Stolen (5 page)

Chapter 6

W
ES DIDN'T WASTE ANY T
IME MOVING
on Shakes's intel, and by morning he had arranged their transport to the golden city of El Dorado, which was a day's drive from Vegas. When Shakes insisted on coming, Wes had tried to talk him out of it at first.

“So maybe I got a death wish,” his friend said, shrugging. Dark circles ringed Shakes's once-bright eyes. His messy hair fell across his forehead. Wes knew he was thinking about Liannan.

“And maybe I have a stupid friend,” Wes answered, clapping his hand on his friend's back. After that, Wes had given up.

They were leaving that night. Sitting in a restaurant, waiting for their pickup, he hoped the meal would improve his friend's dark mood. But not even the fact that they were eating something other than glop could put a smile on Shakes's face. As luck would have it, Wes had been paid twice the usual fee for racing the speedway and there were more watts than he'd expected in his account. It appeared his bosses had enjoyed the little trick he'd pulled, the way he'd swerved and crashed into that Lamborghini, causing the five-car pileup. Crashes made for good entertainment as long as no one got hurt, and Wes had been lucky in that respect.

The crash bonus came in handy for bribing his way to Eliza. In a matter of hours, Shakes's contact had been able to pass on a few more details—the name and exact location of the facility, and Eliza's identification number. Wes sent her information to a hacker, who was able to glean her room number and schedule. By the time dinner was over, Wes had gotten word that the hacker had also confirmed her transfer order. The transport to the Red City was scheduled for later that week.

It had been nine years since he'd seen Eliza. They were both children when she disappeared. She would be sixteen now; would she still remember him? It didn't matter. She was his only remaining family, his sister, his
twin.
He wondered what kind of life she had led, what kind of girl she had grown up to become. Her childhood hadn't been easy, she'd found her power at a young age, it had made life hard for her. Wes shrugged off his worry. It didn't matter who she had become, she was still his sister, his kin—he needed to help her.

Shakes had an all-tofu plasti-burger shoved so far into his mouth, it looked like he might choke.
You'd think the guy never saw a burger before,
Wes thought, although he himself couldn't remember the last time they'd spent the watts on one.

“Slow down, man,” Wes reached for his own sandwich, “or you'll yak that mess onto the floor and they'll charge us extra to scrub out the vinyl.” He grinned. “I'm sorry, I meant
manage
the vinyl.”

In answer, Shakes took an even bigger bite, his cheeks bulging chipmunklike. When he saw the look on Wes's face, he laughed through his food and spit a chunk on his plate.

Wes shook his head as he bit into his own plasti-burger. But he was glad he'd splurged on the burgers. It was good to see Shakes laughing. There hadn't been a lot of occasions to laugh lately. They'd been evicted twice in the last four months and were currently living in a ramshackle trailer outside the Strip, stealing power from the grid to heat and light their home, but it was only a matter of time before they'd get busted and kicked out again. With the sudden and unexpected recession crippling the local economy, the credits Nat had paid them for the trip to the Blue hadn't lasted as long as he'd hoped. While Wes was scraping together a few watts racing, tourist season would be over soon and the track would close.

More darkness on the Strip.

Shakes put his burger down. Wes could tell he wanted to talk about Liannan and the Blue, and Wes just didn't want to go there. Thinking about the Blue made him think of Nat and thinking of Nat made his stomach twist. He couldn't keep the image of her from his mind. Nat astride her drakon, her green eyes flashing, looking dangerous and beautiful, and he missed her so much. So he kept his feelings buried deep inside and he didn't want to hear his friend talk about his own. To be silent and miserable together was enough.

“They're dead, you know,” Shakes said suddenly. “They have to be. I can't believe Liannan would just . . .”

Wes was alarmed at the level of his despair. “No—no. We'll find them. We will. Especially now that we've got the watts. After we get Eliza, we'll—”

“Nah. I'm done hoping. You know what they say . . . gone longer than a month and god knows what's been done to them. If they were taken, they're dead, and we failed them.”

“You don't know that.” Wes tried to console him, but there was no use. He needed comfort himself. He took a second bite of plasti-burger and looked away. The diner was a far cry from the fancy bar where Shakes worked. There were no clear glass walls or glass floor, no snow concierges to make sure a dusting of powder didn't fall into your cocktail. The place had a roof that leaked and walls patched with crooked sheet metal. It was the kind of nondescript place frequented by runners like them; the restaurant had no identifying markers, no signs out front, no lights that you could see from the outside. It looked like an abandoned building, a disguise that worked well for its patrons.

Wes and Shakes weren't exactly wanted men, but they weren't always legitimate hardworking citizens, either, so they kept a low profile. As far as he could tell, no one knew that his team had been on Nat's side when the Pacific fleet sunk beneath the black waters. Make that
almost
no one. There were slavers out there who worked for the RSA and knew what really happened. Wes guessed he was safe in New Vegas for now, but he wasn't taking any chances, not when he was planning another grab-and-go job, this time from a military hospital prison. He finished his burger, fumbling for his napkin.

“We'll find them,” he said, trying to sound confident.

Shakes nodded but didn't answer.

Wes checked his watch. “Our ride should be here by now. Wait till you see it.” He hoped a familiar face might cheer them both up.

They picked up their trays and stumbled through the darkness of the diner, Shakes knocking into a table on their way out. Did they really need to keep the place so dark? Paranoia drove the hunted to extremes—there was no limit to what runners would do to stay undercover. Wes had seen some pretty bad plastic surgery and dye jobs on a couple of their colleagues.

Shakes opened the door and the two of them huddled in the cold for a while. “He said he'd be here by now,” Wes muttered.

