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Chapter 3

ADRIEN’S BACK WAS RIGID as we flew. The only hint that he was rattled at all was a slight tremble in his hand as he punched through an interface cube that rose as a projection from the duo’s console.

I looked behind us. The lab was only a square dot now with the outline of city buildings jutting up behind it in the far distance. No one was following us.

I looked back at Adrien. I could see in the small mirror that his face was taut with focus and his thick hair was matted around his forehead. I’d never really seen him like this. I’d known Adrien as the quiet voice talking to me late at night in my room about beauty and the human soul, not as Adrien the soldier. I’d known vaguely that he used to run missions like this all the time. He’d lived on the run and then joined up with the Rez when he was fourteen. But seeing him in action was something totally different.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

He pressed his lips together tighter. He looked almost angry. For a second, I thought he wasn’t going to answer me, but he finally said, “I should have been there earlier. I was so stupid. I should have found a way to get an encoded message out. I could have warned Milton not to come into work today and gotten you out another way. Now he’s gone, and I almost lost you—” He stopped and clenched his jaw like he was physically holding words back. “I should have done things differently.”

“It’s not your fault, Adrien.” I tried to reach out to touch his shoulder, but my strap held me back.

“I can see the future,” he said, his voice hard. “Whose fault is it but mine?”

“Without you that Inspector would have captured me. You saved me.”

His jaw stayed just as tight. I couldn’t tell if he believed me.

“We’re not safe yet,” he finally said. “Those Regs will be calling for an armada to find us,” he said. “The duo’s cloaking mechanism isn’t built for long runs, but the beta site’s nearby. I should be able to get us there before it wears off.” His voice dropped. “At least I can do this one thing right.”

I stared at him a moment longer in the mirror. My eyes traced the line of his cheekbone down to his strong jaw, clenched in frustration. I took a breath, determined to find the right words to comfort him, but nothing came.

My stomach churned from the speed and sudden drops as we flew on. I squeezed my eyes shut and put a hand on my stomach to try to settle it. I hated the sky. I’d grown up in an underground city in the Community and didn’t think I’d ever get used to the empty expanse above. It was unnatural—all that space. And now we were suspended in it, with only the duo’s whirring engine keeping us from crashing back to earth.

Adrien was quiet for the next half hour as we flew, but he kept running scans for the attack transports who could find us if our cloak wore off. I had time to finally think and process everything that had just happened. I shivered with the realization that Chancellor Bright was enacting her plan. She was the Underchancellor of Defense now. I knew she’d never intended to remain the Chancellor of the Academy for long, but I hadn’t expected her to move so fast. She’d already begun her quiet takeover, and, with her glitcher Gift of compulsion, none of the Uppers in power would see her coming.

I remembered the forced sincerity on her face when she’d offered for me to join her. She promised a utopia with glitchers in charge instead of the corrupt Uppers. I’d even been tempted, until I realized her plan only replaced one oppressive government with another, never changing anything about the Link system that enslaved millions. I’d rejected her offer. And barely escaped with my life.

“Hold on,” Adrien said, breaking into my thoughts. “We’re gonna make our descent now.”

I gripped the black armrests hard as we dropped again, but it wasn’t a quick dive this time. We kept falling and falling until I was sure the engine had failed. I opened my eyes just as the duo slowed suddenly, jerking me forward in my harness strap.

We’d dropped down into a forest. Green surrounded us on all sides, and Adrien slowly navigated the duo through the trees. Leaves slapped at the windows. It was as if the very air sprouted green. Leafy bushes and gigantic trees surrounded us, from above and on every side and the ground below.

I leaned away from the window, remembering the last time I’d been in a forest. It was when I had first met Adrien, six months ago. He’d tried to rescue me from the Community, only to discover once we left the underground city that I was deadly allergic to almost everything on the Surface. I looked down at the rip in my suit, then back out the window. I could only imagine all the billions of allergen particulates surrounding us. If something happened to the last underlayer of my suit here and I was exposed …

“The trees,” I whispered, leaning closer to the glass in spite of my bad memories. “They’re huge.” The trunks were gigantic, several times wider than a person. I’d never seen anything like it.

