Chapter 4
The room was all but gone this time, faded to a pressing, infinite grayness. Only the door
remained substantial.
"It figures," Lisa sighed. But it wasn't a surprise, not really. Wishful thinking had been all that let
her convince herself that the first dream was a one-off. "So," she added, throwing her arms open
wide, "How do you want to play this? I'm not going to stand here and whimper, so you can just
forget that idea. I set my alarm, though. I wasn't about to hang out here all night."
There was no response, no hint at all that anything or anyone heard her. The air in this space
wasn't any more real than the light that seemed to fill the space; the curtains couldn't twitch nor
the light flicker in any way that could even be interpreted as meaningful. There was no way to
tell if someone else was present.
"You're going to make this difficult, aren't you?" she called.
If Sara was listening, she didn't answer. Lisa remained alone in the room that was a shadow of
what it had been.
"Come out, come out wherever you are," she sing-songed. Her voice rang in the stillness.
"Midnight, starbright," she continued under her breath. "I wish I see a ghost tonight." Memories
sprang to mind of many a childhood evening playing the combination hide-and-seek and tag
game. The gray dreamscape lent itself to imagining a foggy night, although it lacked the flashes
of lightening bugs or the playful screams of her peers seeking to navigate in the dark. "And if I
do, I'll take my shoe and knock it black and blue.
"Ghost in the graveyard!" she sang out: the name of the game, but also the warning to the
designated "ghost" that their time to hide was up.
As if on cue, Sara appeared. She, too, seemed faded around the edges. A kind of weariness that
seeped through every movement, and couldn't be pin-pointed to any one description. "You came
back," she said. The girl leaned in to peer at her face. Lisa saw her reflection in the other girl's
eyes, and had no doubt that the reverse was true.
"Yeah, want to tell me why?"
Instead of answering, Sara flashed out of existence.
"Great!" Hands on her hips, Lisa glared out at the emptiness. She waited for several minutes for
Sara to return, until she started to imagine that the grayness was closing in around her. Then she
started to pace, to count off steps. To try to force dimension in its absence.
Eventually she realized that no matter how far she seemed to walk, no ground was covered. Nor
was she tiring out. It was no more than she expected for a dream, but she'd already had ample
proof that this wasn't just another dream. Through it all, the door didn't move.
She stopped in mid-step, caught with that thought. The door hadn't changed position relative to
her. No matter how much she paced, how far she seemed to walk, the door was still in the same
relative location. Even her attempts to circle it were met without result.
"Great," she repeated, but without the fight. "So what am I supposed to do *now*?" The last was
directed up, in the general direction of a God that Lisa wasn't sure she believed in.
She felt her attention redirected to the portal; the same invisible force that had stopped her from
opening the door before now moved her head so she had a clear view of it. While Lisa watched,
the air in front of it thickened, then became a person. A Hispanic teen, with the broad, high-cheek
boned face of someone who no doubt had ancestors among the indigenous population.
He was turning in place, clearly trying to reason what he was seeing. He just as clearly didn't see
Lisa. His gaze skipped over her, just another spirit.
"How come he can't see me?" she breathed, more to herself than anyone else. She didn't expect
an answer, but the silence of this place begged to be filled.
Lisa watched with morbid fascination as the new arrival explored the scene. She couldn't help but
wonder if he saw the same emptiness as she, or if his mind was filling in the blanks somehow.
Maybe he saw the bedroom that she'd seen on her first visit. Was it just the previous night?
Did he understand that this was more than just a dream, she wondered. In a bed back at the
school that had once felt so safe and normal her body lay in sleep, but her mind was quite
conscious of the here and now--such that they were. Although her body was asleep, she was quite
awake. Yet, there was a certain stiffness about the teen's movements that suggested that he wasn't
quite aware.
"Sometimes they talk," Sara said, once again standing next to the elder girl as if she'd never left
her side. "They beg, or yell or pray to God. Some cry. I don't like the ones who cry. Mostly they
just look around, and then . . ."
The boy reached for the door. His hand never found the knob. Instead, he stepped straight though
what had appeared to be solid wood. He didn't come out the other side.
". . . they go away."
The act itself seemed so innocent, so painless. The teenager had been there, and then he walked
through the door. And Lisa knew with utmost certainty that this was not a good thing. Sara
sounded sad, and perhaps a little lonely as she related the facts. Lisa was just horrified. She
rubbed at the goose bumps on her arms. "Ghost in the graveyard," she repeated without humor.
