by K. J. McPike
“He doesn’t have one yet,” I interjected, praying that he would spare my family the punishment for my earlier omission. “He was with a pregnant woman, but I don’t know for sure if it’s Pane’s baby.”
Arlo clucked his tongue and shook his head slowly. Tauntingly. “This will not be fun if you do not give her a chance to use her ability. But I am delighted to know you were able to collect valuable intel on your first day. So delighted that I may spare you retribution for attempting to deceive me.”
I inhaled, not sure what to make of the word may.
Salaxia frowned as she looked between us, but Arlo just smiled at her. “Do not worry,” he said. “You will have your chance now. Since I do not want to lose any of my new friends, I need you to tell me if your big sister is planning to attempt another escape.”
My heart plummeted. Suddenly, I remembered his words from last night: Whatever they are planning, I will find someone who can tell me. He must have been talking about Salaxia. He knew she existed from using Sind to pry into my memories. Had he sent Sariah to another timeline to get my sister? That was the only thing that made sense.
“Well?” Arlo fixed his gaze on Salaxia in a way that made me instinctively step toward her.
“Lali?” she peeked up at me, her bottom lip tucked in and her eyebrows pulled together. I’d seen that face before, every time our parents tried to appeal to her to get the truth about me or one of our siblings. She was afraid to tell on me.
“It’s okay,” I assured her. “You can tell him the truth.” The truth was, there was nothing to tell. I wanted to escape, but nothing I had considered would work. With the monitors in our room, we couldn’t even discuss any plans without risking being punished again.
Salaxia squinted at me, and I knew she was reading my thoughts. Her face fell after a moment, as if she were disappointed at the realization that I had no real plan for getting us out of here.
“She thought about it,” Salaxia told Arlo. “But all her ideas won’t work. And she doesn’t want anyone else to get hurt.” She studied the floor, and I tensed. I hoped she hadn’t seen the punishments from last night play through my mind.
“Good.” Arlo locked eyes with me, and I felt his unspoken challenge. “I am glad you see now that you will not get past our safeguards. The only escape you will see is in your dreams.”
I sucked in a breath. Dreams. That was it!
If Truman could project our group into someone’s dream, we could all brainstorm ways to get out of here without any lab workers overhearing. We could hash out every detail until we came up with a plan—a foolproof plan. I just had to make sure everyone else wasn’t too scared to try. If we were ever going to get out of here, we needed to be a team.
And I wasn’t about to let my teammates down. No matter what it took, I was going to get us all out of here.
Cora and another nurse escorted Salaxia and me through the maze of metal, and I assumed they were leading us back toward the room I’d slept in the night before. I tried to get a sense of the route, but I lost count of the doors after the third time Salaxia asked me a question and was shushed by Cora. Plus, we had turned twice, and trying to remember how many hallways we passed between turns was jumbling the numbers in my head.
We finally stopped, and only the close spacing of the doors hinted that we’d come back to the rooms with the beds. The second nurse pulled my sister over to the adjacent room’s doors, and my stomach clenched as Salaxia’s hand slipped out of mine.
“Lali!” she called out, driving an invisible knife deep into my chest. Separating me from her after I’d just gotten her back was a cruel form of torture.
“It’s okay,” I lied, somehow managing to sound convincing for Salaxia’s sake. Biting down on my tongue, I tried to tell myself it was only temporary. But that didn’t make it any easier. “I’ll be right next door to you, and I’ll see you tomorrow. And Lyx is in there. He’ll be excited to see you.”
Her face lifted a bit at the mention of our brother, and I couldn’t help but wonder how Ulyxses would handle seeing Salaxia. He’d have no warning. But maybe it would help him recover—at least emotionally—from what they’d done to him last night.
“Come now.” Cora tugged me toward the double doors leading to the room I shared with Oxanna, Dixon, Kai, Truman, and Elliot. “You need to eat.” She typed in a code and said her name as I gave Salaxia one last glance.
