“But then what powers it?” Adam asks, kneeling beside him. “Is it electric?”

“I don’t think so. Maybe some sort of kinetic or solar power…”

I have no idea what they’re talking about, but at least they aren’t fighting at the moment. They continue debating how the cars work, but I tune them out and study the stores. There’s a big drugstore, along with some clothing shops, a couple restaurants and fast food places, and some others I don’t recognize.

I catch Zoe drawing furiously in a sketchbook, which she must have found in her backpack. Every few seconds she takes quick glances at the stores before turning back to her page. I peer over her shoulder to get a better look. In a minute, she’s sketched the shopping center and all the cars in front of us, down to the tiniest detail. Not bad. This must be her talent.

A car stops in front of us and part of it slides open. Two women step out, the door shuts, and the car drives off by itself. The first woman wears a long-sleeved dress with tiny blue lights flickering all along the edges. She has a black facial tattoo, a pretty design of swirls and flowers, curling around her left eye and along her temple. The other woman is wearing something similar, but the tattoo on her face looks like leopard print.

Are facial tattoos common in thirty years? That’s a strange trend.

But as I watch, the leopard print design changes, flowing into a new pattern, and I gasp out loud. The women hear me and give our group a strange look before entering a place called Frosty Foam. Probably because we’re all staring at them with our mouths hanging open.

“Did that just…” Zoe asks. “Her face…”

“I don’t know, but we need to find out,” Adam says.

I nod. “We should split up and check out some of these stores.”

“Come on, Trent,” says Chris. They take off toward a huge drugstore called Aid-Mart, leaving me with Adam and Zoe.

We check out the Frosty Foam place first. It’s like a frozen yogurt shop, except that it sells sticks with foam on them in different flavors ranging from green tea to bacon to cupcake. Signs all over the place proclaim that it’s a fun, low-fat treat, but it looks like a weird, frothy mess to me.