Resonance (15 page)

CH
APTER TWENTY-SIX

Days until Tacet: 15

O
RIGINAL SIMON'S RETURN WORKED THE
magic we needed—the school left Amelia alone. Simon's old teammates treated him warily, hurt that he had abandoned them, bewildered by his sudden preference for me over the team. We were conspicuous. People watched us now and whispered in a way the old Simon wasn't used to. The new Simon didn't care. He was too focused on planning the prison break and spending time with Amelia.

Meanwhile, I was recruiting help. Or trying to.

“Where are Mom and Dad?” I asked Addie when we returned from training later that weekend. She and Laurel were baking cookies, and unlike Addie's solo efforts, the entire kitchen was covered in flour and sugar. I dipped a finger into the batter and tasted. “Needs more vanilla.”

She swatted at me with a towel. “I hope you washed your hands. Work, obviously. The Tacet's two weeks away.”

“Why aren't you there?” Eliot asked.

Laurel handed Addie the beater, saying, “A lot of the
information is classified, and we don't have clearance. So we tend to finish early.”

“What sort of information?” Simon asked.

“Nothing I'm sharing with you,” Addie said sharply

“Don't be like this,” I said. “We could use your help.”

“With what?” She threw up her hands. “Do you even know what you're doing?”

Eliot nodded agreement, and I shot him a dirty look. “We're getting the frequency from Monty.”

“Right. Tell me again where it leads?”

I looked at Simon, who leaned forward and stole a glob of cookie dough, but didn't reply.

“You don't have a clue where it leads, do you?” she asked him.

“I know exactly where it leads. And I know the plan,” he said, his smile more like a snarl. “Not that I'm sharing with you.”

Turning his back on Addie, he slanted a look at Eliot. “I need someone to run the tech,” he added. “I've got equipment, but my hands will be full.”

“Use a Free Walker,” Eliot said.

“I could,” he agreed. “But I want the best, and that's you. Besides, you've got a personal stake here.” His tilted his head toward me, and I fought the urge to brain him with a cookie sheet.

Eliot's jaw tightened. “You can't tell me what you're after, I'm not getting involved. I can't believe you would, Del.”

“Eliot . . . ,” I started, but he folded his arms and stared at his shoes.

Simon turned to Laurel, who had been quietly scooping out cookie dough.

“No way,” she said, and laced her fingers with Addie's. “We've had enough close calls lately.”

Addie shook her head in warning. I started to press for details, but Simon cut me off.

“So that's it. None of you will help?”

“Sorry,” Laurel said.

“I'm not,” Eliot replied.

Simon made a noise of disgust, and I nudged him. “You've had seventeen years to acclimate. We need a little time.”

“You don't have it. We have fifteen days before the Tacet.”

“Then make us understand,” I said. “Give them some answers.”

He dragged a hand over his face. “The Free Walkers are planning to move against the Consort. It has to be soon, because they want to stop the Tacet. And no,” he added, “I'm not telling you the plan. Don't ask. But we need those frequencies before we can do anything.”

“Because the weapon is there?” I asked.

“The weapon . . . ,” he snorted. “No. The combined frequencies lead to our fail-safe. We've gone down this path before, during the last Tacet, and Free Walkers have long memories. Before people would commit to this plan, they wanted a way out. An escape plan, in case the Consort won again.”

“I thought you guys were all in,” Eliot said. “Devoted to the cause.”

“Do you know how long the Free Walkers have been around?” Simon retorted. “Generations. Some of them, like Powell, have families. So yeah, they believe in the cause. But they want to protect their kids, too.”

“And this frequency helps . . . how?” Addie asked.

He narrowed his eyes and ground out the words. “It's the First Echo.”

The oven timer dinged, but nobody moved.

“Nice try,” Addie said after minute. “The First Echo is a myth.”

My heart sank. She was right. Simon and the Free Walkers were delusional, and I'd risked my life for nothing.

“No,” Laurel said firmly. She rescued the burnt cookies, gathered her thoughts, and spoke. “The First Echo exists in a technical sense. The Key World's been branching since the beginning of time, so logically, one choice—one Echo—preceded the others. But it's impossible to trace back, because the number of realities generated since then are nearly infinite.”

“Impossible,” I said dryly. “There's that word again.”

“It's like the Holy Grail. Lots of Archivists try to find it—they write algorithms and crunch the data on one of the Consort's supercomputers, but nobody's ever been able to find it.”

“Cleavers think it's a sign that the multiverse is unknowable,” Addie said. “A gift to be revered, not analyzed.”

