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New York Alano

12:40 p.m. (Eastern Daylight Time)

My bodyguard is teaching me how to fight for my life inside the Death-Cast gym.

Agent Dane Madden has been tasked with protecting me since June 1, 2019, because my father wanted me to have a younger personal

bodyguard who could better blend in with me at college. Agent Dane (as I call him since he won’t stop addressing me as Mr.

Alano) is twenty-one years old and was hired because he worked security at Death-Cast affiliates such as Clint’s Graveyard,

a club for Deckers, and Make-A-Moment, a virtual reality station where Deckers can experience risk-free thrills. He’s devoted

to the cause, unlike President Reynolds’s bodyguard, who assassinated him.

Since Monday, March 16, Agent Dane started teaching me Muay Thai during the lockdown.

I’m laying into this ninety-pound heavy bag after Agent Dane coaches me through different moves, but my jump switch roundhouse kick keeps suffering from the switch itself. I finally mastered the timing for swinging my rear arm down to generate power into my kick, but I can’t seem to find my balance to fully rotate my hip and lead foot for execution. An opponent would easily knock me over in the ring, not that I’m doing this to compete. This started off as a mental exercise to expel the negative energy clouding my judgment, but lately it’s been physical training in the event I might have to actually fight for my life.

Agent Dane folds his tattooed arms against his big chest. “You’re not focusing.”

“I am absolutely focusing,” I say, panting.

“Then you’re focusing on the wrong thing.”

I’m used to learning things naturally—history, business, languages, other crafts, even people’s lives—that not being anywhere

near close to mastering this one move is bothering me. “What should I be focusing on, then?”

“Surviving,” Agent Dane says.

“My survival is your job.”

“Only because Mr. Rosa knows that danger still exists even though it’s not your End Day.”

I think back to how my father just told me to not tease Death. “There’s such a thing as being too careful, though.”

“Not in my profession,” Agent Dane says. Back when he was guarding Clint’s Graveyard and Make-A-Moment, he had to retrain his brain to remember that not receiving his Death-Cast alert didn’t mean he was safe, especially since he was working with Deckers whose deaths were daily threats to his well-being. Even his life. “I operate as if you are a Decker who can be saved. I need you to start doing the same.”

“What does this have to do with not getting my kick right?”

“Everything. If you don’t believe you have to fight for your life, you will not give it your all.” Agent Dane nudges me back

away from the heavy bag, sweat dripping from his blond buzz cut as he demonstrates the kick step-by-step again. “Now, instead

of focusing on how hard or fast you would hit your target, focus on everything you stand to lose if you die.” He becomes a

blur as he executes the jump switch roundhouse kick, his tattooed foot hitting the heavy bag so hard that I can’t imagine

a human skull surviving that impact.

There’s a lot I know about Agent Dane, but he holds some cards close to his chest. What he stands to lose if he dies is one

of them.

I square up to the heavy bag, trying again and again to nail this kick, but I’m so angry at my father for forcing me into

a life that is so equally disrupted by his creation and for preparing me for a destiny that I never asked for, a destiny that

I only feel obligated to fulfill for atonement and atonement alone. I collapse onto my knees, panting as I rest my head against

the heavy bag. My lungs and abs are on fire, but my heart is broken that fighting for a life as restrictive as mine is so

pointless.

“It’s okay,” Agent Dane says, helping me up. “This is what I’m here for.”

My survival is his job.

If only the people whose lives I’ve ruined had bodyguards too.