He hugs me to his chest, where his warmth and smell take the edge off my anxiety. “We still have all the time in the world.” He pulls back and wipes the tears from my cheeks. “New first kiss soon?”
My hand shakes with the bag gripped in my fist. Jase opens my hand and takes out the ear pod and the vial, glancing around us. His are clasped in his other hand. He places my vial in my hand. I may as well be gripping the wrong end of a curling iron. I wince, and more tears fall from my eyes.
He wipes them away again as a few trickle from his eye. “It’s going to be okay.” His lips crush onto mine. How many couples know when they’re having their last kiss? This is the last one from this relationship—our real one. How can something feel so good and be so painful all at once? Our kiss ends when he slides the pod into my ear. He pulls away from me and kisses my clenched fist.
I take a deep breath as he puts his pod into his ear. There is only a five-second delay. I should tell him I love him, but the words don’t come. There’s no point anyway. I pour the contents of the vial down my throat, tasting nothing, and slide it into my pocket. I look at him, trying to commit his face to my memory, as my vision blurs.
Chapter Fifty-Six
BRAM
The buzz against my wrist is longer than usual. Everyone except Vogue and Frey directs their attention to floating holoScreens, which pop up from their cuffs. Sophos’ voice echoes across them all.
“Citizens of Kaycie, you have been left in the dark too long. Your way of life, your world, isn’t what you believe it to be. You are kept isolated, caged in the city, to keep you ignorant of the truth.”
This will be appearing on every screen across the chain of islands. The message may be to Kaycians, but this is the green light the islanders have been waiting for. This will wake them up and send them rushing to secure their children, collect hidden weapons, and storm their Establishment Centers.
We were supposed to be in Lawson by the time this happened. Had we slipped away in the night as we intended, the Kaycians around me would be in a secure location in Lawson to do their digital damage, and I’d be fighting alongside my family. The guilt for not being there is all that pulls my thoughts from Serenity. One regret to take the place of another.
“Kaycie cannot create everything you desire out of thin air. It comes from islands beyond the horizon. Islands you are not supposed to know about, because the Establishment does not wish you to know who you step on to get what you want.”
The map of Kaycie appears and zooms out to show the other islands. The video scans across island after island, showing the shabbiest homes, the oldest factory in Lawson, a ragged woman sleeping in an alley. If I’m honest, it overdramatizes the living situation. But since we aren’t pointing out the worst of the Establishment’s crimes—kidnapping and extirpation—this seems fair. Outing the lie about the marshals would cause terror in the city, so Sophos wants to handle that more delicately.
“Your food, water, the materials that build your homes, all come from the labors of people across the sea. They live as slaves to the Establishment, depending on the Establishment to distribute resources but receiving little in exchange for all they provide.
“We in the city are slaves as well.”
Vogue shouts out, “I’ve got it!” She taps around and moves things about, then sits back in a satisfied way. “It’s done.” A breath puffs out from her pursed red lips. “I’ve fired the missiles.”
“Vogue,” Sophos says. “Fire everything you can.”
“What?”
“Dump as many missiles and bombs as you can into the ocean. Every one fired now is one that can’t be used against the islands.”
Vogue’s jaw drops. It takes a lot to render her speechless, but she remains gaping at Sophos while Frey continues to work. She turns back and forth between Frey and Sophos and sets her mouth in a hard line before standing and going to the opposite end of the car to sit alone. As much as the idea of bombing the mysterious power sources unsettled me, depleting Leavenworth’s arsenal is brilliant. I was furious when Serenity brought Vogue into this, but she’s turned the tide for the islands.
Chapter Fifty-Seven
SERENITY
Everything is hazy. My eyes blink hard. Something tickles my ear, and I try to brush it away. Why is my hand so clumsy? I look at it for a minute and wiggle my fingers. That’s funny. I hear whispers, like dreams in my mind, but I’m awake, aren’t I? Sophos Verity is my mentor. Maybe I’m not. Nothing makes sense. Adwin broke up with me. This is the strangest dream—I hope I wake up soon.
