Unnaturals #2 Page 7

  “Stay calm,” Castor said, though inside, he was panicking. “Samken, try to hold your breath in. Enza, help me push.”

  Jazlyn peered at them through Samken’s legs. “I’ll pull from the front, too,” she said. “Sammy, hold on to me tight with your trunks.”

  Bracing their shoulders against Samken’s backside, Castor and Enza heaved and huffed, and Jazlyn pulled and tugged, but no matter how hard they tried, Samken was wedged tight.

  “I’m sorry.” They heard Samken’s muffled voice say from the other side. “This is all my fault.” They could feel the tremors as he began to weep.

  Eventually, Castor was panting so hard they had to stop. He slid down onto the floor, feeling the damp dirt cold on his belly. He laid his head on his paws. How long until the humans find them? he wondered. How long until they are back behind bars?

  Enza stood over him, her great bear head cocked in disbelief. “What are you doing?” she demanded.

  Castor just stared at the ground. Wasn’t it obvious? Giving up.

  “Unbelievable,” Enza said in disgust. “I almost died once, remember?”

  How could Castor forget? Enza had been following his advice, trying to be brave, but she was no match for Laringo’s scorpion stinger and slashing claws in the arena. It had been a devastating blow to the team.

  “And you had the nerve to come visit me,” she continued. “To tell me that I’d get better, that we would escape, that the next open door we saw, we’d jump through together.”

  “You did,” Castor said dully. “And we did. And look where it got us.”

  “No,” Enza snapped. “There was no open door. Because there’s almost never just a door left wide open for you to walk through. Moss kicked down that light post and made a door, and that’s the only reason we got away.”

  “So what?” Castor asked. “We make a door?”

  “We make a door.”

  Enza stood up on her hind legs, rising to her full height, and pressed her paws against the rounded wall near Samken. Tilting her head, she set the sharp points of her saber teeth on the ceiling. As she began to scratch with her teeth, Castor watched the ceiling start to crumble. Samken shifted his weight, and a little more gave way.

  Still, it was only a little bit. Castor couldn’t imagine enough of the ceiling opening up to get all of them out of here. “Enza, are you crazy? That’s going to take forever.”

  “Yeah, by myself. But not if we work together. Boy, freedom sure has made you lazy.”

  17

  INSTEAD OF BEING PUNISHED, LEESA, A DRAINO CRIMINAL, was being pampered. Somehow, she had ended up staying in the fanciest Sky Tower of them all, on a bed that felt like a cloud, in a room that smelled like coconuts and chocolate. Francine’s room.

  When they hadn’t reached her mom at the factory and it was past eight, Leesa knew that she must be asleep in the apartment. Her mom only slept a few hours a night between her jobs, but when she slept, it was a heavy sleep.

  “Just go bang on the apartment door,” Leesa told them, but since the mayor’s men had no intention of going into the Drain, Leesa was stuck here for the night.

  She figured they’d stick her in a jail cell or something, considering the trouble she was in, but instead, a plump woman cut the zip ties from Leesa’s wrists, gave her a pair of pajamas, and led her to a room entirely decked out in bubblegum pink.

  Not really Leesa’s style, but Francine didn’t seem to be around. Neither did the tiger Leesa had seen in the hologram, or the lizard—though an amphibian tank did sit empty across the room. It creeped Leesa out, but it had been a long day, and it didn’t stop her from falling right to sleep.

  Leesa woke, disoriented, as a voice announced through a speaker in the wall that her mother was here, and that she was to report to the mayor’s office. Leesa scrambled out of bed, and pulled on her combat boots and shirt, which still had the musky smell of the Unnaturals Dome on them. She couldn’t wait to get home and change.

  But just as she was about to leave, Leesa spotted a bookcase overflowing with books—real, old-fashioned books—and she couldn’t resist grabbing one. This sky girl had everything. She’d never miss it. Leesa shoved the book in the pocket of her black hooded sweatshirt, and went to find her mom.

