“What happens if we die?” I ask Nishi, shouting over all the noise.
“Each time we survive a danger, a new, worse threat is waiting for us,” she says, shivering as more of the flames are drowned by the rising water. “And it keeps going until the dream finally kills us, and a new nightmare begins.”
I flash to Corinthe’s torture; I instantly shove the image away, terrified that the mere thought could re-trigger it.
The water is now up to my waist, and it seems to be pouring in faster and faster. “If we drown, will you and I be separated?”
Nishi doesn’t answer, but she tightens her grip on my hand as my feet float off the ground. “When Imogen shot me, how did you escape the Party?”
Whether she’s asking from curiosity or just to distract us from our imminent deaths, I’m glad to feel useful one last time. I furrow my brow in concentration, and I find that the more I focus on the past, the better I remember it.
“It was . . . my Mom.”
“What?” Nishi’s amber irises grow bright with wonder.
“She saved me.” As I say the words, the full memory unfurls: “Hysan found her. They were working together in secret for weeks—”
Our heads bob against the Houses of Helios emblem on the ceiling, and we cling to each other as our faces tilt up into the last layer of air. I pull in as deep an inhale as possible before we’re sucked under.
It’s pitch black all around us, more like Space than underwater, and I feel bubbles streaming from my nostrils as we descend deeper and deeper and deeper. My head starts to pound from the lack of oxygen, and Nishi’s hand grows limp in mine, and I know soon this will all be over.
Suddenly my boot brushes against something solid, and I reach down and feel the ground. There’s some kind of metal lever sticking up from the floor.
I try to push it down with one hand, but I can’t. Nishi must realize what I’m doing because she frees her fingers from mine and wraps both hands around the metal, and together we try shoving it.
The lever gives way, and water begins to whirlpool around us as a drain opens in the floor, and all of it swirls away. As I finally draw breath, I turn to my best friend in relief—and I run out of oxygen again.
Nishi’s sprawled on the ground, her long dark hair fanned around her.
Dead.
4
“NISHI, NO!”
I drop down beside her fallen body, her eyes closed and chest unmoving. Remembering my childhood training, I apply chest compressions and administer mouth to mouth, again and again and again. “Don’t leave me alone here, Nish, please,” I beg as tears well in my eyes, and I press down on her chest yet again—
Her eyes fly open, and she starts coughing up water.
Air rushes out of my lungs as quickly as it rushes into hers, and I help her sit up, the tension in my body finally easing. When it’s clear she’s going to be okay, I finally take note of our surroundings.
We’re in a supersized supply closet lined with aisles upon aisles of shelves. Compression suits, helmets, oxygen tanks, and other gear are stacked alongside weapons like Tasers, pistols, and Ripples.
I help Nishi to her feet, and we survey the supplies around us. Then she wordlessly grabs a pistol and starts filling her pockets with extra ammunition, and I raise a Ripple to eye level, resting its butt against my shoulder. It’s House Cancer’s signature weapon, but it’s considered mostly ceremonial, since Cancrians don’t have a violent gene in us.
Unless our loved ones are threatened.
The crossbow device is made of tightly woven strands of Sea Spider silk that propel up to a dozen slender darts whittled from nar-clam shells and dipped in the paralyzing poison of a Maw. The weapon isn’t light, but its weight is comfortable, making the device sturdy enough to keep steady.
Even though I’ve never held one before, it feels familiar. As Nishi hands me extra dart cartridges, she says, “Remember that Protector of the Planets holo-game you used to love playing because it always greeted you by announcing to the whole entertainment center that you had one of the highest scores?”
“That’s not why I loved playing it—”
“The Ripple is just a fancier version of the crossbow you always used in there,” she finishes.
It feels like years since the carefree days when I used to hologram myself into that virtual reality world. The game would provide players with a weapons cache that holds twelve devices, and now that I think about it, they all seemed a lot like watered-down versions of the signature weapons of every House.
“I always chose the crossbow,” I muse out loud.
Nishi strides up to a different shelf and pulls down a couple of blue space suits with the university’s logo. She hands one to me. “In case the walls come down around us,” she says with a shrug.
Since she means that literally, we pull the suits on over our uniforms. “So where’s your mom been this whole time?” she asks as we change.
“With the Luminaries.” It’s getting easier to lower my guard with Nishi around, and I continue pushing down on the walls that barricade my memories to keep filling in the blanks. “It’s a secret society of people who’ve Seen the Last Prophecy, which is—”
“Yeah, I’ve heard of the Last Prophecy,” she says dismissively as we clip black helmets to our belts and holster our weapons. “There are tons of conspiracy nuts on Sagittarius who believe in it.”
“It’s real, Nish. The master himself confirmed it.”
She stops working and steps closer to me, staring into my eyes. “Who’s the master?”
“Crompton.” For some reason, I whisper the name. “He’s the original Aquarius.”
Her face pales, and she begins to shake her head. “No way—”
“It’s true, Nish. He betrayed Ophiuchus to the other Guardians and stole his Talisman to keep his immortality for himself—”
An arrow flies over our heads, and we duck.
Without looking back, we hurtle down the aisle, holding hands, running past rows of shelves in search of an exit as more arrows shoot after us. A dart lodges into the wall a hair behind me, and items keep exploding over our heads.
“There!” shouts Nishi, and she pulls me down a row that dead-ends in a metal elevator, its doors opening like it’s welcoming us in. An arrow bounces off the helmet clipped to my hip as we slide inside.
Nishi frantically presses the button to close the doors, and while we wait for them to shut, I catch a glimpse of our pursuer. He’s in a billowing black cloak, his facial features shrouded in his hood’s shadow. And as he marches toward us, I realize he isn’t human.
Twin walls of metal swallow the view before I can see more, and I blow out a hard breath as we ascend somewhere—anywhere.
“What’s the plan?” I ask Nishi. “While we wait for someone to save us, we’re just condemned to live out our worst nightmares?”
She shakes her head. “The antidote alone isn’t enough.” Her voice sounds small again. “Even if you’re dosed, you won’t escape until you’ve faced your greatest fear.”