I hear the old Chinese man mumbling something incoherent. It sounds like a prayer.
The woman’s voice is back. Echoing and ghostly in my mind.
“Find me.”
Then a fiery flash blazes behind my eyelids, robbing my entire world of color. Of shape. Of meaning. Mercifully, my body turns off. Shuts down.
And I fall, fall, fall.
Into the infinite white.
26
TRIGGERED
An artificial light shines from above, illuminating the confined space I’m standing in. It’s rectangular with a low ceiling. Like a large box. Walls made of steel. It’s full of people and strange smells. A darkened world blurs by outside a smudged window.
We are moving.
The ground rumbles beneath my feet.
I’m suddenly lurched violently to the side as the vehicle jerks left. I grab on to a smooth metal pole that protrudes from the floor. It keeps me from falling.
I glance around, confused by my surroundings.
Where am I?
What is this place?
Brightly colored moving pictures project onto flat screens embedded in the wall. One in particular catches my attention. A beautiful woman stares out from behind the paper-thin glass. She has creamy white skin, iridescent pink lips, shimmering bright blue eyes. She looks right at me and smiles coyly, ready to tell me a secret.
From somewhere overhead, a friendly male voice speaks: “This is a Bronx-bound 6 train. The next stop is Fifty-Ninth Street.”
Train.
I’m on a train.
But why?
Where am I going?
What is “Bronx”?
Someone taps me on the back and I jump. I turn around to see a man covered in grime and dirt and wrinkles. He holds a piece of cardboard in his hand. The word hungry is scribbled in shaky black handwriting.
He holds out his hand, uncurls his fingers. He wants something. Food, I presume. But I have nothing to give him.
There’s a loud screech and I feel the world start to slow. Pull to a stop.
Desperation stings my throat. I need to find something. Something important.
But what?
I let go of the pole and spin in slow circles, scanning the interior of the train car. My gaze falls on one of the screens on the wall. The woman’s face is gone, replaced by a news report. A man is standing outside a tall, curved blue building with trees surrounding the perimeter.
He’s saying something but the sound is muted. His speech is being transcribed and printed on the bottom of the screen. I catch a few sporadic words like vaccine, symptoms, fever. But it’s not the transcript that snags my attention. My eyes are suddenly pulled by an unseen, unknown force. Up, up, up. Above the man’s head. Until they land on small black text that reads:
February 11, 2032. 2:45 p.m.
And instantly I know this is what I’ve been looking for.
A date and time.
A destination.
27
STOLEN
A rush of gentle energy surges into my body, pulling me out of the memory. Warming me from the inside. Like my veins are no longer filled with blood, but with fire.
But it’s not the same fire that nearly burned me at the stake. It’s the good kind. The kind that warms you when you’re cold. Lights up dark rooms. Brings people together around it.
The splitting pain in my head is gone. Long gone. And somehow I feel certain that it will never return. That I will never feel pain again.
Everything has gone still and beautifully quiet. This peacefulness is now a permanent part of me. As unchanging as my tattoo.
I feel light radiating from the top of my head.
And in a moment that seems to last forever, I forget all of my problems.
All of my strife.
I simply forget …
But then my eyes flutter open and I see Kaelen crouched over me, his hand resting delicately across my forehead, and I panic.
I roll to the side, twisting my head away from his touch.
The illusion shatters around me. The warmth running under my skin turns to ice. The glow emanating from my head is immediately snuffed out and I’m left with nothing but heartache and sadness and reminders of Zen lying unconscious in that bed. Waiting for me to return. Waiting for me to save him.
“What are you doing?” I ask, leaping to my feet and glaring fiercely at Kaelen. We’re still inside the old Chinese man’s shop. But he’s nowhere to be found. I’m willing to guess he ran after I passed out.
“The subway,” Kaelen says authoritatively, blatantly ignoring my question and rising from his crouch. “We need to get to the nearest subway station.”
My forehead crinkles. “What?”
“It runs underground.” It’s as though he’s speaking to himself. Living on his own planet where there are only assignments and missions and where pleasing Alixter is the equivalent of breathing oxygen.
“We have to find the Bronx-bound 6 train,” he continues.
Bronx-bound 6 train.
My thoughts are hazy and dim but I know that sounds familiar.
Why do I know those words?
He glances at his watch. “We need to pass through the Fifty-Ninth Street station in one hour.”
“The next stop is Fifty-Ninth Street…”
Wait.
Those words. That stop. The train. They’re all from my memory. The one I just had. Only a few minutes ago.
How did he…?
My hand immediately flies to my forehead. It’s still warm from Kaelen’s touch. My chest tightens. My teeth clench.
I know that touch.
The warmth it brings. The spark. The fire. The way it’s able to lift me out of whatever grief, whatever sorrow, whatever horror I’m experiencing.
I’ve felt it before.
Except it wasn’t here. It wasn’t in this year. It was a long, long time ago. Centuries before. When I thought Zen was dead. When I thought that I was about to die, too.
I can still hear the creaking of the massive iron door being pulled open. The soft footsteps entering. The muted swish of the robe.
