Remember Yesterday

21

The tunnel leads to a metal pipe. We crawl along the cramped space on our hands and knees. A few inches of water, sludge, and who knows what else line the bottom, and the flashlight I attached to my forehead—one of the supplies we found at the mouth of the tunnel—cuts a swath in the darkness. Not that it matters. All I see is more tube, more water, and more sludge.

My arms ache, and my back hurts. With every forward motion, my palms sink into something wet and squishy, and the smell is almost unbearable. But I keep going. I keep crawling. If Mikey’s right, Tanner and I do not want to be caught on the compound.

Above us, the ground rumbles, as though hundreds of feet are pounding across it. That doesn’t make sense. We have only about fifty people living inside the compound. But people from outside Harmony must be joining the riot. Other Underground members and sympathizers. It’s like a massive army is gathering. The thought makes me sway on my hands and knees. The Underground army. Mikey’s army. I always feared that one day the Underground and ComA would declare war against each other. I guess that day’s nearer than I thought.

“Jessa, you okay?” Tanner’s voice echoes in the tube, and his hand closes briefly over my ankle. My skin is dirty, his fingers are probably dirtier, but the touch warms my heart and is enough to get me moving again.

“Only a little while longer,” I say, sidestepping his question.

“Really? You can tell how far we’ve crawled?”

“No clue,” I admit. “I was just trying to be encouraging.”

He snorts, his fingers grazing my ankle again. A glow descends on me, dim and diffuse in the dark tunnel, but so warm that even the sludge and filth can’t mar it. I could crawl forever, if he would touch me every few feet.

And then my hand slides out from beneath me, and my chest plops into the sludge, splattering drops all over my face.

Ew. I grit my teeth, wiping my face as best as I can.

You can do this, Jessa. You have no choice. With reserves I didn’t know I had, I propel myself forward, knee after painstaking knee, until we reach an open crawl space.

A grate crosses over our heads, and the moon shines down on us. I switch off my flashlight, in case there’s anyone outside the grate, and Tanner and I sag against the wall.

“Here.” He lifts his shirt, flipping it inside out, and wets it with some water from his canteen—another piece of equipment we found in the tunnel. Cupping my chin, he carefully wipes my forehead, cheeks, and mouth.

His fingers accidentally brush against my lips, and we both go perfectly still. For a moment, all I can hear is the sound of ragged breathing. Mine or his, I can’t tell. My heart pounds so hard I think it might break open my chest, and my whole world narrows down to his mouth inches away from mine.

The moment seems to stretch into eternity.

And then, he drops his shirt and backs away. “You look atrocious. And to think I kissed those lips before the siren interrupted us.”

I flush. “You didn’t seem to be putting up too much of a fight.”

Even in the dim light, I can see his eyes watching me as if I’m just another specimen under his microscope. “You saw us kiss in the future. I wasn’t about to defy Fate for something as meaningless as a kiss.”

I blink. And blink again. He’d said almost the same thing right before he lowered his lips. But at the moment, I didn’t think he actually meant it. “That was the only reason you kissed me?” I ask in a low voice. “Because you didn’t want to send out ripples that would change our universe?”

He shrugs. “You never know how one small action might change the course of our future. If we hadn’t kissed, who knows what state the world would be in now?”

“You can’t seriously believe that.”

“The future is a funny thing, Jessa,” he says. “I saw exactly what your sister’s action did to our universe. Let’s just say I don’t like messing with Fate without a good reason.”

I rock back on my heels, my mind whirling. Everything he’s saying is perfectly reasonable. If I’d stopped to think about it, I would’ve come to the same conclusion. And yet, and yet…I can’t get over what he’s ultimately implying. That he didn’t want to kiss me.

He didn’t want to kiss me.

When, in that moment, I felt like that was all I ever wanted.

Heat floods my body, followed by an icy flash of cold right to my core. It’s stupid to feel hurt. It might even reach the level of moronic. Never once has he said he’s interested in me. Quite the opposite, in fact. And if I’m dumb enough to have developed some sort of…feeling…for him, then that’s my own damn fault.

I puff out a breath, annoyed at myself. I will not be that girl, I think fiercely. The one who’s going to worry about a boy when there’s a mob after us. I won’t.

Gritting my teeth, I deliberately tilt my head toward the grate. It’s quiet. No screams or shouts from outside. No rushing feet. Either the riot’s died down or the people are all distracted elsewhere.

“We’ll know once we’ve crossed under the walls of the compound because the pipe opens onto a river,” I say, struggling to sound casual. As if the guy across from me didn’t just reject me. “I’m guessing we’re under the woods just south of the residences.”

“Can we get out and walk?” he says, his even tone betraying no awareness of what he just did. Jerk.

I want to say yes. Oh Fates, do I want to. I wouldn’t mind if I never touched a mud puddle again, and the sooner I get out of this tube—and away from Tanner—the better. But both my and his safety are at stake. And sometime during my week of visits to Callie, he stopped being my enemy. The guy might not be attracted to me, but he’s become an ally of sorts. I certainly don’t want him lynched by a mob. “Better not risk leaving the tube.”

Before he can respond, I hear a hum, low and sustained. A few decibels louder than a vibration. For a moment, I think it’s only my imagination, but then I look at Tanner. Under the layer of mud, he’s gone pale. He hears it, too.

