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I feel her mouth smile and giggles erupt up her torso.

“Wyatt? What are you doing?” Christopher says with an exasperated sigh. “You know you’re not supposed to be topside unless Phil or one of us authorizes it.”

I pull back from Penny. She’s all smiles. “Well, Uncle Chris, the plan really wasn’t to
go
topside…”

He rolls his eyes at me and flicks me on the forehead. “Surely, you can…” He shrugs. “I don’t know what to say.” He waves us back down the stairs. “Go play video games or something.”

Penny and I fast walk it down the stairs and past the guard station, Phil giving us the stink eye. Penny gets another case of the giggles and grabs my hand, pulling me down the dorm hall to her room.

“Should we try again later tonight?” she asks, stopping at her door and looking up at me.

It takes me a moment to realize she’s talking about sneaking out and not kissing. I shake my head. “Nah. That was our one opportunity. We’re on Phil’s radar now – no way he pees until curfew when security switches over to auto-Phil, which is even harder to get past than regular Phil.”

Her mouth turns down in disappointment, and I can hardly stand it. “We can’t talk to Christopher or Ben? Get one of them to help us?”

I shake my head again. “I just can’t give up so easily. This is what a Lookout does and I’m yours. Trust that I’m not going to fail you. I will figure out a way to get to Parker Henry so you can rewind the hell out of him like the badass you are.”

She smiles wanly. “I get it. I just wish my visions were of the future instead of real time. What a useless fucking power.”

I put my hand on her upper arm and give it a gentle squeeze. “Don’t worry. I got this.”

Penny reaches up and puts her hand over mine, intertwining our fingers.

“Your power isn’t useless, either,” I blurt. “You’re awesome; it’s the rest of us that need to come up to your level.”

She looks away from me, her tentative smile turning into a smirk and mutters, “If you only knew,” dropping my hand from her arm.

“If I only knew what?” I ask, wondering how there could possibly be anything worse than what I already know about her – than all of the horrible things I know had been done to her.

Penny shrugs.
“Nothing.” She looks up at me again, her eyes amused. “So what was with that non-kiss?”

My face heats and I’m sure my cheeks must be the color of
Zellie’s hair. “Yeah, sorry, that was not chido.” I swallow, stalling. “It was the first thing that popped into my head.”

She tugs her badge to the side and holds it over the doorknob, unlocking her dorm room. “Next time, you might want to move your lips a little more. Girls like that, you know.”

I didn’t know,
know
, but I figured. Seems logical
. Not that Penny needs to be informed of any further lameness on my part. “What makes you think I really wanted to kiss you?” I tease, totally out of control and for sure on the verge of embarrassing myself.

Penny bites her lip and glances down. I follow her gaze with mine.

Right.

“About that,” I sputter.

She opens the door and backs into her room. “Oh, I know
all
about that, Wy, don’t you worry.” Penny gives me a little wave. “I’m going to turn in. Sweet dreams.”

“Sweet dreams.”

Penny

“Careful, Penny,” Elle says.

I kick my flip flops off underneath my bed and turn to look at her sitting on hers. I can’t tell what she means -- her expression is weird -- like she’s trying to appear as though she’s joking. “Careful?”

She shrugs.
“With Wyatt. He doesn’t know how to handle girls flirting with him. He’ll think you want to be his girlfriend.”

That statement raises my hackles and one of my eyebrows. “Is there a reason I wouldn’t want Wyatt as a boyfriend? He’s not taken, right?” I open the door to my wardrobe and step behind it, stripping off my clothes and avoiding Elle’s narrowing gaze.

“No, he’s not taken,” she huffs. “You know he isn’t.”

I yank on a pair of soft blue pajama pants, leaning my head back to meet her eye. “What do you think I’m going to do to him? Lead him on with my slutty ways and then kick him to the curb?”

Elle hugs her pillow to her chest and chews her bottom lip. “Of course not. I didn’t mean to insinuate…I’m overly protective of him. Sorry.”

She does look truly sorry. I pull on a tank top and then hang up the outfit I wore today. I’ve discovered that at the end of the orange hall there’s a nice group of Seer ladies who will wash my clothes for me every two weeks – with filtered instead of reclaimed water at that! This place was too good to be true.

