“Wherever he is,” I said, “we’ve got to find him.”
“We’ve got to get out of here is what we’ve got to do.”
“Not without Kai.”
Will sat up on one elbow and drew his good leg beneath him. “Listen, Vera. We don’t know where he is, or who took him, or even if he’s gone. It was stupid to go chasing after him in the first place. Now if we don’t get out of here, the environmentalists are going to sell us—or worse.”
I blushed, feeling chastened by my brother’s words. But I refused to be cowed into agreement. “The pirates know where he is.”
“They’re dead. You said so yourself.”
“We don’t know for sure. Some are dead, but some may have survived.”
Will was a fighter. He would never give up—not when there was still a chance. He would lead his troops into battle and fight to his last breath. That’s why I couldn’t believe it when he said, “It’s hopeless.”
“What do you mean?”
“We’re in Canada, Vera. We’re prisoners in the country of our enemies. Even if we could find Kai, we can’t save him. How could we? Be realistic. We’re just two kids without any weapons, and we’ll be lucky to get out of here with our own lives.”
“No, Will. Don’t say that!”
“It’s true. Look at me. My leg is infected. I need a doctor. Our parents probably think we’re dead. We have to forget about Kai and the river. We have to get home!”
When other kids couldn’t raise another bucket, Will kept lifting. When they thought the condensers were emptied, Will found the last drop. He was always the first to volunteer and the last to leave. Yes, he was injured, and our situation was desperate, but we were not so far gone that all hope was lost.
“Kai is our friend,” I said. “You can try to get home—if you want—but I’m going to stay here until I find him.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. We’re locked in the back of a truck.”
“I don’t care! I’m going to get out.” I walked to the rear doors of the carrier and banged on the handles as hard as I could. They wouldn’t budge. Even if I could force the doors open, the carrier was traveling at hundreds of kilometers an hour, and the fall to the ground would surely kill me. But the only thing that mattered right then was getting out. I tried prying at the bars that covered two small windows on each side of the truck, but the metal was cold and unyielding. I stamped my feet on the floor as hard as I could.
“Open the doors!” I shouted. It made me angry that people could simply kill other people, take what they wanted, and ignore the cries of the sick and hungry. The world wasn’t like that—or it shouldn’t be like that—even though I hadn’t seen enough of the world to know what it was really like. I pounded at the fortified steel until my wrists felt like breaking. “Open the doors!” I shouted again. “This is wrong! You are wrong! Open the doors!”
Suddenly Will was beside me, leaning on my shoulder for support. “Stop, Vera. Stop. I’ll help you.”
I looked at my brother, and I could see how much it pained him to stand. But he stood; and though his face was pale, his grip was strong. “I’ll help you,” he said again.
“You’re hurt.”
“It’s not that bad.”
“Do you really think we can get out of here?”
“I do.”
If we were going to escape, however, we would have to wait until the environmentalists stopped to refuel or sleep. Anything else would mean certain death. So while the carrier raced eastward, we searched the cargo hold. Shiny electronics, unwrapped and gleaming, lined the shelves. Dried food in airtight boxes and water in sealed containers were crammed in next to them. Although there were dozens of weapons, we couldn’t find any ammunition or fuses for the grenades. I didn’t see any of the explosives used to blow up the dam, but I figured they had either been detonated or stored in another carrier. Nasri was smart enough to keep them out of our hands. Finally we came upon the Bluewater machine.
“Where do you think they got this?” asked Will.
“Probably stole it, like everything else.”
“It’s worth a lot of money. Not too many of these around.”
“What is it?”
“A portable desalinator.”
Desalinization was an expensive and complicated process in which salt and minerals were removed from water to make it drinkable. Most desalinization plants were on the ocean, where they spit their waste back into the sea, killing fish and marine life but producing plenty of water. A portable desalinator, however, would let its owner travel almost anywhere and not worry about dying of thirst. The dirtiest, saltiest puddle could be made to produce clean, drinkable water. “Help me lift it,” said Will.
“There’s plenty of water,” I said and pointed to the sealed crates.
“I don’t want to make more water.”
“What do you want to do, then?”
“Just help me.”
The desalinator was heavier than it looked. We tried to lift it, but Will could barely hold on. Every time we got it more than a few centimeters off the ground, Will’s leg hurt too much to hold it. Finally we half-dragged, half-carried it over to the rear doors. Will was grimacing in pain by the time we finished.
“Your leg,” I said.
We both looked down at Will’s calf. It had begun to bleed again, a bright red color that was different from the oozing yellow pus.
“It’s fine,” said Will, although it wasn’t. He sat on the floor and began to tinker with the machine. First he lifted the cover and peered inside. Then he pulled out one wire, and a second. Soon he had half the top open.
“This thing kicks off a ton of heat,” said Will. “It’s how they desalinate water. Flash boiling, and then condensation.”
“We don’t need to condense water.”
“But we might want to boil it.”
I could almost see the plan forming in Will’s brain. He had the same look as when he was about to pounce with a pillow. Equal parts mischief and determination. I knew not to ask questions.
Will handed me a hose he had yanked from the inside of the machine. “Hold this,” he said.
I followed his instructions while he sorted, crimped, and twisted. More than once Will had repaired the school’s condensers before the maintenance crews could arrive. Now he worked like a boy possessed, removing tubes and hoses and reattaching them in different places. His face was feverish, but his hands were steady, and if his leg hurt, he didn’t show it. He chewed on his lip, squinted liberally, and, when he was momentarily stuck, rubbed his forehead like a lamp for good luck. Finally he stepped back to admire his invention.
“Now we need some ammunition,” he said.
By now I had a pretty good idea of Will’s intentions. I handed him a canister of pure water from one of the shelves, and he poured it into the machine. We would be ready when the environmentalists stopped—if they stopped.
“Where do you think they’re going?” I asked.
Will shrugged. Like the pirates, PELA operated freely among the republics and Canada. They were outlaws too, but with better public relations and more powerful friends.
“Why do you think they came to Minnesota in the first place?” he asked.
“To blow the dam.”
Will shook his head. “Too small. And there’s another dam downstream. It’ll catch all the water.”
I had stopped asking how Will knew all these things; he just knew facts most kids did not. As large as the dam looked, Will was correct it was smaller than average. Yet there were a million reasons PELA might have blown it—most of them unknowable except to the guerillas themselves. Will, however, already had some ideas.
“Let’s say they were at the dam for another reason.”
“Such as?”
We sat next to each other with a box of semiautomatic pistols as our backrest. Will lifted his leg and rested it on my shin to keep it elevated, and the warmth and weight of it calmed me. It was almost like being at home, talking late past our bedtimes until our father caught us and pretended to be angry.