by Dawn Husted
“Well, what will it be?” Mag asked James again.
I didn’t hear James and wondered what he was thinking. I couldn’t see him and wished he could at least see me one last time before one of us died.
“Penny, you remember the six things I taught you that night after the grave?”
“Stop talking,” Mag said, louder this time. Her breath warm and airy against my cheek and every time she exhaled, a shudder of terror ran down my spine. “I will shoot her if you follow me, understand?”
I rummaged through my memory and knew exactly what he was talking about—the six places he told me to hit a person if I were attacked. Of course, I never imagined using any of the techniques so soon. However, with a gun pointed at my head, I didn’t know which move to make first. Do I head-butt her from behind? What if she shoots me because I startle her? I’d be dead and, at worst, she’d have a bloody nose.
She told me to walk slowly backwards while holding her gun on James and Lucan. I doubted she’d actually be able to shoot them, especially with how fast and skilled James was, but I also knew they wouldn’t risk her shooting me. Which meant they would follow every direction she ordered, plus Lucan couldn’t move for fear of setting the bomb off and killing everyone.
Step by step, we walked backwards in the darkness. I followed her movements, unsure of how she knew where we were going with such little light. I wondered how many times she had been in this area, setting up the perfect escape plan if ever captured. She knew these woods better than anyone, especially better than the three of us. Her plan had been carefully thought out, all the way back to when she volunteered to show us a way off this Land. Maybe even all the way back to when she kidnapped me?
I tripped over a small branch and a slight dip in the ground, but luckily I didn’t lose my balance and she didn’t shoot me. However, the gun was still pressed against my temple, and it’d only been five minutes since she presented James with the ultimatum. I hadn’t seen or heard any explosion yet. And I was hoping it wouldn’t come. Surely, Lucan knew how to disable the device—but how long would it take?
Fifteen more minutes passed with us snaking around trees, up new paths, and finally into a well-cleared area in the thicket surrounding us. I felt the branches brush against me, not as numerous as before. I tried thinking. She wasn’t wearing her vest, which meant James could find us once he felt it was safe. If I managed to live until then, then maybe I’d come out of another fatal situation—alive.
“You know he’s going to find you,” I said.
“I’m counting on it,” she whispered back.
Right then I knew… I was bait.
Chapter Sixteen
“Stop,” she demanded and for a brief moment the gun no longer pressed firmly against my head. But the second I thought to do something, the barrel shoved abruptly back into place.
“What now?” I asked, wondering what she had hidden next up her sleeve of surprises.
She responded with a quick knee into the middle of my back. “If you say a word about this aloud where he can hear you, I will shoot you first and make sure your boyfriend still dies. Understand?” she said, jabbing her elbow into my side. “If you want to live, quietly and carefully step back over this wire. Just a foot behind where you are now.”
I didn’t mind dying if it meant James would live, but I was still hoping for the best, both of us alive. I looked down and couldn’t see the ground, not a twig or shiny piece of reflection from the little moonlight available. I squinted my eyes and focused carefully on the movement of my feet.
“On three, together,” she said. “One… two… three.”
In joint unison, we stepped exactly a foot behind where we had just been standing, and she proceeded ordering me to take a few more steps back and then jolted my knees out of place, forcing me to slam against the ground sideways. The gun dropped from my temple, and she sat at arm’s length, holding onto the back of my shirt with a tight grip. I was free in a way. However, she explained the area we were in was lined with explosives. So what was I supposed to do?
“Tell me. Why don’t you have any vines like the rest? I thought that wasn’t allowed,” Mag asked quietly.
I didn’t feel the need to be closemouthed about the subject. No matter how much I hated her, it was somewhat cathartic to talk about the life I once had. And that’s exactly how I’d come to think of it, my past life. I was no longer the same girl that strolled with James or went eagerly to work, hoping for a higher clearance level, pathetically loving my job, which I was good at. That life was gone and was never coming back, no matter how much I wanted it to. After hearing and learning everything I had in the past few days, I blindly sat by, letting my family and friends await their time to be slaughtered once President Falcon or Colonel West deemed it necessary. I didn’t know how I would change any of their futures, but I hoped after I found my sister, I would also find a way back. Another reason I had to live. My life had more purpose now than ever before, and the weight of it was overwhelming but attainable. I would figure a way out—with James’ help.
I sat on the cold ground in silence. The tiny legs of a small critter climbed up my arm and I brushed it off, not caring anymore about things that didn’t matter. The wind blew through the branches, creating a whistling sound, and the crickets rang loud with musical clatter. I envied them—the insects. Their lives. Simple. My sight was completely gone and my hearing became overwhelmed with nature. A few coyotes howled in the distance and the hooting of owls scattered amongst them. A whooshing silence washed over all the others, and at first I thought it was the wind. I listened carefully for the sound again, and there it was. A whooshing sound similar to the creeks we camped near and the rushing rapids we walked through. However, this held more of a splashing effect. A splashing of waves and water. That’s when I knew we must be near the ocean. I took a deep breath, and for the first time I realized salty air filled my lungs. I hadn’t breathed or heard the ocean before and the significance of its existence never held much weight with me. But now, the feeling of harmony, astonishingly peaceful, and a quiver of hope ran through my body.