She looked up to see Sara standing at her side. And another thought occurred to her. "Why me?"
she asked. Why was she standing here watching when another person had been allowed to pass?
she meant. Why was she allowed to see the boy, when he hadn't been able to see her? If Sara was
to be believed, what she'd just seen had happened before, and would happen again.
"You answered me," was the murmured response. "No one's ever answered me before."
"Yeah, you said that already."
"They go away. She went away, and she didn't answer me."
Her hands stilled. The topic had somehow jumped beyond the creepy scene that had just played
out, and Lisa wasn't sure when it happened.
"Lisa Davis," Sara added, her voice child-like and almost too low to be heard. "Make it stop. She
went away and I . . . ahhh . . . ." The sound turned into a moan, then escalated into a scream of
anguish. Sara pressed her arms against her ears, fingers locked behind her head. Dropping to her
knees, she curled in on herself. Her hair cascaded over her hands and face, hiding her from view,
offering yet another layer of protection.
"Sara?" Lisa laid a gentle hand on the girl's head.
Sara froze in place, the scream cut off abruptly. For precious seconds the two stood immobile.
Then Sara pulled back, crawling on her knees. "No. Nonononono." The desperation of the word
tore into Lisa, the sound of an animal under attack. The sound of a person without knowledge of
pain, one naive of her right or ability to fight back, being tortured.
Curling her fingers into a fist, Lisa grimaced and took her own step back. Whatever it was, Lisa
was pretty sure she hadn't started it. But she was sure that she had made it worse.
"There. Will be. No. Touching," Sara choked out. "Not. At all." Then she flickered out of
existence again.
Lisa couldn't move for a long time after that. Her limbs shook from the rush of adrenaline that
had no outlet in either fight or flight; her heart pounded in her chest, the beat equipresent in her
jaw, and deafening in her head.
[Lisa?]
She came awake. Not suddenly, not like waking up from a nightmare. But there was no
transition. One moment she was sleeping; the next she was awake in her dorm bunk-bed. Her
sheets had all been kicked down to the foot, and her pillow was squashed in the corner where the
bed met the wall. From above, the soft snores of her roommate filtered down. It all felt so
normal, until the dream surfaced in her memory. Then she felt her pulse quicken, and the
darkness of the room turn a little less friendly. The bed springs creaked as Tanya rolled over, and
Lisa realized there was no one here she could talk to about the dream. No one who would see it
as she did.
[Lisa?] she heard again.
She felt the softest touch at the fringes of her mind, and reached out in return.
****
"It wasn't just a dream," Lisa said. "Adam, it felt so *real*."
Lying awake in her bed, she'd felt Adam reaching for her. After their less than amicable
discussion they day before, she hesitated about accepting the offered help. She had told him to go
away, after all. She hesitated, but only for a second. Once, the two of them had been the only
representatives of their race. Then, Adam had needed her and the two had formed a friendship of
default that promised to become much more. But Lisa's fears interrupted the developing
relationship, stalled it when she walked away. She had told herself then that she didn't need them
then, and she had mouthed the same words again one day previous.
Maybe she didn't need Adam's help, but someone else did. Someone who, if it was possible, was
more frightened than she. And that someone didn't seem to be in any hurry to go away until she
got that help.
Now Adam regarded her in that soul-searching manner of his, as though looking for the truth
behind her words. Not that he expected her to lie -- not that any of them could lie to him -- but he
looked as if to see the things she wasn't ready to admit. Perhaps, hadn't even yet recognized
herself. "It wasn't just a dream," he confirmed. "I . . . lost track of you." He bowed his head to the
floor.
In the dim light of the spaceship, his expression was impossible to read. Almost without
conscious control she felt the clenched control of her mind ease. The power she had first
struggled against, then ignored, was waking up. Although she never wanted to admit it, the
Tomorrow People's abilities could be convenient at times.
Her hard-fought-for control relaxed, and for the second time in less than a day she reached out
with her thoughts to find Adam's. She found nothing. His control was better than she could have
wished for herself; his thoughts were untouchable.
That wasn't fair. What did she have this power for if she couldn't use it for anything good?
"What's that supposed to mean?" she demanded, instead, using the recourse she was best familiar
with.
Adam raised his head. "I can feel you," he admitted, tapping his temple, "here."
She stared at him in silence for several seconds before responding, "You keep track of me?"
"I don't have a choice."
"Wait a second. You spy on me? All the time? And you're just now getting around to mentioning
this?"
"It's not spying, Lisa. I don't close my eyes and watch you take a shower."
Her eyes widened at the thought, and she opened her mouth as if to say something, but no words
came out.
