Alliance

by Leigh, Trisha

  My heart aches at the idea that meeting me has ruined Jude’s life, which only serves as a reminder that meeting me will eventually end Jude’s life. He’s the first person with whom I saw more than a simple number—the age he’ll be when he dies—when I touched him. I saw him die, bloody and lying in a bright-purple hydrangea bush, while I stood over him with a gun in my hand.

  I swallow hard, trying to force away the image. It’s impossible. “I mean, I don’t know if or how I’ll be able to help, but I’d like to know.”

  We stare at each other for a few moments, until it feels as though we’ve come to some form of unspoken agreement. To communicate, to keep an eye on Jude, but also that we’re going to do our best to stay friends, whatever that might mean going forward.

  It’s not a lot, but it’s more than I expected to get when I snuck into town tonight. I’ll take it.

  Chapter Three

  I make it back to Saint Stephen’s a little before eleven, which means there are just a few minutes to spare before the scheduled Cavy meeting in the graveyard.

  Well, a Generation Four Cavy meeting—of course the Olders aren’t invited. Or aware of it.

  I bend down a few times on my walk, picking up the smooth, pretty stones that lie scattered on the property. There’s a collection of them on the dresser in our room, the only thing that’s really mine.

  The graveyard is far enough from the main structure that we can’t be seen or overheard—at least not by people with average hearing—and since Fake Flicker’s presence forced us to abandon the Clubhouse, we come here often. We usually sneak out of the crumbling church one or two at a time to avoid drawing attention, but I’m late enough that I go straight there. It’s deserted, though, so I’m alone for the time being. Technically.

  With the way my genetic code has been changing since the Olders first injected me with a super-secret serum they call GRH-18—designed to enhance our powers, among other things—I feel surrounded in the graveyard. Just not by the living.

  The headstone closest to me is so old the name and dates have long since rubbed away, and the worn stone is sinking into the ground. My fingertips brush the cold, cracked surface. I see her then, a little girl lying in her bed. The number obscuring my vision tells me she’s nine. The heartbroken look on the weathered face of the woman sitting beside her, smoothing the girl’s sweaty hair from her forehead, says she knows little Elizabeth Grace Miles is about to die.

  The scene solidifies around me as the smell of antiseptic, of death, clogs my nose, refusing to dislodge no matter how hard I swallow. The look in the girl’s huge, terrified brown eyes twists my gut with fear.

  The woman, who I somehow know isn’t her mother, swallows and attempts a smile of comfort. “It’ll be okay, Lizzie. You’ll be with your mommy and your sisters and brother soon.”

  Yellow fever took Elizabeth’s mother already, along with four siblings, and her father has ignored her from the moment she fell ill in an attempt to prepare himself for yet another loss.

  Lizzie’s fear is strong and palpable, filling up my chest until it climbs higher, clawing at my throat. Then, just like that, she closes her eyes. Peace sweeps her features and her hand relaxes, letting go of the sheets that were balled inside them.

  A little after six in the evening on May 14, 1807, Lizzie Grace dies.

  The details are so clear, the sights and sounds and smells, that my heart knows they’re true. Before the injections, only numbers popped into my mind. Ages of deaths. Now, my power grows a little stronger every day. A little different.

  I see things. I know things. But it doesn’t change the fact that I can’t do anything to stop them from happening.

  “Gypsy? You okay?”

  Mole’s voice pulls me more than two hundred years forward, into the present. His hand is on my shoulder, squeezing the muscles that tensed during my vision, from my despair over my inability to help Lizzie or anyone else.

  In his strange and beautiful way he senses when I’m upset, when I’m angry, when I’m hurt, even without being able to interpret the emotion on my face.

  I blink away my tears. “I’m fine.”

  “Did you touch another one?” A pair of plain black gloves are covering Mole’s fingers as they thread through mine, forcing me further out of my head and back to the graveyard. He never touches me skin to skin. None of my Cavies do. The Olders seem content to leave me be, as well.

