“Sorry, sailor, didn’t see you there,” he says, before his eyes narrow in suspicion. “Wait a minute…” He looks at me and at my uniform. “You’re not meant to be on the ship. That is not our uniform,” he tells me.
I don’t want him to continue that thought. I turn and sprint down the stairs. His feet clatter behind me.
“Stop!” he yells. “Stowaway!”
I don’t know if anyone hears. The sound of our feet ringing on the metal floor is deafening. I burst through the cargo bay doors and sprint down the corridor. If I could just open one of these hatches, I could hide…
“Halt!” comes the voice behind me, and I hear a noise that can only be a blaster gun powering up.
I stop in my tracks and turn slowly.
“Put your hands where I can see them,” says the sailor menacingly. He must be about my age, maybe even younger. His voice quivers, like he never expected to find an intruder and doesn’t know what to do with me.
“Who are you?” he demands. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m one of the engineers,” I try to sound confident. “I’m repairing a tear in the hold. Put that gun down. I have work to do.”
“Where’s your on-deck uniform?” the boy asks, holding the gun pointed at me. One wrong move and he’ll squeeze that trigger. I don’t reply. “Get over here, keep your hands up.”
I raise my hands slowly and edge toward him, calculating. Can this boy be persuaded into silence? Will he believe I’m here by myself?
There’s movement behind the sailor and suddenly Hayden’s on him, wrestling the gun out of his grip. It discharges with a loud bang and slides along the ground. Someone will have heard that, but there’s no time to worry about it. The kid punches Hayden in the nose, causing blood to spray everywhere. Hayden wrestles with the sailor as he reaches out to get control of the gun. I run to grab it before he can, and Hayden punches the boy in the face and then the stomach.
“Hayden!” I cry, but the sailor is punching him back, kicking and struggling. He wriggles out of Hayden’s grip and his foot lands on Hayden’s chest. He clambers up, but Hayden’s leg shoots out, tripping him.
I have the gun, but Hayden is in full battle fury, leaning over the boy and raining blows on his face.
“Hayden!” I shout again. Blood spurts from the boy’s ruptured nose and splatters Hayden’s face. He hasn’t noticed. “Hayden, stop!” I yell. I’m pointing the gun at the sailor, but it doesn’t matter because he’s unconscious.
Hayden breathes deeply and lifts himself away from the sailor, who lies in a crumpled heap, bruised and bloody.
“Sorry,” he says. “I don’t know what came over me.”
He’s covered in the boy’s and his own blood. I run forward and check for a pulse.
“He’s still alive,” I say. “He must be knocked out. How about you?”
“I’m OK,” says Hayden. “But I think he crushed my left foot. Damn. What do we do? We have to get rid of him.”
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“We can’t leave him here, what about when he wakes up?” Hayden’s eyes are starting to roam all over the place. He’s freaking out.
“You’re right, we have to hide him,” I say, starting to scout around.
“We can’t hide him. He’ll wake up eventually and go and tell someone about us. They’ll come searching. Maybe someone already heard. We have to finish him off. Give me the gun.”
“No way!” I say. “We’re not killing him.”
“We have to, or we’re all in danger. Not just you and me, but Trinity too.”
“If we kill him, that’s even worse. Someone will find the body.”
Hayden pauses, thinking for a moment.
“We have to throw him overboard,” he says finally. I start to protest. “If we get caught, that’s the end of this mission. We’ll never reach Cader Sanction and we’ll never raise the rebel army. This is bigger than just one man’s life now.”
I open my mouth, but there’s nothing I can say. Hayden starts dragging the unconscious man by his legs, wincing as he treads on his injured foot.
“Are you going to help me or what?” Hayden asks. “He could wake up any minute.”