"I couldn't even if I wanted to," he cut in, interrupting the brewing outrage. "It doesn't work that
way. You, Megabyte, Jade. Everyone. You're all here." He tapped his temple again. "Usually," he
added with a frown. "You know that. Or, you used to.
"I always know where you are, how you're feeling. When a Tomorrow Person dies . . ." he
squeezed his eyes shut and swallowed hard. ". . . the loss . . . we feel the loss. The part that we
share . . . is gone."
She nodded silently. "But I didn't die," she said. "I think I would remember that. I can't seem to
forget the last time it happened."
"No," he agreed. "You didn't die. You just . . . I'm not even sure how to describe it. It's like it
went blank. You were still there, in my head, but . . . you weren't. I didn't know where you were
anymore."
"Do you have *any* idea how many people there are in the world who I could wish had the same
problem?" She pressed the heel of one hand to her forehead and held it, eyes closed, for a long
moment. The ship hummed and moaned in the background, like it was trying to answer her
question.
"Okay," she said. "You said the ship wanted something from one of us. Apparently that person is
me. Here I am." She dropped her hand back to her side, acutely conscious of the slight quiver in
her fingers that she couldn't seem to bring under control. "This is all your fault," she directed to
the central column.
It moaned in response, the voices of thousands of generations of Tomorrow People past and yet
to come trying to speak through alien machinery that had been broken long before the rise of
earth civilization.
"Okay, but why *me*?" She turned suddenly to face Adam. "Why *now*?"
"Maybe she knows you, goes to your school?" he suggested.
"Too young," Lisa argued. "She couldn't be older than fifteen." Which was true, although there
had been something about her that seemed much harder. When the girl looked at her, it wasn't
with the innocence Lisa had come to expect from fifteen-year-olds. Including herself at that age,
though she had fought hard and often to deny it then.
"Is there anything else you remember. Anything, at all?" Adam was leaning against the wall that
looked out onto the ocean. He showed no signs of having been awakened by her dream, but there
were many times Lisa questioned if he slept. She knew he pretty much lived in the spaceship and
he cared for the Tomorrow People like his own. She didn't know if there was another place he
called home, or another group of people he called family.
With a shake of her head she answered, "Nothing. The first time, I guess it was her bedroom we
were in. She mostly just acted strange and cryptic. All this stuff about me being able to hear her,
*and* she knew my name."
"So she's telepathic."
"No kidding. The second time, well I already told you what happened the second time. And it
sounded like it's happened to her before, more than once." She sucked in her lower lip, then
added, "I think maybe he was a Tomorrow Person too."
That got Adam's attention. He looked at her squarely, focused on her with an attention that would
be frightening coming from anyone else. "How? Can you be sure?"
She returned his gaze, wanting him to understand exactly what this piece of information meant.
"His name is Alejandro de los Reyes."
"That's why the ship . . . ." Adam gazed off into the distance, his brow furrowed in thought. He
was dressed as always in a simple, loose-fitting t-shirt and jeans. He should have looked like any
other young adult. But partially turned, with the dim light catching his profile and casting his face
into shadows, he looked like anything but.
"Are they Tomorrow People?" Lisa asked when his silence grew too long.
He shook his head. "We haven't had any new break-outs since Rachel." Rachel was the blonde
American who came into her own during the height of summer a few months back, Lisa
remembered. "I suppose they could be people who're about to break out," Adam added.
"I don't think so," Lisa responded slowly. "There was something just . . . wrong . . . about this,
about her. I can't put my finger on it--" she stopped in frustration, searching her thoughts for just
the right description, and coming up blank. "You'd see it too if you met her."
[So, introduce us,] Adam said, projecting the thought right into her head.
"Don't *do* that," she said, rounding on him with finger upraised.
"You needed to know I'm serious," he answered. "Introduce us."
"Adam, I don't even know if I *can*," she protested. "I mean, what if she doesn't contact me
again?"
"Do you think she's contacting you?"
Lisa scowled. "What else would you call it?"
He crossed the ship to sit cross-legged in one of the round portals that led out of the main room,
like a guru sitting in meditation on top of a mountain. Through closed eyes he looked up at the
ceiling, as if concentrating on a sound he could barely hear. "Maybe you're contacting her," he
suggested. "Maybe she's a Tomorrow Person from another time or another planet, and you've
reached out to her." When his eyes opened again, Lisa made sure her face expressed every bit of
doubt and disgust she could muster. "Maybe not," he conceded, looking a little sheepish.