“Do you really think you’ll get out of this alive?” I asked, turning the tables on the girl with an evil agenda. “You’re going to die.”
She didn’t answer, but instead hit the back of my head with the butt of the gun. I was fine, bruised, but fine.
The sound of branches jumbled and cracked close by, then out of nowhere, the loud, devastating sound of a boom roared high, followed by a large, bright, brassy flame that filled the sky. The bomb. I hoped it had been set off on purpose and Lucan was alive. He was good at that sort of thing.
The lightening flash from the blast suddenly filled the area around me, and I could see again. The shocking outline of James appeared as he stood in front of me and reached over, picking up Mag by her neck, breaking it with one swift squeeze from his hand. He dropped her body and looked at me—I was stunned. Not by the death of Mag or even by the sight of James killing her next to me—killing was something I had started to get used to. No, what really scared me was the sound of the explosion. My ears rang worst than they had at the perimeter. I couldn’t hear anything except for a loud, high-pitched tone and I clenched my eyes shut. I tried steadying myself as I attempted to stand.
James’ hands swooped me up, then he jumped over the surrounding booby-trapped area and started running fast through the trees, me in his hands. I opened my eyes—the forest ablaze. The heat of it scorching hot against my body. Sweat poured down my face and I squinted further ahead of us. The outline of a small, fluffy, dog appeared from the nearby bushes, making me happy. Her white hair now tinged with black ash.
“Where’s Lucan?” I yelled, though I couldn’t hear the sound of my own voice. I hoped my words were clear enough, not slurred too much.
James uttered something. I saw his mouth move, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying through the jarring of him carrying me, bumping all different directions in his arms.<
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Suddenly, we stopped and he placed me on the ground next to a body. I looked over. It was Lucan. He’d been badly burned down the left side but his eyes were open, blinking. James helped him sit up and gently examined his injuries. Pieces of flesh had been melted together and all the eyelashes from his left eye, along with his eyebrow, were completely gone. His hair stood straight, singed in unsymmetrical sections, and black marks smeared the rest of his unburned body.
“I’m okay,” he mouthed as he held his left arm with his right hand—breathing. Smoke was everywhere, clearly an unsafe place to rest.
“Can you move?” I heard James voice, small in the distance of my damaged hearing.
Lucan nodded. Then he stood up with James’ help and walked unbalanced for a few feet before walking on his own. I was surprised at the way he moved, walking at all, and more than grateful he wasn’t dead.
James picked me back up. Immediately, I told him to put me down and figured if the burning, bumbling boy could walk, so could I. I gave Lucan a smile of sincerity and let him lean on me while we walked together, James leading the way, trying to get us all out of the black smoke.
The fire was bright, but the smog of the aftermath was worse—all I saw was gray. James held my hand and led the path while we followed. My eyes were closed from the searing pain of being dried out by the smolder.
Thirty minutes passed before we made it far enough that I didn’t feel like I was suffocating and I opened my eyes. We were standing in a clearer area, smoke behind us and the vastness of the stars in front. My eyes followed the path of the stars until they reached an edge. A few meters ahead was the edge of the island, and I could hear the water crashing against the side of the cliffs below as it sprang to life with every wave.
“I was thinking,” James said. “What if Mag was telling the truth about there being a way to escape this place. Her hutch had barely any supplies and there had to be some way for her to communicate with… Colonel West, none of which was in the hutch. And if she was a soldier, a sniper, then she must’ve had a plan in case this whole Land went to hell.”
“Okay.” I was confused with where he was going. I understood what he was saying, but the only thing I saw was the ocean in front of us. No visible escape route.
“Look.” He pulled the folded map from his back pocket and held it in front of us. The light from the blazing fire lit the map, making it easy to read. “You see this?” He pointed to a little red circle directly off the jagged edges Mag indicated were cliffs. “This is where we are right now or at least close to. I think there’s something down there that could help us or at minimum give us supplies.”
“How will you get down there?” If he were to fall, he would die, no doubt. The distance to the bottom of the cliffs was not an easy path. At the bottom were large, serrated rocks lining the surface with every powerful wave that plunged in. Of course, this was only a guess. I wasn’t sure what awaited at the bottom exactly.
“I’m going to climb down,” he replied. “I can do it. It won’t take me long. I climbed tougher things than this back at the Academy.”
“Like what?” He was going to get himself killed.
“Okay, well maybe not as tough as this. But I know I can do it.”
I peered over the side again and gazed down. More darkness. All I saw were a hundred ways this could go wrong, but reluctantly gave my approval. “Okay.”
James walked over to the edge, turned on his stomach, and then slowly lowered his feet around the side. His hands gripped the earth and in two more moves, his head disappeared over the grassy rim. I leaned over, but was scared to lean too far, possibly causing myself to fly off in response. My heart froze when I couldn’t see him any longer. A thick set of clouds, the only ones in the sky, moved across the moon, blocking the light and any hope of finding him, if he was still climbing.
I wanted to call out his name, but didn’t. Scared if I did it might startle him, causing him to lose his grip. I tried listening for the awful sound of his body crashing against the rocks, but knew even if he did fall, I wouldn’t hear it.
