“Akila won’t mind about the stupid fake headstone!” Nudge answered miserably.
“I think you’ll all want to see this.” Fang stuck his arm out the window, and I stared dumbly at the object he was holding.
Somehow, in the middle of this torched wasteland, Fang had found a laptop.
10
WE GAWKED AT Fang like he was holding an extra-large double-cheese stuffed-crust pizza.
“It’s a laptop,” I said, frowning in disappointment. “So what? With no Internet, all we could do is play solitaire. We need either actual food or a marker for Akila’s grave.”
“It’s a tablet, actually,” Fang corrected as we came nearer. “It’s smaller, see? And it has a touch screen!”
I rolled my eyes at his mocking tone. “Can we eat it?” I flicked the hard casing. “Can we use it to fend off the psycho hounds?” I gestured toward Nudge’s bandaged cheek.
“Let me see that.” Nudge took the tablet, turning it over in her hands. “I can sense the owner’s fingerprints. He was anxious, searching for something.”
“I knew it!” Gazzy punched the air victoriously. “I knew there were still other people alive out there. It’s not just us and the Cryenas!”
Fang’s eyes flicked to mine, challenging. Nudge did have the power to feel leftover energy, but since we didn’t know how old the energy was, it didn’t necessarily mean anything. And when you’ve had the kind of epically bad luck I’ve had, you learn not to get your hopes up.
Still, it could mean something—a record of what happened, or a connection to the rest of the world…?
“It means answers.” Angel sat on the cracked kitchen counter, swinging her legs. The way she said it—with that weird authority she had—made it seem real, and there was a collective inhale, a quickening pulse, a feeling that maybe, possibly, we might just have a shot.
I bit my lip and then asked the only question that really mattered: “Does it even work?”
Nudge held down the power button for a few moments and then looked up with a frown, like she’d been betrayed. Nothing.
“There’s no electricity to charge it, either,” Fang said, flicking a dead light switch.
I sighed. “Like I said, just another useless piece of junk some poor sap left behind.” Seeing some plastic flowers on the table, I grabbed them an
d turned to head out to Akila’s grave.
“Max, be careful out there,” Gazzy said. “We definitely heard some kind of wild animal.”
“What if we could charge it another way?” Iggy called after me. A high-pitched squeal made me cover my ears, and I turned to see him standing in the doorway to the next room, holding up a dusty radio.
“Where did you get that?”
Ig grinned. “Oh, just another useless piece of junk I found lying around.” He fidgeted with the dial, but all we heard was the crackle of static. “Looks like the antenna’s shot, but it has a charging panel—solar powered.”
“Doesn’t that mean you need sun?” I squinted out the window doubtfully. The sky was dark with ash.
“She still might have some juice in her.” Iggy shrugged. “Worth a shot.”
Somehow, of course, Iggy found some doohickey thingamabob, fiddled with it, and managed to plug the tablet into the radio. We crowded around, seeing our anxious expressions reflected on the touch screen. The tiny red light on the power cord blinked on, and we waited.
And waited.
“It’s not working,” I huffed, tapping the screen.
“Patience, Max.” Total licked away the smudge from my grimy finger. “Just give it a minute.”
But after five minutes, the radio started to hum with the effort, and the light was still red.
“It’s not going to be enough.” I started to pace.