Ferocious

by Paula Stokes

  Jesse: I’m going to pull the fire alarm.

  Me: Wait.

  If Jesse pulls the fire alarm, there’s a good chance Kyung will find me if he stops to grab his phone before evacuating. I inch toward the far end of the sofa, closest to the doors leading out onto the balcony. They’re latched, but unlocked. If I time it just right …

  The tea water starts to boil, the sounds of bubbling and whistling filling the entire room. I steal a glance at the girl. Her back is to me as she moves around in the kitchen. Hurriedly, I slip outside onto the balcony, leaving the door slightly ajar behind me so as not to make a noise.

  The penthouse balcony takes up almost the entire north side of the hotel, which faces a small alley and the side of an office building made of brick. There’s a set of chaise lounges with a small table between them, and long rectangular boxes at each end of the balcony that probably hold flowers during warmer months. I scoot toward one of the boxes and press my back against the wall of the hotel.

  Me: Balcony. East side. Maybe I can climb up to the roof.

  I reach out and test the decorative iron railing that runs the perimeter of the balcony. It feels sturdy, but also slippery and cold.

  Jesse: Hang on. I have an idea.

  Me:?

  Jesse doesn’t respond immediately, but a couple of minutes later a new message blinks on the screen.

  Jesse: Look up.

  I look up. He’s on the roof with the escape rope and harness from our suite. I give him a thumbs-up signal and he starts to lower the rope.

  But then I see movement out of the corner of my eye.

  The balcony door is opening.

  Someone is coming out here.

  CHAPTER 30

  Almost without thinking, I vault over the edge of the railing, clinging to the cold iron for dear life, my fingers barely hidden behind one of the empty flower boxes. I climb partially underneath the base of the balcony, my hands wrapped tightly around the bottom of the metal bars, one foot propped precariously across a support beam. Below me is open space. Twenty floors of open space. When I look up, I can just barely see Jesse. He looks back at me in shock.

  I shake my head no. I’m not sure who has come outside, but either Kyung or the girl is going to notice a rope with a harness being lowered. Gentle footfalls parade across the balcony. The scent of cigarette smoke stings my nose. Chances are it’s the girl and she’s just trying to sneak a couple of puffs before returning to Kyung. I can hold on for a few seconds. Everything will be fine.

  Unless I fall.

  Focus, Winter.

  If only it were that easy. I’ve never wondered about the calming voice in my head—I guess I thought everyone had one of those, a sort of self-preservation alter ego that steps in to keep minds from overloading with anxiety. But now I’m not so sure. Maybe it’s me, or maybe it’s Rose. Or some other alter persona. I try to kick my other foot up so I’m supported by all four limbs, but my leg isn’t quite long enough. Save me, I think. Save me and I’ll stop thinking of you as some liability, some disease I need to be cured of.

  I hear the girl’s voice and for one horrible moment I worry I’ve spoken my thoughts aloud and that she’s about to discover me. Or that maybe Kyung has stepped outside too, that both of them are going to watch me fall to my death. I crane my neck to look below me. There’s nothing down there but a couple of trash cans and an old bicycle.

  From above me, the girl laughs. I wait to hear Kyung respond, and when he doesn’t, I realize she’s talking on the phone.

  The girl laughs again. She tells someone she finally has the money to pay off a debt. I hate that she had to sleep with Kyung for that. I hate how unequal, how unfair the world can be sometimes. I wish I had just stormed into his bedroom and killed him.

  You’re going to be all right.

  The fingers of my left hand start to go numb in the frigid air. I make the mistake of looking down again. A boy shuffles past, his face focused on his phone. I imagine falling, crushing him, killing us both. He wouldn’t even know what hit him.

  Don’t scream, I think. If I fall, don’t let me scream. If I don’t make a noise, maybe no one will know I was in Kyung’s room. Maybe people will think I’m some random suicide and Jesse and Baz can continue on with the plan.

  I look up at Jesse again, surprised by his expression. I expected him to be freaking out and falling apart, but he’s just staring down at me with razor-sharp focus, ready to lower the harness the instant the girl goes back inside the penthouse.

