the lost files

8/2/2019 The Lost Files

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/the-lost-files 1/21

CHAPTER ONEKatarina says there is more than one way to hide.Before we came down here to Mexico, we lived in asuburb of Denver. My name then was Sheila, a name Ihate even more than my current name, Kelly. We livedthere for two years, and I wore barrettes in my hair and pin rubber bracelets on my wrists, li e all theother girls atmy school. I had sleepovers with some of them, the girls I called my friends. I went to schoolduring the school year, and in the summer I went to aswimmers camp at the YMCA. I li ed my friends andthe life we had there o ay, but I had alreadybeenmoved around by my Cêpan Katarina enough to nowthat it wasn t going to be permanent. I new it wasn tmyreallife.My real life too place in our basement, whereKatarina and I did combat training. By day, it was anordinary suburban rec room, with a big comfy couchand aTV in one corner and a Ping-Pong table in theother. By night, it was a well-stoc

ed combat traininggym, with hanging bags, floor mats, weapons, andeven a ma eshift pommel horse.In public, Katarina played the part of my mother,claiming thather husband and my father had been illed in a car accident when I was an infant. Ournames, our lives, our stories were all fictions,identities for me and Katarinato hide behind. Butthose identities allowed us to live out in the open. Acting normal.Blending in: that was one way of hiding.But we slipped up. To this day I can remember our conversation as we drove away from Denver, headedto Mexico for no other reason than we d never beenthere, both of us trying to figure out how exac

tly we dblown our cover. Something I said to my friend Elizahad contradicted something Katarina had said toEliza s mother. Before Denver we d lived in NovaScotia fora cold, cold winter, but as I remembered it,our story, the lie we d agreed to tell, was that we dlived in Boston before Denver. Katarina remembereddifferently, andclaimed Tallahassee as our previoushome. Then Eliza told her mother and that s whenpeople started to get suspicious.It was hardly a calamitous exposure. We had noimmediate reason to believe our slip would raise the ind of suspicion that couldattract the Mogadoriansto our location. But our life had gone sour there, andKatarina figured we d been there long enough as itwas.So we moved yet again.The sunis bright and hard in Puerto Blanco, the air impossibly dry. Katarina and I ma eno attempt toblend in with the other residents, Mexican farmers andtheir children. Our only regular contact with the localsis our once-a-wee trip into town tobuy essentials atthe small store. We are the only whites for manymiles, and tho

ugh we both spea

good Spanish,there s no confusing us for natives of the place. To our neighbors, we are the gringas, strange whiterecluses. Sometimes you can hidejust as effectively bystic ing out, Katarina says.She appears to be right. We have been herealmost a year and we haven t been bothered once.We lead a lonely but ordered life in a sprawling,single-level shac tuc

ed between two big patches of farmland. We wa e up with the sun, and before eatingor showering Katarina has me run drills in thebac yard: running up and down asmall hill, doingcalisthenics, and practicing tai chi. We ta eadvantage of the two relatively cool hours of morning.Morning drills are followed by a light brea

fast, thenthree hours of studies: languages, world history, andwhatever other subjects Katarina can dig up from theinternet. She says her teaching method and subjectmatter are eclectic. I don t now what that wordmeans, but I m just grateful forthe variety. Katarina isa quiet, thoughtful woman, and though she s theclosest thi

ng I have to a mother, she s very differentfrom me.Studies are probably the highlight of her day. Iprefer drills. After studies it s bac out into the blazing sun,where the heat ma es me dizzy enough that I canalmost hallucinate my imagined enemies. I do battlewith straw men: shooting them with arrows, stabbingthem with nives, or simply pummeling them with mybare fists. But half-blind from the sun, Isee them asMogadorians, and I relish the chance to tear them topieces. Katarinasays even though I am only thirteenyears old, I m so agile and so strong I couldeasilyta e down even a well-trained adult.One of the nice things about living inPuerto Blancois that I don t have to hide my s ills. Bac in Denver,whether swimming at the Y or just playing on thestreet, I always had to hold bac , to eep my



self fromrevealing the superior speed and strength thatKatarina s training regimenhas resulted in. We eepto ourselves out here, away from the eyes of others,soI don t have to hide.Today is Sunday, so our afternoon drills are short,only an hour. I am shadowboxing with Katarina in thebac yard, and I can feel her eagernessto quit: her moves are halfhearted, she s squinting against thesun, and she loo stired. I love training and could goall day, but out of deference to her I suggest we call ita day. Oh, I suppose we could finish early, she says. Igrin privately,allowing her to thin I m the tired one.We go inside and Katarina pours us two tall glasses of agua fresca, our customary Sunday treat. The fanis blowing full force in our humble shac s living room.Katarina boots up her various computers while I ic off my dirty, sweat-filled fighting boots and collapse tothe floor. I stretch my arms to eep them from nottingup, then swing them to the boo shelf inthe corner andpull out a tall stac of the board games we eep there.Ris , Stratego, Othello. Katarina has tried to interestme in games li e Life and Monopoly,saying itwouldn t hurt to be well-rounded. But those gamesnever held my interest. Katarina got the hint, and nowwe only play combat and strategy games.Ris is my favorite, and since we finished earlytoday I thin Katarina will agree to playingit eventhough it s a longer game than the others. Ris ?Katarina is at her des chair, pivoting from onescreen to the next. Ris of what? she as s absently.I laugh, then sha e the box near her head. Shedoesn t loo up from the screens, but the sound of allthose pieces rattling around inside the box is enoughfor her to get it. Oh, she says. Sure. I set up the board. Without as ing, I divvy up thearmies into hers and mine, and begin placing them allacross the game smap. We ve played this game somuch I don t need to as her which countries she dli e t

o claim, or which territories she d li

e to fortify.She always chooses the U.S. and Asia. I happilyplace her pieces on those territories, nowing thatfrom my moreeasily defended territories I will quic lygrow armies strong enough to crush hers.I m so absorbed in setting up the game I don t evennotice Katarina s silence,her absorption. It is onlywhen I crac my nec loudly and she neglects to scoldme for it Please don t, she usually says,squeamish about the sound it ma es that I loopand see her, staring openmouthed at one of her monitors. Kat? I as .She s silent.I get up from the floor, stepping across the gameboard to join her at her des . Itis only then that I seewhat has so completely captured her attention. Abrea ingnews item about some ind of explosion ona bus in England.I groan.Katarina is always chec ing the internet and thenews for mysterious deaths. Deaths that couldbe thewor of the Mogadorians. Deaths that could mean thesecond member of the Garde has been defeated.She s been doing it since we came to Earth, and I vegrown frus

trated with the doom-and-gloom of it.Besides, it s not li

e it did us any good thefirsttime.I was nine years old, living in Nova Scotia withKatarina. Our training room there was in the attic.Katarina had retired from training for the day, but I stillhad energy to burn, and was doing moores andspindles on the pommel horse alone when I suddenlyfelt a blast of scorching pain on my an le. I lost mybalance and came crashing down to the mat,clutching my an le and screaming in pain.My first scar. It meant that the Mogadorians had illed Number One, the first of the Garde. And for all of Katarina s web scouring, it had caught us bothcompletelyunaware.We waited on pins and needles for wee s after,expecting a second death and a second scar to followin short order. But it didn t come. I thin Katarina isstill coiled, anxious, ready to spring. But three yearshave passed almost a quarterof my whole life andit s just not something I thin about much.I step between her and the monitor. It s Sunday.Game time. Please, Kelly. She says my most recent alias wit

ha certain stiffness. I now I will always be Six to her. Inmy heart, too. Thesealiases I use are just shells,they re not who I really am. I m sure bac on LorienI had a name, a real name, not just a number. But that sso far bac , and I ve had somany names since then,that I can t remember what it was.Six is my true name. Sixis who I am.Katarina bats me aside, eager to read moredetails.We ve lost so many game days to news alerts li ethis. And they never turn out to be anything. They rejust ordinary tragedies.Earth, I ve come to discover, has no shortage of tragedies. Nope. It s just a bus crash. We re playing a game. I pull at her arms, eager for her to relax. She loo s sotired and worried, I now she could use the brea .She holdsfirm. It s a bus explosion. And apparently, she says, pulling away to read from the



screen, the conflict is ongoing. The conflict always is, I say, rolling my eyes. Comn. She sha es her head, giving one of her frazzledlaughs. O ay, she says. Fine. Katara pulls herself away from the monitors,sitting on the floor by the game. It ta es all my strengthnot to lic my chops at her upcoming defeat: I alwayswin at Ris

.I get down beside her, on my nees. You re right, Kelly, she says, allowing herselftogrin. I needn t panic over every little thing One of the monitors on Katarina s deslets out a sudden ding! One of her alerts. Her computers are programmed to scanfor unusual news reports, blogposts, even notable shifts in global weather allsifting for possible news of the Garde. Oh come on, I say.But Katarina is already off the floor and bac at thedes , scrolling and clic ing from lin to lin onceagain. Fine, I say, annoyed. But I m showing no mercywhen the game begins. Suddenly Katarinais silent, stopped cold bysomething she s found.I get up off the floor and step over the board,ma ing my way to the monitor.I loo at the screen.It is not, as I d imagined, a news report fromEngland. It is a simple, anonymous blog post. Just afew haunting, tantalizing words: Nine, now eight. Are the rest of you out there?