"No," Lisa said, just to make sure he understood. "There is no way this would be happening if it
had been up to me to start it. Don't even try to blame me."
"I'm not blaming you."
"Good, then we agree that she's the one causing all the problems. So, how do I make her stop?"
"Well, we have to figure out what she wants," he said, sounding reasonable.
Lisa kicked at some of the sand that covered the space ship floor. "When did it become 'we'? She
came to me, remember? She's not your problem, yet."
She saw something darken in Adam's eyes, as if he were holding himself responsible for recent
events; at his failure to protect her from the world she had opted out of. "If she's a Tomorrow
Person, then she is my problem."
"Okay, so she's your problem. She's my problem. She's generally just a problem. A real problem
child."
"We need to stop her before something happens," he said.
"What makes you think something is going to happen? Besides the fact that something has
*already happened*." She heard her voice rising and forced herself to take a deep breath. In a
more normal volume she added, "I'm sorry, but I'm having a very hard time remembering not to
panic. I don't like the unexplained, and lately I seem to be surrounded with things I can't explain."
"I understand," he said quietly, twisting his hands together in his lap in a gesture of nervousness
that didn't seem like one Adam would ever have reason to know. "What if we find Sara and ask
her?"
That, she thought, was the elder speaking again. No matter how ridiculous a situation they found
themselves in, Adam was able to establish and maintain the distance necessary to solve it. It was
one of the elements that made him a good leader. And one of the elements, Lisa thought, that
made her a lousy follower. Because while everyone else was happily following Adam's course of
action, she was stuck trying to figure out how things got the way they were to begin with.
There was just one problem.
"How?" she asked.
He shrugged carelessly, like the situation wasn't anywhere near as complicated as they were
making it seem. "We know her name," he said.
Lisa kicked again at the sand and started drawing concentric patterns with the toe of her shoe.
"And we're supposed to do what? Look her up in the phone book?"
"Sure."
"Which one? There're probably dozens of Grimms in my town alone and we don't even know if
she's in my town. We don't even know if she's in my country." Why was she having a bad feeling
about this? Why did she feel like she was being set up?
Adam shrugged again. "You said she sounded American."
"That's what people say about Megabyte, too." The comeback dropped from her lips, followed by
the realization that she had squashed any last chance at normalcy. The only kind of investigation
left was the kind she did not, under any circumstances, want to participate in.
Adam's expression grew intense. Lisa didn't have to be telepathic to see the thoughts and plans
racing through his mind. Each idea echoed on his face, his expressions shifting faster than Lisa
could identify and keep up with them. "There is something we can try," he said at last.
"Don't," she interrupted. "Don't you dare suggest a mind merge. I don't even want to hear it!"
That was something she'd never done, to share one's mind with another person . . . or worse, with
the space ship . . . so completely that there was no telling where one mind left off and the next
began. A mind merge was supposed to enhance memories, to bring to light the details that had
been perceived but not noted. It was also supposed to let one view memories from a different
perspective. It was an experience she didn't need.
"It may be the only way."
"Or it may be the wrong way. Did you think of that? Adam, I'm part of this because she came to
me. I don't know if it'll happen again; I can only hope she'll find someone else's head to waltz
around in tonight."
"You said this was the *second* time she came to you," he pointed out reasonably.
"It had better be the *last* time," she demanded. "I didn't ask for this, and I don't want it. All I
want is for her to stop."
"Easy," Adam said. "We find out what she wants and we give it to her. Then she won't have to
come to you anymore."
She stomped her foot down hard. "I am not doing a mind merge."
"Do you have any better ideas?"Adam asked, still sounding too reasonable. He sounded like he
wanted her suggestions, and wasn't just spitting the question out as a dare he knew she couldn't
accept.
The quiver in her hands grew stronger and she clasped them behind her back to hide the shaking
from the one person who wouldn't fail to notice it. "I can't," she said, voice catching.
She could.
"Please?"
Did he see through the lie, she wondered? Could he know the choice he was asking her to make?
He was asking too much.
"I can't," she repeated.
He didn't respond, verbally or telepathically; she could feel him standing somewhere just inside
her personal space, hesitating, sizing up the situation and her determination. She almost wished
he would touch her, place his hand on hers and say something uniquely Adam that would make
her cave in and go with him. Instead, the silence stretched on. She was just about to look up, to
apologize for disappointing him again, when she registered the electric charge in the air and flash
of light that signaled his departing teleport.
"I'm sorry," she said to the empty ship. "I can't."
The moan it responded with left no doubt that it didn't believe her either.
