Shay had warned her to be careful, and whoever this person was—Smokie or not—they wouldn't be easy to sneak up on. But perhaps one ambush deserved another…
Tally veered off the trail, running deeper into the forest. She moved silent and light-footed through the soft undergrowth, sweeping around her quarry in a slow arc until she found the trail again. Then she crept forward, ahead of them now, until she spotted a high tree branch that stretched directly over the path.
The perfect spot.
As she climbed, her suit-scales sprouted the rough texture of bark, its colors shifting into a dappled moonlit pattern. She clung to an overhanging branch, invisible and waiting, her heartbeat quickening.
The glowing figure came through the trees in total silence. There were no synthetic smells among those of unwashed humanity: no sunblock patches, insect repellent, or even a trace of soap or shampoo. As Tally flipped through vision overlays, she detected no signs of electronics or a heated jacket, and her ears didn't catch the slight buzz of night-vision goggles.
Not that equipment would help her quarry. Absolutely motionless in her sneak suit, hardly breathing, Tally was undetectable even to the best technology…
And yet, just as the figure passed below her, it slowed, cocking its head as if listening for something.
Tally held her breath. She knew she was invisible, but her heart beat faster, her senses amplifying the sounds of the forest around her. Was there someone else out here? Someone who'd spotted her climbing the tree? Phantoms flickered at the corners of her vision. Her body longed to act, not hide up here among the leaves and branches.
For a long moment, the figure didn't move. Then, very slowly, its head tipped back to gaze upward.
Tally didn't hesitate—she dropped, flattening her scales to night black armored mode, wrapping both arms around the figure, pinning its arms as she dragged it to the ground. This close, the unwashed smell was almost choking.
"I don't want to hurt you," she hissed through the suit's mask. "But I will if I have to."
The young man struggled for a moment, and Tally saw the flash of a metal knife in his hand. She squeezed harder, pushing the breath from his lungs with a cracking of ribs until the knife slipped from his fingers.
"Sayshal," he hissed.
His accent sent a shudder of recognition through Tally. Sayshal? She remembered that strange word from somewhere. She flipped off her infrared, pulled him to his feet, and pushed him backward, taking in his face in a stray beam of moonlight.
He was bearded and dirty-faced, his clothing nothing but strips of animal skins sewn crudely together. "I know you…," she said softly. When he didn't answer, Tally pulled off her hood, letting him see her face.
"Young Blood," he said, smiling. "You have changed."
Barbarian
His name was Andrew Simpson Smith, and Tally had met him before.
When she'd escaped the city back in her pretty days, she'd stumbled across a sort of reservation, an experiment maintained by the city's scientists. The people inside the reservation lived like pre-Rusties, wearing skins and using only Stone Age tools—clubs and sticks and fire. They inhabited small villages that were constantly at war with each other, an endless cycle of revenge killings for the scientists to study, like a purified layer of human violence squeezed between the halves of a petri dish.
The villagers didn't know about the rest of the world, or that every problem they faced—illness and hunger and bloodshed—had been solved by humanity centuries before. That is, they hadn't known until Tally had stumbled into one of their hunting parties, been mistaken for a god, and told a holy man named Andrew Simpson Smith all about it.
"How did you get out?" she asked.
He smiled proudly. "I crossed the edge of the world, Young Blood."
Tally raised an eyebrow. The reservation was bounded by "little men," dolls strung from the trees and armed with neural scramblers that caused terrific pain to anyone who got too close. The villagers were far too dangerous to be let loose into the real wild, so the city had given their world impassable borders.
"How did you manage that?"
Andrew Simpson Smith chuckled as he bent to pick up his knife, and Tally fought an urge to kick it from his hand. He had called her a Sayshal, the villagers' word for hated Specials. Of course, now that he'd seen her face, he remembered Tally as a friend, an ally against the gods of the city. He had no idea what her new lace of flash tattoos meant, no understanding that she had become one of the gods' feared enforcers.
