I reached up and wiped, smearing blood all over my fingertips. My stomach churned but I cleaned my fingers off on my pants and shrugged. “It’ll match the rest of my face.”
Erik laughed and everyone looked over at him. “Sorry. I’m exhausted. It’s just sort of…refreshing that you don’t wallow. Wallowing gets old fast.”
A corner of my mouth turned up. “If I don’t find the humor in it, I’ll just hate it.” It was actually becoming a source of comfort for me. It was a reminder that I was still alive. It was permanent proof that I was surviving.
“God, I hate fighting these things,” Kris said, staring down at the bodies in disgust. She spotted the two kids lying next to me and her face drained of all color. Our eyes met and she nodded. “Let’s get the hell out of here. I have a feeling these won’t be the only ones we’ll encounter.”
AFTER WE’D CLEANED ourselves up and choked down some food, we continued on. The smell of blood lingered under my nose for miles, and I knew it was more than just the blood staining my skin and clothes. I had killed so many Awakened in the past year but it had never gotten easier. Their faces still haunted me. The Awakened wanted nothing more than to kill me, devour me, but before Razi Cylon had gotten to them they’d been living people. They had been people going to work, going to school, loving their family, living their lives. It was hard to forget that.
We remained in silence for the rest of our journey to Sekhmet. The conversation that we had easily fallen into felt wrong now. The encounter with the group of Awakened reminded us of our mission and how truly dangerous it really was.
Tommy stopped us a couple of miles away, letting us regroup and eat before we went in. The first part of the plan only involved him and Erik. We ate in silence, all of us too nervous to say anything. The only sounds were the quiet chews as we consumed our food and the beating of my heart in my chest.
No one said anything as Erik and Tommy packed up their things and disappeared into the trees. Tommy’s eyes met mine and he nodded, looking confident. I hoped he felt as confident as he looked, as I felt like I was going to lose everything I just ate.
The rest of us sat in silence while they were gone. I hated this kind of silence. This kind of silence was loud and it got into your head. There was nothing else to do except listen to the screaming worries and doubts.
I didn’t know a whole lot about forests but I knew they weren’t quiet. You could hear the rustling of tree branches in the wind and the sound of animals moving around. It wasn’t like that anymore and it put me on edge. Ever since the Awakened had come to be, silence had become normal. People – and animals too, it would seem – were too nervous to make any noise nowadays.
After about an hour, I couldn’t take it any longer and I stood up, pacing the forest floor. Nathan glanced up at me every few minutes or so, before returning to his intense study of his hands at his knees. After another 30 minutes of this, I looked up at Liam, unsurprised to see him staring back at me.
“Shouldn’t they be back by now?” I asked, running a hand through my hair. My eyes met Kris’s and I saw the same anxiety coursing through my veins mirrored in her eyes. “They’ve been gone a long time.”
“They haven’t been gone that long,” Liam assured me. “These things take time.”
Taking out the guards, disabling the cameras and sneaking back here with a key card to get us through Sekhmet? Yeah, I supposed things like that took time.
“What if they got lost? Or worse, caught? What if people are heading this way right now? What if…”
“Does she ever just shut up?” Kris burst out, tugging at the end of her ponytail.
“No,” Liam said and I shot him a dark look. There was a low chuckle behind us and all four of us whirled around, reaching for our weapons.
I sighed in relief when I saw Erik and Tommy standing in front of us and I resisted the urge to launch myself at them.
“Can you maybe not shoot us?” Erik asked, a smile across his face. “Considering we’re the ones with the goods.” He held up a slim black card, with a familiar stamped logo on it. The Egyptian goddess adorned nearly every surface in Sekhmet.
“You got it?” Nathan asked, lowering his weapon.
“Did you doubt us?” Tommy asked, his arms crossed over his chest. They looked a little roughed up, but other than a cut across Erik’s eyebrow and a bruise blooming along Tommy’s jawline, they looked okay.
“Well, for a moment there…” I trailed off.
