Forged(29)

“I’m not sure.”

Harvey pinches the bridge of his nose like a headache’s coming on.

“You truly want to help me now?” I ask. “After yesterday I thought—”

“Yesterday,” he says, “changed everything. What you said about my work and how I hoped a victim of the Laicos Project might one day be thankful for it . . . I vaguely remembered saying that. Felt like it was years ago, but I knew the words were mine once you repeated them, even if some voice in the back of my head was telling me to ignore you. Then you mentioned Clipper.”

He gives a pretend tug at my fingernail. I fake a scream.

“That boy is the closest thing I have to a son, and when you said his name, I could feel my chest cracking. Mozart was playing, filling the room with these glorious notes and it was like a spike of truth had drilled through my skull. Suddenly I remembered that the piece playing was the same exact piece Clipper helped me select in Crevice Valley prior to our mission, the piece Bree was going to use to stage the diversion. All our plans came surging back, all my work for the Rebels, the reason I joined them—it woke me up, Gray. I remember now, and I am so, so sorry.”

And he looks it. There is pain written in the shape of his brows, regret in the creases surrounding his eyes.

“I want to help you,” Harvey says, cringing through the words. “And do right by Clipper. That thought is like a spear between my eyes, but pain I can deal with. My goal was always to undo the work I started, to right wrongs. I bailed on Frank once, and I can do it again.” He coughs, and takes a deep breath before continuing. “Whatever the real Harvey did, I can do, too.”

“If you’re thinking like the real Harvey, then you are the real Harvey,” I tell him. Almost exactly what I said to Jackson once, as we sat in a dark, musty boiler room beneath Burg and struck an alliance.

Harvey manages a smile and it makes him look years younger.

“You said you had a plan?”

“An idea . . . a way to possibly stop the Forgeries.”

“What about me and Emma? Is there even the slightest chance that we can get off this island?”

One side of Harvey’s mouth pulls into a grimace. “I don’t know. There’s a guard at nearly every stairwell, usually a few more per hall. Doorways to the docks open only to key cards or wrist implants, and then there’s the security booth that lets boats in and out of the channel itself.”

“What about the limitless Forgeries? You made them, right?” His grimace intensifies. “Maybe we can sneak out with a shipment.”

“It’s a thought,” he says, cringing as he considers it. When the pain seems to ebb a little, he adds, “Most shipments are heading to the capital and the other domed cities. A few are even going to exposed towns. Their numbers will increase the Order’s presence tenfold, help silence people with wavering loyalties. In the end, I think Frank will march the Forgeries on AmWest. He’s tiring of the Expats’ antics, and he’ll soon have the numbers to overwhelm them. And when he runs low, he can always build more. Because of this facility. Because of me.”

I shake my head, trying to make sense of why. What is Frank really after? I remember a story September and Sammy told around a fire in December—about Frank’s goal of avenging his family, whom he lost to AmWest bullets. Is this still about revenge? Somehow, it feels bigger.

A video feed on the mirrored wall cuts out unexpectedly, its picture replaced by static. I grab Harvey’s arm, and he turns, following my gaze. The Order members in the control room continue to go about their work, not yet aware of the lost signal, but as we glance through the other visuals, we spot movement adjacent to the dead feed.

An Order member walks briskly through a hallway, a gun in hand. Two guards at the far end of the hall see him and nod in greeting, but the approaching Order member doesn’t slow or acknowledge his comrades. He takes aim and shoots them dead. The shots are soundless on our end—just a flash, flash at the end of the barrel—and then the shooter looks up, aiming directly into the camera, and fires.

The picture goes dead, but not before I see her face.

Her.

Because it’s not an Order member.

It’s Bree.





FOURTEEN


THE FIRST THING I THINK is that she is beautiful. It’s a ridiculous thought in a moment like this, but it’s what courses through me—awe at her, at everything about her. Second is the relief, overwhelming and fierce. I assumed her dead, had been trying to not even think of her because of it, and now she is here, as stubborn and brave as ever. She reappears in another feed, walking faster, with purpose and determination, almost possessed. Her gun trains up. Another shot, another dead camera.

She rounds a corner to find three Order members on guard. She shoots twice, two go down, and then her gun clicks, empty. She releases the magazine, which clatters to the floor. As the last man draws his handgun, she reloads her weapon and drops to the ground all in one motion. She shoots his kneecap. He falls, screaming, and after a better-aimed shot from Bree, he is completely still. She scrambles to her feet and is again on her way.

Something hot laces my finger.

“Ow! What the—”

A shallow cut.

“Well, you’re not giving me anything useful!” Harvey shouts, holding the knife he’s used to draw blood. “Quit staring at screens and answer my questions.” He drops his voice to a whisper and adds, “She’s heading for the holding cells, clearing a path right to Emma. This is your ticket out.”