  “Tell me, Norah. You know you can tell me.”

  His use of my real name makes my throat burn and I swallow more tears. It’s a reminder of the girl I almost was for those two months in Charleston—the one that, despite seeing Maya tonight, I can never be again.

  A stiff breeze ruffles his tawny hair, numbs the tip of my nose, and I bury my face in his chest as his warm arms circle my back. Things might be different all around us, but me and Mole? We’re the same.

  Not exactly the same, but close enough.

  “Another little girl. More yellow fever.” The words sound strangled to my ears, having had to try hard to squeeze them past the lump in my throat. “I don’t want to stay here anymore. Doing nothing. Fixing nothing.”

  His arms tighten. “We’re not doing nothing. We’re listening. We’re learning. About the Olders, about how we’re changing. I know you miss…everyone. But we’ve got to be patient and gather as much information as we can before making any moves.”

  His voice tripped over the word everyone, and I know he was thinking about Jude. How he showed up the day we tried to rescue Flicker and saw most of us display our crazy abilities—Mole included.

  Maybe he was thinking about the fact that Jude likes me, and how it had put a funny kind of tilt on my relationship with Mole while we’d been separated after the police took us from Darley, me living with my birth father and Mole in foster care since his birth family hadn’t come forward to claim him.

  But he shouldn’t worry. I’m pretty sure Jude doesn’t like me anymore.

  The mood grows darker than the starless night around us, and the desire to lighten it sparks without warning. I pull away, pinching his cheeks with my own gloved fingers. “You know patience is not one of my many, many virtues.”

  He snorts. “If only I had a scrap of confetti, I could list them all.”

  “Hey!” In spite of his teasing, a laugh burbles up from my gut and I set it free.

  It feels good. There haven’t been many reasons for mirth since we arrived here.

  “Would you two shut up? I heard you giggling from ten feet away.” Pollyanna looks like an elf enveloped in a massive, black down coat that falls down to her knees. Her gaze narrows on me. “And where have you been?”

  The sight of her makes me giggle harder, even under her icy-blue glare. As a bonus, it allows me to pretend as though I didn’t hear her question. “You look ridiculous. Like a tar-covered Pillsbury doughboy,” I inform her.

  “Well, I’m warm, so guess what? I don’t give a rat’s ass.” She flips her long blond waves and plops down on the wide lip of a headstone.

  “Honestly, I don’t know why you can’t just laugh at yourself,” I add.

  She glares at me as Haint appears out of nowhere, her entire body popping into sight in the space of a breath. It takes both Polly and me by surprise since Haint typically either fades in and out or appears one body part at a time until she’s complete.

  “That’s a fun trick,” I mutter, more than a little impressed.

  “What trick?” Mole asks.

  “Haint doesn’t have to put herself together like Humpty Dumpty anymore,” Pollyanna informs him.

  “Fun.” He grins. “I can light things on fire with my eyes closed now. Want to throw me a party?”

  “No,” Haint snaps, obviously not in a lighthearted mood. “It’s making me nervous, actually. Who knows what’s in that crap they’re shooting into us every day.”

  The twins, Athena and Goose, show up next, in nothing but flannel shirts and jeans, chapped hands shoved into deep pocke
ts, but they don’t interrupt for once in their rambunctious, attention-whoring lives.

  “We started to see it before Christmas—me not being able to reappear on cue, Pollyanna’s emotions flying around uninhibited—but what if it gets worse?” Haint asks, meeting each of our eyes in turn.

  Geoff wanders up before we can come up with a good answer. He looks bored, focused on a handful of sticks that dance and whirl over his outstretched hand. I bite my tongue to stop from asking him if he’s on our side or if he’s actually happy here.

  He’s only been coherent for less than two months. He’s been around us for years, but in truth, he barely knows us, I remind myself, thinking of the decade-plus he spent unresponsive.