“Are you mad?” Elle says.

“What?” I come back to reality. “No, I was actually marveling again about how nice we have it here. There’s not some catch? We’re not secretly being experimented on in our sleep or anything?” I close the wardrobe door and get under my covers, lying on my side facing Elle.

She smiles at me. “Wyatt’s going to fall for you. You’re his kind of person.”

Why was she being so back and forth about him? Which was it – heartbreaker or
heartsaver? “Elle, you can tell me if you have a thing for Wyatt.”

“I…” she looks down at her comforter and brushes something off of it.

“If you do, spit it out. If you don’t and you’re merely acting as a good friend, then don’t worry so much. I’m mixed up, and I haven’t always made the best choices, but I’m not someone who goes out of her way to tear other people down. I don’t see Wyatt as just some guy. We’re becoming friends and we’re flirting and, yeah, I would like him to kiss me. That’s where things are at right now.” I flip over onto my back and press the button on the wall by my head, shutting off the lights on my side of the room. Elle does the same.

I’m pleased I got the last word in, until I realize Elle never answered my last question.

Chapter Twelve

Wyatt

I jolt awake as Kai moves his hand from pinching my nose closed to covering my mouth. “It’s happening again. Penny’s on the move,” he whispers, and then opens the door to our room. Elle is standing in the hall, arm outstretched, holding Penny on pause, her face marred with anxiety.

I quickly throw my covers off, grab the shorts I’d slung over the back of my desk chair, and put them on. Kai tosses a t-shirt at me, and I pull it over my head as I jam my feet into flip flops. I retrieve my Ret-tech and badge from their spots on my desktop and we’re out the door.

“I’m letting go,” Elle says, lowering her hand.

Kai runs ahead and rouses Reed; I feel Phoebe come up beside me, her Ret-tech already engaged, even though she’s still in her Seahawks nightshirt.

Penny moves down the hall toward the stairwell. We follow behind, Reed and Ty joining us, as Penny waves her badge over the door handle. She picks up speed on the stairs, bypassing the Orange floor and the Purple floor, where Lookout Command is located, and stalls for just a moment in front of the door to the Yellow floor.

“We don’t have access to this floor, Penny,” I say, not knowing if she can hear me.

She reaches back and grasps the badge around my neck, dragging me forward. She swipes her badge and then mine over the handle three times and it clicks open, the indicator light glowing green.

“Looks like we do now,” Reed says, rubbing his hands together. For years the rumor has been that the Yellow floor contains an alternate exit. Not even I could get a straight answer from any of my relatives, and I’m a first-rate annoyer.

Penny begins to jog down the hallway. There’s nothing here – just blank white walls and gray laminate tile. Abruptly, she stops and looks up at the ceiling. Holding her badge above her head, a tiny red laser light shines down and scans over it.

The wall to the left of us slides open, revealing a brightly lit yellow hallway. Penny breaks out in a run, but her legs are short and I keep up with her easily.

“You’d think they’d put some electric golf carts down here or something,” Ty whines after a while. “We’ve been running for at least a mile!”

“There’s another door up ahead,” I yell back to him.

When we reach it, Penny does the triple badge swipe again, using as much care to handle my person as she did the first time. The door opens to another stairwell. We continue on, up and up, following Penny until we find another door. This one doesn’t require anything fancy; she simply turns the handle and walks through.

Into a storage closet.

Penny

Parker sits under a harsh light, on a metal folding chair in a dimmed room, surrounded by wooden crates filled with squat white tanks. His hands are zip-tied behind his back, just below
the cuffs of his blazer. His face is beaten: both eyes swollen and crusted with blood, his perfect nose broken, crooked and bruised, his bottom lip split, revealing two gaping black holes where teeth should be.

I listen to his labored breathing for a long time, concentrating on his chest rising and falling in stutters. I’m going to him, for the first time I’m aware that what I see in my dreams is happening in real life. It’s happening while I am on my way. An intense burst of adrenaline shoots through me. I’ve got to make it. This scenario was never supposed to go this far, escalate this much. If I’d continued dreaming at the beach, Parker Henry would be in his hotel room relaxing with a beer and a burger, having survived the kidnapping.

