A few blocks from the hospital, Raven dropped to the ground, leaning his back against a wall in the dark alley where he had stopped to rest. His heart was beating out of control and his lungs were begging for more oxygen. He stayed still for several seconds to give his breathing a chance to slow down.

  Panic was once again controlling him. He had woken up in a strange room that appeared to be a hospital room, and hadn’t considered even for a moment staying to find out how he’d gotten there. His mind quickly reconstructed the preceding events. He remembered that his mysterious pursuers had found him again. He’d fled through the sewers, but they’d chased him. He vaguely recalled having become furious and losing control, and then hearing a deafening explosion. After that he’d obviously passed out and had no idea if they had taken him to the hospital or if it had been someone else. When he’d awakened, he’d known he was in bad shape. He felt pain all over his battered body and had resolved to heal himself and get out of there.

  The healing hadn’t been complete; his whole body still hurt. Somewhat calmer now that no one was chasing him, Raven ran his hands over his feet. They were killing him. His hands were coated in blood as soon as they touched his feet, but that didn’t surprise him. Running barefoot at that speed through a city was a sure way to destroy your feet. Stifling a moan, Raven pulled a piece of glass out of the bottom of one foot. He couldn’t keep running like this. His only clothing now consisted of a white hospital gown which was stained all over. And even though the cold didn’t affect him like it affected everyone else, he couldn’t go far without attracting the attention of anyone whose path he crossed. He needed normal clothes as soon as possible, and then he needed to find a place where he could rest.

  His mind suddenly turned to Maya. She wasn’t alive in his memory; in her place he saw a pile of ashes that traced the child’s sweet features, and Raven felt a rush of sorrow. He remembered that it was he who had burned her when he’d lost control.

  “I only wanted to warm you . . .” he sobbed, collapsing onto the ground. “I was trying to heal you . . . God, forgive me . . .”

  He stayed there, crying in the snow, for quite some time. He wished it had been he who’d died instead of the little girl and, when he couldn’t stand it anymore, he started pounding the ground with his fists. He didn’t stop until he felt the pain in his hands, which brought him to his senses enough to stop himself. He had broken his right hand. With one last, mournful cry, he tucked the memory of Maya into a corner of his mind, knowing that if he didn’t, he’d go crazy.

  Raven concentrated on healing himself. He put his hands together, and a reddish glow surrounded them almost instantly. He paid special attention to his feet and his broken hand. The heat invaded him and healed his wounds, though the effort was still not a complete success. He lifted his bruised body off the ground and walked up the alley.

  His mind was stricken with an overwhelming confusion that was making it impossible to think clearly. He wandered through the most narrow, dark, deserted streets that he could find, not really thinking about what he was doing. He was simply trying to escape. He had to assume that he was still being followed. After all, he’d spent his whole life on the run.

  His arm was now starting to hurt in a peculiar way. He felt a kind of throbbing that he couldn’t remember ever having felt before. He pulled up his shirt sleeve and saw that he had some strange burns. His skin was blackened and deformed. Then something else shifted his attention. He felt his pursuers’ presence again, but this time he couldn’t tell for sure how many there were or where exactly they were. He was still too dazed.

  He stepped up his pace and willed himself to not let the panic overtake him. They had found him again. Raven decided it was best not to be in such a secluded place. It would be easier to blend in if there were more people around, so he turned onto a bigger street lit by tall street lamps that threw off an unfriendly light. He started running. He heard a commotion off to his right. Judging by the sound of all the angry voices, there had to be a lot of people involved. Raven went in that direction and shortly thereafter came out onto a crowded street. Everyone there was clutching sticks and homemade torches and was heading in the same direction. Raven jumped into the stream of people and let himself be carried along by the current.

  There must have been several hundred people, and they seemed terribly angry. No one even noticed him. They were shouting out in protest and throwing all kinds of objects at both sides of the street. When Raven noticed that some of them were holding banners, he realized it must be a demonstration of some sort. This was the perfect place for him to camouflage himself.

  From what he could deduce from the shouts and the banners, the purpose of the march was to protest being under martial law. Apparently the people had had enough of the oppressive military presence in their city and they weren’t going to put up with it anymore. He guessed he was in the minority for having managed to get into London without that indispensible, ever-elusive pass that seemed to be a bone of contention of the demonstrators. Many of them were shouting complaints about their family members who’d been denied entrance to the city for all kinds of reasons.

  Raven fell into step with them and looked all around. He didn’t see anyone whose behavior would suggest they were there for any reason other than to reclaim what they viewed as basic rights. Raven picked up on the chorus of the most common protest slogans and began shouting with everyone else in an effort to make his presence in the march completely believable.