The room was all but gone this time, faded to a pressing, infinite grayness. Only the door
remained substantial.
"It figures," Lisa sighed. But it wasn't a surprise, not really. Wishful thinking had been all that let
her convince herself that the first dream was a one-off. "So," she added, throwing her arms open
wide, "How do you want to play this? I'm not going to stand here and whimper, so you can just
forget that idea. I set my alarm, though. I wasn't about to hang out here all night."
There was no response, no hint at all that anything or anyone heard her. The air in this space
wasn't any more real than the light that seemed to fill the space; the curtains couldn't twitch nor
the light flicker in any way that could even be interpreted as meaningful. There was no way to
tell if someone else was present.
"You're going to make this difficult, aren't you?" she called.
If Sara was listening, she didn't answer. Lisa remained alone in the room that was a shadow of
what it had been.
"Come out, come out wherever you are," she sing-songed. Her voice rang in the stillness.
"Midnight, starbright," she continued under her breath. "I wish I see a ghost tonight." Memories
sprang to mind of many a childhood evening playing the combination hide-and-seek and tag
game. The gray dreamscape lent itself to imagining a foggy night, although it lacked the flashes
of lightening bugs or the playful screams of her peers seeking to navigate in the dark. "And if I
do, I'll take my shoe and knock it black and blue.
"Ghost in the graveyard!" she sang out: the name of the game, but also the warning to the
designated "ghost" that their time to hide was up.
As if on cue, Sara appeared. She, too, seemed faded around the edges. A kind of weariness that
seeped through every movement, and couldn't be pin-pointed to any one description. "You came
back," she said. The girl leaned in to peer at her face. Lisa saw her reflection in the other girl's
eyes, and had no doubt that the reverse was true.
"Yeah, want to tell me why?"
Instead of answering, Sara flashed out of existence.
"Great!" Hands on her hips, Lisa glared out at the emptiness. She waited for several minutes for
Sara to return, until she started to imagine that the grayness was closing in around her. Then she
started to pace, to count off steps. To try to force dimension in its absence.
Eventually she realized that no matter how far she seemed to walk, no ground was covered. Nor
was she tiring out. It was no more than she expected for a dream, but she'd already had ample
proof that this wasn't just another dream. Through it all, the door didn't move.
She stopped in mid-step, caught with that thought. The door hadn't changed position relative to
her. No matter how much she paced, how far she seemed to walk, the door was still in the same
relative location. Even her attempts to circle it were met without result.
"Great," she repeated, but without the fight. "So what am I supposed to do *now*?" The last was
directed up, in the general direction of a God that Lisa wasn't sure she believed in.
She felt her attention redirected to the portal; the same invisible force that had stopped her from
opening the door before now moved her head so she had a clear view of it. While Lisa watched,
the air in front of it thickened, then became a person. A Hispanic teen, with the broad, high-cheek
boned face of someone who no doubt had ancestors among the indigenous population.
He was turning in place, clearly trying to reason what he was seeing. He just as clearly didn't see
Lisa. His gaze skipped over her, just another spirit.
"How come he can't see me?" she breathed, more to herself than anyone else. She didn't expect
an answer, but the silence of this place begged to be filled.
Lisa watched with morbid fascination as the new arrival explored the scene. She couldn't help but
wonder if he saw the same emptiness as she, or if his mind was filling in the blanks somehow.
Maybe he saw the bedroom that she'd seen on her first visit. Was it just the previous night?
Did he understand that this was more than just a dream, she wondered. In a bed back at the
school that had once felt so safe and normal her body lay in sleep, but her mind was quite
conscious of the here and now--such that they were. Although her body was asleep, she was quite
awake. Yet, there was a certain stiffness about the teen's movements that suggested that he wasn't
quite aware.
"Sometimes they talk," Sara said, once again standing next to the elder girl as if she'd never left
her side. "They beg, or yell or pray to God. Some cry. I don't like the ones who cry. Mostly they
just look around, and then . . ."
The boy reached for the door. His hand never found the knob. Instead, he stepped straight though
what had appeared to be solid wood. He didn't come out the other side.
". . . they go away."
The act itself seemed so innocent, so painless. The teenager had been there, and then he walked
through the door. And Lisa knew with utmost certainty that this was not a good thing. Sara
sounded sad, and perhaps a little lonely as she related the facts. Lisa was just horrified. She
rubbed at the goose bumps on her arms. "Ghost in the graveyard," she repeated without humor.
