I ignore the cheers and boos from the audience. Zero’s going to regenerate in no time, and with the way this game’s structured, he might have an unfair advantage again. As the wind whistles past my ears, I yank out an arrow strapped to my back holster and frantically knot the rope at my waist to it. I tie the rope’s other end around my chest. Then I fit the arrow to my bow right as I fall like a stone past the entire herd of dragons. I twist, point my bow up at the nearest dragon to me, and shoot.
The arrow hits true, lodging in between two scales on a dragon’s chest. Sparks fly from the burn of the arrowhead’s metal against the scales. The beast lets out a roar of annoyance as the rope pulls taut, yanking me to an abrupt halt with it. I pull myself up as quickly as I can as the dragon veers sharply to one side, narrowly avoiding colliding with a glass arch.
Above me, Zero reappears on the back of his black dragon. Its ice-colored eyes fix on me, and it plunges in my direction just as I swing myself up onto my new dragon’s back. This time, I point my dragon toward the arches.
“Higher,” I snap, urging it up. It obeys, turning its mechanical head where I want it to.
Zero’s dragon hurls toward me, its jaws open. It lets out a column of fire. I pull my dragon to one side, just missing it, but some of the flame catches my dragon’s wing, scorching the metal black. I force it into a tight spiral around the arch’s columns.
“What the hell is she doing?” I can hear a couple of the spectators shouting, their words almost drowned out by the cheers.
Zero gives chase. He steers his dragon to fly sidelong against mine, avoiding the spiraling pattern that I’m doing. He looks ready to pull in close again and jump onto my dragon’s back.
I aim for the gently curving top of the glass arch. As I reach it, Zero nears me. I grab my vine power-up in my inventory. If I can lure Zero closer and set it off on him at the right time, it’ll ensnare him in its tangle of thick vines and freeze him there, hanging from the top of the arch. I can leap off my dragon and slide down the tangle of vines to grab his Artifact.
I glance over my shoulder. He’s drawing closer now, taking the bait. A small smile threatens to creep onto my face. I turn to stare down at the top of the arch. Time to strike—
Then a flash of light hits me. The world washes out into blinding white. Did the game end? Then I realize a split second later that Zero has used his own power-up on me. A lightning strike. I see the top of the glass arch rushing at me as I fall toward it. I hit it full force, without a chance to even pull up my shield.
[Player B] | Life: -60%
WARNING
I struggle to my feet as Zero walks to me on top of the arch. Hastily, I bring up my vine power-up and point it at him.
The world around me flickers, like static cutting through the air.
I blink, frowning. Could everyone see that? Was it just me?
Zero’s focus is trained on me. As he approaches, he waves his hand in a subtle gesture. The static flickers again. It reminds me of when he took over my view during one of the Phoenix Riders’ championship games, how we both ended up in that dark-red cavern.
I hold a hand out at him, as if that could possibly stop him. “Wait—” I start to say. “What are you doing—”
Time for us to stop playing around, Zero says. His words echo in my mind through our Link.
And in the blink of an eye, the virtual world around us shifts into something else.
I gasp. It’s my old foster home.
I’m standing back in those familiar halls, surrounded by peeling yellow wallpaper and slants of gray light. There’s a storm raging, the lights outside stuttering with every streak of lightning, the ground trembling with every roll of thunder. Nearby, one of the doors in the hallway—the girls’ room, my old room—is ajar from where I’d just crept through.
This is the night when I escaped from the foster home.
That’s impossible. If I wasn’t sitting in a chair in real life, I’m sure my knees would’ve buckled. My breath comes up shallow.
How did Zero create this? How did he know? How did he get inside my head, find this memory, and populate this virtual world around me?
The glitch.
But when? Did he get in right after I accepted his Link invite, just before we headed into our Duel?
I can’t hear the roar of the audience anymore, so I can’t tell if they’re also seeing what I’m seeing. Just like the championship game and the red cavern, I’m probably the only one who knows what’s happening to me right now.
I tremble at the sight of the hall, at the familiarity of this night. Everything looks the same, except somehow exaggerated, like it might appear in a nightmare. The walls are so much taller than they should be, stretching so high that I can barely see the ceiling, and the patterns on the wallpaper ripple in the light, like it’s in motion. When I look down at myself, I realize I’m even wearing the same clothes I’d worn that evening as I made my escape—my worn sneakers, my torn jeans, my faded sweater.
The same fear from that evening thrums through my veins. The same thoughts race through me. I’d planned every detail of tonight’s escape. Counted down from when I saw the light go out in Mrs. Devitt’s room. Stashed all I could fit into my backpack. The Dragon’s Nest Duel has all but vanished from my mind. Gone are the thoughts of winning our game.
It’s as if Zero had opened a gate into my soul.
“Every locked door has a key.”
I whirl to see Zero standing there in the dark corridor, his armor making him nearly invisible in the midnight shadows of the hall, his face hidden from view behind the opaque helmet. “That’s what you’re telling yourself right now, isn’t it?”
“Get out of my head,” I growl at him.
He approaches me, opening one of his hands palm up to reveal a hovering cube, crimson and glossy. “This is the hack—the key to this glitch,” he says. He hands the cube to me.
“I can’t be here,” I whisper. The sight of the foster home is making it hard for me to catch my breath. “Get me out.”
Zero shakes his head. “Not until you can do the same to me,” he replies.
I clench my fists as my fear boils over into anger. “I won’t say it again.”
“Neither will I.” He stands before me, cold and impassable. “Look in your Memory. Open the cube.”
Everything around me seems like it’s blurring, spinning in a dizzying circle. I try to concentrate—but then, the old grandfather clock at the end of the hall starts to chime, and the sound of a muffled voice in the kitchen catches my attention.
My heartbeat quickens. I’m back in that awful place again. I’m fourteen, the clock is chiming two in the morning, and I’m out in the hall, sneakers and backpack on, quivering at the sound.
I forget that I’m learning a hack. Instead, I bolt away from Zero and run as fast as I can. My shoes catch against the carpet, making me stumble in the same way I’d stumbled that night. Then I’m out of the hall and in the front room of the home, where the main entrance is staring back at me.
“Hey!”
A shout behind me makes me look over my shoulder. It’s Chloe, one of my older roommates. Her eyes are focused on my backpack and my shoes as she points a finger at me.
“Mrs. Devitt!” she yells, raising her voice so that it seems to drown the whole house. “Emika’s running away!”
I don’t know if it’s because I’m inside my own Memory, but my body does exactly the same thing I did that night. I dart past the kitchen, my eyes on the front door. My legs feel like they’re dragging through mud.
Then comes Zero’s voice again, but I don’t care what he wants from me anymore. All I need to do is get out of here. If they catch me, I’m dead. As I reach the door, I start to sprint.