Watchdog Read online

  Vick grasped the rung and stepped onto the ladder. He hated climbing this ladder, especially in the dark, and most especially while lugging a sack of electronic salvage. They could have taken the stairs inside, but the building was abandoned, and after sundown the stairwell was pitch-dark. Sometimes other people slept in abandoned buildings, too, and Vick liked running into them even less than he liked the fire escape. He half closed his eyes and climbed, his fingers squeezing the rusted iron so hard it hurt.

  When he reached the last rung, the ladder rattled in the wind like it could pull loose from the wall at any moment. He swung the sack onto the roof, then slid on his belly over the low wall. He dropped onto the roof and turned to help Tara.

  “I’m okay. I don’t need any help,” she protested as he pulled on her armpits. “Watch Daisy.”

  Daisy’s little metal head was sticking out of Tara’s backpack. “I thought you named it Tangelo?”

  “I changed my mind.” Tara stood and brushed herself off. “And she’s a she, not an it.”

  The sight of their “home” filled Vick with relief, even though it wasn’t much of a home. It was nothing but a lean-to constructed from salvaged plywood, cardboard, and plastic trash bags. They couldn’t even stand up inside. Parts were strewn across the roof, including three big piles by the far wall. Because it came from the dump, the debris gave off a sour stink.

  There was the faintest nip of coolness in the late-August air. Another two months and it would be too cold to sleep there; they’d have to go back to sleeping at the Salvation Army shelter. Vick dreaded going back there. It was packed with people, a lot of them scary-looking, and anything you didn’t carry around all the time got stolen. Besides, Vick preferred it when they were on their own. Once upon a time he’d trusted adults to watch out for him. Not anymore.

  Vick unloaded the day’s haul of electronic salvage from the sack, separating it into robot parts they could clean up and sell to dealers at the flea market, and phone/TV/computer stuff they’d try to sell to the pawnshop, if Tara could fix them.

  When he was finished, he crawled inside the lean-to and opened the Styrofoam cooler that served as their kitchen. He took out the food that was left in it: half a can of corned beef hash, a sleeve of saltines, the last three Chips Ahoy! chocolate chip cookies in an otherwise empty package.

  He scooted out of the lean-to, holding two plates. “Dinner’s ready.”

  Tara was hunched over Daisy, simultaneously working on her and whispering to her. She accepted the food without looking Vick’s way. Usually this was when she’d launch into a tirade about what they were supposed to be having for dinner (chicken quesadillas with American cheese and bacon crumbles—don’t cook them too long because they’re not good when the edges are crunchy—corn on the cob with butter not margarine, potato puffs, 2 percent chocolate milk), but she just went on monkeying with Daisy.

  “If you’re going to work, could you work on fixing some of the stuff we brought back?”

  Tara ignored him.

  “Fine.” Vick went to the edge of the roof and watched vehicles and people pass below while he ate his pathetic dinner.

  This was the hardest part of the day for him. The dump was awful, but usually he was too busy and miserable to feel scared. It was here, on this big, dark, empty roof, when he felt most strongly how alone they were. It felt like a block of ice in his gut.

  His entire life seemed like a slow-motion fall down a flight of stairs. First his father lost their house trying to start a business and ran away in shame. Then Mom lost her job at Versacci’s Beauty Spa to a robot that worked for free and never needed a lunch break, and she had to take the job installing solar panels, because it was one of the few jobs robots couldn’t do that you could get without a college degree. Then the freak accident where the solar panel broke loose and fell, and Uncle Mason and Aunt Ruby saying they couldn’t afford to take care of Tara and him even though they were supposed to be their godparents.

  Vick had been an honors student, back when his mother was alive. Now he’d missed sixth grade. Every day he wasn’t in school, he fell farther behind. Every day he grew a little dumber compared to the kids who were going to school.

  One of the knee-high cleanup bots Tara had built from junk parts tottered past him on its stubby legs. It was wearing a soiled pink party dress Tara had salvaged from the dump that must have come from some kid’s doll, plus a partially crushed red felt hat with a white bow that looked ridiculous on its square aluminum head. The other bot was dressed as a boy. They were supposed to be Chloe and Jack—the brother and sister from Technopunks, Tara’s favorite book series.