She looked up to see Sara standing at her side. And another thought occurred to her. "Why me?"
she asked. Why was she standing here watching when another person had been allowed to pass?
she meant. Why was she allowed to see the boy, when he hadn't been able to see her? If Sara was
to be believed, what she'd just seen had happened before, and would happen again.
"You answered me," was the murmured response. "No one's ever answered me before."
"Yeah, you said that already."
"They go away. She went away, and she didn't answer me."
Her hands stilled. The topic had somehow jumped beyond the creepy scene that had just played
out, and Lisa wasn't sure when it happened.
"Lisa Davis," Sara added, her voice child-like and almost too low to be heard. "Make it stop. She
went away and I . . . ahhh . . . ." The sound turned into a moan, then escalated into a scream of
anguish. Sara pressed her arms against her ears, fingers locked behind her head. Dropping to her
knees, she curled in on herself. Her hair cascaded over her hands and face, hiding her from view,
offering yet another layer of protection.
"Sara?" Lisa laid a gentle hand on the girl's head.
Sara froze in place, the scream cut off abruptly. For precious seconds the two stood immobile.
Then Sara pulled back, crawling on her knees. "No. Nonononono." The desperation of the word
tore into Lisa, the sound of an animal under attack. The sound of a person without knowledge of
pain, one naive of her right or ability to fight back, being tortured.
Curling her fingers into a fist, Lisa grimaced and took her own step back. Whatever it was, Lisa
was pretty sure she hadn't started it. But she was sure that she had made it worse.
"There. Will be. No. Touching," Sara choked out. "Not. At all." Then she flickered out of
existence again.
Lisa couldn't move for a long time after that. Her limbs shook from the rush of adrenaline that
had no outlet in either fight or flight; her heart pounded in her chest, the beat equipresent in her
jaw, and deafening in her head.
[Lisa?]
She came awake. Not suddenly, not like waking up from a nightmare. But there was no
transition. One moment she was sleeping; the next she was awake in her dorm bunk-bed. Her
sheets had all been kicked down to the foot, and her pillow was squashed in the corner where the
bed met the wall. From above, the soft snores of her roommate filtered down. It all felt so
normal, until the dream surfaced in her memory. Then she felt her pulse quicken, and the
darkness of the room turn a little less friendly. The bed springs creaked as Tanya rolled over, and
Lisa realized there was no one here she could talk to about the dream. No one who would see it
as she did.
[Lisa?] she heard again.
She felt the softest touch at the fringes of her mind, and reached out in return.
****
"It wasn't just a dream," Lisa said. "Adam, it felt so *real*."
Lying awake in her bed, she'd felt Adam reaching for her. After their less than amicable
discussion they day before, she hesitated about accepting the offered help. She had told him to go
away, after all. She hesitated, but only for a second. Once, the two of them had been the only
representatives of their race. Then, Adam had needed her and the two had formed a friendship of
default that promised to become much more. But Lisa's fears interrupted the developing
relationship, stalled it when she walked away. She had told herself then that she didn't need them
then, and she had mouthed the same words again one day previous.
Maybe she didn't need Adam's help, but someone else did. Someone who, if it was possible, was
more frightened than she. And that someone didn't seem to be in any hurry to go away until she
got that help.
Now Adam regarded her in that soul-searching manner of his, as though looking for the truth
behind her words. Not that he expected her to lie -- not that any of them could lie to him -- but he
looked as if to see the things she wasn't ready to admit. Perhaps, hadn't even yet recognized
herself. "It wasn't just a dream," he confirmed. "I . . . lost track of you." He bowed his head to the
floor.
In the dim light of the spaceship, his expression was impossible to read. Almost without
conscious control she felt the clenched control of her mind ease. The power she had first
struggled against, then ignored, was waking up. Although she never wanted to admit it, the
Tomorrow People's abilities could be convenient at times.
Her hard-fought-for control relaxed, and for the second time in less than a day she reached out
with her thoughts to find Adam's. She found nothing. His control was better than she could have
wished for herself; his thoughts were untouchable.
That wasn't fair. What did she have this power for if she couldn't use it for anything good?
"What's that supposed to mean?" she demanded, instead, using the recourse she was best familiar
with.
Adam raised his head. "I can feel you," he admitted, tapping his temple, "here."
She stared at him in silence for several seconds before responding, "You keep track of me?"
"I don't have a choice."
"Wait a second. You spy on me? All the time? And you're just now getting around to mentioning
this?"
"It's not spying, Lisa. I don't close my eyes and watch you take a shower."
Her eyes widened at the thought, and she opened her mouth as if to say something, but no words
came out.
