Jay Budgett: The Indigo Thief

A lantern pressed up against a window, lighting the compartment with a green glow. There was now only a foot of air between the end of the compartment and us. Not much time at all.

A guard equipped with a ReBreather motioned to us through the window. A shadow passed and his lantern flickered.

Gone.

His lantern floated away. Blood drifted through the water like leaves on a breeze.

The water in the compartment continued to rise.

Charlie gulped breaths. “What’s happening out there? Are the nets back on? Did they get rid of the megalodons?”

An explosion threw us downward, hard, into the water, pushing us all the way to other end of the compartment. There was no air. Hardly any light. Just enough to see that the subway car had broken apart around us.

There must have been another bomb onboard. My body ached from the force of the explosion. My lungs screamed for air—I hadn’t taken a last breath.

Charlie.

Where was Charlie?

A green glow—a lantern floating nearby. I snapped my eyes open and ignored the burn of salt water. A shadow swam past me, hurrying away from the sinking rubble.

It might be Charlie. I kicked hard and grabbed the shadow’s foot. The shadow turned, startled, and the lantern’s green glow caught the waves of curls that danced around her head.

The girl from the screen. The one I’d seen on the subway. The one responsible for all this.

The Lost Boy.

Mila Vachowski.

She slammed her heel against my nose. I fought back tears and held on.

Lanterns filled the water around us with blinding bursts of green and white light. Guards sped in our direction. Mila slapped a button on her body suit. Fins dropped from the fabric, covering her feet in silicon flippers.

I tightened my grip on her ankle. I couldn’t let her get away. Not after what she’d done. I glanced around me. The megalodons were gone, disappearing as quickly as they’d come; Charlie and Sandra were nowhere to be seen. The sea around me was empty now, save for the guards and the corpses.

Mila kicked hard and swam through the water. I struggled to hold her ankle. Despite her fins, the guards gained on her, rising with the help of jets. They circled us, and the water bubbled as they fired projectiles at her. At both of us.

They must have thought I was a Lost Boy—a terrorist. That I was partially responsible for killing all these people. And there was no one to tell them differently. No one to explain what I was doing. That I was trying to be a hero, not a villain.

Mila dodged the guards’ shots left and right. Bullets couldn’t be used underwater, I realized, so they were firing darts instead. Something pricked my left leg. A burning sensation rose up my calf.

I’d been shot. My leg was going numb. The lack of sensation rose as Mila swam. Soon I couldn’t feel my left leg at all. Then neither of my legs. Eventually, nothing below the waist.

But I couldn’t let go. If I let go, the guards would swarm me.

The lanterns continued to rise with us. One of them lit up two shadows hanging motionlessly in the water. Another revealed blond hair and chopsticks shoved into a messy bun.

Charlie. Blood floated around her head.

At last I released Mila’s ankle, and she swam away. The numbness ran faster up my spine. I paddled toward Charlie, willing my arms to move, to compensate for my numb, worthless legs.

I knew Charlie couldn’t hold her breath like I could—she wasn’t a free diver—and by now, even my lungs were burning. Best-case scenario, she was unconscious. I didn’t want to think about the other scenarios.

The lanterns’ light and the guards followed me. They’d already hit me once. They knew I was the weaker of the two. And now they swiveled their darts toward their single target—me. Bubbles burst by my ears as darts sailed past.

Charlie was an arm’s length away. I tried to stretch out a hand, but my shoulders locked up, numb. My lungs screamed for air.

I threw my head to the side and swung a hand forward with the momentum. The tips of my fingers were inches from Charlie’s.

A dart plunged into the hand stretched toward Charlie. Euphoria filled me. Intense warmth radiated from where the new dart struck. Uncle Lou had told me this happened when a Dummy Dart’s serum recalibrated your brain. He said amnesia followed.

And then there was darkness.

My eyes burned as they snapped open. The world was blurry. Dark. Cold. Wet?

I fought to remember where I was, and how I’d gotten here, but knew nothing.

Nothing.

Panic crept into the corners of my heart. I gasped involuntarily as my lungs demanded oxygen. Water rushed in instead. White spots floated in my vision.

I was drowning. A green light glowed overhead. I tried to kick, but my legs were numb. My lungs sucked in another breath. Consciousness danced around my head, like the faint memory of black curls and blood.

I stared ahead and saw blond locks floating in the water.

Charlie.

Then blackness again, followed by the slow creep of death.

I woke in a dark room, with concrete walls and no doors or windows. Prison?

A bouquet of red hibiscuses sat in the corner. Not prison. I shut my eyes, and saw a subway’s flashing red lights.

“ This is only a drill .”

The Tube had cracked in half. Megalodons had swarmed. Federal guards had tried to kill me. Charlie had floated motionless in the water.

Where was she now?

I glanced down. I was wearing a white cotton shirt that stretched to my knees. My cargo shorts from the Tube were missing. Dad’s cheeseburger socks were gone, too.

I slid from the cot I’d been lying in and felt the tingle of cold concrete floor on the balls of my feet. My legs had gone numb, I remembered that, but now I felt them. The dart’s paralysis had only been temporary. I did a little dance in the room’s corner.

A red dot stained my forearm. I remembered the Dummy Dart, and the euphoria that had ensued. It had been a small dose, but I still remembered water flooding my lungs. Even small doses could prove deadly underwater.

The Dummy Dart’s serum could stun, drown, and kill a person by making them forget they were underwater and causing them to breathe. Apparently the dose they gave me wasn’t enough to make me forget much else. The Feds had thought I was a Lost Boy, so they probably wanted me to remember everything. I guess I was lucky.

A latch in the ceiling creaked open, and a ladder was lowered into the room, followed by a plump woman in her late twenties. Her hair was short, brown, and curly, and her red cheeks were chubby like a chipmunk’s. She wore a sundress covered in painted hibiscuses. It matched the vase of flowers.

“Ooh! You’re awake!” She clapped her hands excitedly. “So lovely to finally make your acquaintance. We’ve been waiting nearly a week.” She offered me her hand. “I’m Kindred,” she said, “Kindred Deer. Like the animals that used to live in the forests.”

I hesitantly shook only the tips of her fingers. She didn’t seem to mind my reluctance.

I wanted to ask her a hundred questions. Where was I? Where was Charlie? Was Kindred an enemy or a friend? Was she with the Feds? I’d heard the Federation had odd ways of dealing with criminals. People who’d effectively wasted Indigo vaccines by squandering their lives. I couldn’t imagine what they did to terrorists.

I patted my head and felt my black hair tangled in knots. I settled for the first question on my mind. “Where am I?” I asked.

Kindred raised a hand to her face like a caricature and giggled. “Silly me,” she said. “Silly Kindred. Let me be the first to welcome you to Texas.” She skipped around the room and wiggled her hands above her head like a cheerleader.