The Child Thief 5: Ghost Towns Read online

  There was another set of files inside this folder. Some of them looked like random bits of code, and Nelson scrolled past them and then landed on pay dirt: document files. She pulled one up, blew it up to full-screen, and then began to zoom in on the text. The file definitely necessitated zooming in; it was filled with information, all of it in a font tiny enough to barely be legible. There were coordinates, department codes, and even bar codes. It looked like a file that wasn’t even meant for human eyes, like a document that had been issued and circulated only between computers. Code was used throughout, as if it was an easily readable language. Most of it looked like gibberish, and almost none of it made any sense to me.

  Nelson seemed to know right where to go, though. And then all of the information was right in front of me.

  Redistributive Name: Sylvone, Robin

  Place of Birth: Millville

  Birth Name: None

  Birth Parents: Juno Jones, Culver Wright

  Age at Redistribution: 00Y02M

  Redistributive Parents: Luke and Layla Sylvone

  Redistributive Address: Silver Town

  That was all, or at least all that looked relevant to human eyes.

  The moment was anticlimactic. What about—

  “Hope?” I asked aloud.

  “Oh,” Nelson sputtered. “She has her own file.” She hesitated, as if waiting for me to say something about the information we had found in my file. But I had nothing to say. I needed to process that information, and before that could happen, I needed to know about Hope.

  Nelson turned back to the tablet, pulled up another coding box, and searched again. Soon we were in a new file.

  Redistributive Name: Preston, Genevieve

  Place of Birth: Trenton

  Birth Name: Hope Stone

  Birth Parents: Robin Sylvone, Henry Stone

  Age at Redistribution: 00Y00M

  Redistributive Parents: Michael and Mavis Preston

  Redistributive Address: Chanley

  “Genevieve,” I said.

  It was more of a reflex, the word tumbling out of my mouth in my disbelief. It made sense that they would have renamed her, just as I’d assumed my adoptive parents had renamed me. But seeing the name made me feel strangely ill. They had stolen my child and then discarded the only gift I was able to give her. They had done away with the name that was a summation of my dreams and optimism, no matter how childish they had been. They had done away with a name that described how I felt when I looked into my baby girl’s eyes. The renaming caused a fresh pang of anger and sadness.

  Her name was Hope. And that would always be her name.

  Nelson, as it turned out, felt similarly.

  “Genevieve, huh? Definitely a rich people name. Just like Rylo’s adoptive parents. They renamed my daughter Ann-Marie.”

  Rylo. It was the first time I had heard Nelson refer to her daughter by name. Looking at her, the burn marks from her time in Authority hands still pink on her face and neck, I felt a rush of gratitude and kinship. She had a daughter who had been ripped away, too. She had joined Operation Hood to get her back and to change the system, just like I had. She had been working for years to find this information. And now we had it. We were together in this, and now we were one step closer to finding our children.

  I threw my arms around her in gratitude. The emotion of the past day and a half began to pour out of me, and with it came a flood of happy tears. Nelson seemed taken aback at first, but it didn’t take long for the emotion to overwhelm her as well. I felt her hug tighten. And then we were both blubbering like madwomen.

  After a few minutes, we pulled away from each other and composed ourselves, laughing at our outburst. Neither of us was much for public displays of emotion. But if there was ever a time, it was now.

  “I’m surprised they even recorded Hope’s birth name,” I wondered aloud, “since we were just poor people who were about to lose her. Why bother taking down her name at all?”

  “Maybe they wanted a name to refer to her by while she was in custody,” Nelson replied.

  “Where’s the other archives drive?” I asked, remembering what Nelson had said after the mission. “Didn’t you make two back in Smally?”

  “Nathan already has it,” she said. “I took it to him after I left the hospital last night. I was hoping to talk to him, but…”

  “But what?” I queried after she trailed off.

  “But,” she responded, “he seemed busy. Piper and Corona were in his office, and I assumed they were discussing the mission. I wanted to get permission for us to go reclaim our girls, but Nathan was obviously busy.”

  Nathan was always being pulled in a dozen or so different directions, and as much as he felt like a member of our team, I had to remember that he was involved in something much bigger than just our little team of renegades. It made sense that he was busy.

  But this was important. Edgewood was a safe haven. It had a school, a dining hall, and dorms for us to sleep in. Families were happy and thriving here. Now we needed to bring our children here to live with us, too. Our children deserved this type of happiness and freedom as well. And we deserved to have them with us.

  At the very least, we needed to ask Nathan when he would be available.

  “Well,” I started, standing quickly and with determination, “we need to find a way to speak with him. We have a lot to talk about.”

  2

  As anxious as I was to find Nathan and begin speaking to him, it only took a quick glance at Nelson—still in her second-skin suit from the night before—and a rumble of my stomach to realize that we had basic necessities to attend to beforehand.

  I offered to let Nelson shower first, but she was intent on organizing the information in the files into a simpler, more recognizable format before she gave it to the rest of the group. So I left her to her important work on the tablet and stepped into the comforting fog of a hot shower.