CHAPTER TWOThere is a cry in the wilderness, from a member of theGarde. Some girl or boy, the same age as me,loo ing for us. In an instant I ve seized the eyboardfrom Katarina and I hammer out a response in thecomments section. We are here. Katarina batsmy hand away before I can hit Enter. Six! I pull bac , ashamed of my imprudence, myhaste. We have to be careful. The Mogadorians are onthe hunt. They ve illed One, for all we now they havea path to Two, to Three But they re alone! I say. The words comeoutbefore I have a chance to thin what I m saying.I don t now how I now this. It s

just a hunch I have.If this member of the Garde has been desperateenough to reach out on the internet, loo ing for others,his or her Cêpan must have been illed.I imagine myfellow Garde s panic, her fear. I can t imagine what itwould be li e tolose my Katarina, to be alone. Toconsider all I deal with . . .without Katarina? It s unimaginable. What if it s Two? What if she s in England, and theMogs are after her, and she s reaching out for help? A second ago I was scoffing atKatarina sabsorption in the news. But this is different. This is a lin to someone to someone li e me. Now I am desperate to help them, to answer their call. Maybeit s time, I say, balling my fist. Time? Katarina is scared, wearing a baffledexpression. Time to fight! Katarina s head falls into her hands and she laughsinto her palms.In moments of high stress, Katarina sometimesreacts this way: she laughs when she should be stern,gets serious when she should laugh.Katarina loo s up and I realize she is not laughingat me. She is just nervous, and confused. Your Legacies ha

ven t even developed! she cries. How could we possibly start the war now? She gets up from the des , sha ing her head. No. We are not ready to fight. Until your powersare manifest, we will not start this battle. Until theGarde is ready, we must hide. Then we have to send her a message. Her? You don t now it s a she! For all we nowo one. Just some random person using languagethat accidentally tripped my alert. I

now it s one of us, I say, fixing Katarina with myeyes. And you do too. Katarina nods, admitting defeat. Just one message. To let them now they re notalone. To give herhope. Her again, laughs Katarina, almost sadly.I thin it s a girl because I imagine whoever wrotethe message to be li e me. A more scared and morealone version of me one who s been deprived of her Cêpan. O ay, she says. I step between her and themonitor,my fingers hovering over the eys. I decidethe message I ve already typed We are herell suffice. I hit Enter.Katarina sha es her head, ashamed to have indulged me sorec lessly. Within moments she is atthe computer, scrubbing any trace of our lo

cation fromthe transmission. Feel better? she as s, turning off the monitor.I do, alittle. To thin I ve given a bit of solace andcomfort to one of the Garde ma esme feel good,connected to the larger struggle.Before I can respond I m electrifiedby a pain, theli es of which I ve only nown once before; a lava-hotlancet digging through the flesh of my right an le. Myleg shoots out from beneath me, and I scream,attempting to distance myself from the pain by holdingmy an le as far fromthe rest of me as I can. Then Isee it: the flesh on my an le sizzling, poppingwithsmo e. A new scar, my second, sna es its wayacross my s in. Katarina! I scream,punching the floor with myfists, desperate with pain.Katarina is frozen in horror, unable to help. The second, she says. Number Two is dead.



CHAPTER THREEKatarina rushes to the tap, fills a pitcher, and dumps itacross my leg. I am nearly catatonic from the pain,biting my lip so hard it bleeds. I watch the water sizzleas it hits my burned flesh, then it floods the gameboard, washing the armypieces off onto the floor. You win, I say, ma ing a feeble jo e.Katarina doesn t ac nowledge my attempt at wit.My protector, she has gone into full-on Cêpan mode:pulling first-aid supplies out from every corner of our shac . Before I now it she s applied a cooling salveto my scar and wrapped and taped it with gauze. Six, she says, her eyes moist with fear and pity.I m ta en abac she only uses my real name inmoments of extreme crisis.But then I realize that s what this is.Years had passed since One s death, withoutincident. It had gotten easy to imagine it was a flu e. Ifwe were feeling really hopeful, we could imagine Onehad died in an accident. That the Mogadorians hadn tcaught our scent.That time is over. We now for sure now.TheMogadorians have found the second member of theGarde, and illed him or her.Two s message to us, tothe world, was the last thing he or she would ever do.Theirviolent death was now written across my s in.We now two deaths is no flu e. The countdownhas truly begun.I almost faint, but pull myself to consciousness bybiting my lip even harder. Six, Katarina says, wipingthe blood from my mouth with acloth. Relax. I sha e my head.No. I can never relax. Not ever.Katarina is strainingto eep her composure. Shedoesn t want to frighten me. But she also wants to dothe right thing, to honor her responsibilities as aCêpan. I can tell she s torn between every possiblereaction, from outright panic to philosophical cool;whatever isthe best for me and for the fate of theGarde.She cradles my head, wipes the swea

t from mybrow. The water and the salve have ta

en thesharpest edge off the pain,but it still hurts as bad asthe first time, maybe worse. But I won t comment on it.I can see that my pain, and this evidence of Two spassing, is tormenting Katarina enough. We ll be o ay, says Katarina. There are still manyothers. . . . I now she isspea ing carelessly. She doesn tmean to put the lives of the Garde before me Three,Four, and Five ahead of my own. She is justgrasping for consolation. But I won t letit pass. Yeah. It s so great others have to die before me. That s not what I meant. Isee my words haveupset her.I sigh, putting my head against her shoulder.Sometimes, in my heart of hearts, I use a differentname for Katarina. Sometimes to me she s notKatarina or Vic y or Celeste or any of her other aliases. Sometimes in my mind I call her Mom.

CHAPTER FOUR

We re on the road an hour later. Katarina white-

nuc

les the steering wheel of ourtruc throughcountry roads, cursing her choice of hideaway. Theseroads are toorough and dusty to go faster than fortymiles per hour, and what we both want isthe speed of a highway. Anything to put as much distance aspossible between us and our now abandoned shac .Katarina did what she could to scrub our trac s, butif what we imagine is true the Mogadorians illingTwo seconds after we saw her fatal blog post thenthey moved fast, and they could be racing towards our abandoned home right now. As I watch the fields and the hills pass through thepassenger window, I realize that they could already beat the shac . In fact, they could already be following uson the road. Feeling li e a coward as I do it, I cranemy nec

and loo through the rear window, throughthe dust trail our truc ic s up in our wa e.No cars trail us.Not yet, at least.We pac ed light. The truc was alreadyloaded witha first-aid it, a lightweight camping set, bottled water,flashlight

s, and blan ets. Once I was ready to wal again, all I had to do was pic out a few items of clothing for the road and retrieve my Chest from theloc box under the shac .The panic of flight gave me little time to feel thesearing pain of my second scar, but it returns to menow, lacerating and insistent. We shouldn t have responded, says Katarina. Idon t now what we were thin ing. I loo at Katarina for signsof judgment on her face after all, I m the one who insisted we write bac and I m relieved to find none. All I see is her fear, andher determination to get us as far away as possible.I realize that in the confusion and haste to flee Iforgot to notice if we turned north or south at thecrossing at the edge of Puerto Blanco. U.S.? Ias .Katarina nods, pulling our most recent passportsfrom the inside poc et of h



er army jac et, tossingmine into my lap. I flip it open and peer at my newname. Maren Elizabeth, I say aloud. Katarina puts a lot of time into her forgeries, though I usually complainabout the names she chooses for me. When I waseight and we were moving to Nova Scotia, I beggedand begged to be named Starla. Katarina vetoed thesuggestion. She thought it was too attention getting, too exotic. I almost laugh to thin about it now. AKatarina in Mexico is about as exotic as you can get.And of course she s eeping it. Katarina has grownattached to her ownname. Sometimes I suspect thatCêpans aren t so different from parents after all.Maren Elizabeth.. . it s no Starla, but I li e how it sounds.I reach down and cradle my calf, just above thethrobbing scars on my an le. By squeezing my calf Ican muffle the pain of my sizzled flesh.But as the pain fades, the fear returns. The fear of our present situation, the horror of Two s death. Idecide to let go of my calf, and I let my leg burnKatarina refuses to stop the car for anything but gasand pee brea

s. It s a long trip, but we have ways topass the time. Mostly we play Shadow, a game thatKatarina made up during our previous travels, out of our desire to eep training even when we couldn t dophysical drills. A Mogadorian scout races at you from two o cloc ,wielding a twenty-inch blade in his left arm. Heswings. I crouch, I say.

Dodge left. He swings around, the blade above your head. From the ground, a ic to te groin. A leg sweep,from his right side to his left. On his bac , but he grabs your arm. I let him. I use the force of his grip to swing my legsfree, up, and then down to his face. Step on his face,pull my hand free. It s a strange game. It forces me to separate thephysical from reality, to fight with my brain and not mybody. Iused to complain about games of Shadow,saying it was all made up, that it wasn treal. Fightingwas fists, and feet, and heads. It wasn t brains. Itwasn t words.But t

he more Shadow we played, the better I got atdrills, especially hand-to-hand drills with Katarina. Icouldn t deny that the game made good practice. Itmade me a better fighter. I have come to love it. I run, I say. Too late, she says. I almost complain, nowingwhat s coming. You forgot about the sword, shesays. He s already swung it up and nic ed your flan . No he didn t, I say. I froze his sword andshattered it li eass. Oh did you, now? Katarina is tired, eyesbloodshot from ten straight hours of driving, but I cansee I m amusing her. I must ve missed that part. Yeah, I say, starting togrin myself. And how d you pull off that feat? My Legacy. It just ic ed in. Turns out, I can freezestuff. This is ma e-believe. I have yet to develop myLegacies, and Ihave no idea what they ll be whenthey arrive. That s a good one, says Katarina.

