CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
The distance between us is obvious now, because I am too far away to get to her in time.
It doesn’t matter, though, because I have problems of my own a second later: double as many people behind me. And while my attention is still on Catelyn, one of them manages to slip one ring of a set of electronic handcuffs around my left wrist.
I could likely still jerk my way free at this point, maybe even fight my way through them all. Six of them. One of me. Not impossible odds.
But I am having a hard time getting any part of myself to move. All I can think about is the time I spent kneeling in the ashes of that laboratory. How I tried to brush them off, the way you brush off minor annoyances. Some part of me knew I had something to do with it all, I think. Jaxon’s comment wasn’t the first of its kind. And Seth was so strange toward me while we were in that hollowed shell, surrounded by the aftermath of all that destruction. The same sort of destruction that has been screaming through my thoughts since I woke up in this body.
Reborn.
But how much the same?
Do I deserve everything that is happening now? What else did the old Violet do that I might need to pay for?
They twist my hands behind my back. The other ring closes over my right wrist. It pinches a bit of skin, and a few drops of blood trickle down into my palms. All the while, Catelyn is shouting at them, telling them they’re making a mistake. That they were supposed to be on our side.
But I wonder how many of the others following Jaxon were only hiding in that crowd as well, waiting for an opportunity like this. For us to separate the way we did, or to give away some other weakness. Maybe I would have seen it coming where Jaxon didn’t—but I can’t blame him for missing it, can I? A war wages long enough and all the sides begin to blur.
And how do you fight an enemy that looks the same as your ally?
The war in my own mind continues to wage, all the different versions of me colliding and blurring as they fight for control. Catelyn and I are marched through headquarters. Soon enough we fall into a route I recognize, one that I have walked a million times before. I know where they’re taking us.
The noise as we approach the main training room is deafening compared to the peaceful halls. The scene that greets us inside reminds me of historical paintings I’ve seen, ones depicting vicious, bloody gladiator battles. A public spectacle of violence, and at the center, President Cross and Silas Iverson stand facing each other, both of them pointing a gun at the other.
I focus my gaze on Iverson. And I’m struck, again, by how much his son looks like him. The same crooked nose and sharp chin, the same confident way of standing with shoulders just relaxed enough to suggest indifference toward the gun the president holds. Maybe he is right to be confident too. Because not only does he have his own gun, but he is also far from alone; there are dozens of his fellow rebels behind him, most of them armed, with their weapons trained on their former president as well. And there are people standing behind the president, of course—but not enough.
Not nearly enough.
Our captors shove us farther into the room, and the sound of Catelyn tripping a bit makes both Silas and the president dart a glance our direction.
“The others are coming,” one of the men holding me says to Silas.
Silas nods, and I would swear he almost smiles, too. He turns back to President Cross to say something, but I don’t hear it over Catelyn’s renewed attempts at shouting protests that, unsurprisingly, set neither of us free. We’re only pulled faster, more roughly, toward the observation room in the corner. The windows have been shattered, and pressed up against its outer wall, sitting in a pool of glass shards and surrounded by several more of those armed rebels, is the one person I was still hoping might have escaped all this somehow.
Angie.
They drag us over to her, push us up against the wall beside her.
Like little lambs being lined up for slaughter, I can’t help but think. And then I hear Seth’s voice in my head.
The more people the revolutionaries have, the bigger their flame will be.
He was right, wasn’t he? Do they plan to make examples of all of us in the end? I was prepared to face my own death, maybe, but if they all die, then what happens next? If this fanatical, bloodthirsty group takes over the CCA, then what becomes of the work we did trying to free the clones from Huxley’s control?
“Cross should just surrender already,” says a voice to my left. “I’m tired of this standoff.” I glance over and see Emily, mixed in with the armed group gathered around us to prevent our escape. On the other side of her is Josh, who looks like he is ignoring her. His gaze is laser-focused on that standoff between his father and the president.
Emily starts to say something else.
And then our eyes meet, just briefly, and her attention falls to studying her hands instead.
I want to know if she still thinks I saved her that night, and if that was the reason she wasn’t in her usual place at Josh’s side when I was attacked on the roof. And I want to ask her what she’s doing here, and if she is certain—really, truly certain—that she is on the right side.
Because the way she can’t seem to look at me makes me wonder about that.
But Josh, who apparently was listening to her, speaks before I can ask her anything. “She’ll surrender,” he says smugly. “Just watch.”
And, as if on cue, the heavy metal door of the training room slides open again. President Cross’s aim and focus never falter, but several of the crowd around her and Silas turn their heads almost at once toward it. I follow the crowd.
My stomach sinks at the sight of Jaxon and Seth, guns to their heads and hands bound, being led toward the center of the room. Seth must have put up more of a fight than I did, because from the way he is stumbling and fighting to keep his eyes open and focused, it’s obvious he has been hit with some sort of tranquilizer. Still conscious, though. I imagine because there would be no statement of power to be made by killing an already unconscious victim.
They’re brought to a stop just a few feet from the president. Close enough that she can’t avoid seeing them, but too far for her to reach out and touch. She inhales a little more sharply than normal. But other than that she makes no movement, no cry for their release. No sound at all.
