I rush to the lab’s door and, as quietly as possible, lock it from the inside. I’m lucky that Dr. Zakos didn’t knock anything over on his way to the ground: any noise would’ve attracted the attention of the guards on the other side of the door. But I know that once I do what I’m about to, alarms will sound, getting their attention. It won’t take them long to override the lock.
But that’s okay. I only need a little time.
I run to the steel panel controlling the containment pods. There are no buttons, no instructions. I have no idea how to imitate Doctor Zakos’s complex gestures.
“Let me,” I hear. One’s voice.
She takes over my movements, just as she did when she hijacked my body in the jungle. I’m a spectator to my own body, watching as my hand dances elegantly across the surface of the panel.
An alarm goes off. I feel One vacating my body, ceding control back to me.
I get back in the chair, reattach a couple of electrodes and grip the arms of the seat.
I turn for one last look at the wall behind me, as all of the containment pods open noisily at once, a hydraulic chorus, disgorging their captive corpses. All except One’s pod, which is still linked to me through the mainframe.
Exposed to open air, the corpses will be rendered useless to further Mogadorian experimentation within minutes.
It’s hardly an elegant sabotage. But it will keep the Mogadorians from getting any intel from the dead Greeters, and should set Zakos’s research back a few years.
The machine connecting me to One begins to thrum louder. I used up all the anesthetic to knock Zakos out, so I expect this will hurt. But I know that One has a plan for me, and it doesn’t involve dying.
That’s when I see Malcolm Goode, waking up on his slab.
“One?” I ask, nervously.
In the heat of the moment, I hadn’t even considered what would happen to Malcolm, the sole surviving Greeter. I watch as he pulls himself loose from his connecting cables and steps off his slab. His legs, unused for years, instantly give out on him.
He locks eyes with me. He’s almost three times my age, but he looks as lost and confused as a child.
One’s voice in my ear: “Don’t worry about him. He’s going to be fine.”
That’s when the pain hits.
I’m plunged back into the moment of Hilde’s death, the blast of the Mogadorian’s gun opening up her chest right in front of my eyes. Hilde falls to her knees before me.
Red, orange, and purple swarms my vision. Everything’s faster, louder than before, pulsing and buzzing. One’s thoughts are screaming in my head again:
Through the orangey blur of my vision I see the walls of the shack explode, I see four Mogadorian warriors flung out of sight by the force that’s come from within me.
As the dust settles, I look down at my hands, at my legs. I expect to see One’s body as the source of this power.
But I don’t see One’s body. I see only my own.
“That’s it,” I hear. One’s voice.
I turn around, surprised to discover I am no longer in the Malaysian shack. I am on that beautiful California beach. Our place.
One sits on the sand, waiting for me. “Pretty cool, huh?”
I nod, flabbergasted at the sheer power of One’s Legacy. I’m dizzy from wielding it.
“Come sit with me. We don’t have much time.”
I collapse beside her, still breathless.
It’s perfect: the sun is warm on my skin, the sand cool on my feet. And best of all, One’s here, right by my side.
Across the sea, there’s a roiling storm, the clouds as black as ink. But we’re still in the sun.
One touches me.
In this place, I can feel it. I reach out and touch her too. We’re shoulder to shoulder, staring forward at the approaching storm.
“We got what we came for,” she says. “It’s time for me to go.”
