Exist Once More Read online

  Change the outcome.

  We’d been told over and over again that wasn’t possible. Events that had passed were written in stone, the consequences that spooled into the future unknowable at the time but easily traced with the benefit of time travel, and of serious Reflection. It was how they predicted Trues, among other things, and the idea that none of it was necessarily true shook my foundation all the way to the roots.

  “It’s like our whole lives have been a lie,” I whispered, pulling on Jonah’s sweater even though it was wrapped as tight as it would go. “They’ve been telling us one thing and pursuing their own agenda the entire time.”

  Oz reached out a hesitant hand, his warm palm covering my frozen knuckles. He squeezed, and I expected him to let go but he didn’t. When our eyes met, my stomach fluttered at the emotion in his—hope? Determination? Something else?

  “I think maybe they’re still learning, too, Kaia. They figured things were one way, set in stone like we all believed, but the further they explored, the more maybe they started to realize it’s not that simple. That you can’t predict people, because they don’t stay the same. And it could be that what seems set at one point in their lives shifts as they do.” He bit his lip, took his hand off mine, and huddled back in his own space. “But maybe sometimes it’s too late to take things back. To admit that you were wrong the first time.”

  The sense that he felt he’d said too much spilled into the short space between us. My heat sped up and my hands shook slightly as I logged into my own table comp, still trying to process everything Oz had said. It made sense to me on some deep level. After studying human beings, and more so after spending those precious few days with Ceasarion, I could feel the rightness of what he’d said about people. That we change. That maybe we don’t need the same things our whole lives.

  The same people.

  An itching discomfort dug under my skin, poking holes in my veins and leaving behind the sensation that my blood was trickling out. It made me hot, and sick to my stomach, because when one’s whole world tips onto its side maybe throwing up is a natural response.

  I said nothing, taking quick peeks his direction here and there. Oz was focused, or appeared to be, though the tips of his ears were red and he continually shoved his glasses up the bridge of his nose, as if he was sweating.

  “So how are we going to do this?” I asked once we were both logged in. “Surely there’s some back door way to go through some history without specifically searching the Elders’ surnames.”

  Oz looked as if he might die at realizing I wasn’t going to pursue the previous topic of conversation. He didn’t need to know that I wouldn’t have had a clue where to start, or finish, or anything in between.

  “I’ve been thinking about it. What if we try searching the Hope Chest, to start. If their ancestors were all involved in historical events of such importance, there’s a good chance that we might find their names cross-referenced here.” He paused, raising two fingers to poke unconsciously at the bruise on his cheek. “I could try that.”

  His movement made me wince, even as my mind tugged loose a few more answers.

  I cleared my throat, telling myself that feeling badly for half-healed bruises was unproductive. “If you do that, maybe I could try whole System searches that target single people who had massive effects on human history. So far, aside from the Gatlings, the others have been specific contributions.”

  “Give it a shot.”

  We both turned to our comps. My own shoulders slumped, and it was hard to tell whether my renewed ability to breathe more easily was because we had a plan of attack as far as research or because the brief discussion had made things feel like they could return to normal between the two of us.

  After twenty minutes, the muscles in my neck and shoulders were wound tight once again. I wasn’t sure how Oz was faring with the Hope Chest search, but I had found that searching for two or three needles in the haystack of human history made me want to crawl into bed and hide.

  Many of our paternal founders went back centuries—my own had been an Emperor of Rome in the first century, and though we were the exception rather than the rule, there was no telling how far I’d have to travel through virtual time to find a Midgley or Gagarin who had well and truly screwed the human race with a single action.

  I was typing in haphazard search requests as fast as they popped into my mind. It probably looked like someone had gotten ahold of some booze and, for some reason, then chose to spend their free and easy evening in the comp lab running random words through the System in search of stars knew what.

  Hysterics were coming on fast. I swallowed a few giggles, but when one of my searches popped back with a beeped result, they dried up fast.

  “Oz,” I breathed, my gaze fixed to the file that popped up when I poked at it with one finger. He stood and moved closer, hovering so close that the heat from his body, the smell of his toothpaste and shampoo and whatever made Oz smell oddly like a fresh, Earth Before breeze, clogged my nose and my eyes and for some reason, thudded in my chest.

  I cleared my throat. “Look.”

  The results for chlorofluorocarbons had come up in response to my search term inventions that changed the world for the worse. Their discovery, really, not invention, had led to reliable refrigeration and a bunch of things to do with automobiles in the late nineteenth century.

  And, later on, had been the single largest contributor to the hole in the ozone.

  “Thomas Midgley, Jr.,” Oz read over my shoulder. In his voice was the same excitement of discovery that had to be responsible for my hot palms and pounding heart. “Zeke.”

  “It’s just what Analeigh said—the guy basically screwed the environment of Earth Before singlehandedly.”

  “I’m going to search the Hope Chest file on the environment and see if there’s anything else about this guy.”

  Lack of attention to the environment and conservation were one of the earliest established Hope Chest files—something that no one argued was a major contributing factor to the inviability of Earth Before.

