The control box beside the hatch door is broken.
The cover to the keypad has been pried off, and thin wires extend from the box through the shut door of the hatch.
Harley is inside the hatch, holding the keypad in his hand. He’s already tapping out the code.
I pound on the hatch door. Harley gives me a watery smile.
“I can get closer,” he says.
“Don’t!” I shout, banging against the glass.
Harley turns toward the hatch. He finishes the code on the keypad. The hatch slams open and Harley is sucked out into space.
For a moment, he looks back at me, and his farewell is in his smile. Then he turns to the stars.
And he is gone.
The hatch door swings shut, leaving emptiness.
Harley is gone.
69
AMY
I WAKE UP WITH THE PAINTBRUSH STUCK TO MY FACE. Harley would laugh if he could see me now, call me his Painted Fish.
By the door, there is a flashing red square of light. It’s the button to the small rectangle metal cubicle beside the food cubicle. When I push it, the tiny door zips open and a big blue-and-white pill pops out. So that’s what that door was for.
The Inhibitor medicine. The medicine that keeps me sane.
I stare at it, disgusted. It sticks in my throat as I swallow it. It burns going down, and fills my belly with a sense of revulsion and urgency that leaves me sick to my stomach. I push in the button to the food door, and it leaves me a pastry filled with something that is almost eggs and that oozes with something that is almost cheese. I’m done after a bite. I’m tired of almost. I want something real.
I return to my wall. Taking Elder’s advice, I ignore my name and my list of characteristics. What can I or anything about me have to do with murder?
With my name gone, I see it, standing out before me as brightly as if the words were written in different colored paint.
The military.
Each victim, even the woman who hadn’t died—all of them had worked for the military. Tactical specialists, offensive operations, bio-weaponry. They were frozen for their ability to kill—and they were the ones being killed.
But why me? Why was I unplugged? I have nothing to do with that.
Elder had said, Maybe you weren’t meant to be unplugged, maybe you were an accident or something.
An accident . . .
Maybe the murderer had meant to unplug someone else . . .
Someone else in the military.
Like Daddy.
I jump up and race to the door, my heart thudding. Everything falls into place if the killer meant to kill Daddy, not me. He’s killing people with fighting backgrounds.
The door slides open, and I crash into Orion.
I start to mutter my apologies and step around him to go to the cryo level and tell Elder what I’ve figured out, but Orion grabs my wrist with viselike strength.