  A short while later, there was a disturbance in the front part of the march. Some people were moving through the group, going in the opposite direction, and Raven found himself in the midst of a crushing mob. His body was being pushed in all directions and he could do nothing but try to keep his balance. If he were to fall, he would surely be trampled. As his body was shoved left and right, he was faced with the realization that he would never be in a place where he could relax and not have to worry about danger of one kind or another. The people around him suddenly stopped pushing inward and started to disperse. Just when he finally felt he could breathe again, something metal came flying through the air, leaving a trail of smoke behind it, and landed with a clink on the ground. More metal objects just like it started raining from the sky, coming from the direction in which the crowd had originally been moving.

  He saw hoards of people running and stumbling, bent over with their hands over their mouths, as a thick cloud of smoke rose from each of the metal canisters that had been thrown at them. Raven now knew it was tear gas and he scrambled to get out of there along with the rest of the protesters. He ran toward the closest building but had to stop behind a large group of people trying to break the door down. Frightened, he turned around and saw a line of clear shields advancing up the street, moving in the opposite direction as the demonstration. Behind each shield was a uniformed soldier wearing a protective helmet and mask; behind them were at least two hundred armed soldiers with clubs and other weapons Raven couldn’t make out clearly. Banners fell to the ground, abandoned by the protesters in their effort to retreat. A few protesters tried to challenge the soldiers, answering their smoking tear gas canisters with flaming bottles that began exploding as they landed on cars parked along the sides of the street.

  This exchange of projectiles did not last long. The protesters, feeling strength in their numbers, refused to retreat any more. They were shouting at the soldiers, hurling insults at them. Serious confrontation was inevitable.

  Shields raised, the soldiers mounted an attack against the disorganized front line of protesters who were throwing whatever they could get their hands on at them. The ensuing clash was violent. The army broke apart the protesters’ formation, then the soldiers used their clubs to beat down anyone in their path. The citizens responded with the same use of force.

  The scene on the street was reduced to a whirlwind of violence, and Raven could see nothing but bodies, beaten and falling all around him. Fear rose in him as he saw the soldiers heading in his direction, then several people launched a counterattack against them. The violence was spiraling out of control. A frenetic rhythm of sickening thuds boomed around him, and there seemed to be no one attending to those who’d been injured. Raven watched as one soldier brought his club brutally down on a man’s head. He could hear the sound of the man’s skull cracking as he collapsed on the ground. The soldier immediately turned to take on the next person in his path, his shield splattered with blood.

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  Something hit Raven forcefully in the shoulder, and his body slammed into a wall. He fell to the ground, and just stayed there for a moment hoping no one would come after him if he didn’t appear to be a threat. But people were stepping on him, so he began crawling away, staying alongside the wall. Eventually the shouting started to sound more distant. He took that to mean he was no longer in the midst of the fighting but he didn’t turn his head to check. He kept moving until he turned a corner, then stood and ran up the street. At the end of the street was an enormous trash bin, so he stopped behind it to catch his breath. His shoulder was still hurting from whatever had hit him.

  There was a body lying on the ground in a puddle of half-melted snow. Raven instantly knew the person was dead. Since he could see the man was about his height, he stripped the clothes off the dead body, put them on, and took off running again.

  Raven ran until he could run no more. He now had no idea where he was. Being completely unfamiliar with London, he wandered aimlessly through the streets until he saw a light coming from a half-open door. Raven saw a sign at the entrance indicating it was a hostel, so he went inside.

  An elderly man studied him from behind the counter.

  “G-Good evening . . . I . . . was looking for a room for the night,” Raven stammered, approaching the receptionist.

  “I see that,” the man curtly replied, frowning distrustfully. His hand slid beneath the desk. “Show me the cash and I’ll give you a key.”

  “I . . . don’t have any money,” he said, the unfortunate realization of this detail finally dawning on him. He’d been so worried about getting away from the fighting and then so distracted by his aches and pains that he hadn’t even thought about that. “I was robbed. I just need to rest a little. I’ll pay you.”

  “And how to do plan to do that, pal?” the old man asked.

  “I can work. Tomorrow I’ll clean the whole building in exchange for one night’s lodging,” he suggested, not terribly hopeful about the outcome.

  “Go away. No money, no room.”

  “No, wait, please . . . I have nowhere to go,” begged Raven. “I’ll do whatever you want.”

  “I said no. Get out,” growled the old man threateningly.

  “Can I . . . could I sleep in a cleaning closet or something like that?”

  “I told you to get out of here, you disgusting bum!” shouted the old man as he pulled a pistol out from under the table and pointed it at Raven with a surprisingly steady hand.

  “Okay, okay, I’m going . . . I didn’t mean to upset you . . . I’m sorry,” Raven said, his voice trembling.

  He went back out to the street and started walking with no idea of what to do or where to go. He knew no one in London; he really didn’t know anyone anywhere. He was alone again, as always. With each passing day it was less clear to him why he should go on in this sad life. His hopes of getting his memory back and discovering that he had a family and friends somewhere out there, or that at least he was a part of something, were dashed. The ten years that he could remember were nothing more than a series of pursuits dotted with fleeting images of all the places he’d been to without ever putting down roots. He often through that if it weren’t for this pull that seemed to continue tugging at him, he would have ended it all long ago. His only hope was that there was a purpose for that strange sensation. Whatever was calling to him had to have a reason for doing so.

