by Marie Lu
A quiet burst of sparks. To my surprise, every security cam along the hall blinks off.
“How’d you break all of them with just one—?” I start to whisper.
The guide jumps back down to the ground and motions for me to hurry up. “I’m a Hacker,” he whispers back as we run. “I’ve worked the command centers here before. I rewired things a little to suit us.” He smiles proudly, showing even white teeth. “But this is nothing. Just wait till you hear about what we’ve done to Denver’s Capitol Tower.”
Impressive. If Metias joined the Patriots, he’d be a Hacker too. If he were alive.
We sprint down the hall until he stops us at one of the doors. Barrack 4A. Here he pulls out a key card and swipes the door’s access panel. It clicks and swings open a little—inside, eight rows of bunks and lockers sit in the dark.
The Hacker turns to face me. “Razor wants you waiting here to ensure that the right soldiers capture you. He has a specific patrol in mind.”
Of course, makes perfect sense. It confirms that Razor doesn’t want me beaten to a pulp by letting just any Republic patrol arrest me. “Who—?” I start to ask.
But he taps the edge of his military cap before I can finish. “We’ll all be watching your mission from the cams. Good luck,” he whispers. Then he’s gone, hurrying down the hall until he rounds a corner and I can’t see him anymore.
I take a deep breath. I’m alone. Time to wait for soldiers to arrest me.
I quickly step inside the room and shut the barrack door. It’s pitch-black in here—no windows, not even a slit of light from under the door. Certainly a believable enough place for me to be hiding. I don’t bother moving farther into the room; I already know what the layout is, rows of bunk beds and a communal bathroom. I just flatten myself against the wall right next to the door. Better to stay here.
I reach out in the darkness and find the doorknob. Using my hands to measure, I gauge how far the knob is from the ground (three feet six). That’s probably how much space is between the doorknob and the top of the door frame too. I think back to when we were still standing out in the corridor, picturing how much space is between the door frame’s top edge and the ceiling. It must’ve been a little less than two feet.
Okay. Now all my details are in place. I settle back against the wall, close my eyes, and wait.
Twelve minutes drag by.
Then, farther down the hall outside, I hear a dog’s bark.
My eyes pop open. Ollie. I’d recognize that bark anywhere—my dog is still alive. Alive, by some miracle. Joy and confusion wash over me. What the hell is he doing here? I press an ear against the door and listen. Several more seconds of silence. Then, I hear the bark again.
My white shepherd is here.
Now thoughts are racing through my mind. The only reason why Ollie would be here is because he’s with a patrol—the patrol that’s hunting me down. And there’s only one soldier who’d think to use my own dog to sniff me out: Thomas. The Hacker’s words come back to me. Razor wanted “the right soldiers” to capture me. He had a specific patrol in mind.
Of course the patrol—the person—Razor had in mind would be Thomas.
Thomas must’ve been assigned by Commander Jameson to track me down. He’s using Ollie to help. But of all the patrols I’d prefer to be arrested by, Thomas’s ranks last on the list. My hands start to shake. I don’t want to see my brother’s murderer again.
Ollie’s barking grows steadily louder. With it come the first sounds of footsteps and voices. I hear Thomas’s voice out in the corridor, shouting to his soldiers. I hold my breath and remind myself of the numbers I’d calculated.
They’re right outside the door. Their voices have gone quiet, replaced by clicks (safety on loaded guns, sounds like some M-series, some standard-issue rifles).
The following seems to happen in slow motion. The door creaks open and light spills in. Immediately I make a small jump and step one leg up—my foot lands silently on the doorknob as the door swings toward me. As the soldiers enter the room with their guns drawn, I reach up and grab the top of the door frame by using the doorknob as a step. I pull myself up. Without a sound, I perch on top of the open door like a cat.
They don’t see me. They probably can’t see anything except the darkness in here. I count them all in a flash. Thomas leads the group with Ollie at his side (to my surprise, Thomas doesn’t have his gun drawn), and behind him are a cluster of four soldiers. There are more soldiers outside the room, but I can’t tell how many.
