Thin Air

“Yes.”

“And where is he?”

She shrugged. “I said I could hide us from him, not keep track of him. It’s not that simple. You’d better get going.”

“Do you think this is going to work?”

Ve

I swallowed, suddenly very cold. “What if it doesn’t work?”

“Eventually,” Ve

We looked at each other in silence for a second.

“Go east,” she said. “We’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”

I love to drive, but this wasn’t driving, it was being trapped in a car with a crazy man (who kept muttering things in a language that I didn’t understand), a Dji

It didn’t help his attitude at all. Ve

I wondered what he’d been like before. Maybe Ve

All politics. “Fu

“Now it is,” she agreed. “You’re like a virus, you humans. You get under our skins.”

“Flattering.”

She frowned. “Was it? I didn’t mean it to be.”

I resisted the urge to explain sarcasm to her. Barely. “What about memories? Are you going to give me his since he’s human?”

She looked away. “Do you think you want them?”

“Just the ones about me.”

This time, she looked at me straight on. “Do you really want them?”

I realized then what I was asking for. Not just memories of me as Ashan saw me, but the things Ashan might have done to me. To other people I loved.

To my daughter.

I cleared my throat. “Let me think about it.”

She nodded. From the backseat Ashan said, in a low, harsh voice that didn’t sound like it got much use, “You can’t be saved, you know. Whether you die today or in fifty years, you still die.”

Cheery little fella. “I’ll take surviving the fifty years, if I have a choice.”

He smiled thinly. “You don’t.” His eyes were bright-not Dji

I thought longingly about the Taser, then deliberately relaxed. “Can’t you shut him up?” I asked Ve

She glanced over the seat at Ashan. “I don’t like to keep him unconscious all the time. It’s not good for him.”

“Like I care.”

Ve

“Really? What a shock, you seem like such a regular kid.” I checked the map. We were making good time, and the lodge that Ve

I was starting to feel pretty good about the possibilities when I felt the engine give the tiniest little hitch.

“No,” I whispered.

There it was again. Stronger. It sent a shudder through the car.

“No!”

The third time, the whole engine seized up with a clatter of valves. Great. “Ve

But she wasn’t looking at me. I wasn’t even sure if she’d realized we were coasting to a stop at the side of the road.

“She’s found you,” said Ashan, and smiled coldly. “They may kill me, but I think they’ll kill you, too. And that would be worth my death.”

“Ve

“He’s right,” Ve

I couldn’t help but think that it was the threat to Ashan that got her interested, but I didn’t have time to think about it; something happened to the car’s engine, and it choked, growled, and caught fire again. The car leaped forward. I hastily shifted gears to accommodate.

“Maybe we should talk-” I began.

“No! Drive!” Some invisible force slammed the gas pedal down, and I struggled with the steering wheel as the tires screamed, propelling us down the road at a terrifying rate of speed. “Don’t slow down!”

“I’m sorry,” Ashan was saying. I had no idea if he was sorry he was in the car, sorry we were all going to die, sorry that he’d done what he’d done to Imara, and to me. Or just a sorry excuse for a human being. It didn’t really matter, and I could barely hear him over the shriek of tires on the curve. The Camaro was drifting over the line. I fought the wheel and got her straight by sheer force. Come on, baby. Work with me.

I didn’t know what was chasing us, but whatever it was, it was scary enough to panic one badass Dji

Sounded good enough for me to panic, too.

I loved driving fast, but this was a little too fast, on a road that snaked like a car commercial and featured oncoming tractor trailers loaded down with raw lumber and giant tree trunks. Ve

Leaving me with the not very enviable task of steering in overdrive.

“Slow down!” I yelled at her, and tried to downshift. The gear knob didn’t budge. I yanked at it anyway. The clutch pedal didn’t respond, either, even when I jammed it to the floor. Ditto, brakes. In desperation I yanked the emergency brake, but it flopped uselessly.

“If we slow down, you die,” Ve