"Look at me," I command. He refuses. I grab his jaw, forcing him to face me. "You didn't fail. You evolved."
"I am broken," he spits. "Look at me! I am meat on a slab! I am useless to you!"
"Is that what you think?" I ask, my voice hard. "You think you're only valuable when you're controlling everything? When you're the God in the machine?"
"Yes!" he hisses. "Without control... I am nothing. I am just... the boy in the dark."
"Well, I love the boy in the dark," I say.
He freezes. "Don't say that."
"I love him," I repeat, leaning over him. "Because the Director would have died in that chair. The Director would have broken. But the boy? The boy held on. The boy waited for me."
I brush my lips against his forehead. "You taught me to be strong, Alaric. You gave me the gun. You gave me the lessons. Did you think I wouldn't use them?" I stroke his bandaged shoulder. "You built a weapon. Don't be surprised when it works."
He stares at me. The shame in his eyes slowly recedes, replaced by something else. Awe. And fear. "You killed Thorne," he whispers.
"Yes."
"How?"
"I walked in the front door. Like you said." I smirk. "And I played the silence."
He lets out a breath—a long, shuddering exhale that seems to deflate his entire body. "My God," he murmurs. "What have I created?"
"A partner," I say. "A duet."
I lie down beside him. The pallet is narrow, but we fit. We always fit. I pull the blanket over us. "Sleep, Alaric. We have a long way to go."
"Where are we going?"
"West," I say. "To the coast. Nyx said there’s a contact in Seattle. A cleaner."
"Seattle," he mumbles, his eyes closing. "It rains there."
"Good. I like the rain."
He drifts off. I listen to the train wheels.Clack-clack. Clack-clack.It sounds like a metronome. But it’s not ticking time away. It’s counting the miles between us and the past.
I must have dozed off. I wake to the sound of the train braking. Screeching metal. Sunlight streams into the boxcar. Dust motes dance in the beams. Alaric is awake. He is sitting up. He is pale, shaking with effort, but he is sitting up. He is looking at me.
"Good morning," I say, rubbing my eyes.
"We stopped," he says. His voice is stronger. The rest did him good. Or maybe it’s just stubbornness.
I crawl to the door and peek out. We are in a siding. Middle of nowhere. High desert. Scrub brush and red rocks. "Water stop," I guess. "Or a signal change."
I turn back to him. He is looking at his hands. His shattered knuckles. His bandaged wrists. "I can't play," he whispers. "My hands..."
I crawl back to him. I take his hands in mine. "They will heal."
"Nerve damage," he diagnoses, flexing his fingers. They tremble. "I won't... I won't have the dexterity. The precision is gone."
"Then we rewrite the music," I say fierce. "We play something slower. Something heavier."
"Elodie," he says, looking at me with intense seriousness. "We have nothing. No money—the accounts will be frozen by now. No ID. No home. We are ghosts."
"We have the drive," I say, patting my pocket where the USB drive is safe. "Two hundred million, remember?"