  “Chloe looks bored,” Vick said. He spotted Jack on the other end of the roof, wandering aimlessly. “So does Jack.”

  Tara went on tinkering, her lips moving soundlessly.

  Vick watched Chloe scan the ground for small pieces of junk she could put away. That’s all they did, day and night. You had to be careful what you set down, because Chloe and Jack couldn’t tell the difference between trash and valuables. It all went in the trash bin.

  “Hey, Chloe?”

  Chloe, whose voice recognition software had registered her name, stopped walking and waited for Vick to give her further instructions.

  “Move all of the parts in the green bin into the red bin.” That ought to keep her busy for a while.

  The little bot headed straight for the green bin, which was filled with gutted parts from unfixable electronic devices. Vick knew Chloe was just a bunch of wires and circuits and programs, but he couldn’t help thinking she looked happy to have something to do as she scooped an armful of parts from the green bin.

  “That’s great. Thanks, Chloe.” Of course, she’d be finished in ten minutes and would have nothing to do again.

  Vick eyed Jack, who was now near the steel door that led into the inner stairwell. He suppressed a laugh. “Jack? Move all the parts in the red bin to the green bin.”

  Jack took off toward the red bin.

  “Thanks, buddy.”

  Chloe dropped a handful of parts into the red bin, then hurried back to the green bin to get more. Jack bent, scooped up an armful of parts from the red bin, and headed toward the green bin.

  Vick burst out laughing. “Good job, guys. You’re doing great.”

  Tara looked up from her work. “What are you doing?” She watched the bots.

  Chloe and Jack passed each other, each carrying parts. Vick laughed harder. The longer they did it, the funnier it got.

  “You goofball!” Tara said.

  “They were bored,” Vick managed, then broke down laughing again as Jack and Chloe dropped their parts and marched past each other toward opposite bins to get more.

  Tara started laughing. “Aw. The poor knuckleheads don’t know any better.” She watched the two bots and laughed harder. Vick was laughing so hard, tears streamed down his cheeks.

  A shout from below jolted Vick.

  They stopped laughing. Tara hurried over to see who it was as Vick turned to look down at the street.

  Two guys came running around the corner carrying boxes. He’d seen them on the street before, milling around outside gambling stores and pool halls. One was white with long dreadlocks, the other black with a shaved head. Both were a little older than Vick. They stopped out of sight, directly below Vick.

  “Did they see you?” one of the guys said.

  “I don’t know. Nobody looked right at me, I don’t think.”

  “I want to go home!” Tara cried out. Vick nearly jumped out of his skin in surprise. He sprang at Tara, shushing violently.

  “Right now!” Tara wailed.

  Vick clamped his hand over her mouth.

  He could hear the voices trail up from the street. “What was that?” one of the guys asked.

  Tara struggled and tried to shriek right through his hand. Vick pressed tighter.

  “I don’t know,” the other guy said. Then, much louder: “Who’s up there?”

 
Vick dragged Tara back toward their lean-to.

  “Come on down, or I’m coming up after you.” Something clanged against the fire escape, hard. “Don’t make me come up there.”

  They reached the door of the lean-to. Vick squatted and pulled Tara into the darkness.

  “We have to hide,” he said, his mouth close to her ear. “And you have to be quiet. You have to.” Vick went to the back corner and slid aside the panel that led to their hiding place. “You first. Go.” He urged Tara toward the narrow opening. She wriggled through. Vick followed as the clanging continued. He slid the panel back in place and huddled beside Tara in the narrow space between the back of their lean-to and the concrete wall of the stairwell.

  “I’m coming to get you.” Both guys laughed. Vick was beginning to suspect the boys were only trying to scare them, because they were still on the street, but you could never tell for sure who was just a jerk, and who was truly dangerous.

  Tara pressed against him. “I want to go back to our nice warm home.”

  “Shh. Whisper.”

  “I want Mom to come and get us,” Tara whispered.

  “You know she’s not.”

  Tara nodded against his shoulder. “I know.”

  “But everything’s going to be okay anyway,” Vick said.