“She’s in here,” one of them says, with a hand pressed to his ear. “She hasn’t had a chance to board any airships yet. Commander DeSoto just confirmed one of his men saw her enter.”
Thomas says nothing. I watch him turn to observe the dark room. Then his gaze wanders up the door.
We lock eyes.
I leap down and knock him to the ground. In a moment of blind rage, I actually want to break his neck with my bare hands. It’d be so easy.
The other soldiers clamor for their guns, but in the chaos I hear Thomas choke out an order. “Don’t fire! Don’t fire!” He grabs my arm. I almost manage to break free and dart through the soldiers and out the doorway, but a second soldier shoves me down. They’re all on me now, a whirlwind of uniforms seizing my arms and dragging me to my feet. Thomas keeps shouting at his men to be careful.
Razor was right about Thomas. He’ll want to keep me alive for Commander Jameson.
Finally, they cuff my hands and push me so hard against the floor that I can’t move. I hear Thomas’s voice overhead. “Good to see you again, Ms. Iparis.” His voice shakes. “You’re under arrest for assaulting Republic soldiers, for creating a disturbance in Batalla Hall, and for abandoning your post. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.” I notice he doesn’t say anything about assisting a criminal. He still has to pretend the Republic executed Day.
They pull me to my feet and lead me back down the hall. By the time we’re in the sunlight, more than a few passing soldiers stop to watch. Thomas’s men shove me unceremoniously into a waiting patrol jeep’s backseat, chain my hands to the door, and lock my arms down in metal shackles. Thomas sits next to me and points his gun at my head. Ridiculous. The jeep ushers us back through the streets. The other two soldiers sitting in the jeep’s front watch me in the rearview mirror. They act like I’m some sort of untamed weapon—and in a way, I guess that’s true. The irony of it all makes me want to laugh. Day is a Republic soldier on board the RS Dynasty, and I am the Republic’s most valuable captive. We’ve switched places.
Thomas tries to ignore me as we travel, but my eyes never leave him. He seems tired, with pale lips and dark circles rimming his eyes. Stubble dots his chin, a surprise in itself—Thomas would normally never show his face without being perfectly clean shaven. Commander Jameson must’ve run him ragged for letting me escape from Batalla Hall. They probably interrogated him for it.
The minutes drag on. None of the soldiers talk. The one who drives us keeps his eyes firmly on the road, and all we can hear is the drone of the jeep’s engine and the muffled sounds from the streets outside. I swear the others must be able to hear the hammering of my heart too. From here I can see the jeep driving ahead of us, and through its back window I see occasional flashes of white fur that make me feel incredibly happy. Ollie. I wish he were in the same jeep as me.
Finally, I turn to Thomas. “Thank you for not hurting Ollie.”
I don’t expect him to answer. Captains don’t speak to criminals, he’d say. But to my surprise, he meets my gaze. For me, it seems, he’s still willing to break protocol. “Your dog turned out to be useful.”
He’s Metias’s dog. My anger starts rising again, but I push it back down. Useless to rage over something that won’t help my plans. It’s interesting that he kept Ollie alive at all—he could have tracked me down without him. Ollie’s not a police dog and has no training in sniffing down targets.
He couldn’t have helped when they were trying to track me across half the country; he’s only useful in very close range. Which means that Thomas kept him alive for other reasons. Because he cares for me? Or . . . maybe he still cares for Metias. The thought startles me. Thomas’s stare flickers away when I don’t reply. Then there’s another long silence. “Where are you taking me?”
“You’ll be held in the High Desert Penitentiary until after your interrogation, and then the courts will decide where you’ll go.”
Time to put Razor’s plans to work. “After my interrogation, I can guarantee that the courts are going to send me to Denver.”
One of the guards sitting up front narrows his eyes at me, but Thomas holds up a hand. “Let her talk,” he says. “All that matters is that we deliver her unharmed.” Then he glances at me. He seems gaunter than the last time I saw him too—even his hair, combed neatly in a side part, is dull and limp. “And why is that?”
