“What happened?” I ask, but I remember more this time—everything that happened until I blacked out. At least I think I do. “Did I make a Shredder’s head explode?” My voice is hoarse; the words hurt.
My father nods.
I try to move. My head pounds. “Drake?” I call, then relief floods through me. Sitting nearby he waves, a shaky smile on his lips.
But I don’t see Burn. “Where’s Burn? What happened to the Shredders? Did they kill him?”
“No,” my father says. “Can you stand? It’s unusual to see Shredders around here—there’s not enough dust to live off. But we should leave in case their pack’s near.”
With Dad’s help, I stand and look up into his eyes. When he doesn’t look away, my heart fills with guilt, regret, sadness.
I look down. “I’m so, so, so sorry.”
“Sorry?” he runs his hands over my shoulders. “You saved my life.”
I shake my head. No matter what he says to console me, it can’t erase what I’ve done, or the sacrifice he made.
“Time to head out,” he says. “We might get to the Settlement before sunrise.” The sun is setting, casting a yellow glint on the rocky ground.
“I won’t leave Burn behind.”
“He’s fine.” Hands on my shoulders, my father pulls me forward, and I realize he’s trying to keep me from looking behind me. I slip out of his grasp and dash back.
The ground is strewn with body parts and, horrified, I search for evidence of Burn, but all the chunks are dark and dry. All Shredder. At least I hope so.
I turn back to my dad. “Did he—?”
My father’s jaw is tense and he nods. “The Shredders charged toward you when you fell, but before they reached you, Burn’s gift kicked in. He tore them apart.”
My heart slams against my ribs. My head throbs. “Where is he?” He swore he’d never change again. He must feel horrible.
Dad shakes his head. “He ran off. But he’ll be fine. He’ll find us.”
“Let’s go,” Drake says.
I turn toward him. He’s risen to his feet on his own and he takes a few deliberate steps toward us. My heart lifts. He’s walking stronger every time I see him.
“Get on,” Dad says to Drake. To my amazement, my brother jumps slightly to get into place on my father’s back.
We walk quickly and silently as the light fades and darkness falls. The moon’s bright, but I can’t see too far in any one direction as the forests have become more plentiful and dense.
I have so many questions for my father, so many ways I want to say sorry for everything I’ve done, but his silence is soothing, soaked in forgiveness.
Now, if only I can find a way to forgive myself.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
BY THE TIME morning brightens the sky, I’m overflowing with worry and dare not look directly at anyone. We haven’t seen Burn. Yes, he took out those Shredders—took out is an understatement—but what if he was found by others?
Horrible thoughts torment me. He might have found a stash of dust and succumbed to dust madness. The combination of Burn as both monster and Shredder is too terrifying to imagine. But even more terrifying is imagining him alone and hurt, either physically or emotionally. He swore he’d never change into his beast again.
Drake chattered for a while last night as we walked, asking questions about the Settlement and the Freedom Army and digging for more details about life BTD, but I wasn’t really listening, and only the occasional word penetrated the murk in my mind. I don’t know what to expect when we reach the Settlement.
For the past two hours, Drake has been quiet, resting his head on my father’s shoulder. I keep thinking he’s asleep, but his arms remain clasped around Dad’s neck. He’s even using his legs to grip and help distribute his weight. Dad’s steps are growing heavier and I should offer to carry Drake, but my body and head feel like I was in a physical, not mental, fight with that Shredder.
Plus, I’m too depressed to form the words to offer.
We step out of the shelter of trees. Across a field, the ground rises sharply.
Just days ago, mountains and rocks were nothing but concepts, things I’d read about but never seen, and I tip my head back to look up to the top. Drake slides down from my father’s back and takes a few stiff steps.
“We’ll rest here for a few minutes,” my father tells him. “Stay close,”
Drake winds around us in circles, practicing, and his gait improves with each step. My father has Drake in sight so I stare at the rocks, hard like my mood. A black vein traces up and over a small hump in the granite, as if the rock is expelling the darkness within.
