Dualed (12 page)

I can only shake my head. My own anger is starting to simmer, kindled by Chord’s rage. “No, I—”

“I have no idea what’s going on, why you’re still here. Why we’re even discussing this. But you’re running out of time. Did you even bother to read the assignment details on your cell?”

“Yes.” The weight of the cell in my pocket seems to double, heavy with the lie.

Chord’s eyes narrow, and he grimaces. “You haven’t, have you? You don’t know how far away she is—or how close. For all you know, she could be here any minute, if she’s managed to do what you haven’t.”

“You know they never decide that fast. They always—”

“We did, West. Remember? We decided right away to find my Alt.”

And Luc died, didn’t he?

“What we did wasn’t typical,” I insist, pushing away the memory of that day, that room. “Most new actives take a while to decide—”

“West, you really want to talk numbers now?” Chord looks down, sees the slim bulk of my cell in my jeans pocket. He drops the half-filled bag, holds out his hand. “Let me read it, if you won’t,” he says roughly. “You can’t wait any longer.”

I don’t move. My nerves sing and thrum, beating back more panic. A flashback to us in that restaurant in the Grid, me reading his assignment, me forcing him to bend, me being the one who let his Alt get the first shot.

“West, pass me your cell,” he says, his voice grim. “Don’t make me beg.”

“If you leave, I’ll do it, I promise,” I say to him. I don’t let myself think about whether I mean it. Anything to get him away from me … from her.

His face darkens, goes tight. Quick as I’ve ever seen him move, he reaches for me.

“Chord, don’t!” I shove him away, his determination to help me.

He steps back, runs his hands through his hair. Black fire in his eyes. “None of it is going to mean anything if she gets here first. So move!”

“I said I’ll do it!” I yell back at him.

He grabs me by the arm, harder than he probably knows,
swearing under his breath. “I was beyond scared the day I got mine. I started thinking that it maybe
wasn’t
supposed to be me, that I wasn’t meant to win. And it was you who made us go down there to find my Alt. Not me, not Luc—
you
, West. I miss that person.” He drops his hand, and it squeezes into a fist at his side. “That’s who you have to be again.”

Chord’s words cut through me, an echo of what I already know. But in whatever way I might have saved his life, I also ended Luc’s.

“It’s okay, Chord,” I say to him, calm again. “I’ll do it on my own … when I’m ready. I told you, I don’t want you here, remember? I don’t need you.”
Hurt him so he’ll want to leave
.

“West—”

I push him.
“Go!”
My voice breaks, and I can’t say anything else.

Silence in the room, thick with our breathing. Then he’s gone.

I stand there, frozen by the need to keep time from moving forward. To stop the beginning of the end. But I can feel it anyway. I’m being drawn closer to my Alt and her to me. Only three outcomes possible: my end, or hers—or both.

A shiver racks me, even with the light shining in. The morning sun is much higher now, the day crawling closer toward afternoon. Then it’ll be evening, then night, and it’ll start all over again, thirty more times.

I can no more stop what has to happen than I can keep the earth from spinning.

And I have less than seven hours before it’s dark.

I dump the freshly packed contents of my bag back onto the bed.

Chord has picked all the wrong things, of course. He never feels the cold like I do. I need layers, not bulk. The test comes in a few weeks, closer to winter, when the temperatures drop steeply at night.

If I make it that long.

I stuff thermals into my bag. A thicker fleece pullover to double as a jacket. A lightweight shell for rain. A pair of jeans, because although denim’s heavy, it’s also warm and sturdy. Socks and underwear, enough to last me for a few days, so I won’t have to wash or steal more right away.

I bend over, pick up the pens and brushes and tubes of paint that fell from my desk, and tuck them back into the pail I set upright. Pile up my sketch pads again.

Then I get down on my hands and knees, and from underneath the bed I pull out my old jewelry box. Ehm gleefully claimed it as her own years ago, but after she died, I took it back, a part of her mine again.

Carefully, I lift the lid and move aside the old shirt I tossed in there to hide the real treasure.

Inside is Luc’s gun
—my
gun—cleaned and ready for the next job. Beside it is Aave’s old knife roll, what I now use to hold my own collection of blades. They’re nothing fancy, but more than adequate.

