As light hit it, the insect began to wriggle, iridescent blue wings fluttering to life as it flew from the jar.
Pandora was distraught with grief as the insect gently settled on her hand. “You… you were dead.”
“Only asleep,” it said. “Thank you for waking me up.”
“What are you?” Pandora whispered. “And what have I done?”
The insect crawled up Pandora’s arm until he was perched on her shoulder. “I am hope. And you will need me in the years to come.”
Anders leaned back against the shelf. Hope. He’d hoped to see Selene again, and now she was gone. Why couldn’t he forget the defiant way she’d looked up at him with those green eyes, the way she’d touched his chest, demanding he pretend he’d never seen her gun?
Sirens. Anders leaned forward. What had he heard?
The rain intensified, battering the root cellar doors, dripping down the stairs.
Nothin’ but the rain.
Faster.
Run. Faster.
Selene tore through the grass, legs pumping, watching for ruts in the ground. She glanced behind her. Half a mile down the road, Dion and Scott were still emptying their cooler, hurling empty bottles into the woods.
She made it around a bend, ignoring the stitch in her side, and leapt over a fallen branch. Running along the shoulder of the road was slowing her down too much.
If she heard a single siren, she’d run into the woods and hide. But for now, she needed a flat surface so she could run faster. She shifted back onto the pavement and kept going.
Another glance behind her. Listening. Sweat streaming down her face, dripping down her back. Her muscles screamed, burning, begging her to stop, but she used the fire to spur her on.
How many minutes had it been? Ten? Twenty? How long until someone found those men and heard what she’d done?
After the next bend in the road, the dread in her stomach lightened. This was starting to look familiar. Woods ran along either side of her, no roads ahead, no dirt drives in sight.
But somehow she knew… She was almost home.
She was going to make it.
Thunder boomed in the distance, and the scent of smoke reached Selene again as a stiff wind lifted her curls, whipping them into her eyes.
The first drops of rain began to trickle from the clouds above as they gathered, deepening. She rounded the next bend and saw it, just over a mile ahead.
Her driveway.
Home.
A little sob escaped her lips, and she sucked in another lungful of air to fight against the horrible pain in her side.
No cars were coming along the highway in either direction, but she shifted back onto the grass alongside the road, so she could disappear into the woods in an instant if she needed to. She could find her way home from here.
She was considering vanishing into the trees when a glint caught her eye ahead.
A gold Tesla emerged at the end of Selene’s drive. Nan.
She’d gotten the car working somehow.
Relief flooded Selene, and she jogged toward the car, slowing so she could wave her arms.
She was still too far away, but Nan seemed to see her. She pulled onto the road, driving toward Selene.
Selene gulped in ragged breaths, leaning over, her hand pressed against the cramp in her side. She tried to walk, but her legs felt like lead, and she was so dizzy, she had to fight to stay upright.
Nan was halfway to her when Selene heard the sirens.
And saw the lights.
In the distance, from the direction of town. She looked up, heart racing, as a cop car turned onto their road, going fast.
Was it coming for her? If she ran, and the cop wasn’t after her…
Selene looked at the Tesla, desperate. It was only yards away now.
She met Nan’s wide eyes through the windshield. Eli was in the passenger seat, his face pressed against the window.
If Nan stopped, and the cop car was coming for Selene, they’d never outrun it.
And then they’d have Eli, too.
“Go!” Selene yelled.
Nan’s gaze went steely, and she sped up. Despair seized Selene as the Tesla passed her by. Eli waved at Selene frantically. Sirens and lights exploded from the direction Selene had just come from as another cop car appeared, passing Nan.
The black car squealed to a stop directly in front of Selene, and she stumbled back as Nan’s car disappeared around the bend.
It was the cop from earlier who had talked to her. The Coalition symbol on the door spurred Selene into action.
They can’t have me. She darted into the woods, shoving her way through the brush, branches ripping at her jacket, the pain in her side making her even slower.
Wind tore through the trees, the air charged with the energy of the storm. Selene sucked desperate breaths in, tasting wood smoke and ozone.
Brakes squealed as another cop car skidded to a stop behind her, and its sirens cut out. Doors slammed, and the cops shouted behind her, but she couldn’t make the words out over her own ragged breaths.
Selene tried to run faster, crashing deeper into the brush. The forest canopy blocked out some of the gray light from above, but the rain started to fall harder, hitting Selene in the face, each drop blurring her vision.
Unless those were tears.
Selene tripped over something and fell, hard. The sound of cops yelling behind her was getting closer, branches snapping as they pursued her.
Thunder boomed right above her.
She scrambled to her feet and sprinted forward, looking for somewhere to hide, a tree, a bush, anything. I won’t go to a Protected camp.
She made it another five feet. An awful stabbing sensation ripped through her back, knocking the air from her lungs.
Stumbling, she fell to the ground and saw double, her vision blurring even more. Rain slid down her face, into her eyes, and a crack of lightning lit up the forest, blinding her further.
When she tried to stand, a second stabbing sensation tore into her, just below her shoulder blade.
She fell to the ground, panting, gasping for air.
