(Sorry, sorry, sorry for the late update! Yeesh, I need to figure out a better time to write. Also I might've changed a few details as I write, so apologies if you get confused and just leave me your question in the comments and I'll do my best to explain. Enjoy and please support as always by voting/commenting. Thanks for sticking around this long!)

An hour later, we walk to a tiny town close to Wichita Falls and come across a rundown motel that makes Janie's nose crinkle. "I'd rather walk another ten miles than spend a second in that flea-ridden dive. Why don't we call a couple of taxis? It's not like we can't afford them."

"It's a good place to hide out and that's all that matters, princess," Pablo remarks, no doubt to infuriate her even more. His grin when she glowers at him says it all.

Willow's fingers fidget with the straps of her backpack, and Jones looks around nervously as though he's already anticipating trouble. Marcus is halfway across the street, quiet like he's been ever since we caught up to the others. I'm completely baffled at how quickly things went wrong. I thought I had it figured out. Honesty. That's usually a good policy to follow, right? I thought opening my shell and letting him see my weakness would soften him, but instead I've made a major mess of everything.

I was an idiot for thinking sharing the truth was better than withholding it. He wanted to be with me, and what did I do instead? I treated our relationship like some problem I needed to fix. I believed giving in wholeheartedly would mean losing control, and I let my insecurities sail our ship right into the rocks. And now it's going to be even harder to do damage control because anything I do or say might set off another landmine.

And considering I'm standing in a freaking minefield of a life right now, I'm doomed to fail before I even begin.

We pay for two rooms with cash, and when the owner, this skinny lady with a crackly voice and a greedy gleam in her eyes, protests about the occupancy, Janie and Willow take center stage without a single moment wasted between them and make the lady forget she ever saw more than the two of them. Problem solved. If only everything else was this easy.

The room has rust-colored wallpaper and creaky floorboards that would wake up the dead. After scoping out the adjacent bathroom, check the bedcovers and corners for beds, and splitting the two beds for a morning nap--thankfully, I get one all to myself--we decide to take turns in the shower. Janie gets first dibs, which neither of us fight her on. Judging by the way she's sprawled out on her back with her eyes closed, I think it's safe to say being clean is the least of her worries.

I hope she's worried about us.

"You ready to talk?" I say stiffly when Janie is gone.

She opens her hazel eyes and turns her head to look at me sitting on the other bed. "What do you want to talk about?"

"Everything. I want to know what happened to you since we got out of the facility. You've changed."

"We've all changed."

I scoff. "You think it's normal to sneak around behind our backs and keep secrets?"

I'm surprised when she responds, "No. April, nothing about me is normal. I'm tired of pretending to be something I'm not, but . . . I'm not even sure what's right or wrong anymore."

"Keeping us alive is right. Saving the world is right. What's not right is compelling me against my will and making me do things I never agreed to—or don't even know about."

"How's that any different from what we did to the lady downstairs?"

"Because she wanted more money than she deserved. Besides, compelling her protects us. If she doesn't remember who we are, she won't give us away if someone comes around asking about us."

The shower starts running in the background as Willow stares at the ceiling fan. "The ends justify the means? Is that what you're saying? Or maybe it's okay to do things to people as long as there's a good reason?"

"Of course it's not that simple!" I fight to rein in my anger. Her behavior isn't normal, but yelling at her isn't going to make me understand what's happening. "How did you know about the shadows?"

She's quiet at first. "You told me about them."

Something in her tone doesn't sit with me. "Willingly?"

"No . . . it was right before I buried your memories. After I compelled you. I wanted to find out if there was anything important you were keeping to yourself. That's when you told me about the caves. The crystals. Everything."

"You had no right to go into my head like that," I say, my anger rising again.

Her eyebrows pull together. "It's what Sam would've expected me to do. He called me his little architect, did you know that? He wanted me to build worlds with people's minds. He wanted me to do it quietly, of course, so he would have me do little things without anyone ever knowing or suspecting. Make someone think he had casserole for lunch instead of a turkey sandwich. Convince another person she had a conversation that never happened. I kept doing it until I . . ."

"Until you didn't know how to do anything else," I supply when her voice drifts away.

Her shoulders twitch into a small shrug. Seeing her lying there looking so lost makes pity and understanding well up inside me. "We thought escaping from the facility would mean we'd be free to be our own people, to have a brand new perspective and start over in a new world, but we're still stuck in that place with Sam. We are exactly the same people we were then because our nature doesn't let us evolve like normal people. Even Pablo and Jones are affected by it. Their life experiences made them into an opportunist and a coward, and it's all they know."

"You really think we're screwed?"

The question comes from Janie, who has appeared from the bathroom behind me. Her towel is draped across her shoulders, and she's wearing short shorts and a damp t-shirt that hugs her shapely chest. She sits on the bed next to Willow and folds her legs under her.

"I don't know that," I say carefully. "But it does mean we're not just fighting Gardiner and the Shroud. We're fighting to overcome whatever is inside us that makes it impossible for us to change. Or want to change."

"Bullshit," Janie snapped, rubbing the towel vigorously over her head. "I am my own person. I make my own choices."

