Elusion

by kindle@abovethetreeline. com

  “We need to get her to a hospital. Now,” I say.

  Josh begins typing on his tab. “I’ll call an ambulance.”

  “Wait!” Avery shouts at him.

  “We can’t wait, Avery. This girl is in trouble,” he replies.

  Avery storms over to me and the girl, crouching down with blazing red-rimmed eyes.

  “She knows where Nora is. She needs to tell us.”

  “I don’t think she’s in any shape to answer your questions,” I say.

  “I don’t give two craps what you think!” she snarls.

  “Leave her alone, Avery,” Josh warns.

  But Avery doesn’t listen. Instead she puts her hand on the girl’s shoulder and shakes her. “Where’s Nora Heywood? Answer me!”

  “Stop it! You’re going to hurt her!” I push Avery away with one strong, forceful hand.

  “If you don’t get out of my way, you’re going to regret it,” she threatens.

  Josh stalks over to the corner and yanks Avery back by the collar of her coat. “I said leave her alone!”

  When Avery falls on her butt, she looks up at Josh, her jaw clenched. “I can’t believe it. Is she more important than your own sister now?”

  “That’s enough!” he shouts.

  Before I can squeak out a word to either of them, I hear something fall to the floor beneath me. I look down and see a tablet with a neon quilted protective casing, right near the girl’s limp hand. Once Avery sees it, she races over and grabs the tab greedily.

  “This is Nora’s,” Avery said, her eyes filling with tears. “She got this from a street vendor in the Merch Sector. She had it engraved. Look!”

  When Avery puts it in the palm of Josh’s hand, he smiles a little as he runs his fingers over the embossed initials. “You’re right—it’s Nora’s. Even if she was never here, this girl must have come in contact with her at some point.”

  “Can you turn the tab on? Maybe we can see who else she texted,” I say.

  Josh presses the power button several times, but no luck. “The battery’s dead.”

  “That’s why we have to get information out of her, before it’s too late,” Avery says, pointing at the girl.

  I look down at her and bite my lip. Her complexion is quickly losing color. “If we don’t get her to a doctor, she won’t be able to tell anyone anything.”

  Josh starts dialing on his tab again. “Regan’s right; we’ve got to call for help.”

  “We’ll never get clearance to see her again, especially if they think this is related to Elusion. I’m sure someone at Orexis will see to that,” Avery says, her eyes narrowing at me.

  Josh ignores her, putting his tab to his ear and speaking into the mouthpiece. “Yes, we need medical assistance at Forty-Nine Flat Rock Road in the Quartz Sector.”

  Avery gnashes her teeth together and snatches Nora’s tab away from Josh. “I’m riding with her in the ambulance. Just in case she comes to.”

  Then she stalks up the stairs of the cellar, tears soaking her cheeks. I can’t blame her for being distraught.

  “You . . . need . . . to find . . . me,” says a weak, hoarse voice, so faint I can barely hear it over Josh’s conversation with emergency dispatch.

  “We found you,” I reassure her. “Everything’s going to be okay.” At least I hope she’s going to be okay. I feel the girl squirm in my arms a little, and I look down, our eyes meeting only for a brief moment because she can’t keep them open for longer than a couple of seconds.

  The girl reaches up and takes hold of my hand, very lightly because she’s not strong enough to close her fingers.

  “You’re not . . . safe. No one is safe . . . behind the firewall,” she murmurs before succumbing to another wave of all-consuming exhaustion, most likely brought on by nanopsychosis.

  At first, I don’t even recognize the words she just said to me. But then when I take her wrist, trying to check her pulse, I see something written on the palm of her hand in black ink. It’s smudged and in small print, but I can tell it’s a number. I hunch over a little more so I can get a closer look at her wrist, and when I do, my lungs are completely drained of air.

  5020.

  Suddenly, the girl’s voice syncs up with my father’s, and they’re speaking in unison in my mind.

  You need to find me.

  Behind the firewall.

