My thoughts are interrupted by a sharp intake of breath from Asher. I turn to see him clutching his arm, right where the bot had touched him. His eyes are squeezed shut.
“Ash,” Hammie says. “You all right?”
Asher doesn’t respond. His arm trembles; all the color drains from his face. All of a sudden, he opens his eyes wide—and his irises aren’t their usual blue, but an unsettling silver.
The blank, white world around us flickers, replaced for amoment by a new surrounding. We are suddenly within the interior of a house—banisters of curled iron, potted poinsettias, and broken glass all over the hardwood floor.
I shrink away instinctively. Hammie starts to reach for Asher, but I yank her back.
“Don’t touch him,” I warn.
“What happened to him?” Roshan says.
Hideo already understands it. “When that security bot touched Asher, Zero found his way in.”
Zero had broken past Asher’s encryption and gotten into his mind. This must be a world constructed out of his memories.
We look on in horror as the world around us continues to play one of Asher’s memories. The boy hurrying down the stairs isn’t Asher, but his brother Daniel, unmistakable with his shock of light brown-blond hair and piercing blue eyes. When he reaches the bottom, he shoves Asher in his wheelchair hard enough to send it bumping against the back wall.
“Where the hell are you going now?” Asher says to him. He looks younger, like maybe this happened at least eight or nine years ago.
Daniel doesn’t answer him. Instead, he turns to head off into the kitchen. At the sight, Asher’s voice shifts into anger. “You know what? Don’t tell me. I don’t need to know everything about your life when you obviously don’t give a shit about mine.”
At that, Daniel turns back around. He looks so much like Asher, his eyes alight with the same fire. “You don’t need me to care,” he snaps. “Don’t you get enough attention?”
“Just because you’re ignoring the divorce doesn’t mean it’s not happening.”
“And what are you doing? Playing Warcross in your room?”
Asher narrows his eyes, and his expression suddenly turnscold and hard. “What do you do that’s so much better? Maybe you’ve got some fans, but my local wins are what put food on the table.”
This seems to hit Daniel so precisely that Asher hesitates, tightening his lips as if he knew he went too far.
Daniel walks over to Asher, puts one hand on either of the wheelchair’s armrests, and leans down to his brother’s face. “You’re never going to make it,” he says. “You’re never going to amount to anything in it. You keep throwing yourself into this useless game, like you honestly think they’ll choose you as a wild card.”
Asher doesn’t respond. He just pulls his chair away, forcing Daniel to step away again, and turns his back on his brother.
I want to get out of this place right now—I want to take out these lenses and see the panic room around me instead of this warped mindscape. I don’t want to know that, somewhere out there, Asher is just sitting straight in his chair, completely unaware anymore of anything going on around him.
My hand’s still on Hammie’s shoulder. She looks so tense that she might break.
Hideo gets up. “If you want him back, we need to keep going.”
I tear my gaze from Asher’s blank one, turn my back, and along with the others, head off again.
30
Before long, wecome across another door floating in the empty whiteness of this space. I reach it first, put my hand on the knob, and carefully turn it. Then I enter, followed by the others.
We step out into a bustling, crowded, rain-washed street in Tokyo. I recognize the spot immediately—Shibuya Station, right next to the huge intersection that I’d once overlooked from my hotel window. Beside us is the statue of the dog Hachiko, where people huddle as they wait for friends. All around us swarms a moving crowd.
I blink, thrown off by the change. There are people everywhere—huddled under colorful umbrellas, wearing face masks and hats, draped in coats and boots, shadows over their eyes. Cars splash into puddles as they drive by, and above it all tower bright advertisements showcasing smiling people holding up lotions and creams.
Beside me, Hammie almost seems to relax at the sight. I feelit, too—it’s like we’re here, instead of inside Zero’s mind, walking in an illusion. But Hideo’s eyes are narrowed, and he exchanges a quick glance of warning with me.
Roshan frowns at the scene. “This isn’t right,” he says.
Only after he says it do I realize what’s bothering me, too. The scene isn’t quite accurate—some of the storefronts aren’t supposed to be here, while others are in the wrong order along the street. It’s as if Zero—or Sasuke—couldn’t remember it correctly.