"Think about it," I insist. "I get why you'd want to the center of attention most of the time, but why does it matter to you whether a guy like Pablo is interested in you? You couldn't care less about him, but you go out of his way to make sure he does."

She throws the towel aside. "Because it's fun to mess with him. Because I want to. What you're saying—it means everything we are, everything we do, is for nothing."

"Look, I'm not telling you this to get you upset. And I don't want to be right. I don't want this . . . inherent flaw I have to be the reason so many things are going wrong for me. My relationship with Marcus included."

"Sounds to me like you're making excuses for failure."

I open and close my mouth, surprised at how deeply her words cut. It's the kind of pain only felt at the hands of someone you trust and care about, and it carries with it a reverberation of familiar and reliable anger. "I'm starting to doubt I was ever friends with someone like you."

There's a flash of hurt in her eyes, but it's quickly gone. She gets to her feet and pulls a sweater from her duffel bag, shoving it on rapidly. "You know what? You guys can stay here and cry about how unfair life is. I'm going to go and actually live it."

The slam of the door shakes a picture frame loose. It clatters to the carpet, leaving behind the hole it'd been strategically covering. "I don't get it," I say. "Was she telling me the truth when she said we were friends? Because the way she was acting just now is no different from how she used to treat me at the facility."

"Janie has her ups and downs and we've all learned how to deal with her," Willow answers. "I think this latest down has more to do with a certain someone than anything else."

"Who?"

"Adam."

My eyebrows shoot up. "Oh."

"It's not what you think. Not exactly." She grabs her pack and starts pulling out her outfits. "Janie craves attention, just like you said, which makes it pretty hard for her to be in a relationship. I think that's why she's stayed away from Adam. And he's not the best at putting himself out there, so there's no chance of those two figuring out their feelings."

"Janie likes Adam?" I ask in a loud voice.

Willow winces. "Oh. You don't remember. I don't think a peripheral memory will bring everything crashing down, so I'll share this with you. We went out to a club once to unwind. This was just before you and Marcus, um . . . anyway, halfway through the night, Adam ended up in the arms of a hot older woman. I've never seen Janie so mad. We dragged her outside before she could create a scene. At first, she kept saying she wanted to break them up to protect him because it was obvious to her that the lady liked to prey on younger men. By the end of the night, she admitted she was jealous and she wasn't being fair to him because she knew that, even if he felt the same way about her, she'd break his heart eventually."

"Why would she do that?"

She straightens up with a sad smile. "She didn't tell us. She probably didn't even know the reason why. But it's just like you said. Because it's her nature."

"It's not easy hurting the person you love, is it?" I say softly.

"It's the worst feeling in the world." The way her gaze becomes distant, I know she's thinking of Alec, just like I'm thinking of Marcus. She shakes her head. "I'll shower first. I won't take long."

"Willow, hang on," I say when she starts to close the door. "You said before you blocked my memories, you compelled me to see if I knew something important. What did I tell you?"

She turns back. "Nothing."

I make a sound of impatience in my throat. "Come on. I thought we were past the secrets! I know I was onto something—"

"You didn't tell me what it was." She bites her lip. "You couldn't."

I'm puzzled at her suddenly fearful tone. "Why not?"

"They wouldn't let you."



Me: Do you think we're normal like other human beings?

Hermes: One of you can move things with his mind and another can make people become completely enamored with her. I think you're far from normal.

Me: But do we have the power to choose who we are? It feels like Gardiner molded us to become the people we are, and we're stuck this way.

Me: It's been eight months. If any of us could change, wouldn't we have done it by now?

Hermes: Knowledge is power. And with it, you can do something you couldn't before.

Me: What's that?

Hermes: Break the mold.



Marcus and Pablo go car hunting--which is both a relief for me, because I feel like I can't breathe with all of the tension and brokenness between us, and a disappointment that I'm not his easy choice for a car companion. In the time they're gone, Hermes sends us new information about our target. He's somewhere in Dallas, Texas, closing in on a new flipper. This is the gang's first time catching wind of a flipper before in the city around him start blanking.

It confirms something I've started to suspect. I'm betting that every time one of us flips, a Shroud agent is sent to the area to hunt him or her down. The agent then causes mass-blanking, either to create chaos and confusion, or more likely, to surround itself with protectors while it takes care of each flipper that shows up on their radar.

I share this with Janie and Willow that afternoon, adding, "The Shroud must really think we're a big threat to them. Well, you guys, I mean. You're probably the only thing alive that they can't mind-control."

We're sitting at a cafe across the street, thankfully away from the dingy motel room. Janie is in a better mood and feeling apologetic, judging by the cup of coffee she grabs for me before her own. She blows on her own cup and takes a hearty gulp, cradling its heat between her palms. The look on her face is pure elation, and it triggers something.

Janie became hooked on coffee the moment she discovered it after we started traveling. She takes it black, and at some point she put way too much effort into getting me used to the taste enough not to bother with cream and sugar. It never took.

"I'll take being a blissfully ignorant human over this any day," Janie answers. "You have any idea how many times the Shroud has tried to kill us over the months? And they have succeeded in killing some of the kids that were with us. Like Solomon. I swear, that Blank had at least nine lives with the way he kept going after Solomon no matter how many times we shot him."