"After you told me how much lay beyond the edge of the world, Young Blood, I began to wonder if the little men were afraid of anything."
"Afraid?"
"Yes. I tried many ways to scare them. Songs, spells. The skulls of bears."
"Um, they're not really men, Andrew. Just machines. They don't exactly get afraid."
His expression grew more serious. "But fire, Young Blood. I learned they fear fire."
"Fire?" Tally swallowed. "Um, Andrew, was this a really big fire, by any chance?"
His smile returned. "It burned many trees. When it was done, the little men had run away."
She groaned. "I think the little men were burned away, Andrew. So you're saying you started a forest fire?"
"Forest fire." He considered this for a moment. "Those are good words for it."
"Actually, Andrew, those are bad words. You're just lucky it's not summer, or that fire could've taken out your whole…world."
He smiled. "My world is bigger now, Young Blood."
"Yeah, but still…that wasn't what I had in mind."
Tally sighed. Her attempt to explain the real world to Andrew had resulted in massive destruction instead of enlightenment, and his fire had probably released several villages full of dangerous barbarians into the wild. There were Smokies and runaways and even campers from the city out here. "How long ago did you do this?"
"Twenty-seven days." He shook his head. "But the little men came back. New ones, who are not afraid of fire. I have been outside my old world ever since."
"But you've made some new friends, haven't you? City friends."
He looked at Tally suspiciously for a moment. He must have realized that if she'd seen him with the Crims, she had been following them. "Young Blood," he said cautiously. "By what fortune do we meet?"
Tally didn't answer right away. The concept of lies had hardly seemed to exist in Andrew's village, at least until Tally had explained the big lie they were all living in. But surely by now he was more wary of city people. She decided to choose her words carefully. "Those gods you just met, some of them are friends of mine."
"They are not gods, Tally. You taught me that."
"Right. Good for you, Andrew." She wondered what else he understood these days. He had grown more comfortable with the city's language, as if he'd been practicing a lot. "But how did you know they were coming? You didn't just run into them accidentally, did you?"
He looked at her warily for a moment, then shook his head. "No. They're running from the Sayshal, and I offered help. They are your friends?"
She chewed her lip. "One of them was … I mean, is…my boyfriend."
Comprehension spread across Andrew's face, and he let out a low chuckle. Reaching out one hand, he patted her shoulder roughly. "I see now. That's why you follow, making yourself as invisible as a Sayshal. A boyfriend."
Tally tried not to roll her eyes. If Andrew Simpson Smith wanted to think she was a jilted lover tagging along after the runaways, it was certainly simpler than explaining the truth. "So how did you know to meet them here?"
"After I found I could not go home, I set off to look for you, Young Blood."
"Me?" Tally asked.
"You were trying to get to the Rusty Ruins. You told me how far, and in what direction."
"And you made it there?"
Andrew's eyes widened as he nodded, a shiver passing through his frame. "A huge village, full of the dead."
"And met the Smokies there, didn't you?"<
br />
"The New Smoke Lives," he said gravely.
"Yeah, it sure does. And now you help runaways for them?"
"Not just me. The Smokies know how to fly above the little men. Others from my village have joined us. One day, we'll all be free."
"Well, that's great news," Tally said. The Smokies had really gone crazy now, letting a bunch of deadly savages out into the wild. Of course, the villagers would make useful allies. They knew woodcraft better than any city kids could ever hope to, probably even better than the oldest Smokies. They knew how to gather food on the trail and make clothes from natural materials, all the skills the cities had lost. And after generations of tribal warfare, they'd be experts in the art of ambush as well.
Andrew Simpson Smith had somehow sensed Tally overhead, even in her sneak suit. Instincts like that took a lifetime in the wilderness to hone.
"How did you help those runaways just now?"
He smiled proudly. "I gave them the way to the New Smoke."
"Great. Because, you see, I've sort of been out of the loop. And I was kind of hoping you'd help me out with that too."
He nodded. "Of course, Young Blood. Just speak the magic word."
