“But…I don’t understand. If the Consortium’s in control and the nexus-nodes are still there, why hasn’t he logged out?”
“We think he went too deep into the newer CN-net patterning where the nexus-nodes don’t apply. Alexei can take a hell of a beating, but if he’s lost in there, I don’t know how we can get him back.”
“How can he be lost? Can’t you just send someone in to find him?” I shrieked.
Brody put his hands on my shoulders, holding me still when I might have flailed about. “The CN-net is vast. It’s a massive collection of information and stored data. Finding someone without meet-up coordinates is impossible. And he’s been in there a long time. The mind can glitch and get lost in its data flow. You can’t tell what’s CN-net programming and what’s memory. Time begins to slide and everything starts cycling together.”
“But…We have to get him out!”
“We’ve tried sending people after him, but we don’t know where to begin searching. We’ve sent pings hoping to show him the way back, but nothing. It’s almost as if he doesn’t want to be found,” Karol said.
“Thanks for giving up, Karol,” I snapped. “Thanks for being so fucking useless that you ruined everything.”
He flinched as if I’d slapped him, but I couldn’t bring myself to care.
“Felicia, it isn’t his fault,” Brody chided me. “He’s doing the best he can. We all are. We’re going to crack open Alexei’s memory blocks and see if that gives us clues where to search. I promise we’ll find him.”
“But that could take weeks! Minds can unravel without physical bodies. What happens to his body without his mind in it?”
Brody rubbed my arms. “This is Alexei Petriv we’re talking about. He’s overcome tougher things than this. We’ll get him back. I promise.”
Two of Wands, reversed. Okay, right. Unforeseen obstacles. And Temperance. I just needed to be patient. The cards said everything would be okay. To shape the future I wanted, I just had to believe in them.
“We need to keep this hidden from the other factions in the Consortium,” Luka said, hands in his pockets and looking thoughtful. “If Pavel or Sonya learn Alexei was affected this way, they may think there’s a power vacuum and attempt a coup.”
I stared at him, mind racing. “Then we’re not going to tell anyone,” I heard myself say. “We’ll just hold on until he wakes up. How many people know about this?”
“Just those of us here,” Stanis answered, also looking speculative. “It’s been kept quiet so far. We can move him to a private location, then cover for him while the tech-meds work on his memory blocks. For a few weeks, we could do this.”
“And if anyone asks to see him, or tries to ping him? Then what?” Brody asked.
“Then you say he’s with me and we’re visiting my family,” I said, thinking quickly. “We’ll be gone for two weeks and can’t be reached.”
“Who would buy that?” Luka looked skeptical, like he couldn’t believe anyone would want to spend that much time with any one woman. It went a long way to explaining why he was single.
“I’m his wife, I almost died, and he fucking adores me. If I want to visit my family for two weeks in the middle of a Consortium crisis, he’ll do it,” I all but growled at him. I may have even stomped my foot. Then I threw out, because Luka looked like he would object with something even more stupid, “Plus I’m pregnant, so I’m basically guaranteed a free pass for everything I do right now.”
Complete silence followed my revelation as I shut the room down. Everyone looked at me and my flat stomach as if expecting a baby to drop out at any second. Idiots.
“Is this true?” Karol asked first, voice hesitant.
“Yes, it’s true. I’m pregnant.” I felt my cheeks flush but kept on talking since I was so determined to dig this conversational hole. “That means we need to keep him alive and fix this because I don’t want my baby growing up without a father.”
“Well then,” Brody said, rubbing a hand over his face. “I guess Operation Save Alexei’s Ass is underway.”