  Dirt and trace amounts of blood (from scrapes and scratches I hadn’t even realized I had) began mixing with the water and flowing gently down the shower drain while I took a generous glob of shampoo and began to massage my scalp. Then, as usual, I found myself drifting away in my thoughts.

  I had spent so much of the previous night considering what it meant to have more information on Hope. Finding her had been my obsession and my dream for over two years. And while it had once felt like it was an unattainable goal, today it was feeling like a real and tangible possibility, like I could be within days of having her back with me.

  And maybe we would even be a three-generation family soon. I had more information on my biological parents now, too, I realized, thinking back to my own file. I had been so quick to dismiss it in my quest to learn more about Hope that I hadn’t even really given it much thought.

  No birth name. That was the first thing I remembered. But maybe there was a good reason for that. Perhaps Juno and Culver hadn’t felt as strongly about a name as I had when I held Hope for the first time. Or perhaps they hadn’t felt as strongly about the baby at all…

  I shook my head involuntarily. This was going to be a good day, and I wasn’t going to let my normal anxieties and over-analyses take that away from me. Instead, as hot water rinsed the lather out of my dirty-blonde hair, I thought back to the mission from the night before. I remembered the camaraderie we felt as we exited the airship. I remembered the way Alexy had raised her fist in triumph. I remembered the stretchers rolling out of the hatch…

  Suddenly I also remembered the Authority agent’s face as he trained his weapon on Nathan back in the computer room in Smally. I remembered the sound of blood pumping in my ears. I remembered squeezing the trigger and seeing a flash.

  And then I heard a rap on the door.

  “Just how dirty were you? Come on, I’m starving now!” Nelson.

  I turned the water off and stepped out, my brow furrowed, and tried to clear my head. There would be time to think about that later. But Nelson was right. First, breakfast.
/>
  “How can you possibly eat all of that?” Alexy asked, with a strange mix of condescension and wonderment.

  As Nelson and I approached the table, I saw what she had been referring to. Ant was approaching the dining hall table with his plate topped high with pastries, muffins, fresh fruit, greasy fried tomatoes and cheesy waffles. He set it down with a thud and then smiled contentedly. Abe followed close behind with a huge plate of pancakes, syrup streaming down all sides, and another plate topped with half a dozen browned triangles of toast smeared with butter and strawberry jam.

  “Thanks, brother,” Ant said, his smile still plastered onto his face.

  “Don’t mention it,” Abe replied. “Now help me get mine.”

  Alexy guffawed, and Jace, sitting beside her with an impressively loaded plate of his own, laughed good-naturedly.

  “Where do you even put all that?” he asked Ant. Then his attention turned to Nelson and me as we approached the table. “Better hurry,” he told us with a wink. “Before Ant and Abe clear out the buffet.”

  The food was glorious. Although I had practiced a little more restraint with my plate than Ant and Abe, courtesy of years of living almost exclusively on Nurmeal, and my diminished stomach capacity, I still found myself savoring every item, and, best of all, a hot cup of coffee with cream.

  Looking around our table, I couldn’t help but smile at the change in all of us. It looked like everyone had taken advantage of a long, hot shower (I was particularly fond of the way Jace’s thick, dark hair looked when it was damp), and it was apparent that several days of good food was injecting us with an energy we hadn’t felt in quite some time.

  I was ready to begin planning our new mission—our mission to reclaim our families—but I was also intoxicated by the feeling of togetherness and camaraderie. With every day that passed, we were solidifying our newfound family. And even though the government had succeeded in taking away many of our family members and loved ones, it would never be able to stop us from finding family wherever we could.

  Nelson interrupted my musings and took the reins. “All right,” she started, gulping down the remainder of a large glass of orange juice. “We have a lot to talk about.”

  She handed Alexy, Ant, and Abe each an external drive with their adoptive files on them.

  “These are the archive files that are pertinent to each of you individually. The information on your parents, siblings, or children is all here. I made one for everyone,” Nelson said.

  They sat in stunned, appreciative silence for several long moments.

  “So… when do we leave?” Gabby asked, voicing the question that must’ve been on everyone’s minds.

  Ant spoke up immediately. “Now. We leave now,” he said. Then he made to stand.

  Abe grabbed his twin’s bony elbow and yanked him back down. “Ant, wait,” he said, indicating his minutes-older status. “We can at least hear Nelson out. She’s probably put a little more thought into the planning than you have.”

  “But he’s right,” Alexy piped up, holding her drive close to her chest with both hands. “We can leave now to get started. We’re going to need supplies, and weapons, and an airship. We’re going to need—”

  “Nathan,” Jace finished for her. “We’re going to need Nathan’s blessing, and then we’ll be able to ask for his help.”

  He turned to me and gave me a slight nod

  “Right. We need Nathan. And we need a plan,” I said, casting a glance at Nelson. “I know you guys haven’t seen the info in your files yet, but Nelson and I know the locations of our daughters now.”

