Sneak (14 page)

“Dictators of the past
took
these freedoms away. And the world always fought back.

“But Cylis never
took
anything. He
offered
. Offered alternatives to freedom that made life so easy, who could turn them down?

“The Mark, the Religious Inclusion, the Global Union . . .

they all share a single goal: to give us a life so easy that we
want
to surrender our freedoms. A life so easy that we want to hand over
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our individuality and abandon choice. Because to keep them is to take the difficult path.” Peck sighed. “The world was ready for things to be a little easier. And choices are hard.”

After he said this, Peck leaned forward and placed a dry log on the dying embers of Tyler’s fire and blew on them until the log was aflame. Then Peck and Logan just sat by it for a while, listening to it, watching it, letting it warm their faces in perfect, thoughtful silence.

“There are many types of Markless, Logan. We all have our

own reasons when we turn it down. But at the heart of it, each of us wants just one, fundamental thing: the freedom to choose.”

The two of them watched the smoke rise.

“Beacon’s a big city, you know. We’re not just going to show

up and see this place where Lily’s being held.”

“I know that,” Logan said.

“Any clue beyond the city—anything at all—would be helpful.”

“There is one thing,” Logan said. “The Marker gave me a name.”

“A name is good.” Peck laughed. “I’ll take a name.”

But Logan frowned. “He called it Acheron. The place where

Lily’s being held.”

The fire was burning brightly now.

“Listen, Peck. I can do this myself—”

“We go together, and that’s the final word on it.”

“I have a bike,” Logan said. “It would get one of us there, I think.

But not all of us. I don’t have a plan that includes the Dust.”

“Don’t worry about that.”

Logan stared down at the logs in front of them. “Your friends

hate me. They’d tear me apart before we even made it past the

Great Lakes.”

“They’ll come around—”

“But why should they? I don’t mean to sound ungrateful.

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DOME would have had my skin several times over by now if it

weren’t for you, and I know that. I know that I owe you. But I can’t let you in on this. Let’s face it. I’ve left a blazing trail of destruction behind me everywhere I’ve gone. The group’s right—you’re better off without me.”

“I
will
be a part of Lily’s rescue,” Peck said. “DOME and I have a score to settle. Please try to understand that.”

“But they won’t agree to it, Peck! I know these guys look up to you, but it’s asking too much! The Dust won’t join us.”

“They will,” Peck said.

“What makes you think so?”

Peck shrugged. “Call it a hunch.”

He turned around when he said it. The two of them had a visi-

tor. Behind them, Papa Hayes stood, arms folded, standing against the black backdrop of the open field.

“So you’re looking to get to Beacon . . . ,” he said.

4

The farmhouse was warm with a yellow glow. The smell of the

woodstove filled each room, and inside, Logan and Peck and

Mama and Papa sat comfortably in the candlelight of the dining room, hunched over the long wooden table, sipping tea.

“A cross-country trip is hard enough, even for the Marked,”

Papa said. “Flying’s impossible, electrocars wouldn’t make it more than a hundred miles, and electrobuses don’t run past the city power grids . . . not even sure they have ’em out in Sierra yet. Magnetrains are government-run. Can’t get anywhere near ’em without a Mark, and even then, it’s checkpoints all along the way.” Papa shook his
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head and said it again. “No. Cross-country trip is hard enough for the Marked. For Markless like you?” He exhaled hard and clucked his tongue. “Impossible.”

But Mama smiled now, leaning forward, her face dancing with

deep shadows in the light from the woodstove. “Or at least . . . it
would
be . . .” And the boys leaned in too, hanging off the Hayeses’

every word. “If it weren’t for the River.”

“The . . . river?” Logan asked. “Mama Hayes, there’s no river

from here to Beacon.”

“Not
a
river, Logan.
The
River. The
Unmarked
River. The network of Markless.”

Papa grinned. “Members of the River, we call ourselves fish-

ers. Our sea is the American Union. We are the fishers of men. We wait in the shadows. We find one another. We help one another.