I have to run. She tried to move, but she only succeeded in pitching forward into the forest floor.
Rolling over with a grunt, she sucked in quick, painful breaths. The forest canopy rocked above her, each branch moving with the wind. Rain sluiced through leaves and pine needles, and the fat drops stung her face.
They shot me.
Panic filled her, and she started to shiver, her whole body going cold with fear.
Selene blinked rapidly against the rain, and black dots floated across her field of vision.
Rain pummeled the wet earth around her, and the thick scent of decaying pine needles and brush filled Selene’s nostrils. Every sense felt sharper, more vivid than it ever had.
Then it all started to fade.
She fought the terrible darkness that was gripping her, trying to drag her into its depths. To make her disappear.
Is this what dying felt like?
Tears leaked out of her eyes, mingling with the rain. What would happen when she died? Would she see her mom and dad again? Would she see that yellow dog?
Nan didn’t believe in any of that. When you died, you died. You were gone forever.
Selene let out a breathless sob. She’d never see Eli again. Never see Nan.
But at least they got away.
The forest canopy vanished as a cop leaned over her. The lines of his face blurred, then sharpened.
Angular jaw, straight nose, white-blond hair.
Older than him. With brown eyes.
Anders looked a lot like his dad. Except for those eyes.
Lightning cracked across the sky, followed by thunder that seemed to shake the entire Earth.
When the sheriff met Selene’s eyes, her chest seemed to expand, and her pain faded. Everything seemed lighter, like the burden she’d bee
n carrying for the past eight years was gone.
I’m not invisible.
If she had to die, at least someone had finally seen her.
She had been found.
The rest of the world would know that Selene existed.
That she had lived.
“You don’t have to hide now,” a small voice whispered in her mind. “You can be free.”
Selene let herself slide into darkness.
The Coalition has Jeremiah. The Coalition has Jeremiah.
The thought looped in Bas’s brain, a mental chant in time with the sound of his boots hitting the soil, branches snapping as he and his team tramped northeast through the muggy, dying forest. The frogs and crickets looped with him in the night, only interrupted by the haunting low hum of Coalition transports.
The sound periodically broke through the rhythm of his march, reminding him that dozens of Pandemic Control hovers continued to cross the sky in the distance behind them—all headed in the same direction. Northwest.
Their mysterious destination was magnetic, yet paradoxically repulsive. Bas knew, deep down, if they were going to find Jeremiah, it would be in that direction. But his body rebelled, pushing him to go anywhere but that way.
Northwest means death, Bas. Yours.
It was Truth, whispering, an infection in his blood, pumping through his heart in time with each footfall.
The Coalition has Jeremiah. And soon they’ll have you.
Something danced in Bas’s peripheral vision—black wraiths that had been there for hours. Lack of sleep changed the shape of things, but Bas knew they weren’t real. He held his light globe higher and focused on pushing through the brush ahead of him, following the path they’d located with the help of the map.
This wisp of a trail ultimately linked up two Haven safe houses, and as he walked, those wraiths became ghosts—here-yet-not-here, phantoms trapped outside time, visible only to his fevered, overmedicated mind. They were all the people who had ever run this trail before him, carrying crates filled with stolen medical supplies, weaponry, factory-made goods—the lifeblood of an underground rebellion cut off from modern society. Determined to survive their exile until the day returned when they could live in the world, truly free. Each person had walked this path, one step after another, having faith in a journey with no known destination.
Bas was literally walking Haven’s Path tonight, just as he had with Rory all those years ago.
But this will be the last time.
He wiped sweat from his forehead and ground his teeth. That was the trade-off with stims. They could keep you awake, but at some point, the paranoia became an extreme liability. As much as they needed to get to Jeremiah, they needed sleep more. They’d all be useless in a real gunfight right now.
He halted, and Nova cursed as she nearly bumped into him. He flicked off his light and took a long drink from his canteen. The others followed his example.
Nova wiped at the dark circles beneath her eyes and shoved her canteen back in her bag. “I could sleep for a week.”
“What’s this about being weak?” Rory nudged her, and she nudged him back harder.
Bas shook himself and pulled out the map again. Lex stepped up to shine her light on it, illuminating the faint lines. They should be close now—they’d been moving most of the night, and the sun would rise within the hour. The laminated map blurred, and Bas squinted at it, tracing their path with his finger.
“We should be almost on top of this place,” Bas said as he refolded the map and returned it to his pack. “Gotta veer off the path soon to find the house.”
“Want me to scout ahead?” Lex asked.
Bas scanned the three of them, the sheer exhaustion on their faces, the way their shoulders sagged beneath packs. Stopping meant crashing. They couldn’t risk resting now.
Rory absentmindedly rubbed the scar on his cheek, his bloodshot, worried eyes meeting Bas’s in the faint glow of the globes each of them carried. Once upon a time, his brother had sought answers to questions that had no answers, but Rory had learned to let the questions go—to not need the answers to keep going. Still, Bas knew exactly what he was wondering now. What would they discover at a Haven safe house inside a Coalition-controlled quarantine zone? And what decisions would they have to make in order to protect Haven and every other safe house along the Path?
