by Emily Suvada
Matrix’s eyes grow fierce. She nods, grabbing Clara’s arms.
I suck in a breath, steeling myself, and pick up the slick, wet loops of her intestines and push them back into the wound.
Clara’s eyes blink wide, her back arching as she screams. Matrix’s grip tightens on her arms, forcing her down to the cave floor. I pull the tape tight across her abdomen, yanking off another strip of tape to form an X over the wound, the adhesive somehow bonding to her skin through the chalky layer of dust. Clara’s scream grows ragged, echoing off the walls.
“Ruse, keep her still!” I shout, fumbling as I try to yank out my cuff’s reader cable. My fingers are coated with blood and grit, my skin stained dark to the wrist. I unfurl the wire frantically, jabbing it into Clara’s abdomen, kicking off a live stream of nanites to seal her skin. “This is going to hurt even more.”
“Do you know what you’re doing?” Ruse asks, holding Clara’s legs. “She’s in a lot of pain. If this isn’t going to work—”
“Her pain isn’t my concern right now,” I snap. “Her life is.”
Clara’s eyes roll back in her head, moaning as the nanites start to work. The skin on her abdomen bubbles, the edges of the wound shimmering with silver. The scan is 60 percent complete, but it’s slowing as her healing tech sucks the energy from her system. I tweak the code I’m running through her panel to stabilize her, trying to balance the load, but there’s not much I can do now except wait.
“There shouldn’t have been so many Lurkers in these tunnels,” Ruse mutters. He leans to one side, still holding Clara’s legs, and spits on the floor. “Security’s getting lax. We’ll need to run patrols and check for more.”
I glance over my shoulder at the dust-covered bodies of the Lurkers, remembering their crazed eyes flashing in the light of the muzzle fire. I’ve seen the Wrath before—Lachlan invoked it in Cole dozens of times back at the lab, testing the relationship between his DNA and instincts, but I’ve never stood face-to-face with someone lost in it like that. The closest I’ve come was Sunnyvale, when the crowd’s panels turned orange, but I saw that night through Catarina’s eyes. And those weren’t Lurkers either. Lachlan turned the Panacea into a weapon and used it against every person in that town.
Clara shudders, gasping, her skin beading with sweat. Her blood pressure is plummeting, but the scan is only 80 percent complete.
“She’s dying,” Ruse says. “There might be more Lurkers out there. We have to go, Jun Bei. I need to alert the others and protect the city.”
“She’s not dying,” I say. I tweak the nanite stream to add a punch of adrenaline and keep Clara’s heart beating. “Not if I can help it.”
Ruse’s eyes narrow. He looks at the cable jutting from my cuff. “You’re testing the Panacea. Jun Bei, I told you—”
“I know what you said,” I mutter. “No more human experiments. But this is different, Ruse. This might be the only way to save her.”
It’s also the best chance I’ve had to study someone who’s actually dying.
Ruse looks up at Matrix, but she doesn’t say anything. She’s just staring into the distance, something crazed in her expression. It’s like she’s gone somewhere else, somewhere inside herself, though her hands are still locked on Clara’s arms. The scan is 90 percent complete when footsteps sound behind us. Ruse stiffens, and a shot echoes through the cavern. It’s hard to tell if it’s from our tunnel or the fork the Lurkers are trapped in. The scan ticks up to 95 percent, and another shot ricochets off the cave’s stone walls.
Ruse leaps up, letting go of Clara’s legs. He draws his gun. “We should go. This isn’t the time for your experiments, Jun Bei. We could be under attack—the Lurkers might just be a distraction. We can try carrying her, but we need to secure these tunnels.”
“Then go,” I snap, scanning Clara’s vitals. The scan is almost complete, but her heart is stalling. I need her to die—I won’t get any results unless she flatlines—but I also need her to hold on just one more minute.
“There are more people in danger right now,” Ruse says, his voice hard. “If this is part of a bigger attack, then I need your help. You can’t sit running experiments while the whole city is at risk. Not everything is a puzzle you can solve with code. I don’t know why you can’t see that.”
“You mean, why can’t I do as I’m told?” I growl. “The Panacea is the most important thing in the world right now. I don’t know why you can’t see that.”
