The Other Side (20 page)

Grizzly B bows his head. “I attacked the walls. I was not very focused.”

“Still aren't,” T-Clef says.

They laugh.

I decide I like them, and I think they really do like me, so I take a chance. “Why do you think they sent Klyv's team down south?” Grizzly B stops midbite, his eyes narrowing with suspicion. I quickly add, “Because of me?”

T-Clef shrugs.

“It's not actually down south, like in Texas or something,” Grizzly B says. “It could be east or west. Sometimes they go up north, might end up in the same place.”

“It's not meant to be a mystery,” T-Clef says, shooting him a look. “You know how we work, right?”

I shake my head.

“On a need-to-know basis,” Grizzly B says.

T-Clef nods. “And the only things we need to know
are how to shoot and ride. We don't have thinscreens or sat radios or cell phones, we don't get updates about what's going on topside. We don't know what we're supposed to do next until HQ tells us.”

Which means they don't know where HQ is, where Allie is. “Doesn't that frustrate you?”

“You get used to it. It's better that way. No point in worrying about things you can't change. Only clouds your brain,” Grizzly B says.

“And we get enough clouding as it is,” T-Clef says, tapping her CENSIR.

They laugh again.

T-Clef's face hardens. “Seriously, though, Missy C, questions are dangerous things.” Back to perky and singing. “Ours is not to reason why . . .”

Grizzly B joins her for the last part. “Ours is just to fly and die.”

Someone's
playing the piano. I know the song. “Over the Rainbow.” At first I thought it was a nightmare.

The piano stops momentarily, starts again. The same song.

I get up from my cot, wrap the blanket around my shoulders. Most everybody else appears asleep, though a quartet of boys is playing cards at the table near the entrance. In the crank lamp's light, I see Grizzly B bobbing his head.

I skulk forward, hear him humming along to the music.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” The fat one rolls his eyes. “Wake up from your clouds and play your cards, G.”

Grizzly B stops humming and shows his hand. “How 'bout them lemon drops?” He scoops the pile of tokens scattered at the table center into his stash.

Fattie notices me. He stands and blocks my escape. “Where you sneaking off to, Missy C?”

“Just need some fresh air.”

“Fresh air. Good one.” Cowboy and Skinny laugh; Grizzly B resumes humming and bobbing.

I shrug. “What's with the midnight music?”

Fattie hooks a thumb at Grizzly. “That's a generous way to put it.”

“The piano,” I clarify.

“Piano? Do you hear a piano, guys?”

Cowboy and Skinny stare blankly at me.

Fattie cocks his head. “You feeling that itch, Missy C?”

“Over the Rainbow” starts over.

“Stop messing with her,” Grizzly B says. He looks at me. “It's a nightly ritual.”

I frown. “They ever play anything else?”

Fattie snorts. “Feel free to put in a request if you don't like it.”

“For all the good it'll do,” Skinny says.

They laugh.

I start for the door, but Fattie sidesteps with me. “You want in, Missy C?” He indicates the table.

“I'm good, thanks. Now, if you'll excuse me . . .”

He doesn't budge. “You in Praxus land?”

I don't answer.

He grabs my wrist. “What's my name, Missy C?”

“I can't remember.” It's true, but not for the reason he wants it to be.

“I don't think she is,” Grizzly B says, eyebrows pinched together.

I prefer Fattie's leers over his scrutiny. I drop my voice low so only Fattie hears. “If you don't want me to hurt you in front of your friends, I'd sit back down.”

“Brave words for somebody in cuffs,” he whispers, but releases me. “Better sleep with one eye open tonight, boys,” he says with a chuckle, and turns his shoulder for me to pass. “Wouldn't venture too far, Missy C. Not everybody's as understanding as we are.”

He slaps my ass. It takes all my control not to whirl and knee him in the groin, but I can't afford any more enemies at the moment. I look at my feet and head for the chapel, the only way out of here.

The piano player starts over.

Rainbows and magic, dreams and lies.

As I round the corner, the piano goes silent. As I open the door that leads into the chapel, it awakens again. The same damn song, sad, happy, and beautiful all at once. And horrible. Above all, horrible.

James sits in the second of three rows, head bowed onto the back of the front pew. T-Clef's on the piano. Eyes closed,
fingers caressing the keys, head swaying with the music, a small smile on her lips.

