They found the sign where they expected, having cased it earlier. The bright orange lights announced TRAVEL TIME TO WESTVIEW EXIT—10–12 MINUTES against a black background, enclosed in yellow metal and rising above the highway.
They could have done it in the middle of the night. Under cover of darkness. But what fun would that be? So TxDOT could have it down before the morning commute started? No. This was senior year, class of 2017. An election year. It called for a bold gesture. A hack for truth and justice, which were in short supply these days. They parked the car in a Whataburger parking lot and found a remote way down under the bridge, where they could slink in the darkness beneath the overpass, seen only by a homeless couple balled up in sleeping bags deep in the crevice between the grass bank and the bridge base. They had anticipated this, and Peter, with his effortless charm, passed them a couple chicken sandwiches from Whataburger and assured them that the Vindicators had never been here and weren’t here now. The chicken/secrecy oath transacted, they worked their way down and crept in the shadow of the sign, hopefully out of view from the road, and found the control box.
Its cheap lock fell easily to Alex’s bolt cutter. It fell into two pieces, which he merrily twisted apart. “Let’s do this,” he said, grinning.
He pried open the control box, and Peter knelt in front of it.
Inside was a panel with a keyboard and small screen, housed in black plastic. On prompting, it asked for the admin name. Peter typed in the default, admin, and tabbed to the password prompt. He tried the default password, which he’d looked up on .narthex.
“They never change these,” he said gleefully.
He typed DTOC and hit Enter.
Access denied.
“Not to worry.” He scowled. He held down ALT-CTL, then typed CIPC while holding the two buttons. The screen changed and informed him the password was now reset to the default.
“Easy.” He typed admin then DTOC again.
A menu came up, and just like that, they were in.
He selected Image Text, entered their agreed-upon observation, then selected Run w/o Save. Their AI archangel hadn’t told them what message to write, just that they had to pick one. Maybe that was part of the test. Charlie and Peter had come up with the line together.
The text lit up the bright, large construction sign above them, for all the world to see. Now was the time to get the hell out of Dodge.
Alex put the control pad back into the box, tucking the curly black cord inside with it. Vanhi slammed the door shut, and Alex clamped into place the new industrial-grade padlock they had purchased. Unlike the cheap city lock, it would not be so easily cut. Meanwhile, Charlie and Kenny had already put a similar bolt on the power source. Shutting this baby down would take some doing.
The first cars had started honking, whether in agreement or protest it was hard to guess.
They were halfway up the slope under the overpass when Peter grinned at the homeless couple, who had finished their Whatachick’n and balled up the garbage. He flipped them two Snickers bars. “You never saw us.”
One of the couple winked conspiratorially.
Back in the car, they U-turned and allowed themselves the pleasure of watching for a moment, engine running, as the rush-hour traffic streamed past the sign, honking, some slowing to take a second look.
It was beautiful chaos.
“Third-degree felony,” Alex said.
“What?”
“I lied earlier. When I said it was a misdemeanor.”
“Seriously?”
“Third-degree felony. Tampering with a road sign. Jail time.”
“Why did you lie?” Charlie studied Alex, trying to understand him. Charlie wasn’t worried about himself but Vanhi and Kenny and even Peter. They should’ve at least known the risk.
“I didn’t think we’d do it otherwise,” Alex said almost plaintively.
“Oh, wow,” Kenny said, with the giddy freedom of being on the far side of a rickety bridge.
“Yeah,” Vanhi said.
“Well, we did it.”
“Yes. Yes, we did.”
They admired their handiwork. The small gesture wasn’t going to change the world. But in a random, chaotic universe, it was a small, proud shot in the dark. Under the overpass, hundreds of cars passing by, their sign told the world in bright orange light:
DONALD TRUMP IS A SHAPE-SHIFTING LIZARD
A siren sang in the distance, and while it probably had nothing to do with them, they weren’t going to wait to find out.
“Third-degree felony,” Peter repeated aloud.
“Hot damn,” Charlie said.
“I’m applying to Harvard tomorrow,” Vanhi added.
“So … we should go?”
“Hell yes. Yes. Let’s go.”
They drove off, slow and steady in the opposite direction, leaving their glorious sign for the torrent of cars streaming home.
7 THE LIZARD KING
The Grove was where, rumor has it, the Friends of the Crypt met in secret during their reign of terror over the suburbs of Glendale and Pleasant Valley back in the 1990s. It was a cautionary tale for Charlie and his friends, of honors students gone wrong. They, too, had been a group of bright outsiders—the Vindicators sometimes thought of themselves as a benign version of that fabled group—but something had gone so very wrong for the FOTC. They were self-described techno-anarchists, a dangerous mix of knee-jerk teen outrage and mechanical savvy, pipe bombs and viruses. They were going to attack the system, even if they didn’t know exactly what should replace it. Every parent for decades had heard about them, casting glances at those woods as if they were haunted and wondering, Could my kid ever … no. But like so much of the late nineties, those stories of ominous graffiti carved into trees—hooded rats with slit eyes—and dangerous acts ending in tragedy had faded year by year into a pastel memory.
Now the Grove was a place to party.
“I think you’re playing with fire,” Peter said that evening in Charlie’s room, the door closed and locked, the window cracked.
“It’s just a ride.”
“She’s got a boyfriend.”
“Yeah, and he’s a jerk.”
“Maybe, but he’s also a meathead and a jock and a violent guy. I’m just saying, he’s not gonna like it. And he’s got big friends.”
“What, he’s going to beat me up because I gave his girlfriend a ride?”
“I like this new you, Charlie. Totally fearless. I’m just saying, I don’t want to have to bail you out when the football team comes after you. I’m a lover, not a fighter.”
“It’ll be fine.”
“Okay. I’m not saying she’s not worth it. She’s hot. Like, crazy hot.”
“It’s just a ride. Jesus. He’s probably meeting her there later.”
“Right. And you’re the only person with a car.”
“Whatever.”
“It’s not even your car.”
“I get it.”
“It’s a Nissan, for God’s sake.”
“I get it. Enough.”
Peter started laughing, and it was impossible to be mad at him. He could be a jerk and win you back over in the same sentence.
Something chirped on Charlie’s phone.