Midnight City (20 page)

Holt looked off into the night at that last bit. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Zoey switch her gaze from Mira to him.

“Neither of them would ever have left me like that,” Mira continued. “It was like watching who they used to be die.”

Holt looked at Mira, and she at him. They held their gaze, mutual understanding passing between them. If he hadn’t been connected to Mira before … he was now. Holt felt the frustration build. How was he going to do what he
needed
to do? Survival dictated it, but …

Mira looked back at him sadly, like she could sense his feelings almost as well as Zoey could.

The music built into an outpouring of emotion and sound, climaxing in the air around them. And then it receded, faded, withdrew. Holt and Mira were still staring at each other when the voice of the radio station DJ emerged from the static.

“Kid Cryptic, Cryptic Radio, broadcasting whenever and wherever he can,” the rapid-fire voice of a young boy said from the other side, across who knew how many miles of wasteland. “On the road to Midnight City this week, and if you’re hearing this, I’d bet you’re walking the same path. May our trails cross, and our journeys intertwine, my brothers and sisters.

“That was another classic from Cryptic Radio’s very limited music collection. We got more tunes coming your way, pretty much the same from last hour, but before we hit that, got some news from the rumor mill. As always, take it with a grain of salt. Further the truth travels, the more a story it becomes.”

Zoey got up and moved to Mira, sat in her lap. Mira smiled and ran her fingers through the little girl’s hair. Max padded over and sat next to Holt, his chin on his paws, and Holt scratched his ears.

“I keep getting reports from survivors and traders coming from the south that west of the Chicago ruins, there’s a lot of
strange
Assembly activity.”

Boy, was
that
the truth. Holt and Mira exchanged glances again as the voice continued.

“Kids are reporting seeing not just massive numbers of your average, everyday walkers … but also ones painted a solid
red.
Yeah, if I hadn’t heard a multifarious quantity of reports of the same thing, I wouldn’t believe it either, but this DJ keeps hearing the same damn thing over and over. To make matters worse, most reports say these red Assembly don’t get along very well with our home team. Hey, if we’re lucky, maybe they’ll wipe each other out.

“One thing’s for sure, something bad’s going down out in Assembly land, and anyone hearing this would be advised to stay away from the Chicago Presidium’s territory for now. I’d find an alternate route, or just sit tight until it all passes over. Whatever
it
is.”

“No kidding,” Mira said. Zoey looked up at her.

“In the ‘good news’ category,” the voice continued, “Kid Cryptic has a target lock on a whole new set of CDs. I know, I know, I always say that, but this time, the trading source seems legit. And hopefully we can get something else to play besides the old school … not that there’s anything wrong with that. I love me some strings.

“Remember, stay alert, stay alive, do what you gotta do to survive. Kid Cryptic is out.”

The signal filled with static as the voice vanished. And then new music floated out from the speakers. Classical again, but older this time, with a very specific rhythm that came in sets of threes.

Holt smiled, recognizing it. “It’s a waltz,” he said.

“What’s a waltz?” Zoey asked.

“It’s an old song made for dancing,” he said. “It has a certain beat, can you hear it?”

The music pulsed and moved in triplets. Zoey listened.

“One-two-three, one-two-three, one-two-three, hear it?” he asked the little girl. Zoey nodded, smiling and reclining further into Mira’s arms.

“My mom was a dancer before she met my dad.” Holt hugged his knees into his arms. “She taught me and my sister how to dance the waltz once. We were little, we stood on her feet while she did the steps.”

“What’s a dance?” Zoey asked immediately.

The question took Holt by surprise. Then he realized if Zoey didn’t know music, she definitely wouldn’t know what dancing was.

The music continued to churn around them. It had been a long time, maybe years, since he had heard any form of it, and it made Holt smile. The difficulties of the past few days, the pain in his muscles, the exhaustion—they seemed to recede.

Holt grabbed his pack and opened it. He dug through one of the side pockets until he found what he was looking for; then he stood up, held out a hand toward Zoey. “Come here,” he said. “I’ll show you.”

