So Yesterday - By Scott Westerfeld Page 0,64

head. "And I thought you kids were so damn clever.

"It's my fault," Jen said.

"Not any more than mine," I protested.

Jen's knuckles turned white on the wheel as she grimly followed Flushing Avenue. "I was the one who told Hillary what we were doing."

"That was just to get her to help," I said. "You didn't plan on telling her what we found out, did you?"

"Of course not. But it was me who spilled the beans. It didn't even occur to me that Hillary might be playing us."

"Take this left," Wickersham said. "And shut up a second."I

She made a call, speaking quickly and softly into a cell phone, guiding Jen with gestures. I wondered what was being arranged for us at the other end of this trip now that we were in disgrace.

But part of me felt at peace: finally we had answers. Things had fallen into place, not far from our theories and paka-paka revelations: renegade cool hunters, a charismatic Innovator, a movement that wanted to rock the world. Maybe Jen and I really did know the territory.

It was nice to discover that sometimes the useless facts in my brain had some relevance, that my fantasy world matched up, at least occasionally, with the real one. That all my time spent reading the signals around me hadn't been completely wasted.

Maybe the signs had been around even before Mandy disappeared, as obvious as the stones in the street. People pushing back from being force-fed, ready to rebel; maybe Innovators only channel something that's already there. Maybe the Jammers had to happen.

And whatever else went down, at least Mandy was okay.

I leaned back and closed my eyes, exhausted. There was nothing more to do but wait for the car to get where it was going.

"That way. ' Mwadi Wickersham flicked her phone closed.

Jen turned, easing us down an alley, the sides of the car scraping stacks of garbage bags. We pulled into a bare courtyard, surrounded on every side by derelict buildings, their black windows watching us like empty eyes. A rental truck was already there, the one we'd spotted on Lispenard Street the day before.

Two figures were tossing shoe boxes from it into an unruly pile. My eyes caught the flicker of reflective panels as shoes tumbled out onto the dirt.

A third person stood next to the growing pile.

She was pouring gasoline onto it.

"No," I whispered.

The limo came to a crunching halt, a bottle popping under one tire. Mwadi leapt out, her wheels gliding across the rubbish-strewn courtyard like it was a hardwood rink.

Jen and I ran to the edge of the pile.

"What are you doing?"

"Getting rid of these, as per our agreement with the client," Wickersham said. "They'll get the prototypes and the specs. The last thing they want is the originals showing up on the street."

"You're burning them?" I cried. "They should be in a museum!"

She nodded sadly. "You got that right. But thanks to you two, our security's been compromised. We got to do this quick and dirty."

A match went down onto the pile, and the smell of burning gasoline rushed at us.

"No!" I cried.

Then a wave of heat forced us back, fire spreading across the pile like the sweep of a hand. Shoe-box lids popped off, carried up by the superheated air, revealing beautiful forms inside. The elegant lines warped and twisted, reflective panels glittering for a few seconds in the blaze before they blackened. The smell of burning plastic and canvas followed, forcing acid tears from my eyes.

Jen tried to shout something but only managed to cough into a clenched fist.

The pyre turned greedy, sucking the air around us into itself. Bits of paper rolled past my feet, drawn toward the blaze by the column of smoke climbing out of the courtyard. Sickeningly, I realized that the thick, black cloud overhead was the shoes, transmuted from something beautiful and original into shapeless smoke. I was breathing the dream shoes into my lungs, choking on them.

Mwadi Wickersham shouted orders into her cell phone as the last few boxes were thrown onto the fire before my eyes. I was forced back farther by the heat, helpless to prevent the conflagration. The shoes were going, going... gone.
Chapter 33~34
Chapter 33

THEY LEFT US THERE.

"Wish we could work together, but you two are a risky proposition," Mwadi said, pulling herself up into the open maw of the truck.

"We didn't mean to lead them to you." Jen's face was blackened by smoke, streaked by tears. "We were just playing them for information."

"They wound up