  My heart sank slightly for Nelson. I had gotten lucky; while Hope (or Genevieve, as she was being called somewhere out there) was in a dangerous location due to its proximity to government buildings, she was still within an hour or so trip by airship. I had gotten even luckier with my parents. They were in Millville, which was a small factory town that was even closer. But Nelson’s daughter was in Lighton, halfway across the country. A trip that long would require additional planning to ensure that we weren’t risking being spotted or traced. The longer we were on the road, the more chance things had of going wrong. If we were followed or had to engage in any sort of air fight from the ship—if we drew any attention at all—we would be counting on getting back to the safety of Edgewood before anyone caught us.

  A longer trip would make that a whole lot harder. I didn’t know if we’d be able to risk it, even with the toys Little John had at its disposal.

  But Nelson kept a brave face. If I knew her, and I felt pretty confident that I did, she would be able to find Rylo even if she were on another continent.

  And that was another problem.

  “Are the addresses current?” Alexy asked, as if she had read my mind.

  Nelson shrugged. “The files don’t look like they get automatically updated. So they may be current and they may not be. The point is we have a place to start.”

  “They’re probably pretty accurate for our parents, though,” Abe offered. And he was right. Poorer classes tended to stay in one place. They didn’t have the same mobility or access to new opportunities. It was a safe bet that if my parents had been in Millville when I was born, they were still there. Probably even still employed by the same factory.

  “And now that we have names and previous addresses,” Nelson continued, “we can look people up in public records.”

  “Or what’s left of the records,” Gabby said, reminding me of her occasional wisdom beyond her years.

  She was right. The Burchard Regime made sure the records were restricted, even if they were meant to be public. And that was to block people from doing exactly what we were going to do. They knew family members would try to find each other through them, undermining the CRAS. This was a government willing and able to steal children away from their parents, so sealing access to public records to make sure those children remained in their custody barely garnered an afterthought.

  “Leave that to me,” Nelson said.

  Beneath the excitement and joy of learning more about Hope, a nagging question had been forming in my head over the past day, sowing a seed of doubt in my plans to bring my daughter home. At first it was just a sense of unease about something that I couldn’t pinpoint. But it had slowly manifested into a cogent thought. And I felt like now was the time to get it out.

  “The problem is, we joined Little John for a reason,” I started. “What if these personal missions conflict with that big reason?”

  Alexy shook her head. “What do you mean?”

  Nelson was looking intently at me. “You mean, what if we’re allowing ourselves to get sidetracked with this?” she asked, as if the thought had been pestering her as well.

  “Well, yeah, maybe we are,” Abe said, sputtering slightly. “But we’re not here to save the whole country. We’re here to help reunite families. That’s where we started, isn’t it? And now we’re the families that can be reunited!”

  We had joined Operation Hood to reunite families, and that had been what we were doing when Jace first asked us to join OH+. But could that really be enough? Could that really be all we did, after everything we’d seen? The Burchard Regime was doing a lot more than we’d realized, and a lot more than just stealing kids, if our suspicions were correct. If we didn’t stop the regime at the root, families would continue to be separated ad infinitum. And wasn’t that the whole point of coming to Edgewood? To stop the separations from happening? And now we had the Artemis Protocol in play. We couldn’t exactly abandon it to go chasing after our own selfish desires.

  As important as that felt.

  But there was also the ethical dilemma of reclaiming our family members from their established lives. What if Hope was happy as Genevieve? What if Jackie’s sister loved her adoptive parents? What if Nelson’s daughter would be crushed to be pulled away from the woman she knew as her mother?

  A reflective and uncomfortable silence fell over the table. Hope and Rylo were still very young, at l
east. The same couldn’t be said for everyone’s family members.

  “Well, we can at least talk to Nathan and get some guidance,” Jace finally said. He was right. We needed to speak to Nathan, first and foremost; then we could decide how to proceed.

  With that, we all began gathering our dishes and standing.

  Jace grabbed my hand, and I turned to smile at him. His support meant more to me now than he could ever know. Somehow, when things got confusing or unclear, Jace was always there to anchor me to reality.

  Then, as we began to walk toward the exit, I noticed a familiar face: Henry, seated with a new group of people. Maintenance and repair experts, I realized, recognizing them as people who had been working on the airship we’d taken to Asus. Evidently Nathan had discovered a useful skill in Henry—or at least the ability to learn—and assigned him to a specific crew.

  At the sight of him, I realized I had only thought about myself that morning, about my joy and excitement at knowing more about Hope’s whereabouts. But there was someone else who deserved the information just as much as I did. I didn’t know if Henry would be as excited as I was to bring Hope home. But I thought he’d probably considered it. I knew he would want to hear about the possibility.

  I didn’t know, though, whether it was acceptable for me to share this information with Henry. After all, he was new. Nathan and Corona might have vetted him, but that didn’t mean they’d approved him, and Nathan had been very specific about not telling people outside of our teams about the results of our missions.

  Was I allowed to tell him about something that hadn’t exactly been part of a mission, but was something significantly closer to home?

  Jace followed my gaze.

  “Jace, I—”

  He gave my hand a reassuring squeeze and then looked deep into my eyes. “It’s okay,” he said. “I know.”

  I squeezed his hand back and smiled at him.

  Then I left him with the rest of the team and headed toward Henry. He noticed me as I approached, and flashed a bright, charming smile.