  Fifteen minutes later, Josh and I stand shoulder to shoulder under my umbrella, staring at swirling red lights as the ambulance carrying Avery and the girl drives off down Quartz Street and eventually turns a corner. The only thing illuminating the road is a blinking streetlamp that’s perched a few yards away from the house we just left. Josh kicks a dented aluminum can that’s lying near his feet and it bounces along the sidewalk until it collides with the stump of a dead tree.

  “Nora was only a few blocks away from Flynn’s trailer,” he says, rubbing his eyes with the balls of his hands. “We were so close, and now we’re back to square one.”

  “Actually, I don’t think we are,” I reply.

  Josh bows his head and mutters, “Stop it, Regan. She’s gone.”

  “Listen to me. That girl woke up for a minute and said practically the exact same thing my father did when I saw him in Elusion,” I say, latching on to his elbow and turning him toward me. “She talked about the firewall. And I saw the number fifty-twenty written on her hand.” I let go of his arm and tuck wet strands of hair behind my ears. “We can’t give up, Josh. This is just too coincidental to be ignored. There’s something in Elusion that we have to figure out, and we keep seeing the same clues. We have to keep pushing forward and believe that we’ll find the answers. Together.”

  “But we’re at a dead end,” he snaps. “The best chance we had was with the files Avery cracked; we still don’t know what the significance of the anagram is, or why that number keeps showing up.”

  “They lead somewhere. I know they do.”

  “I want to believe that. I really want to, but—”

  “Just trust me, please,” I say, locking eyes with him. “I know that might be hard, given what you must think about my dad right now, but I’m telling you . . . these signs are messages from him. There’s a bigger mystery here that he wants us to uncover, and if we don’t keep going, we’ll never know what it is. And it might be the key to everything—finding Nora, clearing his name, fixing Elusion. Everything.”

  Josh takes a small step away from me, gazing at me suspiciously. “So what are you trying to say? You still think your father is alive?”

  “No one knows what he said to me that day. Except for you, Patrick, and my mom. How in the world did some girl I’ve never even met find that out?”

  “You’re right,” he admits. “It’s weird.”

  “It’s not weird; it’s a clue. Even if you don’t think it’s coming from my father, we have to see where it leads.”

  “I know you don’t want to give up,” he replies. “But have you considered that there’s nothing left for us to do but turn that information on the QuTap over to the press and wait? I don’t want to let go any more than you do. It just looks like we’re out of options.”

  “No, we’re not.”

  I reach into my bag and pull out my tab, checking the time on the screen.

  It’s 8:32. I can still make it.

  “I’m going to Elusion to talk with Patrick,” I say.

  Instead of retreating even more, Josh gently puts his arm around my shoulders.

  “I don’t want you to do that.” His voice isn’t commanding or harsh. He’s just trying to show me that he cares.

  I have to admit, his touch feels wonderful.

  “I’ll be okay, I promise.” I slip my tab back into my bag.

  “What are you going to say to him?”

  “I know he’s running scared. Maybe if I confront him about the memo, and tell him that Avery has it, I can convince him to help us to inspect this firewall,” I explain.

  “Then I should come with you.�
� I look up at him and his breath tickles my eyelashes, and I stop myself from breaking into a smile. “That way if anything happens—”

  “I need to do this alone. I know I haven’t been able to yet, but I think I’m the only person who can get through to him.”

  Josh sticks his hand out to his side, and it seems as though he’s checking to see if the rain has stopped. Then he grins and takes off his O2 shield, nodding at me like he wants me to do the same. Once I close my umbrella and shove it and my O2 in my bag, he puts his hand around my wrist, turning it inward so he can kiss my palm. His eyes are still golden brown, but if I read them correctly, they’re flickering with fear. He takes his other hand and places it on the small of my back, leading me so close to him that I can practically feel his frantic heartbeat thumping against my chest. His lips press against my forehead, and then again on my right cheek, each time as delicate as a feather tracing against my skin.