  Our eyes meet, and even from twenty feet away I see his gaze soften—I see that he loves me. He loves me so much he’s managed to lock away his fear to focus on my safety. The thought should give me strength, but instead it makes me want to let go, to fall, to set him free. Sure, he would mourn me for a few months, but then he would move on, because he’s sane and normal, and that’s what normal people do. What if I’m never able to love him back like that?

  I look away, back toward the pavement far below. Bits of cigarette ash swirl past me. Above me the girl walks from one end of the balcony to the other, her footsteps causing slight vibrations in the beam where I’m supporting my foot.

  I wonder how quick it would be over. I wonder if the wind would sing songs to me as I fell.

  Let go. See if you can fly.

  My fingertips start to loosen.

  No, don’t let go.

  The sliding door opens and then closes with a harsh click.

  “Winter,” Jesse hisses. He lowers the red escape rope toward me. I breathe a sigh of relief. But then, as I reach for it, my foot slips off the beam.

  I’m dangling by the fingertips of one hand, twenty stories in the air.

  CHAPTER 31

  ROSE

  I reach out with my free hand for the metal railing. I wrap both hands around the icy cold bars even tighter. Winter might be ready to give up, but I’m not giving up on her. My shoulders feel like they’re coming out of their sockets. I flail with my legs and manage to get one foot back onto the support beam underneath the balcony, which takes a little bit of the pressure off my upper body.

  I look up at Jesse. He widens his eyes at me and then he shakes his head. I can’t imagine how scary it must have been for him to watch me almost fall. I inhale deeply, hold my breath for four counts, and then exhale. Winter breathes like this sometimes when she’s anxious.

  As I prepare to reach for the rope again, I catch sight of the ground. A dark, yearning voice whispers, Just let go.

  That’s another alter. I call her Black because she spends most of her time thinking about death. It’ll be okay, I tell her. The fingers of my left hand close around the rope. I let go of the balcony and wrap my other hand just below the first one. The rope swings slightly and my leg bumps up against the side of the building, but my grip is secure. Jesse begins to pull me up toward the roof. In a few short seconds he’s helping me over the railing.

  Before I can utter a single word, he’s got his arms wrapped around me, his face buried in my hair. “Jesus Christ. I thought you were going to fall.”

  “You saved me.” I look up at him. “Thank you.”

  He lifts one hand to my face and for a moment I think he’s going to kiss me. For a moment, I want him to; I want to feel that kind of connection. But I shouldn’t do that to Winter. I feel her inside me. She’s curled up asleep, not fighting for control. She’s probably still scared about almost falling. I should wake her, but maybe she needs to rest. Maybe she wouldn’t care about one little kiss …

  It turns out not to matter, because when Jesse locks eyes with me, his expression changes. His body tenses and he slowly removes his hand from my cheek. He blinks hard, as if he’s not quite sure what he’s seeing. “Rose?” he asks.

  “Hmm?” I say, not wanting to lie to him but not quite willing to leave him yet.

  He cradles my face in his hands and looks directly into my eyes. “Let me talk to Winter.”

  CHAPTER 32

  I blink. Jesse h
as my face in his hands. Somehow I’m on the roof. “What happened?” I ask. But I know what happened. I must have dissociated. “Did Kyung see me?”

  “I don’t think so,” Jesse says. He’s staring at me with a look of wonder on his face.

  “Why are you looking at me like that?” I step back away from him.

  “I saw Rose.”

  “What does that even mean?” I ask.

  “At first I was just so relieved you were safe that I didn’t notice, but then when you spoke, when I stopped to really look at you, I could tell it was her.”

  Jesse is still staring at me like this means something major, but I’m not sure if I like the idea of him thinking he can identify my alters. It feels so … intimate. What if he starts insisting I’m not being myself whenever he doesn’t like what he sees?

  What if he just knows you well enough to know us?

  “We should get out of here,” I say. “We’re probably on camera.”

