Step three is dealing with IA. We’ll have proof about Meridian and his operation. If this was a normal case, Barclay would file the paperwork, put together a task force, and they would bust everything up. But it’s not. Which means we need to take the proof to someone high up, who we can trust isn’t involved.
And right now, that’s a really short list.
We need the files at the processing center to help us with that.
As Barclay goes over the minor details, we all lean toward him to make sure we get it right. A couple of times Elijah asks questions and makes Barclay repeat his idea in different words. Other times, he offers his own suggestions—like how we should break into IA and search through their files to find out who’s dirty, or go after Meridian ourselves, both of which get shot down.
After a while, I realize Ben is so close to me we’re almost touching. We’re barely an inch apart and every time he moves I’m sure he’s going to reach out and brush my arm or my thigh. The air in the space between us is electrified.
But no matter how many times my heart skips a beat, or lurches forward, he doesn’t touch me.
Worse, I don’t know if I want him to.
02:11:17:49
I’m on the roof of the building when Ben comes to see me.
We’ve hashed out the plan as much as we can. We’re leaving around three a.m. because the middle of the night will be our best chance of getting in and out alive.
Despite what I’ve said about my double and the fact that she’s unlikely to go anywhere else, Barclay doesn’t trust her enough to leave her alone. Not even while we’re sleeping. He’s promised he’ll figure out somewhere for her to go before we leave. But for now, he’s pulled three more beds into her room so that all five of us can lie down and sleep before we leave.
None of this is her fault, and I don’t blame her for whatever’s going on now between Ben and me—at least, logically I don’t. But I don’t exactly want to spend any more time in the same room with her than I absolutely have to. Not even an extra minute.
She makes me feel . . . crowded.
When I’m in that room with her, it’s like I can’t move without touching someone or bumping into them—it’s like everyone is in my personal space.
Her presence is stifling.
Instead of sitting there and pretending it’s normal, I wander around. But empty hospital beds, peeling paint, and the absence of anything alive is the last thing I need.
Then I find the roof.
I never realized there could be so many stars. The only other light is the full moon and some faint red lights off in the distance.
I’m sitting on the edge of the roof, my legs dangling over the side, when I hear the hinges of the door creak. “Don’t let it swing shut,” I call, assuming it’s Barclay. “It locks from the inside.”
“Got it.”
It’s Ben’s voice, and I freeze at the sound of it, my heart picking up speed, thumping harder against my chest, as if it’s straining to know whether he’s going to come over or just fade back inside.
I hold my breath as I wait.
And suddenly he’s beside me, sitting down next to me. We’re not quite touching, but I can feel the warmth of his body next to mine.
“I was wondering where you went,” he says.
“I just needed some air.”
He nods. I feel the movement next to me.
I don’t say anything, and Ben seems comfortable with the silence. I’m not sure how much time passes like that—the two of us, side by side, yet somehow so far away.
When he finally breaks the silence, he says, “Those red lights out there . . .”
“What about them?”
“They’re trees.”
“Trees?”
“I checked it out a few nights ago,” he says. “They’re really close to one of the nuclear power plants that got taken out. The fallout from that is actually probably what ended up destroying this whole area. The radiation there is still so bad, like three hundred thousand times what could kill a person, or more, that the trees glow in the dark because they’ve absorbed so much of it.”
I don’t ask why he knows that. I kind of like that he does, because it reminds me of the guy who sat next to me in AP English just a few months ago, the guy who crashed my AP Physics class because it would be a good place for us to hang out.
But this isn’t what I want him to say right now. It’s a start, but I just want something . . . more.
More real. More meaningful.
Just more.
But he doesn’t say anything, and again we lapse into silence. It’s not a comfortable one, not like we could have shared before all of this. It’s awkward, like two people who want something from each other but don’t know how to express it.
It’s like we’re broken, and I don’t know what we can do—if anything—to fix that.
“We’re going to make it,” Ben says, breaking the silence.
I nod, even though I’m not sure I believe it. We’re one IA agent and three teenagers, and we’re up against some of the worst criminals in the multiverse.
“I love you,” he adds.
And I realize he’s not talking about whatever is going to happen at the processing center. He’s talking about us—about him and me. He thinks we’re going to make it. That we’re going to be okay.
It’s what I thought I wanted to hear. More than that, it’s what I’ve been waiting to hear from him since I first realized I was falling for him. Just a few hours ago, what I wanted more than anything was for him to tell me that what Elijah said was true, that he was planning to come back. That if IA hadn’t grabbed him, he was going to come back to my world and to me.
But now he’s saying that and I can’t help but think about the consequences. If he does come back with me, then what? Sure, it might be great for a little while, but in five years or in twenty? What if he regrets his decision, what if he decides to leave then? I feel like I can’t take that chance.
For four months I looked for Ben. For 120 days, I thought about him. Every time a door opened or I walked into a room, I looked for him. I was jumpy and on edge, and . . . waiting.
I’m just not willing to put myself through that again.