  While Oz sat back on his stool and started scrolling through his own files, I read about chlorofluorocarbons and their impact on the world. The man who invented them—Zeke’s ancestor Thomas, presumably—would have had no idea of their effect on the ozone, since that wasn’t discovered or discussed as a concept until long after his death. The guy also invented leaded gasoline, though. Even though it had soon become clear that it had negative effects on children, health in general, and on the world around them, Thomas had continued to get rich off his product—even as the workers in his plant died and he himself became sick from lead poisoning.

  “He seems like a peach,” I told Oz after reading the entire thing twice.

  “Yeah, listen to this.” He cleared his throat. “‘Thomas Midgley, Jr., probably had more of a negative effect on Earth’s environment than any other single organism who ever lived.’ Organism, not person,” he clarified before moving on. “‘In fact, if we were to attribute the degradation of this aspect of life to one person, it would be him.’”

  “Jeez. Well, that’s certainly something that would need to be addressed if the Elders are really looking for a way to go back. They can fix all the people they want, and society and weapons and all of that, but if there’s not a healthy planet, the rest of it doesn’t matter.” I pointed to the screen in front of me. “There’s a quote here that says Midgley had ‘an instinct for the regrettable that was almost uncanny.’”

  We sat for a few minutes, scrolling through connected files and the like, but then I couldn’t contain my opinion any longer. “It kind of makes sense that Zeke would come from a guy like this. I mean, what a jerk.”

  “It does seem that way, although he couldn’t have realized the long-term effects of his research at the time.”

  “I don’t know. He was a smart guy, and he was willing to poison kids and workers to keep making money off his gasoline. We studied the industry b
efore, on our Observations regarding environmental impact, and remember how the oil companies commissioned fake scientific studies saying the gasoline was safe? When they knew it wasn’t?”

  “You’ve got me there. He was a jerk.”

  That gave me pause; I didn’t think I’d ever heard Oz admit to being wrong about anything, ever. “And John Wilkes Booth was a jerk, too. Maybe mentally ill, if you want to be completely fair, but a murderer all the same.”

  It took less than a second for Oz’s eyes to brighten as he picked up my train of thought.

  “And the Gatlings invented something that killed a lot of people. My own founder killed thousands with the push of a button.”

  “But they can’t be intent on saving lives,” I mused, still grappling with the mystery of the Elders’ end game. “It’s more than that. They would have to realize that saving all of those lives would show up here, somehow, even if they didn’t exactly realize people would start appearing out of nowhere.”

  “I agree, but I still can’t quite see it. Maybe if we…” Oz trailed off as the door to the lab flew open to reveal Zeke Midgley himself, his face a twist of fury and satisfaction as he pointed one finger at the two of us, his black robes billowing in the blow of the filtered air as it left the room.

  “You two!” he barked. “With me, now!”

  We both flew out of our seats, banging together in the process, and grabbed our things. The closer we drew to Zeke, the more I wondered if he was actually going to reach out and grab us by the ears, the way angry teachers used to do in old movies, but he didn’t.

  His eyes glittered as we stepped close enough to see them, and to hear him when he hissed, “I’d love to see either of you get out of this now, high-ranking families be damned.”

  A zip of terror went down my spine, partly at his words and partly at the pure glee in his manic face when he uttered them.

  Chapter Sixteen

  We followed Zeke through the maze of hallways, so close together that it didn’t even seem weird when Oz slid his fingers around mine and held on tight. His hand was hot and sweaty, but so was mine, and the origin of the tremble that passed between us was impossible to pin down.

  I’d never been so scared in my life, not even when Analeigh was sentenced to death. Whatever Zeke had on us—most likely the files we were searching were somehow flagged, even though they were somewhat random—there was no way what I’d done wouldn’t be the end for my parents.

  A sob rose in my throat but I swallowed it, determined not to give the horrible man what he wanted.

  Instead of leading us to his office, which was likely still occupied by the visiting Genesis Council, we went into the meeting room where our own Council sat for disciplinary hearings and things of the like. The place where my life had been torn apart months ago, and being there again made my blood thrum with anxiety.

  No one else was there except Minnie Gatling and Rachel Turing, both of whom looked supremely annoyed at having been dragged away from whatever work they’d been doing while the Academy was quiet.

  They didn’t look all that surprised to see me. Or Oz, for that matter, though I could hardly believe that Zeke had the guts to call us onto the carpet without inviting Truman to defend—or save—his only son once again. It was a new kind of fear, to realize that perhaps Elder Truman had chosen a side. One that didn’t include Oz.

  Zeke settled into the high-backed, leather chair between the women and took his sweet time addressing us, perhaps even delighting in the way the tension in the room wound tighter and tighter. Breathing was a struggle. Beside me, Oz stood perfectly still, by all appearances cool and collected with his feet firmly on the disciplinary carpet.

  But I was close enough to hear how hard he was breathing. His hand slipped against mine. I wanted to step closer, to grab onto him for support, but given recent events, that would probably have been construed incorrectly by anyone and everyone in the room.

  “What exactly were the two of you doing on the comps tonight? Together?” Zeke’s voice rang out, harsh and startling after the lengthy silence.

