Smokies anymore. They've got military gear and an icy new attitude. They ambushed us with shock-sticks.'
'They almost drowned Shay,' Tally said. 'Pushed her into the river unconscious.'
'Unconscious?' The smile on Zane's face grew. 'Sleeping on the job, Shay-la.'
Shay's muscles tensed, and for a moment Tally thought she was going to spring up from the bed and strike —her diamond-hard fingernails and teeth against Zane's defenseless flesh.
But she only laughed, hands uncurling from fighting position to stroke Tally's hair. 'Something like that. But I'm very awake now.'
Zane shrugged, as if he hadn't noticed how close she'd come to ripping his throat out. 'Well, I don't know where the New Smoke is. I can't help you.'
'Yes, you can,' Shay said.
'How?'
'You can escape.'
'Escape?' Zane's fingers went to his throat. Around his neck was a metal chain, its links a dull silver. 'That would be tricky, I'm afraid.'
Tally closed her eyes for a moment. So that was how they were tracking him. Zane was not only infirm and unspecial, he was collared like a dog. It was all she could do to keep herself from jumping up and diving out the window. The smell of the room—recycled clothing, the musty book, the sticky sweetness of champagne—all of it was making her sick.
'We can get you something to cut that off,' Shay said.
Zane shook his head. 'I doubt it. I've tested this in the shop shed; it's the same alloy they use on orbital craft.'
'Trust me,' Shay said. 'Tally and I can do whatever we want.'
Tally glanced at Shay. Cut orbital alloy? For technology that serious, they'd have to ask Dr. Cable for help.
Zane fondled the chain. 'And for this little favor, you want me to betray the Smoke?'
'You wouldn't do that for your own freedom, Zane,' Shay said, and put her hands on Tally's shoulders. 'But you'd do it for her.'
Tally felt the two sets of eyes on her—Shay's black and deep and special, Zane's watery and average.
'What do you mean?' he said slowly.
Shay just stood there silent, but through the skintenna, Tally heard her lips mouth a few words, carried on a breath of air.
'They'll make him special. …'
Tally nodded, searching for the words. He'd never listen to anyone else.
She cleared her throat. 'Zane, if you escape, it'll prove to them that you're still bubbly. And when they capture you, they'll make you like us. You wouldn't believe how good it feels, how icy. And we can be together.'
'Why can't we be together now?' he asked softly.
Tally tried to imagine kissing his childlike lips, stroking his shaking hands, and the thought disgusted her.
She shook her head. 'I'm sorry…but not the way you are.'
He spoke softly, as if to a child. 'You can change yourself, Tally—'
'And you can escape, Zane,' Shay interrupted. 'Get out into the wild and let the Smokies find you.' She pointed into the corner. 'You can even keep that bag of pills, bubbly up some of your Crim friends if you want.'
His eyes didn't leave Tally. 'And then betray them?'
'You don't have to do anything, Zane. Along with the cutting tool, I'll give you a tracker,' Shay said. 'Once you reach the New Smoke, we'll come get you, and the city will make you strong and fast and perfect. Bubbly forever.'
'I'm already bubbly,' he said coldly.
'Yeah, but you're not strong, or fast, or perfect, Zane-la,' Shay said. 'You're not even average.'
'Do you really think I'll betray the Smoke?' he said.
Shay squeezed Tally's shoulders. 'For her, you will.'
He looked at Tally, a lost expression on his face for a moment, like he really was unsure. Then he stared down at his hands and sighed, nodding slowly.
But Tally saw them clear as day, the thoughts passing across Zane's face: He would accept the offer, then try to trick them once he had escaped. He really believed that he could fool them both, then somehow rescue Tally and bring her back to averageness.
It was so simple seeing into his mind, as easy to read as the uglies' pathetic rivalries back at the Spring Bash. His infirm body let his thoughts leak out, like a random sweating on a hot day.
Tally looked away.
'Okay,' he said. 'For you, Tally.'
'Meet us at midnight tomorrow, where the river splits,' Shay said. 'The Smokies are going to be suspicious of runaways, so bring enough supplies for a long wait. But they'll eventually come for you, Zane.'
He nodded. 'I know what to do.'
'And bring as many friends as you want, the more the better. You might need some help out there.'
He didn't argue with the insult, just nodded, trying to catch Tally's eyes. She looked away, but forced a weak smile onto her face. 'You'll be happier when you're special, Zane-la. You don't understand how good it is.' She flexed her hands, watching the tattoos spin. 'Every second is so icy, so beautiful.'
Shay stood, pulling Tally to her feet and striding to the window. She paused, one foot on the sill.
Zane just looked at Tally. 'We'll be together soon.' All Tally could do was nod.
'You were right. That was horrible.'
'Poor Tally-wa …' Shay swept her hoverboard closer. In the water below, the moon's reflection kept pace with them, warping madly with the ripples of the current. 'I'm really sorry.'
'Why does he look so different? It's like he's not the same person.'
'You're not the same person, Tally. You're special now, and he's just average.'
Tally shook her head, trying to remember Zane back in their pretty days. How bubbly he was, how his face glowed with excitement as he talked, and how that thrilled her, made her want to touch him…Even when he was being annoying, there'd never been anything average about Zane. But tonight he'd seemed emptied of something essential, like champagne with all the bubbles gone flat.
There was a split screen in her brain: the way she remembered Zane and the way she saw him now, two pictures crashing against each other. The endless minutes with him had left her feeling as if her head were about to break in half.
'I don't want this,' she said softly. Her stomach was uneasy and the moonlight on the water was too bright, its lines too sharp in her perfect vision. 'I don't want to be this way.'
Shay angled her board sideways, sweeping directly into Tally's path and spinning to a sudden, dangerous stop. Tally leaned back, and both hoverboards shrieked like buzz saws as they halted, coming to rest only centimeters apart.
'What way? Annoying? Pathetic?' Shay shouted, her voice all razors and ground glass. 'I tried to tell you not to come!'
Tally's heart was pounding from the near collision, and anger rushed through her in a torrent. 'You knew that seeing him would do this to me!'
'You think I know everything?' Shay said coldly. 'I'm not the one in love. Haven't been since you stole David from me. But maybe I thought love might make a difference. Well, Tally-wa, did it make Zane special for you?'
Tally flinched, something inside her flipping over. She looked down at the black water, feeling like she was going to throw up. She tried to stay icy, to remember how Zane had made her feel back in pretty days. 'What did Dr. Cable do to us, Shay? Do we have some kind of special lesions in our brains? Something that makes everyone else look pathetic? Like we're better than them?'
'We are better than them, Tally-wa!' Shay's eyes shone like coins, reflecting the lights of New Pretty Town. 'The operation gives us the clarity to see that. That's why everyone else looks confused and pitiful, because that's
