by Ryan Casey
Because she was holding on to her stomach.
Her bleeding stomach.
“M—Mike?” she said.
Mike smiled. He stroked her hair from her sweaty forehead. “Yeah. Yeah, it’s me.”
“I thought… We all thought—”
“I know,” he said. “But it’s okay. I’m here. I’m alive. And we’re going to get out of this place. All of us are going to get out of this place.”
“Kelsie,” she said. “She’s—”
“She’s fine,” Mike said.
Gina looked around at Mike. Frowned. “How…”
“She’s with me. I was taken somewhere. Somewhere that helped me. It’s… it’s a long story. But this place. It’s a good place. Somewhere that can help you. That can help all of us. A good place.”
“And you’re sure you trust this place?” Gina asked.
Mike looked at her. Then back outside. And he felt himself at that fork in the road once again. That fork in the road that all too often proved costly.
He took a deep breath, fought off the nerves and the reluctance, and he nodded. “I trust them,” he said. “Now come on. We need to get you out of here.”
He went to wrap his arms around Alison. To lift her up.
But then she winced with pain.
“Whoa, whoa,” he said. “It’s okay. We’ll take our time.”
“I’m not going to make it, Mike.”
“That’s not true. You’re going to make it. Nobody’s dying here. Nobody else is dying. We’ve lost too many people.”
But that way Alison looked back at him. The way she looked into his eyes with a glimmer of pain; a glimmer of regret.
It was like she knew exactly what was happening to her.
Exactly what was going to happen next.
“It’s not going to be easy,” Mike said. “Getting out of here… it’s going to be dangerous. But we can do it. And we can get you help. I promise. Okay? I promise.”
Alison looked like she was going to argue. Like she was going to protest.
But then she leaned in. Like she was going to say something.
And then she kissed him on the lips.
He felt the warmth through his body. The taste of rusty blood was masked by the love he felt, deep within.
And it just made him even more determined not to lose Alison.
Even more determined to get out of this chaos.
He pulled away. And Alison looked at him with those big blue eyes and smiled.
“Still arresting you when the world gets back to normal,” she said.
Mike laughed. “I’ll hold you to that.”
He stepped around her, then. “Put a little pressure on the wound,” he said. “It won’t feel too good at all. But it’ll help. I promise. Trust… trust me.”
She looked up at him as Gina and Arya stood beside them, and then she nodded, the fight returning to her.
“I trust you,” she said.
Mike took a deep breath.
And then he picked her up.
He heard her cry. Heard her struggle. He felt the warmth of the blood seeping from her body, through her clothes, dripping to the floor.
And as he stumbled out of the door, back outside, out into this hell zone, he didn’t know what he was going to do.
He didn’t know how Alison was going to survive this mess.
He just knew that he was going to keep her alive.
Because he trusted himself.
He looked at Gina. Then at Arya. Then down at Alison, eyes drifting as he held her slight body in his arms.
“Are you ready?” he asked.
She smiled back up at him. Nodded. “I’m ready,” she said.
Together, they stepped out into the extraction point.
Together, they made their way towards the gates, which people were still fleeing through.
Together, and not for the first time, they made their way towards a new world, and whatever it held for them.
“Just hold on,” he said, as Alison drifted, as she grew more and more pale. “Just hold on. Please. Please…”
He passed Aiden’s body, and he felt a wave of sadness. But then he thought about the extent of his sacrifice. How important it could be. How significant it could be.
He thought about Kelsie out there and how he was going to get back to her, and how everything was going to be okay.
“Mike?” Gina said.
He heard her voice as he walked along, and he didn’t know what she was saying his name for. Not at first.
But then he looked down at Alison, and his stomach sank.
Her eyes were closed. She looked… peaceful. Like she was drifting.
But that wasn’t what Mike needed.
That wasn’t what Alison needed.
She needed to make it.
She needed to survive.
“Just hold on, Alison. Please.”
He kept on pushing. Kept on going. Even though he could hear gunshots in the distance. Even though he could see people running around; see people that might be a threat to him, might be a danger to him, might end everything he had right here with him.
But he trusted himself.
He kept going.
He believed.
“We’ll make it,” Mike said, as they got closer and closer to the gates of the extraction point. “Just hold on for me, Alison. Just hold on.”
He kept on going.
Kept on pushing.
Alison didn’t open her eyes.
Chapter Forty-Eight
Two Weeks Later…
Mike looked out at the fields, and for the first time in weeks, he felt at ease.
It was a beautiful morning. Even though summer was reaching its end, there wasn’t a fear about it anymore. There wasn’t the same level of apprehension as there was last year, when they were out there surviving, going their own ways.
Sure, there was still an element of tension. An element of fear.
But there was something else.
A confidence.
A faith.
A trust.
Things were going to work out.
