I blinked the stars from my eyes as I looked around. I was sitting in complete darkness. The room’s lights must have been off if I was in a room at all. I reached up with one hand to rub my head, but my other arm came up with it. Squinting down at my wrists, I realized they were in handcuffs. They weren’t like the cuffs that Anderson had put on me a couple of months previously. These ones were twenty-first century-style gray cuffs. Nothing electronic about them. Connolly must have known that I would hack my way out of normal cuffs.

“You like? I picked them just for you,” said a voice from the other side of the room.

I let out a frustrated huff as I sat up. Doing that reminded me that I had just been choked out. That explained my ridiculous headache. I squinted at Connolly as he marched toward me. His snake arm had retracted back into the barrel hand. His smirk sent chills down my spine. I instinctively backed away, and realized that I was against a wall. I also realized that I was surrounded by my team. They were all unconscious, and they were all cuffed like me. Someone was missing.

“Where’s Upton?” I asked in a hoarse voice.

Connolly chuckled. “Stowed away on my ship. I’ll be delivering him to Frost after I’m done here.”

I raised an eyebrow. “You’re not going to take us too? Frost still wants me on her side…doesn’t she?”

“Aww, look at Baby all concerned that Mommy might not want him anymore. You get more pathetic every time I see you. I could take you to her, but where’s the fun in that?” Connolly’s expression darkened. “When I lost to you and my failure of a daughter, I made a vow. I swore that I wouldn’t kill a single person until we met again. That way, I could start the killstreak over with you.”

“This isn’t a game!” I shouted in his face. “I’m not some target that’s worth more points than the others. Besides, we just went over why you can’t kill me.”

“Yet.” Connolly extended his snake arm and brought it up to my face. “Someday Frost is going to get sick of her little boy scout. After that, you’re all mine. Until then, I’ll just make your life a living hell. Example: instead of bringing you to Frost, I’m leaving you and your little friends to starve in here until the hospital staff find you. Sounds like a good thing, right? Not when they realize that they have the most wanted man in the First Division all tied up. You and your pals will be thrown in jail until Frost collects you and the other Hybrids. Your human friends will stay in jail just for knowing you. See how this works out for me and Frost? I’m sure she’ll agree.”

“Shut. Up.” That voice hadn’t come from me.

I craned my head to look at Benjamin Oak, who was staring at the floor. His hair was disheveled, and he was still pale. Despite that, it sounded like the confidence had returned to his voice. What about this situation could possibly have inspired him?

“What was that, old friend?” Connolly’s arm slithered up to Ben’s face. “Did you say you missed being in a White Dwarf? I could empty one out, just for you. All you have to do is…say the word.”

Ben flinched at the threat. Envisioning himself back in a White Dwarf must have been awful. Then he glanced at Anderson, whose eyes were still shut. He gulped as he regained his resolve.

“Do your worst, Jason, because I never will.” Ben sat up and glared at Connolly. “If I hadn’t let this stupid planet—I mean, condition, get to me, I could have been a bigger help out there.” Ben looked at me. “I wasn’t even as confident as Wander. Seeing him bark orders and take charge is exactly what gave me the courage I needed to speak up now. I don’t really matter, because he’s the one who’s going to beat you. He’s the one who will have Andy’s back when I can’t. So if you want to throw me back into an explorer—I mean, Dwarf…go ahead.”

Did this high-ranking soldier just say that I inspired him? Me? I’d be surprised if a toddler found me inspiring. Despite how things were looking, I allowed myself a smile. Connolly furrowed his brow. He didn’t have as much control over Ben as he thought.

“Forget it. You were in the Dwarf long enough. It’s time for new torture. When Theodore wakes up, let him know that Upton’s in good hands.”

Connolly stomped out of the door. Now that my eyes had adjusted to the darkness, I looked around and realized that we were in Upton’s old cell. This was the room where I’d first met him. The solidios wall was down in addition to the lights being out. I’d never let Upton come back to this prison, but being with Frost would be even worse.

Since my bionic arm gave me enhanced strength, I could rely on that to break free. Unfortunately, my other arm was still of flesh and human. The amount of force I’d need to escape metal might damage it.

“Is he finally gone?” Dylan lifted his head and opened his eyes. He’d been faking this whole time. “About time that he quit taunting us. I feel rotten enough as is.”

“You’re joking. You feel bad about something?” I asked.

“Of course! This is the second time you’ve been endangered trying to protect me. We’re not even that close, but helping me is always what gets you into trouble. I’m cursed.”

I scoffed. “All Hybrids are cursed. We’re freakish creations of Omen Frost. All that matters is what we do with our freakish power. Which brings me to an idea I have. At the moment, you’re our best bet at getting out. How small can you make your domes?”