I feel sick. This feels wrong, but I go to help my friend because it seems like there’s no choice. We hoist him on our shoulders and carry him up the stairs so he doesn’t leave a trail of blood on the ground. Luckily there’s nobody about on deck as we tip him over, watching his body splash into the churning ocean below.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Skylier
“Gavyn’s not going to come, is he?” My mouth feels papery and my throat is parched. The sun is glaring down on us, and though I know it’s not as harmful as people under the domes think, it’s still going to kill us. Rian sits next to me, slouched against the Sanction wall. His eyes are open in slits. He has never been out in the sun like this before. He looks like he hasn’t got long left.
“It’s been hours,” Rian mutters, his lips cracked. “I thought we had a meeting time.”
“Maybe he’s gotten held up,” I reply weakly. “Maybe something’s happened.”
“We shouldn’t have come. We should have stayed in Cavern and helped, like they wanted.”
“I was so sure we could trust Gavyn,” I say. My heartbeat feels so slow; I barely have the energy to feel betrayed. “He told me he worked for Dax. He—”
“He’s a liar,” says Rian, turning his head slightly. “You can’t trust anyone here. Especially not someone from Purenet. It was too easy. Too good to be true.”
I stare out at the wasteland miserably. If we hadn’t been waiting for Gavyn, maybe we could have tried to make the Grounders’ community.
Mother survived the wasteland with me as just a baby. It is possible… I’ve made it before. But now we’re too weak. We’ve put our trust in the wrong person. The sun beats down and the empty scrubland stretches away before us.
“They’re probably watching us on their cameras and laughing,” I say. Rian doesn’t respond. I turn and look at him, but he’s lying on his side. “Rian!” I cry weakly. I lean forward to check whether he’s OK, but the world goes fuzzy.
I close my eyes for a second. Just a second, but when I open them again the light has changed. I think I hear boots on the ground, voices.
“Over here,” I think I hear. “It’s them.”
Something grabs my waist. I struggle, but I don’t have any strength to put up a fight.
“They must have been here all afternoon,” says a voice. I can only see shapes, not people. “How did you know they’d be here, Gavyn?”
Gavyn. The traitor.
“It was a guess. Bring them in,” says a voice that sounds like Gavyn, but without the kindness.
I feel myself being flung over a shoulder, and see Rian dangling in front of me.
“Are they alive?” asks one of the voices. “We’re supposed to bring them in alive.”
“This one said something,” says someone else.
“Good,” says the first voice.
“Get moving,” barks the traitor voice that belongs to Gavyn.
We really are prisoners of Purenet. Blood rushes into my head as I swing over someone’s shoulder. I feel dizzy. I…
I open my eyes. The air feels cool, deliciously cool. I’m still dangling over a shoulder, but I can lift my head. We must be inside the Sanction. I struggle, but see my hands are tied. I try to kick, but so are my feet.
“This one’s awake,” says the soldier carrying me.
“Make her walk,” Gavyn’s voice replies, but I hang so limply, no one puts me down.
I must be drifting in and out of consciousness, because voices come and go and make no sense.
“Out in the wasteland like I said…”
“…. send word to Command.”
“Yes, we’ve got them…”
“No, not yet. Wait until he wakes up, then report to him.”
“…soldiers at Cavern and Cueva. Y
es, call them back…”
“No, they were outside all along.”
“How did they survive out there? They must have had help.”
“…Cavern or Cueva?”
“Help that left them behind?”
“Where are you taking them?”
“She must return to the Hosts’ quarters. Shristi says…”
“They’re half dead, they must be revived in the hospital, then…”
“I’ll make sure it happens. You can return to your post.”
“Yes, Adohnes.”
CHAPTER NINE
Skylier
There's a sort of blipping noise in the distance and a feeling of cool sheets under my hand. I open my eyes. The world is blurry, but as I blink again it starts to pull into focus. I see a figure sitting beside me. For a crazy moment I believe it’s a friend.
“Where am I?” I ask.
“In the Chancellor’s compound. Hospital,” says the figure.
“Where’s Abaven? I thought I saw—”
“There’s no one called Abaven here,” snaps the figure, and as he swims into focus I realize it’s Gavyn. Then I remember the circumstances that brought us here. We’re Purenet’s prisoners once again, and Gavyn has betrayed us.
