Page 6 of Love, Nemesis (Ocean to Ashes #2)

He wore the Numbers uniform like one of the manikins in the museum—fatigue hitched at every button; bootlaces pulled to such perfect angles that they looked drawn on. His utility belt stretched across the desk behind him, equipped with his map, Atlas, flare gun, canteen, and knife.

“This is why we honor the Numbers. They spend their lives to protect the State way of life. In a year of service, we can easily give up five years of our lives.”

Jasper turned his back to the class as he retrieved something from his belt.

Ana adjusted her watch.

“Now, I’m going to show you an Atlas. I will do a very short demonstration of how it works and then we’ll go through all the proper ways to use it.”

Ana groaned inwardly. That’ll take forever. This must be his extended Atlas seminar that the students had to go through after their final exams in the academy.

Jasper pulled back a light trigger on his Atlas.

“I’m spending fifteen seconds at the default concentration,” he said and tossed it in front of the class.

Everyone watched in sheer amazement as an orb swirled out like clear water with a flash of blue light, surrounding the Atlas as it hovered in the air.

Not wasting a moment, Jasper slipped a glass off a nearby desk and tossed it into the orb. Water swirled out of the glass as it spun into the orb, and everyone watched as the glass slowed down, spinning as if in a dance with the water.

Jasper circled the orb, watching the water droplets. They looked like gelatinous diamonds. One passed through the orb and sped up again before it landed with an undignified splat against the ground.

He reached inside, lightly pinching the glass and guiding it through the orb.

“Now, I can do this because the Atlas is using my own time. I’m immune,” he explained.

“If any one of you tried”—he guided the glass around the droplets, collecting all the water—“you’d be slowed down too.

” He withdrew the glass, lifting it out of the orb before pinching a bronze retrieval ring on his left hand.

The Atlas absorbed the time and slapped into his hand against the ring.

Jasper drank the water in the glass, his back to the class, before setting it down on the desk.

Ana adjusted her watch.

“Now. Does anyone know how to operate one?” Jasper asked.

The class still seemed to process its amazement.

Tick.

Tick.

She had to speed things up.

Tick.

“You use the three levers on the left,” Ana announced. The class turned, and she entered, walking down the stairs between the rows of desks. “You dial in how many seconds you want to use, or how many minutes, or hours.”

Jasper turned to see her, his brows lifted in surprise.

“In case of an emergency,” she said, reciting the basic definition instead of effective improvisation, “you can force the levers against hard springs in the opposite directions. That way you can spend days, months, and years.” She controlled the waiver in her voice, adding words she’d stolen from one of her previous professors.

“As Numbers, we affectionately call these the death levers.”

“Ladies and gentlemen. Some of you may recall me mentioning a specific Minute soldier when I talked about modified combat,” Jasper said, gesturing toward her.

The students began whispering among themselves as she joined Jasper at the front desk. He offered her a warm smile and eyes that searched her motives.

“Hello, everyone,” she said, pulling the velvet ball from the leather net on her utility belt.

She whipped the velvet off, revealing her Atlas.

The sphere was a perfect fit in her palm, a heavy bronze ring sporting a modified clock on one side and a compass on the other, both encased in thick glass that gave the object its round shape.

“I thought she could come by to answer a few questions about the use of an Atlas,” Jasper said, gathering himself as he watched her Atlas. “Ana is a fine Minute. She’s gotten plenty of field experience.” He jerked his head back in the class’s direction as if he’d realized he’d been staring at it.

The students’ eyes poured questions. An eager brunette with freckled skin blurted out from the front row, “You were the one from Dal Hull two years ago. You saved all those people with your time.”

She had saved some workers. That part was true. The fact of the matter, however, was that she’d used her time to fight the other Numbers and ultimately escape with her life.

“That’s right,” Ana said with a chuckle before Jasper could redirect them. She had to give Jasper credit. In its own way, this was nerve-wracking.

Another student spoke up. “What made the mine collapse all of a sudden?”

Well, she’d used explosives in the mine to destroy the Strike’s coffin.

“How many people did you save?” someone else asked.

Workers had heard the commotion and had gone back into the mine. She’d yelled at them, barely dragging Pat out with her own serious injuries.

“Question for the class,” Jasper interjected, glancing at the clock. “What type of mutation were Ana and the other officers investigating?”

According to the official report, that had been their reason for being there—a reported mutation.

Another brunette from the front spoke up. “The town was near En Sanctus. Everything that touches that country is mutated.”

The class laughed.

“Look what you’ve done,” Jasper muttered without looking at Ana and then announced, “Okay, class is over early.” A few students openly complained. “Hurry or I’ll give you more homework,” he said.

A few more students scoffed. They started packing up their things.