Neither of them seems to have noticed me. I skirt the edge, tiptoeing along the carpet. Come to a sudden stop when I hear James. He's singing. Not very loud. And not very well. But earnest. It almost sounds like he's crying.

I listen to him for an entire verse before it's too much. I take a step. The floorboard betrays me with a sharp creak. His head jerks up, and he's staring at me. For a second there is a rainbow in his eyes, and then the clouds return.

He rises, raises his hands in a defensive position.

“I wasn't sneaking up on you,” I say.

He advances on me slowly. “What's my name, Melissa?”

I give it to him.

He looks at me, into me. “I'm sorry.”

I shrug, my heartbeat accelerates. “About what?”

He nods toward the piano. “It helps calm the dragons.”

“Oh.”

“They'd never admit it, but they're scared.”

“Why this song?” I ask.

“Because it has hope, because it promises a better tomorrow.”

“You only believe that if you're a foolish bluebird.” Or a foolish girl. My vision starts to blur. I look away from him. “Other songs are better for . . . hope.”

“Maybe, but I know this song.”

“Did my mother sing it to you?” I ask, unable to keep the bitterness from my voice.

He nods. “When I was younger. When my parents were away on missions and I was scared.”

When she should have been home with me, when
I
was scared.

“It's my song. Not yours,” I mutter. It was the first thing she taught me. I'd play it and she'd sing it. And even when she wasn't there, I could play. And the world was right.

And then the world wasn't. And there's no goddamn song in the universe to unbreak the broken.

“I gotta go.”

He reaches for me. “I'll come with you.”

I pull free. “Alone. I'm fine. Please, James.”

I leave. He doesn't follow. The music does. There are three SUVs parked outside the prayer center. Each has a thumbprint scanner on the driver's door. Each rejects me. I bang hard on the window of the last one, but it's bulletproof or something, and now my hand hurts. And I'm crying and the goddamn music won't stop.

I run. Straight down the middle of the highway, as fast as I can. The music is faster. I lose my strength. I look around. I don't know where I am. Everything looks the same. Faded signs indicate a dragon shelter on my left, a supply depot on
my right, another prayer center up ahead. The understate continues both ways into dark loneliness.

The supply depot's unlocked. Handcuffed, it takes me a good minute to crank up the lamp on the entryway table. Through a film of dust particles, I see row upon row of mostly empty shelves. Nothing useful. I slide over the pharmacy counter.

In the back I find some long-expired NyQuil. I down it in several gulps. I slump down, open a second bottle, close my eyes. I drink. And I sing. And I drink. And I sing.

And that's how James finds me. Slouched against the wall, caroling about bluebirds on rainbow dragon highways. T-Clef's with him.

“You're James, and you're T-Clef.” I grin. “See, I know your names, but can you answer me this? Why aren't there any yellow dragons? Why didn't Blues fly?”

“It's going to be okay,” James says as he scoops me up.

I laugh. “Liar.”

He carries me to an SUV. T-Clef climbs in back with me, hums a lullaby as I lie on her lap. She cleans the tears from my face, then sits me up.

“Hold still now, and I'm sorry in advance.” She grabs my hands, pulls them to her cheeks so that my fingernails dig into her skin. Before I can stop her, she drags them down her face, leaving bloody scratch marks. Then she slaps me hard.

I fall back against the door, feel a wave of nausea. She steadies me. “You okay?”

“What the hell?”

“We needed to make this presentable,” she says. “I'm sorry.”

James looks over his shoulder at me, grimaces. “It's best that the others think you had a detox relapse.”

I get it. They'll leave me alone if they think I'm a ravioli-lid, might-go-dragon-on-you psycho, and not some weak girl who breaks down when she hears somebody playing a piano. I look at T-Clef, who's smiling at me even as blood trickles down her cheeks. “Thank you.”

She winks. “Just don't make it a habit.”

We drive back to the prayer center. James picks me up, then sets me on my feet outside the door. He and T-Clef grab me by the elbows. She presses a railshot to my ribs.

“If you could snarl a bit, that would help,” T-Clef says.

“Think about what they did to your mother,” James whispers in my ear.

It's the best thing to say, and the worst. Inside, the piano sits empty, but the song plays on.

An
alarm clock's chirping at me. For a moment, I think I've suffered the most horrific nightmare, but then I hear the grumbling and groans. I open my eyes. Insurgents are crawling out of their cots.

T-Clef stumbles past me and smacks the alarm.

