launch. We didn’t know if they’d made it into the Security Department or not. Those twenty people had just disappeared. Gone. Zenn’s crew was unaccounted for as well—even Saffediene, who I never suspected would abandon the Resistance, despite her feelings for Zenn. It made sense that if he’d flown away with Darke, she had too.
I considered my remaining personnel. I couldn’t afford to lose Trek. With Pace gone—my throat squeezed —Trek was the only one qualified to run our advanced tech operations. Starr could probably manage in a pinch, but she lay unconscious in the infirmary.
My charges had compromised the Security Department, but Darke’s people had thrown a few last-ditch tech grenades. Starr had been hit by one soon after she and Thane entered the building. That’s where they’d found Vi and me passed out under a solid metal beam.
Thane had dragged out Vi first. After he’d passed her off to his team, he’d re-entered the burning, collapsing building to get me. And then Starr.
I’d never trusted Thane, not completely. But now? Now I did.
He wasn’t the one who’d abandoned his team and flown east with Darke. I felt the rage building inside. The first time Zenn had abandoned me and the Resistance, I was hurt. It was as if his girlfriend meant more to him than freedom—more than me, his best friend.
I thought he’d changed. I thought he understood our situation. I’d forgiven him for abandoning me once, but twice? Now I felt nothing but fury. At Zenn. At his weakness. But also at myself, for allowing him to be so intricately involved in the Resistance. For trusting him, even a little bit. I wished he didn’t know so much about our plans to take down Hightower. I wished he didn’t have the journal, which listed all of the Resistance codes and Insider safe houses.
Vi stepped in front of me, settling next to me to watch the sun rise. “But he does. So Zenn knows our plans. So what? Hightower knows everything anyway, right?”
Glad she had come to find me, I gathered her into my arms and held her close, relishing the fact that Zenn never would. Violet Schoenfeld was mine.
“And you’re mine,” she whispered, tilting her head up to kiss me.
“I wish you’d stop reading my mind,” I said, sliding my hands under the hem of her shirt.
“I can stop—if you want.”
“No, no, it’s fine,” I said, repeating what she’d said to me last summer as we crossed the desert. That felt like so long ago, when we were just getting to know one another.
She slugged me. “Come on. My dad wants to discuss looking for my mom’s team.”
For thirty seconds it was just me and Vi, and the weight of the world had lifted. As soon as Vi pulled away, that pressure returned. At least the darkness was giving way to a new day.
But I’d only taken two steps back toward the hideout when an unmistakable sound carved fear down my spine.
Hoverboards.
Zenn
42.
Bodies littered the orchards. The camps. The green area surrounding Rise One. All clones. The men near Rise One were dead, and had been for a while if their smell was any indication. “Vi killed these men a few days ago,” I said, lifting the collar of my jacket to shield my nose from the offensive odor.
General Darke was silent. He flew away from the carnage and toward the Evolutionary Rise. Smoke billowed from the building, adding to the stench in the city.
The Medical Rise tilted dangerously to one side, and the Technology Rise still had coals glowing at its base. Rise One seemed untouched, but I knew better. The metal and glass simply hid the damage we’d find on the inside.
I followed the General, unsure of how I was supposed to feel. Happy the Resistance had debilitated Freedom? Furious? Neutral, the way General Darke seemed to be? Better to let the General lead—he’d been doing it for decades. He slowly circled the Evolutionary Rise.
“We’ll rebuild,” he finally announced. “Citizens cannot leave their houses without authorization.” His voice sounded detached, as if it didn’t matter that people had died. A lot of people.
“I’ll get to work on the barrier and do a damage assessment,” he said. “You get rid of all these bodies.”
And that’s how I went from Director to grave digger.
Jag
43.
“Vi-i,” I drawled. “Who are they?”
She cocked her head to the side before she spun and gripped my shoulders. “Refugees from Freedom.”
Hope leapt inside me. Could Pace be with them?
“How many?”
Vi shook her head, meaning she couldn’t tell. Four seconds later, the whine of hoverboards became a deafening growl. River Isaacs, her father, and a few others landed in front of us. Their hair and clothing were matted with ash.
River wiped her hair out of her eyes. I’d never seen someone look so tired.
“Hey,” she said easily, as if she’d shown up for a party.
“Hey.” I scanned the group of seven. No Pace. A figure lay prostrate on a hoverboard. Hope surged again. “Who’s that?”
A girl switched her gaze between me and the figure. “Gunner Jameson. We evacuated him from the Evolutionary Rise.”
I swallowed hard and nodded. “Anyone else?”
Vi put her hand on my arm, and I knew. No one said anything, and the people from Freedom shifted nervously. I turned away, angry that Pace wasn’t among them. Neither was Indy. I leaned against the doorway for support.
I felt like dying. Maybe then this pain wouldn’t hurt so much. Like somehow death would release me from this anguish. I couldn’t even cry. I just felt like someone was ripping my stomach out through my throat.
“Lighten up, Ivory. I know how he feels,” River said, and it sounded far away. “You guys got anything to eat?”
Such a normal question. Before I could stop myself, I started laughing. Vi glanced at me like I’d lost it. Maybe I had. But hey, it was either laugh or cry.
After I’d led the new arrivals from Freedom across the street and into the hideout, I found Raine sitting at the table. “Starr’s awake.” She searched my face, looking for an answer about Gunn. I nodded toward the infirmary before I announced, “Breakfast.”
The twenty people remaining in the Resistance introduced themselves as we used the food-generating cube to produce breakfast. We ate waffles and sausage, and drank milk (always Vi’s first request) and soda, and finished the meal with cake and ice cream.
Nobody spoke about the attack here in Castledale. No one reported on what had happened in Freedom.
For that one hour, we were friends. Not rebels.
All too soon someone bustled the dishes off to the kitchen. Trek took Starr by the hand and disappeared into the tech wing. Vi delivered breakfast to the infirmary, where Raine refused to leave Gunner’s side.
Thane talked quietly with the new arrivals from Freedom, then he assigned them bedrooms and returned to