And we’re growing in strength.”

“No one knows the whole River,” Mama added. “We can’t risk

that. But there are paths, all the same. And all along them, there’s always a fisher who can point you in the right direction.”

“That’s it?” Logan asked. “That’s all fishers can do?
Point?
”

Papa nodded. “’Fraid so. Now, that don’t mean you’re on your

own, though.

“We’ve a system in place. Know the system—know the way.”

Logan and Peck nodded, uncertain, waiting for him to continue.

“This here shows the path,” Papa said. “You find this carved in a tree, or on a post, or on a stone . . . you know you’re on the right track.” He drew a symbol onto the wooden surface of the table, in thick lines with a piece of chalk.

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“You just look for that, all along the way, and you’ll never be far from help.

“Now, this here? This anchor?” He sketched it in three quick

lines.

“It’s a place to rest your bones. You see one of these carved

into the countryside, you know there’s a safe place to stay nearby. It might be a cave or it might be a mansion—you won’t know ’til you see it. But if you can find an anchor, you can trust it, absolutely.”

“Wait a minute. A mansion?” Logan asked. “What kind of

Markless owns a mansion?”

And Papa grinned at him. “My boy, fishers aren’t just among

the Markless. This here?” He drew again on the table.

“This here is a lifesaver. Means a Marked man or woman has

opened their lives to our cause.”

“Lifesavers are crucial,” Mama said. “We couldn’t survive

without them. You see one of these in front of a store some-

where, you know you can ask for a loaf of bread, or a drink of water, or a shirt. They’ll give it to ya. You see one in front of a home, you’ll have a place to wash up, maybe a meal in exchange for a day’s labor around the house. And if you see one next to an anchor, you go right ahead and feel safe spending the night, Marked host and all.”

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“Now this,” Papa said, “looks kinda like a boat, don’t it?” He scrawled a quick half circle next to the other symbols.

“This means you’ve found yourself a captain. See one next to a school? You better believe some teacher in there knows the way. You see one on a sidewalk? You can trust there’s a shop owner offering more than goods. Find one by a house or a farm? Well,” Papa said.

“You get the idea.

“Look hard for these, though. They’re few and far between.

But folks with these symbols will do more than show you the way forward. They’ll
take
you there, far as they can go.”

“Who else knows the exact routes? Besides the captains?” Peck

asked.

“No one. You look for waves or you look for a boat. You go too long without seeing either . . . you’re lost.”

Peck sighed. But he nodded for Papa to continue.

“Now, it ain’t all nice out on the River,” Papa warned. “I suppose you don’t need me to tell you that, but, well . . .” He drew another picture on the table.

“Keep your eye out for this one. Hooks are danger. You might

be offered help, or you might see another symbol in the area, but don’t trust it. Because it’s only bait. And it’ll be the end of you if you don’t take care.

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“DOME hasn’t cracked our code yet and they don’t know our

routes, but DOME does know of the River. And they’ll do any-

thing to stop it.”

“So, what?” Logan asked. “In the morning we’re just supposed

to head out onto the River and hope to find some signs? Hope we don’t get caught? Hope it takes us to Beacon?”

“That’s about right,” Papa said. “Though you left out some

steps.” He laughed. “Most of them, in fact. Starting tomorrow, you kids are gonna walk, run, swim, crawl . . . this River’s full of surprises. Don’t think you’ll spend the whole time on foot. Because you won’t.”

“What does that mean?” Peck asked.

Mama shrugged. “I wish we could tell you. But we only know

our leg of the trip. Anything beyond it, we’d be guessing.”

“Wait a minute,” Logan said. “
Your
leg of the trip?”

“Oh, did we forget to mention?” Papa smiled. “Mama and

I . . . we’re captains.”

“You?” Peck said.

Mama laughed. “Well, how do you think we got supplies for

the Fulmart all those years? You think everything in there was pre-Unity?”

