an excellent double agent.”
He smiles and places a hand on my shoulder.
“They’ll be given the same chance I was, yes?” I ask. “I can try to get a feel for who might have the intelligence to join us.”
“Of course. You are my right hand, Five. But I have foreseen that another of them will be my left. You will help her come to see reason.”
Her?
“What about Nine?” I ask.
Setrákus Ra grins.
“I’ll leave that to you when the time comes.”
A smile spreads across my face. I wonder what the Garde are doing at this exact moment. What Nine is doing. Are they trying to figure out what the Mogs have planned next? Have they realized yet how powerful their enemies are?
Are you out there looking for me, fellow Loric?
I turn to my Leader and nod.
“I’m ready to meet the rest of my kind.”
CHAPTER ONE
T HE NIGHTMARE IS OVER. W HEN I OPEN MY EYES, there’s nothing but darkness.
I’m in a bed, that much I can tell, and it’s not my own. The mattress is enormous, somehow contoured perfectly to my body, and for a moment I wonder if my friends moved me to one of the bigger beds in Nine’s penthouse. I stretch my legs and arms out as far as they’ll go and can’t find the edges. The sheet draped over me is more slippery than soft, almost like a piece of plastic, and it is radiating heat. Not just heat, I realize, but also a steady vibration that soothes my sore muscles.
How long have I been asleep, and where the heck am I?
I try to remember what happened to me, but all I can think of is my last vision. It felt like I was in that nightmare for days. I can still smell the burned-rubber stench of Washington, D.C. Smog clouds lingered over the city, a reminder of the battle fought there. Or the battle that will be fought there, if my vision actually comes true.
The visions. Are they part of a new Legacy? None of the others have Legacies that leave them traumatized in the morning. Are they prophecies? Threats sent by Setrákus Ra, like the dreams John and Eight used to have? Are they warnings?
Whatever they are, I wish they’d stop happening.
I take a few deep breaths to clean the smell of Washington out of my nostrils, even though I know it’s all in my head. What’s worse than the smell is that I can remember every little detail, right down to the horrified look on John’s face when he saw me on that stage with Setrákus Ra, condemning Six to death. He was stuck in the vision, too, just like I was. I was powerless up there, stuck between Setrákus Ra, self-appointed ruler of Earth, and . . .
Five. He’s working for the Mogadorians! I have to warn the others. I sit bolt upright and my head swims—too fast, too soon—rust-colored blobs floating through my vision. I blink them away, my eyes feeling gummy, my mouth dry and my throat sore.
This definitely isn’t the penthouse.
My movement must trigger some nearby sensor, because the room’s lights slowly grow brighter. They come on gradually, the room eventually bathed in a pale red glow. I look around for the source of the light and discover it pulsing from veins interwoven through the chrome-paneled walls. A chill goes through me at how precise the room looks, how severe, lacking any decoration at all. The heat from the blanket increases, almost as if it wants me to curl back up beneath it. I shove it away.
This is a Mogadorian place.
I crawl across the mammoth bed—it’s bigger than an SUV, big enough for a ten-foot-tall Mogadorian dictator to comfortably relax in—until my bare feet dangle over the metal floor. I’m wearing a long gray nightgown embroidered with thorny black vines. I shudder, thinking about them putting me into this gown and leaving me here to rest. They could’ve just killed me, but instead they put me in pajamas? In my vision, I was sitting alongside Setrákus Ra. He called me his heir. What does that even mean? Is that why I’m still alive?
It doesn’t matter. The simple fact is: I’ve been captured. I know
He smiles and places a hand on my shoulder.
“They’ll be given the same chance I was, yes?” I ask. “I can try to get a feel for who might have the intelligence to join us.”
“Of course. You are my right hand, Five. But I have foreseen that another of them will be my left. You will help her come to see reason.”
Her?
“What about Nine?” I ask.
Setrákus Ra grins.
“I’ll leave that to you when the time comes.”
A smile spreads across my face. I wonder what the Garde are doing at this exact moment. What Nine is doing. Are they trying to figure out what the Mogs have planned next? Have they realized yet how powerful their enemies are?
Are you out there looking for me, fellow Loric?
I turn to my Leader and nod.
“I’m ready to meet the rest of my kind.”
CHAPTER ONE
T HE NIGHTMARE IS OVER. W HEN I OPEN MY EYES, there’s nothing but darkness.
I’m in a bed, that much I can tell, and it’s not my own. The mattress is enormous, somehow contoured perfectly to my body, and for a moment I wonder if my friends moved me to one of the bigger beds in Nine’s penthouse. I stretch my legs and arms out as far as they’ll go and can’t find the edges. The sheet draped over me is more slippery than soft, almost like a piece of plastic, and it is radiating heat. Not just heat, I realize, but also a steady vibration that soothes my sore muscles.
How long have I been asleep, and where the heck am I?
I try to remember what happened to me, but all I can think of is my last vision. It felt like I was in that nightmare for days. I can still smell the burned-rubber stench of Washington, D.C. Smog clouds lingered over the city, a reminder of the battle fought there. Or the battle that will be fought there, if my vision actually comes true.
The visions. Are they part of a new Legacy? None of the others have Legacies that leave them traumatized in the morning. Are they prophecies? Threats sent by Setrákus Ra, like the dreams John and Eight used to have? Are they warnings?
Whatever they are, I wish they’d stop happening.
I take a few deep breaths to clean the smell of Washington out of my nostrils, even though I know it’s all in my head. What’s worse than the smell is that I can remember every little detail, right down to the horrified look on John’s face when he saw me on that stage with Setrákus Ra, condemning Six to death. He was stuck in the vision, too, just like I was. I was powerless up there, stuck between Setrákus Ra, self-appointed ruler of Earth, and . . .
Five. He’s working for the Mogadorians! I have to warn the others. I sit bolt upright and my head swims—too fast, too soon—rust-colored blobs floating through my vision. I blink them away, my eyes feeling gummy, my mouth dry and my throat sore.
This definitely isn’t the penthouse.
My movement must trigger some nearby sensor, because the room’s lights slowly grow brighter. They come on gradually, the room eventually bathed in a pale red glow. I look around for the source of the light and discover it pulsing from veins interwoven through the chrome-paneled walls. A chill goes through me at how precise the room looks, how severe, lacking any decoration at all. The heat from the blanket increases, almost as if it wants me to curl back up beneath it. I shove it away.
This is a Mogadorian place.
I crawl across the mammoth bed—it’s bigger than an SUV, big enough for a ten-foot-tall Mogadorian dictator to comfortably relax in—until my bare feet dangle over the metal floor. I’m wearing a long gray nightgown embroidered with thorny black vines. I shudder, thinking about them putting me into this gown and leaving me here to rest. They could’ve just killed me, but instead they put me in pajamas? In my vision, I was sitting alongside Setrákus Ra. He called me his heir. What does that even mean? Is that why I’m still alive?
It doesn’t matter. The simple fact is: I’ve been captured. I know
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