For twenty minutes, I sat on the ground next to Lucan. He wasn’t talking, but was still alive. The dog sat by my side as we waited. If James died, what were the two of us going to do? How would we get off this island? Out of us three, he was the only one in a hundred-percent physical shape, something necessary at this moment in time. I was a weak, one-hundred-and-twenty-pound girl and Lucan, well, before I would’ve had no worries for the guy, but now, there was no way he could make that climb or even jump into the water if we took our chances swimming to the other Land. I hoped the Land wasn’t too far. I hoped there was land.
Just then I heard my name being yelled. I jumped up and ran to the edge where I spotted James’ pulling himself up a few yards to my left.
“I found it,” he said. “I was right, and not only is there supplies and weapons, but there is a boat.”
I screamed in excitement and jumped in his arms. “Lucan did you hear that!” I yelled.
Lucan stood up slowly. “I’m happy for you guys,” he said.
“And you too,” I replied. “We have a way off!”
“And I’m glad, but I can’t come with you,” he replied, grabbing his side.
I stopped celebrating. “What do you mean—you can’t come with us? Of course you can. I know you’re injured, but we’ll find a way—” I said.
“No, it’s not that,” Lucan replied. “I’ll be fine; the regeneration process will help me heal back to new within a couple of days.”
“Then what?” I asked.
“I can’t leave my mom, my friends.” He turned around and faced an invisible vision of the perimeter. Miles away.
“Lucan, you blew up your only chance at getting back inside. Don’t you remember?” Maybe his memory had been damaged in the recent explosion. I knew he told me he wasn’t completing the journey with us once he thought his girlfriend was dead, but I hoped he changed his mind.
“If you don’t think I can fix a measly box, then you don’t know me that well,” he smiled. “Besides, you two have to find your sister and I have to get back to the others. It’s the only way to guarantee they’ll find out the truth,” he said.
And he was right. If he could get back somehow and warn the others, then maybe they had a future outside of what they were intended for. “But what about the other guards? What if they find you first?” I was justifiably worried that he was on a path that could get him killed.
“The only guards that knew I was with you are dead along with Rexx. And we haven’t seen any others since we’ve been on this side of the perimeter. If anything, President Falcon probably thinks we died by whatever person he was told would kill us—Mag. He had to have known about that part of the plan. Otherwise, we would have come across more guards. So I’ll make it back, and just in case, I’ll take a clear roundabout way away from the grave and then I’ll sneak back into the perimeter. Most likely, no one will know I’ve gone missing except for the people within our village. My mom. I have to go back for her.”
I ran and hugged Lucan, gently, not wanting to hurt him any further, and then gave him a kiss on the non-burned side of his cheek. “Who’s your mom?” I realized after spending the last few days getting to know him, I still didn’t know much.
“Camara,” he replied.
Camara. The one who granted us refuge in the Lowers and helped save James’ life.
“And your dad?”
He shrugged in response. “He died from an accidental explosion at the Academy when I was young.”
“Wait a minute. How was he at the Academy? Was he a guard?” I asked. From my knowledge, I had never seen any Lowers work there before.
“Yes, but not just him. My aunt and a few others. He was training her and something happened. She touched the wrong switch or wire and a bomb went off in her hands. My father and a few recruits were standing too close when it happened. After that, the other three people there from our village w
ere forced to leave the Academy.” Lucan winced from the left side of his face and raised his one eyebrow. “It was a long time ago. I don’t remember him much.” He tried taking a deep breath, but the smoke became thicker around us, and he started coughing.
“Exactly how long ago did what you’re talking about take place?” James asked, walking closer to him.
“Um—” Lucan counted with his good fingers. “—almost twelve years ago.”
“That’s when my father died. But I didn’t hear the story like that. I was told you Lowers infiltrated the Academy with means to kill many more people. That the bomb was only the beginning,” his voice raised.
Lucan took a step back, wincing with pain. “Look, if that were true, do you really think they would’ve allowed us to live? Besides, us Lowers have never been an aggressive kind of people. You should know that by now. We saved your life and we didn’t have to.”
It took a few seconds, but James finally relaxed his shoulders and the veins around his neck disappeared with the anger.
A large crackle sounded and a group of trees fell over from the fire, thudding against the ground, forcing our thoughts back to our current situation. I scratched the dog’s body with my hands all over her back, and covered her snout with kisses. “Can you take her with you?” I asked. Where we were attempting to go was no place for the dog. She was much better off with Lucan.
“Of course, Penny,” he replied with a smile and a hug. The two of them had come on this crusade with me and I didn’t know if I would ever see them again. Lucan would be okay, at least for now. If he said he could get back into the perimeter undetected, then I believed him. But what lay ahead for everyone inside that place was a mystery to me, and once we made it to the island with my sister, my plans were to come back. Yet, realistically, I had to come to terms with the fact that it may never happen. We barely escaped, so how were we supposed to magically get back in? James and I would be wanted everywhere. Even if everyone thought we were dead, stories about us would float around for years. We wouldn’t be able to walk the streets without being noticed.