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We walk for hours—well, what seems like hours. I keep having to stop. I catch Maggot looking annoyed. Evor doesn’t seem annoyed though. Neither does Shweta.
And I think of Clive, back in the conversion compound. With mirror eyes. And I feel even sicker, and I’m focusing on him now, not on how Kazem’s also Enhanced, and I don’t know why. Don’t know anything.
“You need to explain more to me,” I say to Shweta when we stop. “Come on, you have to know more about this all? The time stuff.”
“I don’t.”
“You do—you’ve got experience. I haven’t. I’ve got so many questions and you must have answers.”
“Well, ask me then.”
I shift my weight a little on the sand, freeing one of my legs which is going to sleep. “Okay. So, like, things can happen differently—in these resets?”
She nods. “Sometimes, yeah. Other times not. Believe me, the repetitive ones are so boring.”
“But do things happen differently because of stuff we’re doing? Like, do we influence it?”
“Sometimes,” she says. Gods, I’m really beginning to hate that word. “Like, yeah, I can change things now, and it might change things later on—or it might not. I guess there are fixed points that have to happen. Other times, not. It’s like there are no rules.”
Like there are no rules.
I go cold. “There has to be someone who can help us—like that Seer you mentioned. Look, you couldn’t find them when it was just you, but if I’m searching too, then maybe we’ll get somewhere. If we both leave, go in different directions—maybe one of us will find other Untamed, one with such a Seer.”
“I’ve never managed to stay in a timeline for more than two weeks,” she says. “And two weeks has never been long enough. But this—I think it’s more unstable with you here. It’s going to be days. Or shorter. It was a minute, once. Kacey, you have to accept there’s no getting out of a time loop. Believe me, I’ve tried.”
“Maybe you haven’t tried hard enough.”
“You really think I haven’t done anything in all the days I’ve been living in this nightmare? How arrogant are you, to think you can just fix this on your first day?”
“Sorry—I didn’t mean that, I just...”
“I get it. You’re desperate. But that doesn’t mean you’re this special person who’ll just be able to solve this at a drop of a hat, when I’ve been trying for way too long. I don’t know how this world works, but this world doesn’t work like that. Just don’t think too much about it—it’s enough to drive anyone mad. Believe me, I know.”
I nod, numb. But she has to be wrong. She has to—
I see people.
People coming toward us. Maybe half a mile away.
I let out a strangled-sounding cry, pointing. The Enhanced? They’re coming? They’re...
“It’s Kazem!” Maggot shouts.
Kazem?
I jolt.
Two figures.
Kazem and Celena.