Activity burst to life around me, as if now that I’d given them a task, they knew what needed to be done. I ignored them, falling to my knees beside the chair and taking one of Alexei’s hands in mine. Temperance. All I needed to do was hang on and it would be over soon. Alexei would be back. Everything would be okay. We’d start planning for the future, and how we wanted to reshape the tri-system. And the baby. We’d plan for the baby. And take Feodor for walks. And handle Lotus’s monster christening. And reschedule the Ursa 3 launch to Callisto. There was so much we had to do. It could be a life so full, I wasn’t sure we had enough time to do it all. And I needed him in it. I couldn’t do this alone, didn’t want to. He’d said I was strong, but how was that possible without him? How could I go from the terror of thinking I’d murdered my husband to not knowing if he’d ever wake up again? This couldn’t be how things were supposed to play out. What was the point of having a luck gene if I couldn’t win the damned game?
“Alexei, you have to wake up,” I whispered, my lips to his ear. “You need to come back and live this life with me. The CN-net isn’t real, and I can’t ever be there with you. I don’t belong there. Everything you wanted is out here, waiting for you. You just have to come back and take it. Please wake up.”
Nothing happened, although what had I expected? That my plea would somehow miraculously break through and wake him up? If he was that far gone into the CN-net, nothing I did would pull him out. Still, I tapped out a shim, hoping it would reach him even if he’d lost himself in the shifting electronic reality.
“The cards say to wait for you and I will, but I’d rather not. You know how terrible I am at being patient. I want you here with me. You’re missing everything.”
Hands were on my shoulders, lifting me to my feet. Brody. He turned me to face him and smoothed back my mess of sleep-tangled hair.
“We need to start on cracking the memory blocks and making sure Alexei is properly monitored. Others in the Consortium will start sniffing around soon so we need to get this situation squared away. If they see you here in a disheveled mess, our cover story won’t work. And most important, don’t stress. You have a baby to think about. That takes priority. We’re going to figure this out, and we’ll get through it. I promise.”
“Okay,” I said, nodding and swiping at tears. “You’re right. This is temporary. Alexei will come out of the CN-net, and it will be fine. It has to be.”
I let Brody put his arm around my shoulders and lead me away. Tech-meds swooped in until I couldn’t see what was happening. They were talking in Russian and it was fast, low, and full of technical jargon I couldn’t follow. I had to trust they knew what they were doing.
Right now, everyone was united in a common goal, but if anyone suspected trouble, that unity would collapse. With One Gov gone and the Consortium fighting, the tri-system would fall apart. That couldn’t happen. Gods, I hoped it wouldn’t. The Judgment—it would all work out. Luck had what it wanted. There was a baby on the way and luck had ensured its own survival. Or did that mean Alexei was expendable now? Maybe he wasn’t coming back. Maybe—
“Felicia, stop,” Brody said, his voice stern, snapping me out of my own head. “I know that look. You’re panicking. That won’t help you or Alexei.”
I strained to look back to the recliner. “I know, but—”
“No buts. I know you, remember? I know you think you have a handle on the future since you read the Tarot, but you panic as much as the next person. Maybe even worse, because you’re trying so hard to understand how everything will play out. But we’ll handle this. You know we will.”
“I feel so helpless,” I whispered to Brody. “He’s lying there, and…I thought I’d killed him before at Soyuz Park. I went for sols thinking he was dead. And now this…What if he doesn’t come out of it…What if this happened because of the luck gene? What if it was always supposed to be like this? What if I’m supposed to move on witho
ut him?”
“Felicia, you control the luck gene, not the other way around. You’re not its pawn and it doesn’t use you to carry out its unfathomable plots. Further, I can’t imagine luck would go out of its way to make you so miserable. It’s a gift for you to use, but it doesn’t run your life without your say-so. It’s yours. Make the future you want. Own it.” His voice softened as he spoke. He hugged me and then rubbed his hands up and down my arms as if I’d been freezing on the elevator again. I had no idea I’d become so cold.
“Why are you always the voice of logic?”
“Someone has to be. For now, all we can do is stay out of the way and let everyone else work.”
I took a shuddering breath, fighting hard not to break down and instead be the person Alexei believed I was. “Okay,” I said, reluctantly letting him lead me away. “You’re right. I’m useless here. I can’t do anything except hold his hand, and that’s not going to fix anything.”