“Well, you're both wrong. It exists,” Simon said. “Gil and Monty stumbled across it, eons ago. Fate, or destiny, or dumb luck. Who knows? But once they found it, they knew the Consort would cleave it.”

“A branch that old and complex would be a gold mine,” Eliot said. “The energy transfer would be huge.”

“The loss of life would be huge,” Simon returned. “So they split the frequency into three parts, and each took one: Gil, Monty, and Rose. Unless all three of them agreed, they'd never be able to find it again.”

“Like activating the missile on a nuclear submarine.” I said. “You need two people to turn the keys.”

Simon nodded. “Once we have the location of the First Echo, we can send the nonessentials there while we launch our attack against the Consort. If we win, they come home. If we fail, they can cauterize it and start over. Do it right this time. First Echo, second Eden.”

“You'd never be able to come home,” Addie said, turning pale.

“Exile's better than death,” he said.

“What if you do?” Eliot asked. “What if you fail, and you all run away to the First Echo? The Consort keeps cleaving. Nothing changes. Who stops all the future Tacets?”

“You understand we're not planning to fail, right?” Simon asked.

“No,” Addie said, her voice cracking. “You cannot do this. I don't agree with the Consort, but there must be a better way to deal with this than outright treason. There's got to be a way to fix it from within.”

“Spoken like an insider,” he said. “You don't know how ruthless they've been to our people.”

“I know exactly how ruthless they've been,” she said. “I've
seen the people they send after Free Walkers; they're fanatics. They believe what they're doing is ordained.”

“Which is why we have to force their hand.”

“And start a new revolution in the process? Even if you win, you'll have a target on your back.”

“She's right,” Eliot muttered. “You'd do better to win people over.”

Simon said, “Free Walkers have been trying to win people over for decades, and it's gotten them nowhere. Which is why we need to get Monty out.”

“It's an oubliette,” Laurel said. “There's no breaking out. There's no breaking in. It's like the crown jewels, or Fort Knox or . . . something.”

“Fort Knox is empty,” Simon said. “And the crown jewels were swapped out for fakes years ago.”

Eliot blinked. “By Free Walkers?”

“By the Consort. Where did you think CCM got their money from?” He shook his head, dismayed. “No wonder you all fall in line. You're as gullible as preschoolers. We need to do this, and we need to move. So who's in?”

The silence was flat and stony. I stared at each of them in turn. Eliot wouldn't meet my gaze. Addie fumed silently, her eyes narrowed to slits. Laurel worried her lower lip between her teeth.

“Eliot?” I asked. “Please. It's the last thing I'll ask you for, I swear.”

“Don't say that,” he replied. “Can you guarantee they won't come after my family?”

“Absolutely,” Simon said. “We protect our people.”

“I'm not your people,” he said with a slow, reluctant nod. “I'm Del's.”

I went up on tiptoe to hug him. “Thank you,” I whispered, and his arms came around me.

“I'm going to be pissed if you die,” he murmured.

“Me too.”

Simon cleared his throat. “I need an ID. Something that will get me past the front desk at CCM.”

“I know someone,” Laurel said, and Addie hissed at her. “What? Just because you don't like going to bars doesn't mean I can't.”

I grinned at Addie. “She is definitely a keeper.”

She didn't smile back. “It'll never work.”

“Never's a big word,” I said.

“I don't understand why we can't try to fix the Consort,” she said. “Why do you have to tear down everything the Walkers have built?”

“Bad beginnings lead to breaks,” I said. “Isn't that what we're taught? The Walkers are built on a bad beginning. Let's push the reset button.”

I reached for her hand, but she yanked away from me, her voice shrill enough to shatter glass. “You are a sixteen-year-old girl, not the leader of the rebel forces! This isn't one of Eliot's movies. This is real life, and you know what happens to the rebel forces in real life? They get outgunned, they get massacred, and then they get forgotten.”

Laurel opened her mouth to speak, then shut it again. Eliot ducked his head, distress furrowing his brow.

“Wow, Addie. Thanks for the support.” I turned to Simon, who was lounging against the counter looking mildly curious, at best. “Let's go. We can finish this at Amelia's.”

He straightened and offered me his arm. Before I could move, Addie blocked my way. “How do I support you if you're dead, Del?” Her eyes glittered with tears and terror. “It isn't a question of believing in you. It's me, being selfish. I've seen what they do to Free Walkers. And I can't stand the idea of them doing it to you.”