“You okay?” my father asks. I turn without thinking.
He smiles tentatively, testing me, like he’s worried I’ll attack. Given the circumstances, I understand his apprehension, but right now I couldn’t muster the energy or emotions to kill a rat.
“You did a good job,” he says.
“Killing that Shredder?”
“Keeping Drake safe. Taking care of him, of yourself. You were so young.” His voice cracks. “I couldn’t be more proud.”
“Proud? I—” The sentence won’t come. He knows all the horrible things I did.
“Yes.” His voice is firm. “Proud.”
Drake stops and points up. “Are we really climbing up there?”
“The Settlement is over this ridge, down in the valley below. Dust rarely blows up that high. Most of the settlers don’t even carry masks.” He grins at me as if I’m supposed to start jumping up and down with glee.
I turn away but he continues. “There’s a lake down in the valley with plenty of clean water, and farms and trees, and anyone who wants one can build a home.”
It does sound idyllic, like a story set in the world BTD, but I don’t feel happiness or even excitement. It’s like I can’t feel anything, like everything I’ve done has erased my ability to feel. Perhaps that’s for the best. When I feel, people die.
A sudden breeze blows past, and my father extends his arms to wrap them around Drake and me in protection. Every muscle inside me tenses.
“Glory?” a man’s voice says, and I duck out from under my father’s arms.
“Gage!” I rush forward and embrace him, and for a split second I forget my despair. He looks stronger now, and while his clothes are still torn and bloodstained, I don’t see any evidence that his wounds are still bleeding.
“Where’s Burn?” he asks.
“Gone.” My despair returns. “We haven’t seen him since yesterday afternoon.” My teeth worry my lip.
“I’ve seen him since then,” Gage says.
“Really?”
“How else do you think I found my way here?” He turns to my dad. “You must be Hector. I’m Gage.” He grins. “And I bet you’re Drake. I’ve got a son about your age.”
My insides pinch as I realize how much Gage left behind in Haven. I’m ashamed I didn’t press harder and find out if he had a family. Whoever betrayed Gage, betrayed them, too. Dad looks at me for an explanation, but I focus back on the rocks.
“They know you up there, right?” Gage asks Dad. “Because they didn’t seem all that friendly when I ran up to take a look.”
“Who are you?” My father’s voice is tight, deep and laced with suspicion, and I recognize the man who taught me not to trust.
“Gage Trapp.” He extends his hand to shake, but my father doesn’t take it. “I was expunged from Haven three days ago. Tried to outrun the Shredders and Comps—I’m fast—but they slowed me down with chains and concrete blocks. Shredders caught me, but then I ran into Burn and Glory.” He steps over and tips my chin up with the crook of a finger. “You kids saved my life.”
I resist squirming. I didn’t do anything to save him, no matter what he says, and even if I had, it wouldn’t make me less of a murderer.
“What makes you think they aren’t friendly up there?” my father asks, his voice still suspicious.
�
�Those.” Gage points up.
My curiosity gets the better of me and I look to where he’s pointing. Along the top of the ridge, I can just make out what looks like wooden towers.
“They’ve got guns,” Gage says.
My dad nods. “They’re defending the Settlement against Shredders.”
“Get many up there?” Gage asks.
“None,” Dad says. “But we can’t be too careful. We came across some less than thirty miles back.” He reaches for Drake. “Let’s get going.”
“I want to walk,” Drake says.
Dad narrows his eyes. “Okay. For the first while. It gets steep.”
Drake starts off quickly, and his happiness almost penetrates my blackness.
“Come on,” he calls back to me. “Stop dawdling.”
I run to catch up, leaving Gage and Dad talking behind us.
Drake and I walk in silence as the ground starts to rise. He stumbles, and I reach for him. “Let me carry you.”
He shakes his head and continues. “It wasn’t your fault, you know. You didn’t know you could do that. How could you have known?”
