Hawk - James Patterson Page 0,88

ultralight, first walking fast and finally running, as if he couldn’t breathe the same air as me for one more minute.

CHAPTER 87

“I can’t,” Clete said. “It’s bedtime.” He looked at his watch anxiously.

I’d found him in one of the meeting rooms when I returned from seeing Pietro. A couple of Tetra’s leaders were with him: Bimi, a small woman who always looked like she could use a trip to the toilet, and Terson, a guy who was built like one of the prison guards from back home. I guess if you can’t fly, climbing in and out of this place must really build up the pecs.

“Hawk!” Clete looked happy and relieved to see me. “Tell them it’s bedtime.”

Clete liked order and for things to happen the way they were supposed to. At the Children’s Home, it had been hard to be predictable. When you don’t even know if you’ll eat every night, it’s kind of tough to keep regular meal times. Still, I’d tried my best. Any bump in schedule could make Clete melt down.

“Yep, it’s bedtime,” I agreed, and saw Tetra’s leaders get tense. “What’s going on?”

“Clete was showing Terson and me his plans to help tomorrow,” Bimi explained.

“What plans?” I asked, some of the tenseness leftover from talking to Pietro seeping into my tone.

Clete stood up, all two meters tall and hundred ten kilos. He swallowed anxiously and looked at his watch, painfully aware that it was now past bedtime.

“I can disable the Voxvoce,” he said. “And like their guns and all.”

“We just need to understand how,” Bimi said.

I looked at Clete, remembering the promises he had made while he folded laundry back at the Children’s Home. “You’ve been working on this for years,” I said. “Do you have it now? Can you disable guns and the Voxvoce, really, truly?”

“Uh-huh. Really, truly,” he said, nodding his head. “I promise, Hawk.”

I patted him on the shoulder. “Good enough for me! Go to bed.”

Smiling, Clete grabbed his beat-up computer and hurried out of the room.

“He likes to keep a schedule,” I explained to Bimi and Terson. “If you made him stay here one minute longer, you would’ve seen a meltdown big enough to pollute Tetra’s air as badly as the City of the Dead.”

They looked unhappy, glancing at each other as the door closed behind Clete. “We really need to understand how he plans to do this,” Terson said.

“Why?”

“Because we’re counting on disabled weapons at tomorrow’s rally,” Bimi said. “If Clete’s plan doesn’t work, people could die.”

“That’s like, a Tuesday for me,” I said, shrugging.

The door opened and the whole Flock came in, pushing Terson and Bimi closer together, almost shoulder to shoulder. They frowned, having clearly lost control of the whole meeting.

“Hey,” Nudge said. “I hope everyone is ready for tomorrow. We’ve invited the Six families, but also everyone in the City of the Dead. We flew over and dropped leaflets a few minutes ago.”

“It was like tee-peeing a whole city,” Gazzy said cheerfully.

“You invited everyone in the city?” I said in disbelief. “And the Six?”

“Yes,” Bimi said. “So you see why we’re anxious that Clete’s plans work.”

“He said they would,” I said defensively. Inside, I really, really hoped that Clete knew what he was doing. Because if he didn’t… I mean, I had a few things on my conscience already. I didn’t need the bloodbath of an entire city added to it.

“Okay,” Gazzy said, clapping his hands. “So the plan is to meet at Industry Park in the City of the Dead at ten tomorrow. “Max is gonna speak, and maybe Angel. Iggy, Nudge, and I are going to be on the perimeter.”

“What about me?” I asked. “I can do overheads, or undergrounds. I know that city like Calypso’s freckles.”

“We were hoping you would be with Clete,” Bimi said. “To help him or protect him.”

I nodded, liking the sound of that. If anybody would be able to keep Clete together during the rally, it’d be me. My eyes bounced off of Max’s. She hadn’t spoken to me at all; hadn’t even acknowledged that I was in the room. Why was she watching me? I flipped her off. Gazzy laughed, quickly covering it with a cough.

Terson cleared his throat. “I hope you understand that very few Tetrans will be at the rally. We’ve escaped the City of the Dead, and most of us never want to go back for any reason. But there are about six of us who will go with you. Your mission is worth it.”

“Toppling totalitarian