by Zoe Cannon
But he just might have saved the resistance.
And she had never known. Had never suspected.
“Thank you,” she said again.
“I made my choice,” said Ramon. “Which is why I came here tonight to help you—whatever that means. If you need me to help you run, that’s what I’ll do.” He paused. “If that’s what you need.”
His dark eyes held a question.
Was he saying… did he suspect…
“What are you asking?”
He didn’t answer.
It didn’t matter. There was only one thing she could do. Thank him, refuse his offer, and send him home.
He watched her, waiting for her response.
Thank him. Refuse his offer. Send him home.
But she hesitated.
For months now, Ramon had kept Internal looking in the wrong places. If he could do that again… if he could help convince the country that Becca’s resistance had been wiped out…
No. She couldn’t risk it. Asking him to do this, even implying it, would mean putting all her people’s lives into his hands.
But her own life had been in his hands for months now. For years. How much sooner would Internal have found her if not for what he had done?
How much sooner would Internal find the others if he didn’t help her one last time?
Thank him. Refuse his offer. Send him home.
The resistance leader would never have considered trusting him.
But she was just Becca now. And he was her friend.
“Thank you for the offer,” she began. “But…”
He waited.
“But I don’t need you to help me run.” Deep breath. “I need to be arrested. I need to be interrogated. And when I break, I need Internal to believe I’ve told them everything.”
Ramon’s face revealed nothing as he nodded. “Then that’s what the truth will be.”
“You’re not going to ask why?”
One side of his mouth quirked up in a half-smile.
“Good luck,” he said.
And slipped out the door before she could say goodbye.
Chapter Twenty-Three
The bedroom clock ticked down the seconds as Becca waited.
She lay in the dark, staring at the shifting shadows on the ceiling. When the Enforcers came, this was how they had to find her. In bed, sleeping, unsuspecting. They had to believe they had taken her by surprise.
Tick. Tick. Tick.
The shadows leapt across the room as light flooded through the curtains. Becca tensed. Her hands clawed at her blankets.
The headlights passed. The shadows returned to their usual places.
Becca unclenched her hands. She closed her eyes.
Tick. Tick. Tick.
The rumble of an engine. Slowing. Stopping.
A neighbor coming home from a late night at work. Or an Enforcement transport here to take her away.
Deep breaths. Slow and even. They have to believe I’m sleeping. They have to believe I don’t know.
She knew what was coming. She had planned it. She had expected it for five years. She wasn’t afraid. She wasn’t afraid.
A creak. Footsteps?
I know what’s coming. I’m not afraid.
She waited for the next creak, for the muted march of boots on carpet. Nothing. Only her breathing—too loud, too tense—broke the silence. Only her breathing and the clock’s relentless countdown.
Tick. Tick. Tick.
And then—
She stilled her breath to listen.
Click.
The sound of a key turning in the lock.
They were here.
She forced her muscles to relax, one by one. Forced her frozen lungs to suck in air.
I’m not afraid.
A slow creak as the door began to open. The drumbeat of boots against the carpeted floor, louder with every step. Their feet fell in time with the clock. Tick. Tick. Tick.
I’m not—
The bedroom door exploded off its hinges.
And five years’ worth of nightmares poured into the room at once.
“Get up!”
A tsunami of black uniforms, of opaque helmets, of boots and guns and voices. Gloved hands yanked at her blankets, grabbed at her limbs, nearly ripped her arm from its socket as she landed facedown on the floor.
A scream tore from her lips. I’m not afraid. I’m not afraid.
“On your feet, dissident!”
Pain bloomed in her side as an Enforcer’s boot met her ribcage. Hands she couldn’t see hauled her up by her arms, drawing a sharp whimper from her throat. Her feet scrabbled for purchase.
“Against the wall! Now!”
Another pair of hands gripped her shoulders. Slammed her forward. Her head cracked against the plaster. Her vision went dark, lit only by bright stars dancing in the corners of her eyes. Copper and warmth filled her mouth.
“Careful!” The sharp protest came from across the room. “You know who this one is.”
“Oh, I know who she is, all right.” A female voice, inches from her ear. The Enforcer shook Becca for emphasis as she spoke. “One of those prisoners she freed killed my brother. Climbed in through his window and murdered him in cold blood. As if he was supposed to remember every dissident he interrogated.”
“I don’t care if she killed him herself. Processing needs her for interrogation. They gave us strict parameters. You damage her, they’ll have you in a cell in 117 right alongside her.”
Becca took advantage of the respite to catch her breath. To try to calm her racing heart. She gagged as a trickle of blood from her split lip ran down her throat.
“I’ll tell you where Processing can put their parameters.” But with a final shove, the Enforcer released Becca. Two others moved in to replace her, one wrenching Becca’s wrists into cuffs while the other patted her down roughly.
“You really think she is who they say she is?” The question came from a third voice—older, maybe, although the helmet made it hard to tell. “I mean, look at her.” The Enforcer wrapped a hand around Becca’s throat, jerking her chin up. “She’s, what, twenty? Twenty-one? That’s my daughter’s age. And she’s supposed to be some great dissident mastermind?”
