CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHTTOBIAS’S HEAD TURNS, and his dark eyes shift to me. His eyebrows draw in. He stands. He looks confused. He raises his g*n.
“Drop your weapon,” he says.
“Tobias,” I say, “you’re in a simulation.”
“Drop your weapon,” he repeats. “Or I’ll fire.”
Jeanine said he didn’t know me. Jeanine also said that the simulation made Tobias’s friends into enemies. He will shoot me if he has to.
I set my g*n down at my feet.
“Drop your weapon!” shouts Tobias.
“I did,” I say. A little voice in my head sings that he can’t hear me, he can’t see me, he doesn’t know me. Tongues of flame press behind my eyes. I can’t just stand here and let him shoot me.
I run at him, grabbing his wrist. I feel his muscles shift as he pinches the trigger and duck my head just in time. The bullet hits th
