The Girl Who Dared to Think 3: The Girl Who Dared to Descend

by Bella Forrest

  “Liana,” she said, a slight smile coming to her lips. “Glad you could come so quickly. I have a full schedule for the rest of the day.” She arched an eyebrow at Ambrose. “Sorry for the circumstances. What’s been going on?”

  Ambrose’s mouth tightened, and I could sense he wanted to defend himself, but was managing to resist. The level of control was impressive, but I was surprised to see that he was capable of it. It only reaffirmed my belief that my request, no matter how symbolic it was, would go a long way in getting Ambrose to listen to me.

  “Nothing that this won’t fix,” I replied. “Ambrose just needs to understand that I take my blackmail-enforced jobs very seriously.”

  Lacey chuckled and sat the beaker back down on the table with a sharp click. “He’s been pushing back?”

  “Yes, and that’s going to change. It has to change, now that he’s officially registered in the Tourney. With people I haven’t even vetted for it yet. As a result, my friends and I were attacked in the Lion’s Den yesterday, and they sent a clear message to us.” I produced the pad and turned it on, opening it to the note and setting it down on the table. It was a risky move, exposing to Lacey what Ambrose had done like that, but I needed her to know that I was taking this seriously, so she would, in turn, continue to take me seriously.

  It was also good to show her how I handled problems—and would send a clear message that I wasn’t going to let her hold me responsible for his mistakes.

  Her head snapped up, her brows drawing together. “You registered for the Tourney two days early?” she hissed. “I told you specifically—”

  “I have been training for this day my entire life,” Ambrose bit out angrily, his eyes flashing. “So I registered a few days early, so what! You sent this criminal into my life against my wishes, and now you expect me to sit by and take orders from her during what was supposed to be my moment! I am a man. I will not be babysat.”

  Lacey’s face might as well have been comprised of stone. “I see. Liana, how do you want to handle this?”

  “Well, for one thing, he is going to get me emancipated from my parents and moved into the apartment across the hall, along with Maddox. He’s also going to move Grey in as his roommate. I don’t want him going anywhere without one of us, which includes the bathroom and showers. Then he’s going to fill out a change of team form to replace his two friends with Grey and Maddox.”

  “You have no idea if your friends are even going to pass the tests!” he exclaimed hotly. “How the hell are they going to be able to—”

  I unzipped a pocket on my thigh and pulled out the thin plastic sheet I had received from Armament the first day I met Ambrose—part of the standard Knight equipment. It allowed us to search for citizens by name or ID number. “Maddox Kerrin and Grey Farmless,” I commanded, and the screen lit up. There was a slight pause, and then both their images were floating there. “Display current test results.”

  The tests weren’t finished, but their results were posted hourly. I hadn’t checked them yet, but I wasn’t concerned. Leo was confident in his abilities, and I knew Maddox’s physical evaluation would come back all right. And I was guessing that Maddox had learned a lot about the Knights from the technical manuals that Cali owned before they had been confiscated, so I felt reasonably confident displaying their standings.

  A second later, four graphs showed on the screen: two physical and two mental. Leo’s mental graph was finished—with him at ninety-three percent. Maddox’s physical was also finished—at ninety-five percent, which was impressive. Their other graphs were incomplete, but were already showing results in the high eighties, with a little over half the tests already completed. I turned it around and smiled smugly at Ambrose.

  “Grey is in the eightieth percentile; Maddox in the low nineties,” I informed him. “My people are good at what they do, and you need to stop underestimating them. They are reliable, trustworthy, and best of all, being blackmailed as well. So change the damn team roster.”

  “He’ll do it,” Lacey announced softly, and Ambrose looked up at her, his eyes wide and horrified.

  “Lacey, you can’t!”