You’ll see her again. I repeated the thought to comfort myself. I would see her again, and I would get her out of here. Now that I had a second chance, I wouldn’t fail her. Whatever Arlo had done to get her here, I refused to waste our time together trapped in this horrible place. Tonight, I’d talk to the others and form a plan.
Cora dragged me through the doors. No one else was in the room yet, and part of me was thankful. I still needed to wrap my brain around what had happened, and I had to figure out the best way to tell Oxanna and Dixon. At least I could warn them that Salaxia was here.
I strained to listen as Cora strapped me into my bed, but I couldn’t hear anything from the other room with the metal barrier between us. My heart twisted as I realized that Ulyxses might not even be able to hug Salaxia when he saw her. Most likely, he would be tied to a bed. It was another level of cruelty, and it was like they weren’t even trying.
Or maybe they were. Nothing seemed to be unplanned here.
Cora took her time feeding me the usual sickly sweet mush, and the other five came into the room one at a time with their own nurses. No one said a word through their meals, and it felt like forever before the last nurse told us lights out would be soon and left the room. As soon as the doors closed behind her, I took a deep breath.
“Oxie,” I whispered. “Dix, I have to tell you guys something really important.”
“If it’s a plan to escape, I don’t want to hear it.” Oxanna’s voice came out clipped. She didn’t even turn to look at me; she just stared at the ceiling.
“It’s not,” I said, though I couldn’t help my disappointment at hearing she’d given up. I hoped learning about Salaxia would get her fired up again. Maybe it was exactly the motivation it would take to get everyone on board to try again.
“What is it?” Dixon asked from one of the beds in the center of the row.
I took a deep breath, my pulse quickening all of a sudden. Why was I nervous about telling them? This was good news.
Unless we have to take her back.
Though I tried not to focus on it, I couldn’t help but worry about the version of my family left behind in whichever timeline this Salaxia was from. What must they have been thinking? Were they even still alive? When I first saw Salaxia, she said she didn’t know what had happened to us. Did that mean Sariah took her from her bed in the middle of the night? From right before the attack? Did Salaxia even know she’d traveled back in time?
If she could read minds, she must have been taken from a point somewhere in the last month leading up to the attack on our house. That was the most I could narrow it down.
“Lali?” Dixon pressed. “Are you actually going to tell us what you’re talking about?”
Shaking my head to clear it, I forced out the words. “It’s Sal. She’s…she’s here.”
At first I was met with silence. After a moment, the lights went out, turning everything into silhouettes against the glow coming from the space where the walls met the floor.
“What do you mean she’s here?” Oxanna finally asked.
“I think Sariah pulled her from another timeline,” I said. “I don’t know exactly what happened, but I saw her. Arlo is using her as a human lie detector.”
“It’s really her?” Kai asked in a tight voice, as if he were afraid to believe it. I knew he’d been carrying the guilt of her death around with him just like I had.
“Are you sure?” Dixon added. “What if it was an illusion?”
I sighed. “It wasn’t an illusion. I saw her. I hugged her.”
“Well, where is she?”
Oxanna’s hair swished across the sheets as she moved her head to look at me.
“A nurse took her next door.” I glanced at the double doors leading to the hallway. After last night, just the thought of trying to open them again made me shudder. Still, I would have given anything to let my brother and sister see Salaxia for themselves.
“Who are you guys talking about?” Truman asked, reminding me that he and Elliot still didn’t know about our youngest sister.
Taking a deep breath, I explained everything. Getting Kala out of the lab, the attack on our house, getting stuck in the past, and then traveling further into the past to try and get Sariah’s help only to end up here. I didn’t worry about the monitors overhearing. Sind had already told Arlo the whole story after he invaded my memories.
“I didn’t mean for you guys to get mixed up in our mess,” I finished. “I’m so sorry. I thought Sariah was like us—a semmie trapped here against her will. I had no idea she worked for Arlo, or that they could use my memory against me. Against you guys.”
