“I want you to see tonight’s haul. It’s fantastic.” Sophia gestured at Adeline. “She’s got it on her. I knew they wouldn’t blow it up if they knew it was being transported on the body of a Committee-Man’s daughter.”
Kane approached Adeline. “What’s your name?”
“Adeline,” said Adeline.
“It’s Ms. Adeline Van Demure,” Sophia called, mockingly. “I hid it in her girdle.”
Adeline grimaced as Kane fumbled under her dress, locating a small knot of burlap. In a whisper he asked, “Where’s the whistle”
“Around my neck. Safe.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yes,” she whispered. “I appeared in whatever house she was robbing—I’m assuming it was mine. I ran into her, literally, and the alarms tripped. I let her take me hostage, and we lost the guards on the way here. She’s some sort of thief, but she keeps hinting at a rebellion. She’s being kind of tough and boisterous. Judging off clichés, I’d say this is a dystopian teen reverie, and she’s the tough, no-nonsense female lead.”
Sophia finished loading her guns, then strode into another room of more boxes.
“What about Ursula and Elliot?”
“Not sure,” Adeline said. “This reverie is huge. Kane, if Poesy gets in—”
“She won’t. Dean is going to stop her.”
Kane wished he felt as confident as he sounded.
“What’s the plot?” Adeline asked. “You always figure out the plots.”
Kane opened the small bundle. He expected a jewel, or something precious, but instead he held a plastic disk the size of his palm, with pills in clear bubbles arranged in a ring.
“It’s a birth control packet,” Adeline provided. “How can you not know that?”
Kane shrugged. “Haven’t started ovulating yet.”
Adeline rolled her eyes. “Convince her to uncuff me before I do it myself.”
“Relax,” said Sophia as she reemerged. She swung a long cape over her shoulders. “One of your own kind can set you free after we ditch you, but mark my words: this is the freest you’re ever going to get. Enjoy it, Ms. Van Demure.”
There was tension between Adeline and Sophia. The privileged girl paired with the renegade rebel. The bookworm in him told him that this was a relationship that would last the plot.
Wait. For the first time, Kane perceived the blue lightning that arced between Adeline and Sophia.
Wait.
“You’ll fail,” Adeline said, a clever move because it launched Sophia into some much-needed monologuing.
“Denounce me if you must.” Sophia’s cape swept her ankles as she closed in on Adeline. “But never forget that I am fighting for your freedom, Noble Girl. For everyone’s freedom. What they teach us in schools is a lie. There are centuries of history that they’ve erased. History in which women gained the right to be more than just political servants. History in which there was no Underclass and no Committee controlling everything. Don’t you see? The city of Everest is a lie. Holy Society is a lie, dreamed up by the Committee to control us. But you’re at the top, so why would you question it? I suppose obliviousness is how the elite must tolerate themselves.”
Adeline set her jaw. Kane thought she was an expert actor in this moment. Her voice dripped with incredulity. “How can you be so sure?”
Sophia chuckled, wagging her white-gloved fingers. “Look, and you will find. Those of us who follow the Bright Hand have been collecting artifacts for years. The heists never make the news, but I assure you our archives have been growing, and they reveal a history of glorious blasphemy.” She leaned even closer. “You think the year is 1961, don’t you? It’s not. It’s the year 2123. I know, because that”—she thrust a hand at the pill packet Kane held—“is from 2009. It’s a type of pill that stops the Mothering. Did you even know that was a choice?”
Adeline feigned disbelief about the concept of birth control, and Sophia’s face split into a gloating grin. She snatched the pills from Kane and kept her eyes locked with Adeline’s as she stowed the artifact back in Adeline’s girdle.
“Move it, rich bitch,” she commanded, leading them from the tower, down into the future’s city of Everest.
• Thirty •
PRETTY
The city of Everest was dead.
It was a public death that emanated from everything. Dark windows shown straight through empty buildings to the other side of the block. Vacant streets stretched, empty under fluorescent lights that collected no moths. Strangest of all, there was no trash. Life, even its litter, had been scoured away.
Sophia demanded silence as they ran through the shadows. Kane and Adeline traded glances when they could. Mostly, they scanned for threats and kept their ears trained on the sirens, which stayed distant.
Closer was the sound of thunder. Whatever dystopian regime kept Everest clean couldn’t tidy up its weather. As the trio traveled across a network of abandoned highways, the humid air buckled under a sudden, ferocious rain, forcing them beneath an overpass.
“Perfect,” said Sophia, yanking down her hat. “Kane, stay here with her. I’ll go secure our transport. Wait for my signal.” Before Kane could protest, she ran into the downpour.
Adeline stopped Kane from following.
“Don’t. You know better.”
Kane glared at her. “Do I?”
“Clearly not, but let’s pretend you give a shit about my life, too, for a second.”
Dirty streams of rainwater carved their way between Adeline and Kane. This was the girl from school. The one who had everyone, teachers included, scared out of their minds. It was too much for Kane, and his anxiety flared to fury like kindling.
“Do you always have to be such a bitch?” Kane sneered. “Like, do you get bitch royalties or something? Is your bitch-craft a tax write-off?”
Adeline shrugged. “Doesn’t matter if you hate me. You’re going to work with us if you want to save your sister.”
Kane laughed. “Oh, because you guys did such a great job with Helena?”
“Winning takes teamwork, but so does failure, Kane. We failed as a team.”
Kane laughed harder. “What team are you talking about, Adeline? The one that lied to me? Hurt me? Hid from me?”
“Saved you!” Adeline yelled back. “Salvaged you! Protected you! And here we are again, in another fucking nightmare. For you. For her. And you’re still acting like a child.”