CHAPTER FIVEWe crossed the U.S. border hours bac , without ahitch. I have never understood h

ow Katarina managesto ma

e such incredible forgeries.Katarina is pulling us intoa dusty pit stop off thehighway. There s a tiny, single-story motel, an old-fashioned and decrepit diner, and a gas station,newer and brighter than the other twobuildings.It is barely dus when we step out of the truc . Thefaintest pin ofsunrise creeps over the horizon, justenough to add a strange hue to our flesh aswestumble out onto the gravel.Katarina curses, getting bac into the car. Forgotto get gas, she says. Wait here. I do as I m told, watching her pull the truc from themotel par ing lot towards one of the pumps. We haveagreed to rest up at the motel for a day or two, torecover from our grueling, fifteen-hour drive and theshoc

of recent events. But even though we ll be herefor some time, the tan must be filled: that sKatarina s policy. Never leave an empty tan , she says. I thin shesays itas much to remind herself as to educate me.It s a good policy. You never now when you ll haveto leave in a hurry.I watch Katarina pull up to the pump and start fi

llingthe car.I examine my surroundings. Through the frontwindow of the diner across the lot, I can see a fewgrizzled-loo ing truc ers eating. Through the scentof exhaust and the faint odor of gas fumes from thepumps, I can smell brea fastfood in the air.Or maybe I m just imagining it. I am incrediblyhungry. My mouth waters at the thought of brea fast.I turn my bac on the diner, trying not to thin

aboutfood, and loo at the town on the other side of thefence from the pit stop. Houses only a step up fromclapboard shac s. A ragged, desolate place. Hello, miss. Startled, I whizz around to see a tall,gray-haired cowboy strutting past. Itta es me asecond to realize that he s not starting a conversation,merely being polite as he passes. He gives a littlenod of his ten-gallon hat and proceeds past m



e intothe diner.My heart rate is up.I had forgotten this aspect of the road. When we resettled in a place, even a remote one li e PuertoBlanco, we get to now thelocal faces. We now,more or less, who to trust. I ve never seen aMogadorian in my life, but Katarina says that most of the Mogadorians loo li e anyone else. After whathappened to One and Two, I feel a deep unease allaround me, a new alertness. A roadside rest stop isespecially troublesome in that everyone is a stranger to everyone, so no one raises any eyebrows, notreally. For us that means anyone could be a threat.Katarina has par ed the car and approaches mewith a weary grin. Eat or sleep? she as s. Before I can answer,she s raised her hand hopefully. My vte for sleep. My vote is to eat. Katarina deflates at this. You now eat beats sleep,I say. Always does. It is oneof our rules of the road, and Katarina quic ly acceptsthe verdict. O ay, Maren Elizabeth, she says. Lead the way.

CHAPTER SIXThe diner is humid with grease. It is barely six a.m. butalmost all of the booths are full, mostly with truc ers.While I wait for our food I watch these men shovelhearty, well-syruped for sful of brea fast meat sausage, bacon, scrapple into their mouths. Whenmy food finally comes I find myself more than holdingmy own. Three panca es, four strips of bacon, a sideof hash, one tall OJ.I finish with a rude belch that Katarina is too tired tochastise me for. Do you thin . . . ? I as .Katarina laughs, anticipating my question. How isthat possible? I shrug. She nods, and calls the waitress over. Witha guilty grin, I order another stac of panca es. Well, says the waitress, with a dry smo er scac le, your little girl sure can put itdown. Thewaitress is an older woman, with a face so lined andhaggard you could mi

sta

e it for a man s. Yes, ma am, I say. The waitress leaves. Your appetite will never cease to amaze me, Katarina says. But she nows the reason for it. I trainconstantly, and though I m only thirteen years old Ialready have the tightly muscled body ofa gymnast. Ineed a lot of fuel, and am not ashamed of myappetite. Another customer enters the crowded diner.I notice the other men give him a suspicious glanceas he ma es his way to a booth in the rear. Theyloo ed at me and Katarina with similar suspicionwhen we first entered. I too this place for a waystation, filled with strangers, but apparentlysome strangers are worthy of suspicion and others aren t.Katarina and I are doing our best, dressed in generic American mall clothes: T-shirts and ha i shorts. I cansee why we stand out apparently they have adifferent definition of generic here in the far reachesof West Texas.This other stranger is harder to figure, though. He sdressed the part, more or less: wearing one of thoseTexas ties, with the dangly strands of blac leather. And li e the rest o

f the men here, he s wearing boots.But his clothes seem somehow out-of-date, andthere s something creepy about his thin blac mustache: it loo s straight at first glance, but the moreI consider it, something about it just seems croo ed . It s impolite to stare. Katarina, chiding me again. I wasn t staring, I lie. I was loo ing, with interest. Katarina laughs. She s laughed more in the pasttwenty-four hours than she has in months. This newKatrina is going to ta e some getting used to.Not that I mind.I stretch out luxuriantly on the hotel bed while Katarinashowers in the bathroom. The sheets are cheap,polyester or rayon, but I m so tired from the road theymay as well be sil .When Katarina first pulled the sheets down wefound a live earwig under the pillow, which grossedher out but didn t bother me. Kill it, she begged, covering her eyes.I refused. It s just an insect.'' Kill it! she begged.Instead, Iswept it off the bed and hopped into thecool sheets. Nope, I said stubbornly. Fine,he said, and went to shower. She turnedthe faucets on, but stepped out of the ba

throom againa moment later. I worry she started. About what? I as ed. I worry that I haven t trained you well. I rolled my eyes. Cause I won t ill a bug?! Yes. No, I mean, itt got me thin ing. Youneed to learn to ill without hesitation. I haven t eventaught you to hunt rodents, let alone Mogadorians . . .you ve never illed anything Katarina paused, the water still running behind her.Thin ing.I could tell she was tired, lost in a thought. She getsli e that sometimes, if we ve been training toogruelingly. Kat, I said. Go shower. She loo ed up, her reverie bro en. She chuc ledand closed the door behind her.Waiting for her to finish, I turned on the TV from thebed. The previous tenant had left it on CNN and I mgreeted with the site of helicopter footage of the event in England. I watch only long enough to learnthat both the



rayed with glass. His fistcloses around the fabric of my shirt and I feel myselflifted out of my seat.Katarina screams. Hey! A voice from outside.My hand scrambles, loo ing for something,anything to eep me in my seat. It finds only myunbuc led seat belt, which gives easily as the Mogstarts pulling me through the window.I feel Katarina shand clutching the bac of my shirt. I d thin twice bout that! I heaa man s voiceshout, and soon I am released, falling bac into theseat.I am breathless, my head spinning.Outside the truc , a crowd has formed. Truc ersand cowboys, ordinary American men. They veencircled the Mog. One of them has a shotgun raised,pointed right at him. With a wry, bitter smile, the Moglifts his arms in surrender. The eys. Katarina is panic ing, near tears. I leftthem in the room. I don t thi

, I just move. I don t now how long theMog will be contained by the protective mob, our saviors, but I don t care: I race bac to the room,swipe the eys off thenight table, and head bac outinto the heat of the par ing lot.The Mog is neeling on the ground now,surrounded by angry men. We called the cops, miss, says one ofthem. I nod,my eyes teary. I m too eyed-up even to say than s.It s strange and wonderful to consider that none of these men now us but they came to our aid, yetfrightening that they don t understand this Mog s truepower, that if he hadn t been instructed to eep a lowprofile he d have torn the s in clean off each of their bodies by now.I get in the car and hand Katarina the eys.Moments later, we pull outof the lot.I turn bac for one last glance and loc eyes withthe Mog. His eyes brim with reptilian hate.He win s as we pull away.

CHAPTER EIGHTKatarina was wrong. I have illed before. Years ago,in Nova Scotia.It was early

winter and Katarina had released mefrom our studies to go play in our snowy bac

yard. Itoo to the yard li e a demon, running circles in thesnow in my baggy clothes, leaping into snowban sand aiming snowballs at the sun.I hated my cumbersome jac et and waterproof pants, so once I was sure Katarina had turned fromthe window I shed them, stripping down to my jeansand T-shirt. It was below freezing outside, but I vealways been tough about the cold. I continued to playand race whenClifford, the neighbors St. Bernard,came bounding over to play with me.He was ahuge dog and I was small then, even for my age. So I climbed on top of him, clutching thewarm fur of his flan . Giddyup! I squealed and hetoo off. I rode him li

e a pony, running laps aroundthe yard.Katarina had recently told me more about myhistory, and about my future. I wasn t old enough tofully understand, but I newit meant I was a warrior.This sat well with me, because I had always felt li e ahero, a champion. I too this ride with Clifford asanother practice run. I imagi

