by Joe Hart
They jog into the street and head for the next yard that’s fenced in, a low door halfway down the barricade promising access. Three steps from the edge of the road she falters.
Something is wrong.
“Stop!” A man steps out from behind a large, knurled oak near the corner, his rifle trained on them.
Her muscles tense, eyes flitting up the street, searching for an escape, but the soldier is closing on them fast.
“Don’t move! Get down on your knees.”
Her mind whirs with thoughts. Rush him? Run opposite directions?
The man stops several steps from them, rifle barrel centering first on her, then Lee. He’s young, perhaps only five years older than either of them. His eyes are wide and a bright blue that contrasts with his dark jacket. A layer of whiskers covers his cheeks in sparse patches, and he’s trembling, the gun shaking in hands that are very white.
“I said get on your knees!” he yells, raising the rifle to his shoulder.
“Let us go,” Zoey says, surprising herself by how even her voice is. It still hurts to speak but the tattered sound is gone from her words. “Please. Pretend you didn’t see us.”
“On your knees.” A plea.
“Okay.” She holds out her hands and slowly kneels.
“Zoey . . .” Lee says.
“Do what he says.”
The man swallows and reaches into a pocket, drawing out a small black radio that he holds to his mouth.
“Please,” Zoey says again. “Don’t. They tortured us on the ship. Please don’t send us back.”
The guard studies her, blinking as his lips work silently. She puts as much feeling into her gaze as she can, beseeching him.
He hesitates a moment longer before pushing the button on the radio. “I’ve got them. We’re at the corner of”—he looks at the sign leaning heavily into the street nearby—“Thirteenth and West Dravus.” There is a snap of static before an answer comes from the speaker.
“Good work. Hold them there. We’re inbound.”
Zoey feels her head cock to the side. That voice.
The soldier swallows loudly again and takes a step away from them, glancing up and down the nearest street. Several motors rumble, their acceleration audible from the direction of the city.
“You can still let us go,” Zoey says quietly. “Bloody your lip and say we overpowered you.”
He brings his gaze back to her and she sees that he is nearly crying. “I’m sorry. They’ll kill me.”
“They’re going to kill us,” Lee says, standing.
“Get down!”
“Lee,” she says, reaching for him. But he’s moving toward the soldier with steady steps.
“You have no right to hold us. We’re leaving.”
“Get down!” the man screams, and now there is desperation in his voice. Zoey stares at his trigger finger.
Tightening.
Tightening.
“Lee, stop!” she yells, and he does.
A teardrop rolls down the soldier’s face and he motions at the ground. “On your knees.” Lee hesitates before taking a step back and lowering himself beside her.
The sound of engines is louder.
Closer.
“You’re never going to forget this,” she says. “This moment.”
“Shut up.”
“You’ll always wonder if you did the right thing.”
“Shut up!”
“I know because I’ve been wrong before. And it never goes away.”
The soldier bares his teeth even as another teardrop courses down his face. He stares into her eyes and she holds his gaze.
With a quick movement, almost like tearing a bandage away from a drying wound, he holds out his rifle to Lee. “Knock me out. It’s the only way they’ll believe me.”
Lee glances at Zoey as they rise. He takes the rifle from the guard who turns partially away from them. Zoey steps close to him, grasping his hand. It’s so cold.
“Thank you,” she says, and he jerks a nod but doesn’t look at either of them. She steps back as Lee hefts the rifle, and without warning snaps the stock across the soldier’s temple.
He folds like an empty suit of clothes.
“Come on,” Lee says, grasping her hand. She has time to spare the soldier one last look before they’re running again.
The steady rasp of tires comes from the south even as headlights appear from the opposite direction. Zoey jerks Lee into the nearest yard and they streak to the rear of the property, fighting through a tangle of bare hedges.
An alleyway runs the length of several houses and they race down it, catching a glimpse of two vehicles blasting by on the main road to their left.
They cross two more intersecting streets before the smell of open water pervades the air. Ahead, the alley ends and they jog onto a path looping away into a thick stand of trees. The path leads them through narrow and wide openings in the forest, all the while the first impressions of water can be seen ahead in the gaps between trees. When they finally stop to catch their breath they are at an opening leading up to a street attached to a massive bridge spanning a width of water perhaps two hundred yards wide.
Zoey searches the bridge’s length but sees no movement. No trucks. No men.
From several blocks behind them comes a yell. They must’ve found their unconscious savior.
“Do we swim or chance the bridge?” she asks, still straining for air.