  Despairing that his life was the sad journey of a man who had control over nothing and was guided by a inexplicable attraction that could very well be a figment of his own imagination, Raven went down the stairs into a subway station, gathered all the magazines and cardboard boxes he could find, curled up in the darkest, loneliest corner he could find, and fell asleep, completely exhausted.

  He woke up on the cardboard with an annoying thumping in his head. He sat up and put his hand on his arm which was aching again from that same, strange throbbing. He shook off the magazines that were still covering him and went up the stairs to the street to get away from the unpleasant smells surrounding him in the subway.

  It was still nighttime. Either he had only slept a few hours or he had slept an entire day. He didn’t much care which of the two alternatives was the right one; it didn’t matter at all given his current situation. He really didn’t know what mattered right now.

  “Those army bastards killed my brother,” said a voice behind him.

  “I can’t tell you how sorry I am,” came another voice. Two people walked past him on the sidewalk. One of them had a bouquet of roses hanging out of one of her hands. “He was a great friend. Does anyone know how many that pig Gordon killed during the protest?”

  Raven assumed the Gordon they mentioned was the man in charge of the army. Apparently the protest march had ended in a lot of deaths, which was not surprising considering the violence that rose out of the conflict. It had been a good idea to get out of there.

  Raven noticed a newspaper in a trash can. He picked it up and stared, dumbfounded, at the headline. The protest had taken place three days before. Three days! That meant that he’d been sleeping on that floor for three days straight. No wonder his head was thumping. He couldn’t do anything about that, but he could take care of the pain in his arm. As long as it was throbbing like that, he couldn’t concentrate on anything else. Raven wandered through the dark streets of London until he came to a deserted alley. It seemed he unconsciously had a preference for the most isolated, out-of-the-way places.

  He sat on the ground and pushed up his sleeve to see if he could heal himself. He never even got to try; he immediately felt a stabbing pain in his head and knew it was starting all over again. He could feel his pursuers approaching. Their presence flashed clearly through his mind; it meant they were close.

  He took off running in the opposite direction from where he sensed they were. There were three of them, one less than the last time at the gate to London. Raven willed his legs to move more quickly, and like every other time he’d found himself in this situation, he wondered why it was happening. They stalked him relentlessly, never leaving him alone for more than a few weeks. He couldn’t go on like this much longer.

  The three pursuers were closing in. He sensed that he knew two of them.

  One was the one who’d been about to strangle him by the Thames—the one whose name was Vyns. The other was the one who’d prevented Vyns from choking Raven. He’d appeared a few moments later and ordered Vyns to stop. Raven guessed he was the leader of the group. Somehow they were also sensing him, because no matter how many times he changed his direction, they always stayed on his trail, ultimately finding him.

  Raven was starting to get tired. He had to find a place to hide. The idea of putting himself in the midst of other people had worked the night he’d escaped from the hospital. For some reason, they seemed to want to capture him without anyone noticing, or at least that was the conclusion Raven had come to. He looked up both sides of the street, trying to find a public place. He saw nothing that showed any signs of life at this hour of the night. All the buildings looked like office buildings, and all their lights were out. His pursuers were getting close now, and Raven sensed that one of them had taken a detour and was now heading in the same direction he was. They were surrounding him, just as they always did, and were moving too damn fast. Raven turned and went to the nearest building.

  The door was closed. Raven had no time to lose. He grabbed the doorknob with one hand and, not trying to curb his strength, concentrated all his energy and melted it. He opened the door and flew into the vestibule. Thankfully, he hadn’t lost control this time. Maybe he was getting the hang of this.

  Trying to boost his spirits with that thought, Raven looked around for a place to hide. He was in a large room which led to two different hallways, one on each side. Without basing his choice on anything concrete, he took the one on the right, turned the corner and froze in place after taking only two steps. A line of flames was burning in midair about three feet off the floor from one end of the hallway to the other. Raven had no time to contemplate this bizarre phenomenon. He crouched down and crawled under the flames as quickly as he could.

  He felt a thump on his head, as if he’d run into a steel plate, and he fell back. He watched in astonishment as blue circles in a vertical position spread through the air. They were coming from the place where his head had crashed into what seemed to be an invisible barrier.

  He stood up and ran in the opposite direction up another hallway. He crossed back through the vestibule and went straight up the opposite hallway, somewhat more slowly in case he should come across another line of fire burning in the air. Luckily, this way was clear. He got to the end of the corridor and stopped in front of an elevator. A split second later, he opened the door beside it and took off up the stairs. He had no desire to meet up with his pursuers while closed up in a steel box. After going up six floors, his legs were about to give out so he sat down on the steps to rest a little.. He heard the door open below, followed by the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs. They were already there.