“They called me Wanderer,” I whispered.
“Wanderer?”
I nodded.
He nodded, too, then hurried away. The back of his neck was still red.
When he was gone, Jeb leaned against the rock and slid down till he was seated where Jamie had been. Like Jamie, he kept the gun cradled in his lap.
“That’s a real interesting name you’ve got there,” he told me. He seemed to be back to his chatty mood. “Maybe sometime you’ll tell me how you got it. Bet that’s a good story. But it’s kind of a mouthful, don’t you think? Wanderer?”
I stared at him.
“Mind if I call you Wanda, for short? It flows easier.”
He waited this time for a response. Finally, I shrugged. It didn’t matter to me whether he called me “kid” or some strange human nickname. I believed it was meant kindly.
“Okay, then, Wanda.” He smiled, pleased at his invention. “It’s nice to have a handle on you. Makes me feel like we’re old friends.”
He grinned that huge, cheek-stretching grin, and I couldn’t help grinning back, though my smile was more rueful than delighted. He was supposed to be my enemy. He was probably insane. And he was my friend. Not that he wouldn’t kill me if things turned out that way, but he wouldn’t like doing it. With humans, what more could you ask of a friend?
CHAPTER 22
Cracked
Jeb put his hands behind his head and looked up at the dark ceiling, his face thoughtful. His chatty mood had not passed.
“I’ve wondered a lot what it’s like—getting caught, you know. Saw it happen more than once, come close a few times myself. What would it be like, I wondered. Would it hurt, having something put in your head? I’ve seen it done, you know.”
My eyes widened in surprise, but he wasn’t looking at me.
“Seems like you all use some kind of anesthetic, but that’s just a guess. Nobody was screaming in agony or anything, though, so it couldn’t be too torturous.”
I wrinkled my nose. Torture. No, that was the humans’ specialty.
“Those stories you were telling the kid were real interesting.”
I stiffened and he laughed lightly. “Yeah, I was listening. Eavesdropping, I’ll admit it. I’m not sorry—it was great stuff, and you won’t talk to me the way you do with Jamie. I really got a kick out of those bats and the plants and spiders. Gives a man lots to think about. Always liked to read crazy, out-there stuff, science fiction and whatnot. Ate that stuff up. And the kid’s like me—he’s read all the books I’ve got, two, three times apiece. Must be a treat for him to get some new stories. Sure is for me. You’re a good storyteller.”
I kept my eyes down, but I felt myself softening, losing my guard a bit. Like anyone inside these emotional bodies, I was a sucker for flattery.
“Everyone here thinks you hunted us out to turn us over to the Seekers.”
The word sent a shock jolting through me. My jaw stiffened and my teeth cut my tongue. I tasted blood.
“What other reason could there be?” he went on, oblivious to my reaction or ignoring it. “But they’re just trapped in fixed notions, I think. I’m the only one with questions.… I mean, what kind of a plan was that, to wander off into the desert without any way to get back?” He chuckled. “Wandering—guess that’s your specialty, eh, Wanda?”
He leaned toward me and nudged me with one elbow. Wide with uncertainty, my eyes flickered to the floor, to his face, and back to the floor. He laughed again.
“That trek was just a few steps shy of a successful suicide, in my opinion. Definitely not a Seeker’s MO, if you know what I mean. I’ve tried to reason it out. Use logic, right? So, if you didn’t have backup, which I’ve seen no sign of, and you had no way to get back, then you must’ve had a different goal. You haven’t been real talkative since you got here, ’cept with the kid just now, but I’ve listened to what you have said. Kind of seems to me like the reason you almost died out there was ’cause you were hell-bent on finding that kid and Jared.”
I closed my eyes.
“Only why would you care?” Jeb asked, expecting no answer, just musing. “So, this is how I see it: either you’re a really good actress—like a super-Seeker, some new breed, sneakier than the first—with some kind of a plan I can’t figure out, or you’re not acting. The first seems like a pretty complicated explanation for your behavior, then and now, and I don’t buy it.
“But if you’re not acting…”
He paused for a moment.
“Spent a lot of time watching your kind. I was always waiting for them to change, you know, when they didn’t have to act like us anymore, because there was no one to act for. I kept on watching and waiting, but they just kept on actin’ like humans. Staying with their bodies’ families, going out for picnics in good weather, plantin’ flowers and paintin’ pictures and all the rest of it. I’ve been wondering if you all aren’t turning sort of human. If we don’t have some real influence, in the end.”
He waited, giving me a chance to respond. I didn’t.
“Saw something a few years ago that stuck with me. Old man and woman, well, the bodies of an old man and an old woman. Been together so long that the skin on their fingers grew in ridges around their wedding rings. They were holding hands, and he kissed her on her cheek, and she blushed under all those wrinkles. Occurred to me that you have all the same feelings we have, because you’re really us, not just hands in a puppet.”