One way or another… they were going to beat whatever came their way.
They were going to survive.
He heard shouting in the distance. And for a second, he felt tension inside. Tension after the reminders of what a shout could mean; of what it could signify.
It could be Kelsie. She could be in trouble. She could be in danger.
But then he looked outside the hospital, and he saw her running around, smiling, playing with the other kids… and he found himself smiling, too.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”
Mike looked to his left. Saw Vincent standing there, smile on his face.
“I always like this view best,” he said. “I sometimes come here early in the morning. Just spend a little time staring out, meditating on this place. On how lucky we are to have it. Because we are lucky. Very lucky. And we’ve got to make sure we keep that luck going no matter what.”
Mike looked at him, and he smiled. He had Vincent to thank for a lot of things. Saving his life in the first place. For helping him reunite with the rest of his people, with his dog. Heading to the extraction point with a small armed group when he got worried about him and Nina.
And also…
“How is she?” Mike asked.
Vincent rubbed his fingers through his hair. “She’s been through the worst. And she’s got a long, long way to go before she’s back to normal. She might never walk again. But she’s alive. And that’s the main thing. That’s the most important thing. Right?”
Mike nodded. As sad as it was… he had to accept. He had to agree. “She wouldn’t be alive if it weren’t for you.”
“Not just me,” he said. “Not just my people. But you. You got her out of that place. You dragged her out of it when everything could’ve gone wrong. When anything could’ve happened. And we’re all here, now. We’re not you and us anymore. We’r
e all we. You were as much a part of that as all of us.”
Mike wanted to tell Vincent that he was just being modest; being humble.
But in the end, he just nodded and smiled.
“Now do you want to see her?” Vincent asked.
Mike swallowed a lump. He still felt tense, going to see Alison. After all, seeing her there in that bed, in pain, it was hard to witness. She was a wonderful person. She didn’t deserve what she was going through.
But this wasn’t about him feeling at ease or not.
This was about Alison and being there for her.
He took a deep breath and nodded. “I’ll go see her.”
“Sure,” Vincent said. “Make sure you’re in the reception area for three, though. Gina’s finally opening up the new greenhouses.”
Mike smiled as Vincent walked away. Hearing about the contributions his people were making to this place… it made him proud. Because this place might not have a promise of salvation at the end of it. It might not be lying about it being a ticket to freedom.
But it was something very real. Something very special.
And Mike and his people—all of these people here—were going to do everything they could to maintain it.
No matter where they were from before.
No matter who they’d fought for before.
This was their home.
He looked outside again as he walked along the corridor. Saw Kelsie playing with new friends. And old friends, too. Tom. Siobhan. Survivors of the extraction point. People who had made it out of there.
And then he saw Sarah.
Nina’s friend. She’d made it after all. Found her just outside the extraction point. Joined the group on their journey back to Vincent’s place.
It hadn’t been easy. It had been a tough pill to swallow.
But they were here now.
They were home.
And Sarah being here… well, Mike felt a glimmer of pride. Like at least he’d done right by Nina. At least he’d fulfilled her legacy.
He walked to Alison’s door and stopped outside.
He looked over his shoulder again. Out at the large walls that were erected around the place. And he thought about the people out there who would want what they had. He thought about the lengths they would go to if they knew about it.
And then he took a deep breath, and he smiled.
They could try taking it from him.
But this place wasn’t slipping from their grip like the other places.
This place was home.
He opened the door.
Alison was lying back on the hospital bed, tubes up her nose, smile on her face.
“Hello, you,” she said.
Mike stopped by her side. “Hello.”
“Did you bring me anything?”
“Hmm,” he said. “Let me see.”
And then he leaned in and kissed her.
He felt guilty, and he felt a flashback. A flashback to when Caitlin had been ill. A flashback to her dying days. To the promise he’d made to himself that he’d never find anyone again. Not after her. Not after what they’d had.
But then he let that fade, and he let the light into his life.
He pulled away. Looked down and saw Alison smiling up at him.
“That all you brought me?”
He wiped her hair from her forehead then he leaned in and kissed her again.
And in that moment, everything felt perfect.
In that moment, everything felt right.
In that moment, winter seemed a long, long way away.
But it was coming.
It was coming for them again.
Mike pushed that thought from his mind.
At least they had this moment.
At least they had a home.
At least they had each other.
At least they had a new beginning.
He kissed her again, and he felt it in his heart.
They might not be going to a new world. They might not be being whisked out of this place; extracted to somewhere new.
But they were doing even better than that.
They were going to build a new world.
And it started right here.
Want More from Ryan Casey?
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The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author. Any reference to real locations is only for atmospheric effect, and in no way truly represents those locations.
Copyright © 2018 by Ryan Casey
Cover design by Damonza
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Published by Higher Bank Books