“Oh, it’s you,” I say. I’m too tired to even accuse him of anything.
“Adohnes has ordered me to guard you to make sure you stay put until you can be returned to Shristi’s quarters,” he says carefully.
“Where’s Rian?” I demand.
“Relax, he’s here too. I am responsible for him as well. I will take him to the Games’ compound soon.”
“I can’t believe you’ve done this to us,” I mutter. “All that, for nothing.”
“Shut up,” he snaps.
“Ah, the patients are awake.” A doctor bustles in and picks up my wrist briskly, checking me over. She wears a white coat and smells sterile.
Rian, are you awake? my mind calls out.
Ugh, I think so. Something’s eaten my mouth out. Or at least that’s what it feels like.
I can’t believe we’ve been betrayed.
“Are they OK to be released back to their quarters?” Gavyn demands, sounding surly. The doctor ignores him and injects me with something that immediately makes me feel more alive.
“What was that?” I ask.
“Don’t you worry,” she replies, and goes over to do the same for Rian.
“I’ve got pressure on me from above,” says Gavyn crossly. “Their owners want to see them returned safely.”
“Yes, just wait thirty seconds,” the doctor replies, annoyed. “Just let the drug kick in.”
What have they given us? Rian’s mind asks me.
I don’t know, I respond, feeling nervous.
The doctor peers into my eyes and helps me sit up. Then she carefully removes a series of tubes plugged into my skin and goes to Rian.
“Yes, you can take them,” she says to Gavyn. “There are spare sets of clothes in the linen cupboards next to their beds.”
Gavyn folds his arms as we get dressed quickly, feeling the strength return to our limbs. The doctor bustles about, then makes us swallow a pill, before saying, “They’ll need to be monitored. There might be aftereffects.”
“Yes, I understand,” says Gavyn. “I’ll tell their keepers. Not my problem. Come on, you two.”
We find ourselves being marched down the corridor outside, Gavyn holding a gun behind us. I’m dressed in a clean white Host dress and Rian in a smart Games uniform. My heart sinks lower and lower. After all we’ve been through, I can’t believe I have to go back to Shristi and the horrible fate of being Xander’s Host. I hope it’s made a difference and my mother and Callie are safe. I hope they haven’t been punished because of my stupid actions.
The atmosphere is tense and nobody says anything for a while. I don’t know what to say to Gavyn now that I know he’s not the person I thought he was.
These corridors are familiar; I remember them from before when we first went looking for mother and Callie and Xander found us.
“It was you who told the soldiers we were in Cavern, wasn’t it?” I say sullenly.
Gavyn shoots me a shocked look. “Why on earth would you say that?” He makes an abrupt turn into a new corridor, opening a door with his barcode.
“How else would they have known?” I ask, feeling irritated. What’s the point of even having a discussion? Let’s just get back to hell and be done with it.
“You haven’t the faintest idea, have you?” Gavyn asks angrily as we march down yet another corridor. It’s different from the hospital wing; there is silvery metal everywhere, but it’s tarnished, like no one is looking after it anymore. “The amount of sacrifices other people have made for you. The danger we’re all in.”
What’s he talking about? my mind asks Rian.
I don’t know, but where are we? This can’t be the way to the Hosts’ quarters. We’ve been going down. The Hosts and Games contestants live higher up.
He’s right. “Where are we?” I ask. “Where are you taking us?”
“These are the inner guts of the Chancellor’s compound,” says Gavyn, annoyed. “The way to where they’re holding your mother and Callie. Only I can get you through here, and I’m risking a lot to do it, so don’t start accusing me of betraying Cavern or anyone else. The only people I’m betraying are the ones from Purenet.”
I feel really stupid. “So this is all part of the plan?” I ask, cheeks starting to burn.
“Of course, what else?” Gavyn says. “Like we planned, I needed to bring you in as my prisoners to take attention away from Cavern.”