I tense at his words but trudge along, keeping him in my peripheral vision, ready to lunge for him if he falters. “Why didn’t you tell me the truth?”
He steps over a rock. “Would it have helped if you knew?”
I turn back. Gage and Dad are gaining on us, and I don’t want either of them invading this conversation. I pick up my pace. “It would have changed everything if I’d known.”
“If you’d felt bad, or turned yourself in, you might not have done such a great job keeping me hidden.”
I bite my lip. For the past three years, I thought I was protecting Drake but he was protecting me, too.
“You were only ten,” I say. “How could you…” I’m not sure what I want to ask.
Drake ducks to avoid a tree branch. “I was old enough to keep a secret. Dad and I agreed—”
“You agreed?” Shame pinches its way up my throat and grabs at the insides of my ears. “You and dad made plans to keep this from me?”
His ankle wobbles. I step closer. He doesn’t resist as I duck and pull his arm over my shoulder, to take some of his weight and guard against his falling.
“Dad told me never to tell you,” he says. “He told me to stay hidden as long as I could.”
“He told me to tell everyone you were dead. To hide you.” I help him over a fallen log. “I still don’t remember what happened….”
Drake squeezes my shoulder. “As soon as it happened, you passed out, cold. I was terrified.”
“Because I almost killed you.”
“Because Mom was dead. Because I thought you were dead.”
“And Dad?”
“You were unconscious when he got home. The best we could figure was that your Deviance triggered mine. The danger brought out my armor and protected my vital organs.”
“But your legs.”
“My armor doesn’t extend low enough, or didn’t come up fast enough.” He shakes his head. “I’m not sure.”
Footsteps approach. Dad and Gage have caught up.
“Get on my back,” Dad says to Drake and he nods, clearly tired.
“I need to stretch my legs,” Gage says. “Now that I know how great it feels to have open space, I can’t get enough.” He races off in a flash.
I stare at my dad as he gets Drake settled on his back. There are still so many questions, so much new information to process, and so many things I don’t understand. “You can teleport?” I ask him.
He nods. “But I can’t carry anyone with me.” He grins. “Otherwise we’d be at the Settlement by now.”
“Why didn’t you teleport out of the dome—”
“Where to? I didn’t know there was life Outside.”
“But once you were out…Burn told me how they found you. If you can teleport, then why didn’t you do it to get away from the Shredders?” And why did you take the blame for what I did?
“I didn’t even know I was a Deviant then. My twin sister was, so I always wondered about you kids.”
I stop. “We have an aunt?”
“Really?” Drake says, excited.
“Had.” Dad looks down. “She was expunged when we were teenagers. Once I realized there was life out here, I hoped I’d find her….” He shakes his head.
I walk in silence, trying to push through all my questions to ones I can voice, ones that won’t scrape coming out, ones whose answers I can bear. My father lost more than I imagined. His kids, his wife, his sister.
“I want to walk again,” Drake says.
My dad shakes his head, then says, “My gift didn’t manifest until I was exposed to the dust.”
“Really?” I suck in a breath, considering the implications.
“Best I can figure. I’ve met others at the Settlement whose gifts weren’t fully revealed until they were exposed to the dust.”
“Does that mean others inside Haven might discover they’re Deviant if they got out and breathed dust?”
He shakes his head. “I’m not certain, but I think so.”
My mind spins. “I guess it’d be a risky thing to test.”
“There’s the rub. No one knows how much dust is too much. Even for us Chosen. If we take too much—” He stops himself.
“We become Shredders,” I finish.
His head snaps toward me and it’s clear he didn’t know I knew this. He nods, a grim look on his face.
“Is everyone at the Settlement a Deviant?”
“No. And we don’t call it Deviant. We call it Chosen.”
“Chosen for what?”
