Page 41 of Raven

“You asked him?”

I hear concern. “Yes. Listen, I just need some help figuring out Port Mrei. He knows it like the back of his hand. He volunteered. I didn’t harass him, okay? Don’t worry, Maddy knows,” I reassure him.

“Good, good.”

I know why he’s so finicky—because Maddy fawns over the kid. The kid loves everyone, but for some reason, he also likes me, or so it seems. Odd, really.

“He doesn’t know how to read,” I say with slight concern.

“Yeah, that’s a problem.”

“He needs to get a teacher or something.”

“Callie is on it. She ordered books. She is sitting down with him daily, but they just started a week ago.”

“Good,” I say, right away wanting to take it back. What do I care?

“She is making him do classes on the computer, too,” Kai continues. “Some educational stuff she got from the archives. He loves computers and technology.”

I can tell. When I throw a glance at the kid, he’s smiling broadly and waving his arms in the air as he’s explaining something to the IT guys, who circle him like he is a miracle.

When I cut the call and approach the group, the IT guys go quiet and disperse. Stewart pulls up a drone and gets the live feed on the giant screen in front of the kid.

“Let’s do a tour of Ayana,” I say, and Sonny is excited like he is about to watch a movie.

I let the IT guy talk. He and Sonny seem to click, but then, everyone adores this kid. Afterward, I will get the kid to carefully follow the drone through the Ashlands and Port Mrei and hopefully find more secret storages and bunkers. The last time Sonny did that, we found one in Ashlands loaded with ammo. If there’s ammo, there are guns. And we have to find as many as possible.

It’s unfortunate that the reason Sonny can help us out is because of him being homeless for years. But everything in this world is a butterfly effect. Nothing is coincidental. Everything is connected. I was once just like this kid. But I didn’t have so many people wanting to make me happy.

The little dude makes me think of Mac.

We don’t talk often, but when we do, we discuss his involvement with college programs for the ones from the quarantine zones, then usually drift to discussions about life. I love hearing Mac talk. He is like a psychiatrist—he asks quite a bit.

So, I remind myself to give him a call.

As I watch Stewart guide the drone above the road that goes to Port Mrei, he tells me another bit of unsettling news. “We saw a drone earlier today.”

“And?”

“It wasn’t ours.”

Butcher’s, then. “Did you report it to Archer Crone or Marlow?”

“Yes. We shot it down, too.”

Good.

But that’s probably not the first and won’t be the last. Butcher is now spying on us.

With a sigh, I look at the kid, who is wiggling in his chair, all excited. “Ready?”

He does a military salute—he’s either seen it in a movie or one of the guards doing it. But it makes me smile. “Let’s do a tour.”

After hours in the Center with Sonny and the IT guys, I snap a picture of the maps we drew based on Sonny’s info. I will go through them later and make a chart for Archer. I’ve had about enough of the kid’s chatter, but I reward him by taking him to the new Thai place and then dropping him off at Kai and Callie’s.

“Wanna come in and hang out?” he asks. I swear, he will grow up to be a party person.

“No. See you.”

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