My cuff vibrates incessantly. Vogue and I got an apartment. My right-hand fails in its first attempts to reach my cuff, but after two more tries, I tap it, and a video projects out. Who is this man talking? I squint to focus on it, but it’s blurry, and I’m so dizzy. Krisalyn, Frey, Dixon… The man’s voice echoes from all over this strange room. How did I get here?
It’s impossible to focus. Oh, that’s Sophos Verity. He is my mentor for my Leadership program.
“We in the city are slaves as well,” he says. That’s an odd thing to say. “The Establishment controls us all by choosing our careers for us, educating our children on what they want us to know, providing us with food and healthcare, not because they want to take care of us, but so we need them. They keep us away from the people on the islands, so we cannot unite.”
After years of friendship…
“They want us to be alone and dependent on them exclusively, but we can stand together. We don’t have to be isolated. We can depend on each other instead of the Establishment. We can rise up.”
This is confusing, and I’m so tired. Voices everywhere. In my head, the holo, all overlapping, and everyone here is buzzing, too. I feel like the room is moving. Dizziness rolls through me. My head drops to my shoulder, and I look up at—oh, is that a window? I lean toward it over something, or is that a someone?
Wow, two shooting stars.
Chapter Fifty-Eight
BRAM
The train car falls into an eerie silence at the end of the message. It’s done. We’ve incited an uprising. Vogue just shot missiles, the tunnels to Kaycie and Leavenworth will be blocked off, and the islanders will attack their Establishment Centers. Islanders will die, marshals will die. But hopefully, they can take control of the islands.
“Bram.” Sophos breaks the silence as Krisalyn leaves his side, done patching him up for now. “The tunnels.”
With the program Tori sent me, I detonate the charges in the Greenwood and Blue Springs tunnels. The under-armed lumberjacks will have a fair fight to take back their island without the Establishment bringing in reinforcements. Blue Springs won’t be fighting, but this way, they won’t be a passageway for the Establishment to get to the other islands.
Dixon confirms that there are no trains between the city and Leavenworth before I set off that one. Serenity and the council may be flying there, but they could have still been moving marshals on the train. Then I detonate the charges in the tunnel between Leavenworth and Gladstone. They’ll be cut off from the forces at the military base, now. Once we pass their station, we can block off their tunnel to Kaycie. The Gladstone station blurs by as we pass through on the way to Lawson. Sophos nods to me, and I set off the charges to block the tunnel a couple of miles back.
The tunnel lights go out, but the train continues on its battery. It would appear that Vogue’s attack worked. The power should be out everywhere.
So far, so good. We’ve succeeded. We got the trains, sent out the call to arms, blocked the tunnels, and shut down the power. Though nothing went to plan, we did what we set out to do. Except Tori was killed, and Serenity was lost in the process.
I can’t feel victorious.
Now that Vogue has completed her task, she sits curled up on a seat as Krisalyn strokes her hair. Losing Serenity is hitting her hard. Part of me would like to collapse under the weight of tonight’s events too, but I remain resolute. I can’t change the water, so I harden
.
“What happened?” Dixon asks me. “What was the explosion at the Establishment Center?”
“Tori and I had a run-in with Watt Kemp.”
“Where is she?” Frey looks around as if he might not have noticed her.
I glance down. “She was killed attempting to get Sophos out.”
They both pale and shift in their seats. Welcome to war, boys.
Dixon opens his mouth but is cut off as a rumble booms through us.
The train pitches, throwing everyone to the right side of the car. Screams ring out as bodies hit the windows and seats. I fall backward onto a seat, smashing my head into the wall next to it. My teeth crush down on the side of my tongue, and the taste of blood fills my mouth. The train teeters but rights itself, and people drop to the floor in heaps. I lay on the seat clutching the edge of it.
My heart races as I huff a few quick breaths. I sit up to see everyone assessing themselves and each other. “What… the hell… was that?” Vogue pants, having risen to her hands and knees. Blood trickles from her eyebrow, red as her lipstick.