“Make sure you finish the assignment for this week. Contrary to popular belief, you will not—I repeat, will not—be considered for the Numbers unless you know every inch of that machine!” he said, pointing to Ana’s Atlas.

“We know!” one kid called back as they left the room.

Jasper watched them go, craning his neck. “I saw that, Patel! Next week you’re reading first, and in front of the class!”

One of them groaned. A few others laughed.

Jasper faced Ana with a deep sigh, tracing the scar on his brow with his thumb, back and forth, as if it hurt. He pointed to her, still using his teacher’s voice. “Now. You.”

She rubbed her neck, putting her Atlas away. “You make it look so easy, but I didn’t enjoy being up here at all. My heart’s pounding.”

“What was that?” he asked, looking at her with irises as dark as night, eyes that gave some hint of his birthplace.

Many Statesmen thought the color unnerving—felt the black was unsearchable—but Ana had never met a more obvious person.

Jasper’s subtle fidgeting and expressive features meant the only thoughts he could hide were those crowded out by the ones most pressing on his mind.

“I needed to talk.”

“And you didn’t want to just wave me over?” he said, making waving gestures with his hands.

“This seemed like a better idea at the time. I needed the class to be over.”

He rubbed his forehead. “I don’t see you for weeks and then suddenly—”

“Pat’s awake and talking. They know about Dal Hull.”

“They know?” Jasper replied, mouth dropping. She could sense the next part of his question— About how you really spent your time?

She sat up on the desk, and Jasper took his place in front of her. “I didn’t explicitly tell him. I’m sure Hailey put the picture together. He’s sending me to kill Ares, but this could mean you’re in big trouble too, just having been associated with me.”

“What?” He wrestled his surprise into a whisper. “That’s a death sentence,” he added, as if completely ignoring the bit where she’d warned him about the danger to his life.

“Thanks.”

“He’s got that mutated gun! What do you expect me to say? No one that’s gone out to find him has come back yet, have they? I haven’t—” Jasper kept talking, but a vivid memory flashed into Ana’s head.

It was at Crackenger, a station on the Mystic border.

She and Ares were holed up in a tower during a stalemate in a battle.

It had been two days, and he was still dressed head to toe in black.

She hadn’t seen his face. He was unwrapping a packet of crackers, the crinkling of the plastic so loud in the quiet.

Mystics were waiting with their mutated artifacts outside.

He offered her a cracker. It was the first time she’d seen him eat anything.

Another memory. Crackenger. Day four. The final battle had broken out. The Mystics had charged the station. The gun fired with measured rhythm from the tower. Ares pulled the trigger mechanically. The sound was jarring. The bodies were building outside. Each bullet found its mark.

She watched the bodies drop, one by one. She counted to seventeen and lost count when she dodged a strike of electrical energy from a mutated weapon.

They got out of the tower, taking strategic steps over the bodies in a quiet field. Ares dabbed the sweat from around his eyes. He shared a rehearsed joke.

They gathered all the mutated items and burned them. She remembered Ares’s stone-gray eyes across the fire.

“Ana,” Jasper said, inviting her back to the present. “Is that all?”

“Yes.”

Jasper leaned against the desk beside her. “All right, that settles it. I’m coming with you.”

“No.”

“Look. I’ll let you take the lead. I’ll just need to find a substitute for my class and training sessions.”

She hesitated.

“Another Minute owes me a favor,” he pushed, holding her eyes.

She tried to weigh the possibilities but knew what she wanted.

So did he.

“When do we leave?” he asked.

She hopped off the desk. “Morning. I need combat clearance.”

“We have time for the hill then,” he replied.

She smiled. “Sure.”

“All right. I’ll go get some travel bags. You change.”

“See you outside.” She walked up the stairs as he gathered his things on the desk.

She glanced back at him as he hurried to put together his things. She was glad she came to see him. Jasper’s enthusiastic, though sometimes anxious energy, always made her feel at ease. He was a friend and comfort she hadn’t allowed herself to enjoy for quite some time.

As if sensing her thoughts, he looked back at her.

The estrangement of the past two years, the tension between them, seemed worlds away.

After Dal Hull, her team, including Jasper, had broken up.

They’d been an unofficial group, ragtag outsiders with a singular mission of tracking down and destroying cursed artifacts from The Ocean’s War.

That was an unofficial and illegal practice in the State, but it had to be done.

The Strike, The Eating Ocean, and all of their poisons had to die with the war.

As if Ana and Jasper’s journey ahead was just like those they’d shared in the past, Jasper smiled at her. She knew she’d leave him before they found Ares, but with so much uncertainty in her future, she felt better with Jasper beside her than in the capital under Hailey’s thumb.