Brody ushered me past the wall of chain-breakers. At the doorway, I cast a look back at the tech-meds. At Stanis and Luka directing chain-breakers forward as they prepared to move Alexei’s body onto a waiting table. I could barely see Alexei as they crowded him, and had to turn away, afraid I’d start crying and not be able to stop.
When I felt the flutter from my c-tex, I ignored it, overwhelmed with a pang of loss I couldn’t fight. This was the agony I’d held at bay while on the Martian Princess. This was the panic and terror I hadn’t let myself feel because I’d known it would cripple me. I’d fought it for so long, but now lacked the strength to stop it.
Out in the hall, my c-tex fluttered again. Stopped, then fluttered a third time. Then a fourth, all the shims coming in rapid succession until my arm began to itch.
With trembling hands, I released the first shim. However, it wasn’t series of messages, but rather a single word, repeated over and over. It filled up my display and all the considerable storage space the Consortium tech-meds had allotted me in the network.
“Wait.”
My knees turned to water. Brody barely caught me before I could hit the floor.
Alexei wanted me to wait for him. He was out there somewhere in the CN-net, trying to get back to me, telling me to wait for him. There was only one choice my heart could make. No matter how long it took: I would wait.
* * *
I had to wait another twenty-four hours. It wasn’t a hardship, but at the time, when I hadn’t known when Alexei would come back to me, it seemed pretty horrific.
He’d been placed in our bedroom in the underground condo, hooked up to machines that monitored his vitals, his brainwaves, the CN-net, and other things I couldn’t begin to guess at. Tech-meds came and went. Stanis, Luka, and Brody did the same. Lotus appeared, brought food, chatted about nothing and everything, made sure I showered, then went away. Feodor was there, then he wasn’t. I knew Lotus had him, giving me one less thing to worry about.
Now, I needed to figure out how to exist in this limbo of endless time. My life had become a revolving door of people coming and going, and I couldn’t keep track. I sat on the edge of the bed, held Alexei’s hand, talked to him, or lay quietly, always waiting.
When he opened his eyes a sol later, I’d been dozing fitfully. It was just the two of us and I startled awake, as if I’d somehow sensed him there. I found him watching me, lines of concentration furrowing his forehead. His blue eyes were narrowed, as if he didn’t quite know how he’d gotten there or what question to ask first.
“Felicia?” When he spoke, his voice was a raspy whisper from lack of use. “You are you, right?”
I sat bolt upright, moving so fast I had a moment of dizziness. It came as quickly as it went before I took his hand in mine and kissed it. I wanted to throw myself at him, but didn’t—which took a heroic amount of self-restraint on my part. Ditto for not bursting into tears. Now wasn’t about me, or giving in to my own panicked relief. It was about Alexei and making sure he was okay. It was about me being strong for him the same way he’d always been strong for me.
“Yes, it’s me. I’ve been waiting for you.”
“How long?”
“Just a sol.”
He closed his eyes, and something like relief washed over him. The worry left his expression and he let out a sigh. “I was afraid months had passed. Or years. I lost myself in the CN-net. I was trying to…I wanted to open all the doors for you.”
I frowned, confused. “The doors? What are you talking about?”
“You asked me once to open all the doors in the tri-system for you, if the Consortium ever took over. You’re not chipped. The scanners don’t work. So I did. They open for you now.”
He said this as if it was the most rational, logical thing in the world. My mouth opened and closed. Why risk himself for something so inconsequential? What an insane, stupid, crazy thing to do.
If I hadn’t already loved him, this would have been the thing that pushed me over the edge.
“What about future doors that aren’t built yet?” I heard myself ask. “Will those open too? On every world in the tri-system? Even Luna Prime? I heard they have special door seals there.”
“Yes, those too. I wanted to make sure I’d covered everything.”