Truman and Elliot stayed quiet, and a silence fell over the room. I flexed my fingers to get out some of my nervous energy. Now that I’d confessed everything to them, I wouldn’t blame them for hating me. I just hoped they wouldn’t be more reluctant to go along with my plan to meet in someone’s dream. I couldn’t undo what had happened, but I would do everything in my power to get them out of here.
That was, if I could find a way to mention dream projections without sounding suspicious to whoever was listening to what the monitor picked up from our room. I briefly considered trying to put something over it to muffle the sound, but I was sure they would make us regret it.
“I need to see Sal,” Oxanna whispered, breaking me out of my thoughts.
“Me, too,” Dixon said. “Do you think they’ll let us see her at all?”
I sighed heavily. “I don’t know, Dix.” But we need to get out of here so we don’t have to depend on them to allow it.
I racked my brain for a way to mention projecting into dreams so it sounded innocent. Maybe I could say what Arlo had said about our only escape being in our dreams. Would Truman get the hint?
Or maybe I could make it sound like I wanted to create an imaginary getaway in my unconscious mind. Our first night at The Hill, Amber-Ann mentioned that Truman had projected her into Elliot’s dream for the sake of seeing their parents. Maybe if I made it sound like that type of request, it would be less suspicious.
“Maybe in the meantime,” I started, pausing to steady my voice, “Truman can visit our dreams so we can see her the way Elliot and Amber-Ann use dreams to see their parents.” As soon as the words were out, I hoped Elliot wouldn’t take offense. He still hadn’t said anything, and I couldn’t see him from where I lay strapped in, so I had no idea what he was making of everything. Maybe he was projecting thoughts to the others, but he’d given me nothing but silence.
“I don’t know how to control my dreams,” Oxanna muttered, shooting down my suggestion.
“Me neither,” Dixon said.
I sighed. Clearly, my siblings hadn’t gotten the hint.
“Well, I’m willing to try.” I spoke slower that time, hoping that would make my intent clearer. “Truman, can you project them into my dream?”
“Not without touching them,” he said. “And we’re all tied down. I’m not getting up after last night.”
I let my head flop to the side. He wasn’t getting it either. Getting up wouldn’t be a risk when Oxanna’s astral form could redo everyone’s restraints, but I couldn’t say that now that we had the monitor in place.
“You can come to mine anyway.” I changed my usual cadence as I said the words, doing my best to communicate without saying exactly what I was thinking. What I wouldn’t have given for Elliot’s ability to project thoughts. I wanted to say more, but I was scared to press my luck. Maybe it was better to wait until tomorrow. In the scuffle of getting ready for the morning, maybe there would be a quiet moment for me to try again in case Truman hadn’t picked up on my meaning.
Until then, all I could do was hope he’d gotten the message—and that I wasn’t too wired to fall asleep.
Chapter 25
Meeting
“Lali?” Truman’s voice broke through the dark fog floating around my subconscious. He stepped into view, and the cloudy air cleared to reveal black and white checkered walls that blended seamlessly into the floor.
“Truman!” I gasped. “I didn’t know if you would pick up on my message.”
He pursed his lips, making his wide face come to a point. “I mean, I figured there was a reason you kept talking about me projecting into your dream. What’s up?”
“We need to come up with a plan to get out of here, and dreams are the only place we can talk about it.” My words came out in a jumble, and it was a wonder Truman understood them.
“Whoa.” He backed up a step. “You wanna try and escape again? Did you learn nothing from the first fail?”
“I learned that I can’t stay in this lab for the rest of my life.” Just speaking the thought sent my mind into a panicked frenzy. “And I just got my baby sister back. I can’t let her grow up here.”
Truman looked down at the checkered floor. “But Kala and Ulyxses are my friends. I can’t watch them go through being shocked again.”