ned chasing facelessenemies around the snow, hunting them down andta

ing them out.Clifford had just run me to the edge of the woodswhen he stopped and growled.I loo ed up and saw apale brown winter rabbit darting between the trees.Secondslater, I was on my bac , tossed off byClifford.I pic ed myself up and dashed after Clifford into thewoods. My imaginary chase had become a very realone, as Clifford ran after the darting rabbit and Ifollowed him.I was delirious, breathless,happy. Or I was, until thechase ended.Clifford caught the rabbit in his jaws and reversedcourse, bac to his owners yard. I was equallydismayed by the end of the pursuit and by the li elyend of the rabbit s life, and I now stal ed after Clifford,attempting to command the rabbit s release. Bad dog, I said. Very bad dog. He waso content with his achievement to pay meany mind. Bac in his yard, he happily nuzzled andnipped the damp fur of the rabbit. It too shoving himforcibly from the rabbit s body for him to give it up,and even then he snapped at me.I hissed at C

lifford, and he grumpily padded off inthe snow. I loo ed down at the rabbit, matted andbloody.But it wasn t dead. All of my hardness gave way as I lifted the light, furrybeast to my chest. I felt its tiny heart beating furiously,at the brin

of death. Its eyes were glassy,uncomprehending.I new what would happen to it. Its wounds were notdeep, but it would die of shoc . It wasn t dead now,but it was past life. The only thing this creature had toloo forward to was the paralysis of its own fear and aslow, cold death.I loo ed to the window. Katarina was out ofsight. Iturned bac to the rabbit, nowing in an instant whatthe indest thingto do was.You are a warrior,Katarina had said. I am a warrior. My words turned to frost in th



dren who practice onit. She wants to continue to eep a low profile.But I can watch the field from behind a tree at theedge of the orchard. It s a girls team playing today.The girls are all in purple jerseys and bright whiteshorts. They re aboutmy age. From beneath theshade of the apple tree I wonder what it would be li eto give myself to something as light andinconsequential as a game of soccer. I imagine I d begood at it: I love being physical, I m strong and quic .No: I d be great at it.But it s not for me to play games of no value.I feel envy creep up my throatli e bile. It s a newsensation for me. I am usually resigned to my fate. Butsomething about this time on the road, about the near miss with the Mogadorians, has opened me to hatingthese girls with their easy lives.But I cho e it down. I needto save my spite for theMogs.That night we allow ourselves to watch a little TVbefore bed. It is a luxury Katarina usually denies me,as she thin s it rots my brain and dulls my senses. Buteven Katarina softens sometimes.I curl up next to Katarina on the queen bed. She sturned the TV to a movie about a woman who lives inNew Yor City and complains about how hard it is tofind a good man. My attentionwanders quic ly awayfrom the screen to Katarina s face, which has gonesoft with attention to the film s plot. She hassuccumbed to it.She catches me loo ing at her,and turns red in aninstant. I m allowed to be sappy sometimes. Sheturns bac to thescreen. I can t help it. He shandsome. I loo bac at the TV. The woman is now yellingatthe handsome man about how he s a sexist pig. I veseen very few movies in my life but I can alreadyguess how this one ends. The man is handsome, Isuppose, though I mnot as transfixed by him asKatarina is. Have you ever had a boyfriend? I as her.She laughs. Bac on Lorien, yes. I was married. My heart seizes, and I blush at my own self-absorption. How could I have never as ed her thisbefore? How could I not

have

nown that she had ahusband, a family? I hesitate before as

ing another question, because I can only assume her husbanddied in the Mogadorian invasion.My heart brea s for my Katarina.I change the subject. But since we ve been onEarth? She laughs again. You ve been with me the wholetime. I thin you d now if I had! I laugh too, though my amusement is mixed withsadness. Katarina couldn t have had a boyfriend evenif she wanted one and it s all because of me.Because she s too busy protecting me.She raises an eyebrow. Why so many questions allof a sudden? Do you have a crush? Seen any cuteboys out on the soccer field? She reaches over andpinches my side, tic ling me. I squirm away, laughing. No, I say, and it s the truth. Boys practiceout theresome days and I watch them, but usually just tomeasure their athleticism and reflexes and tocompare them to my own. I don t thin I could ever li e any of them. I don t thin I could love anyone whowasn t loc ed into the struggle with me. I could never respect someone who wasn t part of the war againstthe Mogs, to sav

e Lorien.Bac

on the TV, the woman is standing in the rain,tears streaming downher face, telling the handsomeman that she s changed her mind, that love is all thatmatters after all. Katarina? I as . She turns to me. I don t even haveto say it outloud; she nows me well.She switches the channels until we find an actionmovie.We watch it together until we fall asleep.

CHAPTER ELEVENThe next day after drills and studies I ma e it bac outto the orchard. It s a warm day and I dodge from theshade of one tree to another as I stroll. I wal overmushy, sweet-stin ing apples, feeling them turn togoop beneath my feet.Despite the heat of the sun, the air is crisp andpleasant today, not too hot or cold. I feel weirdly happyand hopeful as I tramp around.Katarina is boo ing us plane tic

ets to Australiatoday. She thin s it ll ma e as good a hiding place asany. I m alrea

dy excited for the journey.I turn, ready to wal bac to the motel, when asoccerball comes rolling past me, scudding over bro en apples. Without thin ing I leap forward andhop on it with one foot, stopping it in its trac s. You gonna give that bac or what? Startled, I turnaround. A pretty girl with a chestnut ponytail stares atme from the edge of the orchard. She s dressed insoccer clothes and her mouth is open, smac ing onbubble gum.I step off the ball, pivot around it, and give it a quic ic , right to the girl. I use more strength than I should:when sheclutches it with her hands, the force of theimpact nearly sends her off her feet. Easy! she yells. Sorry, I say, instantly ashamed. Good ic , though, says the girl, sizing me up. Damn good ic . I am on the field moments later. The girls team wasshort a



player for scrimmage and the gum-chewinggirl, Tyra, somehow convinced the coachto let meplay.I don t now the rules of soccer but I pic them upsoon enough. I owe Katarina for that, for eeping mybrain sharp enough to process rules quic ly.Thecoach, a dour, squat lady with a whistle in her mouth,puts me in as a fullbac and I quic ly establish myself as a force. The girls on my team catch on fastandsoon enough they re putting up a wall, forcing theother team s forwards to run past me on the right sideof the field.Not one of them gets through without losingtheir hold on the ball.Before I now it I m covered in sweat, blades of grass stic ing to the sweat on my calves fortunately,I wore high soc s today, so no one cansee my scars.I m dizzy and happy from the sun and the appreciativecheers of my teammates.There s a reversal to my left. Tyra s seized the ballfrom a charging opponent before getting chased byanother member of the opposing team. I m the onlyfree player and she manages to ic the ball right atme.Suddenly, almost the entire opposing team is onmy tail. My teammates chase after them, trying to eep them awayfrom me, as I ma e a mad dash withthe ball towards the goal. I can see the goalie steelingherself, ready for my approach. My opponents brea free of my bloc ingteammates. Even though I am stillnearly half the field from the box, I now it s my onlychance.I ic .The ball swings in a long, curving arc, propelled li ea jet.I acted too fast, too thoughtlessly, and haveaimed right at the goalie s position. I m sure she llcatch it.She does. But I ve ic ed the ball with such power that it lifts her off her feet and the ball goes out of her hands, spinning against the net behind her.My teammates cheer. Our opponents join in; thiswas only a scrimmage, so they can ac nowledge mys ills without sacrificing too much pride.Tyra gives me a pat on the shoulder. I can tell she sexcited about having been the one to c

oax me out of the orchard. The coach pulls me aside and as

swhere I go to school. She clearly wants me for her team. Not from here, I mumble. Sorry. She shrugs andcongratulates me on my playing.I grin and wal away from the field. I can tell thegirlsare eager for my friendship, standing in a cluster andwatching me depart.I imagine a different life for myself, a life li e theirs. It has its charms, but I nowmy place is by Katarina s side.I wal bac to the motel, doing my best towipe thegrin of victory off my face. I feel a childish urge to blababout the game to Katarina, even though she told menot to play. In spite of myself I find I m running bac tothe room, ready to start crowing.The door s unloc ed and I swing itopen, stillgrinning li e an idiot.The grin doesn t last long.There are ten men inthe room Mogadorians.Katarina is tied to the motel s des chair, her mouthgagged andher forehead bloody, her eyes filling withtears at the sight of me.I turn to run, but then I see them. More men, some incars, some just standing there, all ove

r the par

ing lot.There must be thirty Mogadorians total.We ve been caught.