“Who? Prince Charming?” Shakes stamped his feet in the snow.

“More or less,” Wes sighed.

A few minutes later a vintage white stretch limousine pulled up to the curb. It was a behemoth, a boat, like one of those old ocean cruisers, from when people still took vacations on the sea. The car was a relic, most likely rebuilt half a dozen times, the body made from flimsy white plastic, but through the front window he could see it had black leather seats, and the engine purred.

Shakes snickered when the limo stopped in front of them. “Let me guess. This monstrosity is our ride to El Dorado?”

“You're welcome,” replied Wes, feigning hurt.

The front window rolled down to reveal the smiling mug of one Farouk Jones, a member of their former crew and fellow survivor of the battle of the black water. The kid held a screen in one hand and the steering wheel in the other. The loud beats of a reggae mash-up thumped from his headphones. He was listening to music, playing a video game, and driving all at the same time. Typical Farouk.

Farouk's long, thin face broke into a huge grin. “You guys call a cab?” he asked, getting out to open the back door for his friends. When they'd returned to New Vegas after ferrying Nat to the Blue, it had been difficult for Wes to get work for his crew, and so after a few weeks kicking around waiting, Farouk left, taking a job as a casino driver. At thirteen, he had the battle-hardened face of a thirty-year-old and the temperament of a kid not older than nine. He brushed back a face full of dreads as he opened the door.

Wes pushed into the backseat, Shakes nudging him aside as he shoved in behind him. The door slammed and the limo pulled out, music blaring, Farouk spinning the wheel to avoid almost colliding with a pedestrian. He turned around and his smile faded. “What's with the long faces? Just you two? Where's the pretty lady and my bros?” he asked. The last time they'd seen him was a month ago, when the team was still intact and Liannan, Brendon, and Roark were still part of it.

Shakes remained silent as he sprawled on the backseat with his hat on his face, and Wes also ignored Farouk's question. He ran a hand across the leather seat. Luxuries of this sort were rare these days; even his Mustang from the racetrack didn't have this sort of juice. “Who owns this white elephant?” he asked. “Must be a big shot if he can pay for the gas.”

“Nope, this thing runs on electric, man, and the casino bosses pay for everything,” Farouk said. “Like I told you on the phone, I run daily routes between the El Dorado domes and the Strip, sometimes Ho Ho City if we have an armed escort. Everyone's leaving New Veg, what with the casino wars and now with the protests, the place is a mess. Wait till we get to the domes. Good stuff. Hot in there for sure. Chicks in bikinis even.” He winked. “Talk about domes.”

“Which nobody was,” Shakes groused, rattling empty bottles in the minibar.

“Sounds like paradise,” Wes joked, kicking his legs up to the seat while Shakes poked around, rooting for treats. “This ride have any heat, vids, tunes?”

Farouk bobbed in his seat, his fingers running across the stream on the screen, playing some video game Wes couldn't see. He was the youngest of Wes's former team members and a know-it-all. He could fly or drive anything and was better on the nets than any other kid they'd worked with. “Yeah, this baby's fully loaded, but you need a key card to turn on the goodies. That's why I carry portables. Gotta ride in the cold and can't use the toys. I don't even get to chauffeur the bigwigs. My job is to drive the cars back to El Dorado after I drop off the tourists.” Farouk adjusted the rearview mirror as the enormous New Vegas perimeter came into view. “Fence is coming up, you guys know what to do.”

Wes and Shakes made for the trunk, pulling down the seat and clambering into the dark space, then pushing the seats back into place. The casino bosses paid the right bribes, so the hotel logo on the side door meant they were waved through the checkpoint without a word.

“Might as well be invisible.” Farouk beamed. “Like I'm not even here.”

“Yeah? That pickup line work for you?” Wes asked as he edged his way out of the trunk and climbed back into his seat.

“Man, this whole ride is my pickup line,” Farouk said, snapping his fingers.

“This ride is your pickup
truck,
” Shakes said. “Only not as nice.”

But they were relieved to scramble back into their seats as the car pulled away.

So far, so good. But getting out of the city was only the first step. Wes still had to figure out a way to get
into
El Dorado. The holes in his plan were big enough to fly a drakon through, but there was no use worrying the boys right now. He would figure things out as he went; he always did. He always had.

I'm not going to let Eliza down now.

The roads heading north toward Salt Lake were white with snow, stark and gleaming against the black lines made by the cars ahead. Traffic was infrequent, the sky gray, the air white and alive with snowy flakes. But in the distance Wes glimpsed patches of green—a sight that might have been unthinkable a few years back. The world was changing, little by little. Whether the earth was coming alive again because the Blue was spreading as Liannan said, he didn't know, but he hoped she was right. Maybe once all the lights went out in every casino in New Vegas and every city in the RSA, they would be able to see the stars again. A new world could begin. He smiled. One trip on the black ocean had turned him into a pilgrim, but unlike many, he had actually seen Nat's drakon, had seen the Blue with his own eyes. The world was changing, whatever that meant. He just hoped to live long enough to see it happen.

As they drove, the only noise came from Farouk's headphones, a small tinny sound. Wes was used to the rowdy camaraderie of soldiers, of blasting music, screeching punk-metal-rap mash-ups, the blaring of video games, Shakes laughing; he found the quiet downright depressing.

Apparently he wasn't the only one who thought so.

The limo suddenly braked hard, making both Wes and Shakes lurch forward. Farouk swung his arm over the seat and turned to them, annoyance written all over his face. “You two going to tell me what's wrong or am I going to have to dump you on the side of the road? Come on, spill.”

“You trying to kill us?” Shakes rubbed his head where he'd hit the window.