“You know better than to underestimate a dissident.” The first voice again. “Or to question the information we’re given. Now let’s get her out of here before she tries something. And watch her. We don’t know what she’s capable of.”
She finally got a good look at the Enforcers as they marched her out of the room. Five of them. Ten. More. Internal had sent an army for her—for one girl, barefoot and shivering in her pajamas.
They half-dragged her through the hallway, ignoring her efforts to keep up. She stumbled. Three sets of arms caught her, held her up, pushed her forward. The barrel of a gun jabbed into her back. “Keep moving.”
I planned this. I chose this. I’m not afraid.
Enforcers swarmed the kitchen as they passed. Opening cabinets, yanking out drawers, knocking on the walls in search of secret compartments. Dishes shattered as the Enforcers swept them carelessly to the ground—the dishes from her childhood that her mom had sent with her when she had moved out. Her mom had insisted that Becca needed something to make her new place feel like home.
I chose this.
Memories ghosted through the air, echoed in the walls. Her mom holding the door open for her, her smile proud as Becca stepped into her new apartment. Micah kissing her for the first time, his touch sweet and shy and searing. Heather helping her paint the walls, laughing as she flicked paint onto Becca’s cheek.
Now only Enforcers surrounded her. No friends. No allies. Alone.
I’m not afraid.
The memories came faster, as if they knew she didn’t have much time. Micah’s stammered confession of love. Heather’s playful screech as Becca raised her paint roller in a mock threat. Her mom urging her through the door—Welcome home, Becca.
And her own voice, tel
ling the others her plan. Telling them she could save the resistance.
She could save them.
She would save them.
She stopped. Her breathing steadied. The sound of her heartbeat faded from her ears.
I chose this.
I’m not afraid.
She closed her eyes. She let the memories go.
When she opened them again, the ghosts were gone.
Another jab from the gun, hard enough to bruise. “I said keep moving, dissident.”
The Enforcers led her out the door, down the stairs, out into the night. The icy wind, heavy with the scent of snow, sliced through her pajamas as if she were wearing nothing. She lifted her head to the sky, heedless of the cold, and breathed as deeply as she could. Her body relaxed as she absorbed the pain of the wind, the clacking music of tree branch on tree branch, the distant light of the stars. All the things she would never have again.
She was ready.
Ahead of her, the transport waited.
Around the side of the building, a flash of movement caught her eye. She stopped herself from turning her head just in time as the vague shapes resolved themselves into two human figures.
Micah. Kara.
Slowly, deliberately, Micah raised his hand in a silent farewell. Beside him, Kara’s shoulders jerked like she was fighting back tears, struggling to hold herself upright. But she did the same.
They had come to watch her go. To say goodbye. To make it so she wouldn’t be alone.
I’ll always be right there with you.
She couldn’t risk acknowledging them. Couldn’t even dare to look in their direction for too long. But as the Enforcers pushed her to the van, she gave a tiny nod. A single twitch of her chin, barely a movement at all.
They lowered their hands, and she knew that they had seen.
Then the Enforcers bundled her into the windowless van, and darkness swallowed her.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Back in her apartment, the plan had made so much sense. She would let Internal take her. She would make them believe she was telling them everything. And she would save the resistance. Simple.
It had made sense—right up until the Enforcers hauled her out of the elevator and onto the underground levels.
The hallway stretched out in front of her, ending at a point almost too far away to see. In the distance, other hallways branched off—each of them, Becca knew, as long as this one. Each of them lined with rows and rows of cells. Dozens. Hundreds.
The floor above held more of the same. The floor below—more of the same.
And against all this… her. One dissident. One girl. She looked down at the floor, at her bare feet padding alongside the Enforcers’ thick boots. At the frayed flannel pants that hung loosely around her legs, brushing against the Enforcers’ impenetrable body armor. At the goosebumps rising on her skin from cold and fear.
Just one more dissident swallowed by 117.
The concrete walls seemed to close in around her as she walked. She fought the urge to gasp for breath. I’m ready. I can do this. I can do this.
I have to do this.
But how could she, with all of Internal arrayed against her? With the weight of this place—of all the dissidents who had vanished into this building without so much as a whisper—pressing down on her, crushing her into nothing?
She tried to keep her head held high. Tried to keep her gaze fixed on the Enforcer directly in front of her. Not the impossible length of the hallway and all it implied. Not the cells they passed, door after door after door. Defeated dissident after defeated dissident.
I can do this. I can—
Ahead of them, a door opened. Two guards exited the room, with a third person propped up between them. A prisoner not much older than Becca. His hair was matted with sweat and blood; his feet dragged uselessly along the floor beneath him. One of his eyes wouldn’t focus. The other, wide with terror, rolled in its socket as he looked from the guards to the Enforcers to Becca.