  “How is everything going to be okay?” Tara sounded annoyed.

  Vick shushed her again, because her voice was rising. It had gone quiet outside, but he didn’t want to take any chances. Maybe they were coming up the fire escape.

  “Who’s going to make it okay?” Tara asked, whispering again.

  “We are. You and me.”

  Tara was quiet, evidently mulling this over.

  Vick waited a half hour before climbing out and scanning the streets. The guys were nowhere in sight.

  When Vick returned to the lean-to, Tara was working on her puppy-bot by the light of their flashlight, a cable running from Daisy to her salvaged laptop. To preserve the battery, they were only supposed to use the flashlight in emergencies, but Vick was too tired to argue.

  Vick curled up in the pile of laundry that was his bed and studied the things he’d taken with him when they were kicked out of their apartment eight months ago: a stack of comics, his baseball glove, his video games and portable player, a photo album, Mom’s judo black belt, his inhaler. That was all he had in the world, besides the junk outside. They’d only been able to take what they could carry, and mostly that was stuff Tara insisted she couldn’t live without. Things like her plastic toy robot collection and the Disney Purple Girls shirt that hadn’t fit since she was four. He’d been stupid to let her load them up with so much junk when they could have been carrying food and medicine, but he’d been so sure this was temporary, that some adult was going to swoop in to save them. He hadn’t realized that when things got bad, when there weren’t enough jobs and people were hungry, adults only took care of their own kids. Some people could look so kind; then when Vick asked for help their eyes would get hard and they’d look right through him.

  Vick picked up his inhaler and weighed it in his palm, trying to divine how many pumps it had left. He’d had more asthma attacks than usual since Mom died, which wasn’t surprising considering what they’d been through. He’d only used the inhaler twice, when it got really bad. Once the inhaler was empty, he was in trouble.

  He was almost asleep when he realized Tara still had the flashlight on. “Don’t stay up too late,” he muttered.

  She didn’t answer.

  For the first couple of seconds after Vick woke, he thought he was back in his bedroom. Then his eyes focused on the warped, splintered plywood two feet above his head, and he remembered, and the knot in his stomach returned.

  When he sat up he saw Tara wasn’t in the lean-to. He crawled outside into the dim light of dawn.

  Tara was kneeling beside Daisy, who had her little metal face all but buried in the guts of an old Python phone. It looked like she was chewing on it.

  “Please tell me you weren’t up all night playing with your robot.” Tara looked bleary-eyed but wired. She could get so excited about something that she shut everything else out. Vick stepped closer and squinted. “What’s she doing with that phone? Take it away from her—”

  Vick froze. Daisy wasn’t chewing on it; she was moving her little paws around on it. Almost like she was working on it.

  “What is she doing?”

  Tara laughed with delight. “Trying to fix it.”

  Daisy set the Python phone down, then moved to a second, partly crushed phone sitting nearby. She extracted some tiny part with her teeth.

  “How did you get her to do that?”

  “I’m a supergenius. That’s how.” Tara giggled.

  Tara’s toy was trying to repair a phone. Vick looked from Daisy to Tara and back again. “Is she doing the right things? I mean, is it really fixing it, or just moving stuff around?”

  Tara’s grin widened. “She’s doing fine. Aren’t you, Daisy?”

  Daisy looked at Tara and nodded.

  This was a toy. It was supposed to understand basic commands like come and stay. You had to pay thousands and thousands of dollars for a robot that understood sentences and answered you.

  What did a robot that could repair phones cost? There was no such thing as a robot that could repair phones on its own.

  “Can you make more of those?” Vick pointed at Daisy.

  “Nope.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t have the right part.”

  Vick tried not to let his disappointment show. “What part?”

  “The one that makes her smart.”

  Vick nodded. “Why don’t we head to the dump and see if we can find what you need?” If Tara could make more of them, they could make a lot of money. A lot of money.

  Vick washed up using the rainwater they had collected by diverting it from the gutters, then changed into one of the cleanish shirts he’d washed in the same water and draped on a railing to dry.

  As they headed for the dump, Daisy didn’t follow at Tara’s heels like she usually did. She was all over the place, sometimes running ahead, sometimes disappearing from sight before reappearing from a completely different direction.