Dylan raised an eyebrow, but then held his palms out. A red dome flickered on the floor. It vanished after a second. Dylan huffed as if creating that little thing had taken more effort than a making a full-size one. It seemed shrinking things was hard.

Dylan groaned and stomped the ground. “These stupid powers! I can make the shields small, but not for long.”

I sighed. “So you also can’t grow them once they’re like that?” I glanced at Ben. “Nudge Anderson awake. Dude could break out with his suit’s strength.”

Ben nodded and bumped his shoulder against Anderson’s. He was a heavy sleeper, so it was possible that that would take a while. I scooted closer to Dylan despite his sour expression. I’d promised to help him master his powers. Now was the time. I racked my brain for every word of wisdom that Manning had ever bestowed upon me. I’d need them because I was no instructor.

“Implants are part of us, Dylan. When we use them, it’s equivalent to moving a limb or flexing a muscle. That’s just half of it, because the other half comes from our emotions. Our will. Your abilities will improve over time, but you can also force a temporary power surge. You can achieve whatever you want if your will is strong enough.”

“This sounds like one of those ‘If you put your mind to it, you can do anything’ speeches.” Dylan furrowed his brow, indicating that he was unhappy. I should have known that something like that wouldn’t work on him.

“I’m just saying you need to focus. Some of the craziest stuff I’ve ever done? Total accidents. Just imagine what you could do if you focused.”

Dylan raised an eyebrow, and then shrugged. He shut his eyes and held out his palms again. I crossed my fingers as I waited for my student to impress me. The red snow globe from earlier materialized, and stayed a second longer before vanishing. Dylan huffed as if he saw it happen, despite his eyes being shut.

Dylan took a quick, exasperated breath as he wiggled his hands a little. The small dome returned. I waited for it to disappear…but it stayed there. He was finally doing it.

“Good job, Dyla—”

The globe expanded into a dome, smashing us against the wall. It disappeared a second later, but the pain remained.

Dylan groaned as he rolled his shoulders. “You distracted me!”

“And you nearly dislocated my shoulder, so we’re even.” I massaged and stretched the pain away. “Anyway, I’m glad that happened. It’s exactly what I want you to do to our wrists.”

I explained the specifics to Dylan as I held my wrists out. His eyebrows raised and furrowed at all the right moments during my explanation. My idea sounded insane out loud, and it wasn’t even our best option (the slumbering Anderson was). But, man, did I want to see if it’d actually work! I scooted away as Dylan took deep breaths.

My wrists glimmered red then the globes popped up. They were so big that the shields went over the handcuffs. Dylan groaned and made them disappear. He tried again, and got the globes underneath my cuffs this time.

Almost there!

Dylan took a quick breath and stretched out his hands. The globes flickered before expanding against my cuffs. My arms shook under the pressure of the shields struggling with the restraints. I wanted this to work, but would it actually work? I had to believe so. Doing the impossible was all part of being a Hybrid.

SNAP!

The shields expanded past the cuffs. The broken restraints fell off, and the shields launched them across the room as they continued to expand. At this point, the two shields covered my arms, but they were also crushing my torso. It looked like I was wearing two giant bubbles on my arms. I groaned as they struggled to expand further but couldn’t because they were in each other’s way!

“Dylan! Dylan!” I shouted as the bubbles continued to sandwich me.

The domes vanished. I fell forward as my body screamed out in pain. As usual. I pushed myself up just as Dylan covered his mouth. I was worried until I heard him snicker. The little jerk!

“Apologies,” was what Dylan said, but the laughter in his voice betrayed him. He cleared his throat. “So now what?”

I stood up as I rubbed my left wrist. “Now, I get Upton back. But, first…wake up!”

I aimed a slim string of electricity at Anderson’s foot. His suit lit up, and his eyes shot open. He screamed as he sat up and craned his head around. When he saw his restrained hands, he made a sound of pure confusion. His arms lit up as he pulled them away from each other. The cuffs trembled under the force. The chain connecting them snapped as a few pieces clattered to the floor. Anderson dusted off his hands.

He’d just broken himself out before I’d even said a thing. He had been Frost’s prisoner once, so I understood his hatred of cuffs.

“What’s going on?” Anderson asked. “Your lightning woke me up, didn’t it, Locke? You need something?”

My jaw had fallen so I picked it back up. “I was going to say…but you already…uh, do you mind breaking everyone else out?”

“Sure thing. I’m guessing you’re off to do your hero thing?”

I smiled in response, but it the smile was wiped from my face when the ground trembled. The walls and ceiling trembled too, as if a small quake was going off. If one was, that’d make our escape easier. I made my way for the door as the tremors stopped, unlocked the door, and slipped out.

The hallway was filled with screams and gunfire. No one was there, so I assumed the noise had come from the lobby. I ran over there and dropped my jaw for the second time.