“It’s old-growth forest,” Adrien said. “This area’s been pretty much left alone over the last two hundred years. Look, you can barely see the sky, the canopy’s so thick overhead.”

I looked up through the top of the windshield, and he was right. Occasionally I’d catch a glimpse of blue, but for the most part the tops of the trees spread a dense canopy. I swallowed hard. I wasn’t sure which was worse—being in the duo up in the open sky or being here surrounded on all sides by deadly greenery.

“But they’re so much bigger than last time.”

“Different forest,” he said. “We’re on the other side of the Sector.”

That meant my home, and my brother, were thousands of miles away. My stomach dropped. Markan was safe for now. I had to focus on that. He was only thirteen, young enough that he’d still be a drone in the underground Community, numb to all thought and emotion. He wouldn’t have felt anything about my disappearance. And if he did become a glitcher like me and wake up, it wouldn’t happen for a couple of years. Most importantly, he was still five years away from getting the adult V-chip, the device that would silence his emotions forever. I had to get him out before then, or he’d be lost.

But I wasn’t sure how I’d be able to rescue him. The Chancellor was hunting me, and even if she weren’t, how was I going to be able to infiltrate the tightly guarded Community? Especially since I couldn’t even count on my power to help me.

Another branch smacked into the window, right near where the Reg had smashed his face. Several long spider cracks spread out from the site.

“Sorry,” Adrien said, gripping the control stick harder and pulling back on it. Our speed slowed more. “There we are.” He slowly came to a stop with the duo hovering over an open spot of ground. A woman appeared, seemingly out of nowhere, carrying a heavy green cloth with her.

She made wide gesturing motions. Adrien popped the lid.

“Out, out, out. I need to cover it so they can’t catch its heat signature.”

Adrien jumped nimbly over the side of the duo to the ground, then held up a hand for me. I took it and hurled myself over. I landed much less gracefully, my thick boots thudding into the ground and sinking a few inches in.

Adrien quickly grabbed the thick cloth in the woman’s hands and they spread it over the vehicle.

“Were you tracked?” she asked.

“No. I think our cloak held just long enough.”

“There,” the woman smiled and let out a breath. Her brown hair was pulled up in a loose bun and she had warm brown eyes. “You took a long time. You don’t know how relieved I was to see the duo’s beacon light. Though I’m surprised it still works, this thing looks so mangled.” She gestured to the ripped-up hood.

“We barely got away.” Adrien’s said, his voice quiet. “And Milton didn’t make it.”

Jilia’s eyebrows furrowed together. “I didn’t know him, but I’m sorry.” She pulled Adrien into a loose hug. “It’s so good to see you.” She was so short, the top of her head only reached the middle of his chest. She pulled back and turned to me. “And you must be Zoe. I’m Jilia, but everyone calls me Doc.”

“Hi.” I tried to take a step toward her, but my boot was stuck. I tugged a little harder and heard a slight suction noise as the ground released it. The bottom half of my boot was covered in a mixture of green and brown sludge. “Ugh,” I muttered, just as I heard a gentle tap, tap, tap on the rounded top of my helmet. I looked up and several drops of water landed on my face mask.

“That’s springtime for you. Mud and near constant rain. Hurry, let’s get you inside and dry.” She started walking.

Adrien took my hand and we made our way forward through the woods. My feet suctioned and released with every step. The trees and foliage all blended together, and I didn’t understand how the woman could move so sure-footedly. She weaved around trees and over logs as if she knew exactly where she was going even though everything around us looked the same to me. The rain started to come down harder until little rivulets ran down the faceplate of my helmet. I reached up a hand to wipe the water away, but I only smeared it around and added some mud from my glove to the mix.