For a long time I don’t say anything. Then I feel Ben’s hand cover mine. His skin is rough and calloused like I remember it, and it takes everything I have to ignore the wave of sheer yearning that sweeps over me. I want so desperately to lean my head against his shoulder and pretend we’re just stargazing and not two people looking out into the end of the world.
“After all this, I’m going to come back with you,” he whispers. “I thought about you all the time.”
I squeeze his hand, because I’m not sure I can form words.
Ben turns toward me, and even in the dark, I can see the tragic beauty of his face, his deep-set eyes and hard jaw, the way his hair is too long, how it flops into his face and covers his eyes.
Flushed and breathless, I lean into him, our foreheads touching, our noses brushing against each other, his breath warm against my cheek.
And right when I think he’s going to kiss me, I say, “We can’t be together.”
02:11:06:14
He reels back and I see the surprise in his face and the hurt in those brown eyes, and somehow that makes it worse. It’s not that I want to hurt him. I just need to save myself from getting hurt again.
I push to my feet and start walking away.
“Wait,” Ben says, and I can hear him following me even though I don’t look back. “Why are you running away?”
I turn around, but keep walking backward. “You have a family and a life in your own world, and I have one in mine.”
“And I’m saying I want to be a part of yours.”
“But you can’t!” I shout. “Look what happened today. I walked in on you with another version of me. I can’t even begin to explain how messed up that is.”
“I know, and I should have known,” he says. “
I’ll make it up to you, I promise. I’ll—”
I shake my head. “It’s not about that. It’s . . . If I needed a sign from the multiverse that we’re not supposed to be together, that was it.” I take a deep breath and ignore the way my eyes sting. “How we feel about each other doesn’t matter. We’re from two different worlds and being together has only hurt us—both of us.”
“You don’t really believe that,” he whispers.
“I do,” I say, my voice cracking. “My world is falling apart, and we’re both wanted criminals. You abducted people from their worlds, and you did it for me. And I broke out of a prison and became a fugitive and a murderer.”
I press the heel of my palm to the center of my chest to try to hold on to some semblance of self-control.
“I killed a man.”
Ben’s voice comes out quiet, calm, and even, everything that mine is not. “That wasn’t your fault.”
“I shoved a piece of glass into his neck and felt his life bleed out all over my hands,” I say, and hearing the words out loud makes them more true. And that makes my eyes burn and my throat constrict because those words shouldn’t belong to me.
I have to pause and catch my breath. “We’ve both ruined people’s lives in the name of being together.”
I turn around and head to the door. I don’t look back. This time, he doesn’t follow me, but as I’m pushing it open, he says something. It’s quiet, and I can’t quite make out the words so I’m not sure if he meant for me to hear them or not.
When I turn, I don’t ask him to repeat himself. But he does anyway. “So you think we’re doomed?”
“Aren’t we?” I whisper.
“How am I supposed to forget how I feel about you,” he says, and it’s not a question.
“I don’t know,” I say. It’s the truth. But I also don’t know how we can be together. So I say something stupid, something that I’ve heard other people say because they don’t get it. The wrongness of the words makes me stumble over them. “It won’t feel like the end of the world forever.”
And then I slip through the door, careful not to let it latch behind me.
02:06:00:00
I’m not sure I’ve ever been so in need of coffee.
It’s three a.m. I tossed and turned through the couple of hours we had to sleep and I can’t be certain if I nodded off at one point or just lost track of time. I’m awake, dressed—not showered, but as ready as I’ll ever be.
I have Barclay’s 9mm HM USP Match and an extra magazine in case I run out.
We’re all here.
“Earth 49873 is going to be the safest place for you,” Barclay says. “It’s got civilization, unlike this place, but it’s one of the universes that barely has any IA presence.”
My double shifts on her feet. She’s wearing jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt, and Ben’s hoodie—and even though I shouldn’t care about that, it bothers me. “Why can’t I just stay here?”
Barclay doesn’t tell her that he doesn’t want her to somehow lead people to us, that he wants to be able to come back here. Instead he says, “What if we don’t make it back? Who knows what effects the radiation could have on you if you’re here too long. You’d probably be dead or out of your mind within a week.”
She frowns. “All right, I guess I’m ready.”
“Just remember what I told you,” Barclay adds. “The industrial revolution never happened, so things will be really different. You need to learn the culture and assimilate—and quickly.”
“Sounds like a blast,” she says, the sarcasm dripping off her in waves.
Barclay’s nostrils flare a little in annoyance, and in another situation, I would want to smile. I like that she can push his buttons.
“I’m serious. If you stand out, they’ll notice you, and you’ll end up dead,” he says.
She doesn’t look at him when she says, “Yeah, I got it.”
The inherent sadness of what’s about to happen weighs down on me, and I take a deep breath to try to balance myself. Barclay is going to open a portal, and this girl who’s lost everything is going to walk into another universe where she won’t know a soul, and she has no idea what to expect—other than the fact that if IA finds her, she’s as good as dead.