His silver eyes narrow, gleaming in the dim light slanting through the dust clouds. He’s so stubborn and so focused on protecting Entropia. I don’t understand why the people here chose him to lead them. Regina had vision—she was wild and creative. She had dreams of a bold new world. Ruse is pragmatic. He’s smart, but he has no imagination. He’s never been able to see the Panacea for the gift it truly is.
An alert pings into my vision. The scan has finished running. I look back down at Clara, letting out a breath of relief. She’s still alive, and now I’m ready to study the Panacea when the instinct for death overwhelms her. When her heart stops, when her systems crash, then I’ll be able to see what’s wrong.
But her heart is still beating. I frown, scanning her vitals. Her heart has been stalling for the last minute, but it’s shuddering again. The beats are slow and fragile, but they’re there. The blue in her lips is fading, the color in her skin coming back. Her abdomen is an angry mass of purple, bubbling flesh, but it’s sealed.
She’s going to live.
“No,” I whisper. Her stomach was open. She had the Lurkers’ hands inside her. I stabilized her, but she wasn’t supposed to survive. I can’t see how the Panacea fails unless she actually dies. But she isn’t dying—she’s recovering. I must have healed her too well.
Ruse stares down at her, his expression shifting to amazement. “You saved her.”
I shake my head, balling my hands into fists, but I can’t say anything. I can’t tell Ruse and Matrix that I’ve failed—that she was supposed to flatline. I’m no closer to fixing the Panacea—running the scan was a waste of time. I’ve saved Clara, and part of me is happy for that, but the Panacea could save everyone if I could just finish it. I rock back onto my feet, ejecting the cable from Clara’s panel, trying to hide my frustration.
Matrix is still kneeling silently, clutching Clara’s hand, her eyes glassy. She barely flinches as the footsteps echoing through the tunnel grow louder.
Another gunshot cuts the air, and Ruse backs away. “Can you two move her? I’m going to go to the surface and see if I can find Rhine’s team. I’ll make sure it’s clear for you to come out.”
“Fine, go,” I say.
Ruse runs down the twisting tunnel, and I grab Clara’s arm to sling it over my shoulder. She won’t be able to walk, but Matrix and I should be able to carry her to the surface. Matrix’s grip won’t budge from Clara’s arms, though. She’s still holding her down on the cave floor, staring into space with glassy eyes.
“Hey, Matrix,” I say. “Come on, we need to go.”
She looks up, swaying, but doesn’t move. There’s something off about her eyes. Ruse lets out a shout in the distance, gunfire peppering the air.
“Matrix,” I repeat, frustrated. “Snap out of it. We have to leave.”
Her eyes refocus slowly, and her hands loosen on Clara’s arms. She opens her mouth and lets out a strange choking cry. I lean back warily as her lips quiver, but not into a smile. They curl into a snarl.
She lunges forward, her eyes suddenly wild. I throw myself backward, trying to scramble to my feet, but I’m too late—she grabs a handful of my hair and sends an elbow into my face. My head flies back, my teeth clacking shut. I claw at her wrist, trying to break her grip on my hair, and she snaps at me like a crazed animal.
No, not an animal. Like a Lurker.
But that’s impossible. I send a fist into her ribs and wrench her hand from my hair, stumbling back. People don’t just turn into Lurkers like this. The Wrath isn’t suppo
sed to be contagious.
Footsteps pound in the tunnel, but I don’t know if it’s Ruse or another pack of Lurkers. I spin around, reeling, trying to run down the tunnel and away from her. Before I can, she lunges forward, teeth bared, and bites a chunk out of my face.
The tunnel spins, static humming in my ears, my legs buckling beneath me. All I can feel is the thunderclap of pain that roars through me as the newly healed flesh on my cheek splits open. Matrix screeches, drawing back for another bite, and I search frantically through my panel for a weapon, for anything to stop her. I can’t think, though. I can barely see. My nerves are a wash of static, Matrix’s teeth scraping my jawbone, her hands tightening around my neck. I fumble blindly for the scythe, my vision spotting with black, and find it just as a figure races down the tunnel.