“The priest has come to hear your last confession and bless your soul.”
My eyes flash with rage as I glare at Kaelen. “You,” I spit out.
He’s already moving toward the door. “What?”
“You were there!” I accuse him. “You were in my prison cell in 1609.”
He stops, seemingly frozen, with his hand on the doorknob. But he doesn’t turn around.
“We have to go,” is the only thing he says.
“No!” I shout back. “Not until you tell me the truth!”
Finally, he turns, his face as hardened and callous as ever. “Sera,” he says sternly, “we don’t have time for this. If you refuse to transesse with me, then we have to leave now.”
I ignore him. “That’s how you were able to see the first memory. That’s how you knew the time-delayed recalls were even there. How you knew to bring me to 2032 after the fire. You came to my cell posing as a priest. You touched me and somehow read my mind.”
“Yes,” he admits. “I did.”
I cross my arms over my chest, indicating that I won’t be cooperating any further until he explains himself.
He seems to understand. “Your trial appeared on the historical archives. One of the researchers at Diotech found it. She recognized your face from the sketch on the poster and your abilities from the accusations brought against you. I was sent to investigate. I posed as a priest in order to perform a brain scan. I took the results back to Diotech to be analyzed. That’s when they found the TDRs and the first memory pointing to this year. Consequently, I returned to 1609 to pull you from the fire and I brought you here.” He raises his eyebrows at me. “Satisfied?”
My head is spinning.
Satisfied?!
No, I’m not satisfied.
I feel violated. Betrayed. Enraged!
Something happened to me when t
hat priest touched me. Somehow, just for a fleeting moment, I felt like everything was going to be okay. I felt … happy.
Was it all fake? Was it some kind of trick to lull me into a false sense of security so I wouldn’t suspect what was really happening?
“And just now”—I press on through gritted teeth—“you read my memories the same way. By touching my head.”
Kaelen’s face tightens. I can tell this is not a conversation he wants to be having. But he answers anyway. “Yes.”
“How?” I shoot back. “How is that even possible?”
Kaelen holds his hand to my face, palm out. “Nanoscanners,” he explains. “Transparent film secured to my fingertips, invisible to the naked eye. They scan memories upon contact and wirelessly transmit them to be stored here for Diotech to review later.” He reaches into his pocket and removes a familiar cube with a faint green glow around the edges.
A hard drive.
It looks similar to the one Zen stored my stolen memories on.
Kaelen points behind one of his ears. “But I’m able to read the memories as they transmit with my receptors.”
I tilt my head to peer through his head of thick, dark blond hair, just able to make out the small clear disk fused to his skin. It’s smaller than the one Zen used on me. Practically imperceptible if you don’t know to look for it.
I feel sick. I think I’m going to vomit. Miraculously, I manage to swallow the bile rising in my throat. It tastes bitter all the way down.
If he can touch me and see everything—my private memories, my most cherished moments with Zen, every thought I’ve ever had—then nothing in my brain is safe anymore.
Nothing in my life is safe.
“Can we go now?” Kaelen asks, placing his hand back on the doorknob. “We have a train to catch.”
I feel frail. Hopeless. Like I just want to lie down on this floor and never get up. I don’t have the strength to fight him anymore. And even if I did, I don’t know how I could ever win. He’s faster. Stronger. Smarter. More capable in every way. He has every advantage over me.
How will I ever manage to outmaneuver him?
Any plan that I make can be stolen with a simple stroke of his hand. In fact, he probably already knows that I’ve been planning to double-cross him the moment I get any information about Zen’s cure. He probably already knows everything.
Why does it feel like no matter what I do, Diotech is always one step ahead of me?
Why does it feel like I’m constantly running and never getting anywhere?
Kaelen opens the blue door that leads back into Chinatown. I glance longingly at the outside world lying just beyond this tiny, cramped spaced. A world that once held so many possibilities. So many potential futures. So many promises of what could be.
Today I watched them all shrivel and die until only one remained.
This one.
The one where Diotech wins.
With a weak nod of my head, I follow Kaelen out the door.
28
TRAINED
The subway station is dark and musty and claustrophobic. Maybe it’s those long lonely days and nights of being locked up in the filthy prison cell that have seeped into my subconscious, or maybe it’s my flight instinct rearing up again, but the thought of being in such a confined space, so far underground, with limited escape routes is putting me on edge. Like the air has somehow lost its invisibility, turned dense and rough, scraping at my skin.
Plus we are surrounded by people. So very many people. Ready to squeeze me to death at any minute. I can’t understand how anyone lives in this crowded city where it seems as though you can never be alone.
Not to mention the stares. They follow us everywhere. Down the steps from the street, through the main level of the station, across the long dark corridors carved under the city. Kaelen still seems oblivious to the attention but I notice it. Sometimes I feel like I can’t notice anything else.
The eyes—the thousands of wandering, questioning, reproving eyes—they are all around us. They penetrate my clothes. They rip at my skin. They devour me.
I feel the constant urge to run. To hide. To huddle in a corner, shut my eyes tight, and try to disappear.