“What's my name, bitch?” she says, loud enough for everybody to hear. I hiss it at her. She jerks me up, jams the railshot into my ribs. I grimace out a growl. She keeps me at arm's length, marches me to a table. I get some mumbled catcalls and sidelong leers, but everybody keeps a safe distance.

She feeds me by tossing ravioli at my face, saying things like “This is how you feed crazy bitches” and “Does bitch want more?” She scowls at me throughout, and I try to focus on the scratches on her cheeks, but by the fifth time she's smacked me
in the face with cold noodles, I'm half ready to really kill her.

When the can's empty, she gives me a slight nod, then hurls it at my face. I duck just in time.

“Come on, we're already running late, guys,” Grizzly B says from the doorway. The few bystanders who stuck around to witness my humiliation and offer up their own taunts funnel out of the room.

“I'll be there in a little bit,” T-Clef calls after them. “Gotta give her dessert.”

Grizzly B gives me a thumbs-up and sprints off.

T-Clef cleans my face with a wet rag. “How you doing?”

“Where's James?”

“Said he had to do something. Think he didn't want to be here for this.”

“How much longer we have to do this?”

“Usually it's a couple of days.”

I glance at her. “You've done this before?”

“Lots. Though never pretend before. It's kind of fun, isn't it?” She retrieves a makeup bag from under her bed.

“What's that for?”

“I'm gonna rough you up some.” She clenches a fist, fakes punching me, grins. “I've got a reputation to uphold.”

I spend the rest of the morning handcuffed to a chair in the arena, watching everybody else blow up mannequins.
Mostly watching James. He leads the scoreboard. Others joke and laugh and kill efficiently, but he's stoic and focused and kills ruthlessly.

He's always seemed so confident, so sure of right and wrong. Real or not real? Maybe he's wearing a mask, too.

Wear it long enough, and is that who you become?

Who have I become?

It's been almost six weeks since I lost Allie, and I'm no closer to finding her. In the meantime, I've managed to make life worse for everybody I know. I can only imagine what the mask I wear resembles. Bloodied and battered and scarred with savagery. I don't know if I'll ever be able to take it off.

I break my promise and try contacting Grackel to see if she's heard anything from Allie, if she knows anything about Colin, but I don't get a response. The CENSIRs can be set to limit communication to specific dragons, so maybe I can only talk with Praxus.

I'm trying to reach her again when Vincent comes over for his periodic checkup on me. “What's my name?”

I give it to him. He scrolls through pictures on his phone. I give him those names. He checks my CENSIR readout, pats me on the shoulder, and resumes instructing the others on proper killing technique. In a few more minutes, he'll return to my chair and ask me the same questions.

What is my name? Who am I? Melissa Callahan,
Twenty-Five, Diocletian, Murderer?

At the end of the dummy decapitation session, Vincent orders everybody to gear up for dragon dashes. Cheers echo through the cavern as they hurry toward the lockers to change. Even James smiles. It fades when he glances at me. I give him my best fake smile, fine as fuck, but he's already moved on.

“You can hide who you are from them,” Vincent says, pulling my attention from James.

The bald instructor towers over me, his eyes dark and unreadable. “But you can't hide the truth from the CENSIR.”

I laugh at the irony. I wish the CENSIR would tell me my truth.

He frowns. “It's normal to come off the high and experience emotional reflux. It's not easy, what we do.”

I look at him. He was playing along with my detox story for everybody else. He knows I'm not under Praxus's influence.

“I'm fine,” I say, because that's the only choice.

“‘Black care rarely sits behind a rider whose pace is fast enough,'” he says, removing my cuffs. “Luckily, we've got dragons.”

The other riders are finishing gearing up when Vincent and I reach the lockers. He instructs me to wait with him until they've vacated the area. “You're dangerous,” he says.
“At least for a few more days.”

After everybody's disappeared into the stairwell beneath the wall, I'm allowed to change. The label on my locker now says
Melissa
in somewhat ugly handwriting. Inside, the pictures of Double T and his family have been removed. So have the Confederate-flag bandannas. The body armor's smaller; so is the helmet. The scored dragon-jet stickers on it look new. I don't count, but I suspect there are eighteen.

Inside the helmet, I find a package of earplugs with a sticky note taped to them in that same ugly handwriting as my name.
To help with the outside noise.

“Go!” Vincent shouts.