FD soldiers and Dwarfs were firing at a walking red robot: Exo. My eyes flitted from the soldiers to him. The FD plasma bullets dissipated against his back. He was wrestling with a White Dwarf, so I didn’t think they could hurt him much either.

“One of the prisoners has escaped!” said my new least favorite FD soldier.

I ducked behind a pillar as the bullets soared in my direction. When I peeked around the pillar, I saw Exo shooting a huge ball of red plasma at the FD soldiers’ feet. The explosion knocked them into the air. Once they hit the ground, they remained limp. Exo made eye contact with me and went back to fighting the Dwarfs. What was he even doing here? I should probably have been thankful, but now Frost would know the AI and I were in Red City. Could things get any worse?

“I knew it.” Connolly stepped into the lobby. He must have heard the commotion from his ship. “I knew you were here with him. AI are annoying like that.”

“I have come to defend my allies and to see the building that exists because of me and my kind.” Exo twisted his neck to get a good look of the lobby. I had underestimated how badly he wanted to see this place. “I wish to help its inhabitants.”

“Never thought I’d meet a sappy killer robot. Must be a side effect of hanging with that kid hiding behind the pillar.”

I flattened myself against my cover. Not that it would do much for me now. All I could do was watch these two monsters go at it and hope that the good monster won.

Exo aimed his arm cannon at Connolly. “Surrender. I don’t wish to harm anyone else.”

Connolly held his hands up, but his smirk grew as he did. In one fluid motion, he tapped the back of his arm. A control panel opened up, and he tapped a button on it. A high-pitched wail filled the room. When I covered my ears, that barely muffled the whistle. I stumbled out of cover as rage filled me. If Connolly didn’t shut that thing off, I was going to shock him until he stopped moving!

Whoa. Where did that come from? Was I that frustrated?

Connolly shut off the whistle and smiled at Exo. He hadn’t moved since the wail had begun. Could AI be affected by high-pitched sounds?

“What are you waiting for? Blast him!” I pointed at Connolly.

Exo continued his impression of a statue. I didn’t even have theories about what was happening. The situation was just weird.

“Locke? Wha—Connolly!” Anderson and the others ran up to me. Manning was rubbing his eyes. It was about time he woke up. Anderson popped his knuckles as he stomped toward Connolly. “This beating is long overdue. Wait. What’s Boss AI doing here?”

Exo whipped around and aimed his arm cannon at us. It charged up with red energy. My voice caught in my throat as I stared into the cannon. It was like staring into a red Sun. My right arm heated up as it remembered the last time Exo’s cannon had been aimed at it.

I disregarded that heat as I shot electricity at Exo. Even though it latched on to him, I barely felt the connection. Controlling Exo was as hard as hacking into a White Dwarf. I pushed past the walls that Exo’s incredibly complex systems had put up. I willed him to aim the cannon at the sky, which he did while shaking like a jackhammer. My electricity vanished as I failed to hold the connection. Red shot into the ceiling, shattering the glass there. Luckily my helmet was still active. It shielded me from the glass shards that rained down around us.

“Exo, what are you doing?!” I rubbed my bionic arm. “Have you forgot that we’re on the same side?”

Exo raised his cannon again. He couldn’t even hear me. What was going on? Connolly’s whistle had something to do with this, but what?

“Sorry, he’s a little busy seeing red at the moment.” Connolly activated the whistle again.

Frustration and anger flooded my head like the high-pitched cry. I covered my ears again, as did my friends. Well, most of us. Anderson and Ben gave Dylan, Manning, and I concerned glances. They weren’t even covering their ears. Only the Hybrids were affected?

“Anderson…you can’t hear that?” I asked him as I resisted the urge to strangle him. The rage was annoying, but being annoyed at it only made me angrier. I was stuck in a loop.

“Hear what? Huh—get down!” Anderson pushed me aside and jumped back as another red blast barreled past. It zoomed through the door to Upton’s room and exploded inside. We had to get Exo under control before he shot into an occupied room.

Manning slammed his fist against a pillar as he groaned. “That thing you told me about. President Frost artificially increasing the AI’s aggression levels…so that they’d kill your family? That’s what he’s using!”

Exo fired off both cannons, filling the room with red. I didn’t think anyone got hit, but it was hard to tell underneath all the red. Exo’s cannons had been shaking when he fired, so he must have been fighting the whistle. That was the only reason why those shots hadn’t obliterated me.

It seemed that the aggression enhancer only affected machines. That was why no one had heard it when Frost had used it in New Selene. That was why us Hybrids were only partially affected. If it weren’t for our human halves, we’d be rampaging mindlessly like Exo. I had to get close enough to shut him down. As if I could even do that with Connolly using the whistle every two seconds!