  And then his mouth is on mine, his hands caressing the nape of my bare neck. A rush of heat burns through my arms and legs as I reach around his strong back and hold him as tightly as I can. His tongue slips between my lips and I tremble, my mind drifting off to a distant place. As Josh pulls away, we lean our foreheads together, sighing. When he kissed me in Elusion, I wasn’t sure what it meant, but I did think that nothing could ever compare to how I felt in that ice cave. I was wrong.

  This is much, much better.

  Because it’s real. And I know what it means.

  “Promise me something,” he whispers as I press my cheek against his shoulder.

  “Anything.”

  “Come back to me. As soon as you can.”

  UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

  HarperCollins Publishers

  ..................................................................

  SIXTEEN

  THE FIRST THING PATRICK DOES WHEN HE sees me in Elusion is throw his arms around me, trapping my arms at my sides and squeezing so tightly that I can’t really move.

  But I want to. More than anything, I want to be moving—toward the firewall and whatever lies behind it. After seeing 5020 written on that girl’s hand and hearing her talk like my father, I’m convinced that there’s yet another layer to this mind-boggling mystery, and it’s all hidden in the borders of the Escapes.

  Perhaps with a final answer to whether or not my father is dead.

  But now it’s time for the hard part. Convincing Patrick that he has to let go of whatever remaining secrets he’s keeping, before any more lives are lost. So far, I haven’t been successful at breaking through the suit of armor he has built for himself over the past week. Then again, from the sound of his quick breathing and the desperate way he’s clutching me, maybe he’s finally about to come clean.

  If not, I’m prepared to push him over the edge. I have to do something—anything—to drive this sinking boat back to shore. I owe it to the people he and my father have put at risk. I can’t make a mistake. I can’t let him leave here without telling me what he knows.

  “Thank you so much for coming,” he says. “This is the only place I could think of where we couldn’t be followed or monitored.”

  When Patrick pulls back a little and loosens his grip on me, I get a closer look at him. He’s wearing a male version of my current Elusion-provided outfit—a loose, plaid flannel shirt, knee-length cargo shorts, and high-top hiking boots. His blue eyes are weary and drooping at the corners, and his skin has lost almost all of its natural pigment. Which is very odd, considering how perfect and surreal everything usually looks here.

  I manage to wiggle away from Patrick’s grasp and begin to glance around the rest of the Escape. We are standing in a field that’s thick with glimmering gold stalks and geometric-shaped bushes filled with succulent berries that glow like fireflies. But above us is a pitch-black sky, with thousands of grasshopper-green numbers, letters, and symbols, scattered throughout it like numerical stars.

  But that’s not the strangest thing about this Escape. I don’t feel that euphoric hum filtering through the atmosphere and into my blood. Now that I think about it, I didn’t experience that rush of energy when Patrick touched me, or the traditional brain fog either. There’s just a small flurry of anticipation in my heart, like someone has injected it with a low dose of adrenaline.

  “Pat? Where are we exactly?”

  “This is stage one of the Prairie Escape,” he says, his eyes not leaving my face for a moment, like he’s expecting a big reaction from me. “Trypnosis isn’t as intense because I’m still constructing the landscape. But it’s turning out beautifully, don’t you think? I tried to get all the details right.”

  I feel a lump form in my throat. Patrick knows all too well that I have a thing for prairies. There’s a series of children’s books that my great-grandmother on my father’s side passed down through the generations, and when I was little, I was pretty obsessed with them. I loved reading about pioneer times, and I thought the characters, even the little girl at the heart of the story, were so brave. Patrick listened to me go on and on about these novels for years, and here we are, standing in a field that flawlessly resembles the hand-drawn black-and-white illustrations.

  This Escape is obviously some kind of romantic, loving tribute to me, and I know Patrick’s trying to impress me, but instead of feeling flattered and appreciated, I just feel uncomfortable. He has done nothing but lie to me since the day I saw the vision of my dad in Elusion. Does he think this is enough to make up for it?