“That’s the sound of a whisper-quiet machine,” he says. “An invisible car, a perimeter force field, a blade to chop someone’s head off.”

Ah. Of course. “It’s a stealth copter. Mikey acquired one for the compound when we moved back to civilization. We must be under the landing pad near the south wall. Which means we’re close to the river. Really close.”

This is our cue to leave. We need to dive back into the sludge and crawl our way to river water and safety.

Yet I don’t move. Curiosity thrums through me—and a small part of me is grateful for the distraction. Mikey insisted on purchasing a stealth copter with the Underground’s credits, but to my knowledge, it’s never been used. He’d never get away with such a big loan these days, not with the financial system becoming tighter and tighter. At the height of future memory, getting a loan was as easy as assembly pie, if you had the right memory. Now that memories are fading—and therefore unreliable—it’s almost unheard of to receive a loan that’s more than a few months’ credits.

So what stealth mission has this copter just run?

The moonlight becomes dimmer and dimmer, and then the copter lands with a thud, right above us. The crawl space goes black. I don’t dare switch on my flashlight, but I reach out blindly and wrap my hands around the rungs of the ladder that leads up to the grate.

“I’m going to take a look,” I whisper in Tanner’s direction. “Stay here.”

Without waiting for an answer, I clamber up the ladder. I reach the top and push aside the grate. Quietly, I hoist myself out of the hole and slither onto my stomach, my forearms scraping against the gravel and my head just brushing the underside of the copter.

Seconds later, Tanner’s on the ground next to me.

What are you doing? I mouth at him, but it’s too late to argue.

The hum shuts off, and the hatch door squeaks open. First one pair and then a second pair of heavy black boots land on the ground. The boots walk a few feet away from the copter, and I can just make out the shadowy figures of their owners.

By Eden City’s standards, the first guy is tall, wide, and muscular. But the second man is arch-your-neck-to-the-sky huge. Two of me could fit across his shoulders. He must be pushing six and a half feet, and he carries a lumpy canvas sack over his shoulder as if it weighed nothing.

There’s only one person I know who fits that description. Zed. One of Harmony’s original occupants and a friend of Callie’s. A big guy who saw a vision of his future self beating a girl—and ran into the wilderness in an attempt to avoid that particular future.

“How’s she doing in there?” The first guy turns, and in the light of the moon, I recognize his red hair and freckles. Brayden. The guy I had a crush on when I first joined Harmony. He’s much older than me, but he could read minds. I used to fantasize about growing up and marrying him so I would never have to say another word.

“Hasn’t moved since we gave her the draught,” Zed says. “Good thing, too. The screams were shredding my nerves.”

That’s when it sinks in what they’re saying. Her? No way. Zed is a kind man, despite his size. He’s quiet and steady, a person who gains the love and respect of everyone he meets. There’s no chance he’s a kidnapper.

But the evidence is right there before my eyes. I look at Tanner, my eyebrows trying to climb off my forehead. There’s a person in there, I mouth. Or at least, I intend to mouth. It comes out more like a harsh breath, and I slap a hand over my lips.

Luckily, the two men are either too far away to hear or too preoccupied to notice.

Brayden runs a hand through his hair, spiking it up. “I really didn’t like restraining her. I think we hurt her. You can’t fake that kind of crying.”

“Desperate times.” Zed’s voice is edged with fatigue, as though he hasn’t slept in a week. “I don’t like this, either, but we all have to make sacrifices. Callie gave her life for the cause. This is the least we can do.”

He adjusts the bundle across his shoulder, and they walk into the trees, presumably to the Underground cabin tucked near the landing pad. The cabin’s used by Underground officials for board meetings, strategy sessions—and, apparently, middle-of-the-night kidnappings.

“Who do they have?” I ask Tanner as soon as they’re swallowed by the night. “What are they going to do to her?”

“Someone like me,” he says, his voice grim. “Another scientist. This is why Mikey wanted us gone. They have to punish somebody. They didn’t find a victim at Mikey’s, so they went and got her.”

My stomach flips. “You mean they kidnapped her because of us?”

“Obviously, I don’t know. But it seems that way.”

A gust of wind blows under the copter, and I can suddenly feel each and every pebble pressing into my skin. This…this changes things. Oh, I wouldn’t abandon her. No way. If I let Zed and Brayden take a prisoner, I would be no different than the scientists who tortured me. But this need for a scapegoat, any scapegoat, means I won’t be able to circle back to get Mikey’s help. There’s no time.

I roll onto my side, so that I’m facing Tanner. “Listen. Just follow the tube and—”

“I know what you’re going to say, so you can save your breath.” He moves forward so that our noses are nearly touching. “I’m not crawling down that tube without you.”

“I’m not leaving her.”

“I understand that. What you don’t understand is that I’m not leaving you.”

I look into his eyes. Dark, discerning. So arrogant, so sure. Once he makes a decision, he never second-guesses himself. I used to hate that about him—but now I’m beginning to see value in his confidence. Value in having someone like Tanner on my side. Even if I’m not his type.

“Okay, fine,” I say. “Stick around if you want. Just don’t get yourself killed.”