“Please,” he begged in a roughened voice. “Please. I’ve told you everything, I’ve told you…”
Becca forced her gaze away as the guards dragged the man down a side corridor. His broken pleas faded into the distance.
Soon that would be her.
No. Head up. Back straight. I’ll hold out. I won’t break. Not until it’s time.
But that prisoner had probably told himself the same thing.
In her time transcribing torture sessions, she had lost count of the dissidents who had walked into the interrogation room with their chins raised in defiance, full of brave words about how they would never give anything away.
Not one of them had lived up to that defiance. Not one.
The Enforcers steered Becca around a corner. Another endless hallway faced them. Another row of cells filled with dissidents who had thought they could resist.
I will hold out. I will. If I don’t, the resistance dies.
They turned again—and stopped abruptly as a wall of guards strode up to block their path.
Every guard’s gaze snapped to Becca. She shrank under their scrutiny. Head up. Back straight. She forced her eyes to theirs. Some looked away; a few kept staring, their faces a kaleidoscope of awe and hate and fear.
One of the guards stepped forward. “Is this Rebecca Dalcourt?” he demanded.
The lead Enforcer took a matching step. “This dissident is the responsibility of Enforcement until she arrives in her detention cell.” His distorted voice echoed strangely in the hallway. Another step put him inches from the guard, the toes of their boots nearly touching. “And we’re not doing this for your entertainment. Unless you have clearance to know this prisoner’s identity, I suggest you stand around and gawk somewhere else.”
“We’re not here to gawk.” The guard shoved a sheet of paper in front of the Enforcer “We have orders to take Rebecca Dalcourt directly to interrogation.”
The Enforcer examined the paper. After a moment, he handed it back. “This seems to be in order.” Although the helmet flattened his words, Becca could imagine his grudging tone. “She’s all yours.”
He nodded to the Enforcers holding Becca. They released her as two of the guards took hold of her arms. The guards formed a circle around Becca as they drew her forward, until she couldn’t see anything but their bodies surrounding her, couldn’t breathe anything but the stale sweat of their uniforms.
In a motion so smooth it seemed rehearsed, the Enforcers turned around. Their feet pounded the floor in unison as they strode away.
The guard who had spoken before gave a grunt of satisfaction. “That’ll teach them to think they’re better than us. It’s always the same with Enforcement. They think those fancy uniforms mean they can do no wrong. Like they’re Raleigh Dalcourt or something.” Something hard and blunt prodded Becca between her shoulder blades. “Let’s go,” he barked, as if he was afraid she would defy him.
She didn’t.
She started walking.
Murmurs surrounded her as the guards led her forward. A thousand prisoners. Can’t wait to see her execution. Dalcourt—does that mean… Their stares crawled along her skin. One guard extended a hand to touch her, then hastily drew it back.
She wished she were the person they saw. The person they were whispering about. That person would have the strength to withstand what was coming next.
I will hold out. I don’t have a choice.
Another turn. Another. The walls pressed in around her as she traveled deeper into the maze. As every interrogation she had ever transcribed replayed behind her eyes.
And then they stopped.
The door looked identical to all the others—flat metal, windowless, marked only by a number stenciled in black.
But Becca knew what was waiting for her on the other side.
One of the guards slid a keycard into the reader next to the door. The light flashed green. Harsh white light poured into the hallway as the interrogation room opened its mouth to her.
I can do this. Her thoughts sped up along with her pulse. I can do this. I—
The guards shoved her through the door.
Three years ago, when Milo Miyamoto had gotten her arrested along with her mother, she had stepped into a room identical to this one. Concrete walls, spotless tile floor, a light above that made her squint against its brightness. Air thick with disinfectant and, lingering underneath, the metallic tang of blood. A single chair waiting in the center.
Identical to this one—except for one thing.
This time, a long metal tray stood against the far wall. A tray with tools arranged in careful rows, sharp and gleaming.
Heat drained from her hands and feet, leaving them numb. Her pulse filled her ears.
I’m ready, she tried to tell herself. Her hands shook.
She needed to be the resistance leader again. She needed that strength, that certainty. But that person was gone. She was all that was left. Weak. Human.
So let it make you strong instead.
The ghost of Micah’s hand settled over hers. The tiniest spark of warmth.
I’ll always be right there with you.
She held on to the memory of his words, the memory of his arms around her, as she looked up to meet her interrogator’s eyes.
Lucas’s eyes.
Lucas.
He was Heather’s accomplice.
He had agreed to sacrifice innocent lives for the resistance. To torture a false confession from a stranger to save Becca.
And now he was going to get that confession from Becca instead.
They would save the resistance together.
“Rebecca Dalcourt.” His face betrayed nothing. His voice and his eyes were as cold as a stranger’s. “I hear you have information for me.”
* * *
“Becca?”
The voice sliced through Becca’s ears, dragging her up out of darkness. A low whimper escaped her throat. No. No more. Please.
“Becca, can you hear me?”
She curled into a ball, arms and legs pulled tight against her chest, as she waited for the next blow.
Something wasn’t right.
She had moved. How had she…