Tally blinked. "A magic word? Andrew, it's me. I may not know any magic words, but I've been trying to get to the Smoke since you met me."
"True. But I've made a promise." He shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot. "What happened to you, Young Blood, after you left? When I reached the ruins, I told the Smokies how you had appeared to us. They said the city had taken you away again. Had done things to you." He gestured at her face. "Is that another fashion statement?"
Tally sighed, looking into his eyes. He was just a random, and a particularly random random at that, with his uneven teeth and spotty, never-washed skin. But for some reason, she didn't want to lie to Andrew Simpson Smith. For one thing, it seemed way too easy, tricking someone who couldn't even read, who'd spent all but the last few weeks of his life trapped in an experiment.
"Your heart is beating fast, Young Blood."
Tally's hand went to her face, which was no doubt spinning. Andrew hadn't forgotten how flash tattoos revealed excitement and distress. Maybe it was pointless to lie to him. Instincts that could detect someone in a sneak suit were not to be underestimated.
She decided to tell the truth. The part that was important to her, anyway.
"Let me show you something, Andrew," she said, peeling off her right glove. She held out her palm, the short-circuited flash tattoos sputtering in time with her heartbeat in the moonlight. "See those two scars? They're marks of my love … for Zane."
He stared at her hand wide-eyed, nodding slowly "I've never seen scars on your people before. Your skin is always…perfect."
"Yeah. We only have scars if we want to, so they always mean something. These mean that I love Zane. He's the one who looked unwell, kind of shaky? I need to follow him, to make sure he's okay out here."
Andrew nodded slowly. "And he's too proud to accept the help of a woman?"
Tally shrugged. The villagers were pretty much Stone Age about the whole gender thing, too. "Well, let's just say he doesn't exactly want my help right now."
"I was not too proud when you taught me about the world." He smiled. "Maybe I'm smarter than Zane."
"Maybe you are." She made a fist with her bare hand. The ridges of scarring across her palm still felt stiff. "I'm asking you to break your promise, Andrew, and tell me where they're headed. I think I can cure Zane of his shakes. And I'm worried about him being out here with a bunch of city kids. They don't understand the wild like you and I do."
He still stared at her hand, thinking hard. Then his eyes raised to meet hers. "Without you, I'd still be trapped inside a false world. I want to trust you, Young Blood."
Tally forced herself to smile. "So you'll tell me where the New Smoke is?"
"I don't know. It's too big a secret for me. But I can give you a way." He reached into a pouch at his belt and withdrew a handful of tiny chips.
"Position-finders," Tally said softly. "With a route programmed in?"
"Yes. This one brought me here to meet these young runaways. And this one will lead you to the New Smoke. Do you know how it works?" Andrew's calloused, grubby forefinger hovered over the boot button of one of the finders, and there was an eager look on his face.
"Yeah, no problem. I've used them before." Tally smiled back at him, reaching for the device.
He pulled it away. She looked up, hoping she wouldn't have to take it by force.
His fist stayed closed. "Do you still challenge the gods, Young Blood?"
Tally frowned. Andrew knew that she had changed, but how much?
"Answer me," he said, his eyes bright in the moonlight.
She took a moment before answering. Andrew Simpson Smith wasn't like the non-Specials in the city, the blank-eyed mass of uglies and pretties. Living in the wild had made him more like her: a hunter, a warrior, a survivor. With the scars of a dozen fights and accidents, he almost looked like a Cutter.
Somehow, Tally didn't see Andrew as wallpaper. Whether or not she could deceive him, she realized now that she didn't want to.
"Do I still challenge the gods?" Tally thought of what she and Shay had done the night before, breaking into the city's most guarded facility and practically destroying it in the process. They had set off on their own without telling Dr. Cable their true plans. And this whole journey was, for Tally at least, more about fixing Zane than winning the city's war against the Smoke.
The Cutters might be Specials, but over the last few days Tally Youngblood had reverted to her own nature: thoroughly Crim.