  “I can and I will,” she said, her voice thundering angrily. “I told you that this was what was going to happen, and I expected you to go along with it. You didn’t, so now I have to step in and make you do it. I expected you to be a professional, Ambrose. We’re trying to make you the damn Champion, for Scipio’s sake. So when Liana says jump, you better damn well ask her how high.” She marched up to him while she spoke, one muscular arm snapping up to grip him tightly by the chin and pull his head down until he was looking her in the eye. “Now tell me you understand me,” she growled.

  He jerked his head, but Lacey held on, her fingers gripping him so tightly that his dark skin grew pale under the force of them, the area around them becoming white.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he finally said. “I understand.”

  I watched their interaction with no small amount of curiosity. Their relationship was more familiar than I had originally thought it would be. It was an assumption on my part, but given what I’d seen of Lacey, I didn’t think she was the type to get physical with any of her people. With him, however, there was an annoyance that seemed to grip her more tightly. They were of similar ages, too—perhaps they had been in a relationship at one point?

  I wasn’t sure, but it was something to note and possibly exploit in the future. Depending on how much pushback Ambrose gave me after this.

  “Good,” Lacey said, releasing him and taking a step back. “Lucas?” The man sitting at the table had been staring down at it, avoiding the confrontation completely, and looked up at her now, his expression attentive. “Please get started on Liana, if you don’t mind.”

  Lucas nodded and waved me over, patting the stool next to him.

  I sighed and unzipped the front of my suit, pulling it off to the waist. The procedure to change out nets was a common one, but there was still some blood, and I didn’t want any of it getting on my uniform. I smoothed down the black, sleeveless top I was wearing underneath, and then moved over to Lucas, dropping onto the stool and presenting him with the back of my neck.

  I tensed when I heard the sound of the aerosol blast, followed by the hair-raising feeling of cold droplets on my neck, numbing the area.

  “Once you’ve explored it some, I suggest you pull it out until after the Tourney,” Lacey said, and I looked at her, trying not to think about what Lucas was doing back there. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but I’d rather lose you than it. The data on there is beyond priceless.”

  I started to nod and then caught myself. It made sense, but it was still quite invasive—I’d have to keep the net Lucas took out and then have Quess ready to change it out whenever I was worried about getting caught doing something wrong. Luckily, the regular nets lasted for two years when they weren’t implanted, so as long as I didn’t keep it out for very long, it would be fine. “Very well,” I said. “How does it work?”

  Lucas’s gloved fingers pressed against the side of my neck, and I felt a dull pressure, indicating that he was now cutting the skin open and exposing the implanted net that he was about to remove. I clenched my jaw and quickly decided not to think about it.

  “It has the same capabilities as a normal net: reading brainwaves and sending net transmissions. Only this one has data stored on it, and delivers the information directly into your mind,” Lacey replied. “It takes a bit of getting used to, though, so fair warning.”

  I winced as the tendrils that draped across my brain began to withdraw, the sensation more nauseating than painful, and gritted my teeth, trying not to imagine them dragging along my cerebral cortex like vines that weren’t willing to be uprooted.

  It felt like forever before the sensation ended, and I exhaled sharply, instantly relieved. I heard the sharp tink of my net dropping into something metallic, and then braced myself, the momentary reprieve about to come to an end.

  Seconds lat
er, Lucas’s fingers returned, and I felt pressure at the back of my neck again. I waited in expectation of the filaments pushing back in, and the teeth-clenching pressure they caused, but to my surprise, nothing came. I continued to wait, even as Lucas smeared dermal bond onto the incision point to seal it closed.

  “I’m not sure this is working,” I said. “I don’t think the filaments extended. Are you sure this one is still good?”

  “The filaments on these nets are… ‘gentler’ is the only word I can think of,” Lacey said, rubbing the back of her neck. “They are about half the size of the ones we get now.”

  My eyebrows lifted. “That’s amazing. And it can still do everything a regular net can?”