I stumbled on a thick root and pitched forward. Adrien tried to catch me, but I took us both down. A long ripping noise filled the air as we fell.

The suit.

I held my breath even though I knew that wouldn’t really matter. With my hyperallergies, any skin contact with the air would trigger a lethal attack. I looked down frantically, but I could barely see a thing through my smudged faceplate. “Is it ripped?”

Adrien immediately started searching my suit. An agonizing minute passed before he breathed out and held up my forearm where the outer suit material hung almost completely off now.

“It was just the two top layers that you’d already ripped. The underlayer is still safe. That was too close,” Adrien said, his eyes wide. He reached up and wiped my faceplate clean with the sleeve of his tunic. His hair dripped with water.

“It’s okay,” I said, my heart still thrumming in my chest. “I’m fine. Let’s keep going and get you out of the rain.”

He let out a slow breath and nodded. He interlocked his fingers tight in mine as we started forward again.

After a few more minutes, Jilia announced that we’d arrived.

I looked ahead and frowned. I didn’t see a building. Just more green. “Where?”

Jilia laughed. “Right here.” She reached toward one of the trees, but when she touched it, it rippled and moved like a cloth surface. What had looked like a three-dimensional forest was actually a painted curtain.

“It doesn’t work close up, but we’re deep enough in the forest that it’s camouflaged from any random flyovers. The material’s like the tarp I used on the duo, it covers heat signatures so thermosatellite scans don’t detect us.”

She gestured for us to step in, and I nudged Adrien ahead of me. I was kept dry by my suit, but he was drenched. I followed him inside to a softly lit, small interior room. Rain spattered loudly on the roof and the walls.

Adrien’s wet tunic clung to him. His shoulders seemed wider than when I’d last seen him and his wiry arm muscles more sharply cut. But he looked thinner too, and when he turned I could see just how ripped-up his back was from the chute.

“Your back!” I said. His tunic hung in tatters and blood had dried from a couple of deep gashes below his shoulder blades. Deep bruises were already starting to bloom.

“Oh right, I forgot about it,” he said. He turned around so Jilia could see. She immediately reached out a hand.

I winced when she touched him, placing her hand on the worst of his injuries. Then as I watched, the lacerations wove themselves shut under her touch. I looked back and forth between the now smoothed skin and Jilia’s face, feeling my eyes widen. “You’re a glitcher?”

“Yep,” she said. “First generation, like Adrien’s mom.”

“Can you heal anything?” I asked.

“I can only heal minor wounds, knit tissue and sometimes bones back together, that kind of thing.” She saw my face drop and smiled apologetically. “I can’t deal with anything at the systemic cellular level, like allergies.”

I moved closer. Within a few minutes, the skin of Adrien’s back was completely smooth. Even the bruises were gone. His muscles rippled under his skin as he rotated his shoulders and breathed out a sigh of relief. “Good as new. Thanks, Doc.”

“That’s amazing,” I whispered, still staring.

“Have you had a lot of traffic lately?” Adrien asked.

“Busier than ever,” Jilia said. “A whole safe house got cracked last week, so our beds were full up. Most of them have moved on.”

Adrien must have seen my questioning glance. “The Resistance uses mobile tent compounds like this one for way stations.”

“We try to set them up outside all the major cities for travelers,” Jilia said. “Or so Rez operatives heading into the city on raids have a base station, or if a situation gets too hot for our people living in the city and they have to run.” She looked at Adrien. “But I can’t remember when it’s ever been this bad.”

Adrien’s face darkened. “It’s gotta be because of Underchancellor Bright. She’s got access to Rez prisoners now, and she can force them to tell her anything she wants. Safe house locations, encryption codes, anything.”

Something passed between them, a quiet communication of dread, before Jilia turned to me and smiled. “Come on, let’s get you inside. Tyryn was cooking up something that smelled delicious when I saw the duo beacon and came to meet you.”