"Yes. I still challenge them," she said softly, realizing that it was true.
"Good." He grinned, relieved, and handed her the position-finder. "Go then, follow your boyfriend. And tell the New Smoke that Andrew Simpson Smith was very helpful."
Split
As Tally made her way back down the river, she held the position-finder tightly in her scarred hand, thinking hard.
Once she told Shay about her encounter with Andrew Simpson Smith, the plan would change. With the finder the two of them could fly ahead of the slow-moving runaways, reaching the New Smoke long before Zane and his crew. By the time the Crims arrived, their destination would be a Special Circumstances encampment, full of imprisoned Smokies and recaptured runaways. Showing up after the rebellion had already been crushed wouldn't make Zane look very bubbly.
Worse, he'd be out here on his own for the rest of the trip, with only his Crim friends to help if something went seriously wrong. One bad fall from his hoverboard and Zane might not survive to see the New Smoke at all.
But how much would Shay care about all that? What she really wanted was to find the New Smoke, save Fausto, and get her revenge on David and the rest of them. Babysitting Zane wasn't her idea of an important mission goal.
Tally slowed to a stop, suddenly wishing she hadn't run into Andrew Simpson Smith at all.
Of course, Shay didn't know about the position-finder yet. Maybe she didn't need to know. If they stuck with the original plan, tracking the Crims the old-fashioned way, Tally could save the finder as a backup in case they lost the trail…
She opened her hand, looking down at the finder and at her scars, wishing for some of the clarity she'd felt the night before. She thought of drawing her knife, but remembered the expression on Zane's face as he stared at her scars.
It wasn't that she needed to cut herself, after all.
Tally closed her eyes, willing herself to think clearly.
Back in ugly days, Tally had always wimped out on decisions like this one. She'd always avoided any confrontation. That's how she'd wound up betraying the Old Smoke by accident, too afraid to tell anyone about the tracker she carried. And how she'd lost David, by never telling him she'd been a spy.
Lying to Shay now was what the old Tally would have done.
She took a deep breath. She was special now; she had clar
ity and strength. This time, she would tell Shay the truth.
Closing her fist, Tally urged her board forward again.
Ten kilometers upriver, her skintenna pinged as it picked up Shay's.
"I was getting worried about you, Tally-wa."
"Sorry, Boss. I ran into an old friend."
"Really? Anyone I know?"
"You never met him. Remember my campfire stories about the Restricted Experimental Area? The Smokies have started freeing the villagers and training them to help with runaways."
"That's crazy!" Shay paused. "But wait a second. You knew him? He was from the same village you stumbled into?"
"Yeah, and I'm afraid it's no coincidence, Shay-la. It's the holy man who helped me, remember? I told him where the Rusty Ruins were. He was the first to escape, and he's an honorary Smokey now."
Shay whistled in amazement. "Very random, Tally. So how was he supposed to help the Crims? Teach them to skin rabbits?"
"He's sort of a guide. Runaways give him a code word, and he gives them position-finders that lead you to the Smoke." She took a deep breath. "And for old times' sake, he gave me one too."
By the time Tally caught up with Shay, the Crims had made camp.
Tally watched from the darkness as one by one they made their way to the river's edge, dipping their purifiers into the silty water. She and Shay had hidden themselves downwind, and smells of self-heating food packs drifted from the runaways' camp. Tally vividly remembered all the tastes and textures from her own days in the wild, catching the scents of CurryNoods, PadThai, and the hated SpagBol on the breeze. Her ears picked up snatches of the Crims' still-excited chatter as they prepared to sleep the 'day' away.
"They did a good job on this thing—it won't tell me the final destination." Shay was playing with the position-finder. "It only gives you one waypoint at a time; it waits till you get there to give you the next one. We'll have to follow the whole path to find out where it ends." She snorted. "It'll probably take us the scenic route." Tally cleared her throat. "It won't be us, Shay-la." Shay looked up. "What's that, Tally?"
Specials u-3 Page 11
