Exist Once More

by Trisha Leigh

  Oz raised his dark eyebrows, gray eyes as serious as ever. “Aren’t we?”

  “Wait, are we spies?” My lips twisted in confusion. “I don’t think so. If we were, we’d have been fired for being lazy.”

  I flopped down in the chair behind one of the desks. It was the spare one, and far preferable to using his bed. Being here already felt like a betrayal—of Sarah, of Caesarion—and I didn’t need to add another layer of inappropriateness to the mess.

  “We haven’t been lazy,” he replied, pushing jet black hair off his forehead.

  He needed a trip to the grooming booths worse than I did. Another aspect of normal life that had fallen even farther to the wayside without Analeigh here. No one had reminded me to go get my eyebrows tweezed in months. Which meant they resembled the furry caterpillars of Earth Before.

  “We’ve been lulling the Elders into a sense of false security,” Oz clarified, pacing instead of sitting down. “Or, trying to.”

  “Hmm.” My brilliant reply didn’t even earn me a glance and I sat up straighter, determined to contribute to the conversation. “So, the meeting yesterday morning was pretty wild. You think it’s the Return Project that’s causing these glitches or whatever they’re calling them?”

  He nodded, finally turning to look at me. The force of the determination in his gaze knocked me backward, my chest heavy under the weight of his intensity. I pressed a hand there, feeling my brow furrow in confusion at the odd feeling.

  Oz cocked his head to one side, the expression in his gaze turning quizzical for a half a second before switching to exasperated. He’d probably decided a long time ago that he had neither the energy nor inclination to figure me out. All the better.

  “Of course that’s what’s causing it,” was all he replied, in a tone that said I was stupid for worrying about our own interference being the catalyst.

  “Okay, well, I’m glad you don’t think this is my fault, at least.” I managed to get myself back to normal, still unsure why things insisted on being so weird between us. It could have been that too much was being left unsaid, but if Oz wasn’t keen on acknowledging the whole True Companion card thing, I certainly wasn’t going to bring it up.

  I cleared my throat. Focus, Kaia. Problem at hand. “Why would the Elders report their own breach to the Genesis Council, though?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know.”

  “Maybe some of them aren’t in on it?” That was the theory Analeigh and I had been working with when we’d first found out something was going on. Of course, that was also back when we thought Oz was involved because he was sneaking off to the past, too. Changing things because the Elders asked him to.

  I needed to focus on the here and now. Oz had become all I had left, so trusting him was key. And he had given himself up. Taken my side when he could have hung me out to dry. That would have to be enough.

  A glance his direction said Oz seemed unaware of the turmoil inside me.

  He shook his head, returning to his pacing across the room. “I know for sure that they’re all aware of it, though it was always my dad and Zeke who gave me assignments. So maybe there’s a smaller group aware of the full extent of the project, or of the endgame. But none of them are clueless.”

  My heart sunk. It had been nice to think that at least a few of the people who helped raise me hadn’t been full of crap the entire time. Especially Booth. “What is the full extent of the project? I mean, if they’re using that Projector machine you showed me, how are they messing up so much that people in Genesis are disappearing?”

  “I don’t know. It was never perfected. They were still in the testing phases when they were sending me out, but they’re not including me anymore, for obvious reasons.” He made a vague gesture my direction, like I was a stain he couldn’t get out of his favorite shirt no matter how hard he scrubbed. “My father hardly speaks to me.”

  “I imagine that’s been an upside,” I said without thinking. I slapped a hand over my mouth, horror widening my eyes over my thoughtless statement.

  Pain edged the storm clouds in Oz’s eyes a moment before lightning flashed. “Let’s stick to the topic at hand.”

  “You invited me here.” I swallowed, reminding myself to think before I spoke. “What is the topic at hand?”

  “I wanted to ask you something.”

  “Okay…” Please don’t let it be awkward, please don’t let it be awkward…

  “Do you think there’s anything strange about your new roommate?”

  The direction surprised me enough to tie my tongue for a moment. At least we were still avoiding the elephant in the room, hopefully until it lumbered away.

  It didn’t take much thought to come up with an answer, though. “A little. I mean, I know she only started living with us after Analeigh…left.”

  His expression turned skeptical. “But we’ve gone to school with her since we were kids. You should be able to tell me as much about her as you can about Jessica, or Levi. Right?”

  “I guess.” I bit my lower lip, thinking about the strange, slipping-away sensation that frustrated me the other day. “I know you’re right, But honestly I couldn’t tell you anything about her, not even when I think about it hard. Especially then.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Like, what her parents do, where they live. Who her paternal founders are.” I pinched my lower lip, stunned to realize that it took at least thirty seconds of real concentration to even come up with her last name. “I mean, obviously the Phans, but I don’t know anything about them.”

  He paused. “Why do you think that is?”

  “We were never close,” my mouth said without my permission. “I never talked to her much, even when we were girls.”

  “Is that why?” Oz asked carefully. He watched me with intention, his stormy eyes guarded. His head tipped to one side. “Are you sure?”

  I stopped to think, pressing my lips together before an agreement could roll off my tongue without hesitation. It felt as though some kind of automated program ran through my brainstem tat, but that was ridiculous. Those sorts of answers only activated in the past.

