But I wish I could find the confidence I felt last night when I first tested the cure.
Too late. I’ve committed. I’ve promised them something and taken their money. There is no going back.
I swallow my dosage—a little more than yesterday’s to make sure it combats the extra hour—then I return to fulfilling orders. I hope people are taking precautions as they pick them up. All it takes is one mugger lurking in one of the neighborhoods, waiting in the shadows to steal their lifeline.
But the people who have survived this long must have some amount of street smarts.
I pull an empty glass vat over to me to start another batch. This should be enough to fulfill the rest of the current orders, and then I’ll ask the Shadow Market guy if he has more serum. If so, I can reopen the form. People have already said they’re traveling across the country to get the cure. That’s almost more dangerous than spending time in the Nightmare.
My hand shakes as I pour. I’m too tired. I need food again. I really shouldn’t be mixing these while I’m on such low energy. That creates a higher risk of making a mistake.
When I finish this batch I can sleep.
Just push through. I take a deep breath and try again. My measurements have to be perfect. The shaking continues. My vision blurs.
I release an irritated sigh and set the serum down to rub my eyes. That’s when I see the black billows of fog rolling in. My gaze snaps to my silenced alarm clock: 6:00 a.m.
It isn’t exhaustion taking over.
It’s the Nightmare.
I’m lying on a couch. Lumpy and firm and . . . foreign.
I sit up and see I am next to a short table beside the couch with some brass bowls and an empty pizza box. Then a face. Pale skin. Dark hair. Serious. Too serious.
The fog of disorientation muddies my thoughts as I try to reconcile this scene with the lab where I was making the cure. But the more I try to think about the lab or the cure, the more it fades away into the back of my mind.
Unreachable. Vague. Hidden in gray.
Memories from the Nightmare take the forefront. The man sitting before me is the Emperor of this terrible reality. He sits on the edge of the table, next to the pizza box. His name catches up to me, followed by details of our one and only conversation.
“Luc.”
I am, without a doubt, in the Nightmare. It’s like my body and mind aren’t even fighting. Crushing disappointment hits first. Failure, though I’m still trying to scoop up the running sand of my thoughts. Of what just happened.
“Where were you?” Luc hardly moves a muscle. His lips are tight. White. His eyes seem sunken, like he’s skipped sleep.
I press my palms against my temples. “In the Real World.” What is the term he likes to use? Past World? “Where else would I be?”
“You were in the Old World too long.”
Old World. That’s what he calls it—like he’s left it behind. Like it’s expired and we’ve graduated to World 2.0.
I drop my head in my hands and rack my brain, desperate to remember the reason I feel such emptiness right now.
A glint of black metal catches my eye through the gaps in my fingers. Barrel. Trigger. Luc’s fingertips brush metal that’s far too shiny and modern to fit this Roman universe.
A handgun.
I lift my head, on alert. For some reason, my heart won’t slow. Any clarity of thought is drowned out by a growing hum of irritation. Who is this teen Emperor to question me? To corner me? To threaten me?
“I . . .” What can I tell him? That something happened in the Real World that has left me wrung out and confused? Something having to do with a cure . . . I think. Frustration bites at me. Why can I remember some details but not the important ones?
Luc’s hand is wrapped around the handgun, unsteady.
“Where were you?”
“I thought I found a cure.” The confession tumbles out—words disconnected from my brain. They invite a slug to the emotions. Shame and failure flash in my mind.
A cure. The cure. Failed.
I acted too fast, handed the public hope with a false promise.
The wintry seriousness thaws from Luc’s face a little, replaced by a frown.
“A cure?”
“For the virus. Nole—my brother—had been working on one before he died.” I fight to remember. “I thought I figured it out. I skipped a Sleep. But now . . . now I’m back.” Why? Why didn’t it work?
“There is no cure for the Nightmare. Trust me on that.” Luc leans back on both hands and when I look down at the table again, the gun is gone. Did he stow it away or make it disappear into the mysterious Nightmare air?
Luc looks more worn and ragged than when I first met him. Is that because I skipped a Sleep? Was he that concerned? I don’t buy it. Something’s going on, and even though the gun is gone I stay alert. Emotions are weird in here. That’s what Crixus said. Or was it Luc? If emotions are higher, faster, more sudden and crippling in the Nightmare, maybe Luc is struggling with his.
“Sorry for the rude awakening. Literally.” Luc’s tone turns conversational. The shift in his demeanor is more concerning than the former rigid coolness. “I thought you might be a Spore.”
I’m still not over the fact that he was ready to shoot me for missing a single Sleep, and I tense at the accusation.