  “What is it?” he asks, reaching out to me. “What’s wrong?”

  Instead of answering, I turn the tables on him, reminding myself that I have to stay on the offensive. “Why did you ask me to come here, Pat?”

  When he steps closer to me, a lock of his blond hair falls in front of his eyes. “I wanted you to see that I’m not the monster you think I am. That I care about you more than anything.”

  “Pat . . . ,” I begin. I don’t want to discuss our relationship. Not now. Not here.

  “I can feel you slipping away from me.”

  “I don’t think you’re a monster,” I say, even though I’m not sure if I really mean it. But I don’t argue with him about me slipping away—it’s true. As scary as it is to admit, we might be at the point of no return.

  “Well, then you’re in the minority. The media is going wild with this story, Ree. Especially now that Anthony . . .” He trails off as his gaze casts down at the ground.

  I can’t blame him for not wanting to finish that sentence. Nor can I blame myself for what I’m about to say and do.

  “I’m afraid it’s going to get worse.”

  Patrick glances back up at me, his lips wrought into a tight line. “Why?”

  I take a deep breath. Throwing Avery under the bus isn’t something I feel good about doing, but my back is up against the wall.

  “Avery has the QuTap.”

  His mouth hangs open a little and I notice his Adam’s apple slowly bobbing up and down, like he’s swallowing hard. “Avery? You’ve been plotting with Avery?”

  “I didn’t have a choice. You stonewalled me, and she was the only one who had the resources to crack the decryption the files,” I say coolly. “And she got a few open.”

  Patrick just stands there, staring at me in the same tortured way I stared at Josh when I saw him handing the QuTap over to Avery. For a minute I feel a tug of sympathy at my heart, but I push it away.

  “There was a memo,” I continue, listening to the sound of my pulse pound in my ears. “It was from Bryce to my father, warning about the danger of nanopsychosis. And giving him the idea to put sodium pentothal in the wristband.”

  Patrick brings his hands up to his face, first pressing down on his cheeks and then pushing them toward the back of his head, like he’s trying to relieve the pressure. I’ve seen that move before. No one else might understand it, but I’ve known him long enough to translate—it’s practically an admission of guilt.

  “You know exac
tly what memo I’m talking about, don’t you?” I say. “You’ve known Elusion could hurt people from the very beginning, just like my father seems to have.”

  “It’s not like that,” he says. “Do you really think he or I would have intentionally harmed anyone? Especially you?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe we should ask Principal Caldwell.”

  He reels back, like I’ve just shot him in the chest with an assault rifle. But when he steadies himself, he levels a nasty glare at me. “You think you have everything all figured out, but you don’t.”

  “That’s why you’re going tell me, Pat. Everything, including what’s really behind the firewall,” I threaten. “Because if you don’t, that memo is going public and there’s nothing I can do to stop it.”

  He shakes his head, like he’s ashamed of me, which I find pretty outrageous, all things considered.

  “I’m prepared to do whatever needs to be done to make this right,” I say.

  “Even if you’re wrong? Even if your mere accusation is enough to ruin everything your father and I worked for? Drag our reputations through the mud?”

  “Those things aren’t as important as people’s lives!” I shout, my cheeks flushed with heat. “Has your mind been so corrupted by big business and fame that you can’t even see that?”

  “Corrupt?” Patrick narrows his eyes at me. “I didn’t find that memo until after David died. When I took over his office and started working on his quantum, it was a wreck. The files were completely disorganized, and some were even missing.” He’s starting to pace now, back and forth, back and forth, like a caged animal. “When I came across the memo, Elusion was already undergoing trials at the CIT. At that point, there wasn’t anything I could do without sabotaging the entire project. There was way too much riding on it then, and when we got the approval, I assumed your dad and Bryce had successfully worked all the kinks out.”

  “So I’m supposed to believe that you never knew what they were up to? You helped my father with every aspect of Elusion,” I say, as a slight wind blows a golden stalk against my leg.