I’m still not as good with a blade as they were—Aave, especially, who was at the top of his class. But I’m getting better, stronger. No longer does my blade catch when slashing. No longer does my wrist seize up with the quick motion. Years of training with my brothers, coupled with my work as a striker, all to prepare for something that will last no more than seconds.

Only with my aim am I less than I should be. My weak spot, what nature’s decided to make me work for, forcing me to go against the tide just to keep up.

The knife roll—minus the one blade still in my jeans pocket and the other that I slip into my jacket pocket—goes into my bag. The gun I put into my jacket’s other pocket. Together, they’ll be what keeps me alive. Not food, not clothes, not money. What will any of that amount to when I finally see her? When she sees me?

It’s habit that has me going through the rest of the house, turning off lights, pulling down blinds, and locking all the windows and the back door. In the garage I drape drop cloths over the largest of my father’s factory belt servicing tools, his off-site building components, his programming tablet. After securing the heavy metal door to the driveway, I return to the kitchen and wipe out the sink and throw away the milk I find in the back of the fridge. Little things like that. Normal things.

And that’s it. I’m done saying good-bye to my home … and it didn’t break me. I guess it really is just a house now. A case made of concrete and wood and drywall. I’ve been living here, but it’s been long empty in every way that counts. From Aave’s death onward, life has seeped from the walls like blood from a wound, refusing to stop until there’s no more blood to bleed. It’s finally dry.
I’m
dry.

I open the front door and step outside. Lock the door behind me by punching in the key code.

He’s sitting on the bottom step, and I’ve been moving without really seeing for so long that I nearly fall over him. At the sight of him an ache shoots through me from head to toe.
Maybe it’s because I truly thought he’d left, but the depth of it catches me off guard, leaves me winded.

“Chord.” I go down the stairs to stand next to him, my eyes locked on his face. “What are you still doing here?”

He gets to his feet. “Thought I’d stay until I knew you were ready to go. Safe.”

I shift the shoulder straps of the bag. Already it feels too heavy on my back. I packed too much. “What made you think I was going to leave anytime soon? I never said I was ready. You might have ended up waiting all day.”

A quick flash of a grin that’s loving and bleak and desperately unhappy, and I know the sight of it is going to haunt me for a long time. “You’ve always been ready for this, West,” he says. “You just forgot for a bit there, that’s all.”

I can’t think of anything to say, but somehow it’s okay. The silence between us isn’t awkward or tense, but almost trembling and fragile, a haunting kind of vulnerability where we’re just happy to be together and not wanting to think about anything else.

A few seconds, and then it has to be over. “Chord, I have to go—”

“Take this,” he says abruptly. He holds out his hand. I can see a bunch of bills there, a cell. And a flimsy black strip I don’t recognize, about the length of my hand.

“I don’t need your money,” I tell him, shaking my head.

“You will. C’mon, don’t be stupid. Take what you can get. Being stubborn’s not going to help you anymore.”

“You should keep it, Chord. You don’t know what you might need it for.”

“I need it for this. Will you quit finding reasons to argue with me and just take it?” He lifts my hand and forces the money, cell, and strip into my palm. He says nothing about the sleeve I’ve got pulled over it, even though he knows what it’s hiding.

“What’s with the cell?” I ask him. “It’s not yours.”

“No, it’s just an extra one I had lying around. I was just … messing with it. You know how you always bug me about having all that tech stuff in the house.”

“Well, your room
does
look like a parts shop.”

He smiles. “Anyway, keep it on you as a backup, in case something happens to yours. It’s bare bones, but it should work well enough for texting and calling.”

I hold up the black strip. The material is more mesh than solid, a fine web of the thinnest black wire I’ve ever seen. “And this?”

“It’s a key code disrupter.”

“That doesn’t really tell me much, Chord.”

“It’s for bypassing locks,” he says. “For when you need to get inside somewhere. Or if you just need to get out of sight … hide.”

“How does it—”

“Hold it between your wrist and the lock faceplate. It’ll read the chips in your marks, scramble them, and temporarily mess up the lock’s key code. The broken signals will unlock the door. Quieter and faster than having to force your way in.”

