“I missed you too, Mason.” He pulls back and smiles at me even though it looks like it hurts him. Two duffel bags sit crisscrossed over his back and he shrugs one off for me. “Thanks.”
“Got our usual shit in there,” he says. The silence isn’t awkward—we have so much to say, but neither of us are verbose by nature. We default to what’s easiest: orders. “Our train leaves in about a half hour, so we gotta move. You want to take anything with you?”
Mason looks around the room, and his face turns pensive and sad. He’s always worn his heart on his sleeve, and I know he liked Lucy. The feeling was mutual. Their friendship meant a lot to me, weaving in with my dream that Lucy could be a permanent part of our lives. Instead, she is a permanent hole in our hearts.
Though it feels akin to grave robbing to do so, I lean toward the end of her bed and pick up a small stuffed tiger. Lucy’s childhood favorite—it has some sort of funny name like Colonel Cuddles—and it is sad to have it destroyed with the rest of her room, which is Theia’s likely next step. I also shove two of her books into my duffel bag.
“Ready.”
The walk through the mansion shocks me. They’ve shuttered Lucy’s wing, but the rest of the house functions as a headquarters. No longer are the halls swathed in gilded frames and ostentatious décor. The light fixtures don’t glisten with diamonds and stained glass, but fabric shades and bare bulbs. Fluorescents buzz incessantly down the walkways. It is sterile. It is crowded. I don’t want to be here anymore.
“Hey, stop!”
We’re near the grand front doors when Private Frank comes bounding down a staircase, duffel bag and rifle bouncing against her back. Mason and I turn in tandem and exchange a wary look.
“Private Frank?”
She stops short, nearly out of breath. “I’m coming with you.”
“You are?” I look to Mason for confirmation, but he shrugs. “Who gave you that order?”
“Nobody,” she says. “But what am I supposed to do now? Guard a door to a room nobody is in? Theia didn’t even reassign me.”
Her voice trails off by the end and a twinge of sympathy grips me. It’s my fault her military trajectory plummeted. If I’m truly restored to my rank, then it’s fully within my power to reassign Private Frank. And, well, why not? I quite literally have nothing left to lose. “All right. Let’s go, Private.”
Private Frank poorly hides her giddiness as she falls in line behind Mason and me. Soldiers salute as we pass through the front doors. I know these streets well, but I let Mason lead us toward the train terminal. The city blocks, once choked with Force and homeless, have been scrubbed clean, and plain-clothed citizens walk cheerfully on the sidewalks. It’s sweltering hot between the abandoned glass buildings, but you wouldn’t know it to see their faces. People are happy. Lucy would have loved to see her city get a second life.
Blocks ahead, wide gaps between the buildings catch my eye. Mason follows my gaze. “Lot of fighting here while we were in Michigan.”
I nod as we take a turn down another block and stop cold in my tracks. By instinct I shove Mason behind me and reach for my holster. A Lightbringer stands on the corner, rifle in its ginormous hands. It turns to me with the screech of metal against metal, head cocked to the side.
“Stay behind me.” I lower my voice to a whisper. Not that it matters; the bot knows we’re here and armed.
A small hand rests on mine. I snap to look at Private Frank, who, for some insane reason, is giggling. “They’ve been reprogrammed and work for the Order. Well, not the Order—that doesn’t exist, technically. But for the United Regions.”
Looking closer, those ominous, formerly blood-red eyes glow lime green. We walk by and its cold gaze follows our every step. “Why?”
Mason shrugs. “Theia likes them. It makes people feel safe.”
That’s not how I feel. I feel watched, tracked. I remember what it is like to feel protected and this is not it. “I see.”
Private Frank giggles again. “What were you gonna do? Shoot it with a pistol?”
“My first thought was to protect you both. Doesn’t much matter how, as long as it worked.”
She nudges her shoulder against mine. “You and a gun against that giant machine.”
“That’s how she did it last time,” Mason supplies. Ahead of us, citizens flash tickets in front of a blue light in a turnstile and then cross through. Mason pulls out an ID card from his pocket, and the machine beeps when it registers him. He nods to me. “Yours is in your pocket.”
In the front breast pocket of my uniform, I find a palm-sized plastic rectangle. It has no photo, only my name and rank with abarcode. I hover it in front of the light and it beeps, allowing me inside.
We stroll along the waxed tile floor, past our fellow soldiers standing guard at posts along the route. Not many travelers, I note. Perhaps inter-region travel is still difficult. Maybe the Southeast isn’t the only problem.
“So, you’re telling me it’s not a rumor? You took down a Lightbringer?” Private Frank asks in a hurried whisper. Her big blue eyes blink excitedly at me.
“Yes.”
Private Frank stops walking. “No way.”
