I waited forever for some response. When it came, it was as faint as a whisper.

Callie, run!

That was her last word. And then nothing. The sound in my head went completely silent.

Our connection was severed, I knew it. I felt it.

A cold fear took over my body, making me shiver. I couldn't stop the shaking.

She was gone. Helena was dead, I felt it in my bones.

I was alone.

Suddenly I heard a noise like a high-pitched ping and a crack. I looked to my right but didn't see any unfriendlies. I turned to the left and saw a boxy SUV slinking away in the night.

Then my focus changed as I saw a small hole in my driver's side window. Surrounding it, a web of cracks radiated out, growing as I watched.

The hair on the back of my neck rose. I looked up and saw the red brake lights of the SUV. They'd stopped.

They turned around. They were coming back.

I started my car and pulled out. The SUV was barreling down the middle of the street, heading right for me. I stopped my car and pressed the reverse button. I floored it, retreating from the approaching SUV. As it got closer, its high beams came on, blinding me with the blast of white so I couldn't see who was behind the wheel.

Only a few feet separated the hoods of our cars. I checked the rearview mirror, hoping I wouldn't hit anything. My palms got so sweaty my grip on the wheel became slippery. I held on tighter as I raced backward. Houses, lawns, hedges, flashed by me on either side. At least there were no other cars driving in this residential neighborhood.

The SUV got close enough to bump my hood. I flicked the wheel back and forth and pressed the gas pedal to the floor. I pulled away, but the SUV caught up and hit me again.

A small intersection was coming up in my rearview mirror. I made a quick decision and pulled hard on the wheel, whipping back into the side street. The SUV's momentum kept it going through the intersection and beyond. I switched into drive and raced straight across the intersection, staying on the side street, knowing it would take the SUV time to back up and turn around.

I floored it and hung a right, then a left, making my getaway. I turned off my lights and searched for a place to hide. One house had its gates open, and I pulled into the circular driveway, hiding my car behind the tall hedges. I shut off my engine and listened. A moment later, I heard the screech of the SUV as it raced through the streets. The sound faded away to the quiet residential night that mansion neighborhoods enjoyed.

Lights came on in the home of the driveway I was borrowing, so I started my engine and left. As I drove off, I wondered where I could go. My brother was at the hotel, Blake was in Washington, and who knew where Michael was? I couldn't tell Madison.

I wanted to run to my brother and Florina for refuge. But someone was shooting at me. The last thing I wanted was to lead danger to my brother's door.

Run, Helena had said. But where? Before I went anywhere, I had to go to Helena's place.

For the gun.

I got to Helena's home and went straight to her bedroom. I threw open the dresser drawers, digging through the scarves, searching for the gun Helena had had waiting for me at the Music Center. It was gone.

Had Eugenia moved it?

I went out to the hall and shouted for her. "Eugenia!"

Her heavy shoes clunked as she climbed the stairs. "Coming."

Her voice sounded bored. I didn't wait but shouted down the length of the hall as she approached, taking her own sweet time.

"Did you take anything out of my drawers?" I asked.

She waited until she stood in front of me before she answered. Her expression could only be described as stunned. "You know I never, ever touch your drawers."

"You took it. You took the gun, didn't you?"

She put her hand to her mouth. "A gun? No. I'd never touch a gun."

"People will do anything if they have to."

"It was here, in your bedroom?"

I turned around and looked at the room. Then I winced.

I'd remembered where I left the gun. I went to the closet, opened it, and saw the evening bag there. Eugenia stood in the doorway. With my back to her, I squeezed the bag.

The gun was inside.

I turned around. "I'm so sorry. I haven't been myself. I've had headaches. I was going to go see my tech, to look at the chip." I was reaching, praying that she knew who Helena's tech was.

"Why don't you just go back to the place where they put it in? You sure paid them enough."

She was still angry. But that was nothing compared to how she'd feel if she knew she might be in danger. Helena had only told her about the rental, nothing else.

"Eugenia, listen carefully. Don't answer the door for anyone. If someone calls, you don't know where I went."

Eugenia stared at me, her face long and serious. "You mean business as usual?"

So Helena had been cautious. But it was never as dangerous as this. My life was at risk every minute I stayed. Eugenia knew nothing, which would serve to protect her.

"I have to go," I said. "Please be careful."

I got into Helena's sports car and turned on the engine. I pulled up the navigator's listing of Helena's history. The long list made me want to give up, but then I recognized one of the names. Redmond. That was the person Eugenia had mentioned my first night at the house. She said he'd called Helena.

"Redmond," I said to the navigator.

"Redmond. Right away," the navigator chirped.