  “Good idea.” Jesse unties the rope from where he anchored it on the railing of the roof. We head for the door leading back into the building.

  “Let me check to make sure no one is in the hallway.” Jesse hands me the rope and ducks into the building. He returns about thirty seconds later. “The coast is clear.”

  We return to the penthouse Baz rented and Jesse coils up the escape rope and replaces it in its basket. I grab my computer and configure the bug in Kyung’s phone. We won’t know if it’s working until he actually makes a call.

  I turn to Jesse. “How did you know?” I blurt out suddenly. “How did you know it was Rose?”

  “Well, I could tell by your voice. It changes,” he says. “But even before then, there was something … different in your expression.” Jesse is talking animatedly, using his hands for emphasis, like the fact that I’m actively dissociating is a good thing.

  “Different good, or different bad?” I ask lightly, a whole new anxiety settling in on me. What if Jesse prefers Rose to me?

  “Just different,” Jesse says. If I can learn to recognize Rose and Lily, then maybe I can help you learn to live with them.”

  “Maybe,” I say. But I’m not as excited as Jesse about this new development.

  * * *

  Back at the apartment, I play the ViSE I made at UsuMed today and try to figure out whether I know the man I saw with Kyung, the one whose name I think is Alec. Going through the footage doesn’t give me any new information, so I switch over to my computer.

  I open up a window on the tablet to a Google search box. In it I type “Alec” and “UsuMed.” I’m not really expecting to get any results. But I do. Over thirty, almost all of them involving a freelance neurotechnology consultant named Alec Kwon. I skim through the results until I find a picture. Sure enough, it’s the other man I saw at lunchtime with Kyung.

  I click on a page with basic information about him. Apparently he was born in Korea but moved to London at a young age. He’s done work for UsuMed as well as other large pharmaceutical and biotech companies.

  Jesse leans over to see what I’m looking at. “Do you know him?”

  “I’m not sure. I think so. I remembered his name from somewhere.” I switch ViSEs and play the recording I made when Baz and I broke into Kyung’s suite, pausing on the scrap of paper that was in his pocket to verify the three names.

  Jesse wanders off toward the kitchen while I switch back to my tablet. When I search for Nai Khaing, I find what looks like a profile for a Burmese military leader. This must be the man Baz said was part of a group of rebels in Myanmar. When I try to search his name with Usu and Kyung, nothing comes up. There are a lot of people named Cristian Rojas, including a soccer player from Chile and a researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, but no one who seems to be affiliated with Usu or Kyung. I flip to image search and scroll through a couple of pages, but none of the images stands out.

  I’m expecting the same result with Erich Cross, and for the most part, that’s what I get. There’s a musician from Ohio and a realtor with that name. No connections to Kyung or Usu as far as I can tell. The image search turns up a wide variety of white men and one African American who works for a TV news channel. Just as I’m about to give up, a picture at the bottom of the screen catches my eye. It’s a somewhat grainy still made from a security camera, and the man is wearing sunglasses, so I can’t see much of his face, but something makes me click on it. I suck in a sharp breath as the larger picture appears on the screen.

  Erich Cross looks a lot like Sebastian.

  I wouldn’t have noticed it back in St. Louis, because Baz always shaved, but the beard is definitely similar, as is the shape of his nose and jaw. I tap the screen to open the web page that’s hosting the photo and I’m not surprised to find out that Erich Cross is wanted by Interpol for questioning in multiple robberies, as well as a car explosion that happened six years ago in Karachi.

  I start to call Jesse over but then change my mind. I trust him completely, but if I tell him I think Baz might be communicating with Kyung under an alias, he’s going to think I’m losing my mind again. Even if he humors me, he’ll probably say something to Baz, and if Sebastian is somehow working for Kyung, I don’t want to tip him off that I know.

  As if I summoned him with my thoughts, the door to the apartment swings open and Baz enters with a giant green duffel bag. He sets the bag on the floor and slips out of his shoes. Bending down, he unzips the bag and starts unpacking a bunch of black cases.

