“The point?” I stare at her out of the corner of my vision. “Emma, this is where we change everything. Claysoot, your mother, Kale. Don’t you want to get them out?”
“They’re safest where they are. It’s this world they should fear. Frank. Forgeries. A complete lack of freedom.”
“All the more reason to remove him from power.” She gives me a look that reeks of doubt. I don’t know—or like—this person she’s becoming. So pessimistic, so beaten. “And they aren’t free, Emma. They’re slaves.”
“To what?”
“The Heist. The Council. All those stupid rules they’ve created just to last another generation. We both hated the slatings. I don’t want Kale to have to deal with that when she’s older. I want her to be able to make her own choices. Remember the birds?”
She glares. “Do you?”
Of course. I might feel differently about her now, but the birds, that idea she planted in my mind of permanent pairs, is something I’ll never forget. Emma changed me. She changed me for the better.
A group of gulls soars past, heading for the white-specked shoreline. One lands on the section of roof right outside our window and starts pecking at the shingles as though he can drill his way into the first-floor rooms. I cup my hands at my mouth and though I expect nothing, I blow into my palms. The most feeble whistle cuts between us.
“Did you hear that?!”
I adjust my hands, try again. This time it’s unmistakable. Not as pure and crisp as the cries Bree can produce, but audible.
“Ha!” I push the window open and stick my torso through. Clinging to the top of the frame, I pull my feet after. The gulls are screeching and the water is lapping and the world smells like salt and hope and possibilities. We’re going to be okay. All of us. The Rebels, the Expats, our steadily shrinking team. My eyes stream from the fierce morning wind, but I stand on the shingled roof, my hands in position, whistling again and again to the loons that are nowhere to be found.
“Well, I’m glad one of us is happy with the way everything’s panned out,” Emma mutters.
I turn around, but she’s already gone. It’s Aiden in the window frame now, one hand tangled in Rusty’s copper coat. He refuses to move for me.
“Why’d you lie about Emma?” he asks.
“It’s complicated.”
“I’m not letting you in until you tell me.”
I want to be honest with the kid, but the whole of it will give him nightmares and leave me weak in the process. He puts a hand on the glass pane, threatening to lock me out.
“Aiden . . .”
He looks up at me. The wind whips through my shirt.
“Sometimes people lie because they’re trying to protect you. They’re trying to help.”
“But you made me think she was dead. All that did was hurt.”
“I’m sorry about that,” I say. “Really. I just didn’t think we’d see her again.”
He taps on the pane, sucks on his bottom lip. Then: “Will you play a game with me?”
“Yes. Absolutely.”
He steps aside and lets me slip back into the house. I wish all negotiations were so simple.
After a few rounds of Rock, Paper, Scissors with Aiden, I head downstairs. Harvey and Clipper have rewritten portions of the code and pinned them up on the far wall. Select letters and symbols are circled, lines connecting them like cobweb strands.
“Did you guys get any sleep?” I ask.
“Barely,” Clipper says through a yawn. “But it was worth it.”
“You found something?”
“Think so.” He taps one of the pinned-up comment blocks, and I step closer to read.
/* Master logic and Most Operations vary depending on Forgery’s Zoning (test group origins, location assignments, etc.). Corresponding Algorithms should Run accordingly, though some errors Triggered in early model Forgeries. Backtrack(?) catches and resets Forgery logic per K492 in these instances. */
“The Forgeries have specific zoning?”
“That part’s not important,” Harvey says. “But backtrack”—he taps the word with a forefinger—“is the fail-safe function. It’s embedded in the conditionals I was talking about last night. If it’s initiated, that’s the end of them.”
“Okay, so how do we initiate it?”
“We’re still trying to figure that out. K492 is referenced only once in the entire program: here. In this comment.” Harvey tilts his head to the side. “What are you trying to tell me?” he asks the code.
“I thought the capitalization was weird,” Clipper says. “The way there’s random letters capitalized in the middle of sentences.” He points to another scrap of paper pinned on the wall where he’s listed them out.
M M O F Z C A R T F B F K
Harvey taps a pencil against the desk. Clipper and I stare at the letters.
“It’s too quiet in here,” Harvey grunts. “I need music. I can’t work without music.”
And right then, the letters jump at me. I’ve never seen the name written out before, so I could be completely wrong, but after Harvey broke through his programming from the same thing, it seems too much to be mere coincidence. I leap to my feet and grab the marker from Clipper.
“Forget the third sentence. Just look at the first two.” I cross out letters from the last sentence.
M M O F Z C A R T F
“We’re trying to eliminate the Forgeries, right? So if you remove them . . .” I strike both Fs.
M M O Z C A R T
“. . . and remove the properly capitalized letters at the start of each sentence.”
M O Z A R T
“Holy. Shit,” Clipper says.
Harvey slaps the back of his skull. “Watch your language.”
“I saw it as soon as you mentioned music,” I explain. “That is how it’s spelled, right?”
Harvey nods.
“So what song?”
“K492: The Marriage of Figaro. I don’t know how I didn’t see it earlier.”
“I don’t get it,” Clipper cuts in. “If this is right, the fail-safe won’t work.”