  “Yup. You can net as usual, but you’ll find the vibrations to be greatly diminished as well.” That didn’t surprise me—Leo had linked with my net once, and the vibrations while he spoke were greatly reduced. Still, from how Lacey had put it, I wondered if the vibrations on normal nets were always the same—which would mean that Leo had managed to alter them. Was there something else that made them rattle so hard—something that could be fixed? And if so, what was it, and why hadn’t anyone done anything to fix it?

  “Are you ready to give it a whirl?” Lacey suddenly asked.

  I blinked in surprise and took a moment to recall what was happening. “How do I do it?”

  “You have to focus your mind,” Ambrose said. “Think about something specific, like… Think about the End, or something.”

  “Whoa,” Lacey said, her hand shooting out in a universal symbol for “stop.” “That’s a bit… heavy for a first try. Let’s start with something a little simpler. Liana, have you ever heard of a car?”

  “Of course I have,” I lied. “I read about them in a book once.” It was almost true—I had read about a truck once. Leo had been the first to show me a car, so I did have an idea of what one looked like through his projector, but I wasn’t about to tell her that.

  In any case, I had just admitted to a crime—owning, let alone reading, anything other than a technical manual or schoolbook was illegal—but to her credit, Lacey only smiled. “Give it a shot,” she said encouragingly.

  I stared at them, and then closed my eyes, focusing, picturing the image that Leo had shown me. They were rectangular boxes of metal with four wheels. They had radios and windshield wipers and seemed prone to their tires going flat.

  I was letting the details roll over my mind, trying to imagine what it really looked like, when the fuzzy edges of it snapped into focus. Details I had never even known existed sprang into focus. I suddenly knew the name of every part: exhaust, carburetor, air filter, oil tank… Things that Leo’s image hadn’t shown, and that I hadn’t read about in a book, but could now understand. I focused on the image, wondering what it felt like to be inside of one, and then suddenly I wasn’t just seeing the car, I was driving the car.

  My foot pressed down as a feeling of elation, as wild and carefree as the wind whipping through my hair, rushed over me, making my limbs tingle. The car surged forward, the expanse of gray road rushing by beneath me. There was nothing overhead—it was a convertible, something I now understood was different but the same—and the warm morning sun was shining down on me, warming my skin even as the wind cooled it. I turned my face toward it, smiling, laughing, just enjoying being alive…

  My eyes snapped open, and suddenly I was back in the Tower. I took a deep breath, and another, the experience so real that my hands were trembling in my lap. I balled them into fists and looked up at Lacey, who was watching me intently.

  “What was that?” I asked. “At first, I could see it. I could understand it. But then something happened, and it was like I was—”

  “There?” she supplied, and I nodded. “It’s a tangent memory. When these were passed out among the first generation of survivors, Lionel Scipio wanted a way to preserve memories as well as history, so that later generations could feel connected with their ancestors, and the world before.”

  “Wait, that was someone’s actual memory?” I asked. Lacey nodded, and I blinked a few times, trying to process how I felt about that. On the one hand, cool. On the other hand, it felt a little intrusive. “Doesn’t that freak you out at all?”

  “No,” Lacey replied with a smile. “It makes me feel connected. Now, is there anything else you need?”

  “Yes, actually,” I said, putting my thoughts about the legacy nets to one side and focusing on the matter at hand. The net was just part of my plan, but I needed something else, too. And I needed Lacey’s considerable resources to work for me, for once, to get it. “Dylan Chase and Frederick Hamilton. They are the strongest competitors signed up thus far, and I want their backgrounds, as well as knowledge about whether they are working with anyone.”

  “You think they might be from another legacy group?” Lacey asked. “What makes you think that?”

  I smiled at her. “Perfectly justified paranoia.”

  “Look, we can’t just focus on one individual,” Lacey said. “I know you’re trying to be thorough, but there are going to be a lot more competitors coming through. We can’t waste time on each one.”

  “I’m not asking you to,” I replied. “I’m asking you to do two. My people are doing their best, but we don’t have the access and resources you do, and we’re spread pretty thin. We need information.”