CHAPTER TWELVEMy hands are cuffed and my legs are bound in rope.Katarina s are too, though I can tsee her. TheMogadorians threw us in the bac of a big rig s trailer,tied together, so the only proof of Katarina I have isthe place where our spines touch.The trailer buc s wildly and I now we are on thehighway, going somewhere fast.Katarina is still gagged, but they never bothered togag me. Either they sensed I wouldstay quiet to eepKatarina safe, or they figured the roar of the roadwould swallow any sound I made.I don t have any idea where we re being ta en or what the Mogadorians plan to do to us once we getthere. I assume the worst, but I still murmursoft,soothing things to Katarina in the dar of the trailer. I now she d be doingthe same thing for me if shecould. It ll be o ay, I say. We ll be o ay. I now we won

now with sic certainty that this journey will end in our deaths.Katarina presses her bac against mine, in agesture of love and encouragement. Hands tied andmouth gagged, it s the only way she can communicatewith me.It s dar in the trailer save for a small sliver of lightshining through a brea in the trailer s aluminum roof.Sunlight dribbles in through the crac . Sitting in thedar , musty chill of the trailer, it is strange to thin it sday outside. Ordinary day.I m achy everywhere,sore from sitting and toouncomfortable to sleep. In my exhausted delirium, Ihave the ridiculous thought that I should ve stayedbehind with the soccer girls. At least long enough tohave some of the Gatorade the coach offered me.Something murmurs inside the trailer. A low,guttural growl.There is a cage, tuc ed up against



the front of thetrailer. I can dimly ma e out its thic steel bars in thedar . What is it? I as . Katarina mumbles through her gagged mouth, and I feel bad for as

ing her aquestion she can t possibly answer.I lean forward, as far as I can, pulling Katarina withme. I can hear Katarina protest from beneath her gag,but curiosity pushes me forward. I stretch into thedar ness, bringing my face as close to the steel barsas I can. Another rustle in the dar . Another captive? I wonder. Some ind of beast?My heart fills with pity. Hello? I spea into the void. The personor creature ma es low whimpers of distress. Are youo ay? Jaws snap with sudden force against the bars of the cage, eyes the size of fists flashing red in thedar .The breath of the beast sends my hair bac . Ipull away in terror and disgust, the smell so revolting Ialmost retch.I try to scoot away, but the huge beast,unappeased, eeps its head pressed to the bars, itsred eyes fixed on me. I now thatwere it not for thebars, I d be dead already.This is no captive. No fallen ally. This is a pi en.Katarina told me about thesebeasts before, savage accomplices and hunters for the Mogadorians, but Ihad ta

en them for fairy tales.Katarina helps me nudge us bac towards the rear,givingme more space to pull away from the beast. AsI bac farther away, so does the pi

en, disappearinginto the dar of its cage.I now I am safe for the moment. ButI also nowthis animal, this foul, fearsome creature, may bepitted against me inthe coming days or wee s. Mystomach turns in fear and helpless rage: I don t nowwhether to vomit or pass out or both.I nestle my damp head against Katarina s, wishingthis nightmare away.I fall into an agitated half-sleep, awo en only byKatarina s voice. Six. Wa e up. Six. I snap to. Your gag? I as . I wor ed it off. It s ta enhole time to get itoff. Oh, I say stupidly. I don t now what else to say,what good it

does us to spea

. We are caught,without defense. They bugged our car. Bac

in Texas. That s howthey found us. How stupid of us,I thin .How careless. It was my job to thin of that, she says, as if reading my thoughts. Never mind that. I need you toprepare for what s coming.What s that?I thin .Death? They will torture you for information. They will . . . Ihear Katarina succumb to weeping, but she pullsherself together and resumes. Theywill inflictunthin able torments on you. But you must bear them. I will, I say, as firmly as I can. They will use me to ma e you bend. You can t letthem . . . no matterwhat. . . . My heart freezes in my chest. They will ill Katarinain front of meif they thin it will ma e me tal . Promise me, Six. Please . . . they can t now your number. We can t give them any more power over theothers than they already have, or power over you. Theless they now about the charm, the better. Promiseme. You have to. Imagining the horrors to come, I can t. I now myvow is all Katarina wan

ts to hear, but I just can t.

CHAPTER THIRTEENI have been in my cell for three days. I have nothing inhere with me but a buc et of water, another buc et touse as a toilet, and an empty metal tray fromyesterday s meal.There is not a spec of food left on the tray: I lic edit clean yesterday. When I wo e up in my cell threedays ago it had been my intention to mount ahunger stri e against my captors, to refuse all food and water until they let mesee my Katarina. But two dayspassed with no food or water from them anyway. I hadbegun to imagine I d been forgotten in my cell. By thetime the food arrived, I was so far out of my mind withhopelessness that I forgot my original plan and wolfeddown the slop they shoved through the little slot of mycell door.The odd thing is that I wasn t even particularlyhungry. My spirits were low but I didn t feel we

a fromhunger. My pendant throbbed dully against my chestduring my days in the dar , and I began to suspect thecharm was eeping me safe from hunger anddehydration. But even though I wasn t starving, or dehydrated, I d never gone so long without food or water in my life, and the experience of being depriveddrove me to a ind of temporary madness. I wasn thungry or thirsty physically, but I was mentally.The walls are made of heavy, rough stone. It feelsless li e a prison cell and more li e a ma eshiftburrow. It seems to have been carved out of a naturalstone formation instead of built. I ta e this as a cluethat we re in some natural structure: a cave, or theinside of a mountain.I now I may never find out the answer.I have attempted to chip at the walls of my cell, buteven I now there is nothing I



can do. In my attempts,all I accomplished was to wear my nails down until thetips of my fingers bled.The only thing left now is to sit in my cell and try tohold on to my sanity.That is my sole mission: to not let my solitaryconfinement drive me to madness. I can let it hardenme, I can let it toughen me, but I must notlet it ma eme crazy. It s a strange challenge, staying sane. If youfocus too hardon maintaining your sanity, theslipperiness of the tas can only ma e you crazier. Onthe other hand, if you forget your mission, if you try tomaintain your sanity by not thin ing about the matter at all, you can find your mind wandering insuchdizzying patterns that you wind up, again, at madness.The tric is to forgea middle ground between the two:a detachment, a state of neutrality.I focus onmy breathing.In, out. In, out.When I m not stretching or doing push-ups in thecorner, this is what I do: just breathe.In, out. In, out.Katarina calls this meditating. She used to try toencourage me to do meditation exercises to eep myfocus.She felt it would aid me in combat. I never followed her advice. It seemed too boring. But nowthat I m in my cell, I find it is a lifeline, the best way for me to

eep my sanity.I am meditating when the door to my cell opens. Iturn around, myeyes straining to adjust to the light coming in from the hall. A Mog stands inthe light,bac ed by several others.I see he s holding a buc et, and for a second Iimagine he s brought fresh water for me to drin .Instead, he steps forward and empties the buc etover my head, dousing me in cold water. It is a harshindignity and I shiver at the cold, but it s also bracing,restorative. It brings me bac to life, bac to my purehatred of these bastard Mogs.He lifts me off my feet, dripping wet, and wraps ablindfold around my head.He drops me again and I struggle to stay upright. Come, he says, shoving me out of my cell and intothe hall.The blindfol

d is thic

, so I am wal

ing in totalblac

ness. But my senses are

een and I manage anearly straight line. I can also sense other Mogs allaround me. As I wal , my feet cold against the rough stonefloors, I hear the varied screams and moans of myfellow prisoners. Some are human, some are animal.They must be loc ed insidecells li e mine. I have noidea who they are or what the Mogs want them for.ButI am too focused on my survival right now to care: Iam deaf to pity. After a long march, the Mog leading the guard says Right! and shoves me to the right. He shoves mehard , and I land on my nees, scraping them againststone.I struggle to get to my feet, but I am pic ed upbefore I can, two Mogs throwing me against a wall. Myhands are raised and chained to a steel corddangling from the ceiling. My torso is stretched, mytoes just barely touching the ground.They remove my blindfold. I min another cell; thisone is lit, brightly, and my eyes feel li e they will burno

ut adjusting from three days of nearly total dar

ness.Once they do, I see her.Katarina.She is chained to the ceiling, as I am. She loo s far worse than me, bloody, bruised, and beaten.They started with her. Katarina, I whisper. Are you o ay . .. ? She loo s up at me, her eyes brimming with tears. Don t loo at me, she says, hereyes drifting down tothe floor. A new Mog enters the room. He is wearing, of allthings, a white polo shirt and a crisp pair of ha ipants. His haircut is short.His shoes loafers scuff quietly across the floor. He could be a suburban dad,or themanager of a neighborhood store. Howdy, he says. He grins at me, his hands in hispoc et. His teeth are white li e in a toothpastecommercial. Hope you re enjoying yourstay with us so far. Inotice the bristly hair on his tan arms. He ishandsome, ina bland way, with a compact but strong-loo ing build. These caves can be awfullydrafty, butwe try to ma e it as cozy as possible. I trust you havetwo buc ets in your cell? Wouldn t want you to gowithout. His hand reaches out so casually that f

or a second Ithin he is going to caress my chee . Instead, hepinches it, hard,giving my flesh a twist. You are our guests of honor, after all, he says, the venom at lastcreeping into his salesman s voice.I hate myself for doing it, but I begin to cry. My legsgive out entirely, and I dangle hard against my cuffs. Idon t allow myself to sob audibly, though: he can seeme cry, but I won t let him hear it. O ay, ladies, he says, clapping his handstogether and approaching a little des tuc

ed into thecorner of the cell. He opens a drawer and pulls out avinyl case, which he unwraps on the surface of thedes . The ceiling light glints off an array ofsharp steelobjects. He pic s them up, one at a time, so I can seethem all. Scalpels, razors, pliers. Blades of every ind. A poc et-size electric drill. He giv



