Nulls?
Nix’s grip on the fade wavered. After a split second, he came crashing back to the solid world. His body felt heavy—as heavy as he’d felt after killing Seven and making it messy. He took a deep breath and assessed his current situation. Even when Nix wasn’t faded, the people who worked here rarely bothered to take note of his presence—but that wasn’t a chance worth taking now that he’d gone rogue.
Nix stopped questioning, stopped thinking—and he shed his solid form like a snake wriggling out of its skin. He faded, and this time, he didn’t let himself remember. He didn’t think about why he was here or what he was doing. He just stepped through wall after wall, working his way to the center of the sprawling building.
To the lab.
The scientists and Sensors scurried around, from computer to computer, screen to screen. Nix didn’t know what they were doing. Faded, he didn’t care. He watched them like a child examining an ant farm. The man closest to him was young: a decade older than Nix, maybe less. There was sweat on his brow and scars on his arms: tiny, round pinpricks, up and down the flesh, from elbow to wrist.
“What’s our status?”
Nix recognized Ione’s voice. She rarely spoke to him directly, but her voice had always been the one in his head when he read a target’s name.
She
made the decisions.
She
was in charge.
She
was the one who’d sent him after—
No
. Nix couldn’t let himself go there, couldn’t let himself think about anything the real world had to offer, least of all the girl he’d left behind on the forest floor.
“We’ve got facial recognition programs running on all sectors within a two-hundred-mile radius of the Nobody’s house,” one of the ants replied, scurrying to do his queen’s bidding. “Alarms are set to go off every three minutes, per protocol, to remind us what we’re looking for.”
What
they were looking for. Not who. Never who.
“And our defense mechanism?”
At this, the ant bristled. Said something about
testing
and
phases
but all Nix could think was that Ione was looking for the
Nobody
. She was looking for
Claire
.
Nix felt his stomach turning itself inside out, and he knew he wouldn’t be able to keep hold of his fade for long. Thinking about Claire: the way he’d left her; the things they had done; the feel of her skin; the taste of cherries on her lips—
In his last instant of nothingness, Nix crossed the room. He stepped through the wall and came out on the other side.
In Ione’s office.
Flip-flops were not conducive to trekking one’s way through the wilderness, but Claire didn’t let that stop her. Her ankles and calves were splattered with mud. Welts rose on her arms, courtesy of branches and trees. She watched the sun travel across the sky. She marked her progress, notching trees in case she got turned around.
Her muscles were sore. Her feet were screaming, but Claire didn’t listen. She couldn’t listen, because she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t pause. She couldn’t let herself think about anything but making it out of this forest alive.
She wasn’t going to be the victim this time.
She wasn’t going to cry.
She wasn’t going to sit and wait. She was
done
waiting, because you could spend your whole life waiting for something to happen. Something big. You could wait and wait, and even if something big happened, even if it
finally happened
—it didn’t change anything.
Even if it changed everything.
The sound of traffic broke Claire out of her thoughts.
Northwest, about a hundred yards out
. She ran, ran with the knife in one hand, her feet bleeding, her heart pumping faster and faster. She broke through the edge of the woods. She stepped out onto the road. Wind whipped through her hair. A car whizzed by, close enough that she felt its motion.
The driver didn’t see her.
Claire stood there for five minutes, ten, watching the world pass her by. She was covered in mud, bleeding, holding
Nix’s grip on the fade wavered. After a split second, he came crashing back to the solid world. His body felt heavy—as heavy as he’d felt after killing Seven and making it messy. He took a deep breath and assessed his current situation. Even when Nix wasn’t faded, the people who worked here rarely bothered to take note of his presence—but that wasn’t a chance worth taking now that he’d gone rogue.
Nix stopped questioning, stopped thinking—and he shed his solid form like a snake wriggling out of its skin. He faded, and this time, he didn’t let himself remember. He didn’t think about why he was here or what he was doing. He just stepped through wall after wall, working his way to the center of the sprawling building.
To the lab.
The scientists and Sensors scurried around, from computer to computer, screen to screen. Nix didn’t know what they were doing. Faded, he didn’t care. He watched them like a child examining an ant farm. The man closest to him was young: a decade older than Nix, maybe less. There was sweat on his brow and scars on his arms: tiny, round pinpricks, up and down the flesh, from elbow to wrist.
“What’s our status?”
Nix recognized Ione’s voice. She rarely spoke to him directly, but her voice had always been the one in his head when he read a target’s name.
She
made the decisions.
She
was in charge.
She
was the one who’d sent him after—
No
. Nix couldn’t let himself go there, couldn’t let himself think about anything the real world had to offer, least of all the girl he’d left behind on the forest floor.
“We’ve got facial recognition programs running on all sectors within a two-hundred-mile radius of the Nobody’s house,” one of the ants replied, scurrying to do his queen’s bidding. “Alarms are set to go off every three minutes, per protocol, to remind us what we’re looking for.”
What
they were looking for. Not who. Never who.
“And our defense mechanism?”
At this, the ant bristled. Said something about
testing
and
phases
but all Nix could think was that Ione was looking for the
Nobody
. She was looking for
Claire
.
Nix felt his stomach turning itself inside out, and he knew he wouldn’t be able to keep hold of his fade for long. Thinking about Claire: the way he’d left her; the things they had done; the feel of her skin; the taste of cherries on her lips—
In his last instant of nothingness, Nix crossed the room. He stepped through the wall and came out on the other side.
In Ione’s office.
Flip-flops were not conducive to trekking one’s way through the wilderness, but Claire didn’t let that stop her. Her ankles and calves were splattered with mud. Welts rose on her arms, courtesy of branches and trees. She watched the sun travel across the sky. She marked her progress, notching trees in case she got turned around.
Her muscles were sore. Her feet were screaming, but Claire didn’t listen. She couldn’t listen, because she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t pause. She couldn’t let herself think about anything but making it out of this forest alive.
She wasn’t going to be the victim this time.
She wasn’t going to cry.
She wasn’t going to sit and wait. She was
done
waiting, because you could spend your whole life waiting for something to happen. Something big. You could wait and wait, and even if something big happened, even if it
finally happened
—it didn’t change anything.
Even if it changed everything.
The sound of traffic broke Claire out of her thoughts.
Northwest, about a hundred yards out
. She ran, ran with the knife in one hand, her feet bleeding, her heart pumping faster and faster. She broke through the edge of the woods. She stepped out onto the road. Wind whipped through her hair. A car whizzed by, close enough that she felt its motion.
The driver didn’t see her.
Claire stood there for five minutes, ten, watching the world pass her by. She was covered in mud, bleeding, holding
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