“Did it work?” Rian asks. “Have they left Cavern alone?”
“Not yet,” says Gavyn. “Command is still suspicious. But Abaven is working on them.
“As Abaven or as Adohnes?” I ask.
He doesn’t answer because he’s working on opening a new door to a new corridor.
“No one comes down this way,” he explains, “which is why we can go this way without being seen. Soon someone’s going to wonder why these doors have been registered as opened, but I hope no one’s going to read the logs for a while.”
“What’s down here? Why doesn’t anyone come?” Rian asks.
“These are the vaults,” Gavyn explains as we hurry past great sealed doors. “It’s where they hold the secrets of the past. The ones they’d rather forget but can’t quite bring themselves to destroy. Beyond this it’s mostly just offices full of pen-pushers. They shouldn’t cause us too many problems.”
“Secrets of the past?” I ask. “Right here?”
“Yes, but it’s just a convenient shortcut to the labs. We haven’t got time to stop.”
“But we have to,” I say. “What sort of things are in there? The people have to know what happened before.” Part of me wonders if there’s information there about the Watchers, and the people like my family they left behind.
“It’s mostly documents and history books,” Gavyn says. I look blank. “You know, things made of paper, talking about life before the wars. Even artwork.”
“You’ve seen it?” I demand. How can he have access to this thing and everyone else is denied knowledge? How can the Chancellor keep these things from us? They should belong to everyone.
“Yes, but only as part of my duties in watching Dax as a youngster.”
“Dax has been here?” For some reason this makes me feel angry. Left out.
“Skylier, drop it,” says Gavyn. “This is something you can worry about later, after the world has crumbled. We’re here to get your family out. And—”
“What is it?” Rian asks.
“It’s not just about your family,” says Gavyn. “It never really has been, but we all needed a reason.”
“What’s going on?” I ask. We’re still marching through the inner passages of the vaults.
“There are a lot of people being held prisoner in the labs,” says Gavyn.
“Th
e Grounders,” I say. I knew it.
“Not just the Grounders,” says Gavyn. “Lots of people. It’s wrong. Purenet is rotten to its very core and we have to do something about it. But not while innocent people are still being held prisoner.”
“What do you mean? What’s going to happen?” I ask.
“You don’t need to know the details, you just need to play your part,” says Gavyn. “Just as Dax is playing his.”
“Dax? Have you heard from him? Or Lowell?” My heartbeat quickens.
“Not lately,” says Gavyn, frowning as he passes his barcode across another scanner and takes us out of the vaults into another silvery corridor. If he left us now we’d die down here. We’d never be able to find our way out again. “But I’ve spoken to Abaven and he has come to agree with the plan. Forces are coming together.”
“Where’s Abaven now? Did he get out of Cavern? Was he here when we were brought in?” I ask.
“Yes, he’s back as Adohnes,” says Gavyn. “I don’t know what happened in Cavern, but we’re waiting on his signal. He’s going to hack the main computers and drop all security around the compound so we can get people out.”
“When?” Rian asks.
“When the time is right,” says Gavyn. “But first we have to—” He stops suddenly and puts his finger to his lips, gesturing for us to be quiet.
“What is—”
“Shh!” he silences me.
Then I hear it too. A door opening, feet on the floor, and voices. Gavyn glances about briskly, then crosses the corridor swiftly to a door. He opens it with his barcode and beckons. We slip inside and hold our breath.
CHAPTER TEN
Dax
Cader Sanction’s dome is about a day’s walk to the west, and getting there feels more urgent than ever. The ground beneath me is wet from recent rain, but the leaves still crunch, like they’ve spent the last week drying out. I glance around the forest, but I can’t see any threats. Not for the first time I long for my bike, to ride between the tree trunks, to feel the wind stinging my cheeks. I’d get there in no time. There’s nothing here, though. Not a single vehicle I can steal. Something about this forest feels wrong. My heart flutters with a feeling of unease, but I can’t put my finger on why. I have to get going; there’s no time to stand and think about things.
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