“Are you ready for the next move?” Tommy asked, checking the ammunition in his gun before sliding it back into the waistband of his pants. “We won’t have much time while those cameras are down so we should get a move on.”
The unwavering fear that had sat simmering in my veins since we had left Hoover had disappeared for a moment, replaced by the worry I’d had for Erik and Tommy. Now it came rushing back and I felt paralyzed. I was about to willingly enter Sekhmet. There was no turning back now.
Liam seemed to get my train of thought. “Zoey, you don’t have to do this. You can stay behind. No one would blame you.”
I shot him a disgusted look. “I am not staying behind, Liam. I’m going through with this. I’m not going to keep hiding.” I pushed past him, heading in the direction Erik and Tommy had gone earlier. “Let’s just do this.”
The hallways of Sekhmet were freezing, just like I remembered. The hairs on my arms stood up, and I rubbed my arms, trying to chase off the chills that were running up and down my skin.
“What is this entrance anyway?” I whispered. “Why didn’t we use this to escape?”
Tommy shook his head. “It’s a back entrance. Most of the people in Sekhmet don’t even know it exists. It’s for Dr. Cylon, if she ever needed a quick getaway. She barely keeps it guarded, which is her first mistake. She would never expect someone to try to exit this way, if they needed to.” He sighed, running a hand through his hair. “But I couldn’t take the chance that she would know I would send you here. So we didn’t do that. But she’s gotten lazy. Complacent. She would never think that anyone would sneak in this way.”
“Are you sure about that?” Erik said from behind us.
“Well, I’m counting on that,” Tommy admitted. “Let’s continue.”
We made our way slowly through the hallways, stopping occasionally to slide the keycard through another door or to disable the cameras in the next sector. It felt torturous to go that slow. Ash was somewhere within these walls and everything in me was screaming to run, to burst into every room and tear the place apart until I found him.
But I kept myself contained. I followed Tommy as we made our way through the bright hallways, twisting and turning until I was so dizzy that I knew there was no way I could make it out without his help. For a moment, dread filled me and I wondered if he was purposefully bringing us back in here, but I had seen the scars he had from his gunshot wounds. For some reason that I couldn’t even begin to explain to myself, I trusted him.
We came to a fork and Tommy held a hand up. We all stopped, exchanging looks. He took a couple moments to disable the cameras in this corridor. “This is where we split up,” he whispered. Liam and I would sneak to the detention level, where Ash was sure to be held. It seemed stupid for Razi to keep Ash in the same place she did last time but it wasn’t like she was trying to hide him from us. She wanted us to come here. She wanted us to find him.
Liam and I looked at each other and I suddenly felt safe. Whatever happened next, I had my best friend with me. I had someone who would help me get Ash back. He was the only one I trusted to have by my side during this. We would succeed. I knew it. We started to walk down the left fork before Tommy reached out and grabbed my arm, spinning me around toward him.
“What?” I asked him, pursing my lips.
“You have an hour, Zoey. That’s it. Once we shut down that program, all hell is going to break loose and we’re going to need to get out of here. They won’t have the Awakened but there are still plenty of men
with guns in this place.”
“I know,” I barked out, impatiently.
Tommy hesitated before letting go of my arm. He pressed an extra black key card into my hand. It felt slim and cool in my hand, and I tucked it in my back pocket. “Be careful. We’ll see you in an hour.”
Liam came back over to me, slipping his hand in mine. It filled me with warmth and comfort. “We’ll see you then.” He nodded toward his friends. “Good luck.”
We reached the stairwell quickly, pausing every so often to listen for any footsteps approaching. My heart was beating like a drum underneath my ribs but despite that, I felt calm. I was thrust into my worst nightmare but I was finally here. I was finally able to find him.
We raced down the stairs, getting lower and lower into the depths of the compound.
“Level five, level five, level five,” I whispered to myself as we thundered down the stairs. My sweaty hand slid across the handrails. I skidded to a halt when I came face to face with a number five. “Liam.”