Then the man holding the weapon against Jaxon’s head clicks the safety off. The pulsating sound of its energy charging fills the room. Jaxon closes his eyes and takes a deep breath.
The president’s gun drops to the ground.
She still doesn’t move at first, except to draw her gun hand very slowly back against her chest, closing it into a fist over her heart. Silas exchanges a look with Jaxon’s would-be executioner, and the weapon is lowered, and Jaxon and Seth are marched the rest of the way over to us. And with all the calm and poise of someone out for a casual stroll in the park, the president walks herself over and takes her place beside her sons.
One little lamb, two little lambs . . . Six little lambs lined up for slaughter. . . .
Catelyn leans against my arm, silent.
The group of loyalists the president left behind shuffle uncertainly, leaderless now. Some move as if to attack, but then seem to remember they are outnumbered and draw their weapons back instead.
Silas kicks the president’s fallen gun toward the crowd behind him, and then starts toward us. A group of his rebels converge in his wake, moving backward with weapons raised to protect him. “Now that we’re all here,” he says, “let’s get started, shall we?” His eyes sweep over all six of us, without lingering long enough to meet any of our gazes.
Seth is the only one who answers. But the tranquilizer must be fogging up his brain, because instead of one of his usual quips, he manages only to call Silas a name, strung together with enough curse words to make Angie sigh.
“Always with that awful language,” she says softly.
“You’ve just changed my mind about something, cl
one,” Silas says. He steps in front of Seth, grabs him by the jaw and forces their eyes to meet with a jerk.
I try yanking my hands apart, testing the handcuffs one more time.
Still just as strong as before. My eyes don’t want to leave Seth, but I force them to, searching for something I could possibly break the restraints against.
“See, my original plan was to take care of the former president first,” Silas is saying, “just to settle any lingering hopes for her possible resurgence. But . . .”
The broken-out window frame of the observation room, maybe.
“. . . now I have a better idea.”
If I hit the middle of these cuffs against the edge of that frame, I may be able to weaken them enough that I can break free.
“You can go first,” Silas tells Seth. I jerk my attention back to them just as Seth is pulled from our lineup and forced to stumble his way out in front of us, to be centered in front of the crowd pressing in, where everybody can clearly see him. “This way,” Silas says, gaze flickering back to the president, “she can watch. And maybe it will be a reminder to her, as well, of what this organization is supposed to be about.”
“It was never supposed to be about this.” The president stares straight at him as she speaks, her voice as stoic and unyielding as the rest of her.
He abandons Seth for a moment and moves back to her instead. “Did you honestly think it could be otherwise? Especially after you brought that other monster into our very ranks?” He brings his face closer to hers, lowers his voice. “You are a disgrace, to yourself and to everyone who helped start this organization.”
The president’s fists, hanging at her sides, clench tighter.
I inch toward the window’s edge.
Silas backs away from the president. He orders the ones holding Seth to turn him around, so that he has a clean shot at the back of Seth’s head.
One of the guards sees me trying to move, and steps between me and the window.
Silas raises his gun, and I realize how serious he is about this slaughter, and that, for all my speed, I am still going to be too slow again.
I kick the guard as hard as I can in the stomach anyway, and I dive toward the window.
I slam the handcuffs against the wall, and a crack appears in their center at the exact moment that gunshots ring out behind me.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
I spin around. Silas is lying on his back with his gun on the ground beside him, and President Cross is pushing herself off him, heaving for breath.
She stopped him.
But something is wrong.
She doesn’t seem able to get off her hands and knees. She reaches for her chest, and that’s when I see it: a burnt and ragged-edged hole, with more blood oozing from it with every movement she makes. Her eyes scrunch in pain and try to flutter shut, but she forces them open with a wild, defiant determination. Her hand swats for the gun Silas dropped, but he plants his foot in her side and sends her toppling the rest of the way over.
As Silas climbs to his feet, the president tries to do the same, pushing herself up with the arm on her unwounded side. But just seconds into the shaky attempt, she collapses under her own weight.
The moment her head hits the ground, the rest of the shocked room springs back to life.
A scuffle breaks out in the watching crowd. Someone breaks free of it and rushes to the president’s side. Silas is closing the distance between himself and Seth with rage in his eyes, recharging the gun as he walks. I remember the crack in my handcuffs, and I finish the job in one quick motion, turning and smashing them against the window and then ripping them apart. I shake my wrists to regain the feeling in them, sending bits of metal raining down to the floor.
Several of our guards rush toward me. I knock one to the ground as I start to run, and as he falls I grab his gun and wrench it out of his hand. I toss it to Angie. Seth has told me she’s a good shot—a result of all the years she spent hiding and had to be prepared to defend herself, I guess. Still, she looks hesitant for a moment after catching it, frowning down at it as if she’d taken a vow of pacifism at some point in her recent past. At least until a stray shot hits the wall behind her.
She fires a shot of her own then, hits the guard closest to Jaxon, and then races to his side and tries to help him and Catelyn break free from their handcuffs. I leave them and turn just in time to dodge a streak of gunfire. After that I don’t look back. My sight is set on Silas now. And this time I won’t be too slow.