es it a few nerve-shattering whirs before putting it down.He strides over to me,putting his face right up inmine. He spea s, and his breath forces its way intomy nostrils. I want to retch. Do you see all of these? I don t respond. His breath smells li e the breath of the beast in the cage. Despite his bland exterior, he smadeof the same foul stuff. I intend to use each and every one of them on youand yourCêpan, unless you answer every question Ias truthfully. If you don t, I assure youthat both of youwill wish you were dead. He gives a hateful little grin and wal sbac over tothe des , pic ing up a thin-loo ing razor blade with athic rubberhandle. He returns to me, rubbing the dullside of the blade against my chee . It scold. I ve been hunting you ids for a very long time, hesays. We ve illed two of you,and now we have oneright here, whatever number you are. As you mightimagine, Ihope you are Number Three. I try to inch away from him, pressing my bac hardagainst the cell wall, wishing I could disappear into thestone. He smiles at me, again pressing the dull sideof the razor into my chee , harder this time. Oops, he says, tauntingly. That s not the rightside. With a single dexterous motion, he reverses theblade in his wrist, the sharp side now facing me. Let s try it this way, shall we. With reptilian pleasure he brings the blade to theside of my face and swipes hardagainst my flesh. Ifeel a familiar warmth, but no pain, and watch withshoc ashis own chee begins to bleed instead.Blood flows from his wound as it splits open li e aseam. He drops the blade, clutching his face, andbegins stamping aroundthe room in pain andfrustration. He ic s over the des , sending hisinstrumentsof torture scattering across the cell, thenflees the room. The Mog guards who d been standingbehind him exchange indecipherable glances.Before I even have a chance to say anything toKatarina, the Mogs move forward, unshac le me, and drag me

bac

to my cell.CHAPTER FOURTEENTwo days pass. In the dar of my cell I now have morethan madness and boredom tocontend with. I mustalso wor to burn the image of a bloody and bro enKatarinafrom my mind. I want to remember Katrinaas I now her: wise and strong.I continue with my breathing exercises. They help.But not much.Eventually the cell door opens, and again I mdoused with cold water, gagged this time, blindfolded,and dragged bac to the same cell. Once I ve beenchained to the ceiling, my blindfold is removed.Katarina is right where I last saw her, as bro enand battered as before. Ican only hope she s been letdown at some point.The same Mog as before sits acrossfrom us, onthe edge of the des , a bandage across his slicedchee . I can see heis straining to be as menacing ashe was before. But he regards us with a new fe

ar.I hate him. More than anyone I have ever met. If Icould tear him apart with my bare hands I would. If Icouldn t use my hands, I would rip him apart with myteeth.He sees me loo ing at him. He leaps forwardsuddenly, tearing the gag from my mouth. He wieldsthe rubber-handled razor in front of my face again,twisting it, letting the ceiling light dance across itsedge. I don t now what number you are . .. he says. Icringe involuntarily, expecting him to try and cut meagain, but he holds bac . Then, with sadisticdeliberateness, he crosses over to Katarina, pullingon her hair. Still gagged, she manages only awhimper. But you re going to tell meright now. No! I scream. He grins with satisfaction at myanguish, li e he s been waiting for it. He presses theblade to Katarina s arm and slides it down her flesh.Herarm opens up, pouring blood. She buc lesagainst her chains, tears flooding herface. I try toscream but my voice gives out: all that comes out is ahigh, painedgasp.He ma es another cut beside the first, this oneeven deeper. Katarina succu

mbs to the pain andgoes limp.With my teeth,I thin . I can do this all day, he says.Do you understandme? You re going to tell me everything I want to now,starting with what number you are. I close my eyes. My heart burns. I feel li e avolcano, only there s no opening, no outlet for the ragefilling up inside of me.When I open myeyes he s bac at the des ,tossing a large blade from his left hand to his righthand and bac . Playfully, waiting for my gaze. Nowthat he s got it, he holds the blade up so I can see itssize.It begins to glow in his hands, changing colors:violet one second, green the next. Now . . . your number. Four? Seven? Are you luc yenough to be Number Nine? Katarina, barely conscious, sha es her head. I now she s signalling me to eep silent. She has epther silence this long.I struggle to eep



quiet. But I can t handle it, can twatch him hurt my Katarina. My Cêpan.He wal s overto Katarina, still wielding the blade.Katarina murmurs something beneath her gag.Curious, he lowers it from her mouth.She spits a thic wad of blood onto the floor by hisfeet. Torturing me to get to her? He eyes her hatefully, impatient. Yes, that s aboutright. Katarina manages a scornful, slow-building laugh. It too you two whole days to come up with that plan? I can see his chee s turn red at the well-aimed jab.Even Mogadorians have their pride. You must be some ind of idiot, she howls.I thrillat Katarina s impudence, proud of her defiance butafraid of what the consequence will be. I have all the time in the galaxies for this, he saysflatly. Whileyou are in here with me, we are out therewith the rest of you. Don t thin anything has stoppedus from moving forward just because we have you.We now more than you thin . But we want to noweverything. He cruelly stri es Katarina with the buttof the nifebefore she can spea again.He turns to me. If you don t want to see hersliced into little pieces,then you better start tal ing, and fast. And every singleword that comes out better be true. Iwill now if you relying. I now he isn t playing games, and I can t bear tosee him hurtKatarina again. If I tal , maybe he ll bemerciful. Maybe he ll leave her alone.It comes out so fast I barely have time to order mythoughts, so fast I barely now what I m saying when Isay it. I have one intention, but it s a mur y one: to tell himeverything I now that he can t use against me or the other Loriens. I tell him pointless details about myprevious journeys with Katarina, our previousidentities.I tell him about my Chest, but I don t give itsburial location, claiming it was lost in our journey.Once I start tal ing I m afraid to stop. I now that if Ipauseto measure my words he will smell my deceit.Then he as s me what number I am.I

now what he wants to hear: that I am number Four. I can t be Three, or else they would have beenable to ill me. But if I m Four then all he ll need is tofind and ill Three before he can begin his bloodywor on me. I am Number Eight, I say finally.I am so scared Isay it, with a desperate, cringing sigh, that I now thathe s fooled. His face falls. Sorry to disappoint you, I croa out.His disappointment is short-lived. He begins tobeam, victorious. I may not be the number he wanted,but hegot my number out of me. Or what he thin s ismy number.I search out Katarina s eyes, and though she isbarely conscious, I can see the faintest hint of gratitudein her eyes. She is proud of me for givinghim the wrong number. You really are wea

, aren t you? He stares at mewith contempt. Let him, I thin . I feel a surge of superiority over him: he was dumb enough to believemy lie. Your relatives on Lorien,as easy as they fell, atleast they were fighters. At least they had somebraveryand dignity. But you . . . He sha es his headat me, then spits on the floor. You

have nothing,Number Eight. At that, he raises his arm with the blade and thrustsit, deep into Katarina. I hear the sound of bonecrac ing, of the nife pushing through her sternum,right into her heart.I scream. My eyes search out Katarina s. Shemeets my gaze for one last instant. I will myself pastmy chains towards her, struggling to be there for her in her last moment.But her last moment goes fast.MyKatarina is dead.

CHAPTER FIFTEENWee s turn into months.Some days they don t feed me, but my pendant eeps me from dying of thirst or starvation. What sharder is the absence of sunlight, the endlessimmersion in dar ness. Sometimes I lose trac of where my body ends and the dar

ness begins. I losesense of my own existence, my own borders. I am acloud of in

in the night. Blac on blac .I feel forgotten. Incarcerated, with no hope of es

cape, and with no information that can lead them tothe others, I am useless to them for now. Until they ve illed the ones before me, until my extinction date.Theurge to survive has gone dormant in me. I livenot because I want to but becauseI can t die.Sometimes, I wish I could.Even so, I force myself to do the wor of staying asfit and limber and as ready for combat as I can. Push-ups, situps, gamesof Shadow.In these games of Shadow I have learned to playKatarina s part as wellas my own, giving myself instructions, describing my imagined attac ers,before Irespond with my commands.I loved this game before, but now I hate it. Still, inKatarina s honor, I continue to play. As I was lying to the Mog, I thought I was doing it sohe would spare Katarina, let her live. But as soon as Isaw his nife p



ierce her heart I realized what I was really doing: hastening her end. I was giving himeverything I new so he would finish her off, so shewouldn t have to sufferanymore, so I wouldn t have to watch her suffer anymore.I tell myself that was the right thing to do. That it swhat Katarina would ve wanted. She was in suchpain.ButI ve been without her so long at this point that Iwould give anything for anothermoment with her, evenif she had to suffer unimaginable torments for it. I wanther bac .The Mogadorians continue to test the boundaries of my conditional immortality. These trials ta e time toplan and construct. But every wee or so I amdragged out of my cell and brought to another, jury-rigged for my destruction.The first wee after Katarina s death I was broughtto a small chamber and made to standon a sharpsteel grill several feet off the floor. The door wassealed behind me.I waited for a few minutes as theroom filled with noxious-loo ing gas, curlingup frombeneath the grill in green tendrils. I covered my mouth,trying not to breathe it, but I could only hold my breathfor so long. I gave up, gulping in theirpoison, only todiscover it smelled li e the coolest and freshest of mountain breezes to me. Furious Mogs dragged meout of the room minutes later, pushing me quic lybac to my cell, but I could see the pile of dust besidethe door on the wayout. The Mog who had pushed thebutton releasing the gas had died in my place.The next wee they tried to drown me; the wee after, they tried burning me alive.None of theseaffected me, of course. Last wee , they served mefood laced so heavily with arsenic I swear I could taste each poison grain. They had brought a ca

e to mycell. They had no reason to treat me with dessert, andI new at once thatit was their hope to tric me withthe ca e and in turn tric the charm. They hoped thatif I didn t now my life was in danger, the charmwouldn t wor .Of course I sus