  And anyway, sides are a touchy subject after Reaper sold us out. They’re after the rest of us now, and if their recruitment speeches don’t work, we’ll either have to stay in hiding or be forced to join the CIA.

  According to the Olders.

  Athena’s voice jerks me from my thoughts. “We’ve already asked them to tell us what it is, how they developed it, and what it does.”

  He cocks his head slightly to one side. At last update, he could hear all the way up to the International Space Station, but he’s still working on filtering so he doesn’t have a billion voices in his head at once. He’s our lookout during meetings like these, and even though he acts like he can listen to us and keep watch, I know Goose fills him in on the details later.

  “And they told us they would discuss it with us later,” Goose reminds him, pursing his lips. “We’ve been letting them shoot us up for over two weeks now. It’s later. Let’s ask again.”

  The truth is, we’ve spent our entire lives being shot up with drugs we know little to nothing about, so it didn’t necessarily occur to us to question the Olders at first. They’re like us, after all—the only people we’d ever met who are. But we can’t afford to think that way anymore. These are our genetics—our talents, our bodies, our futures—and we need to know how they work. We need to have control.

  Me especially, since it could mean finally not being the failed experiment. Not Inconsequential after all.

  “We know the Olders went through an elaborate ruse to get us here. We know they’re the ones Flicker was talking about when she said ‘they won’t let you go.’” They all turn to look at me, and I suck in a deep breath. “They’re the ones who hurt her, who got her shot, who are keeping her in that awful tank. They’ve done nothing but lie, and I think we should stop the injections unless they explain them to us.”

  Varying expressions play on the faces that are so dear to me. Skepticism from the twins, outright denial from Geoff, who has gained so much from the serum. Thoughtfulness from Mole and maybe Haint, and a blank stare from Pollyanna. My stomach sinks at my own proposition. At the idea of going back to seeing plain numbers when people touch me. At the fact that it would mean just letting Jude die in a few short months, not even trying to stop it.

  I may not have figured out how to do it yet, but it’s a no-brainer that having the details would make it easier to stop what I see in my visions from happening in real life. Then again, as hard as it is to admit, Jude isn’t the priority right now. It’s Flicker, and running a close second is getting out of Saint Stephen’s.

  But if I can figure out how to make all three things happen, that’s plan number one.

  Haint clears her throat. “I agree we need answers. I’m not convinced that asking them straight out is the best way to get them, though. Sneaking around could be better, and Goose and I can handle that easy.”

  She’s right. She can go invisible and Goose can move fast enough that he’s basically invisible, too. They could get in and out of any room in this place without detection.

  “You don’t think they’ll be prepared for us to use our abilities for just that purpose?” Athena’s skepticism is aimed at Haint now, and she frowns in response. “Plus, Fake Flicker never leaves us alone for five straight minutes.”

  “She doesn’t sleep with us,” Haint reasons.

  They’re claiming she needs to sleep in the medical wing for observation because of everything she “went through.” It boggles my mind that the Olders think we’re dumb enough to buy their crap.

  “I agree with Gypsy, actually.” Mole shrugs. “It won’t hurt to ask again, but in the meantime we need to make sure we’re in control of our own bodies. If that means ditching the meds, we ditch the meds.”

  “What’s the point of that, though?” Pollyanna asks.

  “The point is we shouldn’t be messing around with shit we don’t understand. And sadly, our mutations fall into that category,” Goose supplies, a little tart. “I mean, I’m freaking out about what could happen if the GRH-18 makes my talent go totally awry somehow.”

  It’s obvious that some of us are less excited about life returning to the status quo than others, but that logic is pretty hard to argue with, at least right now, and even Pollyanna shrugs after mulling it over. Her ability to influence the emotional state of anyone around her is more dangerous than most of our powers when it comes to losing control. I’m surprised she’s against the idea.

  “Who do you think is funding this place and all the experiments? The Olders?” Geoff poses the question, a detached sort of expression on his rosy face. I don’t think any of us had thought about that yet. It certainly didn’t cross my mind in all the craziness since we left Charleston. And why should it have?