  “What’s all that?” I ask.

  “Guns,” he says.

  “Guess what we did?” Jesse says proudly, striding back into the living room with a bottle of cider and a package of cookies.

  Baz smirks. “You really want me to guess?” He stacks all of the cases on the floor next to the sofa and sits down.

  Jesse snickers. “We bugged Kyung’s cell phone.”

  I watch Baz’s expression for any kind of tell that he’s worried, but his face remains neutral, with a hint of curiosity. I pull up the audio surveillance program on my tablet and show him the fifth feed.

  “This is excellent. Do I want to know how you accomplished this?”

  “He was vising,” I tell Baz. “But it wasn’t the headset that was stolen from me. He’s already got his own prototype. But Jesse and I hurried over there and I sneaked in while he was … distracted.”

  Jesse arches an eyebrow at me.

  “Well, it was a little more complicated than that,” I admit. “But the important thing is that he didn’t catch me.”

  “Good job. Has he gotten any calls?”

  “Not yet,” I say.

  “Let’s hope it pans out.” Baz opens a black fiberglass case and snaps together three long, black pieces to form what I think is an automatic rifle. “A little showy for our purposes probably, but I couldn’t resist the offer.” He sets the gun on the coffee table and reaches for a softer neoprene case with a zipper. It’s another rifle, this one with a mounted scope.

  “Which one do I get?” I ask.

  Baz and Jesse exchange a look. “Actually I was thinking you should stick with your throwing knives. It’s best if we work to our strengths.” Baz opens the two remaining cases, which are both handguns. He and Jesse each take one.

  I frown. “I see your point, but if I hadn’t used a gun back in St. Louis, both of you might be dead right now,” I remind him.

  “True,” Baz admits. “But come on, Winter. You know guns are dangerous in the hands of … troubled people.”

  I clear my throat. “You mean crazy people?” Inside my head, a little voice whispers something about how if Baz is working for Kyung, of course he wouldn’t want me to have a gun.

  I shush it. He just gave Jesse a gun and I know that Jesse would never betray me.

  “Don’t get mad. I think it’s great you’re not hallucinating anymore, but you killed a guy in Los Angeles and don’t remember it. Then you called Jesse, talking about how you were someone else and someone else had done it
.” Baz pauses. “I don’t know much about psychology, but if you don’t have control over your actions, then I don’t feel comfortable giving you a gun.”

  “But what if I—”

  “I have an idea.” Baz rises from the sofa and pulls something out of his backpack—a small silver gun. It doesn’t look like any gun I’ve seen before. “It shoots tranquilizers,” he says.

  I scoff. “What good is that going to be up against someone with a real gun?”

  “I’m not expecting there to be too many people with real guns, since they’re so hard to come by here. This has got a strong sedative. If you got a shot off first, there’s very little chance someone would be functional enough to accurately fire a real weapon.” Baz sets the tranquilizer gun on the coffee table. “I know it’s not the same as a real gun, but I also know you’d never forgive yourself if you killed someone you didn’t want to kill because you were dissociating.”

  I pace back and forth across the wooden floor. “I saw Kyung at work today and I didn’t lose control. It’s not like I’m the Incredible Hulk, Baz.”

  Jesse clears his throat. “No, but you did just—”

  I silence him with a glare. “That’s different,” I say. And it is. Dissociating as Rose is not the same as dissociating as Lily. Rose protects me. I … trust her.

  “Fine. Prove it,” Baz says.

  “What do you mean?” I ask.

  “I want to try to talk to Lily.”

  “I can’t just call her up on command,” I snap.

  “Maybe I can.” Baz’s gray eyes are predatory. He turns to face me. One hand loosely encircles my arm. Without warning, his fingers tighten and he pins my wrist behind my body.

  “What are you do—”

  “Baz. Stop,” Jesse says.

  Baz pushes me against the wall of the flat, gently first, and then harder. “Where is she? Where’s Lily? Let me talk to her. Let me talk to the part of you who’s so anxious to end someone else’s life.”