He struggled to sit while I fumbled for words, momentarily speechless. Pulling myself together, I helped him, pushing aside the wires and monitoring machines before rearranging the pillows to prop him upright. Somewhere, a tech-med was lathering up into a panic because the sensors had gone haywire and would soon burst into the room to investigate. But for right then, it was just us.
“Why didn’t you log out when you were finished?” I asked.
“By that point, the CN-net shifted and I’d gone so deep, I couldn’t get back. Memories became jumbled and I couldn’t tell what was real anymore; wasn’t sure you were real.”
“But that’s not supposed to happen. You were made to exist on the CN-net in ways the rest of us can’t. You could live there indefinitely. You’re not even supposed to need this body, right?”
He was quiet a moment, mulling it through. “I think the quantum teleporting incident after the TransWorld disaster may have altered something in me. I’ve become as susceptible to CN-net memory-slip as everyone else. When I couldn’t find my way back and the CN-net began distorting my perception of true reality, I tried looking for exit clues in my memory blocks. When I found images of you, they were so perfect, I thought I’d created them. I couldn’t stop myself from wandering through them. I didn’t know how I deserved something so good in my life and assumed you couldn’t possibly be real. So, I decided I didn’t want to return to a place where this woman didn’t exist. Your shim jolted me out of those memories. I knew you were out there and I had to find my way back to you.”
“And you did,” I whispered, my fingers brushing the dark stubble on his cheek. “You found me.”
His eyes met mine and stayed there. “I’ll always find you, Felicia. You are the center of everything.”
Overwhelmed, my tears came despite my stern command for them not to. I sniffed inelegantly. “I bet you never thought I’d make your life this twisty or complicated, did you? Bet you never saw any of this coming.”
He smiled. “It’s not my job to see what’s coming. It’s yours. And I wouldn’t have changed anything it took to get me here. Not this. Not you. Never us.”
I leaned in, kissed him, and let myself relax for the first time in what seemed like forever. While the kiss was careful and hesitant, it was so full of love, I thought my heart would burst. This was where I belonged—right there, with him. Always with him.
“I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of being patient. I’ve had enough of Temperance,” I murmured against his lips. Then I pulled back enough to smile at him. “Are you ready to run the tri-system with me? Should I get Granny G’s cards?”
He returned it. “I’m ready for whatever luck throws at us. Shuffle your cards and we’ll see what’s next.”
So I
got the cards and dealt us both in.
Acknowledgments
I never expected to write a third book in this series, so every time I sat in front of my computer to work on another scene or scribbled down a random bit of dialogue or a plot point in my notebook, it was always done with a certain amount of shock. Luckily, it was the good kind of shock—the kind you’d feel if you won the lottery. I would announce to people, “I’m writing a third book!” then demand to know if they could believe it too, because God knew I certainly couldn’t. Clearly the team at Orbit saw something in my series when the decision was made to take it from ebook to trade paperback, and asked me to write a third book. And I couldn’t be more thrilled and excited to be given this opportunity. This has been a dream come true for me and I wouldn’t trade this experience for anything. With that said, thanks to everyone at Orbit for all their faith and support in making this book happen. My editor, Nivia Evans, has been an absolute pro when it came to smoothing out some of the more political aspects of the novel. There were times when it felt like I kept losing track of all the threads, as well as the bad guys and what they were supposed to be doing while all the other things were happening. She was great at helping me weave it back together into a cohesive, action-packed whole.
Thanks also to my amazing agent, Rena Rossner, who metaphorically held my hand, assured me everything was going to be okay and I would be fine whenever I stressed over some detail. Apparently I enjoy stressing, so she was a lifesaver and all-around excellent cheerleader.
Another thank you to Lindsey Hall, who believed there was more to Felicia and Alexei’s journey together and that another book was needed to finish their story. She was invaluable in helping to shape the initial idea and laying the groundwork as to where this novel could go.
The Game of Luck Page 37