  “Yes, I am aware,” Lacey said with a grin. “Your friend Ms. Elphesian is transferring into the Cogs with her boyfriend, and requested Roark’s apartment. Those boxes are the ones they managed to get down here in their first trip.”

  I frowned, processing what she said. “Wait, what?” Why were Zoe and Eric moving boxes here? What was she doing? We hadn’t discussed anything about her and Eric coming down here. Just what was she thinking?

  “I will let Zoe explain it to you,” Lacey said. “And I will have someone look into these people, as you asked. Ambrose, I trust you’ll be more tolerable to Liana in the future? As far as I’m concerned, she outranks you. So I trust you’ll follow her orders when it comes to your safety.”

  Ambrose rolled his eyes, but nodded sharply, only once.

  Lacey beamed. “Good. Now, please take care of my cousin, Liana. He can be a little jerk at times, but he’s not all bad.” They were related? That… explained a lot, actually.

  But it killed any questions I had about Zoe, and the pointed look she gave me ensured that they didn’t return. I swallowed hard, her message received loud and clear: I was to keep her cousin alive, or else.

  15

  I sat a carton down on the counter and exhaled, lifting my arms and clasping my hands over my head to stretch the aching muscles in my back while I looked around my new living quarters. My very first apartment.

  I couldn’t help but smile, pleased at the prospect of having my own home, free of my parents. I supposed, in a way, that Sanctum had been like that. But this was different. It had furniture.

  I permitted myself a childish moment, and fell face-first onto the sofa in the shared living room, sinking into the cushions. I luxuriated in it, imagining what it would feel like to take a nap there once the Tourney was over and I could breathe a little bit more. Maybe curled up with a good book from Zoe’s stash, letting my eyelids grow heavy as the words blurred together…

  Hands shook me roughly as a male voice whispered “Mom” in a low, urgent voice that called to some instinct deep inside, ripping me from a peaceful slumber.

  I opened my eyes and saw my son kneeling next to the couch. I had dozed off again, for the umpteenth time today. Old age was getting harder and harder to resist, but I kept holding on—there was so much more to be done.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked, grabbing my son’s hands and holding them tightly between my own. He was agitated, tears in his eyes.

  “He’s dead,” he whispered. “Lionel’s dead.”

  My head spun with the news, but I didn’t let the shock rule me. I had already lost so many on the path here. Mourning
would come later.

  “How?”

  “In his sleep,” my son replied. “They found him in his quarters.”

  “Scipio 1.0?” I asked. We were supposed to have an emergency vote on that tomorrow, to finalize or reverse the decision to destroy him.

  “The records show he was deleted,” he replied. “We can’t find any trace of the program.”

  “No napping until we’re moved in,” Maddox announced, jolting me out of the memory I had just gotten caught in, and my eyes snapped open to find her emerging from the hallway.

  There was a moment of disorientation as the memory broke, but I breathed through it. These tangent memories had been happening since I’d received the legacy net, and I still wasn’t used to it. Especially this time; the emotions that came with this one were more powerful than any of the generalized sensations I had experienced before.

  I sat up, put my feet on the floor, and flexed my neck. The memory was interesting, but also irrelevant—I’d already known that Lionel Scipio had been murdered, and that nobody had been able to find Scipio 1.0. Until I had stumbled onto him by pure dumb luck. But now I knew why they hadn’t searched: everyone had believed he’d been deleted.

  What was interesting about it, though, was that the memory had belonged to someone who was there at the beginning of the Tower. I just didn’t know who, only that they had been important in some way. And elderly.

  I shook the memory and the resulting emotions off, and returned my focus to Maddox, who was now crossing over into the kitchen. She was wearing her new uniform, having passed her tests with scores high enough to be promoted to Knight Elite. Ambrose was now officially listed as her supervisor—and Leo’s. Leo himself was in the process of moving in next door, although his move involved only one box, which was filled with his spare uniforms.