The Replaced

by Kimberly Derting

  My mom and I spent a girls’ night one time watching Titanic, the version with Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet. And the way Simon was looking at me was like the scene where the two of them are floating in the icy waters of the Atlantic, after the ship has sunk, and Leo’s character, Jack, tells Kate’s character, Rose, to “never let go” . . . minus the freezing waters and blue lips.

  “I will. I’ll stay hidden,” I finally caved, even if it was just to make him stop giving me that look.

  Satisfied with my answer, Simon turned and scaled the rungs two at a time, and I followed right behind, not wanting to be trapped down in this place a second longer. When we reached the top, there was a heavy grille blocking our way. He glanced back at me, grinning over his shoulder as he reached out and scratched his fingertips along its surface, creating an almost imperceptible rasping sound.

  I was about to ask if he needed a hand, or maybe a straightjacket, but when there was a matching response that came from the other side, all scratchy and quiet—an acknowledgment—my eyes widened.

  “Willow?” I whispered up to him. “How’d she know we’d be down here?”

  “She didn’t,” Simon answered, right before the grate slid open above his head. “That’s why I gave her the signal. In case something went wrong. It was our backup plan.”

  Willow stood above us, peering down into the opening impatiently, as if we’d kept her waiting. “What took you two so long?” she criticized, but she was smiling when she reached out for us.

  When I was on my feet again, I checked out the sterile-looking hallway we stood in. The lights here were bright, reflecting off the ultra-white tiles beneath us. The whole thing—the explosion, the gas-releasing key card, and the underground tunnels—was so secret agent–y I couldn’t help feeling like some kind of superspy.

  “We safe?” I asked Willow, searching for signs we weren’t alone.

  “Safe-ish. Most everyone was sent offsite. They’re convinced we got a good five-minute lead on ’em.” Willow scoffed. “That Agent Truman’s sure a piece’a work. Thinks his shit don’t stink, don’t he? Wouldn’t even put on a haz-suit.”

  Willow hadn’t heard what we had, about them not having enough suits for everyone. Still, it was hard to imagine Agent Truman sacrificing his own safety for that of his men.

  “I don’t think your boy’s here, though,” Willow said.

  My heart withered.

  “Surprised you waited for us.” Simon winked at her.

  “I planned to give you another sixty seconds, and then you were on your own,” she shot back.

  “That right?” Simon questioned, his black brow raised challengingly.

  Willow glanced at her watch—a black timepiece that looked like it was issued straight from the military and could withstand a nuclear blast. Envy that she knew the time ate me up inside. Her eyebrow ticked up as a small grin parted her lips. “No, actually. You were down to forty-three seconds.”

  Simon laughed and nodded toward Willow’s backpack, which was bulkier than it had been when she’d left the lab, and sagged like it was being weighted down—a telltale sign that she’d been scavenging while we were laying low in the underground tunnels. “Looks like you found some stuff we might need.”

  Willow’s grin just grew. “You know . . . I had some time.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  IT WAS DARK WHEN THE THREE OF US SPILLED out of the east exit door, which dropped us into a dim alleyway behind the building. The only light out here came from a parking lot in the distance. A tall chain-link fence ran along one side of the narrow street, separating this building from the one next door. On the other side of the fence I could see broken glass and litter and pieces of flattened cardboard stacked on pallets. The oily smell made me think they must do something mechanical in that other building, like build engines or tractors, and it made me curious what they thought happened over here, in this place.

  Somehow, being out here, in the alley and breathing the fresh-ish air, made me feel moderately less . . . claustrophobic.

  “Where to now? Any word from the others?” I asked Willow, wondering where Jett and Thom and Natty had gone after the explosion. It freaked me out, not knowing where they were, or if they’d been captured, but it freaked me out even more that we hadn’t seen a single No-Sucher since that guy in the ventilation shaft had tried to grab me.

  Even if most of them had been sent out to search for us, shouldn’t there still be some left to guard the place? I glanced up at a security camera above the door and wondered if someone was on the other end, watching us. A chill ran over my skin.

