I’m back in my cell, covered in a layer of sweat so dense you’d think I was actually in a burning restaurant a moment ago.
Leaping to my feet, I head straight for the monitor keypad device.
The clock shows 1:49.52—the remaining time on my work allotment.
With a trembling finger, I key 911 into the number pad.
The screen blinks red at first; then a videoconference app comes on.
Blinking in confusion, I accept the call.
“You don’t look like you’re having a medical emergency,” Nero growls. “I thought I explained the consequences of—”
“Vlad’s about to die,” I blurt out. “We have to go save him. The fire—”
“Slow down.” Nero gets closer to the camera. “How and why is Vlad going to die this time?”
My voice unnaturally shrill, I tell him what I just foresaw.
“It was sunset when he got to the scene, and the sun sets around six p.m. this time of year.” I wave my phone. “It’s 3:45 right now, and it could take over two hours to get to Brighton Beach at this time of day. We have to—”
“I can’t step foot in Brighton Beach.” A muscle ticks in Nero’s temple. “I’ve told you that.”
“Isn’t the contract only valid while Baba Yaga is alive?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I saw her die in my vision. Can’t you—”
“No. It doesn’t work like that. If anything, that’s an excellent argument against going. Doing so can change the vision and result in Baba Yaga’s survival.”
“But don’t you also have the right to attack her if she goes after me?”
His eyebrows snap together. “She just confirmed that she didn’t try to kill you with that explosion—and she was telling the truth again.”
“That’s bullshit.” I smack the monitor in frustration. “Let’s see how she doesn’t try to kill me when I go there to save Vlad.”
“You’re not going anywhere.” Nero reaches for his computer, about to disconnect.
“Wait!” I shout. “Please. I promised Rose I’d take care of Vlad.”
The phrase “take care of Vlad” seems to awaken something dark in Nero’s eyes. Something frightening.
“Don’t you see that this was Vlad’s exact plan?” His tone is sharp enough to cut glass. “He knows Baba Yaga has the power to take someone over. The gasoline in the sprinklers, the smoke grenade, the firebird egg—they’re all part of a suicide mission. Vlad wants to die. Losing someone you love can—”
“Vlad isn’t thinking rationally.”
“Neither are you,” Nero snaps. “Your work allotment is now doubled for today.”
With that, he hangs up.
I bang a fist at the safe-like metal door to no avail.
The clock shows up on the screen again, now showing 9:45.12.
Resisting the urge to punch it, I type in 911 again.
The screen goes red, and the video conference app starts up but instantly disconnects.
Nero doesn’t even pick up to tell me I doubled my “work allotment” again—the clock just shows 15:44.59.
I almost rip the screen off the wall, but I need it.
Since I can’t rely on the bastard’s help, I must figure out the passcode.
Praying to my seer intuition, I type in my best guess: 5317. According to Felix, if you write 5317 on an old-school calculator and turn it upside down, it will read as LIES.
The screen blinks red, and an annoying beeping sounds rings out—but the door stays shut and the clock changes to show 55:44.48.
What?
He did say he’d double my week’s work allotment if I put in the wrong passcode, but I didn’t expect the bastard to do it like this.
My head is ready to explode, and it takes all my willpower to calm myself enough to think.
If my powers don’t serve up a passcode, I’m screwed. Assuming the code is four digits, there are 10,000 possibilities to try. If I enter one per second, it will take 166 minutes to go through them all—or about two hours and forty-two minutes.
That’s assuming I don’t get locked out after too many wrong guesses for security reasons, as with smartphone passcodes.
Either way, Vlad doesn’t have that kind of time.
If only I had reception in this place. Then I’d call Felix, and he would figure out a way to hack this lock.
Thinking of Felix gives me an idea.
Back when we were trying to hack Nero’s computer, Felix had suggested a way to use Headspace to guess a password. At the time, I had no clue how to do what he described, but I might now.
“I’m going to guess the passwords,” I tell myself so confidently that I actually believe it. “I’ll punch in 0001, then 0002, and so on and so forth, until I get to 9999.”
To really seal in the deal, I punch 0001.
It doesn’t work, and I get forty more hours on my allotment clock.
I punch in 0002.
Same result.
Instead of typing in 0003, though, I launch myself into Headspace.
Ignoring the default shapes around me, I focus on my situation in the cell—particularly the password-guessing game that I’ve started.
A cloud of vision-shapes appears in front of me, all as similar to each other as I’ve ever encountered.
If I’m on the right track, these are so alike because the only difference between them is which digit I press into that keypad.
I focus on reaching out with multiple wisps, as I’d done for the Vlad visions. Only this time, it’s not a dozen or so that I need to sprout but ten thousand.
The feeling of getting ripped apart is exponentially stronger as I get pulled into thousands of directions—but then I feel myself in ten thousand places at once and the visions begin.
I type in 0003 into the keypad without success.
I type in 0004 into the keypad without success.
I get visions of myself failing while pressing 0005, then 0006, and on and on, until I get to 7734.
I type in 7735 into the keypad. Green light winks at me, and the cell door unlocks.
I get visions of myself of futilely pressing 7736, then 7737, and on and on, until I get to 9999 and the visions stop.
I’m back in the room, the metal walls spinning around me as I jump from foot to foot in excitement.
I did it.
I used my power to brute-force the stupid lock.
At least I hope I did.
Index finger trembling, I type in 7735 into the keypad.
Green light winks at me, and the cell door unlocks.
Finally.
Now I just have to get out of the building before Nero can stop me.