I wonder what’s going through her mind, if there’s any interest, even a spark, at the idea of seeing not just another world, but one that’s practically a window into the past. If she’s scared. Looking at her, she just seems bitter.
“Let’s get this over with,” she says.
Barclay points the quantum charger at the ground, but as he’s about to open the portal, I give her a chance.
“Wait,” I say, reaching for her.
She flinches away.
“You don’t have to go,” I say, ignoring the way Barclay is looking at me. “You could come with us—help us.”
“Go . . . go with you?” She shakes her head. “Why would I want to do that?”
“Because of what they did to you.” They beat her, made her pretend she was someone else, and then when she’d played her part, they left her to rot in a prison cell.
She either doesn’t remember or she doesn’t care. She just stares at me with a doe-eyed expression I can’t imagine on my own face.
“You can help take them down, make right the things they’ve done, help get them put away.”
Her lips turn into a sad smile. “Or I could end up in the same place I was in six months ago—or worse. Better to run now. Maybe I’ll luck out and they’ll think I’m dead.”
Maybe she doesn’t get it. I’m not sure why I can’t drop it—why I can’t just let it go. But I can’t. She’s got as much stake in this as any of us—maybe more. “But if you run, you might not ever be able to go home.”
Her laugh is harsh. “What home? Prima? I don’t have anything waiting for me back there.” I open my mouth, but she doesn’t let me say anything else. “Look, I’m not willing to die yet. I’ll do what I have to—you do the same.”
And with that she turns to Ben. “Thanks for getting me out.”
His eyes flick to me, but I look away.
She doesn’t look at any of us as she closes her eyes and steps into the portal, but I can’t take my eyes off her as she disappears through it.
“Glad that’s fucking over with.” Elijah looks at me, his lips turned up in a smirk. “Also glad you’re the version we got. Someone should have gotten their money back for that one.”
I smile, but I don’t feel it.
02:05:44:22
When we portal in, we’ll walk right into the main office of the processing center.
Before Barclay opens the portal, he grabs my arm. “Don’t hold your breath.”
I nod and shift my grip on the USP Match. I think of the guard I killed. Then I remind myself that there’s no other way, that in two days and five hours we could all be dead. The portal opens and Barclay goes through. I follow immediately behind him, gun raised and trying to breathe normally.
Freezing-cold air whips into my lungs, then it turns warm—too warm, and I feel like I’m breathing fire, but I refuse to let myself tense up.
And then we’re there.
I relax my knees and let them give a little to keep myself from stumbling. True to Ben’s description, there are six guys hanging out in front of the computer monitors in the processing center, which is a large circular office with glass walls that overlooks the six lower levels of the prison. They’re all startled and fumbling for weapons.
“Arms behind your head,” Barclay is screaming. “Get down on the ground!”
I train my gun on the guy who looks like he’s in charge, a big bulky brute of a guy in a T-shirt and cargo pants, as Ben and Elijah come through the portal behind me, guns raised and spreading out with their backs to the window—just like Barclay instructed.
My grip on the gun is relaxed, my arms slightly bent at the elbows. The safety is already off, and my finger is on the trigger. The pounding of my heart echoes agai
nst my eardrums. I tune out the sounds around us, as if I’m at the shooting range—as if the men in front of me are targets. I know from experience that if I fire off ten shots, all ten of them will be fatal.
They’re not outnumbered, but they are out-gunned, and apparently that makes up for it. All six guys reluctantly raise their arms, some of them more hesitantly than others. Barclay moves to the first one, and I flank him just in case the guy tries to do something stupid.
But he doesn’t. He lets Barclay restrain his hands behind his back and lower him facedown on the ground, something Barclay repeats with every guy in here. I follow him, keeping my gun aimed at their heads. I speak evenly and tell each one that if he makes the wrong move, I’ll put a bullet between his eyes.
My voice is so cold, I barely recognize myself.
When we get to the last guy, I see his eyes dart around, as if he’s looking for a way out. His hand twitches and I nod toward the gun at his hip. “You’ll be dead before you get your hand on it.”
Barclay smirks and grabs the guy’s left arm, folding it behind his back. “Better not try her, Basil. She almost shot me once.”
Basil doesn’t find that as funny as Barclay apparently does, but he stays still and lets Barclay restrain him. Then he looks behind me at Ben, with nothing but pure hatred on his face.
“You drink my beer and tell me about your girlfriend and your dog, and how much you miss them, and you listen to me tell you about my family, and now you come back here and point a gun in my face?” he says. “I kept you safe here. I thought we were comrades.”
I risk a glance at Ben. His face is flushed. His gun raised, his hand quivers as he points it at this supposed comrade. “You rape the Unwilling and put out your cigarettes on their skin,” Ben says.
“Don’t,” I say, moving toward him. I don’t care what this guy has done, how awful he is. We’re here to save the slaves and get the proof we need. I think of the guard I killed and the way his eye looked when he was gone, how his blood spilled warm over my skin when he died. I’ll defend my own life and the lives of everyone here, but we need to get through this without killing anyone else if we can.