“I know, honey. Let’s do this,” he said, pulling the rifle off of his shoulders. I reached for my gun, clutching it tight in my hands. “I’ll go first. And don’t argue with me.”
The moment we pushed our way through the door, the shots began to fire.
“Shit,” Liam said, shoving me backwards and closing the door. “Well, there goes the idea of sneaking in there.”
“Damn it,” I said, clenching my fist. “They were totally expecting us.”
Liam peeked through the small window in the door. “There are only about four of them, maybe five. It’s hard to tell. But we can take them out.” He sighed and looked down at me. “They knew you’d come for him, Zoey. That’s why they’re stationed down here. They didn’t have guards down here before.”
“What are the chances that she still wants me alive?” I joked, a weak smile on my face.
“Well, we’re about to find out,” he said, shaking his head. “Cover me, okay?”
I started to protest but he didn’t wait for me. He pushed the door forward again, his rifle at the ready. I cursed, loudly, and followed him, staying ducked behind the open door.
There were five of them, standing together to block passage down the hallway. They had their guns raised but they didn’t shoot again. I saw more than one uneasy look as they stared at Liam. He stood, unprotected in the hallway, his rifle raised toward them. He didn’t fire a shot, just stared them down.
“Let us pass,” Liam said, firmly, not taking his eyes off of them. “We’ll shoot each and every one of you dead and I’m not sure you’d like that. Put your weapons down and let us pass and we’ll let you live.”
I felt a sense of relief at his words. In the last year, I’d yet to shoot an actual person and I wasn’t aiming to do so anytime soon. These guys were Sekhmet goons but they were still people.
The guards stared at us, not saying a word. I could feel my knees shaking as I crouched behind the door, wondering how long this stare-off could go on for.
“Let us pass,” Liam repeated.
“And why would we let you do that?” The one in the front spoke firmly. “Who’s to say that you’ll shoot us as soon as we let you pass?”
“We won’t,” Liam promised. “We don’t want anyone to get hurt.”
There was a sudden movement, a hand moving. I didn’t know what they were reaching for but I didn’t pause, didn’t stop to look. I wasn’t taking the chance. I raised my gun, aiming at the man on the left. The trigger was pulled and I watched as the bullet went sailing toward him. He went down with a thump but I couldn’t stop to think about that.
One of the guards on the right immediately spotted me and I ducked back behind the door, flinching when I heard the bullet strike the door. The door was heavy and I pressed my back harder against it as I peeked around the corner. Liam had shot the man who had just missed me and was aiming for the one next to him. The other two looked hesitant, unsure of whether to engage us or turn tail and run.
A shot rang out from one of their guns, just missing Liam who ducked behind the door with me. He looked down at me, crouched on the ground, before engaging again.
I aimed and missed one of them, sending a bullet ricocheting into the wall. I swore and shot again, catching one of them in the face. My stomach dropped as blood burst from the wound, and the man fell, choking, to the ground.
The last man fell, a clean shot through the throat, courtesy of Liam.
I stood up, letting the door slam behind me.
I walked over to the bodies, feeling the bile rise in my throat. “That’s not the way I planned that going…”
Liam came up next to me. “Yeah, me neither.” He climbed past them and offered me a hand. I took it and hoisted myself over. “It was us or them.” He didn’t sound happy about it. He stared at them for another moment and then reached down.
“What are you doing?” I asked him.
He yanked a gun out from underneath one of the bodies, tucking it over his shoulder. “Ash is going to need something once we find him. We didn’t think of that. Now we have something.”
I nodded. “Good thinking.”
We continued down the hallway, more alert than before. We hadn’t planned for guards down here. No one came down here. It’s what had made it almost easy to sneak Ash out the first time we’d been here.
We paused at each and every door and it was like a blow to the chest each time we found it empty. I was starting to believe they were keeping him somewhere else when Liam peeked through a window and drew in a sharp breath. “Zoey.”
I pushed past him, reaching for the door handle. I fumbled at the key cad in my back pocket and slid it through the slot. It flashed green and I practically threw myself through the door.
