Tandem

It wouldn’t be long now.

THIRTY-EIGHT

They’re here.

The thought rang through my head as I opened my eyes, waking from a deep sleep. Thomas and I were crammed together on one of the beds; we’d curled up close to each other, my head on his chest, his knees bent and sort of hanging over the edge. In spite of that, I’d slept better than I ever had since I came to Aurora. I’d been shy at first, as we crawled into bed exhausted, wondering what it would feel like to have him that close, but the moment I settled in next to him and his arms wrapped around me, I felt calm and comforted, or at least as calm and comforted as I could feel while I was trapped in a dark, cold dungeon in an alternate universe. I’d drifted off to the sound of Thomas’s light, soft breathing, warmed despite the chill by his nearness. We didn’t speak, letting the silence envelop us, feeling as though we were the only two people in the world and wishing, at least in part, that it could always stay that way.

But we weren’t alone anymore. I knew they were there before I heard them, but as I struggled to sit upright, my limbs still tangled up in Thomas’s, the door to our cell slid open, emitting a loud, animal squeal as it was dragged along its rusty tracks. Footsteps echoed off the stone walls.

“Isn’t that just adorable.”

Thomas’s eyes flew open, and he leapt to his feet while I scrambled after him. He turned in the direction of the voice, his hand darting reflexively to the shoulder holster he wasn’t wearing, to grab a gun that wasn’t there. The lights, which had shut off long ago, snapped on, but not before I realized that there were two people in the cell besides Thomas and me, not just one. It took me a moment to recognize the voice, but when I did, I knew we were in trouble.

Lucas was pointing a gun at us. “Don’t move,” he said. “Stay right where you are.”

“Since when do they let you carry a gun?” Thomas asked. His tone was calm and even, but I could tell from the way he was standing—straight as a pole, shoulders tensed, using his body to shield me—that, unarmed, he was at a terrible disadvantage and he knew it.

“At least I have a gun,” Lucas said.

Thomas jerked his chin toward Lucas’s companion. “Who’s your friend?”

The girl revealed herself, stepping out from behind Lucas and shoving back the hood that covered half her face. “Hey, T,” she said, her mouth curling at the edges in a wry, sad smile. She was blond, but in all other ways, she was me.

You’re never prepared to meet your analog. It’s a situation where knowledge does you absolutely no good. Even if you understand what they are, that they’re not you but that they are real, it doesn’t stop you from thinking you’re losing your mind. For a second, it’s like you’re floating; you lose all sense of space and time, and everything else disappears except them and you. Your nerves start humming like tuning forks, and your vision goes blurry at the edges. You start to wish you were crazy, because the only alternative is that you’re not.

I stared at Juliana. She stared back. Neither of us was willing to speak, or capable of doing so. The silence in the room was so oppressive that I sagged in relief when Thomas finally said something.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded. “Juli, for God’s sake, where have you been?”

“Didn’t you get my note?” she asked.

“Yeah, I got it,” Thomas snapped. “It was … concise.”

“I meant it,” she told him, with a hint of desperation. Juliana was disheveled, her eyes wild, and in her normal-person clothes, with that hideous bleached hair, she looked nothing like the princess from the photos and paintings that covered the Castle walls, nothing like the image I’d seen in the mirror when I was pretending to be her. But my soul recognized her even as my eyes did not. Did she even know or understand just how much we were connected?

“I’m sure you did.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t live up to your lofty expectations,” she bit back, her voice trembling. “I couldn’t stay there. He would’ve killed me. You know he would.”

Thomas’s jaw tightened, but he didn’t bother asking who she meant by “he.” We all knew who she was talking about. “I asked why you were here.”

Juliana glanced at Lucas, so we turned our eyes on him as well. He affected surprise. “Oh, is it my turn to talk?” He nodded at me. “We’re here for her.”

Thomas used his arm to block me. “I’m not going to let you lay a hand on her.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll leave her intact,” Lucas said. “All Juli’s got to do is touch her and my work here is done.”

“Touch me?” A horrible realization struck me. She’s going to use me to pass through the tandem. I glanced down at the anchor around my wrist. As long as it was activated, I was stuck fast to Aurora and nothing could dislodge me. If Juliana touched me now, she would be sent to Earth, not me.

She’s going to steal my life.

“You can’t do that!” I cried. “You can’t take my place!”

“Why not?” Juliana snapped. “You took mine.”

“Because I was forced to! You can have it back, I don’t want it. I want to go home.”

Juliana hesitated, and I could see that she was conflicted. “Please,” I begged. “Don’t.”

“I won’t let her get close enough,” Thomas assured me. There was a pause as he and Lucas sized each other up; then Thomas darted forward like he was going to try to take the gun from his brother, but even I could tell they were too far apart for that to actually work.

I shouted at Thomas in warning, but it was too late. A shot cried out in the cell as Lucas pressed the trigger of his gun. Juliana and I both shrieked, identical sounds from identical mouths that lingered in the air long after the ring of the bullet bursting from the chamber had lost its echo. Thomas clutched his right shoulder and stumbled backward, narrowly missing me as he fell to the ground and cracked his head against the wall.

“Thomas!” I screamed, dropping to my knees. My hands shook as I pressed them against his wound, trying to staunch the flow of blood. He winced, sucking air through his teeth in pain. I followed Thomas’s hateful gaze to his brother; Lucas’s face was white as paper and he was breathing heavily. Juliana stood immobile with shock.

“Touch her,” Lucas commanded, his voice shaking, but Juliana didn’t move. He swung around and pointed the gun at her, only inches from her temple. “Do it now, Juliana!”

She stumbled forward, and I was sure that she would collapse, but she didn’t. She crouched down in front of me, and I shrank back until I hit the wall. With Lucas training a gun on me there was nowhere to go.

“I’m sorry it has to be this way,” Juliana said, her eyes meeting mine. I stared unfeelingly back at her, bracing myself for what was about to come. I felt weightless and numb as she closed in on me, reaching out to touch my face, tentatively, as if she still didn’t believe, after all she’d seen, that I was even real. My fingertips itched with adrenaline. The air crackled with electricity and smelled like an approaching storm. I wondered just how much this was going to hurt.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Thomas reach into his pocket.

“You don’t have to do this,” I told Juliana. She hesitated. For a split second I thought she might reconsider.

“I’m sorry,” she repeated. She sounded like her heart was shattering, but I felt no sympathy. She was a coward and a traitor, if not to her country, then to Thomas, and through him to me. I had no pity for traitors. “I can’t. I wish I was better, but I’m not.”

I glanced down and saw that in his hand Thomas held a small black rectangular device. As Juliana extended her hand to make contact with my skin, Thomas’s finger hovered over the remote’s solitary button. Our eyes found each other and I knew what he was going to do.

“Get your own life, Juli,” he said with great effort. Then he pushed the button and deactivated my anchor.