I wake in a coffin.

The beep of my own flatline is fresh in my memory. What's going on? Where am I? Why am I ... not dead?

My arms press against walls of wood. My hot breath rebounds off the underside of the coffin lid, hitting my face. Flashes. Glimpses of memories. I can't remember. Something happened to me — something traumatic. Something powerful. My emotions are drained, but I can't pinpoint why I'm here.

ARISE.

I start. Nothing wakes me more than that voice. His voice.

"God, where are you?" I open my eyes wide, meeting only darkness. "Where am I?"

Dying.

I am dying right now ... in this coffin. My very breaths tremble. Why can't I remember details?

Another burst of breath. My chest seizes. What woke me? I feel ... startled. Is it because I'm suffocating?

I'm suffocating!

The beat of my heart is frantic, like a trapped bird. My next inhale is thin. There's not much oxygen left in the casket. How long have I been in here?

How ...

... am I ...

... alive?

I flail and push against the coffin lid with my hand and stump. It groans like a slave beneath the weight of a hundred shackles. The cold seeps through the thin walls, through my clothing, and the creak of wood tells me I'm underground.

Deep underground.

My elbows and knees knock wood and bruise. I'm lost in my mind. Lost in a coffin. Who would bury me? Alive?

"Help!"

My own voice startles me, rebounding around my ears in this death box.

What do I do? God, what do I do?

ARISE.

The calm that floods my heart brings with it a distant recollection. The last time I lay in His peace, beneath the umbrella of His voice, I was dying. But He's woken me. For ... something. A last prayer, maybe?

Then they come, like a marching troop — memories parading across my mind:

I broke down a chunk of the Wall.

I helped free people from the United States of the East.

The Council captured me — us. Us ... Solomon, Elm, Frenchie, Kaphtor, Cap, Gabbie.

I am Parvin Blackwater.

Where is Skelley Chase, the Council member who helped kill me? Where is Solomon? Did he escape? He can't possibly know the Council buried me alive.

I'm alive.

With this thought comes a rerun of the emotions that abducted my heart the last time I was awake. Hope that my friends escaped. Peace in the sacrifice of my life for their sakes.

"I'm alive!" I laugh and then clap my lips shut. There goes more oxygen, but I'm not afraid. I should be dead, which means God had different plans. And that means ...

I'm escaping this coffin.

This is the second time in my life I've willingly embraced death, and both times God responded with, NOT YET. Giddy excitement fills my heaving chest with a thousand mini bubbles. What does He have in store for me?

I squirm in the space. It's roomy — not made for me. My feet hit something lumpy. Ugh, not another body! No, it's too small to be a body.

How does one escape a buried box? I don't have a nanobook to send a message for help. Besides, I have no idea where I'm buried. Help would be too late, NAB or not. I'm not strong enough to lift the dirt, but the Council probably buried me with haste to get rid of the evidence, so they might not have buried me down all six feet.

The Council. They think I'm dead. Once I escape, I'll be invisible to them.

I kick the lump at my feet again, snag it with my heels, and scoot it toward my torso. I need light! This darkness threatens to replace my shaky peace with fear. My knees hit the underside of the coffin, barely bent, but it's enough. I squirm to one side, reaching with my right hand — my only hand — for the lump. Fingers brush canvas.

My shoulder pack.

The Council had it searched and practically emptied when putting me in the cell. Yet here it is. All evidence is buried with me — at least, that must have been their plan. Good thing they didn't cremate me.

If Solomon managed to escape with the others, he's still out there spreading truth. My heart squeaks.

Solomon.

He thinks I'm dead.

He was so brave in accepting my choice to succumb to the Council's torture. For a moment, I allow myself to create a vision of the last time I saw his face. He was crying. Resigned. I mentally wipe the tears from his light skin, turn his squinted, teal eyes into open ones filled with hope and surprise.

I must find him. The man I love.

ARISE.

God. His voice. His presence in my mind reminds me why I'm here. I'm alive and fully His. I'm fully Yours. My agenda doesn't matter. I focus on obeying. Arising.

I hold my breath and reach, pressing my face and shoulder against the rough coffin wood. It creaks as I wrap my fingers around the pack strap. This coffin isn't Father's handiwork. It smells old and breakable. That's a plus.

The minus is that if it breaks, the dirt will cave in on me. I'll be suffocated before I can move. I'm already weak and light-headed. My chest aches.

I yank the pack up the side of the coffin until it's on my chest. The air grows thinner and my breaths more frequent. I'm tempted to panic, but then I remember why I'm awake.

I'M NOT DONE WITH YOU YET.

I smile and fumble with the pack straps. They're tied tight. Without a left hand, it takes me twice as long to get them untangled. I can't angle my head to bite the knot where I need to. There must be something in here to help me escape.

The darkness presses on my eyes, mocking me. I'd laugh back in its face, but oxygen is too precious. I'm dizzy. Or I might be suffocating. Maybe there are still matches in my pack.

Oh! Silly me. I search for the thread-thin metal cord around my left wrist that's causing so much havoc in the United States of the East right now — the Clock telling me the day I'm supposed to die.

It's secure, but so light I barely feel it. With my thumb and forefinger, I press the thickest portion of the wire. A blue screen reveals my underground prison. The projected red Numbers that used to mean so much to me click down, virtually, second by second:

031.014.17.02.44

Parvin Brielle Blackwater

OVERRIDDEN

That's supposed to be the day I'll die. Thirty-one years, fourteen days, seventeen hours, blah, blah, blah. I don't believe a second of it. Besides, the word glowing beneath my ticking Numbers is what matters: OVERRIDDEN

That's why there's chaos in the USE. These new Clock inventions — stolen from Jude by the Council — have a glitch. They don't tell me my future. What the Numbers do tell me is that I was with the Council just over two hours ago.

I died as they tested my Clock.

The Council was afraid of that — I've proven their new system is flawed. They're going to have to admit it to the public eventually ... and pay the consequences.

If I was buried within the last two hours, the dirt above me will be fresh and loose. I hold my illuminated stump aloft, taking a good look at my situation. I look long at my healed wrist, no longer feeling heart pain because of my missing hand. Funny how a single year can change my perspective.

The lid of the coffin is bowed from the weight. Best to figure out an escape plan before I run out of oxygen. My stomach lurches. Maybe ... maybe God will let...