  I opened my mouth to answer, but he beat me to it. “We weren’t together. I mean, we didn’t go in there together and we weren’t working on anything specific.”

  He was talking too fast. Even I heard it, and none of the Elders looked particularly convinced by his avalanche of excuses.

  “I was researching Reflections that have been accepted to the Hope Chest, for what are obvious reasons I would think,” he soldiered on. His tone had turned smug, confident, and far more like the Oz of the past almost-decade at the Academy.

  Everyone knew he wanted to have something accepted to the Hope Chest before the end of his apprenticeship and he was running out of time. Thanks largely to me, though he could thank the Elders themselves for getting him tangled up with the Return Project last year, too.

  “And you, Miss Vespasian? It’s not like you to spend your free time studying, so I certainly hope you’ve got a better excuse cooked up.”

  I wished I had any excuse cooked up, but they’d already ruled out seconding Oz’s claim of schoolwork. My mouth opened. Nothing came out, and beside me, Oz tensed. Zeke’s dark gaze grew triumphant, and the women looked more disappointed than anything.

  At the very last moment, when something was about to fly out of my mouth without being checked first by my brain, the door to the room opened to reveal Elder Booth. The startled, suspicious reactions of every other Elder suggested he had not been invited.

  “Booth. Did you need something?” Zeke’s demeanor went freezing cold, casting a chill over the room and confirming my assumption about invitations.

  The rage in his eyes as he tracked Booth’s progress to the front of the room, where he took a chair next to Minnie without being asked, made me feel a thousand times better about my instinct to trust Booth.

  Whoever was against Zeke had to be with us, in some form or another. It was clear the two of them were not on the same side.

  “Yes, as a matter of fact. My student. I went to check on Miss Vespasian’s progress with an assignment I gave her and found her missing.” Booth gave me a hard look. “Have you completed your paper?”

  “What assignment?” Zeke interrupted. “I wasn’t made aware that Kaia had fallen behind or would need additional assignments.”

  “I was disappointed with her recent Reflection and asked her to write up her thoughts on the five single most influential poor decisions in Earth Before’s modern history.” The lie sounded as smooth as liftoff in a brand-new ship.

  So much so that it left me wondering, however briefly, whether it could have been true and I’d missed it. Confusion filtered through my blood. I did my best to keep it off my face while my brain stumbled along.

  Booth knew what I’d been researching—how?

  Unless he’d been the one watching me the whole time.

  A shudder went down my spine as Oz elbowed me. I looked up to meet Minnie Gatling’s raised eyebrows. She’d obviously asked me a question I’d totally missed.

  “Uh, sorry. What?”

  An impatient burst of air escaped her lungs. “I asked whether this is true.”

  “Oh, yeah. Totally true.”

  “Which Reflection?” she asked, her eyes narrowed.

  “The one in England,” I answered before I could stop myself, and before I could remember that I’d done the same one with her—and that she’d been complimentary of my thoughts. I cleared my throat, trying to think fast. “After I talked it over with you and your sister, I thought perhaps I was ascribing too much importance to the decision to put Muslims in camps.”

  Minnie looked as if she struggled to believe me, but Rachel slammed her hands down on the wooden desk in front of her. The snap of her eyes inside her wrinkled skin said she’d had just about enough of sitting here listening.

  “Are we done here, Ezekiel? The girl has a long history of not living up to academic expectations and Booth says she was working on an assignment
for him. Can we all get back to our lives, now?” She frowned. “I was in the middle of quite a good book.”

  Her complaint made me want to laugh, but she looked awfully serious. Zeke didn’t look convinced we were telling the truth and neither did Minnie, but the calm expression on Booth’s coffee-bean skin reassured me that we would get out of there alive.

  “Miss Vespasian, you may go. Mr. Truman, I appreciate your academic zeal, but perhaps spending time alone with Kaia isn’t the best course of action as far as your future career. Or the future of any other aspect of your life.” Zeke glared. “Something to consider.”

  It was a clear dismissal for us both, but after what Zeke said, it felt awkward to leave the room together. That was when Booth saved us a second time, standing and moving quickly to my side.

  “I’d like to see you in my office, Miss Vespasian, if you’d come with me.”

  I scampered after him, thankful for the out and feeling only slightly terrible about leaving Oz behind with the Elders. Not nearly as badly as I would have felt leaving him alone with his abusive father, so perhaps that should have counted for something.

  Booth didn’t speak until we’d gone into his much smaller office and closed the door, at which point he closed his eyes as if gathering the strength needed to deal with me. I knew because it was an expression I was used to seeing from a multitude of people.

  When he opened them, the fear slithering through his gaze was impossible to miss. And that was when cold, slimy fear wrapped its hands around my heart.

  “You need to be more careful,” he said without fanfare, rubbing his forehead. “They will not allow me to continue to cover for you, nor will they believe it’s genuine.”

  “I don’t think they believe it now,” I confessed, my mouth dry.

  “Most likely not. They do not trust either one of us, I’m afraid, which makes us dubious allies, at best.”