"I couldn't even if I wanted to," he cut in, interrupting the brewing outrage. "It doesn't work that
way. You, Megabyte, Jade. Everyone. You're all here." He tapped his temple again. "Usually," he
added with a frown. "You know that. Or, you used to.
"I always know where you are, how you're feeling. When a Tomorrow Person dies . . ." he
squeezed his eyes shut and swallowed hard. ". . . the loss . . . we feel the loss. The part that we
share . . . is gone."
She nodded silently. "But I didn't die," she said. "I think I would remember that. I can't seem to
forget the last time it happened."
"No," he agreed. "You didn't die. You just . . . I'm not even sure how to describe it. It's like it
went blank. You were still there, in my head, but . . . you weren't. I didn't know where you were
anymore."
"Do you have *any* idea how many people there are in the world who I could wish had the same
problem?" She pressed the heel of one hand to her forehead and held it, eyes closed, for a long
moment. The ship hummed and moaned in the background, like it was trying to answer her
question.
"Okay," she said. "You said the ship wanted something from one of us. Apparently that person is
me. Here I am." She dropped her hand back to her side, acutely conscious of the slight quiver in
her fingers that she couldn't seem to bring under control. "This is all your fault," she directed to
the central column.
It moaned in response, the voices of thousands of generations of Tomorrow People past and yet
to come trying to speak through alien machinery that had been broken long before the rise of
earth civilization.
"Okay, but why *me*?" She turned suddenly to face Adam. "Why *now*?"
"Maybe she knows you, goes to your school?" he suggested.
"Too young," Lisa argued. "She couldn't be older than fifteen." Which was true, although there
had been something about her that seemed much harder. When the girl looked at her, it wasn't
with the innocence Lisa had come to expect from fifteen-year-olds. Including herself at that age,
though she had fought hard and often to deny it then.
"Is there anything else you remember. Anything, at all?" Adam was leaning against the wall that
looked out onto the ocean. He showed no signs of having been awakened by her dream, but there
were many times Lisa questioned if he slept. She knew he pretty much lived in the spaceship and
he cared for the Tomorrow People like his own. She didn't know if there was another place he
called home, or another group of people he called family.
With a shake of her head she answered, "Nothing. The first time, I guess it was her bedroom we
were in. She mostly just acted strange and cryptic. All this stuff about me being able to hear her,
*and* she knew my name."
"So she's telepathic."
"No kidding. The second time, well I already told you what happened the second time. And it
sounded like it's happened to her before, more than once." She sucked in her lower lip, then
added, "I think maybe he was a Tomorrow Person too."
That got Adam's attention. He looked at her squarely, focused on her with an attention that would
be frightening coming from anyone else. "How? Can you be sure?"
She returned his gaze, wanting him to understand exactly what this piece of information meant.
"His name is Alejandro de los Reyes."
"That's why the ship . . . ." Adam gazed off into the distance, his brow furrowed in thought. He
was dressed as always in a simple, loose-fitting t-shirt and jeans. He should have looked like any
other young adult. But partially turned, with the dim light catching his profile and casting his face
into shadows, he looked like anything but.
"Are they Tomorrow People?" Lisa asked when his silence grew too long.
He shook his head. "We haven't had any new break-outs since Rachel." Rachel was the blonde
American who came into her own during the height of summer a few months back, Lisa
remembered. "I suppose they could be people who're about to break out," Adam added.
"I don't think so," Lisa responded slowly. "There was something just . . . wrong . . . about this,
about her. I can't put my finger on it--" she stopped in frustration, searching her thoughts for just
the right description, and coming up blank. "You'd see it too if you met her."
[So, introduce us,] Adam said, projecting the thought right into her head.
"Don't *do* that," she said, rounding on him with finger upraised.
"You needed to know I'm serious," he answered. "Introduce us."
"Adam, I don't even know if I *can*," she protested. "I mean, what if she doesn't contact me
again?"
"Do you think she's contacting you?"
Lisa scowled. "What else would you call it?"
He crossed the ship to sit cross-legged in one of the round portals that led out of the main room,
like a guru sitting in meditation on top of a mountain. Through closed eyes he looked up at the
ceiling, as if concentrating on a sound he could barely hear. "Maybe you're contacting her," he
suggested. "Maybe she's a Tomorrow Person from another time or another planet, and you've
reached out to her." When his eyes opened again, Lisa made sure her face expressed every bit of
doubt and disgust she could muster. "Maybe not," he conceded, looking a little sheepish.
