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The familiar cityscape I had known for years was nothing but rubble now. It looked as though a violent earthquake had leveled the buildings—power lines swinging like broken straws, bricks crumbling from rooftops and raining down one by one.
And above all that wreckage, there was something that looked like it belonged in a religious text. As if someone had descended from the sky, suspended inside a sealed electric shield, transparent and glowing blue.
“How am I supposed to reach him?”
Eleanor pressed a few buttons on a scooter and slid it toward my feet.
“You can ride one of these, can’t you?”
“I once flew a zeppelin, but this sounds considerably more terrifying.”
She shook her head, lips pressed together, but a soft snort betrayed her. “You’ll be fine, don’t worry.”
“You think so?” I grinned and launched myself forward.
I might have been the first citizen of Mars to ever ride a flying-scooter. Not even non-flyers on Mars used them. I should have celebrated that later.
Without hesitation, I fled to Raymond. But the white soldiers spotted me. Their weapons turned toward me, but I held up my necklace chip as if it were a clearance pass. It worked; the rifles turned back to him again.
“Raymond!” I yelled, but the figure trapped inside didn’t flinch.
He was in pain; his face contorted, his hand clenched into a tight fist over his chest as if trying to hold back something tearing to escape his heart. I called out again, but it was useless; my voice couldn’t pierce the barrier.
“You need to say something to trigger his memory!” Eleanor jumped from roof to roof to catch up with me until barely five meters separated us.
I shouted. “Remi!”
His body continued to writhe. Squinting against the harsh current, I tried again, straining my vocal cords with everything I had.
“Remi! Remi! Remi!”
At last, his trembling ceased, though his eyes remained tightly shut.
“It’s working!” Eleanor thundered. “You need to trigger him more.”
“What am I even supposed to say?” My brain was practically fried. Stepping into the savior role I had spent years running from didn’t bother me as much as I’d feared, but I was hopelessly inexperienced. “Good boy? Remi! You look cute today!”
“No…” Eleanor muttered, her brows knitting. “It has to be something from before the Umbra infected him. Something that will awaken the dormant cells still fighting inside his body.”
“How do they even react to sound?”
It was probably the last question I should be asking right now, but the answer might help me figure out a better angle.
“They react to memory. If you stimulate the neural pathways, we can bring his consciousness back to the surface.”
“A memory haunting his mind?”
What was Raymond’s absolute greatest fear? What were the demons that would never leave his mind in peace…?
I swallowed hard. I had no choice but to throw whatever came to mind.
“You’re useless!”
The sphere surrounding him shuddered and expanded. Raymond buried his hands in his hair; he seemed to be screaming, but no sound escaped the barrier.
I flew a bit more and tried again. “You’re not human! You’re a monster. Nothing but a monster!”
Even as the words made my own face twist in cringe, seeing Raymond actually react pushed me to keep going. “You don’t have a soul. You’ll never be a human!”
