But he caught her wrists, bringing her to a frightened stillness. “If I do, everything we’ve worked to achieve for the last five years is gone. We need what’s in your head to clear your name and bring Opti down. You’re okay. Just relax and breathe. You’re not insane.”
Not yet, anyway. Peri looked down at his grip around her wrists. “I can’t believe you did this,” she said. But he was right. The confusion was gone. The conflict of emotions she’d been dealing with the last few days had settled into a faint ember burn. She hated Jack, enough to kill him, apparently. Sandy, Bill, and Frank, too, were on her new shit list. But when she tried to remember why, she was … distracted before her mind could … circle back and recollect.
It was the oddest sensation, and Peri pulled out of Silas’s hold. “Well, I guess Jack’s right then,” she muttered, and Silas nervously stood.
“About what?” he asked.
“That he’s a spitball of psychiatric bullshit.”
Karley laughed long and loud, and somehow it made Peri feel better. “Oh, I like that,” the polished woman said as she glanced at her watch. “Nicely done,” she added as she gave Silas a peck on the cheek. “I didn’t think it was possible. Now, get out of my house.”
“It’s just a Band-Aid,” Silas said, still uneasy. Peri wasn’t happy, either. “You have to be really careful until you get a few days of base memories. I don’t want you to risk drafting.”
“So why am I seeing Jack?” she demanded as the hallucination began arranging her underwear again. “And how can he answer me? Talk back and everything?” Silas had saved her, but she felt fragile, as if a sneeze might destroy everything.
Silas’s brow eased. “Think of him like a mental cop on the corner. I needed the flexibility and awareness your intuition would give, and it manifests as a hallucination because disembodied voices in your head can lead to, ah, more problems.”
“I’ll bet.” It made sense, but she still felt like his personal science project. “Why Jack?” she asked. Just saying his name felt slimy, her cooling hatred toward him tempered with hints of past tasks, of danger shared, of good times—before it fell apart.
“You’d rather it be your mom?” Silas said, and her eyes widened as the horror of that slid through her. “They’re the only two people you listen to.”
“Jack is fine,” she said. “But I don’t trust either one of them.”
Silas stood, and Karley edged toward the door. “I said listen to, not trust.” Silas’s eyes crinkled at the corners. “I know this is hard,” he said, his voice low. “But if I destroyed both timelines, we’d have no way to clear your name or bring Opti down.”
Tired, Peri put her forehead on her drawn-up knees. It was hard to be angry with him, even if it was unconscionable for an anchor to leave twin timelines in a drafter. He was right; she was alive. “How long until you can fragment one of them?” she asked, her words muffled.
“It depends on how long it takes to, ah, find that original list.”
She lifted her head, a faint sense of purpose growing. “It has to be in my apartment. We can do it tonight.” Peri wanted this done, and done fast. Silas’s patch job was just that.
Karley was on her way out, but she hesitated on the threshold, shaking her head at Silas’s inquiring glance. No? Did she just tell him no?
“Not yet,” Silas said, and Jack, forgotten in the corner, laughed quietly as Peri’s eyes narrowed. “You need to build some memories before you can risk your mental state. I don’t know what will happen if you draft. You can stay here with Howard and Taf.”
“You are all leaving.” Karley pointed at the unseen front door. “Right now.”
Peri began to get out of bed, hesitating when the sheets rubbed her bare skin. “You need your list. I need my talismans. They can give me the cushion I need. Keep me from a MEP.” Her heart pounded as she said what they were all thinking, none of them saying.
“It’s not worth the risk, especially if all we have to do is wait a few weeks.” Silas pushed Karley out the door, the woman protesting hotly.
“I’m not waiting a few weeks!” Peri exclaimed. “Besides, it’s a little late to be flying the flag of not wanting to stress my mental state.”
“Opti is camped out at your apartment. We wait.” Silas had a hand on Karley’s arm, forestalling her complaints. “We’ll get you some new IDs to keep you off Opti’s radar. You need at least three months of solid memories before you can risk another draft. You’re going over the bridge this afternoon.”
I’m not going to hide out in Canada, either. “What do Taf and Howard think about this?”
“I’m sure they’ll agree,” he said calmly.
“Last time I checked, that was doctor-speak for you’ve not told them yet,” Peri said, and Karley chuckled and went downstairs.
Sighing, Silas came back in. “I don’t want to risk it,” he said, his concern obvious. “Add an unexpected jump to what you’re running with, and you might go into MEP. We have time.”