He lifted a weak arm, pointing farther west. She closed her hand around his where it rested on her shoulder, lugging him along. She took every corner she could, still trying to keep out of the men’s sight.
“Did they find us again by chance, or do you have something on you they can track?”
He shook his head. “Nothing to track.”
She thought of the PRD in her pocket, praying that the producer hadn’t double-crossed her. She switched it off just in case.
“How far is it to the city’s borders?”
“A mile or so,” he gasped. They hurried, his feet dragging a little. He tripped a few times. “Think I’m feeling better,” he said after some time, taking some weight off her. They picked up their pace. His head had stopped bleeding.
She glanced back, thinking of how Rowan had killed the Repurposers who had come for her. Should she have done the same back there? She’d never hurt anyone before tonight. The guard’s bloody nose in the PPC Tower had been the first time she’d made someone bleed. She couldn’t just kill two prone men, could she?
She snuck a glance at Rowan, whose head was sagging. What was his life like, and what was it like out there?
She gazed up at the city’s atmospheric shield. “How do we exit?”
“Exiting’s no problem. There are huge carbon dioxide vents at the city’s perimeter. They pump all the CO2 out of the city. We can get out through there. It’s getting in that’s the hard part.”
“How did you get in?”
“I know someone on the inside. He opened doors for me. But I didn’t have much time. It’s got to be a quick in and out or they start to notice the open doors.” He hooked his thumb back the direction they’d come. “Let’s hope those guys stay down.”
As they hurried onward, H124 started to feel sick to her stomach. Was she really leaving the city? This place was the only home she’d ever known, such as it was. It may not be a good life, but it was familiar. As far back as she could remember she’d lived in her tiny pod, going from cleaning vacated living pods to cleaning corpses six years ago, when she turned twelve.
How could she leave? Where would she go? She knew nothing about the world outside. She barely knew the city. Maybe she could stay. Maybe she could explain to her employers about the asteroid. Maybe they’d understand and let her stay as she was. Maybe Willoughby could explain to them that she knew something important, that she hadn’t been shirking her responsibilities, but discovering something vastly more important. Maybe she could go back to her little bed, her tiny, comfortable room, the bland but easily acquired food cubes.
She started to slow down. She thought of the PRD in her pocket. Maybe she could call Willoughby and see what he thought.
“What’s wrong?” Rowan asked. “Why are you slowing down?”
She looked up at him. “I—”
He gazed back at her, lifting his eyebrows.
“I don’t think I can do this,” she admitted.
“What?”
“Maybe I could explain to my employers . . .”
He gently took hold of her elbow. “Look, I don’t know why those Repurposers are after you. I don’t live in your world, but I do know a lot about it. You’re a worker. A cog. You don’t even have a name. Whatever you’ve done, they won’t listen to you. They won’t spare you. You’re a machine to them. A machine made of meat. You go back there, and those Repurposers will wipe your mind. It’s not worth their time to listen to you.” He stared at her with compassionate eyes. “If you go back there, you’re signing your own death warrant.”
She thought of Willoughby urging her to leave the city. If he had enough sway to keep them from harming her, wouldn’t he have mentioned that? They hadn’t listened to him in the Tower, at least not for long.
She looked up, thinking of the asteroid out there in the darkness of space, on its way to Earth. Would her employers really do something to stop that? Willoughby said no one even knew how to stop it, except maybe these Rovers. Even if she talked to her employers, and they let her back without wiping her, that wouldn’t change the fact that soon the earth was going to experience the biggest destructive force it had ever known. She could sit in her comfortable little room, clean up more corpses, and then one day fire would fill the sky, and she’d be obliterated along with everyone else.
She looked back at Rowan. His eyes met hers. They gleamed with an intensity she’d never seen in another person. Hope filled them. She had to take this chance. Had to leave the city. She would never forgive herself if she went back now. And besides, if she went back and they wiped her, she wouldn’t even remember about the asteroid. Nothing would save them. All would be lost.
She adjusted the strap on her tool bag. “Okay. Let’s go.”
He nodded, then squeezed her shoulder. She felt a pleasant zing of electricity at his touch. They hurried onward.
Above the atmospheric shield the gray clouds roiled. Lightning flashed. She’d never been outside of the shield. She didn’t know anyone who had. Until now.
“What’s it like out there?” she asked.
“Rough. Be ready.”
They walked on, staying to the shadows, listening to every sound behind them. Relief flooded through H124 when they reached the edge of the atmospheric shield. It was the first time she’d been this close to it. She could hear it buzzing all around her.
“Where are the vents?”
Rowan pointed toward a series of large holes in the concrete base. The concrete swept around them, a
