In the Afterlight - Bracken Alexandra (онлайн книги бесплатно полные TXT) 📗

“He’s can see someone’s memories—” I caught myself, half-stunned by the realization that slammed into me. “He only ever saw my memories when I let him in. I don’t think he could do it on his own. The real reason he tried teaching me control at East River was because he wanted to figure out how I was doing it.”

“That other Orange kid you knew—what could he do?”

Martin. My skin crawled at the thought of him. “He manipulated people’s feelings.”

Chubs looked intrigued, flipping back through the book to a diagram each section of the brain. “That’s fascinating...you’re all using different parts of a person’s mind against them. Er, sorry, that came out the wrong way.”

I held up a hand. “It’s fine.”

“This is complicated to explain, but even though the mind has many different structures within it, they all work together in different ways. So it’s not really that you’re accessing different sections of the brain, but different systems within it. Like the frontal lobe plays a part in making and retaining memories, but so does the medial temporal lobe. Does that make sense?”

“Sort of. So you think I’m somehow interrupting different parts of that process depending on what I’m doing?”

“Right,” he said. “My understanding is that ‘memory’ is many different systems, all of which function in slightly different ways—creation, for instance, or bringing one to mind, even storing.” He picked up the book in front of him. “The memory of what this object is, how to lift it, how to read the pages, how I feel about it...all different systems. My best guess is that when you ‘remove’ someone’s memories, you’re not removing them at all, just disrupting a few of these key systems and rerouting the real memories to imagined ones...or disrupting the encoding process before the memory can take shape and the neurotransmitters work, so the person can’t—”

“Okay, but how do you jump between different systems? Control other functions?”

“I don’t know,” Chubs said, “how did you do it to Clancy?”

That brought me up short.

“You froze him the same way he froze Liam and Vi. What did you do differently?”

“It was...the intent, I guess? I went completely still and wanted him to do the same—” The words choked off.

Mirror minds.

That’s what he had told me, when I couldn’t figure out how to get back out of the darkness there, sever the thread between us. Once I brought up a memory, my grip on his mind shifted back to his memories. When I went still and wanted him to do the same, he did.

I explained the theory to Chubs, who nodded. “It sort of makes sense. When you intentionally go into a person’s memories, you’re using the memory of how to do it rather than a memory itself. Wow, that sounded less confusing inside my head. Anyway—it involves being vulnerable to the other person having access to your memories, some sort of natural empathy on your end. I can’t imagine him being willing to run the risk of releasing any part of the control he has over his mind, or that he possesses a shred of empathy. Do you want to experiment with this? Maybe we can see if you can get me to move my hand—”

“No,” I said, horrified. “I just want to know what system, or part of her mind, he affected to leave her like this.”

Chubs sat back, his excitement still there, verging on gleeful. “It’s going to take me a little time to find the answer. I’ll have to go through all of these books.”

“Hey, losers,” Vida said from the doorway, still flushed and dripping with sweat from her workout. “I think you’re going to want to see what they’re working on in the garage.”

18

IT TOOK ME A MOMENT to even understand what I was seeing as we approached. Duct tape held up two white sheets as a backdrop behind Zu, who was perched on a folding chair. She glowed under the flood of light from four desk lamps that had all been turned and angled toward her. They’d set up a poor man’s version of a studio in the corner of the room.

There were two other chairs; the one facing her, next to the camera, was for Alice, who was fiddling with the device. The other was for Liam, who sat to Zu’s right, talking to her quietly.

He was the one that spotted us first, and scowled.

“What’s going on?” Chubs asked, trying to take in the scene.

“Suzume’s agreed to do an interview with us,” Alice said, craning her neck around to look at us. She was still dressed in all black, but her hair was twisted now into a messy bun. Next to her were two different notebooks, each open to a page full of scribbles in blue ink. She had a third in her lap.

Cole said you only get one shot to prove this would work. I almost said it, but it felt petty. After only a few hours, there was no real way to measure the full impact of the first media package they’d already released.

“Is there a problem?” Liam asked.

Vida let out a whistle, as if already predicting how this situation was going to play out. But contrary to what Liam apparently thought, I wasn’t here to pick a fight.

“Zu,” I said, “can I talk to you? Just for a second?”

She nodded immediately, and I felt tension release its hold on my stomach. I led her a little way away from the others.

“Are you okay doing this?” I asked. She gave me a bright nod, and held up her fingers in an “okay” sign.

“And you understand that if you do this, your face will be all over the place—they explained that, right?” I didn’t want her to think I was treating her like a kid incapable of making her own decisions, and I didn’t want to imply that Liam would ever purposefully trick her, but I needed the confirmation from her. My first instinct with the others, no matter what, would always be to act like a shield, positioning myself between them and the prying eyes of the world. And Zu, being Zu, seemed to understand.

She slid the small, narrow notebook out of her pocket and wrote, I can’t fight, right? Not at Oasis. Not at Thurmond?

When I shook my head she didn’t seem upset by it, just resigned. This is the only way I can think of to do something. I want to help!

“I hope you don’t think I haven’t noticed or appreciated all that you’ve done here at the Ranch so far,” I said.

Zu kept writing. What happened yesterday made me realize it’s important to speak up and say your piece—what you believe in.

“Liam has that effect on people,” I said quietly.

She took my arm and moved her thumb from the corner of the page, so I could see what else she had written. I want to be strong like you. I want to do this to help you get what you want. I’m tired of being scared. I don’t want them to win.

The words stole the pain in my heart away, just for a little while. I managed to smile at her, and hugged her tight enough that she let out a silent, shuddering laugh.

“Okay,” I said. “Liam’s talking for you?”

She nodded. I told him he could as long as he wasn’t in the shot. He said it was okay, but I don’t want anyone to go looking for his family because of this.

“What about your family?”

My family is here.

I bit my lip. “You’re right. We are. And, for what it’s worth, I think you’re going to knock ’em dead.”

Zu scribbled something down in her notebook and held it up for me to see. I will. I’ve been practicing. Will you stay and watch?

“Of course.”

Chubs and Vida were still standing where I’d left them, talking quietly to each other, their backs turned to Liam. They stepped away from each other as I came closer, and the quiet conversation between Liam and Alice ended the moment Zu sat back down.

I felt Liam’s eyes flick to me, just for a moment, but I kept my own eyes on Zu, gave her an encouraging little smile when she glanced over one last time.

“Ready?” Liam asked.

“I have paper and a pen for her to write with,” Alice said, picking up one of the bigger notebooks from the floor and holding it out to her. “She can tell me to stop at any point, and I will. She and I shook on it.”