“Tyryn’s here?” Adrien asked, his face breaking into a smile.

Jilia nodded. “And his sister Xona. You remember her?”

“She was just a kid the last time I saw her.”

Jilia’s face soured a bit. “She’s not little anymore. Tyryn brought her up here a few weeks ago. She’s been getting into fights with the other Rez kids ever since their parents died.”

“I heard about that.” Adrien’s voice was quiet. “Her mom and mine used to be friends.”

“Anyway, let’s get you cleaned up, and then you can say hi.”

I looked down at my suit. Spattered mud covered my legs, and, in spite of the oxygen constantly circulating, I could smell how sweaty I was. Everything had been happening so fast, I hadn’t stopped to wonder what came next. “So I guess I stay in this suit till we can get to the Foundation where I can change into another?” I asked uncertainly. I looked at the muddy, ripped outer layers.

“Oh no, no, I’ve got a new suit for you,” Jilia assured me quickly. “We shipped some here just in case. It’s much thinner and more flexible. It’s made of polysurtrate, a new tribond blend that won’t tear or even cut easily. And it allows a far better range of motion than the old model. You’ll love it. It’ll fit like a second skin.”

“But how do I get from this suit,” I pointed down at myself, “into another one without being exposed to the air?”

Jilia smiled. She pushed through a tent flap in front of her and gestured at us to follow. “One of the benefits of a portable research facility. This is the bathroom, normal shower and toilet on one side—” she pointed to one curtain partition covering the left half of the room, “—and this is the three-chambered, all-enclosed allergen wash-down station.” She pointed to a long, rectangular container on the other side of the room that was about seven feet tall and four elevator pods wide.

“And just in case, here’s an epi infuser.” She handed me the thin, stylus-sized device.

“Great,” I said weakly, my heart thumping at the thought of having to use it.

“I’m sure it will be fine,” Jilia said quickly. “Let me go get your new suit.” She turned and pushed through the flap at the far end of the room that must lead to another tent chamber.

Adrien stepped closer and put a hand on the small of my back. “You okay?”

I didn’t answer, just leaned into his chest. He wrapped his strong arms around me, pulling me in tight. Even through my thick helmet, I could hear the steady beat of his heart. He dropped his chin on top of my head and rubbed my back in gentle circles. I melted against him. I was exhausted, and his arms felt so good around me, I thought I might fall asleep right there.

He pulled away, looking intently at my face. I tried to raise the sides of my mouth into something that resembled a smile, but I was sure it looked more like a grimace. He laughed. “It’s gonna be okay. We’re safe now,” he said, giving my hand a squeeze. He nodded his head toward the container. “After you get the new suit on, you can finally rest. I’ll be waiting when you come out.”

Jilia came back with a shrink-wrapped plastic bag in her hands.

“After each cycle, the next door will open. Just move right through with it.”

The lights turned on as I stepped inside. The tiny chamber was about the size of a square elevator pod. The door closed before I could say anything else.

Almost immediately spouts dropped from the ceiling and from the walls, and the next instant a hammering spray assaulted me from all sides. The cycle lasted for almost ten complete minutes. A drain at the button suctioned up all the water as it poured down.

I was glad to peel off the suit and my sweaty underclothes in the next chamber, but it felt strange to strip completely down, knowing that outside this container only a mere spread of tent material separated me from the dripping green forest. I clutched the epi infuser in my hand after I dropped the last bit of the suit to the floor.

I paused and closed my eyes, not daring to breathe. I waited to feel any of the telltale signs of an allergy attack. But I could only hold my breath for so long, and eventually I had to take in a gulping breath of the steamy air.

I clutched the epi infuser tighter, my thumb on the release button. One breath, and then another.

I peeked one eye open.

No swelling, no rash.

I was fine.

I breathed out again as another set of sprayers came out from the sides. Instead of water, warm white foam spurted at me, followed by another pounding spray of hot water that left me certain that every millimeter of my body had been scoured raw.