“Don’t know. They might’ve abandoned the post to come for us. How long do you think it will take to swim the channel?”
“Too long. They’ll be back by then. Go.”
They break cover and jog up the incline to the bridge’s entrance. The road to their left curves away around the bend of trees. The bridge is empty.
They barely hesitate, their strides matching again, each second a breath, each second putting more distance between them and the city. She can make out a hill peppered with homes and buildings across the bridge, a thousand places to hide, a million directions to go. If they can only get across the bridge, they’ll be safe.
A large vehicle appears ahead just as the rumble of engines sounds behind them.
Zoey falters and Lee slows as well.
They are halfway across the bridge, equal distance in either direction to cover.
“Zoey?” Lee says.
She looks over the side of the bridge, but the drop is too great; there’s no way they would land uninjured or unnoticed.
“Zoey? What do we do?” Lee holds the rifle the best he can with the limitations of the shackles, centering it on the nearing truck. Because it has to be a truck, it’s too large—
She blinks.
For some reason the shape of the vehicle reminds her of the voice on the soldier’s radio.
Familiar.
Three vehicles come into view around the bend behind them.
A guttural purr grows as the closer vehicle looms, its form becoming distinct.
Zoey grabs Lee’s arm and runs forward, eyes traveling over her shoulder at the convoy that is only blocks behind them. The other vehicle swings sideways and shrieks to a stop in the middle of the bridge.
The ASV idles as the side door opens revealing Tia, who steps onto the street, a rifle tucked to her shoulder. “Get in.”
Zoey grasps Lee’s arm and drags him forward as Tia opens fire.
Disbelief washes over her as she climbs onto the rear bench, Ian holding her arm as Newton and Nell drag Lee away from the door. Merrill turns partially in the driver’s seat and they lock eyes.
There is everything in his gaze.
Anger.
Terror.
Panic.
Relief.
And love. Mostly love.
“You just had to see the ocean, didn’t you?” he says before facing the windshield again.
Tia yanks the door shut as a hail of bullets ping off the reinforced steel.
Then they’re moving, backing up before turning in the direction they arrived. Zoey catche
s a glimpse of one truck barreling down on them while another rolls toward the steep drop beside the bridge and plunges over. The last is nowhere to be seen.
Bullets chatter against the ASV as Merrill begins to accelerate.
“They’re going to catch us,” Tia says.
“Counting on it,” Merrill says. “Everyone grab on to something!”
Zoey has a split second to grip the bench she’s sitting on before the ASV shudders almost to a halt.
An eerily still heartbeat passes.
The sound of rending metal fills the cab and they’re all shoved backward.
She loses her hold on the bench and tumbles into Ian who falls against Lee. The rear end of the vehicle is suddenly elevated. Merrill guns the engine and everything levels out with a bone-jarring bang.
Then they’re cruising forward, accelerating away through quiet streets. Merrill glances into one of the large side mirrors. “They’re done. Front end’s smashed to shit.”
“They shouldn’t have tailgated us,” Tia says, checking the load on her rifle.
Zoey rearranges herself on the bench and looks around, absorbing what just happened. “How?” she manages as Ian wraps her hand in his callused palms.
“Your false trail in the snow only threw us off for about a day,” Merrill says, glancing over his shoulder. “I knew where you were headed. You’re so damned stubborn there’s only one place you could’ve gone.”
“When did you get here?”
“Two days ago,” Tia says. “It was clear right away that something was off, so after a little reconnaissance we decided to hang back and observe.”
“We were also able to monitor their radio channels,” Merrill says, tapping the dash of the ASV. “Your capture was all over the airwaves yesterday. We took a position up the shore to watch the ship since we knew that’s where they took the two of you. We were still formulating a plan when Tia spotted your escape this morning through the binoculars. After that we moved in closer in the hopes of finding you.”
“It was you on the radio,” she says, a smile tugging at her lips. “You answered the soldier that captured us.”
“Did I sound official?”
She laughs. “Yes.”
“Good.”
“Where are the others?”
“We left them at a house about an hour away. They’re safe,” Merrill says.
“I can’t believe you came for us. I can’t believe you’re here.”
“And I can’t believe you’re stupid enough to have gone to the last major city in the continental United States,” Tia says. “I’d ask what the hell were you thinking but I know you weren’t.”
“I had to know. For sure. And”—she gazes around at them, her throat tightening—“I didn’t want anything to happen to you because of me. Like Eli,” she says, her voice failing her at the mention of his name.
