“That’s the best part of the plan,” I say, smiling. “We won’t have to find her. Because Meadow is going to draw her out.”
That gets Orion’s attention.
“We should kill them both,” she whispers.
“No,” I hiss.
“Yes. I’m in charge here, and if you want my army’s help, you’ll listen to me. You’ll kill the girl, and end this all for good.”
That’s when it hits me.
“I don’t need you,” I say to Orion.
She laughs, but I cut her off. I stand up, cross to the pile of weapons that the Resistance has, in the center of their building. I choose a crossbow, a quiver of arrows, and sling it over my shoulder. Then I turn back to the fire.
“I don’t need you, Orion, because I’m a Patient of the Murder Complex. And the second Lark dies, my army will come. And I’ll be the one to lead them.”
“Zero, you’re making a mistake,” Orion says.
“No,” I say. “I’m doing what I should have done this entire time.”
I hoist the bow higher on my shoulder, look to my friends. Dex and Rhone help Sparrow to her feet. Dex comes to my side, but Rhone holds up a hand.
“You can’t go with us this time, Kid.”
Her eyes look like they’re going to pop out of her head. “What? Of course I’m going. I’m not staying here”—she looks over her shoulder—“with them.”
Rhone’s voice is sad, like he’s looking at his little sister for the very last time. “I’ll be back for you, when it’s safe. For now, you’ll stay here with the others your age.”
“I’m not a child!” Dex shouts. Her voice rings across the Cave. “This is my fight, too!”
I step forward, kneel down to her side. “Stay, Dex. For me.” I feel guilty as hell, because I know she’ll do whatever I say. She always has, since the very first day we met.
Tears fill her eyes.
Then she falls forward and body-slams me with a hug. I’m about to say what I always say. Thanks, Kid. But then I realize Dex isn’t a kid, and she never has been. She’s been forced to grow up fast, forced to forget the years of being young, where everything is happy and careless and safe.
I have a fleeting memory. Something my dad used to do with my mom, and even though I know it’s a fabricated memory given to me by the Leeches, it seems like the symbol it stands for is true. I reach for Dex’s hand, take it in mine. She looks up as I press my lips to the back of her hand. “Thank you,” I whisper. “For believing in me.”
Her face grows as red as the sunrise. “Be safe,” she says. And then, in normal Dex fashion, “Give those Leech bastards a good show.”
She stands on tiptoe and kisses my cheek. Then she turns to Rhone and sticks her middle finger up in the air.
“I love you, too, little sister,” Rhone says, chuckling.
Dex turns and runs away to join the other kids.
“Let’s go,” Rhone says.
We head down the tunnel, back the way we came.
It’s when we’re almost out of earshot that I hear Orion’s voice.
“You’d better look after Meadow, Patient Zero. Stand in my way, and you’ll both end up dead.”
We see the message on the way back to the Graveyard.
It’s in bold red letters, still dripping like blood down the bricks.
6 a.m.
For Peri.
I know that name. It’s Meadow’s little sister.
A Leech Cam soars by overhead, scanning the streets. We all dive into the shadows as it passes by.
“This is where she’ll be,” I say. “I’m sure of it.”
Sparrow squeezes my shoulder. “Then we’ll stay,” she says. “I’ll do it. I’ll kill my sister.”
At first, I want to say yes. How will Meadow ever be able to look at me the same, once she sees what I’ve done? Lark is her mother. I saw the love in her eyes when we found Lark in the Leech building. Saw the brokenness, when she discovered what a monster her mother really was. But she loves her, still. And as long as Lark lives, Meadow will hold on to that.
I hate it.
I realize deep down, for the first time in my life, that I truly want to kill.
This is the only death, and the only victim, that I won’t ever regret. “I’ll do it,” I say. “I have to be the one.”
“I was afraid you’d say that,” Sparrow says. “Go ahead. Do it for the both of us. Make her bleed.”
We hide in the shadows and wait.
CHAPTER 24
MEADOW
I search the Shallows all night.
I go through the Graveyard, look in all the places I think she might be. I check the old storage units, the locks on them now replaced from when Zephyr and I were hiding here, the time we found my mother’s secret unit, all of her information on the Murder Complex.
She is nowhere to be found.
I take the train to Cortez, walk the boardwalk. This was the place Zephyr almost kissed me. The place where he first turned on me and tried to kill me. I run the streets, and memories flash by with each step. Zephyr, grabbing me by the hair and slamming my face into the sand. Me, stabbing him in the shoulder. His eyes, cold and black.
I don’t know where my mother is.
Because the more I think about her, the more I realize I hardly knew her at all. The articles I found in her locked storage unit, about her science and her beginnings, are the biggest truths I ever got from my mother.