I exhaled slowly, and my anger went with it. “My odds aren't terrible, Addie. I had an amazing teacher.”

“Who got caught. He wasn't that good.”

“I'm talking about you, moron. You did the best you could, even when I was a pain in the ass.”

“You're still a pain in the ass,” she said, but her voice cracked, and she smiled when she said it.

“I was never going to have a place in the Consort,” I said. “You know that. I've never had it in me, the way you do.”

“If you'd just go along,” she said desperately. “If you'd just try, Del. It doesn't have to be all or nothing. We can make people listen. We can change their minds, but we have to be patient.”

“Every day we wait, more Echoes are dying.”

“Better them than you,” she said.

Next to me, Eliot made a noise of agreement.

“What are you going to tell Mom and Dad?”

My stomach bottomed out. “I hadn't thought about it.”

“You have to tell them,” she said. “I know you're not close, but put yourself in their position. Do you really want the news coming from Lattimer? Or a Consort guard?”

“What do I say?”

“Tell them the truth,” she urged. “You've never tried to explain Simon, or the Free Walkers. You assume they won't understand, but you haven't given them a chance.”

“I have! But they don't listen. It's never that I do things differently—I do things
wrong
. That's never going to change, no matter how I explain it.”

“Try. Once. If they don't listen, you can leave with a clean conscience. Otherwise, they'll keep cleaving. And when the truth finally comes out, they'll feel terrible. If you can convince them now, they might become allies, instead of enemies.”

“If.” Such a small word, easily dismissed. But “if” made entire worlds. “If” changed the course of the universe. One breath, two letters, three strokes of a pen. And contained within was more power than a star. I bent my head. “I'll try.”

C
HAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Days until Tacet: 11

T
HE NEXT FEW DAYS PASSED
in a blur of training and school and furtive, meticulous preparation. Simon returned to school, but not the basketball team—his “transfer” made him ineligible to play for the rest of the season, no matter how hard the school petitioned the conference.

“Thank God,” he said when I met him outside the coach's office.

“You don't like basketball?”

“I don't give a hot damn about basketball. I have bigger things to worry about than a carnival game on steroids.”

“I think it's supposed to be fun,” I said as we headed back toward my locker. “Don't you have fun?”

He draped an arm over my shoulder and eyed Bree as we passed her in the hallway, gave her a lazy, inviting nod. “Sure. But it's a little more horizontal.”

“Gross,” I said, shoving him away. “Can you please try not to make things worse around here?”

“Saved your ass, didn't I?” He popped a can of Coke and
drained half of it while I sputtered in outrage. “How are things with Addie?”

“Better, I guess. She's not actively trying to stop us.”

“Was that a possibility?” The rumble in his voice sounded like a threat.

“If she thought she could get me to stay, maybe. But she knows better.”

“Good.”

“You don't get frequency poisoning,” I said, tugging my locker open and changing the subject. “Why the sugar addiction?”

“Grew up that way.”

So had Ms. Powell. The memory prompted another question. “How do the Free Walkers deal with frequency poisoning? They can't go around mainlining corn syrup.”

“They've got a few tricks. Tuning strategies, earplugs, devices, surgery. The longer they spend in Echoes, the more drastic the treatment. None of them are perfect solutions, but they keep ­people sane.” He considered. “Mostly.”

“Other hybrids are immune too? Or is this a result of the swap?”

“All hybrids. Yet another reason we're good at cauterization. Now lay off. You're starting to sound like Eliot.” He glanced around, scowling. “Where's Einstein, anyway?”

“Going over the tech.”

“Right. He's done that a hundred times already.”

“You think he's lying?”

“Hardly. He can't even lie to himself.”

“That's not a bad thing.” I swung my backpack over my shoulder, and we headed toward the commons.

“We all lie to ourselves. It's a survival technique. Anyway, I'm glad he's gone. I need to talk to you.”

I wondered what lies Simon was telling himself—and what lies I believed. “Oh, well. As long as it works for you.”

“If we're going to sell this,” he said, ignoring my sniping, “you and I need to sell it. Nobody's going to believe that we took off together if you keep glaring at me like that. They'll think you killed me and buried the body in a shallow grave.”

“Tempting.” I tilted my head back and batted my eyelashes. “Better?”

He dropped onto one of the benches. “Sit on my lap.”

I glowered at him. “I'm not a Pekingese.”

“The last time you touched me, you nearly broke my nose. Time to make up some ground.” He nodded toward Bree, who was watching us from across the commons, eyes narrowed.