Zoey’s smile was huge as she stood up and took Holt’s hand.

“Put your feet on top of my feet,” he instructed.

“Won’t it hurt you?” she asked.

Mira laughed behind them, leaning back on her elbows to watch.

Zoey put her right foot on top of Holt’s left boot, then her left on top of his right. Holt handed her one of the things he had pulled from his pack. It was a simple black stone that had been buffed and polished until it was worn smooth and shiny. It fit neatly in Zoey’s small hand. Holt held on to another stone that was exactly the same.

“The important thing is to remember which side is your right side,” he continued. “Because you always move right to start, and it can get hard to remember when you’re thinking about your feet. So if you hold something in your right hand and grip it really tight, you won’t forget. Make sense?”

Zoey nodded, put the stone in her right palm and squeezed it.

“Okay, then.” Holt took her hands. “Here we go.”

He waited a few beats … then moved to the right.

“One-two-three, one-two-three,” Holt said as he waltzed around the campsite in movements of three, carrying Zoey with him on his feet. Zoey laughed as they moved and turned, circling around the flickering campfire while the music poured from the hissing radio.

As they spun, Holt continued to catch Mira’s gaze, watching him. In the dark of the dying fire, he couldn’t see the black fingers of the Tone in her eyes, could see only the clear emerald green.

Maybe she was pretty, after all, he thought. This time, his rational side made no attempt to discount the notion.

Holt and Zoey danced to the music for several more rotations around the fire. Then the little girl looked up at him excitedly with her blue eyes.

“Dance with Mira now, Holt!” she exclaimed.

Mira laughed from the other side of the camp. “Holt wouldn’t want
that.
I’d break his toes.”

Holt looked down at Mira, still perched on her elbows, her red hair trailing gently down her shoulders. He saw the smallest question in her green eyes … and he knew he was asking himself the same thing: Did he really want to go there? Doing so was crossing a line, to be sure, a dangerous line for both of them. It would only complicate things. And his life was all about simplicity, keeping things in perspective.

But over the past few days, Holt had found his resolve slipping when it came to her. He was listening less and less to the voice of survival in his head. And right then, as he imagined pulling her close, having her eyes stare into his from just inches away … he stopped listening to it altogether.

“What’s the matter?” he asked quietly, keeping his stare on her. “Can’t keep up?”

The smile on Mira’s face gradually sobered, like she was slowly reaching her own decision. Then she stood up and walked toward Holt.

Holt let Zoey off his feet and took the black stone from her. She moved to where Max was chewing on one of the straps of Holt’s pack, grabbed the dog’s ears, and twisted them gently like motorcycle controls. “Vroom, vroom…,” she mimicked. The dog didn’t seem to mind.

Mira reached Holt. They stood before each other. He took her right hand, opened it, placed the polished black stone in her palm. Her fingers were soft and cool, like stretched silk.

“What makes you think I need that?” she asked, looking up at him.

“I’ve seen you run,” Holt replied. “Trust me. You need it.”

Mira smiled back at him.

Holt took her hands, slowly raised one up to the level of his shoulder, and placed the other one behind his back. He drew Mira close, and felt her press against his chest. She was an impossible combination of soft and firm all at the same time. They looked into each other as their bodies met.

Zoey chuckled from the fire, staring at them.

“What are
you
laughing at, kid?” Holt asked without taking his eyes off Mira. Zoey chuckled louder.

And then Holt and Mira started to move, spinning slowly with the waltz and static that floated out from the radio’s tiny speakers. The music swelled around them, building toward its finale. But for Holt, the music became irrelevant. Just an audible guideline for when to move his feet and in what direction. His real focus was on the girl in front of him, her soft hands, the smell of her hair, the way the fire sparkled in her eyes.

Holt and Mira waltzed around the camp, their eyes locked on one another. Everything seemed to recede into the distance around them. The starlight, the flickering flames, the breeze that whispered in the leaves—it all faded slowly to black as they spun, faded until there was nothing but them, dancing in slow motion, the thoughts of Assembly walkers and Forsaken and bounties and death marks and plutonium and Fallout Swarms and everything else that had to do with reality vanished, faded until there was the staticky waltz and them and—

The music ended. And when it did, everything stopped.

