She shakes her head. “We’ve come this far.” She raises her sword, ready to strike, and I pull the eighty-billion-duro knife from my pack.

“Back to back,” I say. I explain to her about my eyes and their ability to see faint images even in complete darkness and tell her I’ll go first. She’ll be a lot more graceful and adept at walking backward than I would be and I’ll be better at guiding us in the right direction. “If you hear anything, slash and stab.” Step by step I walk her through the tunnel, telling her when to step left or right to avoid an obstacle. We advance a good fifty feet and I think we’re going to make it without incident when we hear a screech close by and I see movement to our right. I can hear Raine’s sword cutting the air.

“I’m slashing!” she calls frantically. “What’s there?”

I see the outline of the pack. My knife is out, poised, but nothing is coming at us. I force my eyes to pull in every molecule of scattered light, and then I see more. A large half-human at the front of the pack, keeping the rest back, snarling, a small creature at its side. The one I let go? It appears this half-human is letting us pass—at least this once.

“We’re here to get a friend,” I say. “We’ll be passing back this way one more time and then we won’t bother you anymore.”

A flurry of yelps and screeches echo through the tunnel. They growl and they snap and I have no idea if they can understand a thing I said. But beneath the slime, the scabs, and the grotesque lipless mouths, their lidless eyes are still completely human. It makes them even more horrific, trapped in bodies and minds at odds with each other, not even knowing they’re abandoned experiments. I’m glad Raine can’t see in the dark.

“Move slowly,” I whisper. “Stay close. I think they’re letting us pass.”

The pack follows us as we move until we finally reach a point where the tunnel curves again and we see light. White light. The pack scatters in the other direction. We cautiously move forward. Up ahead the tunnel ends and it opens into a large brightly lit chamber with four doors on either side. A Security guard walks past, disappearing down an adjacent hallway.

Raine and I look at each other and nod, our wordless signal that we’re ready. We advance to the chamber, hugging the wall in case the guard returns. I gently ease open the first door, to find an empty room that looks like an office. We move on to the next door, carefully gauging the fall of our footsteps. The second door only reveals a supply room. We both take deep silent breaths and move on to the third door. It has a lock on it, easily opened from this side. As soon as I touch the door, I know. There’s someone inside. “Wait here,” I whisper. “If you hear someone coming, signal me.” I open the door and enter.

The room is antiseptic white, void of any warmth. In the corner, a man lies on a thin ragged mat facing the wall.

“What now?” he asks.

I step closer. “I’m here to take you out.”

He rolls over. “Get out of—” He eyes my clothing and his face sparks with suspicion. “Who are you?”

“The Network sent me. I’m here to take you out.”

He stands, wincing, like the effort pains him. Scars wind across his arms, his neck, another across his jaw and forehead—I assume failed attempts to escape through the tunnels. I notice fresh bruising on his cheekbone. He’s very thin but muscular, clearly still a soldier in his army of one. I can’t believe the legend is standing right in front of me.

“Which game are you playing this time? I’ve seen them all.”

“No game, Karden. This is the real deal. We have to hurry.”

He shakes his head and smirks and then turns away to lie back down on his mat.

“I have your knife,” I say. “Miesha gave it to me.”

He spins. Dark and dangerous. His eyes cut through me. I toss him the knife. His reflexes are fast, like Raine’s. He examines the knife, a pained furrow growing between his eyes, as though he’s remembering Miesha. He throws it back to me, disgust crossing his face. “There’s a million knives out there like this one.”

“No, none quite like this one,” I say. “Especially not like the smallest blade.”

His eyes narrow. I have his attention. “You need to trust me,” I tell him. “We don’t have a lot of—”

The door swings open and Raine steps inside. “There are footsteps coming down—”

She freezes, her eyes fixing on Karden.

The air is sucked from the room. Karden looks at her and then back at me, his eyes glassy and wild like I’m playing another trick on him. They see themselves in each other. The striking resemblance is impossible to miss. It’s probably only a few seconds but it feels like a century that each of us waits for someone else to speak.

Finally, I’m the one who has to break the silence. “It’s the real deal,” I say again.

Raine looks away, overcome. “We need to go,” she whispers.

Karden nods, like he finally believes it. “There will be two of them bringing me dinner. Stand behind the door. Now.”

Raine and I move to positions behind the door just as it swings open. The dispatching of two more guards is nearly uneventful, Raine holding her sword to the throat of one before he can draw his weapon, and me grabbing the other from behind, holding him by the neck. They’re both young guards, frightened, pulling the lowest rank of duty. We take their weapons and lock them in the room, warning them to remain silent or we’ll come back and finish them off—or worse, we’ll disable the lights so the creatures of the tunnel take care of our work for us. I quickly check the remaining rooms, praying that Livvy might be in one of them, but they’re all empty. We’re only a few feet out of the chamber when I notice Karden’s severe limp.