  When she opened the door to the office, her mom was there, but she looked nervous, and as soon as Leesa stepped in, the flashbulbs went off. The mayor had a big announcement, and she wanted Leesa to be a part of it.

  “Thank you for showing me it was time for a change,” Mayor Eris said to Leesa under her breath. Then she turned to the screens of reporters and told them, “This is Leesa. Our hero!”

  The mayor’s smile was as white and pristine as everything else in her office, but something about it was unsettling. Like the way her skin seemed a little too tight and her eyes never seemed to close fully when she blinked. To Leesa, she looked like a doll—manufactured.

  “Things have gone on too long as they were,” she declared, gripping Leesa around the shoulders. “It’s time for a new era.”

  18

  THE CITY SPEAK CLICKED ON AND ANNOUNCED THAT A mandatory press conference would interrupt normal programming.

  Marcus and his parents sat on the couch and looked out the window wall of their living room. The Sky Towers around them were still flashing all different images on each one of their glass windows—ads and warnings and news clips and reruns of old Unnaturals matches. Then, all at once, every screen went black. When they clicked back on, they all showed the same image: Mayor Eris, streaming live from her office, where Marcus had sat less than a day ago.

  “What happened yesterday at the Unnaturals Dome was a tragedy,” the mayor’s one thousand mouths said together.

  Mayor Eris’s voice came out of speakers in their wall, so it sounded like she was right there with them. Her tone was a lot different yesterday. More people must have seen Joni’s broadcast than he’d thought.

  “During a security oversight, four mutant animals managed to evade their handlers. In the ensuing chaos, we regret that people were injured. Two women were trampled by other members of the audience, resulting in a punctured lung and a sprained arm. One man suffered a heart attack. And several staff members who were trying to get control of the animals were attacked while doing their jobs. Unfortunately, the mutants were able to escape and are still at large.”

  Marcus wanted to cheer and pump his fists in the air, but his mom and Bruce were somber, putting a real damper on the situation. He wondered how other people were reacting behind all those Sky Tower windows. He knew at least one person in Lion’s Head would be happy, and he wished he could be celebrating with Leesa right now instead of trapped in this stifling room with his parents.

  Right then, Leesa’s face flashed on the screen.

  “Thankfully, with inside knowledge of a corrupt employee, this young lady took action and risked her own life to prevent a real tragedy. For that act of valor, Lion’s Head owes her a great debt.”

  Why is Leesa getting all the credit? Marcus thought sourly. They had planned this together from the beginning.

  “Still,” continued Mayor Eris, “this was a devastating turn of events for Mega Media, a company that has always strived to provide the best entertainment value,” Mayor Eris continued. “As part-owner of the company, I am confident in Mega Media’s safety standards and protocol. However, as mayor of Lion’s Head, it has been my stated mission from the start to protect its citizens. In my three terms served, we have tripled the thickness of UV glass on new towers, eliminated produce and with it many food-borne diseases, and reduced sky crime by nearly 80 percent.”

  The mayor paused here to stare out meaningfully at all the people watching from their homes.

  “I want to remind citizens that the escaped animals are very dangerous and should be treated with extreme caution. We are already developing technology to quickly apprehend them, but Mega Media takes responsibility for creating something that is a demonstrated risk to the citi
zens of Lion’s Head. After careful consideration, we have decided that this will be the Unnaturals’ final season.”

  Marcus actually gasped. “Did she just say what I think she said?” This was beyond what he had dared to hope for.

  No one else had expected it, either. His mom’s mouth hung open, and Bruce was leaning far forward, clasping his hands between his knees. Watching his stepdad hanging on the mayor’s words—words he had inspired—Marcus couldn’t help smirking a little.

  They were canceling the Unnaturals? Completely?

  “NuFormz will discontinue its mutant gladiator program to focus on research that can more directly benefit the needs of the community long-term. Thank you.”

  The screens went black again, but as soon as they came back on, the feeds were already full of commentators volleying questions and Moniac fans threatening to riot. It was clear that not everyone was happy with this decision.