  “It doesn’t work.” The unmistakable voice gave me a second chill, this one gripping my spine and rendering me immobile as I realized my Spidey senses had severely underestimated the danger we were in. “It’s still down. Impressive bug you kids set loose in our system. Kudos.”

  We weren’t alone, and we were never safe. That oily voice belonged to Agent Truman.

  I thought I might puke.

  When I trusted myself, I finally turned to face him. It was the first time I’d actually set eyes on him since that night we were all at Devil’s Hole, and he was no less formidable than I remembered. To sum it up: he was scary as shit.

  If it hadn’t been for the gun he was clutching, I might’ve allowed myself to relish a twinge of satisfaction over seeing his other hand still encased in plaster. All because of me and what I’d done with the baseball. As it was, however, all I could concentrate on was that he didn’t seem to be holding the gun as awkwardly as he had been the last time I’d seen him, up at Devil’s Hole, despite the fact it wasn’t his natural shooting hand. Like, maybe he’d had time to practice since then.

  It wasn’t a comforting thought.

  “I knew you wouldn’t be able to stay away,” he said, and I hated the way his voice turned my knees to rubber.

  I barely trusted my own voice, but I had to know for sure. “So you . . . you don’t have Tyler?”

  He had the nerve to shrug—I mean, he actually shrugged, like we were just hanging out, talking about grades or a ballgame, like we were a couple of buddies.

  We definitely weren’t.

  “The boy made for good bait,” he remarked, taking a measured step toward us and sounding far too flippant. His eyes squeezed into narrow slits. “It’s sweet, the way you came running.”

  I glanced down at my empty hands, wishing I had something to hurl at him. I desperately wanted to break his other hand.

  “You’re a prick,” Willow sneered from behind me.

  “Yeah?” Agent Truman sneered back, raising his gun in her direction. “Well, right now I’m the prick who has you cornered.”

  Simon shouldered past Willow, pushing her behind him. “You won’t shoot us.” He said it boldly, as if it were a fact. And maybe it was, I thought, realizing Agent Truman really didn’t have a hazmat suit on, but it still seemed like a bad idea to goad the guy with the gun. “It’d be suicide.”

  Simon’s prediction fell on deaf ears. Agent Truman’s weapon stayed exactly where it was, aimed at Simon, who’d taken Willow’s place, and just when I was convinced this whole shooting-us thing had to be a bluff, Agent Truman proved me wrong.

  He pulled the trigger.

  It was one of those moments where everything happens too fast and too slow at the same time. My brain felt scrambled as it tried to make sense of any single thought, even while every detail that unfolded seemed to do so with startling clarity: the look on Simon’s face as he tried—and failed—to get out of the way in time, the ringing in my ears, which was back because the sound of the gun firing was so much louder than I’d ever imagined, and the smell . . . that odd crisp and chemical smell that I could only assume must be gunpowder.

  Watching Simon take the impact of the bullet made my blood turn to ice. He looked like a ragdoll as he slammed backward, his unusual copper eyes brimming with all the disbelief I felt. He hit the ground so much harder than the soldier we’d gassed in th
e ducts, and I cringed when his head cracked sharply against the pavement behind him.

  I shrank back against the wall, even as Willow launched forward, dragging Simon out of the way. Agent Truman fired again, only this time he was a split second too late. Willow tossed Simon aside as her attention turned to the agent.

  When she charged Agent Truman, she looked like a bull—nostrils flared, jaw set. She was seriously pissed.

  And he may as well have been standing there waving a red bullfighter’s cape. He dug in, securing his stance and setting his feet shoulder width apart. And then, just when I thought I’d seen it all, he pulled the trigger one more time.

  When the bullet caught Willow square in the chest, I thought my own might collapse as well. Willow gasped, her mouth open for an eternity, like a fish gulping and gulping for air.

  And that’s when I realized what was wrong. With everything. With this whole scene.

