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“What the—I mean, what was that, man?” Edilio demanded.
“Ask Astrid,” Sam snapped.
Astrid handed Little Pete his Game Boy and pulled him gently to his feet. She kept her eyes down, unwilling to meet Sam’s accusing glare. “I don’t know what it is. It’s some kind of waking nightmare, maybe.” There was a distinct note of desperation to her voice.
“The doll, the thing, whatever it was,” Sam said. “It was fighting Pete, and Pete was figh
ting back. Like it was trying to come to life.”
“Yes,” Astrid whispered.
Edilio was the only other person who knew Little Pete’s history. It had been Edilio who had retrieved the videotape from the power plant that showed the moment of the nuclear meltdown when a panicked, uncomprehending Little Pete, there with his father, had reacted by creating the FAYZ.
Edilio asked the question that was on Sam’s mind. “Something was fighting Little Pete?” Edilio asked, “Man, who or what has the power to take on Little Pete?”
“We don’t talk about this with anyone else,” Sam said firmly. “Someone asks you about it, you just say it must have been some kind of…”
“Some kind of what?” Edilio asked.
“Optical illusion,” Astrid supplied.
“Yeah, that’ll work,” Edilio said sarcastically. Then he shrugged. “Kids got other things to worry about. Hungry people don’t waste much time on questions.”
If others learned of Little Pete’s guilt…and his power…he would never be safe. Caine would do anything it took to capture if not kill the strange little boy.
“Edilio, put everyone on one bus. Take a couple of your guys and start driving down residential streets. Go door to door. Round up as many kids as you can. Pack the bus, then take them to pick some melons or whatever.”
Edilio looked dubious but said, “Okay, Mr. Mayor.”
“Astrid. You come with me.” Sam stalked off with Astrid and Little Pete trailing.
“Hey, don’t start getting all high and mighty with me,” Astrid yelled at his back.
“I’d just appreciate it if you’d let me know when some new weirdness breaks out. That’s all.” Sam kept moving, but Astrid grabbed his arm. He stopped, glancing around guiltily to make sure no one was in eavesdropping distance.
“What was I supposed to tell you?” Astrid demanded in a terse whisper. “Little Pete’s hallucinating? He’s floating off the ground? What were you going to do about it?”
He held up his hands in a placating gesture. But his voice was no less angry. “I’m just trying to keep up, you know? It’s like I’m playing a game where the rules keep changing. So today’s rules are, hey, killer worms and hallucinating five-year-olds. I can’t do anything about it, but it’s nice to get a heads up.”
Astrid started to say something, but stopped herself. She took a couple of calming breaths. Then, in a more measured tone, she said, “Sam, I figured you had enough on your shoulders. I’m worried about you.”
He dropped his hands to his sides. His voice dropped as well. “I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not,” Astrid said. “You don’t sleep. You never have a minute to yourself. You act like everything that goes wrong is your fault. You’re worried.”
“Yeah, I’m worried,” he said. “Last night we had a kid who killed and ate a cat. The whole time he’s telling me about it he’s weeping. He’s sobbing. He used to have a cat himself. He likes cats. But he was so hungry, he grabbed it and…”
Sam had to stop. He bit his lip and tried to shake off the despair that swept over him. “Astrid, we’re losing. We’re losing. Everyone is…” He looked at her and felt tears threaten. “How long before we have kids doing worse than killing cats?”
When Astrid didn’t answer, Sam said, “Yeah, so I’m worried. You look around the plaza here. Two weeks from now? Two weeks from now it’s Darfur, or whatever, if we don’t figure something out. Three weeks from now? I don’t want to think about it.”
He started toward his office but plowed into two kids absorbed in yelling at each other. They were brothers, Alton and Dalton. It was clear they’d been fighting for a while.
Under normal circumstances it might not have been a big deal—fights were breaking out all the time—but both boys had submachine guns hanging from their shoulders. Sam lived in fear of one of Edilio’s soldiers doing something stupid with the guns they carried. Ten-, eleven-, twelve-year-old kids with guns weren’t exactly the U.S. Army.
“What now?” Sam snapped at them.
Dalton stabbed an accusing finger at his brother. “He stole my Junior Mints.”