“Chosen to adapt to the dust, I guess, to survive.” He pauses for a moment as if considering what he just said. “But some at the Settlement can’t tolerate any dust without choking. A lot of people traveled up here from the South. They survived for generations in bomb shelters and mines—anywhere they could find—but when they came out from hiding, the dust was so thick it made what little soil was left impossible to farm. Most water supplies had dried up. They came north.”
Burn told the people at the fort that we’d traveled up from the South. Now I understand why, but I don’t know if Burn told my father about how we were captured and taken to the fort. I certainly don’t want to, so I keep my mouth shut.
We’re nearing the top of the ridge when Gage runs back to join us. “The air is so fresh here. Almost no dust. Amazing.”
Dad nods and I decide to stop asking questions. For now.
We enter a clearing and Dad climbs a lone tree at its edge. Near the top, he unclips a cord that’s wrapped over a branch. He unfurls a bright red flag then waves it in a pattern—two small swoops to the right, a giant figure eight starting down to the left, then three circles above his head. A moment later, I spot flags waving in similar intricate patterns from the two guard towers. Dad climbs down and we continue up the hill to its crest.
When I reach the top, my breath catches. Stretching below us are thousands of buildings, all much smaller than the high rises in Haven, but even from a distance they instantly look more like homes than anything I’ve known. Farther ahead there’s a gleaming lake surrounded by green. Green brighter than the skin of the cucumber Cal fed me. Greener than the needles of the pine trees we’ve walked through. And there are fields of soft gold, too. It’s so beautiful.
“What do you think?” my father asks.
“Spectacular!” Drake says and grins.
“Holy moly.” Gage runs forward.
Joy spreads inside me, trying to push out the blackness, and I think I might let it. Drake’s always been a positive guy, but looking at him now, it’s like I’ve never seen him smile before. The entire world seems brighter. Even though I know I don’t deserve the happiness this place promises, at least I’ve accomplished my goal. Drake is safe.
We continue to walk down a well-worn path that zigzags in long, sweeping passes. Soon both sides are lined with small buildings. Like
the uppermost parts of Haven, many of these dwellings are constructed from materials clearly salvaged from ruins, but some are made of wooden planks that look new. Fresh wooden planks are something I never saw in Haven, although I now realize there might be many things Management had access to that I never witnessed.
Ahead, a woman steps out of a doorway and shakes a small rug. “Good morning,” she says as we pass. Her smile’s broad and genuine, but her eyes are the strangest color I’ve ever seen—bronze, and they sparkle so much it’s like they’re faceted. Whether she can do anything beyond seeing with those eyes, her appearance alone would brand her a Deviant. I hope she never lived inside Haven.
After we round the next bend in the road, a group of about ten men and women appear. They’re walking with purpose and authority toward us. At the group’s apex is a man who’s well over six feet tall. While his height makes him seem slight, his figure’s imposing and his hair’s closely cropped and coppery. His tightly fitting suit is made of the heaviest material I’ve seen. It looks thick and strong like the Comps’ armor, but it flexes more easily, almost like leather but it can’t be—leather is way too rare to make into such large garments.
The two men flanking him are similarly dressed and panic skitters in my chest. Their approach is too much like Comps marching toward us, or those men at the fort, but Dad keeps going so I don’t let fear stop me either.
Burn steps out from the back of the pack.
My heart skips and a smile bursts onto my face. Waving, I start toward him but he immediately turns away.
The air rushes from my lungs like I’ve been punched. I know he saw me.
Drake tugs my arm, pulls me forward, and the tall red-haired man steps up to us. He shakes my father’s hands and they lean in for a quick, backslapping embrace. Burn holds back, not even looking in my direction.
“Welcome to the Settlement,” the man says. “I’m Rolph. Commander of the Freedom Army.”
“Army commander,” Gage says, with caution in his voice. “Do you welcome all guests like this, or are we special?”
Rolph turns toward Gage. “Not sure about you, yet.” One corner of his mouth twitches up. “But you”—he turns directly toward me—“you might prove very special indeed.”
Deviants (The Dust Chronicles) Page 20