  It was the reason Agent Truman hadn’t been worried about shooting us.

  There was no blood.

  He was shooting at us . . . he had shot Simon and Willow, but there wasn’t a single trace of blood.

  I dropped to my knees and lunged for Willow, who was still grappling to catch her lost breath, and I wondered if her ribs had been shattered by whatever Agent Truman had fired at her. I wished she’d hurry up and mend already, but Simon had told me that I healed faster than anyone else, and clearly that included Willow. Her hands clawed at mine as if somehow, some way, I might be able to give her what she needed. But I couldn’t.

  I scoured the ground around her, trying to find a reasonable explanation for the lack of blood, and when my eyes fell on the lone capsule, I snatched it up and closed my fist around it.

  When I looked to Agent Truman, he met my gaze with a vicious sneer.

  The exit door crashed open, and two more men came bursting into the alleyway, stopping behind Agent Truman’s back. Unlike him, they were in full hazmat gear, but beneath those plastic face masks, I could see what they really were: soldiers. Just like the one we’d left behind in the ducts beneath the lab, their faces smeared in black paint.

  They’d come prepared, as if they’d known all along where to find us. My eyes strayed to the security camera as I wondered if Agent Truman had been lying about it, the same way he’d lied about Tyler being here.

  Simon was still trying to get to his feet, so I grabbed Willow, meaning to drag her out of the way. But she was dead weight and I couldn’t make her budge. Not even an inch.

  A tremor rippled through me as I watched, frozen in horror, while one of the men lifted an enormous rifle of some sort. Its barrel was too wide for bullets of any kind, and when he pulled the trigger, I realized why. Netting burst from the end of it, hurtling toward us—toward Willow and me—unfolding and spreading toward us.

  It was a net gun, and we were about to be tangled in its web.

  Simon’s hand closed over mine, and he yanked me out of the way just as the edge of the rope glanced off my cheek.

  Willow wasn’t so lucky. The heavyweight mesh trapped her, making it impossible for her to move more than a few inches in either direction.

  She thrashed beneath it, still not breathing.

  Simon’s grip tightened as he continued dragging me away, and from behind us, I heard Agent Truman’s voice shouting, “Don’t let her get away!”

  But they were too late because we were already running in the opposite direction, through the darkened alleyway.

  Away from them . . .

  . . . and away from Willow.

  Jett, Thom, and Natty were waiting for us in the SUV not too far from the place we’d left it. They spotted us way before we saw them, and they were flashing the headlights even while they were speeding right toward us. Since they barely slowed, we had to run-jump to make it inside the still-moving vehicle.

  Once the doors were closed, Simon panted, “Go!” to Jett, but even from the backseat, his devastation was palpable.

  “Where’s Willow?” Jett demanded to know from behind the wheel.

  Natty and Thom turned to stare at me, and for the first time since I’d been returned, I wished I couldn’t see in the dark. I wanted their expressions to be as veiled from me as mine was from them.

  Eighty-four minutes. That’s how long it had taken us to cause an explosion, break into a secret NSA lab . . . and to lose one of our own.

  Had we really just abandoned Willow at the Daylight Division’s headquarters? Did Agent Truman really have her now? How did that make us any less monstrous than the men we’d just handed her off to? What kind of friends were we?

  I pressed my forehead against the glass, watching the Tacoma facility recede out of the corner of my eye. Somehow, it looked so peaceful from here. “What are we going to do?” I asked, breaking the silence at last.

  When we turned a corner, disappearing behind a row of darkened warehouses, Jett slammed on the brakes. “Someone tell me what happened back there. Where’s Willow?” he repeated, while he massaged that memory of a wound on his arm.

  I turned to Natty, who was watching me. When she didn’t answer, I looked to Thom, but he just shook his head. Maybe Willow didn’t matter to him because she wasn’t one of his people.

  It had only been seconds, but it felt like forever since anyone had spoken.