Two shots ring out, and Matrix flies off me, blood misting the air. The figure runs across the cavern and crouches beside me. It isn’t Ruse or Rhine, though. It’s a soldier in black armor. The darkness is coming for me, lapping at my mind as the pain in my cheek radiates down my neck.
“Jun Bei! Hold on!” the soldier urges me, sliding the visor back. Their voice tugs at something inside me, something deep and overwhelming. “I’ve got you. I’m here now.”
Ice-blue eyes blink down at me as the darkness takes me under.
It’s Cole.
CHAPTER 4 CATARINA
LEOBEN IS SLUMPED AGAINST THE wall, his hand clutched to his side. His shadow jumps on the hallway’s tiled floor with every flicker of the lab’s fluorescent lights. Scarlet blood trickles over his fingers, soaking into the gray fabric of his shirt. His eyes are underlined with blue, his hair a shock of white against his tattooed brown skin.
He meets my gaze, and something in the look he gives me freezes me to my core.
The man in front of me isn’t a simulated character like the five children huddled at my back. There’s a spark in his eyes that’s undeniably alive. I’ve been around the avatars of the children for so long, I didn’t realize it was missing, but now it’s startlingly clear.
This is Leoben—my Leoben. He’s here.
“Shit, that hurts,” he moans. He pulls up the hem of his shirt, revealing a gaping inch-wide gash between his ribs. Blood is smeared across his stomach, flowing down in a twisting stream to drip from his belt to the floor. “What kind of asshole codes a personal simulation where people can get stabbed?”
I take a step back, the piece of glass cutting into my palm. The way Leoben’s looking at me, the way he’s talking—it seems like he remembers me. But that’s impossible. Jun Bei wiped weeks of the world’s memories. There are only a handful of people who even know I exist, and Leoben isn’t one of them.
“Lee?” I whisper. “Is that… is that really you?”
He looks up, pausing as he sees the five-year-old version of himself huddled behind me with the other children. “Okay, squid, this is way more messed up than I thought.”
I just stare at him, my heart pounding. He does remember. It’s really Leoben—the boy I thought was my brother. He tried to teach me how to fight. We camped in his jeep while Cole was healing. He forced me to wear a T-shirt with a squid printed on the front. It’s taking all my strength not to throw the shard of glass down and fling my arms around him, to bury my face in his neck and let out the tears I’ve been holding back for weeks.
I don’t know how many times I’ve fantasized that someone would come and find me like this, but I thought it was impossible. Seeing Leoben now is enough to make me sway, to take the strength from my knees. But another tremor rolls through the lab, and the words I’ve been repeating to myself through every long, dark day in this simulation are enough to keep me on my feet.
Don’t go out like a fool.
Leoben might be here to help, but I don’t know why he’s here, or how he found his way into this simulation. I’m not just locked in a lab—I’m locked inside a body that isn’t mine. This simulation is running on the neural implant in Jun Bei’s skull, which means Leoben must be hacking it somehow. I need to hold myself together until I find out what’s going on. Only a fool would fall apart the moment they caught a glimpse of hope.
I draw in a slow breath, folding my emotions into a tight, jagged space inside my chest. “How are you here, Lee?”
“It’s a long story…,” he starts, but trails off as another rumble sounds. The floor shudders. I brace myself, waiting for the tremor to pass, but instead the shaking grows stronger until the beakers rattle on the metal shelves behind me. The children huddle closer, and Anna’s arms tighten around my leg.
Leoben clutches the wall as the floor lurches. “What the hell is happening now?”
The laboratory groans, a spiderweb crack racing across the ceiling. I follow it with my eyes and dodge a chunk of falling plaster. “Whenever Jun Bei’s hurt, the simulation becomes unstable. It’s never gone on as long as this, though.” A beaker rattles off the shelf and smashes on the concrete. The children yelp, scrambling away.
A chill licks down my spine. This isn’t like the quakes we’ve had before. They’ve always been intense, but none have been nearly as strong as this. I can feel the vibration in my chest, like bass turned up too loud. There are still no flashes, no glimpses through Jun Bei’s eyes. Either she’s seriously hurt, or Leoben’s presence here is tearing the simulation apart—or both.
