by Logan Keys
“Where are we?” I ask.
This is a new landscape.
“The beach,” Tommy says. He frowns. “You’ve never been here? Let me show you around.”
Tommy takes my hand and I glance down to see that my feet are bare and sinking into wet sand.
“It’s pretty,” I say, looking at the distant sunset. The sky’s turning pink.
“Yeah,” he replies, sounding excited. “I wanted to show you. We can sit here and watch the sun go down.”
He glances at me. I nod that I will, and he grins. Tommy leads me to what feels like the edge of the world. “This where we landed before. We fought a battle here with the Authority, and then we lost. But now look, see? They took it back.”
“Yes.” I smile because his good ole boy charm is infectious as always.
A sinking feeling in my gut reminds me this isn’t real as we sit together in the pretty setting. Because somehow this too will turn.
I mutter under my breath over and over, “Wake up. Wake up. Wake up.”
“Liza,” Tommy chides. “You can relax. Nothing bad will happen.”
But it will. I almost say it out loud, but then he’s gone. He just disappears.
“Come on in the waters fine!”
I spin toward the ocean. Tommy’s in the waves up to his waist.
My mouth drops open. “Tommy!” I scream.
Behind him rises a tidal wave of red water.
“Look out!”
But it’s coming for us both.
He stays there not moving.
I watch it rush onward.
Swallow him whole.
And then it hits me too.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Crystal
Jeremy’s awake. I mean really awake. He’s up and pacing and angry.
“I’ve never felt a rage as I do now. My sister should have died in her home. Surrounded by her family. One who loves her.” He shoots a glare in my direction.
“Use it, Jeremy. That’s fuel for your work.”
“Where are they?”
“The Skulls or..?”
“My family.”
“Your father---”
He waves a hand in the air. “I know he’s dead.”
Jeremy doesn’t mention Liza. His eyes dart away like he’s avoiding looking at the empty air that a moment ago held her ghost for him.
I don’t say that she’s alive. Instead I say, “Your mother’s purging the citizens. We have to make our move.”
“I know.”
“But?”
“Not yet.” He sits down, defeated, running a hand through his long hair. “Where’s Phillip,” he asks.
“On his way to Anthem, hopefully.”
“From where?”
“A mission.”
He nods. He doesn’t care. Not yet.
“When will we return, Jeremy, when?”
“God, Crystal! I’ve just lost my sister! I need a moment.”
“We’ve needed a “moment” since day one. Every other moment is in need of a moment after. But every moment costs them! Jeremy, every single second counts.”
Jeremy is staring at me but sees nothing. The fog has got him. Whatever is wrong with him is happening more and more. Used too, there were warnings. Now, just one instant we are talking, the next, he’s gone.
I wave a hand in front of his face.
Nothing.
I turn to find the doctor
Chapter Twenty-Five
Crystal
I knew Jeremy would be wary of me letting Phillip into the skulls, but what choice did I have?
“He helped us.”
Jeremy’s purple eyes, now matching the skin around them where he’d bruised up like a piece of fruit during his imprisonment, stares back at me realizing that’s all I’ll say on the matter. My argument is just that. He’s the talker, not me.
“Fine,” he says. “But look.” He grabs my hands and pulls me close.
“Yes,” I say, hating my traitorous girlish heart that picks up beats.
“Thank you is what I wanted to say,” he murmurs.
That’s all, I think, breath held.
And I do it. I kiss him. I know I shouldn’t but I can’t help myself. I love this boy as much as I love my own worthless hide and he kisses me back.
He doesn’t love me back, but he kisses me back and I’ll take it.
And I wrap my arms around him. I pull him flush against me and use my curves for all they are worth and I bet him with my body to not be interested enough to fall off that cliff with me, so I’m not alone.
Jeremy turns his head, deepens our kiss, and for one moment the passion that is his, passes between us and it ignites me. I’m believing in every bit of his work and I believe in him all over again because he’s like that.
He’s energy and goodness, but sometimes not as good as he is passionate, but a little bit spills over and I want it---I want it all, and I want him---
But then he stops.
“Crystal,” he says.
“I know,” I answer.
I don’t want him to put his precious words to our feelings. So, I say, “I know,” more firmly and I step away.
I’m proud of myself because if I can step away then I can do this. I can build a rebel team of Skulls to take on the Authority and I can create anything if I can step away from this passion. Unlike him, I’m the one who puts the cause above all else for once, and I will love my job as leader more than Jeremy Writer. I will do that.
I will love this country more than I love the Skulls even.
I will love this city more than I love myself.
“Phillip,” I say. “You can be a skull.”
He gives a humorless laugh. “So, you got permission then…?”
I stiffen. “I don’t need permission. I’m not even sure why you want to be one…”
“But you asked him.”
“I did.”
I don’t want to but I color. I turn bright red like a Christmas bulb on the brightest freaking Christmassy Christmas tree ever.
