DAY 189, 2:13 A.M.

Aboard Genesis 11

My ascension is short-lived. Bilal’s pale form lays me low. His X-rays show more hardware than bone. Babel’s surgeons have left him with finger-thin scars in five different places. His right leg’s been shaved clean of hair. I never noticed how much of it he had. Like me, he’s becoming a man in the deep black of space. Like me, he’s stuck in a med unit millions of kilometers from home, from the people he needs at a time like this.

He wakes up once, eyes wide and dazed. But his words are clear enough.

“Emmett,” he rasps. “Hey, do me a favor.”

I take his hand and give it a light squeeze. “Anything. What you need?”

“Longwei. Tell him he is an asshole.”

Laughter rips from my throat. Bilal manages half a smile before shaking his head.

“Just kidding. Tell him I know it was an accident. I forgive him.”

I swallow as Bilal squeezes my hand and leans back, eyes closing.

“I don’t want him to feel guilty,” he adds, drifting off.

I can only smile. If I were in his shoes, I’d be pissed, but Bilal is Bilal. I sit with him, stealing little slivers of sleep, until morning comes. I know I need to leave or forfeit breakfast.

“I’ll come back. Every day. Like Kaya did for me. I promise, I’ll be back.”

As I pass scoreboards, I try not to look at how tight everything is. I’m just barely above Roathy now. If the competition ended today, I’d be going to Eden. But there’s still time, and I have work to do. Even with the penalties Babel gave me for Kaya’s death, I’m so close I can taste it. It’s like Kaya’s hand is on my back, giving me a shove, telling me to do the impossible.

And after my performance in the Rabbit Room, I know I’m meant to go to Eden. I can rise above this. I eye the scores again and know that a month out will have Bilal dropping like a stone. His score will plummet, and even if I do beat out Roathy, he might beat out Bilal. A part of me wonders how I would even survive Eden without my two favorite people.

Longwei hawks a glance at me. I don’t look away. Instead, I survey the damage. He has a black eye and a few other prominent bruises. As far as I’m concerned, it’s not punishment enough. He breaks eye contact and I turn my attention to breakfast. The table’s mostly quiet. Quiet is always a sign of Katsu’s sour mood. If he’s not joking, we usually don’t even talk at breakfast.

“Bilal?” Azima asks. “Is he okay?”

“He slept all night,” I say. “Recovering from surgery.”

“A choice time to get injured,” Katsu says bitterly. “Good for us, I guess.”

“Don’t be a lurch,” I throw back. “He’s really hurt. It could happen to any of us.”

Katsu wags his fork at me. “It won’t happen to me. I have a secret strategy.”

Jazzy leans over. “You do? What is it?”

Katsu pats his gut. He’s slimmed down some, but he’s still got all of us by forty or fifty pounds. “Keep on as much padding as possible. Less likely to break the bones underneath.”

We laugh into our cups. The sound dies quickly, though. That happens a lot now. Jokes aren’t as funny as they should be. Joy slips through our fingers because we’re grasping and reaching for everything else. We’re past being broken. Now we’re at the stage where Babel is gathering the shattered pieces and making us into something. I catch glimpses of it in myself, in the others. Defoe plans for us to be more. I think about my friends sitting in algebra or running laps in gym class. How could they ever be as fast, as hard, or as smart as we will be? They don’t want like we want. They won’t die for what we would die for. They haven’t seen what we will see.

But then I remember Bilal. He’s not a product of Babel. He has a joy they can’t touch.

“Longwei,” I say, remembering my friend’s request. “Bilal said he forgives you.”

Everyone stares. Longwei turns slowly. “For what?”

“He knows it was an accident,” I say, trying to keep the hatred out of my voice. “He didn’t want you to feel guilty for hurting him. Just a message he wanted me to pass along.”

For just a second, Longwei’s determined front breaks. I see some deeper and darker pain in his eyes, but he looks away, focuses on his breakfast. The others are quiet.

“It’s unfair they pushed some people through.” Her eyes flick briefly to Isadora. “Bilal is a good person. If someone deserves a free pass to Eden, it’s him.”

Before I can agree, medics spill into the room. Vandemeer looks like someone hosed him awake with cold water. I panic, scanning the table. Only Roathy and Bilal are absent. The other medics gather their contestants, and I fear the worst has happened. Another death, another Kaya.

“What is it?” I ask.

Vandemeer nods toward the exit. “The Tower Space Station. We’ve arrived.”