The navigator led me to a warehouse in an industrial area of the San Fernando Valley. It wasn't exactly a neighborhood I would have chosen for a nighttime drive. I passed chain-link fences holding back dogs that warned me to keep driving. The address popped up on the navigator. It was a complex of warehouses with pools of light coming from roof-mounted lamps. I parked inside the compound so my car wouldn't be visible to any renegades on the street.

Redmond's address was the last warehouse. The door was locked. I pressed an old-fashioned metal buzzer. Above it was a tiny hole with a shiny center, a camera, most likely. Redmond was crafty, making the exterior look old and cheap. A moment later, the door opened with a loud clunk.

Inside, it was very industrial, the kind of place you'd expect a sculptor to live and work. Concrete floor, a basic hallway created out of a plain white wall. I saw the cool glow of fluorescent light at the end of the hallway. I took out my gun.

My heart was pounding. Was this a trap? I wished I had Helena in my head. She'd know; she'd tell me. I should have pressed for more information about Redmond when I had her.

I came to the end of the hall. I turned left and stepped into a large space broken up by rows of tables and counters of electronic parts, computers, and monitors, some working, some with guts exposed. There was so much that some of it was fastened to bars suspended from the high ceiling. A chemical odor hung in the air.

An airscreen above a cluttered counter showed the outside door, where I had rung the buzzer. Below it, a silver-haired man sat slumped in front of a bank of computer monitors. Ender.

What I couldn't tell was whether he was dead or alive. He was motionless as I crept up behind him, both arms holding the gun in front of me.

"Redmond?" I said.

"Helena," he mumbled with a British accent. "You took so long, I almost dozed off."

He lifted his head. I could see his face reflected in two black-screened monitors. He looked back at my reflection in them, speaking to me without turning.

"Helena, what's that for?"

"I've got a request."

"Usually you ask without pointing a gun at my head."

He started to swivel his chair around. I slammed my foot on the metal ring, freezing it in place.

"Put your hands on the back of your head," I said.

Everything I was doing I'd either learned from my dad or from the holos. It worked, and he obeyed.

One of the monitors beeped in time to a pulsating red dot, part of a map of the city. The dot looked like it was right at the spot where we were.

"What's that?" I pointed to it.

"It's you. Your tracking device. But you know that." His eyes narrowed.

He was thin and gangly, with mad-scientist hair. His bone structure was nice-you could tell he had been handsome when he was young.

"Everyone knows more about my body than I do," I said. "Well, now I want you to remove the chip. I'm finished."

"How did it go?"

"What?"

"Your big plan."

"All these monitors and you don't get the news here?"

He stared at me and rolled his chair forward, hands still on his head. He was reading me, examining, searching to see who was really inside me.

"My God." He lowered his hands and moved in so close that I could smell mint on his breath. "That's not Helena in there, is it?"

My gun hand shook. "No. She's dead."

He wrinkled his brow. "How?"

I shook my head. "I don't know. But I heard it happen. She was inside my head at the time. I think someone killed her."

His eyes grew wider as he hung on my words.

"We were getting close," I said. "I thought I'd get to meet her, in person."

"Helena was a fireball." Sadness washed over Redmond's face. "We met in college, must be over a hundred years ago now."

"How much do you know about the body bank?"

"I know what I need to know."

"Then I'll give you the dummy's version. The body bank killed her. She warned me they would kill me too." I aimed the gun again. "I need you to take out this chip."

"I can see why you don't want them tracking you. You're an eyewitness to Helena's death."

"An earwitness, anyway. So please, take it out."

"I can't."

"I could kill you." I straightened the arm holding the gun. "You should know that better than anyone. You're the one who flipped off my stop-kill switch."

"The question remains whether Helena's plan would have worked," he said. "Would you have been able to do it? It's not clear whether I was successful or whether I failed at that too."

"Do you really want to be the one to test it? For the last time, I'm begging you to remove the chip."

"I want to. I do. Because I'm concerned they may have built in a drop-dead command."

"And that is?"

"They send a signal to the chip to make it explode."

I squeezed my eyes shut for a second. That was one I hadn't thought of.

"Don't worry. It's more likely they'd continue to use the chip-with another senior, someone else there at the body bank, wired up the way Helena was."

I didn't know which was more frightening: someone else taking over my body or my head exploding. "But since you've altered the chip, I haven't had any more blackouts. Helena was unable to take over."

"Right. But someone else could reach the level that Helena had with you at the end-that kind of mind-to-mind connection."

"So take it out!"

"I would if I could. But it's impossible. It's located in your brain."

"But you went in and altered it. Twice."

"And it wasn't easy. But I can't remove it. They embedded it in you in a complex webbing pattern so that if anyone tried to take it out, it would self-destruct. You would almost certainly hemorrhage at the least and be blown to bits at the worst. Think of it as a tiny bomb in your head."

"A bomb? In my head? You've got to be kidding."

"Sorry."

Hemorrhage. Exploding head. I was feeling dizzy.