The Deathless Trilogy

1.23. My Own Hero

As Winston ushers me into the mechanics lab for early morning immersion training, I brush his chilled hand.

"You feel really cold, Winston," I say dryly. "I think you're sick."

He thanks me for my concern, not realizing I really meant that I believe he is a sick human being.

Idiot.

It feels nice to say it to his face, but the anger doesn't go away. It's too strong to go away at this point, especially after dreaming almost exclusively of Eleanor and Ben last night.

They weren't even really dreams, more like memories, mixed up and confused. I dreamt I was back home, and Eleanor was fixing my hair as she liked to do from time to time. She brushed it into a ponytail, and I watched her work through the mirror. But my dream combined that ritual with a memory from after my failed hunting outing. In reality, I had been crying in the barn when Eleanor found me and comforted me, but in the dream, she met my gaze in the mirror and said, "Don't worry, Isla. You'll find your place here."

"But I'm going to die," I said in the dream.

"No one ever dies. We are deathless."

"I'm so sick of that word."

She smiled. "Show them you won't give up on yourself. Like you always have."

Suddenly, Ben was there too, as if he emerged from the wall, and he wrapped me in his arms and told me I was the daughter he never had.

And then I had to wake up, both because I couldn't handle the memories anymore, and because Alexander was knocking at the door to wake me.

I stood up and opened the door. "We're starting immersions early today," he said, but I didn't move or respond. I even waited to close the door until he breathed the words, "I am so sorry. I will protect you."

And as his words—I will protect you—echoed in my mind, I hit a new level of anger: the tunnel vision level. These people are not going to put me in danger and then promise to be my heroes. No, I will be my own hero, and I will survive this. Because I'm not actually a stupid survivor girl. I'm intelligent and I'm compassionate, and dream Eleanor was right: I have to show them I won't give up on myself.

Declan straps everyone into their chairs and flips their switches to send them into the immersion, leaving me for last. He hovers over the switch before immersing me in Mitchell's warped virtual reality. "What happened to you last night?" Declan whispers.

"I'll explain later, but when we get to the refugee camp, we are telling the General about the plans and about the leaders. They have to be stopped."

"Okay," Declan says as he flips the switch, and I drift into the immersion. By now, additional Deathless soldiers have been added, so when we enter the immersion, we are already armed and among them.

Both Mom and Nate stand a few feet from me, and neither one has spoken to me yet. They can be mad at me, that's fine. Nate is a jerk for what he said last night, and Mom will forgive me when I tell her that Dad is waiting for us at the bunker. I just have to get through these immersions and get to the refugee camp. Then the General will fix everything. I hope.

We begin our march to the bunker, through the abandoned town and the forest until we reach the edge of the clearing. Gabriela and Mitchell run to their positions, Nate and Dr. Patel run toward the back entrance, and the rest of us wait patiently for the explosion and the knock out gas to fill the air.

It's so routine by now that I'm not even startled when the tree line bursts into a thousand pieces and the screams of the government soldiers commence. The knock out gas quickly follows, and we run in as Mitchell tells the government soldiers to put down their weapons. The virtual Deathless soldiers join us in the yard, and a group of them follow Phoebe into the heart of the bunker to set off the smaller explosion while Alexander and I cover them.