Praxus launches toward his hatch with an earsplitting roar. In the other cages, Bakul and Erlik roar toward their hatches. Soon we're in our chute, swerving around, ducking under, and smashing through outcroppings. We zig and zag through tunnel after tunnel, sometimes shooting up, sometimes jetting down. Half the time my stomach's in my throat or feet, and the other half I'm too busy holding on to make sense of up or down at all.

Yet when we exit from our tunnel into the mammoth cavern that signals the halfway point of the racecourse, we're in last place. The other two dragons and their riders are already looping back toward their respective tunnels. Praxus banks
hard right on an intercept path with Erlik. The smaller Green turns its head to growl at us, but stays on its line.

I yank on the reins, yell at Praxus to get back on course, but he doesn't listen. I use the command Vincent taught me before I boarded Praxus for my dragon dash. “Shock, pulse level one!”

Tendrils of lightning shoot from the collar around his neck. Praxus spasms, his glow flickers, but he's a stubborn bastard.

“Shock, pulse level two!”

He spasms harder, his wings hiccup, and we crash to the cavern floor.

You are craven, human. I should eat your bones.

“Bring it, Praxi, or stop wasting my time. We're losing.”

Death is the only competition.

No wonder he's come in last in the five races before mine, by a good margin.

He sprinted all the way here just in hopes of fighting Erlik. Now that that's no longer a possibility, he's gonna lie here as long as he damn well pleases. Which would be fine by me, but I'm already persona non grata and I can't afford any more blemishes to my ravioli-stained reputation.

“The faster you are, the faster you get to kill things.”

What do I get to kill at the end of this game of yours?

“The next time you want to go actually kill something,
they might send Erlik or Bakul.”

I cannot help it if your kind makes foolish decisions.

I'm so frustrated I almost shock him again but stop myself. I know what it's like to be controlled, to be forced. I am not that person. I cannot be that person.

I go the taunting route, knowing that gets him hot under the saddle. “It's because you're injured, isn't it? That's the real reason. You couldn't even keep up if you wanted to. It's okay to admit weakness, Praxi—”

He rockets off the ground, hissing something guttural at me that's definitely not English. Might just be a growl. We zip toward the end of the cavern, where a mattresslike pad is pinned to the wall. It's got a red X on it. Makes me think of Colin and our crate training, but this time I'm the bullet.

Praxus whips his tail into the mattress. I hear an alarm bell in my CENSIR, followed by an announcement of our halfway time (six minutes and twenty-two seconds) and our time behind second place (one minute and thirty-seven seconds).

No way we're catching up, but it's not the other dragons I'm competing against. It's Praxus's other riders. I've gotta make up ten seconds if I don't want to end up in last place.

“So I can hum to you. . . .” I sample the
Kissing Dragons
theme song. “Or you can be a brave little Green and—”

I jerk backward as he accelerates to lightning-bolt speed.
I press against him, hold on tight, and enjoy the ride the best I can.

By the time we reach our cage, new riders are already mounting Erlik and Bakul. T-Clef, James, and the others from Praxus's Posse clap as we touch down. It's the standard response for a completed run. I'll call that a win.

Get off.

“Good job,” I say.

Get off.
With him growling and stomping about like a giant elephant throwing a temper tantrum, it takes some effort to descend the rope down his shoulder. I bang against his leg a couple of times and almost slip a couple more.

Once my feet are firmly on the ground, I look up at him. “That was fun. Thank you.”

He snorts smoke in my face, slams his foot to the ground, knocking me off my feet.

I do not like you.

I smile at him. “I do not like you either.”

I'd swear he smiles back. Or he could just be showing me how sharp his teeth are.

“Round two. T-Clef, you're up!” Vincent calls from the middle of the walkway that separates the four dragon cages.

T-Clef saunters into the cage, gives me a curt nod, then a wink when she's closer. “You got some heat in his beat, Missy C.”

I exit the cage. People still keep their distance, but I do get a couple tips of the chin. James ignores me, his gaze focused through the bars on Praxus, but as I pass behind him, I hear him say, “You agitated him pretty good.” Sounds like he's grinning.

“Riders ready?” Vincent bellows as I retake my probationary position beside him.

“Ready!”

“Go!”

The dragons disappear into the chutes. The cavern darkens. Still enough light from the crank lamps around the perimeter to show Vincent's scowl. “Next time, do better.”

My heart sinks.

Then he shows me his phone.

Second place.