  When no one answers, he sends the dancing twigs flying into the nearest tree trunk, where they shatter into pieces. “What? We need answers, and I think that is the intriguing question. None of them work, and the equipment in that lab with Flicker, not to mention the research necessary to cook up the enhancement serum they’re giving us, had to have taken years and tons of cash to acquire. Where’s it coming from?”

  Our collective confusion shifts to incredulity, our mouths hanging open. We’ve spent so much time wondering what they’re doing to us, what they’ve done to Flicker, that we haven’t stopped to consider the idea that the Olders aren’t the they we should be worrying about.

  This world, so new to me, keeps peeling away in layers like an onion, until I’m not sure I even want to know what lies in the middle.

  “We have to do something,” I say. “Playing nice and waiting around is getting us nowhere, and Flicker could be in more trouble than we think.”

  Mole’s eyes linger on mine, until finally he nods and breaks the silence. “Gypsy and I will try asking Chameleon for details again tomorrow. Haint and Goose, you two start looking through file rooms, phone bills, anything that might lead us to who’s funding Saint Stephen’s and what’s been done to Flicker and how to reverse it. We need leverage, and I don’t see how else we’re going to get answers. We meet back here tomorrow night to debrief.” He tips his head. “And we all stop taking the injections.”

  “Don’t go if there’s even a chance you’re being watched,” Pollyanna adds, her eyes bright in the moonlight as they bore into Haint and Goose.

  Goose grunts. “We’re not idiots, Polly. Cripes.”

  Pollyanna usually lives to make life more difficult just because she can, but she doesn’t return the retort. Geoff’s observation still swirls through the air, gathering above our heads like pregnant, ominous thunderheads. The idea that there are powerful people—other than the CIA—out there watching us, cultivating us, waiting for a day or an event in the future to pull us back into the fray… It’s like seeing a flash of lightning and waiting for the thunder. And I think we all know that the storm is just beginning.

  Chapter Four

  It’s easier to ditch the syringe full of faint yellow serum than it should be.

  The Olders aren’t thinking like a bunch of scared teenagers who are sick and tired of being kept in the dark about their own origins. They’re thinking that we trust them. That we like the effects of the serum too much to turn them down—enjoy being stronger, more proficient, and are grateful for the fast healin
g we’ve all experienced since those first surprise injections on the streets two months ago.

  So, when one of them hands me my second injection of the day with barely a nod, it’s easy enough to stand over the sink and pretend to shove it in my arm when I’m really letting the sticky concoction drip down the drain. I toss the empty container into the hazardous waste bin and leave the room with a little more sweat under my arms than usual, but I’m otherwise no worse for the wear.

  Pollyanna runs into me in the hallway and gives me a tight smile, tugging her sleeves down over her wrists like she’s cold. She’s nervous. It’s the only tell she has, and seeing her do it now infects my stomach with dancing ants, too.

  We don’t know what stopping the injections will do to us, but we also don’t know why the Olders called a meeting in the cafeteria between meals.

  We gather, the only Olders in attendance a slight, younger man they call Mist and the ever-present Chameleon. Once all of us Generation Four kids are present—plus Fake Flicker—Mist doesn’t waste any time, standing up and clearing his throat. “We’ve decided you’ve had enough time to settle in and to adjust to your daily injections of GRH-18.” He pauses, pulling his greasy shoulder-length blond hair back into a ponytail as though giving us time to object. When we don’t, he continues. “You’ve been adapting well to the training related to your various powers and abilities, but it’s going to take more than that to keep yourselves safe.”

  He stops again, meeting our gazes one at a time. He might read a question in my eyes: Safe from what?

  “Several of us have military training in hand-to-hand combat skills, as well as weaponry, and both Lightning and Sepasiph are black belts in judo. We’ve arranged for you to attend a session of each in the morning and afternoon, alternating in groups that we will assign.

  “Okay.” He nods and strides out of the room.