Chapter 19 ELLA JULIETTE I’ve been standing outside the door staring at a smooth, polished stone wall for at least fifteen minutes before I check my wrist for a summons. Still nothing. When I’m with Anderson I don’t have a lot of flexibility to look around, but standing here has

Chapter 18 KENJI I’m suddenly a big fan of the Warner groupies. On our way back to my tent, I told only a couple of people I spotted on the path that Warner was hungry—but still not feeling well enough to join everyone in the dining hall—and they’ve been delivering

Chapter 17 ELLA JULIETTE Anderson takes me to meet Max. I follow him down into the bowels of the compound, through winding, circuitous paths. Anderson’s steps echo along the stone and steel walkways, the lights flickering as we go. The occasional, overly bright lights cast stark shadows in strange shapes.

Chapter 16 KENJI “Hey,” I call out. “Wait up p> I’m still sprinting after Warner and, in a move that surprises absolutely no one, he doesn’t wait. He doesn’t even slow down. In fact, I’m pretty sure he speeds up. I realize, as I pick up the pace, that I

Chapter 15 ELLA JULIETTE It is a relief not to speak. Something changed between us this morning, something broke. Anderson seems relaxed in front of me in a way that seems unorthodox, but it’s not my business to question him. I’m honored to have this position, to be his most

Chapter 14 KENJI I stop short at the door. Warner is here. Warner and James, together. James was given his own private section of the MT— which is otherwise full and cramped—and the two of them are here, Warner sitting in a chair beside James’s bed, James propped up against

Chapter 13 ELLA JULIETTE When I wake, I am cold. I dress in the dark, pulling on crisp fatigues and polished boots. I pull my hair back in a tight ponytail and perform a series of efficient ablutions at the small sink in my chamber. Teeth brushed. Face washed. After

Chapter 12 KENJI No one comes to the funeral. It took two days to bury all the bodies. Castle tired his mind nearly to sickness digging up so much dirt. The rest of us used shovels. But there weren’t many of us to do the work then, and there aren’t

Chapter 11 ELLA JULIETTE When I open my eyes, I feel steel. Strapped and molded across my body, thick, silver stripes pressed against my pale skin. I’m in a cage the exact size and shape of my silhouette. I can’t move. Can hardly part my lips or bat an eyelash;

Chapter 10 KENJI The guy gasping at the doorframe is still finishing his sentence when everyone jumps into action. Nouria and Sam rush past him into the hall, shouting orders and commands—something about initiating protocol for System Z, something about gathering the children, the elderly, and the sick. Sonya and

Chapter 9 ELLA JULIETTE Adam feels close. I can almost see him in my mind, a blurred form, watercolors bleeding through membrane, staining the whites of my eyes. He is a flooded river, blues in lakes so dark, water in oceans so heavy I sag, surrendering to the heft of

Chapter 8 KENJI It’s been four days. Four days of nothing. J is still sleeping. The twins are calling it a coma, but I’m calling it sleeping. I’m choosing to believe J is just really, really tired. She just needs to sleep off some stress and she’ll be fine. This

Chapter 7 ELLA JULIETTE I wake in waves, consciousness bathing me slowly. I break the surface of sleep, gasping for air before I’m pulled under another current another current another Memories wrap around me, bind my bones. I sleep. When I sleep, I dream I am sleeping. In those dreams,

Chapter 6 KENJI J is sleeping. She seems so close to death I can hardly look at her. Skin so white it’s blue. Lips so blue they’re purple. Somehow, in the last couple of hours, she lost weight. She looks like a little bird, young and small and fragile. Her

Chapter 5 ELLA JULIETTE When I dream, I dream of sound. Rain, taking its time, softly popping against concrete. Rain, gathering, drumming, until sound turns into static. Rain, so sudden, so strong, it startles itself. I dream of water dripping down lips and tips of noses, rain falling off branches

Chapter 4 KENJI I sidestep an eruption in the ground and duck just in time to avoid a cluster of vines growing in midair. A distant rock balloons to an astronomical size, and the moment it starts barreling in our direction I tighten my hold on Nazeera’s hand and dive

Chapter 3 ELLA JULIETTE I have eyes, two, feel them, rolling back and forth, around and around in my skull I have lips, two, feel them, wet and and heavy, pry them open have teeth, many, tongue, one and fingers, ten, count them onetwothreefourfive, again on the other side strange,

Chapter 2 KENJI It feels weird to call it luck. It feels weird, but in some perverse, twisted way, this is luck. Luck that I’m standing in the middle of damp, freezing woodlands before the sun’s bothered to lift its head. Luck that my bare upper body is half-numb from

Chapter 1 ELLA JULIETTE In the dead of night, I hear birds. I hear them, I see them, I close my eyes and feel them, feathers shuddering in the air, bending the wind, wings grazing my shoulders when they ascend, when they alight. Discordant shrieks ring and echo, ring and