After a bracing rush of air that lasted five more minutes, even my thick curly hair was dry. I stretched my neck and took a deep breath in, taking a moment to enjoy standing free from the restrictive suit.

I opened the plastic bag that held the new suit. It was smaller than I expected, made of dark blue stretchy material that was only about a centimeter thick. There weren’t any boots on the bottom, and I slipped my foot into the leg just like I would a sock. The suit pulled up snug around my waist. Really snug. I thought of Adrien holding me earlier in the bulky suit and wondered with a blush what he’d think of me in this one.

I rebraided my hair, then fit my arms in and pulled on the helmet with the built-in faceplate. The plastic glass of the faceplate was curved in closer around my face, just half an inch away from my nose at its apex, but the surface area was larger. Instead of being a tight rectangular window, the plastic was clear all the way from ear to ear so that I had much better peripheral vision. I stretched my neck. I liked the way the suit moved with me. I looked down at the front where the fabric was still slack. Even though these gloves were thinner and my fingers less clumsy, I couldn’t figure out how to seal it up.

Jilia’s voice came on over a small speaker. “Activate the console on the right arm of the suit, and it will self-seal.”

I did what she said and the slack at the front of the suit suddenly wove itself closed. I took a little breath in as it tightened on my ribs and wondered just how formfitting it was going to be. Jilia had said it would feel like a second skin, but this left very little to the imagination. I stretched my arms and lifted my knees up to my chest a couple times, trying to get comfortable in it.

The front loosened a little and I felt like I could breathe again. I pulled on the oxygen tank that fit like a slim backpack. It clicked into place and fresh air began circulating through the mask. Finally I was able to press the release button and step back into the tent.

Adrien was waiting, all clean and in a dry tunic. I stepped out tentatively, worrying that I looked ridiculous in the tight suit. When he saw me, his eyes widened. He looked me up and down. Color bloomed in his cheeks, but he didn’t look away as a sideways smile slowly spread.

His reaction made me feel bolder, and I walked around the small space and gave a little twirl, feeling more confident with every step. When I looked back at him, his bright aqua eyes twinkled.

“Nice suit,” he said.

I arranged the pillow under my head and tried to get comfortable. I was so tired, I thought I’d fall asleep right away. Instead, the events of the day played like a vid screen across my closed eyelids.

I thought of Milton and wondered if even now his poor, crumpled body was being tossed into one of the incinerators. Bile rose a little in my throat at the thought. I banished the image and tried to think of something else instead. The living matter, not the dead, Adrien had said.

I looked at the thin tent wall and tried to imagine Adrien on the other side of it. Was he asleep already? I thought of his arms around me earlier and felt cold and lonely. There had been so much space separating us for so long. And now that we were finally together, we still felt too far apart.

I sat up, then after a brief moment of indecision, got to my feet and padded over to the hanging tent flap of my room and slipped into his.

He was sitting at the edge of his mattress, his forearms on his knees. His eyebrows had been bunched together as he stared at the wall with a sad, faraway look in his eyes. He blinked, surprised by my sudden appearance, and then smiled as I stepped inside.

I’d been so sure when I left my room, but suddenly I felt self-conscious. I didn’t really have a reason for coming in and disturbing him. He gestured for me to sit. “Are you okay? What’s going on?” he asked.

I sat down on the mattress beside his. Each room partition had several beds for when the compound was full of people traveling through. “Nothing,” I said. “I just … didn’t want to be alone.” I looked down and fiddled with the tip of my glove, suddenly shy and awkward. He grabbed my hands to stop me, then moved swiftly so that he was sitting beside me. His thigh was warm next to mine.

“I’m not really in the mood to be alone either. I think too much when I’m alone.” His smile was sad, but he quickly masked it with a mischievous wink. “Plus, I couldn’t stop thinking of you in the other room, so close by. In that suit.” I blushed.