  “I don’t know. I’m not sure. Every time I think too hard about her my memory gets fuzzy around the edges. Like I’m chasing someone else’s thoughts through my head.” I shrugged and laughed, hoping he wouldn’t think I was losing my mind. “I kept meaning to ask Sarah about it but you know. We’re not really talking.”

  Oz flinched, looking less than confident for the first time since he let me through the door. He fiddled with his watch, checking the time. We had plenty left before we had to turn up to dinner or leave the Elders wondering where we both were.

  “I think it’s because she’s new,” he confessed after a moment. “Yumi.”

  I spun the desk chair to face him and put my hands on my hips, then squinted to get a better look, as though that would help me understand. “What do you mean, new?”

  “It’s like Elder Bohr said at the meeting—since there have been random disappearances from Genesis that it’s as likely there have been appearances, as well, but that they would naturally be harder to spot.”

  “Wait. You’re telling me that Yumi Phan appeared in this Academy, that her family appeared on Genesis…when?”

  He shrugged this time. “I don’t know. Maybe recently.”

  “We’ll go with recently,” I allowed, my brain still struggling to put together pieces of a puzzle that’s edges were lining up with startling ease. “And we went along with it without skipping a beat?”

  “Sure. Why wouldn’t we?”

  I chewed on my lower lip, working it out in my head. “Because if the past was somehow altered to allow her family to have made it onto the refugee ships that left Earth Before, we all would have known her our whole lives.”

  He nodded.

  I’d caught up but my thoughts spun dangerously fast. “If that’s true, then why do my memories of her feel different?”

  Oz picked up
his pacing again, the excitement of discovery crackling between us. “Because we don’t really have them. They could be like, I don’t know, shadows. We know we should know her, but we don’t.”

  “Or maybe because there are too many other memories and events to alter. Too many things the other seven of us did and we know on some level that she wasn’t there?”

  “Could be. Anything’s possible. As far as I know, no Historian has seriously considered the day-to-day implications of such a thing. This is why the rules are in place.” Oz stopped in front of me, so close his body heat flushed the back of my neck.

  I stood up, wanting to be eye level, and pinched the sore spot on my lower lip. “How can we find out for sure?”

  It was hard to say what exactly I’d do with the proof that a girl who wasn’t supposed to be alive in this solar system shared my bedroom, but it seemed best to be positive before making any rash moves.

  It wouldn’t prove anything as far as the Elders and the Return Project, since they themselves were the ones who had mentioned possible appearances, but it was possible we could use the information to learn more about what exactly had been changed.

  Oz’s face pinched. He ran a hand through his hair, mussing it in an oddly perfect way. “I don’t know. I told you they won’t let me near any of their secret assignments anymore, no matter how frivolous, and they’ve taken my bio data out of the permissions file for the projection room.”

  Oz looked as though he’d like to punch something. This must have been hard for him, the way everything had changed. It was tough, but I tried not to let his frustration affect me—one of us had to keep our wits—and it wasn’t a moment later that a lightbulb flickered to life over my head. “What if we didn’t need the machine?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean…the Elders said the recordings that were stored before these changes took place wouldn’t be altered, right? Because they’re static?”

  “That’s what they said.” He folded his arms. “It should be true.”

  I waved a hand, determined not to dig the trench in the road before pushing the cart. Or however that saying went. “Then all we have to do is go back through our own Observations during the months before Analeigh ran away. If Yumi wasn’t actually on any of them, then she couldn’t be part of our class.”

  Oz’s fists started to uncurl, only to clench again as he shook his head. “It might work, but we can’t do it. They’re watching us too closely, and going back through those old archives, particularly that period, will make them suspicious.”

  I flopped back into the chair with a heavy sigh. “We need help.”

  He ignored me, going into the bathroom and finger combing his hair back into place. After that he took out a toothbrush and toothpaste, smearing it on deliberately before meeting my steady gaze in the mirror. The connection made him flinch as though I’d punched him, and that was all the confirmation I needed.

  I blew out a heavy breath. “Oz, we need Sarah’s help and you know it. She’s the only one with enough tech knowledge to get us in and out of the Archives—and maybe a few other places, too—without being detected.”

  He took his time rinsing and spitting, though because he was Oz, I couldn’t say for sure whether the toothbrushing before dinner was a ruse to buy time or an actual routine. His quirks were well-documented and since I recalled making fun of him for every single one, they had to be real.

  I stared him down until he flicked off the bathroom light and perched on the edge of his bed. He kept his gaze on his watch, like maybe it would turn into a real cuff any moment and whisk him away somewhere.

  Anywhere but here, where the two of us and our elephant were coming face to face.

  “Can’t you talk to her?” he mumbled.

  “Oh, no. I’ve tried. And tried and tried and tried.”

  “Well, so have I. She won’t listen to anything I say. I don’t even know why she’s still seeing me, to be honest.”

  “That makes two of us, although for me the wondering didn’t start on your birthday.” Oh my laundry, did I just crack a joke at his expense? About this?