  Marcus, however, was elated. “I guess this means you’re out of the job then, huh, Bruce?” he asked.

  “Marcus.” His mom gave him a look that said he should stop talking if he knew what was good for him.

  Bruce pinched the bridge of his nose and rubbed his eyes. He didn’t say anything for a long time, and Marcus actually felt a little guilty. Only for a second, though, because when Bruce did speak, he was the same condescending jerk as always.

  “I wish the world really was as simple as you think it is, Marcus. First the Unnaturals reality show is your favorite thing in the world, then it’s the worst thing that ever happened in Lion’s Head. First the mayor is your number one enemy, and now I am. . . .”

  “No,” Marcus answered coolly. “You’ve always been at the top of my list, Bruce.”

  Bruce blinked at him. “You really think I orchestrated this whole thing, don’t you?” He shook his head in disbelief, but Marcus didn’t budge. “Let me ask you something, kiddo. Who do you think has been profiting from the matches all these years? Because I’m certainly not rich. And what do you think is going to happen to those animals now—the ones you saved? Who do you think is going to have to clean up your little mess?”

  Marcus tuned out Bruce’s words. All that mattered was that the mess was over . . . right?

  19

  AFTER THE MAYOR’S BIG ANNOUNCEMENT, LEESA FELT LIKE her insides were all tangled up. She was relieved, of course. This was what she’d wanted for years, what she’d tried so hard to make happen. The Unnaturals games were finally over, and now no more animals would have to go through what her beloved pet Chihuahua-turned-mutant-spider had.

  But the way the mayor had spun the story made Leesa feel queasy. She had acted like the animals were evil or something. Like Leesa knew things she didn’t. Like Marcus hadn’t been part of it at all.

  It was still a huge win; even her mom said so. Oh, Leesa’s mom had been plenty angry with her—she wasn’t cool with anything that could jeopardize Leesa’s future chances of success, and doing something that put lots of people in danger and caused major damage to property definitely fell in that category—but that didn’t mean she wasn’t still proud of her daughter.

  One of the mayor’s goons had escorted them all the way home from the mayor’s office, which took forever and was super embarrassing. Even after they took the elevator down almost eight hundred flights, they were far from home. The mayor’s Skyrise was right on the river on the west side of Lion’s Head, and while the Drain sprawled under the entire city, under the river, and all the way to the Greenplains, the only entrance to the underground neighborhood was on the southeastern tip, right on the border of the trash mountains.

  Leesa and her mom traveled across Lion’s Head using the covered footbridges connecting all the buildings. The whole time, the security guy was right behind them with his baton, acting like they were the scary animals, about to attack, but Leesa’s mom held up her head the whole time. They had to go outside to access one of the stairwells that would take them down into the tunnels, and they could see the press conference already airing reruns for anyone who had missed it.

  Even though they’d been at the live feed, they stopped to watch, anyway, and Leesa’s mom put her arm around Leesa’s shoulders. They stood on the top step of the Drain, so small next to the buildings, and faced the infinite faces of the mayor. Her eyes reflected like that, over and over across multiple buildings, made it seem like she was watching them from everywhere, but at least they couldn’t hear her voice—everyone else was listening to the sound inside their homes. The lies were silent this time. Eris’s words couldn’t touch them.

  When they got to the underground, everyone was talking about it, of course. Unlike the sky city, where people stayed locked up inside by themselves, the underground neighborhood was buzzing with chatter and life.

  No one seemed happy. They didn’t care about the entertainment—only sky people could actually afford fancy things like warp screens for a virtual reality show—but they cared about the money. Gambling. Food carts. Rewards for scouting new animals. Or low-level work at NuFormz itself. It was already pretty hard to survive in the Drain, and thanks to Leesa, half the economy had just collapsed.

  They hated her.

  “Come on,” Leesa’s mom whispered, pulling Leesa close to her. There were jeers as they wove through the main underground cavity where the population was most dense, but when they splintered off into the side tunnel that led to their section of an old subway car, people left them alone.