pected them at once.But I ate the ca

e anyway. It was delicious.By eavesdroppingagainst the slot of my cell door, Ilater learned that not one but three Mogadoriansperished from the attempted poisoning. How many Mogadorians does it ta e toba e aca e?I as ed myself later. Then, with malevolentsatisfaction, I answered:Three.I allow myself to imagine a happy outcome in whichthe Mogadorians, who seem toplace little value evenon their own lives, eep trying to ill me and end updying in the attempt, until there are no Mogadoriansleft. I now it is just a fantasy, but it s a happy one.I have no idea how long I ve been here. But I havegrown so hardened to their execution attempts that Iam fearless as they drag me through the halls to yetanother. This time I am thrown into a large, draftyspace with dimlights, larger than any room I ve beenin so far. I now I am being watched throughone-wayglass or a video monitor, so I wear my face in a sneer. A sneer that rea

ds: Bring it on.Then I hear it. A low, guttural moan. It s so deep Ican feel it, rattling through the floor. I whirl around tosee, deep in the shadows of the room, a large steelcage. It loo s familiar.I hear jaws snapping hungrily, followed by thesounds of massive lips smac ing.The pi en. The beast from our trip out here.Now I am scared.There s a bright flash. Suddenly I m bathed instrobing red lights, and the steel bars of the cageretract.Weaponless, I fall bac against the opposite corner of the room.Clever,I thin .The Mogs have never pitted meagainst a living creature before.Thepi en steps out. A four-legged monster, itstands li e a bulldog the size of a rhino: forelegsbowed, mouth all dripping, sagging jowls. Massiveteeth jut from its mouth li e tus s. Its s in is a putrid, nobby green. It smells of death.It roars at me, drenching me in a spittle so thic Ifear I will slip on it. Then it ch

arges.I can t believe my own body. I m stiff from solitaryconfinement, I haven t practiced combat in months,but instinct and adrenaline ic in, and soon enough Iam dodging the beast li e a pro, careening off corners, duc ing between its legs.Thepi en roars, frustrated, getting more and morewor ed up, battering the walls with its head.I haven t had this much fun in years, I thin , as Imanage to give it aroundhouse ic across the face.I land on the ground, beaming from my well-placed ic , but I land in one of its spit puddles and my armsand legs give out in the slime. It s a momentary lapse,but it s enough: The beast has me in its jaws.My whole body floods with warmth, and I am sure that this is the end.But no pain comes. The creature lets out a longwhimper and then releases me from its jaws. It s afi



ve-foot drop from its mouth to the floor and I land onmy nee, which hurts worsethan the bite.I turn to see the pi en sprawled out, mouth open,chest heaving powerfully. A massive crescent of puncture wounds stud its chest. It too the brunt of itsown bite.It lets out another low, pitiful moan.Of course, I thin . A Mogadorian beast is as mucha Mogadorian as any of the rest. It s susceptible to thecharm too.I whirl around, trying to get the attention of whoever is watching. It is clear to me that the creature, thoughwounded, will live. Left to their own devices, the Mogswill nurse their beast bac to health so it can live tospoil another day.I stride over to it, remembering the rabbit I illed allthose years ago in Nova Scotia. I hear the footstepsof approaching guards and now I must act fast. A Mog guard bursts into the room. He wields a longblade, and is about to swing at me when he thin stwice, realizing he will only ill himself in the process.I use his hesitation to my advantage. I leap off theground and hit him with a high swing ic , his bladeclattering to the floor. One more ic to eep himdown,and then I swipe the blade from the floor.I approach the heaving, panting beastas moreguards enter the room and I bring the blade straightdown, through the pi

en s s ull.Dead in an instant.The guards swarm around me and drag me out of the cell. I am dazed but happy.No mercy.

CHAPTER SIXTEENI have come to appreciate the tiny differences in thefood they serve me. It s always the same gray slop,some protein and wheat blended into a paste andladled ontomy serving tray. But sometimes it is madewith more water and less wheat, more w

heat and lessprotein, etc.Today is a heavy protein day. I swallow it downwithoutjoy but with some gratitude: my muscles stillhurt from my battle with the pi enand the guard, and Ifigure the protein will do me good.I ta e my last bite andbac into the corner.It is dar in my cell, but there is just enough lightfrom the foodslot that I can see my feet, and myhands, and my food tray.Except today Ican t see my hand. I can see my leftone, but not my right one.It has ta en a longtime to hone my vision to thisstate of sensitivity in the dar , so I m furious atitsfailure. I wave my right hand in front of my face,twisting it left and rightin my sleeve. But still all I see isdar ness. I slap my face, blin , trying tobring myvision bac .But still my right hand is a void.Finally I reach down and pic up my for , holding itin front of my face.I feel a thrill in my stomach as Ipush it down into myhand. I don t want any false hope. I now I can tsurvive any false hope.But I can see the for .And I still can t see my hand . At t

hat moment my cell door opens and a lowly Mogenters. He s come to retrieve my serving tray. All itta es is the light from the hallway flooding the room toconfirmmy suspicion.My right hand is invisible.My first Legacy has arrived.I gasp. Of all the s ills I could develop, this seemsli e the one the only one that might get meout of this prison alive.The Mog grunts at me suspiciously, and I tuc myhollow-loo ing sleeve behind my bac , hoping hedidn t see. I am dizzy with joy.He s a stupid one, and doesn t notice a thing. Helifts my tray from the floor and exits the room.I am plunged bac into dar ness, and waitimpatiently for my eyes to adjust to the point where Ican see my new ability again. There it is. Hollowsleeve, invisible hand. I roll up my sleeve and loo atmy arm. My hand is completely invisible, my forearmmil y, nearly translucent, but by my elbow I m fullyvisible.I can see I ll need to practice this s ill.

CHAPTER SEVENTEENIt has ta en two days, but I have learned to wield myfirst Legacy. My control isnot perfect yet: sometimesmy invisibility stutters, and I panic, struggling torestore it. Turning it off and on is not li e turning a lightswitch up or down; it ta es a certain ind of concentration.Katarina s breathing exercises have come inhandy. When I struggle to control my invisibility, I turnmy focus to my breathing in, out and then bac tothe ability. After I m able to ma e my hand invisible atwill, I start practicing with other parts of my body. It sli e flexing a new muscle itfeels strange at first butquic ly feels natural. Next, I let my whole body fade



out. It s no more difficult than ma ing my handdisappear; in fact, it seems to ta

e less precision.I am ready.I go fully invisible and wait for the next food drop. Itta es some of my energy to maintain the invisibility,energy I wish I could conserve, but I have only thatsingle instant for my snare to wor and I can t ris them seeing me transform.Finally, a Mog appears. The food slot opens, thetray istossed in. It shuts.I worry the snare hasn t wor ed. Maybe the Mogsdon t bother to chec on me, to loo for me in my cell?In which case my power is totally useless The slot opens again. Two beady eyes peer intothe shadows, squinting.In, out.Sometimes nerves can send me bac intovisibility and I can t spoil this moment.In, out.The worst-case scenario is them discovering my power before I can use it againstthem.It is a strange thing, willing someone to see myabsence.The slot closes again. I hear the Mog wal awayand my heart plummets.Where d he go? Didn t henotice that I m not here The door opens suddenly. Soon, my tiny cell is filledwith Mogadorianguards, four in total. I press myself against the far corner, hiding. They arehuddled close,conferring about my apparent disappearance.No way out .One leavesand runs down the hall. His exit createsmore space in the room, less chance thatsomeonewill stumble onto me, and I breathe easier.One of them whirls his arm infrustration, and I haveto duc as quic ly as I can. He barely misses me.Close call.I dodge, quiet as a cat, into the corner nearest thedoor. Two of the Mogs stand deep in the cell, but oneof them bloc s the exit.Move, I thin .Move.I can hear footsteps, racing towards the cell. MoreMogs. I now that all it will ta e isone Mog brushingmy shoulder or sensing my breath for me and my newLegacy to bediscovered. The footsteps are gettingcloser. The Mog by the door steps further into the cellto accommodate those on their way and I lunge outinto the hallway.I

nearly fall on the stone floor outside my cell, but Icatch my balance just in time. Flesh slapping againststone: I surel would ve been discovered. A horde of Mogsis racing down the hall towards mycell from the left. No choice but to run right. I ta e off,landing as delicately as I can.Quiet as a cat .It is a long hall.I struggle to maintain quiet, my barefeet ma ing only the faintest of noises asI run and runand run. At first I am scared, but then I can feel it:freedom, up ahead.I go faster, landing on arched feet to mute thenoise. My heart leaps up into my chest as I exit the halland find myself in the center of the Mogadoriancomplex, a massive cavern fed by many other tunnelsli e the one I just came from. Closed-circuit securitycameras are everywhere. When I spot them, my chestleaps with fear, but then I remember I am invisible, tocameras as well as to Mogs.For howlong, I don t now. A siren is pulled. I should ve expected that. Flashingsecuritylights go off as the cavern is filled with thealarm s shrie . The high walls of th

e cave only amplifyit.I ta

e off again, choosing a tunnel at random.I pass othercells li e mine, then steel doors thatprobably hold more prisoners.I wish I hadtime to help them. But all I can do is run,and eep running, as long as my invisibility will hold.I dodge left off the tunnel, passing a large, glass-windowedroom to my right. It is illuminated by brightfluorescents. Inside hundreds and hundreds of computers in rows hum and sift data, no doubt loo ingfor signs of myfellow Garde. I eep running.I pass another laboratory, also glass-windowed,thisone to my left. Mogadorians in white plastic suitsand goggles stand inside. Scientists? Bombchemists? I am past them before I have a chance tosee what they re doing. I can only assume somethingawful.My brain is split by the siren, and I wantto close myears. But I need my hands to eep my balance as Irun, to eep my footsteps dainty and soundless. I havethe strange thought that for all my bluntness, mytomboyishness, my warrior s training, I now findmyself calling on such a femin