The image of my brother convulsing flashed behind my eyes, and I had to take a moment to gather myself. “That’s why I want to brainstorm with everyone,” I said. “We can make sure to cover every angle so we don’t risk anyone’s safety.”
Truman opened his mouth, but nothing came out before he closed it again.
“I won’t let them spend the rest of their lives here,” I whispered. “I know you don’t want that for them, either.”
“Lali, there’s no way out. They’ve thought of everything.”
“They haven’t thought of this.” I held out my arms, gesturing to the checkered dream-room. “Talking in dreams just came to me today. Imagine what we could come up with if we all contributed ideas.” He still looked hesitant, but I kept pushing. “We have a lot of abilities to work with. There has to be a way to use them to get out of here. And I need you to help me get everyone together in a dream so we can discuss ideas.”
“No way. I told you I have to touch people to project them into dreams, and I’m not getting caught in the morning out of my restraints.”
“We’ll strap everyone back in before anyone comes in tomorrow.”
“How? One of us would be left up with no one to redo the straps.”
“Not if Oxanna uses her astral form to tie the last person back down,” I said. “Then she can go back to her body and we’ll all be in place.”
He hesitated, and I felt my confidence in my plan wither. If it was this hard to get him to agree just to have a meeting, how would I convince the whole group to try and escape?
Finally, Truman’s face relaxed, and he tilted his head to the side. “Fine. I’ll project them into someone’s dream so we can talk. But I’m not promising to do anything besides that.”
“Thank you,” I gushed. “Can you go into everyone else’s dreams and tell them the plan beforehand? That way they won’t be confused about why we’re all getting out of bed. Plus we’ll need Oxanna and Kai to undo our restraints.”
“Yeah,” he said. “I’ll give everyone a heads up.”
“Thank you.” Remembering that when Truman left dreams, the dreamer automatically woke, I quickly added, “Well, maybe explain to everyone except Elliot. We need someone to stay asleep so we have a dream to meet in. We can all project into Elliot’s after you explain to the others.”
“Got it.”
As soon as Truman left my dream, my eyes snapped open. I saw his astral form beside my bed for a second before it disappeared back into his body.
While I waited for him to project into the others’ dreams, I made a mental list of all the abilities we had on our side. How could we combine them to work in our favor?
The easiest way out of the lab was to try and get one of the guard’s necklaces to Kai. Bianca was our best bet there, but even if she managed to do it subtly, I was sure that one of the necklaces going missing would make it obvious that we were planning to escape. Plus, I had no way to communicate with her when she was in the other room.
And then there was the matter of our trackers. How were we going to get rid of them? I would have been okay with resorting to cutting them out, but now that they held poison inside them, I didn’t feel so confident about that plan. Maybe there was a way to get one of the devices in the cabinet to remove the trackers. That was probably the safest way. We would just have to get them out of the locked cabinet that could only be opened with a nurse’s card.
I heaved a sigh, fighting the doubt trying to creep into my mind. This was why we were going to have this meeting. Surely getting everyone else’s take would bring up possibilities I hadn’t considered. I just wanted to have some idea of where to start so the others didn’t give up before we even began.
Truman’s astral form appeared next to Oxanna’s bed, and her eyes flew open. She turned her head to face me, and the light at the base of the wall illuminated her just enough for me to see her are you crazy? expression.
Not that I was surprised. After what they made her do, I was sure she wouldn’t want to risk it happening again. Still, I offered her a small smile that I hoped would be reassuring.
The minutes felt like hours as Truman projected into dream after dream to fill everyone in. Eventually, Kai appeared by my bed and slowly undid my restraints. Somehow, he managed to do it without making much noise at all. I sat up, and he threw his arms around me. Neither of us spoke, but the comfort of human touch was far better than words.
Kissing the top of my head, he released me and started toward Oxanna’s bed. Before he could get there, her astral form appeared next to her body and waved him off.
Good. At least she was willing to go along with the plan to talk.