“Oh. Thanks for thinking of that.”

“I didn’t really have a choice.”

I don’t know how else to ease his worry, so I carefully zip
it into one of the outer pockets on the side of my bag for easy access. I tuck the cell into the main compartment, the money into my jeans pocket. Just by feel I can tell it’s too much, but still not enough.

Suddenly I’m unable to look away from him. When will I see him next? Whenever it is, it will be too soon. I don’t want him near me at all. Not while I’m a walking target.

“So let’s go, then,” he says.

I go cold all over. “What are you talking about?”

His eyes are hard now. Gleaming against the sunlight as they scan my face. “I’m going with you.”

I laugh, though there’s no humor in it at all. “No way.”

“Why wouldn’t I? There’s no reason for me to stay here.”

“School.” I’m scrambling, grasping. “They would notice if you just stopped showing up.”

Chord shrugs. “I’m over fifteen,” he says simply. “I can just tell admin I’m opting out to work somewhere.” He takes a deep breath. “And Luc would have wanted—”

“Luc again? Chord, I told you, you don’t need to do this for him.
I
don’t need you to do this.” Even as the words leave my mouth, Luc’s request echoes in my head. How he wanted me to promise him I wouldn’t keep Chord in the dark, that I wouldn’t shut myself off from him.

I press a hand to my chest. There’s a pain that comes with the memory of his voice. And, worse, with the realization that I’m not going to be able to keep my promise to him, after all.

I’m sorry, Luc. But you’re already gone, and Chord’s not
.

“He wouldn’t have wanted you to go it alone,” Chord says. “Not if you didn’t have to. And, West … I told him, you
know?” His voice is husky, full of the same memory that’s in my head, full of purpose. “As he was dying, I told him I would. How can I fail him now? I can’t screw up again. So I’m coming with you.”

I know that voice … and I know I have to hurt him some more. Because as hardheaded as Chord is, his stubbornness is nothing compared to mine. And I’ve become a very good liar these past few months.

“Fine.” I make sure to sound ungrateful about it. It’s what he would expect, and I can’t afford to have him thinking anything else is up. “Keep an eye out while I run in and grab a bag for you. No way you’re making me carry all this by myself if you’re coming with me.”

“Time.” Chord’s watch instantly processes his order, spits out the numbers in a modulated burst. Nearly eleven in the morning. I think of Luc’s watch, carefully strapped around my own wrist.

He frowns, knowing I’ve already lost a couple of hours, and says to me, “Okay, but be quick, all right? We want to get a good head start.”

I don’t let myself look at him, as much as I want to. It would be written all over my face. What he doesn’t know, what he can’t know—that for me, this has to be good-bye.

I run back into the house and keep going straight through until I’m leaving again, this time out the back door at the other end. If I stop for even a second, I will go back, hold on to Chord, and not let go until someone is dead: my Alt, me, or Chord, somehow caught in the middle.

I step out onto the porch, lock the door behind me, and silently cross the length of the yard until I’m at the back fence.

Three boards over from the left. I can hardly dare to believe that I still remember.

I count them with my fingers. One, two, three. The third cedar slat wiggles slightly; it has more give than the others, just as it always has. I slide it over until there’s a gap in the fence. It’s no more than a foot and a half wide, but I know I can squeeze through. There is no choice but to squeeze through.

For one horrible second, I’m stuck, the sheer bulk of my bag catching on the sides. But I work it free and replace the loose board so the fence looks whole again.

I’m moving fast across the neighbor’s yard now—past the large sugar maple cradling the old tree house in the back, along the side of the main house, through the tangle of bushes at the front—to come out on another street altogether. Chord’s in a hurry. He’ll be heading inside any second to see what’s taking me so long. And I can’t risk his seeing me.

My eyes burn as I run down the street, and soon I’m blinded with tears. Throat on fire from a withheld scream, chest tight with agony.

I’m sorry, Chord. Stay safe. Stay away from me
.

Ten days left.

The thin, keening whistle of a fighter jet wakes me up. It’s far away, deep in the Surround, probably miles from the border. Merely routine, not nearly loud or close enough to have Kersh be at the ready.