It’s morning, or at least morning-ish, though you really can’t tell because all the windows are boarded up. There’s twilight outside beyond the broken back door, though. I get myself some of the food from the cooler and look outside. There’s no sign of any other people; no indication that anyone’s looking for us.
It occurs to me that I could leave. Tiptoe away, leave Rachel sleeping—I could leave her a note, so she wouldn’t think I’d been kidnapped—find my own way to a hiding place that wouldn’t involve Rachel. If my father comes after us and Rachel’s with me, she’ll be in at least as much danger as I am. My mother was kidnapped and tortured; it was the coworker who got picked to take the blame for it who wound up dead. Rajiv. I wonder if he actually killed himself, or if Michael killed him and made it look like a suicide?
Of course, Michael probably has Rachel’s address, so he could come after her, anyway.
But even aside from that, I don’t want to leave. I feel safer with Rachel, even if that’s completely irrational. And I feel like she’s safer with me, even though I know that’s irrational. We’re protecting each other. We’ll keep each other safe. I left her yesterday, and she came right back.
“Steph?” Rachel flicks on her flashlight, illuminating the room. “Is it morning?”
“Yeah,” I say.
She pulls out her cell phone and turns it back on. “Let’s see if there’s any new news about your dad.”
The news about my dad is all over this morning, but it’s not because of my dad, it’s because of the car: it’s gotten out that the car that hit him was self-driving. One of the neighbors apparently saw it happen and has given interviews to every major network; he doesn’t appear to have noticed that I was there, just that my father fired a gun at the Roadster and then got hit.
The actual owner of the car was sitting in class at the U when it happened. Various experts are insisting that the most likely explanation is that someone stole the car, ran down the “unidentified male,” and then fled before the police arrived.
The car company has released a statement talking about their commitment to security, and someone’s saying that if the owner of the car had compromised its built-in security in some way, a hack would be possible though very unlikely.
My father is a footnote in every article but one: “taken to the hospital,” “stable condition,” “taken to the hospital with injuries,” “taken to the hospital for evaluation.” There’s one dubious-looking newspaper that got a blurry photo of him from someone’s security camera and adds an unnamed witness saying they saw the aftermath and his head was gushing blood. That seems like it ought to be a good sign—I mean, a good sign for me, since I would prefer that he be really seriously injured and in the hospital indefinitely—but Rachel lets out an impatient snort and says that head injuries always bleed like crazy.
CheshireCat would probably have more information. They’d have eavesdropped on the hospital through the staff cell phones or something. But CheshireCat isn’t in the Clowder and doesn’t respond to my private message.
Orlando pops online. “GEORGIA, ARE YOU HERE? Because your dad is flipping his lid. He came over last night, and I thought he and my dad were going to wind up in a fistfight. I think he thinks maybe you were involved somehow in that car crash that’s in the news. Did you text him and let him know you’re alive?”
Rachel leans over my shoulder to type. “I TEXTED HIM. I told him I was fine and not to worry.”
“Maybe call him?” Orlando says.
“He’ll just start yelling,” Rachel types.
I take back the keyboard. “Has anyone seen CheshireCat since yesterday?” I ask.
No one has.
“Is anyone else weirdly missing?” I ask.
“None of the admins are on,” Hermione says. “I noticed this morning because the main channel was getting all clogged with spam, which basically never happens. I tried to ask Alice what was up. She wasn’t on, and neither were any of the others.”
Did CheshireCat run away after the thing with the car? Did it get them in trouble?
“Are you worried about CheshireCat?” Firestar asks. “I’ve been trying to remember what they’ve said about their parents and whether they have the sort of parents who’d just cut them off from online.”
“I asked about their parents once, and all they said was, ‘Mostly they let me do what I want,’” Hermione says.
In a sense, CheshireCat’s parent would be the programmer who created them. They mentioned a creator—they said they didn’t know if their creator knew they were conscious. So maybe it was their parent that took them offline. Maybe their creator realized what had happened and came after them.
“Can anyone remember CheshireCat ever saying where they were from?” I ask.
“Do you think they’re in trouble???” Firestar asks.
“Yeah,” I say.
I check my email, hoping to find something—anything—from CheshireCat, some clue.
And I do find one, from an address I’ve never seen before.
CheshireCat needs you.
66 Antshire Street, Cambridge, MA.
Rachel stares at me. “What if that’s your father trying to lure us in?”
“How would he know to mention CheshireCat?”
“I don’t know. How did he know to come straight to New Coburg? How did he get here so fast?”
I pull out my phone to see if my mother’s texted. Or if CheshireCat did.
Neither has, but there’s a text from some number I’ve never seen before.
Is this Laura’s daughter? Are you in Wisconsin in this mess? Do you need help? And then it’s signed with something that’s probably an emoji or special character, but those don’t show up on my phone so I just see a .
I should feel reassured, maybe, but the only thing I can think right now is that