ine s ill beinglightfooted, li e a ballerina.The tunnel feeds into another center,this one evenlarger than the other. I had assumed that what I sawearlier was the heart of the complex, but this is truly it:a cavernous hall half a mile wide and so dar andmur y I can barely see across to the other side.I am covered in sweat, out of breath. It is hot inhere. The walls and ceiling are lined with hugewooden trellises eeping the cave from collapsing inon itself. Narrow ledges chiseled into the roc faceconnect the tunnels dotting the dar walls. Above me,several long arches have been carved from themountain itself to bridge the divide from one side tothe other.I catch my breath and wipe my brow, to eep myown sweatfrom blinding me.There are so many tunnels, none of them mar ed.My heart plummet



s. I realize I could run and runthrough this complex for days without finding the wayout. I imagine myself li e a rat in a laboratory maze,scampering and weaving to no avail.Then I see it: a single pinpric of natural light, up above. Theremust be a way out up there. It will be asteep climb up these walls, but I can do it. As I grabthe trellis to hoist myself up, I hear it. She will be found. It s him.Katarina s executioner.He is spea ing to a few guard Mogs, on a wal wayabove me.The guards tramp off. My eyes pin to theexecutioner as he ta es a detour bac into thecomplex.I must choose. Between escape and vengeance.The light above bec ons me li e water in a desert. Iwonder exactly how long it s been since I last sawsunlight.But I turn around.I choose vengeance.

CHAPTER EIGHTEENI follow him through the halls on tiptoe, careful tomaintain my invisibility I ve learned enough about myLegacy by now to now that any surprise or brea inconcentration can cause me to fade bac in.I watch as he duc s into a cell. I snea in behind himas the door shuts.Unaware he has company, he wal s to the corner of theroom and begins to tidy up. I loo down. There isblood on the floor, his weapons are out. He hastortured and illed others.I have never illed a Mogadorian before. Notcounting the Mogadorians who died trying to ill me, Ihave only in my entire life illed a rabbit, and a pi en.To my own shoc , I realize I am thirsty for murder.I grab a razor from his des and approach him. The blade feels good inmy hand. It feels right .I now better than to give him a chance to beg, or plead, to sha e me from my resolve. I clutch him frombehind and slit his throat wit

h one clean slice. Hismouth gurgles and spews blood across the floor,against myhands. He falls to his nees and thenbursts into ash.I feel more alive than I ve ever felt.I open my mouth to spea .That s for Katarina,I mabout to say. But I don t.I don t spea because I now it s a lie.That wasn t for Katarina. That was for me.I emerge from the complex an hour later,exhaustedand struggling to stay invisible as I climb out to themountaintop, as Irun from the mountain to a hillopposite. I have to stop to rest, to adapt to theblinding midday sun.My translucent s in ba es beneath the sun. I stareat the mouth of the complex, already hard to ma e outfrom this distance. I don t trust my memory, so I pauseto memorize its shape, its precise location.I am sure Mogs havefanned out through thecomplex, loo ing for me. And I m sure they havecrawled outof the exit, and are even right nowsearching through the trees along these hills.Let them loo .They ll never find me.I run for a few miles through trees, until I

come to aroad in a small mining town. I m running barefoot, sothe road slaps hardagainst my feet, illing my joints. Idon t care; I ll get a pair of snea ers eventually.I find a truc idling at the town s only stoplight. Ilightly hop into the bac

of the pic up, letting the truc ta e me farther and farther away from the Mogadoriancomplex. When the truc er stops for gas a few hourslater, I dash, still invisible, into the cab, rifling throughhis stuff. I ta e a handful of quarters, apen, a couplescraps of paper, and an uneaten bag of barbecuechips.I run behind the gas station and sit in the shade. Idraw a map of the complex s entrance on oneside of the paper, and a diagram of the tunnels inside as bestas I can remember.It will be a long time before I putthis to use, but I now my memory of their hideaway isthe most valuable thing I possess, and it must be preserved.Once I finish the diagram, I throw my head bac . It ssunset, but I can still feel of the warmth of the sun onmy face. I open the bag of chips and eat them in threemessy bit

es. The salty-sweet chips taste delicious,wonderful.I am in a motel room, at long last. For a full day Iwandered, driven by the urge for shelter and rest.Therewas no way I could afford a room, and in mydesperation I began to consider thievery. Pic a fewpoc ets, plun down the cash I d need. Using myLegacy, stealing would be a piece of ca e.But then it occurred to me I wouldn t need to steal,not yetanyway. Instead I went into the lobby of a smallmotel, went invisible, and snuc

into the hotelmanager s office. I lifted the ey for room 21 off thehoo . I wasn tsure how I was going to get the floating ey past the crowded lobby and I pausedfor amoment, frozen in the office. But soon the eydisappeared too, in my palm.I dnever made an object disappear before, onlymyself and my clothes. A hint of my



Legacy s other uses.I ve been in the room for a couple hours. So I feelless li e I m thieving, I sleep above the covers, in thechill of the room s AC.I catch myself: I vebeen invisible the whole time I vebeen in the room, clenched from the exertion ofsustaining it. It s li e holding your breath.I get up and approach the mirror across the room,letting it go. My body fills in in the mirror, and I see myface forthe first time in over seven months.I gasp.The girl who stares bac at me is almostunrecognizable. I m hardly even a girl anymore.I stare at myself for a long time, standing alone inthe room, unattended, unaccompanied, aching for Katarina, aching for a worthy tribute to her.But it s right there. In the new hardness anddefinition of my face, in the muscled curve of my arm. Iam a woman now, and I am awarrior. Her love andthe loss of her is etched forever in the firm set of my jaw.I am her tribute. Survival is my gift to her.Satisfied, I return to the motel bed and sleep for days.

CHAPTER NINETEENYears have passed.I live an unsettled life, hopping from town to town. Iavoid connections or ties, and focus on developingmy fighting abilities and developing my Legacies.Invisibility was followed by tele inesis, and in recentmonths I ve discovered a new ability: I can control andmanipulate the weather.I use that Legacysparingly, as it s an easy way toattract unwanted attention. It manifested monthsago,in a small suburb outside Cleveland. I had beenfollowing a lead on one of the Garde that didn t goanywhere and, discouraged, I was ambling bac towards my motel, sipping an iced coffee. My legburst into searing pain, and I dropped my drin

on theground.My third scar. Three was dead.I fell to the ground in pain and in

rage, and before I

new what was happening the s

y above me filledwith clouds. Afull-on lightning storm followed.I am in Athens, Georgia, now. It s a cool littlecity,one of the best I ve passed through in the past coupleyears. College studentseverywhere. I ve got a bit of avagabond roughness to my appearance that standsoutin suburban areas, but surrounded by college-agehippies and music nerds and hipsters I don t loo quite so unusual. This ma es me feel safe. All of my leads havegone dead, and I have yet todiscover one of my ind. But I now it is coming. Timeto assemble the Garde. If my Legacies aredeveloping at this rate, I am certainthe same is trueof the others li e me. There will be signs soon, I canfeel it.Iam patient, but excited: I am ready to fight.I wander the street, sipping the dregs of an icedcoffee. It s become my drin of choice. I have resortedto pic poc eting to finance my appetites, but it sbecome so easy that I never have to outrightfleeceanyone. I just ta e a few buc s here or there to get by.I am suddenly no

c

ed by a gust of wind, practicallyoff my feet. For a second I thin

I ve lost control, thatit s my own power that caused it. But the wind ends assoon as it began,and I realize it did not come fromme. But it has swung the door of another café open.I almost eep wal ing, but my eye is caught by anopen computer terminal at the bac of the café. I useinternet cafés to eep tabs on the news, loo ing for itemsthat could turn into a lead on my ind. Doing itma es me feel closer to Katarina. I have become myown Cêpan.I chuc my empty cup in the trash outside and stepintothe air-conditioned chill of the place. I ta e myseat, and begin scanning the news. An item from Paradise, Ohio, catches me. Ateenager was seen leaping from aburning building.New to town. Named John. The reporter mentionedhow hard it wasto get solid information on him.I stand up so quic ly I send the chair flying out fromunder me. I now in an instant he s one of us, though Idon t now how I now.Something in that gust of wind.Something about the way butterflies are now flutt

eringin my stomach, brushing my insides with their wings.Perhaps this recognition is a part of the charm,something that lets us now that a hunch ismore thanI hunch. I now.I just now.My heart races with excitement. He s out there. Oneof theGarde.I run out of the café and onto the street. Left, right . .. I m not sure which way to turn, how to get toParadise as quic ly as I can.I ta e a deep breath.It sbeginning , I thin .It s finally beginning .I laugh at my own paralysis. I remember that the busstation is a mile down the road. I ma e a habit of memorizing alltransport routes into and out of anytown I visit, and the bus route out of Athens returns tomy mind. The beginning of a plan to get to Paradisestarts to develop.I turn and begin the wal to the station.

the lost files

Documents