The bearded man comes forward. He backhands Parker across the face. “I’m losing my patience with you. The Crusaders know-”

“I don’t know anyone called The Crusaders,” Parker moans, squeezing his eyes closed. “If I did, if I knew what this formula was that you think I have, I would give it to you.”

The other man emerges from the shadows, his face fully visible. It’s Darren. His expression is cold and calculated; it’s not one I recognize, but I get the feeling he is showing his true self. I spent the better part of a year with him and the implications of why he was with me…I’m beginning to think I wasn’t as hidden as I thought I was. I’m beginning to think that several things in my life are not the coincidences I thought they were.

Elle, Maud Lavoie, my parents’ deaths, the Society School, meeting Parker outside of the airport bathroom, Wyatt Adams being the only available Lookout – all of this is connected.
By this formula? Or The Crusaders?

Darren reaches back into darkness and comes up with a baton
tazer. He points it at Parker’s chest.

Wyatt

Penny feels along the wall of the storage closet, frantic. She turns to me, her eyes wild and pleading.

“What are you looking for?” I ask, cramming my hand behind a metal shelf that holds cleaning supplies.
“A door? Is there a door in he-” My fingers scrape over a switch and I flip it up. I jump back when the shelf splits open, becoming two halves. The breeze from the ocean blows down the alley in front of us, mixing with the rancid smell of the Dumpster across the way. Penny rushes forward and takes off down the alley.

Penny

“He doesn’t know anything. Our intel was bad,” the old guy shouts, pacing back and forth.

Darren smirks. “Our
intel isn’t the problem. He’ll talk.” He tucks the baton under his arm and cracks his knuckles. “It’s just going to take another level of persuasion.”

The bearded man snaps his head toward Parker and narrows his eyes.
“Unless you’re a twin. You got a twin brother, rock star?”

Darren’s menacing expression falters for a second.

“No, I’m not him,” Parker says, shaking his head emphatically. “I told you I’m not him. Do you not recognize me, Mr. Dansbury? Please. Please don’t hurt me anymore,” he begs.

Darren puts a hand on the bearded man’s shoulder. “Why don’t you get some air? You’re getting a little mixed up.”

He nods and walks away.

“My partner may be confused about
who you are and what you do, but I’m not,” Darren says. “As for the not hurting you anymore? Give up the formula, simple as that.”

Parker spits blood at Darren’s feet. “Fuck you,
dumbshit. Like you’d be able to understand it. ”

Darren furiously jabs the baton into Parker’s chest, sending a constant current of electricity through his body. Parker doesn’t move, can’t move, as his skin turns bright red, blistering, burning from the inside out.

Wyatt

I round the corner, chasing after Penny, nearly mowing down a homeless guy. Penny collapses in mid-sprint, like she’s tripped over something, only there’s nothing in her way. If her ribs weren’t broken before, they are now, I’m sure of it.

Two seconds later, I’m there, kneeling beside her, my heart thudding in my chest. I have failed her. I’m not up to the task of being her Lookout. Penny deserves Melody or Aunt Hazel or even Phoebe. Someone born to this who would use their God-given common sense and not get all wrapped up in trying to prove themselves.

The gang catches up and surrounds us, blocking people from looking at the limp body of a beautiful girl and the stupid, hopelessly average boy who was supposed to be her protector kneeling on the sidewalk.

I cradle Penny’s head in my hands, smoothing my thumbs over her forehead in circles, trying to rouse her gently.

Slowly, her lids rise and she takes a moment to focus on my face before tears well up in the inner corners of her eyes and spill out onto her cheeks. “He’s dead. I didn’t get there in time.”

From behind me comes the sound of three men clearing their throats.

“
Awwww. Shit,” Reed curses.

I turn and look over my shoulder.

Avery.

Christopher.

Ben.

All raging pissed, standing with their arms crossed.
Two out of the three in pajamas.

“What.
The. Fuck,” Ben says.