  Safely inside their apartment, Leesa expected the feeling of victory to really set in. Regardless of what anyone else wanted, she knew she had done what was right! She had changed things, really changed things for the better.

  Only . . .

  Here, inside their cramped apartment, it didn’t feel like anything had changed. She was still poor, and her dad was still gone, and Pookie was still dead. Instead of some explosion of happiness filling her up, mostly, Leesa just felt kind of empty.

  It seemed like a hundred years had gone by since she’d stepped aboveground to meet Marcus on the bridge and come up with a plan to free the animals. She had seen how big the sky was, and how high the towers. She had seen how the rich lived, with their windows and their space. She had met the mayor. But that wasn’t her life.

  “I have to go back to work,” her mom said.

  Leesa nodded and slumped down onto their shared sofa bed. “I know.”

  Her mom was always working—that hadn’t changed, either. After running errands for rich sky snobs during the day, she had the night shift at one of the synthi factories. Even without the added debt from the damages in the Dome, would they ever have enough money to get out of the Drain?

  “I’m so sorry, Mom,” Leesa said. Despite helping the animals like she’d always dreamed, there was still so much wrong in the world. Leesa felt like crying.

  “Oh, lovebug.” Her mom bent down to give Leesa a hug. “No matter what, I’m proud of you. You know that, right? You know your heart, Leesa,” her mom said. “That’s all I could ever ask for.”

  Once her mom left, Leesa was restless. She wished she was back at street level for just a minute, so she could see what the talking heads were saying. Every major news outlet was sure to be streaming onto the buildings. She wondered if there had been any information about the escaped animals, or about what would happen to all the other mutants on the island at NuFormz.

  She picked up her ratty old tablet. It was too outdated to mindscroll like Marcus’s simulink, but it could still access the main news sources.

  Leesa saw that irrational fear had taken hold of Lion’s Head. A lot of the citizens had assumed the mutants were just virtual or robotics, but now that the mayor had said they were real, violent animals, people were freaking out. A lot of the headlines speculated about the mayor’s suggestion of a corrupt employee, and she wondered about what Joni had said about a serum, but there wasn’t any more information.

  She tried to text Marcus to see what he knew, but his name wasn’t lit on her scr
een. Leesa assumed he was grounded from simulink—his stepdad seemed pretty strict.

  Leesa took the stolen book from her pocket. It had a girl on the cover, holding a strange glass circle thing on a stick. The text said her name was Nancy Drew. Leesa loved reading—it was the only thing that kept her going back to school—but books were pretty rare in the Drain. Of course a sky girl would have a whole shelfful.

  When Leesa opened the book, she was struck by the writing on the inside. It was weird to see the script, because Leesa had never really learned to write using a pen—they were so outdated.

  To Francine, the note read. I hope this brings you comfort as you go through this. Reading is a wonderful escape throughout the trials of our lives. Even if we cannot get out of bed, adventure can come to us! Be well, Ms. Hoiles.

  Leesa started. Ms. Hoiles was Leesa’s teacher, who had first introduced her to books. Ms. Hoiles knew the mayor’s daughter, Francine, too?

  The wheels in Leesa’s mind were already turning. Francine loved animals, and the mayor had said she’d do anything for Francine. Maybe if Leesa could get to Francine, together they could turn around the treatment of the mutants and really make a change. And now she had a connection!

  20

  FIRST, SUCCESS HAD ONLY LOOKED LIKE A TINY CIRCLE OF light. But Samken kept pummeling the walls, and Enza kept scratching at the stone, and Castor kept digging around the pipes, and finally, Jazlyn gave the ceiling a good, strong kick—and the circle widened into an exit as the pavement above them collapsed in.

  “Wow,” Castor heard his friends saying as they climbed up. “Unbelievable.”

  The eagle-dog had been the last to jump into the hole in the middle of the arena, and now he was the last to step out of the hole in the street. He swayed a little on his four legs. Castor was the only one of the group who had ever been outside before—really outside, not in an enclosed zoo or a temperature-controlled aquarium—yet he was more overwhelmed than anyone by the sight of the city.