Ash stood up, quickly, and my stomach dropped. He looked awful. There was a gash on his cheek that had dried up, blood crusted at the sides. His face was a variety of colors and the side of his lip was fat and bloody. He was leaning on his left leg but he didn’t’ seem to notice any of that. He limped across the room, moving as quickly as he could, and grabbed me, lifting me into his arms. We went crashing into the wall, my back slamming into the hard concrete.
“I knew you would come. I didn’t want you to but I knew you would,” he whispered to me. His hands clutched my face tightly between them and I clung to him. It hadn’t even been a week but it had felt like a lifetime since I saw him. He was here and he was whole, for the most part. He was going to be okay. He was going to be safe.
“I love…” I started to say but he cut me off with his lips sliding over mine. I welcomed them eagerly, my fingers sliding through his hair to tug him closer to me. A growl rumbled through his chest and a shiver went down my spine. He tasted like blood and sweat but I hardly noticed. Every inch of my body was pressed against him and I didn’t care if he had to carry me out of this place like this, I didn’t want to let him go. I didn’t want to ever let him go.
Ash pulled back, his forehead pressed against mine. “I’m sorry,” he said, out of breath. “I don’t want to but I have to…put you down.”
A jolt of concern rushed through me and I let go of him, sliding to the ground. “Are you okay?”
He grinned at me, pulling at the gash in his lip. “I’m always okay. You’re covered in blood.”
I shook my head. “It’s not my blood. Mostly.” Ash’s fingers gripped me tightly, his eyes full of concern. I watched as he took an assessment of my body. When he deemed me good enough, he smiled and pressed a hard kiss on the top of my head. A shiver went through me. He was safe. He was alive.
He turned around, looking at Liam, who I had almost forgotten was in the room. He reached a hand toward him and Liam stared at it, before reaching for it. Ash tugged at it and pulled him into a hug. “Thank you. For being here. For bringing her. And I’m assuming, taking care of her.”
I could see the surprise on Liam’s face over Ash’s shoulder. I bit back a smile as the two of them broke apart. “No one reall
y takes care of Zoey,” Liam managed to say.
Ash laughed, clapping him on the back a couple times. “That’s true enough. But still. You came with her.”
Liam shuffled nervously back and forth. “Well, I couldn’t live with this girl every day if we didn’t come and get you.”
Ash cracked another smile, reaching his hand back for mine. Our fingers intertwined and I felt a smile stretch across my face, my first genuine one in days. “So what’s the plan?” He glanced around. “Or is it one of the kind where we make it up as we go along? Those are always my favorite.”
Liam handled over the extra gun and Ash took it, nodding at him gratefully. He checked the ammunition quickly before gripping it tightly in his hands.
“Just tell me we don’t have to run,” Ash joked. He was still favoring his left leg, though he was trying really hard not to show it.
Liam studied Ash’s leg for a moment and then looked at me. Whatever he saw on my face kept him from commenting on it. “Well, if the others did their part, hopefully not.”
“Others?” Ash asked, confused.
“Yeah, we have a sort of ragtag group here to rescue,” I said, opening the door and peeking out. The hallway was clear but I didn’t think it would stay like that for long. “Part Sanctuary, part Hoover and part Sekhmet.” Ash’s eyebrows rose. “We ran into Hoover on the way to Sekhmet and picked up some of Liam’s friends and ran into an old friend, who, incidentally, is not dead like we thought he was. That’s how we’re in here.”
“Could you be any more vague, Zoey?” Liam said, rolling his eyes.
“We should probably get moving though. We, uh, deviated from the original plan a bit and I think they’ll notice soon.”
“Liam’s eyes grew wide in realization. “Okay, I lied. Running just might come into play.”
“Fantastic,” Ash said, looking unperturbed. “Let’s get this show on the road, then.”
AS WE ENTERED the hallway, Liam explained what had happened since Ash was kidnapped from Sanctuary. He didn’t leave anything out; Octavia’s reaction, us leaving, Astrid following us, running into Hoover, learning about Tommy, everything.
The Sanctuary Page 21