He let go of my hand, but absentmindedly began to gently trace a line up over my wrist, to my elbow, then all the way to my shoulder. The fabric of the new suit was so thin, I could feel the pressure of his fingertip. A shiver went up and down my body, and I couldn’t help arching my back.

“God, you’re beautiful,” he whispered.

All the day’s worry and terror and chaos suddenly dropped away at his touch. I turned to him and wrapped my arms around his neck, trying to pull him close, but I was too awkward and the movement knocked us both back onto the mattress. Adrien laughed. Our legs tangled together and he dropped his head to nuzzle at my neck. I ran my gloved hands through his hair, trembling at the feel of him in my arms. But the material between us was such a barrier. I was tired of barriers.

“This stupid suit,” I said as my hands curved up behind his shoulder blades.

“Hey, I am very fond of this suit. It’s saving your life.” His fingers clutched at my waist, right above my hips. It sent a burning fire racing through my stomach.

“But I know what you mean,” he murmured. A low growl escaped his throat as he pulled away.

“What’s wrong?” I sat up in alarm.

“Nothing,” he said with a laugh, running his hands through his hair. “You’re driving me crazy is all.”

His words gave me a zing of satisfaction. “Really?” I asked, smiling wide.

“Really. Look at you!” He gestured up and down at me. “And I can’t even kiss you!” He reached out and wove his fingers with mine. He closed his eyes and dropped his head slightly so that his face was shadowed in the dim light. “When I’m touching you, it’s like everything slows down for a minute. All my thoughts finally narrow down to focus only on the feel of your hand in mine. The rest of the time everything is pressing down so hard. The past. The future.” He shook his head and swallowed hard. “Sometimes I feel like I’m gonna break under the strain.”

“You’re not going to break,” I whispered, squeezing his hand tighter. “You’re the strongest person I know.”

He let out a scoffing noise and shook his head again. “Hardly.”

“It’s true,” I insisted. I paused, watching the tension tightening at the corner of Adrien’s mouth.

“How are we really doing?” I asked quietly. “You’ve been working with the Rez. You’ve seen visions. Do we really have a chance? Can we really take down the Chancellor and the Community?”

He was quiet a long moment, as if he was trying to find the right words. “I don’t really know how to answer you,” he finally said, looking down. “Sometimes I worry we’re fighting a war we can never win. We’re impossibly outnumbered, we don’t have enough resources, and now that the Chancellor has joined the war, we’re stretched too thin. We were always fighting an impossible fight—that’s life in the Rez for ya. But now…” his voice quieted. “I don’t know. It’s harder to hold on to hope. We’re fighting for a dream, for a life unlike anything we’ve ever known. Maybe it can’t be done.”

“Then why—?” I stopped myself.

“Why fight?” He finished. “Why risk everything for something we might not win?” He turned his face back to me, his aqua eyes sparking to life just like they always used to when we talked. “Because if we don’t fight, we’ve already lost. Without hope, without trying, there’s no point. There’s no future. And you, Zoe,” his voice softened. “I would fight forever to have a future with you.”

“Maybe hope alone can make a difference,” I said. “Maybe having something to fight for will make us stronger than anything they can throw at us.”

He nodded, but I wasn’t sure if he was really agreeing with me. Then he looked back at me and smirked. “You know, we’re talking about war and revolution, but really this is supposed to be when you sneak into my room just to make out.”

I laughed. “But I’m trapped in this suit.”

He lifted a hand and caressed down the side of my head. “You must be exhausted.”

“But I can’t sleep.”

“I have an idea. Here, lay down on your stomach.” He moved to arrange the pillow for me.

I laid down, and he put his hands on my shoulders, squeezing and rubbing his thumbs in circles. I felt like I was about to melt into the mattress. He moved from my shoulders up to my neck, and then back down again.

I felt myself growing drowsier with each passing minute. Even though I wanted to stay awake so I didn’t miss a moment with him, I quickly dropped off to sleep.