I hesitate, not wanting to say it. In the corner of my view, I see Hideo’s profile haloed in green. He’s awake and online. It’s enough to make me want to reach out and Link with him.
I hate that he still has this pull on me. After all, everyone has had that one person they can’t help but obsess over. It’s not like I haven’t enjoyed flings that came and went in the span of a few weeks. And yet . . .
He’s more than a fling or a bounty or a mark. He’s forever bound to my history. The Hideo who has stolen the world’s free will is still the same Hideo who grieved his brother so deeply that it left a permanent thread of silver in his dark hair. The same Hideo who loves his mother and father. The same Hideo who once lifted me out of my darkness and dared me to dream of better things.
I refuse to believe that he’s nothing more than a monster. I can’t watch him sink like this. I keep going because I need to find that boy again, the beating heart buried underneath his lie. I have to stop him in order to save him.
He was once the hand that pulled me up. Now I have to be his.
* * *
* * *
BY THE TIME we leave the bar, it’s well past midnight, and the pouring rain has dwindled to a fine mist. Some people still dot the streets. The first two all-star players have just been announced, and virtual figures of them now hover under every streetlight in the city.
HAMILTON JIMéNEZ of USA | PHOENIX RIDERS
PARK JIMIN of SOUTH KOREA | BLOODHOUNDS
Hammie barely glances at the images of her best in-game moves now dancing below the light posts. “You should head back with us,” she says, eyeing the neighborhood.
“I’ll be fine,” I reassure her. If someone really is following me, best not to make it so that they’re following my teammates, too.
“It’s Kabukichō, Em.”
I give her a wry smile. “So? Hideo’s algorithm is running on most of these people now. What’s there to be afraid of?”
“Very funny,” Hammie responds with an exasperated lift of her eyebrow.
“Look, we shouldn’t all be traveling together. You know that makes us too tempting a target, regardless of the algorithm. I’ll call you when I’m in back in my hotel.”
Hammie hears the note of finality in my voice. Her lips twist in frustration, but then she nods and starts to walk away. “Yeah, you better,” she says over her shoulder, waving her hand at me as she hurries off.
I watch her join the others as they head toward the subway station, where a private car waits for them. I try to picture each of them before they were famous, the first times they arrived in Tokyo, whether or not they felt invisible enough to take the subway. Whether they felt alone.
When my teammates disappear into the haze of rain, I turn away.
I’m used to traveling by myself. Still, my solitude feels sharper now, and the space around me seems emptier without my teammates. I shove my hands back into my pockets and try to ignore the virtual male model that now saunters up to me with a smile, inviting me in English into one of the host clubs that line the street.
“Nope,” I reply to him. He vanishes immediately, then resets at the entrance of the club and looks for another potential customer.
I tuck the rest of my hair completely under my hood and keep going. Just a week ago, I probably would’ve been walking with Hideo beside me. His arm wrapped around my waist, his coat over my shoulders. He might’ve been laughing at something I said.
But I’m on my own here, listening to the lonely splash of my boots in the dirty street puddles. The echo of water dripping from signs and overhangs keeps distracting me. It sounds like someone else’s footsteps. The feeling of being watched has returned.
A static buzz vibrates in my ears. I pause for a moment at an intersection, tilting my head this way and that until it stops.
I glance again at Hideo’s green-haloed icon in my view. Where is he now, and what is he doing? I imagine contacting him, his virtual form appearing before me, as Asher’s question rings in my ears. What if I did tell him about Zero’s connection to his brother? Would it be so bad to see what happens, even without being entirely sure?
I clench my teeth, annoyed with myself for thinking of excuses to hear his voice. If I just give myself enough distance from him and focus on this whole thing like it’s a job, then maybe I’ll stop wanting to be near him so much.
The static buzzes in my ear again. This time I halt and listen carefully. Nothing. Only a few people are on the street with me now, each a nondescript silhouette. Maybe someone’s trying to hack me. I start an inspection of my NeuroLink system to make sure everything’s in order. Green text floats past my view, the scan looking normal.
Until it skips over running a diagnostic on my messages.
I frown, but before I can examine it closer, all the text vanishes from my view. It’s replaced by a single sentence.
I’m still waiting, Emika.
Every hair on the back of my neck rises. It’s Zero.
2
I whirl in place on the sidewalk, my eyes darting to each silhouette on the street. The colorful reflections on the road blur in the wet night. Lampposts suddenly look like people, and every distant footstep sounds like it’s headed toward me.
Is he here? Has he been the one watching me? I half expect to see a familiar figure walking behind me, his body encased in fitted armor, his face hidden underneath that opaque black helmet.
But no one’s there.
“It’s only been a few nights,” I whisper under my breath, my words transcribing into a reply text. “Ever heard of giving someone time to think?”
I did give you time.
Irritation flashes hot under my fear. I grit my teeth and start walking faster. “Maybe this is my way of telling you I’m not interested.”
And are you not interested?
“Not interested at all.”
Why not?
“Maybe because you tried to kill me.”
If I still wanted you dead, you would be.
Another shiver down my spine. “Are you trying to get me to take your offer? Because you’re not doing a very good job of it.”
I’m here to tell you that you’re in danger.
He’s toying with me, like he always does. But something about his tone makes me freeze. I realize that maybe he’s hacking through my shields right now, digging through my files, digging through me. He once stole my father’s Memories from me. He could do it again.
“The only danger I’ve ever faced was from you.”
Then you haven’t been in the Dark World lately.
A view of the Pirate’s Den suddenly appears all around me. I jerk backward at the abrupt shift. Just a second ago, I was standing on a city street; now I’m belowdecks on a pirate ship.
Tremaine was right—a good number of people in the Dark World must still be using beta lenses, because Hideo’s algorithm would never let them go down under. The ship looks crowded with virtual people, all of them gathered around the glass cylinder in the den’s center. The screen that displays the assassination lottery.
Always the first pick, aren’t you?
My gaze runs up the list. Some names are familiar ones—gang lords and mob bosses, politicians and a few celebrities. But then—
There I am. Emika Chen. I’m at the top, and beside my name is a reward sum for five million notes.
Five million notes for my death.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I manage to say.
The Pirate’s Den vanishes as quickly as it appeared, leaving me standing in Kabukichō again.
Zero’s messages come rapidly now.
Two assassins are making their way up this street. They’re going to reach you before you can get to a train station.
Every muscle in me tenses at once. I’ve seen what happens to others who end up on that list—and for a price that high, the assassinations almost always go through.
For a split second, I find myself wishing that Hideo’s algorithm already affected everyone. But I quickly shake the thought away.
“How do I know that you didn’t send them yourself?” I whisper.