Hawk - James Patterson Page 0,60

of the Dead,” Nudge said simply. “To a canyon city, outside of these tall walls.”

“There’s nothing out there!” I said sharply. “Only desert! I know! I’ve flown out there and seen it!”

“Maybe you didn’t go far enough,” Nudge said calmly. “It’s pretty well hidden.”

My back pressed against the dirty building wall, my hands clenching and unclenching.

“What’s the matter, sweetie?” Nudge asked me in surprise. “It’s a good place—we know the people who run it.”

“There’s nothing out there,” I insisted. This was just like when I was five. I thought I’d had a family and they were going to leave me again. Last time they’d left and not come back; this time they were lying to me, telling me they were going someplace that definitely doesn’t exist.

“No, it’s there,” Gazzy said firmly. “So everybody, get on your horses!”

“What’s a horses?” Calypso asked, her fevered brain latching on to that one word.

“They’re made-up animals,” I said shortly. “They’re not real; just in books.”

Calypso nodded.

Gazzy wrinkled his brow as if he wanted to say something but changed his mind and looked away.

“Fang!” Nudge called. “Let’s go!”

My breath was coming fast, as if I’d just run up ten flights of stairs. They’d gotten us this far. They’d said I was one of them. They’d helped all of us. But I knew this city, knew it inside out and knew the places beyond it. Knew there was nothing.

“Hawk?” Gazzy said.

My forehead was damp with sweat, and I bet I looked as white as Clete did.

Shaking my head, I said, “I can’t do it. I can’t leave the City of the Dead.”

CHAPTER 58

Max

My life totally sucks, I mused as the prisoners below chanted my name. Some of them were rooting for me, some of them against. All they knew was that I was providing some entertainment. McCallum was on every vidscreen, sometimes talking to me, sometimes shouting, sometimes coaxing. I still had a death grip on the doctor and had tuned out his pleas, threats, and wiggling.

Then the glitch happened, the glitch that would change the course of my life.

My left-hand fingers were turning white from holding on to the bars of the ceiling cage, so I quickly shifted the doctor (he shrieked) and clamped my right hand around a bar.

McCallum’s broad, fleshy face blurred and pixelated for a second, and then yours truly was on all the screens in the prison. Someone was talking: “For those of you just joining us, we’re watching as longtime freedom fighter Maximum Ride leads her captors on a less-than-merry chase. It’s been some hours now.”

My mouth dropped open and I almost lost hold of the doctor. Down below, everyone was silent, in shock. I mean, my face was on the screens! I tore my eyes away to look for the camera. The screens showed me doing that! Quickly I judged the angle of the camera—it was practically eye level with me! But where was it? I have good eyesight, an eagle’s eyesight, so let’s say good, and I didn’t see any camera or lens or anything up there.

I looked back at the screen, which was a close-up of me and the doctor. Was this being broadcast to the world? To one country? To one city? Was someone somewhere learning about what had happened to me for the first time in years? And wow, I… I… really looked like shit. Yeah, world, finally see my face right now when I look the absolute worst! This was great timing!

“How will this end?” the female voice went on. “No one knows! But we’ll bring updates as we get them!” The screen crackled and McCallum was back. I mean his back was to his constant camera and he was waving his arms and screaming as several people ran around like kids playing freeze tag.

It wasn’t what we were used to seeing. McCallum was always calm, always in control… always facing you, always watching. But not right then—he didn’t seem like he was calm, or controlled, and for once I had been the one watching him.

The screen went black again just as an extra-long, extra-bad Voxvoce dropped everyone to their knees. The doctor tried to curl up, moaning, his hands over his ears. I decided it was a good time to let go and was down before anyone realized it, dropping the doctor on the ground and immediately flying back up to perch on one of the courtyard’s tall walls.

Then McCallum said, “Okay, people!” He was smiling wide on every vidscreen, but his smile