I hit him just as he tries to raise the loaded gun toward Seth. I aim for his head, and I don’t hold anything back. I don’t want him getting back up anytime soon—I still have too many other people to deal with.
The ones holding Seth are next. I grab the gun from one of them, send him to the ground with a stabbing kick and keep him there by pointing his own gun at him. Seth has regained enough consciousness that with the first man on the ground, he is able to fight his way free from the second one, even with his hands still behind his back. He gives the man a vicious knee to the gut that makes him double over and fall face-first to the ground.
After kicking the man’s gun out of his hand and sending it flying, Seth turns and races to President Cross. He stumbles only a few times from the tranquilizer poison pumping through him. But when he tries to kneel next to her, between the poison and the handcuffs still hampering his balance, he almost ends up collapsing beside her instead.
What good does he think he is going to do, handcuffed and half oblivious as he is?
I run to them, grab Seth by the arm, and yank him back to his feet. “Observation room. Now.” He tries unsuccessfully to shrug out of my grip. “Get out of the middle of all this until the tranquilizer wears off,” I say. “I’ll take care of the president.” He glances toward the room, eyes still unfocused, unsure, but then he finally listens and takes off.
There are two CCA members also kneeling beside the president, one trying to stifle the bleeding from her wound while the other swings his weapon toward anyone who gets too close. They both move aside when I bend to pick her up. I cross her arms over her chest, placing the gun in one of her hands so I have both of my hands free to cradle her against me and prevent jostling her as much as possible. She is still conscious, but her eyes have taken on a strange, glassy look.
She needs medical attention.
And I have no idea how we are going to get it for her in time.
Right now, all I can do is get her out of the center of the fray. I bolt across the room, dodging bodies and stray fire and plenty of fire that was actually intended for us, and reach the observation room. Angie and the others have barricaded themselves in the far corner with some of the loyal CCA members standing as protectors in front of them. Catelyn and Jaxon—and now Seth as he joins them—are still fighting with their handcuffs.
I’ve made it a few steps into the room when a shot hits me between the shoulder blades. The pain is blindingly, teeth-grittingly intense for a few steps. It passes almost as quickly though, my lightning-fast brain releasing the synthetic chemicals to block it and sending signals to the cells around the new wound to start healing it.
But then two more shots hit. One right after the other. The second is dangerously close to the nerve center of my brain. My head buzzes. My face flushes with heat.
I stumble and fall, and it takes all my focus to keep myself from crashing hard on top of the president’s wounded chest. I have to drop her to catch myself on my shaking hands, and she hits the ground with a sickening thump that shocks life back into her glassy eyes for a split second. I close my own eyes for a moment, trying to bring myself back. The world has fallen away to only a few basic sensations—that heat on my face, spreading over my scalp. Footsteps pounding, vibrating the floor beneath my hands. Catelyn’s voice screaming my name.
I roll off President Cross. Blink my eyes open just in time to see a figure step into the doorway, a silhouette against the bright lights shining over the battle outside.
Josh.
He fires another shot without even thinking about it, without even really aiming. It glances off my shoulder. The weak shot normally wouldn’t faze me, but my brain is already struggling to keep up, to heal as fast as it normally does, and so the burn of it is enough to nearly well my eyes shut. I do close them—for what can’t be more than a few seconds—and when I reopen them, Josh is somehow already directly in front of me. President Cross shifts beside me. The gun still in her hand glints in the corner of my vision.
Josh grabs it first.
He points both of the guns at my chest. I vaguely wonder how many shots my body could actually take, if my brain can continuously keep up with this brutal healing, pain-dulling cycle.
“One more move and you’re dead!” shouts one of the CCA members behind me.
Death by firing squad, I think. Exactly what he deserves.
He still doesn’t seem to notice the firing squad facing him, though. And the guns are shaking in his hands. My mind has controlled enough of my pain that I can focus on the tiny movements. Movements that seem strange, being made by this boy who has never shown me anything except a foolish, death-wish sort of confidence.
At least not when he thought I was looking.
It’s like watching him outside Huxley’s gates all over again.
His mom was there. Her name was Michelle, I think.
“My dad is dead,” he says suddenly, talking more to his shaking hands than me.
I am not sure what he expects me to say.
“Not you, this time. I don’t even know who it was, but does it matter now?”
I know enough about human nature now that the normal reaction to something like this statement would be to say “I’m sorry.” Even to someone like Josh. So I try saying that.
But it only makes him laugh. “No, you aren’t.”
The strange thing, though, is that I am.
I am sorry enough that I don’t want him to be gunned down in front of me, at least. Maybe it isn’t true, what they say I did at Huxley’s lab. I don’t know. But I know what it is like to have things taken away, to wake up empty, and to not know how to fill those empty spaces inside you. So I make myself sit up, and then stand, so that I am blocking any clear shots at Josh. My body protests the entire time. The tingling around my healing wounds turns into more of a needle-pricking sensation, and my vision shifts in and out of focus as my ears fill with an odd whirring noise.
Into the Abyss Page 24