  “What’s she doing?” Vick finally asked when Daisy disappeared yet again.

  Tara shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “You didn’t give her a command?”

  “Nope.” Tara giggled and clapped her hands together. “You should see the look on your face.”

  Vick scanned the streets for the little robot, but it was nowhere in sight. A flicker of motion from above caught his attention: it was Daisy, airborne, leaping from one roof to the next. “Holy—” What was she doing?

  Vick caught a whiff of the dump. They were still three blocks away, but the smell carried.

  Up ahead, Daisy turned a corner and raced toward them. As she drew close, she started making a strange bloop sound, her hindquarters bouncing into the air.

  “What is she doing now?” Vick asked.

  “No idea. She’s blooping.”

  They passed her. She got in front of them again and blooped.

  “Settle down, girl,” Tara said. Immediately, Daisy fell into step beside Tara. They approached the dump for another stinking day of trash-digging.

  As they climbed the edge of the pile, Vick could see something was wrong. None of the usual pickers were in the dump. Instead, people in gas masks and plastic clothes were spread evenly across the mounds.

  “Hey.” A guy in a gas mask headed toward them across the trash. “The dump is closed.”

  “How can it be closed? Nobody owns it.” There wasn’t another dump in walking distance. Without this place, they wouldn’t eat.

  The guy lifted his gas mask, and Vick immediately recognized him. Stripe. “You two again. I’ve got a long day ahead of me and I’m in a crappy mood, so don’t argue, just get lost.”

  “Well, you can’t tell us where we can wal
k,” Tara shot back.

  Stripe stuck his fingers in his mouth and whistled.

  In answer to his whistle, Stripe’s watchdog, Tiny, cleared a rise, racing toward them. Stripe gave Vick a steely glare. “I said it’s closed, man. Take your dimwit sister and get lost.”

  Tara surged forward, her face reddening. “Don’t call me a dimwit. I’ll bet I’m smarter than you are, pinhead.”

  Vick grabbed Tara’s shoulders and turned her around, expecting Stripe to sic the watchdog on them at any second. He could still hear that awful screeching sound it had made before it crashed through that apartment door.

  “Hang on,” Stripe said.

  Reluctantly, Vick turned back.

  Stripe was staring at Daisy, who was right at Tara’s heels, looking up at them. “You said you designed that?”

  “That’s right.”

  Stripe squatted beside Daisy. “How’d you design those hip joints?”

  Tara frowned, trying to find the words. “It’s not ball and socket. More like a K-joint, but two K-joints on top of each other.” She gave Stripe a satisfied grin. “Now who’s a dimwit?”

  Stripe curled his finger at Daisy. “Let me see her.”

  “No!” Tara shouted.

  “Just for a minute.” Stripe stepped toward her.

  “No. Daisy, run.” As soon as the words left Tara’s lips, Daisy took off.

  Stripe pointed at the fleeing figure. “Tiny, fetch.”

  Tiny took off after Daisy.

  Daisy didn’t make it a hundred yards. The gleaming chrome monster pinned her with a front paw, snapped her up in his jaws, and brought her back to Stripe.

  Stripe turned Daisy over, grasped one of her rear legs, and moved it back and forth.

  “Leave her alone.” Tara lunged, but Vick held her back.

  Stripe raised Daisy out of Tara’s reach. “I’m gonna hang on to this for a while. Now get out of here.”

  Tara went nuts. She tore loose from Vick and launched herself at Stripe, trying to pry Daisy from his grip. When she didn’t come loose, Tara bit Stripe’s arm.

  “No!” Vick leaped to protect Tara as Stripe knocked her to the ground.

  “Get off me.” Stripe examined his forearm. “Dang. You’re pushing me, kid.” It was red, with clearly visible tooth marks, but it wasn’t bleeding. He flipped Daisy over. “Here, you want her back?” He grasped one of Daisy’s hind legs and tore it off, his big bicep bulging like it was going to push right through the skin. He tossed the rest of Daisy to the ground beside Tara. “All I need is this joint. Now get lost, and don’t let me catch you back here.”