"No," Lisa said, just to make sure he understood. "There is no way this would be happening if it
had been up to me to start it. Don't even try to blame me."
"I'm not blaming you."
"Good, then we agree that she's the one causing all the problems. So, how do I make her stop?"
"Well, we have to figure out what she wants," he said, sounding reasonable.
Lisa kicked at some of the sand that covered the space ship floor. "When did it become 'we'? She
came to me, remember? She's not your problem, yet."
She saw something darken in Adam's eyes, as if he were holding himself responsible for recent
events; at his failure to protect her from the world she had opted out of. "If she's a Tomorrow
Person, then she is my problem."
"Okay, so she's your problem. She's my problem. She's generally just a problem. A real problem
child."
"We need to stop her before something happens," he said.
"What makes you think something is going to happen? Besides the fact that something has
*already happened*." She heard her voice rising and forced herself to take a deep breath. In a
more normal volume she added, "I'm sorry, but I'm having a very hard time remembering not to
panic. I don't like the unexplained, and lately I seem to be surrounded with things I can't explain."
"I understand," he said quietly, twisting his hands together in his lap in a gesture of nervousness
that didn't seem like one Adam would ever have reason to know. "What if we find Sara and ask
her?"
That, she thought, was the elder speaking again. No matter how ridiculous a situation they found
themselves in, Adam was able to establish and maintain the distance necessary to solve it. It was
one of the elements that made him a good leader. And one of the elements, Lisa thought, that
made her a lousy follower. Because while everyone else was happily following Adam's course of
action, she was stuck trying to figure out how things got the way they were to begin with.
There was just one problem.
"How?" she asked.
He shrugged carelessly, like the situation wasn't anywhere near as complicated as they were
making it seem. "We know her name," he said.
Lisa kicked again at the sand and started drawing concentric patterns with the toe of her shoe.
"And we're supposed to do what? Look her up in the phone book?"
"Sure."
"Which one? There're probably dozens of Grimms in my town alone and we don't even know if
she's in my town. We don't even know if she's in my country." Why was she having a bad feeling
about this? Why did she feel like she was being set up?
Adam shrugged again. "You said she sounded American."
"That's what people say about Megabyte, too." The comeback dropped from her lips, followed by
the realization that she had squashed any last chance at normalcy. The only kind of investigation
left was the kind she did not, under any circumstances, want to participate in.
Adam's expression grew intense. Lisa didn't have to be telepathic to see the thoughts and plans
racing through his mind. Each idea echoed on his face, his expressions shifting faster than Lisa
could identify and keep up with them. "There is something we can try," he said at last.
"Don't," she interrupted. "Don't you dare suggest a mind merge. I don't even want to hear it!"
That was something she'd never done, to share one's mind with another person . . . or worse, with
the space ship . . . so completely that there was no telling where one mind left off and the next
began. A mind merge was supposed to enhance memories, to bring to light the details that had
been perceived but not noted. It was also supposed to let one view memories from a different
perspective. It was an experience she didn't need.
"It may be the only way."
"Or it may be the wrong way. Did you think of that? Adam, I'm part of this because she came to
me. I don't know if it'll happen again; I can only hope she'll find someone else's head to waltz
around in tonight."
"You said this was the *second* time she came to you," he pointed out reasonably.
"It had better be the *last* time," she demanded. "I didn't ask for this, and I don't want it. All I
want is for her to stop."
"Easy," Adam said. "We find out what she wants and we give it to her. Then she won't have to
come to you anymore."
She stomped her foot down hard. "I am not doing a mind merge."
"Do you have any better ideas?"Adam asked, still sounding too reasonable. He sounded like he
wanted her suggestions, and wasn't just spitting the question out as a dare he knew she couldn't
accept.
The quiver in her hands grew stronger and she clasped them behind her back to hide the shaking
from the one person who wouldn't fail to notice it. "I can't," she said, voice catching.
She could.
"Please?"
Did he see through the lie, she wondered? Could he know the choice he was asking her to make?
He was asking too much.
"I can't," she repeated.
He didn't respond, verbally or telepathically; she could feel him standing somewhere just inside
her personal space, hesitating, sizing up the situation and her determination. She almost wished
he would touch her, place his hand on hers and say something uniquely Adam that would make
her cave in and go with him. Instead, the silence stretched on. She was just about to look up, to
apologize for disappointing him again, when she registered the electric charge in the air and flash
of light that signaled his departing teleport.
"I'm sorry," she said to the empty ship. "I can't."
The moan it responded with left no doubt that it didn't believe her either.