Holt and Mira’s movement slowed, then ceased altogether. When they were still, they stayed in their positions: close, staring into each other’s eyes. A lock of her red hair hung loose on Mira’s forehead, and Holt gently pushed it back and tucked it behind her ear. They could feel each other’s hearts beating.

Then, from the distance, a sound yanked them both back to reality. Far off, the percussive booming of plasma cannon fire. The muted thumps of the after-explosions. Max, near Zoey, lifted his head up in alarm. The sounds ricocheted quietly off the thin trees, echoing eerily around them all … then faded.

Holt looked down at the girl in his arms and once again remembered all that she represented. A reward. His ticket to escaping the Menagerie for good. The ability to go where he wanted without always having to look over his shoulder. A chance for true freedom.

Holt could see similar thoughts playing behind Mira’s green eyes.

They were back where they had been: She was his prisoner. He was her captor.

But their hands were slow to leave one another, their eyes lingering. Regardless of what the other wanted to believe, for better or worse, something had changed.

They pulled away from each other as a new orchestral piece began to play. Mira moved back to her sleeping bag while Holt reached down and turned off the radio.

“Let’s rest up, we’re moving at first light,” he said. “We haven’t had any sleep in almost a day and a half.”

Zoey’s face formed a disappointed frown, and she left Max and moved to Mira’s sleeping bag. Mira said nothing as the little girl climbed inside, just pulled her close.

Holt climbed into his own bag, heard Max lie down next to him.

The fire was dying, the burning wood had reduced to coals now, glittering orange and red and providing only the dimmest light.

Holt, for his part, was glad for the dark. No one would see him there, his eyes open long after the fire finally died, staring sleeplessly at the stars that filtered in through the treetops above.

24.
CUPCAKES

HOLT, MIRA, ZOEY, AND MAX STOOD
at the top of a gently sloping hill that rolled down to the river valley below. At the bottom, where the river twisted and sparkled through the grass, something stretched from one side of the water to the other: a floating trading post made of all kinds of boats, rafts, barges, and other river craft that had been tied together into a single structure, and Mira saw a hundred or more kids swarming all over it, moving back and forth, trading supplies and necessities.

Floating trading posts like this one had the advantage of being mobile. They could set up shop in a different location every few days so as to avoid Assembly patrols. The permanent depots (like Faust or Midnight City) couldn’t relocate if the aliens came calling, so their only choice was to defend themselves. Fortunately, they rarely had need to.

The four had once again left the trees behind them, and now only the occasional elm and spruce jutted up from the green hills. Holt and Mira stood in the shade of one, leaning against opposite sides of the trunk, while Zoey and Max played together in the tall grass nearby.

Mira stared down at the trading post with a tightness in her chest she hadn’t expected. But why shouldn’t she? After all, the place represented an end to the group dynamic that had formed ever since the strangers were forced to traverse the Drowning Plains together. A dynamic that, in spite of her better judgment, she had grown to like. It was similar to the sense of belonging she had felt in Midnight City. The coming loss of it bothered her far more than she was comfortable with.

Here, Holt would hand off Zoey to one of the congregations or boats below, and the mysteries surrounding her would be left for someone else to solve. Mira would be bound again, and led around like a trophy. Holt would trade for the supplies he needed for the inevitable march north to Midnight City, where she would be returned to her old faction and slated for execution.

In spite of the facts, her thoughts were divided between the trading post on the river … and the waltz from last night. What each represented were polar opposites.

Mira shook the images from her mind. She never should have let that dance happen. But watching Holt put Zoey on his feet and spin her around the fire had all been too much. The feelings that had been building inside her, feelings she had adamantly denied, were stoked to life.

Was she
insane
? There was absolutely no way she was falling for her
captor.
For the bounty hunter who planned to turn her in for a reward, who’d kept her tied up for almost a week. And then there were her … other responsibilities. Her other relationships. Had she forgotten them, too?