"Twenty-two minutes. I will change our destination back to Topeka in fourteen minutes."

I sit back and close my eyes. We're almost there. It won't be soon enough for me.

Run, Jenna. Run. Precious, privileged Jenna. Jenna.

My eyes fly open.

Miesha and Dot are silent, staring straight ahead.

Jenna. Jenna. Jenna.

It's an angry, deliberate beat. I look around me, out all sides of the car, grunting in pain as I twist around, and then I see it. A train is passing on our left. I press up to the window.

You left me.

"Put the window down! Put it down!" I yell to Dot.

"What are you doing?" Miesha yells back.

"At this speed I am unable to lower the window," Dot says. "It would be too dangerous for--"

"Put it down!" But the window remains up. I frantically search the windows of the train as it passes, a blur of faces staring back. A little boy sticks his tongue out at me. More faces turning away, or not noticing me at all. Moving past, away, faster than us.

Jenna. Jenna.

I pound on the window. "She's there! I know she's there! Kara! Can you hear me? Kara!"

Jen--

Passengers stare back at the maniac pounding on his own window and quickly look away. And then I see her, her shoulder pressed up against the window, her face hidden by a curtain of black hair. In seconds she will move ahead and out of view.

Kara! I'm here! This way!

Her head jerks, the tiniest movement, like she is going to turn, her hair moving in slow-motion waves, but then she stops, the waves subside, and she is gone.

Did she hear me? Why didn't she turn? I know I could hear her. Kara. But now the sound is gone, and a part of me has vanished too. She is all I had for so long. Without her, the Locke I was doesn't even exist.

"At least you know you were correct," Dot offers. "She's headed to California. And it looks like we will be at the Topeka station in time for you to meet her."

"Thank you for hurrying, Dot."

"My pleasure! When we--" Dot's eyes fly from me to the control panel. "We're moving over." She hits several lights, and then hits them again, repeating the same pattern.

"So? Didn't you say you were going to change our destination back to Topeka?"

"I haven't changed it yet."

We're now in the middle lane and moving toward the far right one. Alarm spreads across Dot's face as she pounds light after light.

"What's happening?"

Her hands drop from the panel. "They've found us. There's a Security Tunnel four kilometers ahead. They are maneuvering us over to dispatch us into it." She turns to look at me. "I am so sorry, Customer Locke."

"Can't you do something?"

"There has to be a way...." Miesha pounds at the panel.

I pull myself up over the seat and pound too. "Are they going to zap us?"

"No," Dot answers. "If they had that capability, they would have done it by now. We are extreme risks. But they have found at least one hidden signal that has allowed them access to the controls."

"Look out!" I say. "Move to the side, Miesha!" I pull myself up and sit on the back of the seat. I use the headrest behind Miesha to leverage myself, and I kick against the panel. It doesn't even crack. I'm not going down any Security Tunnel. I pull back and throw every bit of my weight into my leg, and my shoe crashes into the panel, shattering the glass. I stomp again and again at the circuits beneath the panel. "Turn the steering bar, Dot! Get off at the next exit! Turn!"

"I'm turning, but it's not moving! We're still on the hook."

I continue to stomp. Glass and circuits fly. The car slows substantially and then moves into the exit lane.

"It's working!" Miesha shouts.

The cab coasts off the next ramp.

"You are brilliant, Customer Locke! Disabled vehicles are moved off the grid automatically to avoid impeding traffic." The grid hook spits us out at the bottom of the ramp, and we coast as much as we are able down a deserted road. We are in the middle of nowhere.

I fall into the back seat, out of breath. "Can we keep going at all, Dot?"

"I think we can limp along for a short way. At least away from here. The signal has most certainly stopped transmitting, but they will come searching soon anyway because they know our approximate location."

She pulls on a lever on the left side of the steering bar, and we jerk forward, the car moving in awkward jumps and at a very slow speed. This car is not going to get us far. How will we make it to Topeka in time now?

The deserted road leads into a small town. All I see is a rest stop with a diner, a ratty public park with some restrooms, a little market, and a few other nondescript buildings. Most look abandoned.

"I think it would be expedient to park the car in a hidden location," Dot says. "And for you to find another mode of transportation."

I notice that Dot's tone has changed. She is quiet and reserved, the way she was when Kara and I first entered her cab.

"Good idea," I answer. "How about that building there?" It is a large metal barn with piles of rusted garbage outside. Junkyards still look the same. One of the doors is open, and a loose beam hangs from the roof.

Dot drives in, and I hop out to close the door behind us, leaving it only slightly ajar for light. Miesha gets out too, but Dot remains seated in the disabled car because there's not really anything else she can do.