  “Simon?” I reached in front of me to the passenger seat, settling my hand on his shoulder. He flinched, rolling his neck and shoulder, reminding me that Willow wasn’t the only one who’d been shot. He was healing—I was sure of it—but slower than I would have. “What are these things?” I dropped the pellet I’d picked up in the alley. It fell with a dull scrape on the center console.

  Jett picked it up and rolled it between his fingers. “It’s a beanbag.” It was smaller than a golf ball and nearly as dense. “Damn,” he said, awed. “If this is what you were shot with, no wonder you’re hurting. Willow . . .” His voice drifted away. “If they got her with these . . . well, then she must be . . .” He didn’t finish. “Shot at a high velocity, this could be lethal to a regular person.” My gut recoiled over the way he said “regular person,” like I needed to be reminded we weren’t normal. “To us”—he looked at Simon sympathetically—“it must suck. Hurts like hell, I bet—maybe even incapacitates us temporarily—but probably won’t kill us. Looks like they’ve come up with the perfect weapon,” he added, tossing the thing in the air and catching it. “Because it also won’t make us bleed. It’s low risk for the No-Suchers.”

  “How’s your shoulder?” I asked.

  Simon peeled away the collar of his shirt. Beneath it I could see the bruises—large and deep and dark purple, but they were already visibly retreating. It was fascinating to watch. “It’ll be fine.”

  “Good,” I said, inhaling as I made a decision. “Because I can’t do this. I can’t abandon her.”

  Simon’s brows met over the bridge of his nose. “Kyra, there’s nothing we can do for her now. This is no longer a sneak attack. Those guys know we’re here and they’ll be halfway expecting us to come back for her.”

  I shook my head, refusing to accept his explanation. “She would try if it were one of us.” I didn’t know if that was true or not, but it sounded like the thing to say.

  From the other side of Natty, Thom piped up. “Simon’s right. It’s too late for her. They’d be waiting for us if we tried to go back again. She knew the risks when we went in. We all did.”

  I closed my eyes at the word “risks.” Nausea choked me, and throwing up became a very real possibility. I’d seen that lab and the equipment they had, and I knew the kind of person Agent Truman was.

  Whatever happened to Willow in there was all my fault, because I’d been so desperate to find Tyler. Just like it had been my fault when Tyler got sick because I didn’t know my own blood was toxic.

  I was a killer, whether I meant to be or not—the kind of person no one, not even other Returned, apparently, should get too close to.

  I looked aroun
d at the others in the car with me—Thom, Natty, Jett, and Simon—and wondered which of them would be next if I didn’t put an end to this.

  I had to do something.

  “I don’t care what you say, or what any of you think might happen,” I said. Before Thom could stop me, I grabbed his gun and was out the door when I shouted back to them, “You can come with me or not, but I’m not leaving without Willow.”

  Natty jumped out behind me, plucking the gun away before I realized what she was doing. “I’m with you. But here, if you’re gonna use that thing, let’s give you a crash course.”

  She came up behind me and showed me how to wrap my fingers around the black grip of the gun. “Use both hands for maximum support. This,” she instructed, “is the safety. On this gun, you slide it like this . . .” She flicked a small black switch. “Since you haven’t done this before, get as close as you can and try to keep the gun in line with your elbow.” She moved through the brief lesson effortlessly. “For now,” she finished, “keep the safety on, and tuck it back here.” She slipped it in the back of my jeans, away from view but still within reach.

  Simon was out of the SUV now too, and I knew he’d reluctantly joined our mission. “You sure you can shoot someone?”

  Any qualms I might’ve had evaporated the minute Agent Truman had fired at us. “Let’s hope so.” I glanced over my shoulder, to where Jett had the driver’s side window down. Thom was already out of the vehicle, standing decisively close to Natty. “What about those key-card things? Got any more of those? That thing was sorta awesome.”

  Jett grinned, but shook his head. “Sorry, that was a prototype. But I’ll pass your comments on to R and D.”

  “R and D?” I repeated uncertainly. Who was Jett even talking about?