I glanced over my shoulder. A trio was coming in off the ocean. I recognized Trek Whiting immediately.
He shifted to the side, and there was Starr Messenger. My stomach twisted, but one thought kept me from heaving:
Jag
49.
That night, after everyone fell asleep, I slipped away from the group. Even with Vi curled in my arms, I couldn’t settle my nerves. I kept hearing falling dirt, burying me farther and farther underground.
I returned to the rock where Vi and I had sat earlier that evening. The gentle lapping of water against sand sang to me, and I watched the waves in an attempt to purge my mind of more troubling thoughts.
I felt Gunner approaching before I saw him. Exhaustion poured from him, with a little bit of shame.
“Hey,” I said as he sat next to me. “Good to see you awake.”
He grunted in response, and I knew that I’d be doing most of the talking. Another side effect non-Voices don’t understand: Once you do something truly horrific with your voice power, you want to stop speaking. Maybe then you won’t say something you’ll regret.
“You did what you needed to do,” I said. “You enabled the Resistance to wipe out Freedom.”
He scoffed, and I heard what he meant.
“You didn’t kill him,” I said. “And she knows that.”
Gunner wouldn’t look at me. “I’m not going to lie to you,” I said. “It’s hard. Remember that day you tased Thane? That was hard too. Holding someone’s life in the grip of your voice never gets easier.” I paused, remembering some of the more negative ways I’d used my voice.
“The fact is, you have a voice that people will obey. You need to use it for the right things. I believe using your voice to escape and help the Resistance was the right thing to do. Our lives should be our own, and I’m using my voice to accomplish that goal.” I touched his arm. “So are you.”
He finally faced me, and his eyes looked shiny, almost as if he was crying. “Thanks,” he said.
“Yeah,” I said. “Dealing with the voice sucks sometimes. I know how it is.”
“You ever kill someone?” he asked, his words quiet and strong—the way he’s always spoken. That’s Gunn. He’s got some real resolve.
“Yeah,” I said. “Yeah.”
Rancho Port perches right on the ocean. The wind blows constantly, and it’s hot as hell most of the year. Even now, in early April, as I led our small band of Insiders to the swampy areas on the eastern border, the heat oppressed me.
Dread settled in my stomach. As if Vi sensed it, she nudged her hoverboard closer to mine. I didn’t look at her. I wouldn’t like what I found reflected in her eyes. My fear. Her reassurance.
Sometimes I really hated that my girlfriend could see inside my head.
Vi moved away, leaving behind a wake of her wounded pride. I let her go, needing to be alone. I flew over miles of swampland, breathing shallowly at the stench of warm earth, stagnant water, and dead fish. I found myself flying slower and slower. Everyone had pulled ahead of me by the time the first buildings came into view.
I drifted closer to the open water. I imagined the path I’d used to escape just several short weeks ago. That tree, had I paused behind it? That stretch of beach, had I run as hard as I could, my feet sinking into the wet sand even as the next wave obliterated my footsteps?
And that stretch of open swamp, was that where the taser fire had hit me in the back? Where the silencers were applied? Where Thane stood over me, his eyes broadcasting hatred and his voice dripping with disdain?
Now Thane rode in the front of the pack—where I used to ride.
He spoke to Vi with a genuine smile on his face—like I used to do.
Before he saved me from the burning building in Castledale, I would’ve felt anger and hatred and distrust. Now I only felt sadness that could not be explained.
Sure, I’d cried many times. But that was usually from pure helplessness. Never sadness. I hadn’t felt sad since my parents died. I’d closed off that part of myself, determined not to let myself get hurt.
I watched Vi’s shoulders tense. Her sadness matched my own. She wanted me to let her in.
Could I do it? I’d established a boundary in all my previous relationships. Indy had not crossed it, though she’d tried—and she knew it. Other girls had been nothing to me. Vi had broken me within days, and yet I continued to push her away. I was constantly trying to re-establish the boundary she had breached.
Not her.
Never her. I asked instead of commanded, and I thought snippy things to hurt her, to drive her away, so I could blame her for my weaknesses.
She dropped back, letting the others flow around her, until we flew side by side. I reached for her, and she let me hold her hand. The act was simple, yet it spoke volumes.
“You mess me up,” I said.
“Why, Jag Barque . . . is that a compliment?”
I smiled, looking at her. “I don’t let anyone in.” Naked fear flowed in my voice.
She heard it, loud and clear. “I won’t hurt you,” she promised. “I love you.”
It was the first time she’d ever said it before I did. The words rang with truth, with power, and I knew she loved me.
“You have to find a way to let me in,” she said. “I won’t hurt you, but you’re hurting me. I refuse to live like my parents.”
“They love each other,” I said, surprised by her statement.
“They love what they can do for each other,” she corrected. “I love you for you. Not for your voice, or because you’re the leader of the Resistance, or anything else. I love you because you’re Jag Barque, and because that’s good enough for me.”
I felt something hiding between her words. “You’re good enough for me.”
“I didn’t say I wasn’t.”
“You feel like you aren’t.”
She pinned me with a pointed look. “Because you act like I’m not.”
I couldn’t argue. When I wouldn’t let her in, she heard
“This is very difficult for me.” I squeezed her hand. “You know that, yeah?”
She gripped my hand in return. “Yeah, I know that.”
Vi and I caught up to the group just as we entered the city proper. My guard went up. Something felt wrong. It was silent. Still. No steam rose from the factories; no movement flowed through the streets; no life stirred in the buildings.
Just over a month ago this city had bustled with workers. Thane had been here; Zenn’s father had been murdered. What had happened after I’d been taken to Freedom?
Thane swung around to fly beside me. “No transmissions.”
“Vi?” I asked. “What can you sense?”
“No Thinkers,” she responded. We all swept our eyes from side to side, expecting a threat to materialize out of thin air. “There are people here, but they’re all . . . asleep.”
“Asleep, asleep?” I asked. “Or brainwashed?”
