dawn, from the clock on the dashboard, and from the first paleness in the eastern sky.

She fished in a pocket and found dental gum. She preferred it to a toothbrush, when she was in the field, even if, technically, it didn’t clean her teeth quite as well. Chewing was easier than brushing, and she had a lingering, slightly silly worry that someone could sneak up on her as she brushed, as well. Brushing made noise, a surprising amount of noise, inside your own head. Enough to cover quiet footsteps behind her, Ellie had always thought.

She opened the gum, and chewed for a moment, and looked around, a little bleary.

“Where are we?” she said.

Sameh handed her a tablet, so she could see. The circle that marked their vehicle, in the centre of the screen, was now very close to the cluster of dots that were the last financial and tracker locations for the missing kid.

“Was there any trouble with the militia?” Ellie said, realizing they had driven past that part of the map in the night.

“None,” Sameh said.

“Nothing?”

Sameh didn’t answer. She didn’t usually bother repeating herself when Ellie asked her stupid questions.

Ellie looked at Joe. She thought about saying that he’d been right about the militia, so that he knew she’d noticed, and to affirm him as a part of their team or whatever. Then she decided not to bother. He’d heard the conversation she just had with Sameh because he was sitting beside her. He knew she’d noticed, and Sameh had too, and probably didn’t need it said again.

“Do you need one of us to drive?” she said instead.

Joe shook his head.

“You’re not tired?” Ellie said.

“I’m fine for now.”

“You’ve been driving all night.”

“On a highway. I’m fine.”

“I want you fresh.”

“I’m fresh.”

Ellie kept looking at him, wondering if he was.

“A highway,” Joe said. “Not a real road. It’s not the same.”

“If you say so.”

Joe looked over at her, and hesitated, then he said. “I drive. Only I drive my car.”

“Oh,” Ellie said, and wanted to grin. “Yeah,” she said. “Fair enough.” She’d grown up with people like him, she thought to herself, back at home, long ago.

“Say if you’re tired,” she said, and took a meal bar out her shirt pocket and chewed on it slowly as she watched flat countryside go past. Sameh passed her a water bottle and a packet of caffeine pills from a bag in the back seat, and Ellie smiled at her, grateful.