“I have information the Elector may be highly interested in.”
Thomas’s mouth twitches—he’s hungry to question me now, to uncover whatever secrets I might hold. But that’s outside of protocol, and he’s already broken enough rules by conversing idly with me. He seems to decide against pressing me further. “We’ll see what we can get out of you.”
Then I realize that it’s a little strange they’re sending me to a Vegas penitentiary at all. I should be interrogated and tried in my home state. “Why am I being held here?” I ask. “Shouldn’t I be on my way to Los Angeles?”
Thomas keeps his eyes forward now. “Quarantine,” he replies.
I frown. “What, it’s spread to Batalla now too?”
His answer sends a chill down my spine. “Los Angeles is under quarantine. All of it.”
* * *
HIGH DESERT PENITENTIARY.
ROOM 416 (20 × 12 SQUARE FEET).
2224 HOURS; SAME DAY AS MY CAPTURE.
I sit a few feet away from Thomas. Nothing but a flimsy table separates us—well, if I don’t count the number of soldiers standing guard beside him. They shift uncomfortably whenever I let my eyes rest on them. I sway a little in my chair, fighting back exhaustion, and clink the chains that keep my arms secured across my back. My mind is starting to wander—I keep thinking back on what Thomas said about Los Angeles and its quarantine. No time to dwell on that now, I tell myself, but the thoughts won’t go away. I try to picture Drake University marked with plague signs, Ruby sector’s streets crowded with plague patrols. How is that possible? How could the entire city be under quarantine?
We’ve been in this room for six hours, and Thomas has gotten nowhere with me. My answers to his questions lead us around in circles, and I’ve been doing it in a way so subtle that he doesn’t realize I’ve been manipulating the conversation until he’s wasted another hour. He’s tried threatening to kill Ollie. To which I threatened to carry any information I had to my grave. He’s tried threatening me. To which I reminded him of the taking-information-to-my-grave factor. He’s even tried some mind games—none of which went even remotely well. I just keep asking him why Los Angeles is under quarantine. I’ve been trained in interrogation tactics as much as he has, and it’s backfiring on him. He hasn’t gotten physical with me yet, the way he had with Day. (This is another interesting detail. It doesn’t matter how much Thomas cares for me—if his superiors order him to use physical force, he’ll do it. Since he hasn’t hurt me yet, it means Commander Jameson told him not to. Odd.) Even so, I can tell his patience with me is wearing thin.
“Tell me, Ms. Iparis,” he says after we’re silent for a moment. “What will it take for me to get something useful out of you?”
I keep my face expressionless. “Already told you that. I’ll trade you an answer for a request. I have information for the Elector.”
“You’re in no position to bargain. And you can’t keep this up indefinitely.” Thomas leans back in his chair and frowns. The fluorescent lights cast long shadows under his eyes. Against the undecorated white walls of the room (aside from two Republic flags and the Elector’s portrait), Thomas stands out ominously in his black-and-red captain’s uniform. Metias used to wear a uniform like that. “I know Day is alive, and you know how we can find him. You’ll talk after a few days without food or water.”
“Don’t assume what I will and won’t do, Thomas,” I reply. “As for Day, I should think the answer’s obvious. If he were alive, he’d head off to rescue his little brother. Any fool could guess that.”
Thomas tries to ignore my jab, but I can see the irritation on his face. “If he’s alive, he’ll never find his brother. That location is classified. I don’t need to know where Day wants to go. I need to know where he is.”
“It makes no difference. You’d never catch him anyway. He won’t fall for the same tricks twice.”
Thomas folds his arms. Was it really just a few weeks ago that the two of us sat together, eating dinner at a Los Angeles café? The thought of LA brings me right back to the quarantine news, and I picture the café empty, covered with quarantine notices.
“Ms. Iparis,” Thomas says, putting his palms flat on the table. “We can continue like this forever, and you can just keep being snide and shaking your head until you collapse from exhaustion. I don’t want to hurt you. You have a chance to redeem yourself to the Republic. In spite of everything you’ve done, I’ve received word from my higher-ups that they still consider you to be quite valuable.”