Only one way to find out.
“No scouting again,” Bas said. “We’re almost there, and we go together.”
They stepped off the trail, veering east through thick foliage for a mile as the first gray light of dawn appeared through the forest canopy, adding detail to the dark, hulking shapes of the dead and dying vegetation around them.
Lex froze and pointed to the well-hidden antenna without a word. It was attached to a tall tree. She then located the buried cables that would lead them right to the safe house. They followed the barely noticeable line all the way to a tall wood fence that wound its way along the tree line, marking the beginning of the off-grid property.
“Weapons ready,” Bas said softly as he peered through a crack in the fence. He listened.
Silence.
There was enough gray light in the sky now that he could make out a small property, filled with brown grass. Plants in raised bed gardens filled most of the backyard, but they were dry and dead. Desiccated like the Quin fields had been. The log cabin and small solar array at the front of the homestead looked to be well-maintained—but there was no sign of people.
Bas gestured silently in a flanking motion, and the team split up, weapons out. Bas and Lex followed the fence to the right, and Rory and Nova headed left. It was eerily quiet here, not even the sound of a bird. The trees ringing the homestead still showed signs of life, yet this place didn’t feel alive. It was empty.
It’s all dead.
Any sign of green left in the woods would vanish soon enough as this blight finished its work. The color here was a false sign of life. Holo. A lie.
Like you, Paranoia whispered.
Bas gritted his teeth and moved more quickly around the perimeter, sweat trickling down his back, making his fatigues stick to him. He’d tossed his filthy gloves after the barn, and his palms felt too damp now, slipping on his gun. The rush of his own pulse and the sound of his fast breathing filled in the emptiness as he and Lex reached the front of the property.
A narrow dirt road dead-ended at the front gate, and long, stiff grasses, waist high and dry, crept up alongside it. Then a low whistle filled the silence—Rory letting them know they were in position.
Bas whistled back and rounded the corner of the fence alone, moving in a low crouch until he reached the gate. The others stayed hidden on either side, watching and waiting for his signal.
The gate was ajar.
Bas lightly kicked it the rest of the way open, and it swung inward, on well-oiled hinges.
The front porch of the cabin was clear… still no signs of life. No signs of Coalition either. Pandemic Control troops would have left boot marks and humvee tracks on the ground. There was none of that here.
A pick-up truck was parked in front of the cabin, and ruts beside it suggested another had been parked there before. Bas filed the truck away as a potentially useful future resource. An unnetworked vehicle might become a necessity to move more quickly and conserve their energy.
Bas let out another low whistle to tell his team to follow, then advanced toward the front porch of the cabin, which was shadowy and dark in the almost-dawn.
A figure darted into the light and stopped at the top of the steps with a slight creak. Bas halted a foot from the stairs.
A child in a dirty, sleeveless dress peered down at him from the porch, her red hair wild, blue eyes wide with surprise.
And she had her cross-bow aimed at Bas’s heart.
One slip of a finger, and she’d send her bolt right through his chest.
Bas swallowed, not taking his eyes off of her.
Eight or nine years old. Dirty. Dried blood on her cheek and arm, possibly ill.
“Drop that,” Bas said, his voice low.
“Who are you?” The girl’s strong voice had no trace of the southern accent he’d expected to hear, but he hadn’t expected this at all.
“I’m a friend. Lower the weapon.” Irritation swept through him. How had he missed her on the porch? He’d been caught off-guard by a god damned child. “Drop it. Now.”
“Why should I?” She said, keeping her crossbow steady. “You don’t look friendly to me.”
“Put it down, kid.” Bas could sense his team behind him—they were there, even if the yard was still too dark for the girl to see them. He took a step toward her, and the girl let out a warning sound.
“You put your gun away,” the little girl said, baring her teeth at him. “You should know… I always hit my target.”
Her eyes flicked behind Bas for a split second, widening again as Rory walked past him and made a show of holstering his gun.
What the hell was he doing?
“You alone in there?” Rory asked, his voice kind. Soft. He’d always been good at that, knowing how to soothe people. Like he’d calmed Nova into dropping her knife the day they found her.
Bas’s eyes flicked between the little girl and Rory—her red hair, his red-blond hair—and something turned over in his gut. Lark. Rory’s sister, the little one who might still be alive, had looked a lot like this kid.
This was going to be a problem.
Rory advanced another step toward the porch.
“Stop!” the girl cried out, keeping her crossbow aimed at Bas, but her forehead creased with confusion and doubt. Her entire demeanor shifted, reminding Bas of a feral cat—cornered and desperate to escape—as she looked from Bas to Rory, then behind them where Bas sensed Nova and Lex.
“Where are your parents?” Rory asked in that calm-a-caged-animal voice of his, radiating something that he seemed to reserve only for the weak and injured.
The girl blinked, her eyes suddenly taking on a sheen. Bas swept the area visually, keeping his ears pricked for any sound of the Coalition or another trap, trying to ignore the fact that the bolt was still aimed at his chest, letting Rory do his work.
Defective (Fractured Era Book 1) Page 20
