Eclipse: Time Thief (Romantasy)

37. Connection

Piercey sighed at my claim that Dr. Henderson threatened to kill me so that he would obey. "No. She never threatened that. I just know her. If you keep crossing her, I'm afraid I won't be able to save you. Let's get on the same page and make our world better. Don't be stubborn."

"You're a fool, Piercey. I'm going to prove it to you."

Anger hardened his voice. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"I'll provoke her and let you see who she really is. I doubt you ever piss her off enough to see behind her mask. Her council ought to know she's devolving as she plays god with our world. There's no experiment anymore, Piercey. Dr. Henderson has truly become a god. Our world is for her, now."

He groaned. "We're just not on the same page. I need to share what I've learned with you. That's the only way for us to understand each other. See, we've made war with these neural implants and missed their most basic functions. Things children in other worlds grow up knowing how to do are lost on us." He reached both his hands out. "If you still trust me, I can give it all to you, right now."

I stared at his hands. "How?"

"I have a neural link with my graduates. We can communicate with our minds any time we tap in. We don't need computers. Our implants are linked. But I've never shared everything with someone before. I want you to have it, Max. I want you to have everything I've been through, everything I've learned, every ounce of wisdom I have."

My heart started to pound. "You'll open your soul to me."

He laced his fingers with mine. "All of it."

"Piercey..."

"Trust is all it takes." His eyes lowered. Voice lowered. "It doesn't mean anything more than that."

The pain on his face crushed my heart. "Leif and Wren are my blood, Piercey. But you've never stopped being my best friend. Not for a moment." I squeezed his hands. "Take what I have too. Understand me and I'll understand you."

"If you hold nothing back, I'll have it all. Your every memory and thought."

I glanced at the window where Nash slept still. I couldn't share everything.

"You don't need to save me from the things I already know." Piercey smiled sadly. "I know how you see him, Max. And I know how you see me. It's okay."

Sadness tinged my thoughts. Knowing it and experiencing it were different. "I can't hold anything back?"

"Once you close up, it's hard to keep the rest of yourself open. You don't have to give. You can just receive."

"No. We both need to know everything. Let's do this."

"Linking will give you a weapon I've been working on for a very long while."

"What weapon?"

He lowered his voice. "It's safer to show you."

The look that had always stopped me in my tracks as a kid, made me retreat, burned in Piercey's eyes, somehow brighter than ever. How could he still love me? After all these years? I'd left him behind, but he never left me. I'd had him this whole time.

The other day I'd slipped back to when I fled the Sacred School. I could feel his embrace now, as if that girl I'd been and the woman I'd grown into shared the same body. It'd been different than any other time we hugged. Didn't feel like it was between the kids who'd survived this terrible Sacred School together anymore, but instead the people who'd been quietly growing inside of them. His hands had touched me differently that day. Touched me more like he did now. When he'd pressed his lips against mine, it was the first time I'd ever kissed someone.