Phillip doesn’t just notice. He stops everything to gawk at me like I’m infected and I am infectious, so he better not come any closer.
I grind my teeth, try to look tough.
He’s not buying it.
“You really need this guy?” he asks me.
“What choice do I have? If we lost Jeremy, we’d lose everything.”
Phillip’s eyes turn curious. “You think so? Is that the leader talking or you?”
No one’s ever mentioned it before. My affections. Or even tried. They’d have had the fight of their life on their hands if they had. Phillip’s lucky I’m too tired to argue.
“It’s both,” I say. “Jeremy is an integral part of this operation. He always will be. If you don’t like it, there’s the door.”
“So that’s that, then? Hey, no worries. I plan on sticking around either way, but I’d like to see your priorities weighted better.”
I show my teeth. I’m so angry I could bite him.
The glittering eyes flicker away and he moves to grab his shirt. He punches his arms threw the holes, his muscles rippling, making me realize for the first time how truly attractive the wolf really is. Then I feel silly for the fact that I don’t even notice other men anymore. Ever. Jeremy’s a whirlwind and enough on a girl’s hand… even if it’s just a one-sided crush, it’s… crushing.
I shut that part of my brain off and look at Phillip. Not in contrast. Not in comparison. He’s all bronze skin and gorgeous ink. Loads of work on his body in both arenas.
I shake my head. At myself. At the world. Since when do I look at men or women as more than a tool to fight against the Authority? Since Jeremy. Since Phillip.
That’s when.
Son of a bitch.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Crystal
And Phillip wants me, too.
It only takes me a week to finally get it through my thick head.
Jeremy fi
nally recovered from his purging and was back to his usual Yo-Yo self, and he started writing. And he wrote and wrote and wrote. Every morning I’d go into his room to find him practically naked between the pages on his bed as if they were women he’d loved all night.
I’d collect them one by one from his sweaty sheets, the musky smell on the pages making me think of things I’d rather not, and he’d turn just enough to show me himself, and I’d find myself staring. Not at his body.
At the scars.
Jeremy’s scars bother me more than my own. The ones across his back, red and livid still, angry, ruined lines from nape to rump. They must have put him up there and let him rip himself down a few times. They must have known who he was.
The first time I’d seen them, I shook with rage. Today, I sit on the bed and cry.
He wakes up but doesn’t turn his head to look at me. He lets me have that much dignity.
I’d always wanted Jeremy. From the moment we met, back when our parents had parties and balls together to celebrate the Authority’s rule. And from the first night we both had this shared energy of rebellion at one such celebration. We both had stepped outside, and I had ripped my hair down from its pretty bun and he had rubbed a hand through his gelled head to mess it up and we’d smiled at one another in our impotent positions. We’d grinned. Finally, we’d found someone else who was as disgusted with humanity.
We were just two kids who would not only walk away and never look back, but we’d start something that would start something and something else and another thing and now it’s got eight legs and it’s rushing off into the darkness carrying the torch with it.
“Spiders,” I say, now, to Jeremy after wiping my eyes.
“Spiders?”
“Yeah.” I sniff and get ahold of myself. “There was this crazy scientist who used to work for my father. She was the one who helped create the purging program. She had all these spiders in her lab. She used to say they are the most resilient animal alive. She was obsessed. And that started the rumor that the stuff they put in us during the purge is spider venom. But I don’t believe it is.”
Jeremy looks at me unsure of where I’m going with this.
“I say that if we get caught. We get purged. We get a spider tattoo. We embrace it.”
He grins. His purple eyes light up. “I like that.”
“Wanna take a trip to the black market with me?”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Dallas
I recognize him right off.
A handsome man with bright hair and a glowing face---opposite to what I know him to be, but I still spot him straight out of the group of others. It’s like I knew him all along. But as the crowd flows by, they don’t see him.
He doesn’t see me either, he’s too busy staring at the rude people running into him, almost over him, in their rush.
They ignore him as he says, “Hey. Excuse me.”
People start brushing into him even harder. Then they almost knock him down.
I try to get to him, to help, and soon a wave of people has overcome the tall man in the hustle.
“Shade,” I call out, but then wonder if in dreamland he’d even answer to that name.
He wasn’t always Shade. Then again, I wasn’t always Dallas.
Careful, because I know how easily it upsets a person when they find me inside of their dreams---I’ve tripped into a few, it’s too personal---they become aware, then they become embarrassed. I learn their fears, their loves, what they miss most.
I’d hate for them to be in my dreams, so I get it.
But when Shade is swarmed with bodies, run over, and is beaten down, suffocating beneath an endless flow of humans, I can’t help myself.
I rush over, and I yank people away until I find his hand. Gripping him tightly, I pull him out of the pile.
He breaks free, shrugging me off, running from the crowd a few steps, breathing hard, eyes wild.
Shade looks so haunted that I feel like I should look away, give him privacy.