I shuffle feebly behind Kaelen as we descend another flight of stairs, bringing us deeper and deeper under the ground. We arrive on a platform full of more people.
A train is approaching. It slows and screeches to a stop. People exit. More people get on. I absentmindedly start to lumber toward the door, cringing as I allow myself to be drawn into the current of bodies. Until Kaelen’s arm juts out in front of me.
I manage to halt just before colliding with his arm.
Then I jump back, remembering the startling jolt of electricity I felt when we touched on the street earlier.
“We will not be taking this train,” he informs me, lowering his arm. “We will take the next one.”
I blink, trying to shake this heavy fog that seems to be following me around like an oversize shadow. But I know that’s probably not going to happen. Not while Diotech continues to hold all the power. Not until I can stop feeling so aggravatingly helpless.
“Why not?”
“Based on the frequency of the trains and the distance between here and the Fifty-Ninth Street station, I’ve calculated that we need to take the 6 train arriving here in exactly 3.2 minutes in order to pass through the correct station at exactly 2:45 p.m. The time that was indicated in your memory.”
I sigh and slouch. “That sounds complicated.”
He arches an eyebrow. “It would have been easier to transesse.”
I grunt and step a few paces away from him.
I’m grateful when the train departs and the platform clears again. But my relief only lasts a few seconds before more people begin descending the stairs, slowly filling in the empty space.
Where are they coming from?
Where do they go?
The sheer volume and the notion of housing and containing them all contorts my mind into loops and knots.
I look up and notice a young man watching me from a few feet away. He’s tall and muscular with hair cut very short. He’s carrying a black bag over his shoulder. His lips are curved into an unnerving half smile that reminds me of the foxes I used to see on the Pattinsons’ farm. They would hide in the brush, watching small birds, waiting for one to fly down to pluck a seed from the earth, and then they would pounce, seizing the vulnerable little creature between their teeth and ripping its head off with one yank. The poor fluttering bird never had a chance.
When our eyes meet, the man immediately starts toward me. I wince and drop my gaze, trying to reverse whatever invitation he thought I was giving him. But it soon becomes apparent that he’s not deterred because I hear his footsteps clacking across the tiled platform. The clacking rises above the other sounds clamoring around me.
And then he’s standing beside me. And although I don’t dare look up to see his face, I can sense that same disturbing fox-like grin.
“Where did you come from?” he asks.
I have no idea what to do. Do I answer with something dismissive so that he leaves or do I just not reply and hope he goes away?
I opt to keep my mouth shut.
But this seems to have the opposite effect of what I intended.
“What’s the matter?” he says, irritation fraying the edges of his voice. “You too good to talk to me?”
I press my lips hard together, feeling them go numb. Then I give my head a subtle shake.
“You should know I don’t like girls who are rude to me.” He tugs at the strap around his shoulder. “Wanna see what’s in my bag?”
“No, thank you,” I say as politely as I can.
“She speaks,” he replies, and then, without warning, his hand is on my wrist, pulling me closer until my body is crushed against his and I’m forced to look at him, forced to breathe the same air as him.
“Let go,” I tell him, the politeness gone.
 
; He doesn’t comply. In fact, he only grips my wrist tighter. “You know,” he breathes, “you really should learn to be nicer to people.”
“Let go now,” I seethe.
“What if I don’t want to?” I hear amusement in his voice.
“Then I will make you.”
I don’t want to have to reveal my true abilities in front of all these people. I don’t want to cause that kind of scene. But I realize now that I may not have a choice.
He laughs quietly in my face. “I doubt that.”
With a firm jerk, I yank my wrist free. The man is suddenly in the air, soaring across the station and crashing into the tiled wall behind me. I glance curiously at my hand.
Did I just do that?
The answer comes a moment later when I look over to see Kaelen grabbing the man by the shirt and wrenching him up to his feet. He slams him hard against the wall again.
“What’s your problem, man?” the stranger roars, squirming to get free of Kaelen’s grasp. He attempts to take a swing at Kaelen’s face but isn’t fast enough. Kaelen ducks effortlessly and then presses his forearm against the man’s throat.
“Don’t touch her,” Kaelen growls.
If I thought we were drawing attention to ourselves before, it’s nothing like the audience Kaelen has attracted now. The entire platform has turned to watch the spectacle, as well as the people standing across the train tracks, who are craning to see what the commotion is.
I hurry over to Kaelen, careful not to touch him. “Kaelen, let him go.”
The man smirks. “Yeah, do what your girlfriend says, Kaelen. What kind of name is that?”
Kaelen’s forearm presses deeper into the man’s throat, causing him to gasp.
I hear a low rumble on the tracks behind us. “Kaelen,” I try again, “the train is coming. We have to make that train, remember?”
I watch comprehension register on his face and in an instant the man is slumped on the floor again, gasping for air and clutching his neck, which is already starting to show the bruises from Kaelen’s grip.
Without even a second thought, Kaelen turns and stalks callously through the swarm that has formed around us, people parting to make room for him.