“How many times do I have to use this thing before he disintegrates you losers?” Connolly rolled his eyes as he inspected his wrist. “Frost warned me about overusing this, but she’s not here right now. I can do whatever I—”

An even louder cry filled the room. The remaining glass on the windows and ceiling shattered. Alhabor was launched off his feet, and went skidding across the glass. He pushed himself up to look at the source of the sound wave. Manning gasped as Upton stomped through the glassless door. His eyes had a silver glow that was unmistakably Hybrid in origin. I had no idea what he’d just done, but it had been powerful.

“Upton. He must have heard the whistle from Alhabor’s ship.” Manning stood up. “Upton, it’s all right! I’m here.”

Connolly’s whistle pierced my eardrums once again. I fought back the rage as I looked up and saw him sprinting out of the lobby. Upton’s straitjacket bulged as he stumbled around and grunted. The whistle faded away as Connolly presumably boarded his ship again, but its effects lingered.

Exo’s golden eyes and Upton’s silver ones instilled the same amount of fear in me.

“Manning, go and try to calm Upton down,” I said as I eyed Exo. “Even with all that rage, he’ll hesitate more with you in front of him. By the way, his power is a sonic scream, right?”

“Correct. He can expel invisible energy from his mouth that devastates anything in its way.”

“That’s annoying…and kind of unoriginal. A sonic scream is such a common power, so why—”

“AI!” Upton shouted in a hoarse voice. His silver eyes were locked on Exo. I gulped as I remembered Upton’s burning hatred of all AI: his broken mind was the result of their actions. Now, he was finally about to face one again, but this particular AI was on our side. At least, he was supposed to be.

My eardrums throbbed as Upton screamed again. This latest assault was directed at Exo, who was shielding himself with all four arms. The blast pushed him back but didn’t seem to do any substantial damage. When the scream died down, Exo aimed both arm cannons at Upton.

“Manning, go! Dylan, shield! Anderson, help me out.” I sprinted at Exo.

A red dome popped up around Exo, who blended in with it. Exo’s twin blasts destroyed Dylan’s dome like it was made of glass. Luckily, it absorbed the blasts. Manning raced over and tried to calm Upton down. But Upton’s menacing expression told me that it wasn’t going well.

“Cut it out, Metal Face!” I reached for Exo, but he swung and hit my torso. I flew back and rolled on the floor. As I coughed, I pushed myself up. “The whistle is gone. You can calm down now.”

I wasn’t even holding back. If I could shoot a huge bolt of electricity and short-circuit Exo, I’d do it in a heartbeat. Anderson lurched forward and struck Exo’s chest. The massive AI skidded back a single inch. Superhuman strength could only do so much against something that almost weighed a literal ton. Exo morphed one cannon back into a hand and grabbed Anderson’s shoulder. He had the ability to kill him in ten different ways, but I wasn’t planning on waiting around to see which one he chose.

“Andy!” Ben shouted. “Wander, do something—”

“I will.” I took a deep breath as I put together one stupid idea. “Dylan, dome him from the chest down. Ben, shoot his face. I’m going in one more time.”

Here goes everything. I pumped my legs as hard as I could while charging at Exo. He stomped toward me, but the dome that Dylan created stopped him immediately. The dome had been cast around Exo’s waist, essentially shackling him in place. However, it’d only last as Dylan could keep it up. Exo aimed his cannon at me, but I ignored it. I had to. Ben’s plasma bullets whizzed by me, exploding against Exo’s face. They didn’t damage him, but they were an effective smoke screen. I jumped up and reached into the smoke. My palm made contact with Exo’s face as his cannon filled with red. I couldn’t shut him off with my remaining strength, so I had to go for the next best thing.

I sifted through my memories until I found the ones that didn’t belong to me: the ones that had been forced upon me when I had seen Exo’s past. I just figured that he’d like them back. I willed the memories into Exo’s head, which would have been impossible if he hadn’t been a robot. He screeched as he lurched back. Then he scratched at his face until the screeching stopped. He heaved despite not having lungs and slowly lowered his hands.

The ferocity had fled from Exo’s golden eyes. They were as tranquil as they should have been from the start. I’d essentially downloaded a copy of his memories into him.

“Alpha?” Exo’s eyes darted between Dylan, Anderson, and I. “What…is happening?”

I leaned around Exo. “Manning, use the memory—oh.”

Upton’s eyes glowed gold as Manning grabbed his face. Manning must have been showing him a memory like I’d just done with Exo. I’d stolen that move from Manning? I’d known it felt familiar… Manning released his grip, causing Upton to fall to the floor. Then Manning slumped against a wall as he rubbed his temples.

“I’m sorry. What was that, Wander?” Manning asked.

“Heh. Nothing.” I glanced around the room. Fallen White Dwarfs, unconscious FD soldiers, and crumbling walls where stray plasma blasts had hit. “Why do I feel like this went better than most of our missions?”