“I'm not kissing you,” I said through a smile as brittle as winter leaves.

“Pretend you're kissing him.”

“But I'm not.”

“You've done it before. Twice, if memory serves. Imagine you're sending a message: one to him and one to the world.”

So my words
had
gotten through. “Does he always see me through your eyes?”

“Only once we touch. Then it fades in and out, like a radio
signal. Contact boosts it again, like when you recharge the stars you leave in Echoes. So if you want to have a conversation, you're going to have to use me.”

A thought struck. “Did you see me? When Simon was here and we . . .”

“Oh, yeah.” He grinned. “Good times.”

“Can you block it?”

He shrugged. “If I try hard enough.”

“Try harder,” I ordered, and my heart went abruptly, painfully still. “Were you influencing him?”

His smile dropped away. “Echoes are alive, and part of being alive is making choices, mistakes and all. Denying someone their choices is like saying they're more houseplant than human.”

My blood started moving again. “Thank you.”

“You're welcome.” He grinned again. “Feel free to show your gratitude by kissing me. Bree's watching, you know. Showtime.”

A quick glance over my shoulder proved him right.

Instead of flipping Bree off, I tugged my sleeves down until only my fingertips were poking out. Simon looked up at me, cocksure and expectant.

I traced his cheekbone, his jaw, the line of his throat, letting his signal travel through me. Slowly I bent until my lips hovered next to his ear. His hand curved around my hip, blatantly possessive.

Threading my fingers through his hair, I murmured, “The next time I kiss you, it's going to be in person. And it's going to
be amazing. And I don't want this guy watching, so figure something out.”

When I pulled back, irritation and admiration warred in his eyes. I gave him a languorous smile, one full of promises meant for someone else. “Showtime, remember? Sell it.”

His grip tightened for a minute, and then he stood up, drawing me closer, dipping his head so that his words resonated against my neck. “I'm not a messenger boy.”

“Then stop telling me to send a message.” I faked a giggle. “Let's go save the world.”

“Take a last look,” he said. “You going to miss this place?”

I pictured Eliot and me testing his maps, making fun of our classmates, planning Walks and swapping stories and arguing about movies. I pictured years of watching Simon without being seen, and the few brief weeks where his eyes followed me. When he'd taken my hand and led me away, and I'd believed, only for a moment, in happy endings.

“Some of it, I suppose. Mostly not.”

“Keep the good memories,” he advised. “The other stuff is deadweight. Regret only slows you down.”

•   •   •

Later that night I stopped by Eliot's and found him tinkering with the Free Walkers' technology, exactly as he'd said he would. The familiar sight of him, hunched over the keyboard, cajoling the software to behave, swamped me with nostalgia.

“How many times is this?” I teased from the doorway. “A thousand?”

“Thousand and one,” he muttered.

“You can hack a baby monitor to play HBO,” I said. “You've got this.”

He shrugged and went back to hunting and pecking. I looked over his shoulder at the stream of computer gibberish and then flopped back on the bed.

“I can't decide if I like him more or less than the old one,” he said abruptly.

“Definitely less,” I said, staring at the ceiling.

“But that makes me like him more,” he replied.

“You're not making sense.”

He turned to face me. “
You
like him less, because he's not the one you want. But since I wasn't a big fan of the Original—or the Echo, or whatever we're calling the Simon who started this whole mess—this guy seems like an improvement.”

“Really?” I propped myself on my elbows.

“Well, I could do without the whole prison break,” he said. “Addie's right, you know. It's not going to work. And it's not worth your life.”

“Does that mean you won't help?”

“This is a no-win situation for me. If I help you, I lose you. If I don't, you end up dead.” He threw his arms wide. “The only way to save you is to stop you.”

I sat up fully now, temper rising. “I don't need to be saved. Try it and see how far I run.”

He drew back as if I'd slapped him. “You're asking a lot, you know.”

“Then forget I asked.” I reached for my backpack and he tugged it away.

“Right,” he scoffed. “I'll forget how my best friend went on a suicide mission because I wouldn't help her. I told you I'm in, and I'm in. But quit asking me to be happy about it.”

“I wish you'd come with me. After.”

“Never going to happen,” he said gently. “My life's here.”

“But we're a team.” It wasn't enough of a reason, and I knew it, but I couldn't help asking. “Always have been . . .”

“Always will be. Exploring's your thing. I'm the navigator, and that means I stay behind.”

“But you could . . .”

He touched my cheek, equal amounts of regret and resolve in the gesture. “I'm nice, Del. But I'm not that nice.”