  To my surprise, he laughed. Oz never laughed, not a real, deep, belly one like this. It tumbled around the room like a playful dog, endearing enough in its antics to get me to laugh, too. The fits and starts of mirth released tension like an uncorked bottle of champagne and just like that, we could face it.

  Our laughter fizzled out over the next several seconds but the calm in its wake remained. Oz shook his head, his eyes soft for the first time since I walked through the door. Maybe the first time in weeks. “Fair enough, Kaia. Fair enough. But seriously, I don’t know what I can say to her that I haven’t said. She acts like she hates me but she refuses to admit she wants to change the status quo.”

  “Yeah, you guys aren’t fooling anyone.”

  “That’s what I told her.” He’d grown serious, even agitated, again and pinched the bridge of his nose. “She’s just…not sensible about this. It’s not like her.”

  “Are you serious? Sensible?” I snorted. “Sarah’s a lot of things that are pretty awesome, and I’m guessing at some point you noticed that one of those things is being female. Her treating you like crap but refusing to end it doesn’t make sense, but it’s how she feels. We have to find a way to appeal to her analytic side. Or her philanthropic side.”

  “You’re just using big words to distract me.”

  “Oz, big words could never distract you. If I wanted to do that I’d toss out some cool kid lingo that would have to filter through your brainstem tat before it made sense.”

  “Noted.” He grimaced, but the twist of his lips suggested he might have been mildly amused. “So, how do we do that? Convince her to help?”

  I bit my lip, ignoring the sharp stab of pain in my chest. “We remind her of Analeigh.”

  He nodded, slowly. “That could work. We never talk about it. Like not saying her name means she isn’t trapped in space, running around with pirates.”

  He made a face like we all had when we’d walked past a garbage dump on a trip to twenty-first century India, and said the word pirates the way most people said who farted?

  I shook my head, trying to let the dig against my brother go and, as usual, failing miserably. “One of those pirates is my brother, and in case you’ve forgotten, they also saved her life. If Jonah and his friends hadn’t been here that night, Analeigh would be dead.”

  “I know.” He didn’t apologize, but then again, Oz’s feelings about my brother leaving this Academy under duress and fleeing society had never been a secret.

  As smart as Oz was, it appeared he hadn’t put two and two together and figured out Jonah’s reasons for leaving the Academy. They were the same reason we were on the ropes at the moment—the Return Project.

  At least, I was pretty sure that was what happened with Jonah. He had never said in so many words, but the fact that he’d gone back into the past and saved his True’s life without worrying it would burn down the world was a great clue.

  “Fine,” I ground out through clenched teeth. If we wanted to convince Sarah that fighting for Analeigh’s life was bigger than her anger over our perceived betrayal, then Oz and I couldn’t be sniping at each other about my brother and the pirates every five minutes. “What do we do first?”

  He thought about it for a minute. “Mention Analeigh, but also ask her about Yumi. See what she remembers, convince her why we think it’s not as much as it should be. Then try getting closer to Yumi so once Sarah figures out how to get us back into the system without being tracked, we’ll have something to go on. Sound good?”

  I nodded after a few minutes of mulling it over. Sarah might be shocked enough at the mention of Analeigh to forget her commitment to being a stubborn ass for five minutes. That might be enough time to get her to listen to the rest of the plan, which wasn’t half bad. If it worked. “She and Levi have been spending time together. You could try to talk to him about her, too.”
<
br />   “It’s worth a shot. As far as Sarah, I’m happy to stay out of this conversation and let it stay between girlfriends.” He grimaced, then walked over to let me out of the room.

  I couldn’t help but think as I slipped out of his room and headed for the dining hall that we wouldn’t be in this situation in the first place if he’d learned that lesson a long time ago. Oz was a quick study in almost everything we’d been tasked with since coming to the Academy, but reading people?

  He needed to play catch-up, and fast.

  Chapter Five

  In Oz’s room, it had made sense that I should be the one to speak to Sarah about getting into the Archives undetected, but now, sitting on my bed while she ignored me yet again, I regretted agreeing to it all the same. The vegetable lasagna we’d had for dinner sat in my stomach like a brick.

  When she closed her tablet with a sigh and stretched, I figured there was no time like the present—once she went into the bathroom, she sometimes wouldn’t even come out until she knew I was asleep.

  “Sarah?” I ventured. The rigid set of her shoulders said she heard me, but she didn’t acknowledge my question. A sigh wound out of my chest. “I know you don’t want to talk to me, but this is important. It’s about Analeigh.”

  Sarah whirled around, her eyes huge with warning. She put a finger to her lips in the universal gesture for shut up now. The swiftness of her reaction took me aback and my mouth hung open for several seconds while I watched my roommate grab her tablet and attack the keys. A frown turned down the corners of her lips, but I was used to that.

  I closed my mouth, thinking that my grandfather would have used a funny expression to get me to shut it—you trying to catch flies, Kaia-girl?

  We didn’t have flies, of course, but I’d been to Earth Before enough at this point to understand the meaning. And to keep my mouth closed.

  “Okay.” She put down her tablet and leveled me with a serious, if wary, gaze. “Now, what about Analeigh? Have you seen her again?”

  “What did you just do?”