I climb onto a seat to open the emergency hatch in the ceiling. The roar of rushing water freezes everyone. I pull myself up to see a waterfall pouring onto the last train car. “Move!” I jump down and lift Sophos by his good arm. “Head toward the front of the train. Find a transparent section of tunnel!”
We scurry to the next car, then the next. From the windows of the third one, we see the acrylic tunnel. I open the door manually—water rushes over the tracks, and it’s rising. I pull out a grenade.
“What are you doing?” Frey’s eyes bulge as he questions me.
“Opening a window so we can get out of the damn tunnel.”
“It’ll just flood it faster! You’re going to drown us all.”
Understanding lights up Dixon’s eyes. “The water pressure will even out, and we can swim out. A grenade won’t do it, though.” He grabs Krisalyn’s bag and fishes out a four-inch cube.
“It’s too big a space,” Frey says. “By the time it fills and the water pressure stabilizes, we will have drowned.” He hits a seatback for each of the last four words to accentuate his point.
“We don’t have any other options,” Krisalyn says. “We’ll drown anyway. There’s nothing to lose.”
Dixon leans out of the door, looking at the rushing water as it rises to enter the car and cover the floor. Frey is right. We’re going to die. For a fraction of a second, relief overtakes my dread. Serenity could have been here too.
“We won’t be able to stand in that to attach the stinger,” Dixon says. “Help me onto the roof.”
Dixon shuts the door and steps onto my interwoven hands to hoist himself onto the roof of the train. “Oh my God.” He sounds confused rather than panicked.
“What is it?”
He says nothing. His legs hang through the hatch as he presumably attaches the device to the ceiling of the tunnel. He drops back in and closes the hatch slowly.
“What was that?” I ask.
His face is contorted in disbelief as he shakes his head. He sits on the back of the seat and opens a holoScreen from his cuff. He taps around and closes it, looking like his mind is anywhere but here.
Did he just set it off? We need to brace ourselves. This train is about to be pummeled! We have to— Through the window, the acrylic shatters to dust, but no waterfall bears down on us. Everyone’s attention snaps to Dixon, who only shrugs and gestures up to the hatch. I look up at it in bewilderment and gulp as I release it. It’s quieter now. The water doesn’t rush by in a torrent through the tunnel anymore. My blood pulses in my ears as I pull myself up and out of the train.
Sitting with my legs in the hatch, my jaw drops as I take in the view. The water that should be yards over the tunnel is barely half-way up its side. And it’s falling.
Chapter Fifty-Nine
SERENITY
The room jolts and stops moving. I’m not sure if I’m comforted or alarmed by the idea that the movement may not have been in my head. But what is this room?
My mother rushes over to me. “How are you feeling?”
I take a mental inventory of the shaky mess I am. “Um, I think I’m all right.”
She presses my hand and takes a breath before dropping her gaze with a sigh. “Stay with Jase. Papá and I will come to find you soon.” With a kiss on my forehead, she turns away.
She and the rest of these people, whoever they are, file out through the far end of the space. I turn to my left and look at the face next to me. Jase Delgado is supposed to look at me like I’m the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen, but he just looks worried. “Serenity, I think we need to go.”
“Where are we going?”
“I don’t know.”
My legs wobble as I stand. Between Jase catching my arm and me grabbing a seatback, I manage to stay on my feet—which are bare. It’s a curiosity I barely register as a rush of pain floods my head. Slowing my breathing abates my misery to a gauzy fog as Jase rubs my back. “Sit back down,” he says.
I shake my head, keeping my eyes closed. A long moment later, I straighten myself and make for the exit. What happened to my shoes? Jase hangs his jacket around my shoulders as we follow the group of people out of the door. The steps leave us outside, and when I turn back, I see we just left a large metal vessel. What on earth happened tonight?