Avery comes over and gets on the other side of Penny. He takes a
Medi-punc from the zippered pocket on the arm of his scrubs and taps it on Penny’s thigh. She drifts off. He slips the instrument back in his pocket and then motions for me to get out of the way. Easily, he scoots his arms underneath Penny’s knees and back and lifts her up.

Raleigh pulls up in the van, the door sliding open.

“Get in,” Christopher says, running his hand over his face, his eyes tired and disappointed.

We all silently get into the van, Elle and Phoebe sitting on Kai and Reed’s laps so that there’s room for everyone.

Avery holds Penny to him on the first bench seat, his eyes flicking over her features, evaluating. Ben reaches out and lays his hand on her forearm.

Raleigh drives away from the curb, pulls a U-
ey and heads down Ocean Park, back to school.

I lean my forehead against the second row window, not really looking at anything. Elle ruffles up my hair, but I duck away from her touch.

I deserve whatever is coming to me.

My sisters meet us in the rotunda; Zellie follows Avery, who is still carrying Penny, down the hall toward the infirmary. Melody hooks her elbow around mine and squeezes me to her for a second. This is not how my sister usually acts -- real Lookouts are typically aloof and professional, but she’s the one person who doesn’t seem super mad at me, so I’ll take it.

The rest of us file into the conference room. Melody, my friends, and I sit on one side of the table, Ben and Christopher on the other. Raleigh, as per usual, assumes a neutral position by sitting on the floor near the head of the table, his back against the wall.

Melody starts right in. “He did his job. He stuck with his Retro.”

Ben snorts. “Who gave away our one escape
route!”

“The instant you knew she was going toward the Yellow floor,” Christopher says, his eyes boring into me, “you should’ve gotten one of us to help you subdue her.”

No sense in hiding things now. It’s not like I can get in worse trouble. “I didn’t want to subdue her. When she started having a vision while we were at the beach, I stopped her and we lost precious information.”

Melody kicks me underneath the table. This, I’m more accustomed to.

“Wait,” Ben says, holding his hand up. “There’s more you didn’t tell us? This is not like you, kid. What’s got your brains so scrambled?”

No one says anything, although I can practically hear everyone thinking it. I shouldn’t already be this infatuated with Penny unless I’m her trigger, and there’s no way little
ol’ me could be that for someone like her. I feel, once again, the awesome kick in the balls of being powerless.

Elle takes the pressure off and reaches her hands across the table at Christopher and Ben. “Here’s the vision Penny had at the beach.”

They take her hand and close their eyes, seeing the vision.

Melody’s phone pings. “I’ve sent you everything I collected,” Phoebe says, flipping her microscreen up. Christopher and Ben open their eyes. “I’d also like it to be known that I fully support Wyatt’s decision to handle Penny’s visions the way he sees fit. He’s either a Lookout, or he’s not. You can’t treat him as such when it suits you just because he’s family.”

Have I mentioned that Phoebe is a shoo-in to be Lookout in Charge someday?

Avery appears on the screen at the far end of the room. “Hey, so here’s the deal. Her cracked ribs are now broken and she’s got contusions on her chin and chest from the fall. I’m going to keep her sedated for a few days, no arguments. I know I’m probably impeding a rewind by doing this, but she’s my patient and I’m not going to let her repeatedly injure herself. Someone has to care about Penny’s physical well-being because it’s clear that she’s never had that.”

My brother means well, but he doesn’t know what he’s doing in this instance. “Penny doesn’t want to be on drugs, Avery. She hasn’t been taking the ones that you gave he-”

Zellie sticks her head in next to Avery’s, everyone completely ignoring me. “When Avery takes her off of sedation, I’ll do a proper intake. We were foolish to try to assimilate her to our world like she’s a typical Retro. I think we all know now she’s anything but.”

Ben headdesks and then looks at me. “You’re off of Penny duty immediately and will bunk with your brothers and sisters aboveground.” He points to my friends. “The rest of you are on probation. You should not have seen what you saw and you absofuckinglutely shouldn’t have helped Wyatt keep Penny’s visions from us.”

He dismisses us with a wave of his hand. Uncle Ben has never been this harsh. I mean, I get that the alternate exit was supposed to be a secret, but I didn’t think we’d done the Worst Thing Ever in the Existence of the World.