Papa stood now. “But enough planning. Tomorrow we head

east. There’s an anchor at the southern tip of Lake Michigan, and another captain not far beyond that. I have a raft for us on the stream out in the woods. We’ll be able to take it most of the way.”

Mama smiled. “You’re in good hands, kids. This part of the

River is ours; Papa could get you there with his eyes closed.”

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When Logan and Peck left the farmhouse, Peck walked past

the trees strung up with antennae. On one of them, a boat was

carved in the side. On another, an anchor. He hadn’t noticed

them before.

Papa chuckled from the farmhouse’s doorway. “Good eye,” he

said. “Now you’re getting the hang of it.”

Peck sighed. “I’d better be. After tomorrow, these little drawings are all we get.”

“Ah! Not quite,” Papa said, stepping off the porch. “There’s one more trick I have to show you.” And Papa swung his foot out in front of him, making a long arc in the dirt. “Any time in your travels, if you want to find a fisher among the people you’re talking to, you just do this, real casual-like.”

“Okay. What’s it mean?”

“Nothing on its own. That’s the whole point. Just a fidgety leg and an arc in the dirt. Not even DOME would bat an eye. But if you’re face-to-face with a fisher . . .” Papa carved a second arc in the dirt now, overlapping it with the first at one end. “They’ll do the same. And do you see it?” He pointed down.

“A fisher will always have a fish.”

“There’s just one problem,” Logan said. “There’s still no way

the Dust is gonna agree to come with us.”

“Don’t worry about that,” Peck said, erasing the lines of the

fish with his foot. “I’m telling you, they’ll come around.” Then he smiled and turned to walk back to the barn.

Logan hurried to follow.

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5

Erin rode the elevator to the top of DOME’s New Chicago head-

quarters, known throughout Spokie as “the Umbrella.” It was

nighttime, but the doors opened to a full and bustling space.

The main floor of the headquarters was one big room, fifty

stories up. It was glass on all sides, including the floor, with desks circling around the building’s tall, central spire. Right now, hundreds of DOME agents shuffled about, preparing reports, ana-lyzing holograms, sorting documents on each desk’s touch screen.

Mr. Arbitor stepped out of the crowd with a large cup of

steaming nanocoffee and handed it to his daughter.

“It’s not fresh,” he warned.

Erin sipped it anyway. It was bitter and stale and her nose crinkled when she tasted it, but nanocoffee never went cold, and the warmth helped after so many hours of following Hailey in the woods.

“Come,” Mr. Arbitor said. “Time for an update.”

The two of them walked to the outermost ring of desks. Mr.

Arbitor swiped his Mark to unlock his tabletop, and he began pulling up documents for Erin to see.

“At twenty-two hundred hours, two of our men approached

the underpass in New Chicago’s Ruined Sector, where Logan

Langly was identified. According to plan, our informant led Logan away from the group, leaving him vulnerable and alone.”

Mr. Arbitor pulled up a series of night-vision stills and video feeds so Erin could see what he was talking about.

“At twenty-three hundred hours, Hailey Phoenix arrived at

the scene, thanks to your good work this afternoon.”

“Amazing,” Erin said enviously. “How did she find him? Do

you know?”

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“That was your brilliant wording, Erin. The cryptic note you

‘accidentally’ left visible on your tablet. Nothing more. She came right to the underpass and headed Logan off early on during his escape. After a brief encounter with our agents, Logan and Hailey were identified, and the two of them were allowed to leave.”

“Logan didn’t find that . . . strange?”

“They had a plausible enough means of escape.” Mr. Arbitor

smirked. “Disguises and alibis and all that. It was cute, I’m told.”

“But Logan didn’t even catch on that he being was followed?

That doesn’t sound like him . . .”

“Ah. He
wasn’t
followed,” Mr. Arbitor corrected. “Once we had his initial coordinates, we were able to lock on by satellite surveillance.” He pulled up another few files now, dragging them across the tabletop with his fingers. With a series of double taps, he zoomed in from an orbital shot all the way down to a close-up on two teenagers biking and riding a rollerstick through the woods.