Few lights illuminate our path as we are led into a dark, unfamiliar building. We end up in a large, dimly lit, but comfortable room with some food set out on a far counter and several tables and chairs scattered throughout. What happened to the lights? Some people here are well dressed like we are, but some are in sleepwear. How did we all end up together? Adwin is dressed nicely… he’s so handsome. He broke up with me. The memory flashes like a spotlight in my foggy mind. But why did he break up with me?
My mother comes in soon after us. “How are you feeling? Let’s get you to a doctor.”
“No, my head just hurts. It’s okay,” I say.
“Well, you hit it pretty hard.” That explains some things. “Sit down.” She walks me over to a booth in the corner. “Papá will be with us soon, he’s in a meeting with the council, and soon we’ll find out what’s going on.”
Oh good, I’m not the only one who doesn’t know what’s going on.
“Let me get you some tea,” Jase says. “Grace, would you like some coffee?”
“Yes, please,” my mother responds. When he’s gone, she leans closer to me. “Serenity, what did you know about what Sophos has done tonight?”
“I have no idea what’s going, Mamá. I was hoping you could clue me in.”
Her eyes search mine until Jase brings us our tea and coffee. He sits down next to me, gingerly taking my free hand in his and rubbing it softly. “Are you all right?”
He loves me. Another spotlight shines through my fog. “I don’t feel great, but mostly I’m confused.” I turn to my mother. “What’s going on?”
“I know it must be a big shock to you that Sophos is stirring up trouble.” My mother looks as confused as I feel. “You don’t have to worry. We’re safe, and everything is going to be okay.”
They keep us away from the people on the islands. There are other islands.
“Why doesn’t the Establishment want us to know about the other islands?” I ask. Jase tenses at my side.
My mother presses her lips together in a frown. “It’s complicated, sweetheart, but you can’t believe everything Sophos said. Things are complicated, and the council will tell us as much as they can.” I can’t think of anything Sophos has told me. It doesn’t feel right. Something is off, but I don’t know what.
Soon, a middle-aged woman in a plain blue dress comes in and tells us our rooms are ready. She distributes numbered key cards and tells us all to follow her to the stairs, which will take us to our rooms. She apologizes that the elevators aren’t running on the generator. In the morning, we will receive information on where to gather for a briefing.
Jase and I stop on the third floor to go to room 326. My mother continues to the fourth floor. Room 326 is a small bedroom and modest bathroom, lit in a faint bluish glow coming from some backup lights. The bed is nowhere as lush-looking as mine, but I’m exhausted, so it’s inviting all the same. I do not, however, want to sleep in this dress. But it occurs to me that I’m not sure if Jase has seen me undressed. That’s something I should know. Why don’t I know it?
How hard did I hit my head?
I consider my options while Jase explores the closet. He brings me a heavy bathrobe. “Here, I think this will be a little more comfortable for you.”
“Thank you.” I take it into the bathroom.
As I change out of my dress, the sparkle of light reflecting off my necklace catches my eye. I examine the silver stems and blue flowers as best I can. When did I get this? God, I hope I regain my senses after some sleep. Undone, my hair falls in waves to my shoulders. I miss my long hair. I take off my lashes but keep my makeup on. Nudity would be one thing, but no makeup is out of the question.
Back in the bedroom, Jase sits at the foot of the bed, leaning his forehead onto his hands. Now he wears only an undershirt and his pants. The muscles in his back and shoulders look tense. I sit next to him and wrap my arm around him to stroke his shoulder. It seems like the thing to do.
“Are you all right?” I ask him.
He turns to gaze at me with a sad look in his eyes. “I’m fine,” he says as he tucks my hair behind my ear. “We should get some sleep.”
I press my lips together and nod. It must be my head injury or these bizarre circumstances, but I can’t talk to him. I don’t know where to start. He’s right—sleep will help.
We each take a side of the bed without touching. I consider cuddling up to him. I want to feel the connection I know I have with him, but it would be forced. The smell of him reaches me—warm spices that soothe the edges of my anxiety. It threatens to recall a memory that I can’t find. It feels comfortable, though, and I drift from the fog of this strange night into the misty haze of sleep.
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