When he turns to face me, confusion clouding his bright green eyes, a gorgeous color of moss ---no more red lasers, no shadow face, these irises are clear and baleful, but now his gaze flickers between anger and fear---he whispers, “Dallas…?”
I sense his shame, but he stands tall.
“I understand,” I say with a lame gesture toward the people who now walk around us without disruption.
“Do you?” he asks placing his hands in his pockets.
“Yes,” I try. “I don’t get to live in the day. You don’t get to live in either. That part, from my own past, yeah, I get it. Being invisible.”
I place a hand through my hair, then drop it by my side.
He stares at my hand, and I try to distract from the awkwardness of his gaze of longing.
My smile is easy. “You are mighty handsome there, Shade.”
I want to ask him his real name. But…how dare I?
“This is a new look for you, as well.” He motions to the mirrors that appear along the wall.
In the image, I’m me. The normal version. Auburn hair, freckles, green eyes much darker than his own, and without any vampire moonlike skin. Gone are the bright red eyes, and the scary teeth. Jeans and a t-shirt cling to my frame instead of leather.
“What now?” I ask. “I’ve never just hung out in a dream before.”
He smiles. It’s too brilliant to be real. “We could get something to eat.” He turns and creates a food court.
“Food,” I say, frowning. How long has it been since I’ve eaten a regular meal? “Can you eat? I mean when you’re awake.”
“No.”
“Not at all?”
“Not at all,” he says, and the words drop like a thousand-pound elephant in every room.
Maybe I’d prefer that.
“But in here,” he says, “we can eat normal food. Sounds nice, huh?”
I’m the one knocking people over now. I want a cheeseburger. “We can have anything we want, right?” I ask, and Shade grins.
And we do. We eat burgers and fries and it feels so real. We people watch. His mind hasn’t forgotten a thing of normalcy and our past.
“I miss this,” I say.
“I figured you were too young.”
“Yeah grandpa, I was born after the zombies, right?” I shake my head. “They were about when I was probably nine, but nothing endemic. The world was the same longer to me than anyone. We stayed at the farm far after the Authority left and built Anthem. It was like a bubble that all of that evil couldn’t touch.” I clear my throat. “Tommy… and I…” I nearly choke on my dream burger.
“So, you’ve never been to Anthem.”
“Nope.”
“I have. I mean, early on. I saw the walls. Never got inside. Sometimes I wonder if it’s still there or if the guards are just rogue and running off a memory.”
I shrug. Conspiracy is the way of life now. “Then we went to the Underground here. We joined.”
“And?”
I shrug again and squirt some ketchup out of the bottle, staring at it like a marvel.
He gets me. He stops asking.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Dallas
I’m in Shade’s dream again today.
“You came,” he says.
“You nap a lot,” I reply.
So, Shade must day-sleep like I do. So few people are actually asleep during the day. Bradford must get his night’s rest at certain points, because I can’t lock onto his mind whatsoever.
Then I find myself drifting to Shade. I can’t help it. “I’m supposed to be in Bradford’s.”
“I just worked out in the gym,” he says. “I imagine all these cool machines we never had.”
“Did you do that a lot? Before?”
“Yeah.”
I keep watching him even as he strips down and enters the shower. The dream does that to people. It’s like being drunk. They don’t feel sober enough to worry about things like nudity or em
barrassments because it’s not real. And I don’t worry about seeing them naked because it’s like watching a movie for me. You don’t feel embarrassed for the people on the screen.
Shade’s under the spray, water dripping off his perfect face. He turns away, and his back is ripped with muscle.
“I know you’re still there,” he says.
“You dream of showering.”
“Yeah. I dream of normalcy. A good hot shower. Man, I miss that more than food. Our generators are shot. We only use them for light now. Which I don’t need, anyway.”
“The girls have hot water.”
“Figures. They are smarter. Wanna join me?”
I back away. This too, I’ve noticed, is the bolder sense of “unreal” that becomes part of the dream. You can make mistakes in here, because, what does it matter?
It matters.
“No,” I say, and I look away. I’m trying to get out of his dream. I try to control it.
“Dallas,” he whispers.
And then I’m back in my bed.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Dallas
I’m in my own dream today. I’m in my kitchen, and the same as always, I’m in a normal outfit and cooking. I glance out of the window, the place is overgrown already, and when I check again, my outfit has changed and everything is aged.
So soon? This is premature to my other dreams like this.
Outside, the sky is orange and there are no children.
I risk a glance where he should be, but there is only a shadow in the furthest corner.
Shade is here. And he’s watching me.
“Are you really there?” I say.
Is he a dream? Or is this himself brought into mine?
“Yes.”
I wildly glance around, and shout, “You must leave! What if he comes back!”
Or what if Shade sees the other part with my father? Or with Toby.
What if he sees Tommy?
“Get out!”
I sit up in my bed, sweat soaking my clothes, my eyes searching the room just to be sure. I relax when I verify I’m good and awake, and alone. I curl into a ball.