The Rebel Code

Chapter Twenty-Two

A sleepless night passes on the floor of the engineering room, and I imagine the paneled walls folding in around me, making the space smaller and smaller until it's only me and the walls, and walls begin where I end. Twice I wake up with a start, dreaming strange dreams that stifle and spread deep fear through my bones.

When I open my eyes a third time, my head is on Larry's shoulder, and he's put a jacket across my chest. The floor is cold, and there are no windows here, so the light never changes.

"It's morning," says Larry. "I didn't want to wake you up."

I blink and rub my eyes, stretching my stiff joints. I check my ProtoBand, and sure enough, the full night has passed. Nothing seems different, but when I look around, John is gone. Mo's jacket is on the floor, but she's missing as well. Only Link is still sleeping, leaning against the wall with his arms across his chest.

"Where-" I start to ask, but my tired voice breaks off.

"John went to find Natcha again," says Larry. "Mo's with the janitors getting us breakfast."

"He left so soon."

"He said Atticus needs a charging port immediately, and he needs to keep in charge with that lady Shandi."

Of course. If we aren't in touch with Shandi when there's an opening, we won't time our re-written identities correctly, and we'll lose a chance that might not come again for months, maybe even years. I shudder at the thought and close my eyes again.

"We're never getting out of here," I moan, burying my face in my hands and massaging my scalp.

"What?" Larry laughs. "Don't talk like that. John knows what he's doing, right?"

"There's so much more to it than John, Larry. If we were still in a stable apartment, maybe we'd have a chance, but now we're on the run again. And what if we get found?"

"Don't talk like that. You're probably just tired and hungry."

He's right. When Mo and our host get back with styrofoam plates of leftovers from whatever breakfast the control managers had upstairs, I feel remarkably better. Mo wakes Link up, and we all eat together, savoring the sweet pastries and toast even if they are a little bit stale. Desperate to feel awake, I try a sip of coffee, but it's bitter and tastes like smoke, so I leave the coffee drinking to Mo and Link.

Our host brings us some more scavenged supplies. Spare paper and pencils. A few more blankets. Larry and I draw and play games to keep ourselves occupied and try to ignore how long John's been gone. We get a quick tour of the room. I don't know how much time passes. It might be a few hours. But finally, when I'm just beginning to wonder how much more of this I can take, I hear a scuffling in the ceiling across the room, and a shadow emerges from the crawlspace, lowering a few bags with him. I breathe a little easier.

"Here we go," says John, taking a moment to catch his breath from the errand. "Charging for Atticus, and I've got a few bags belonging to a few important people in my life. Heads up."

He tosses me something, and it lands in my arms with a soft thump. It's my watermelon bag. I press it tightly to my chest, smiling.

Once John's passed out all our things and hooked Atticus up to the wall, he produces the second bag and pulls out a plastic sack that smells amazing. Chinese take-out.

"You bought food?" gasps Link. "What were you thinking? You could have been caught."

"I wasn't," says John dismissively. "Natcha says the cops have been keeping quiet about the incident at the ballroom. They don't want to air a failed capture on national news, but to make up a story would mean sharing our identities, and we're all legally dead."