“Can we get out of here?” Leoben yells. “This place is freaking me out.”
A fire sparks inside me at the mention of getting out, but I swallow it down. “Not so fast. How do you even remember me?”
A shadow passes over his features. “I was faradayed during the wipe. I was in a Comox. I’ve been stuck at Cartaxus ever since, trying to figure out what the hell happened to you. If it’s okay with you, I’d like to get us both out of here before this place falls down.”
Faradayed. Of course. Dax showed up in Entropia to take Leoben away just before Jun Bei launched the wipe. Leoben could easily have been shielded, running dark as they flew away in a Comox. He would have been protected from the signal that wiped everyone’s memories.
“How are you here, though? The only people who could have gotten you in are Lachlan and Cartaxus.”
“I’m not completely useless,” he says, wincing as the lab lurches again. “I used to code sims when I was younger—nothing as creepy as this, but I know my way around VR code. I know how to get you out, and we’d better hurry. The implant in your head can’t handle running this simulation while keeping you and Jun Bei apart.”
A thread of unease tightens inside me. Leoben can definitely code, and I know he’s skilled with computers and networks—but he’s not a gentech coder. Even if he’s found a way to remotely access the implant keeping Jun Bei and me apart, he shouldn’t know so much about how it’s working. That’s cutting-edge tech, designed by Regina, updated by Jun Bei and Lachlan.
Something about this doesn’t feel right.
“How do you know so much about the implant?” I ask.
Leoben doesn’t look surprised by the suspicion in my voice. He lets out a choking laugh, still clutching the wound in his side. “I should have known you’d be a pain in the ass about this. I can explain everything, but we need to leave, and fast. I’m trying to save you, squid.”
I search his face, the shard of glass cutting into my hand. He doesn’t look like he’s lying—he looks like the sweet, cocky boy I know. The floor heaves, making my knees buckle, an entire row of beakers smashing to the floor. Ziana screams, running past us and down the hallway. I still don’t know how Leoben got here, and I don’t know how he’s going to get me out, but his is the only real face I’ve seen in weeks, and I know one thing he’s said is true: The implant is on the verge of breaking down. I can feel it straining now, feel the ocean of Jun Bei’s mind raging on the other side. It’s closer than it’s ever felt before. Pain pulses in the base of my skull. The only way to avoid being swept away is to get out of here.
Leoben might be lying to me,
but I still have to trust him. I don’t have a choice.
“Okay,” I say, dropping the glass, wiping my bloodied hand on my sweatshirt. “How am I supposed to get out? I’ve tried everything.”
“We need to get to an interface.” Leoben looks up and down the hallway, pushing himself to his knees. “You have to exit the simulation.”
“Of course—exit the simulation!” I say, slapping my forehead. “Wow, Lee. Why didn’t I try that? What do you think I’ve been working on in here?”
He raises an eyebrow, looking at the kids huddled at my back. “Babysitting a much cuter version of me, apparently.”
I roll my eyes, gesturing down the hallway. “There are some genkits in the lab down there, but the last one I hacked blew up on me.”
“Let’s check them. There’s gotta be a way out. I’ll find it for you.”
I follow him over to the lab’s double doors, tugging the children’s hands from my pants. “What’s happening out there? Is the vaccine still holding?”
“I don’t know.” Leoben pushes through the doors. “I’ve been locked up by Cartaxus. They’ve kept me away from their networks.” He heads for the genkits on the wall, his eyes glazing. “I think we can use these to get you out. Come on, I’ll jack you in.”
I step across the room, then pause, looking back. “What will happen to the kids?”
His eyes refocus, his face softening. “They’re not real, squid.”
My throat tightens. The children stare up at me, dirty faced and frightened. I know they’re not real. I know they’re just part of the simulation. But that doesn’t stop my heart aching when I think about leaving them behind.
“They’re real to me,” I whisper. “They’re all I’ve had in here.”
“They’ll be fine,” Leoben says. “The simulation won’t be destroyed. It’ll just be switched off.”
I let out a breath, kneeling down beside the children. Leoben’s right. They’ll be fine, but I won’t be unless I leave them now. “Okay, I gotta go, guys. I’m sorry—I can’t stay here with you.”