"Let's keep the unpleasant reminders to a minimum," Willow says with a nervous glance at me. As always, she's acting like I'm a bomb that'll explode with the wrong click of a button.

"Too late," I mutter. "I remember way more than you probably think."

"It's hard to avoid triggers in our world. The only way to do it is to tape your eyes and ears shut—and don't think that Marcus didn't consider it." She stares at me intently. "So you remember the days you went missing? When you were taken by—"

"The Shroud? Yes, for the most part. The details are fuzzy, but I know enough." I look outside the window by our table. The diner's built on a surprisingly nice spot in town, under the shade of some trees and with a perfect view of the three-way street. "I'm doing a lot better than anyone expected. I think it's safe for you to unlock the rest of my memories."

"Those fuzzy details you mentioned—they're the difference between your sanity and the obsessive, terrified, dangerous person you were turning into. You took risks, you put yourself and everyone else in harm's way without giving it a single thought. You didn't eat, didn't sleep—not to mention you almost stabbed Adam for trying to stop you from leaving yet again."

My chest feels hollow. "I did?"

"Luckily, that's what his shield is for," Janie replies. She fans her thick dark hair across one shoulder, completely disregarding the admiring gazes of several men at a nearby table. "But seriously, she's right. You were out of control. Count your blessings and hope the rest of your bad time never comes back to you."

"But you said I knew something important," I say to Willow. "Maybe that's why I was being so obsessive. I was on a mission to—to find something. Or to do something. I don't know. All I know is, that mission could be the key to everything."

Willow and Janie trade looks, and I know neither of them has much faith in me. Holy crap. How bad were things back then? It's like I was a monster they barely managed to overpower, and now they're worried about releasing me back into the wild.

"Okay, fine," I say, putting my coffee cup down with more force than necessary. "Forget it. We have enough on our plate as it is."

I glance at the clock. Marcus and Pablo should be back by now. They had to travel twenty miles to find a decent car lot and last we heard an hour ago, they were negotiating over a sizeable SUV with enough modern features to delight any teenage boy.

Jones didn't go with them. He was hiding out back at the hotel, too afraid to wander around in the same state as the Shroud. I'm not sure what that says about his dependability on this dangerous mission. He might become more of a liability than an asset.

I sigh. "I hope Hermes isn't going to get us all killed by sending us after this Shroud agent."

"Can we think of something better to call him?" Janie asks. "Agent makes him sound like some secret service guy in a black suit and an earpiece. He's an alien, for God's sake."

"That doctor, Hansel, called them Ancients," I provide.

"So let's call him that. An Ancient. Makes him sound weird and not human, which is what we need to keep reminding ourselves."

Willow laughs lightly. "Very insightful, Jane."

"Hey. You say that like I'm not usually the source of wisdom around here."

My phone buzzes in my pocket. I extract it and frown at the unknown number on the screen. Normally I'd disregard it for safety reasons, but there's something oddly familiar about it. Willow and Janie stare at me curiously as I take the call and say, "Hello?"

"April Parker?" a man's voice booms through the phone.

There's noise in the background, conversation and a woman's voice making an announcement. "Who is this?"

"It's Doctor Hansel, dear. We met the other day, if you recall."

Speak of the devil. I raise my eyebrows in confusion at the girls. "Doctor Hansel, I didn't expect to ever hear from you again."

"Believe me, contacting you is the last thing I should be doing right now. My family and I relocating ourselves to Europe. Never mind exactly where—I don't want that sort of information getting in the wrong hands. I'm not looking forward to another visit from you either. But there is a reason I contacted you. It's about what you said to me concerning the metamorphosis inhibitor serum."

Now he has my attention. I get up and step outside, distancing myself from the diner's mid-afternoon disquiet. "What about it?"

"I've double-checked all of my notes and even tried to reach out to a few colleagues who worked on the serum with Sam. Most of them are missing, presumably dead, but the two that I was able to get ahold of confirmed my suspicions."

He clears his throat and adds in a hushed tone, "My dear, the serum cannot reverse the Blank condition. It manipulates the neurotransmitters in the brain and counteracts the way that Ancients take control of the mind, but once an individual blanks, communication between the neurons falls under the Ancients' control. At that point, trying to increase serotonin or norepinephrine levels would be completely useless. The drug would have absolutely no effect."

I lean against the brick wall and shield my eyes from the glare of the sun. "How did I turn back to normal after blanking if it wasn't because of the drug?"

"I'm highly doubtful that you ever blanked in the first place, dear."

I laugh humorlessly. "Believe me, my life for the past eight months has been nothing but a struggle for my brain between me and the Ancients. I wouldn't be asking if I didn't mean it."

"Hypothetically speaking," he huffs, "if you blanked and then regained cognizance, there might be two possible explanations for this. One, the Ancients allowed you to go free—as it served their purposes, I'm assuming."

I don't like that one very much. "What's the other option?"

"If you managed to free yourself, it would only because you have some unique power that is capable of breaking the Ancients' hold on you."