So. Commander Jameson was involved in making sure I’m not harmed during my interrogation. “How kind,” I reply, letting sarcasm seep into my words. “I’m luckier than Metias.”
Thomas sighs, bows his head, and squeezes the upper bridge of his nose in exasperation. He sits like that for a moment. Then he motions toward the other soldiers. “Everyone out,” he snaps.
When the soldiers have left us alone, he turns back to me and leans forward to put his arms on the table. “I’m sorry you have to be here,” he says quietly. “I hope you understand, Ms. Iparis, that I’m bound by my duty to do this.”
“Where’s Commander Jameson?” I reply. “She’s your puppet master, isn’t she? I would’ve thought she’d come interrogate me as well.”
Thomas doesn’t flinch at my taunt. “She’s containing Los Angeles at the moment, organizing the quarantine and reporting the situation to Congress. With all due respect, the world does not revolve around you.”
Containing Los Angeles. The words chill me. “Are the plagues really that bad right now?” I decide to ask yet again, keeping my eyes firmly fixed on Thomas’s face. “Is LA quarantined because of illness?”
He shakes his head. “Classified.”
“When will it be lifted? Are all the sectors quarantined?”
“Stop asking. I told you, the whole city is. Even if I knew when it would be lifted, I’d still have no reason to tell you.”
I know instantly by his expression that what he actually means is: Commander Jameson didn’t tell me what’s going on in the city, so I have no idea. Why would she need to keep him in the dark? “What happened in the city?” I press, hoping to get more out of him.
“That’s not relevant to your interrogation,” Thomas replies, tapping his fingers impatiently against his arm. “Los Angeles is no longer your concern, Ms. Iparis.”
“It’s my hometown,” I reply. “I grew up there. Metias died there. Of course it’s my concern.”
Thomas is quiet. His hand comes up to push dark hair away from his face, and his eyes search mine. Minutes tick by. “That’s what this is all about,” he finally mutters. I wonder if he’s saying this because he’s weary too after six hours in this room. “Ms. Iparis, what happened to your brother—”
“I know what happened,” I interrupt him. My voice trembles in rising anger. “You killed him. You sold him to the state.” The words hurt so much that I can barely squeeze them out.
His expression quivers. He lets out a cough and straightens in his chair. “The order came di
rectly from Commander Jameson, and the last thing I’d do is disobey a direct order from her. You should know this rule as well as I do—although I have to admit you’ve never been very good at following it.”
“What, so you were just willing to hand him over like that, because he figured out how our parents died? He was your friend, Thomas. You grew up with him. Commander Jameson wouldn’t have given you the time of day—you wouldn’t be sitting across this table right now—if Metias hadn’t recommended you for her patrol. Or have you forgotten that?” My voice rises. “You couldn’t risk even a fraction of your own safety to help him?”
“It was a direct order,” Thomas repeats. “Commander Jameson is not to be questioned. What don’t you understand about that? She knew that he hacked into the deceased persons’ database, along with a host of other high security government catalogs. Your brother broke the law, multiple times. Commander Jameson couldn’t have a well-respected captain of her patrol committing crimes right under her nose.”
I narrow my eyes. “And that’s why you killed him in a dark alley, then framed Day for it? Because you’d happily follow your commander’s orders right off a cliff?”
Thomas slams his hand down on the table hard enough to make me jump. “It was a signed order from the state of California,” he shouts. “Do you understand what I’m saying? I had no better choice.” Then his eyes widen—he hadn’t expected those words to come out, not that way. They stun me too. He keeps talking, now at a quicker pace, seemingly determined to erase the words. A strange light glows in his eyes, something that I can’t quite pinpoint. What is it? “I’m a soldier of the Republic. When I joined the military I took an oath to obey my superiors’ orders at all costs. Metias took the same oath, and he broke it.”
There’s something odd about the way he refers to Metias, a sort of hidden emotion that throws me off. “The state is broken.” I take a deep breath. “And you’re a coward for leaving Metias at its mercy.”