Unforgotten(84)

I erase the original string and transcribe each one as he announces it, until I have a new sequence staring back at me.




I let out a small gasp and cover my mouth.

“What?” Kaelen asks, his eyes scouring the digits.

“The password. On Cody’s computer. It’s the same sequence. I watched him input it earlier today. And in the memory…”

“He was inputting an unseen password into a computer,” Kaelen finishes the thought as we arrive at the same conclusion simultaneously.

“That was supposed to be the trigger,” I deduce, feeling more confident than ever. “The password. It’s why I felt drawn to it in the memory. The sequence is telling me where and when to go next.”

Kaelen and I both stare at it, our eyes focused, our lips pressed together. Concentrating. Searching for an indication of time and place.

I circle the 32. “This has to be the year.”

“You don’t know that,” Kaelen disagrees. “Any of those numbers could indicate a year.”

I shake my head. “Why suddenly send me to a whole different year? She wanted me here. Every clue has been in this year.”

“Maybe because he’s here,” Kaelen suggests, glancing back at Cody, who still hasn’t moved.

But I refute him again. “He’s in a lot of years. There’s a reason she sent me to 2032. I just don’t know what it is.”

“Okay,” Kaelen concedes. “What about the other numbers?”

I study the sequence. “If 32 is the year,” I say, pointing to it, “then it’s only logical the two numbers before it are also part of the date.”

“7 12 32,” Kaelen reads aloud.

“July 12, 2032.” Excitement is boiling up inside me. And even though I know we have different motivations—even though I know once he acquires what he’s been sent for he won’t hesitate to rip me away from Zen—I feel a kind of bond forming between us. The connection of a shared goal. A common ground.

I glance at Kaelen out of the corner of my eye and for a split second our gazes connect. That energy exchange starts. That pull. He flashes me the smallest of smiles.

But the expression itself isn’t what surprises me. It’s the emotion behind it.

It feels genuine.

Real.

Not programmed.

I blink and focus back on the countertop.

“If that’s the date,” Kaelen speculates, “then the next two figures must be the time.”

With a flick of his fingers, he pulls the 21 and the 15 out of the sequence and places them above the original string.

21:15.

“9:15 in the evening.”

We both study the last two numbers: 77 and 78.

“When I was with Maxxer I received a message from Alixter,” I point out. “It was a pair of two-digit numbers, like this.”

“GPS coordinates?” Kaelen suggests.

I nod. “That’s what I’m thinking. She knows I would recognize them because I followed them once before. And if that’s the case, then she’s telling me to go to this location”—I point to the last two numbers—“on this date”—I indicate the first two numbers—“at this exact time.” I point to the middle sequence.

Kaelen is one step ahead of me, tapping an icon at the bottom of the counter. A huge map of New York spreads across the glass, taking up every inch of the surface.

He drags the coordinates into a search box above the map.

Immediately the map morphs and we’re flying over terrain, heading east, through the streets of New York City, off the edge of a bridge, and into the sea. We travel over miles and miles of ocean, veering up. We cross more land. I catch sight of labels on the map.

Ireland.

Norway.

Sweden.

Russia.

The terrain has turned snowy white. And still we travel upward. Into a swatch of crystal-blue water teeming with massive chunks of ice. The map identifies it as the Kara Sea.

And then suddenly it stops. A small, blinking orange dot indicates that we’ve arrived at the location of the coordinates.

Near the top of the world.

In the middle of nowhere.

“Where is that?” I ask, tilting my head to try to find a landmass nearby. An island. Even, perhaps, something floating in the water. But there doesn’t seem to be anything around for miles.

Of course, I think. Where would you go if you never wanted to be found? What location would ensure that anyone who tried to transesse there without an exact date and time would die?

“She’s on the water?” Kaelen says, squinting at the map.

I shake my head, remembering the lesson I learned the last time I followed GPS coordinates: they’re two dimensional. They only track left and right. Not up and down.

“No,” I say with certainty, tapping the blinking orange dot. “She’s under it.”