Ian squeezes her hand. “You know that we wouldn’t forsake you. Everyone knew the risks when we accepted you and the other women into our group. I told you before, once we get an idea in our heads it doesn’t go away.”
Her vision blurs but she blinks away the tears. “Thank you. Thank you for coming for us.”
“Yes, thank you,” Lee echoes and glances at Nell. “I’m sorry, I don’t know you. I’m Lee.” He holds out his hand, which Nell takes.
“Nell Carroll. I’m Rita’s mother,” she adds, and Zoey can’t help but smile as Lee does a double take.
“Rita’s m-mother? But how . . .” He looks to Zoey, eyes wide.
She leans back into the bench, its embrace more comfortable than anything she can recall. “Later,” she says, and the steady rumble of the engine carrying them away from the city draws her eyes closed.
35
Hiraku hurries down the ship’s hall, two of his men trailing closely behind.
He rubs gritted sleep from one eye and tries to calm the growing unease in the back of his mind. Zoey and Lee escaped. That much was clear from the jumbled message one of the men behind him had given. Shortly before dawn. Not much else was known yet.
When he’d asked for Shirou the men had said his quarters were empty.
That’s when the worry started to gnaw at him.
They take a shortcut through the galley before emptying out into another hall that leads to a set of stairs.
Down.
Down.
Down.
At the bottom of the last flight his feet splash in water. The entire floor is covered in a thin layer of liquid. Ahead, a group of men stand outside the rooms they’ve used for interrogation before. He hates this part of the ship.
As he strides forward, the men standing in a circle begin to part. There is something on the floor in their center, outside the smaller of the two rooms. The dark shock of hair belonging to one of their physicians is visible, but what he bends over is only partially clear.
“What happened?” he says, as he nears the group, and the ones who hadn’t seen him approaching flinch. The physician, whose name he can’t remember at the moment, turns his head and slowly rises, moving enough for Hiraku to see.
Shirou’s pale face turned to the ceiling. Eyes open and staring at nothing. His clothes sodden, and the water all around him.
Hiraku’s breath catches. It’s like he’s walked into a wall. He falters, stopping as the sight of his oldest friend’s body sets in.
This is my fault.
The men look at him, and the quiet is as thick and tangible as a soaking wool blanket. Soaking with water. His feet are wet with cool water.
And he can’t break his gaze from Shirou’s dead eyes.
“What happened to him?” he hears someone say, and it is only when the physician begins talking that he realizes he asked the question.
“He drowned. When the men found him the smaller room was full of water and locked. There was nothing to be done.”
Hiraku tries to get himself to look away from Shirou, to examine the situation, determine how Zoey and Lee escaped the rooms, but the gears within the leadership part of his mind strip and spin, freewheeling, as he realizes he will never be able to speak to Shirou again.
“Leave us,” he manages after a moment. The men look to one another but none of them move. “Leave us!” he screams, and before the sound of his voice has faded they disappear, hurrying away down the corridor and up the stairs.
Steel creaks around him. Water sloshes against the walls. One of the pipes overhead gurgles faintly.
Hiraku kneels, cold water saturating the knees of his pants. He reaches down and lifts Shirou’s head and shoulders off the floor, letting him rest against his thigh. His skin is freezing and he feels heavy. Not for the first time Hiraku wonders if the dead weigh more, but he already knows the answer.
A tremor runs through his chest and shoulders, seeping up into his throat until it bleeds from him in a long moan.
“I’m sorry. I failed you. I—” But there is nothing more. Nothing beyond the truth of what he spoke. If he had never been exposed to the radiation, if Jiaying had never left him, never had the abortion, if the Dearth . . . But there is no end to the regret. He could go further and further back, blaming himself and everything that happened.
It is all wrong. This should never have happened.
None of it.
Even as he registers the tears that drip continuously from his chin onto Shirou’s pale face, heat begins to flow across his skin.
White-hot, prickling heat.
He swallows the knot in his throat and gently lays his friend down. He places his fingers against Shirou’s eyelids, drawing them shut, but they come partially open, forever staring at whatever arrives when life slips away.
Hiraku rises, bypassing the room where Lee was being held. There is only the rage now, the burning across his skin that he hasn’t felt this strong since—
—he followed him to the store while it was raining. He had taken to drinking in his car outside their new house after he’d seen the announcement on every social med
ia site Jiaying used. The declarations of “It’s a boy!” along with the ultrasound pictures had split him in half, one part brimming with jealousy and envy of the man he watched strolling with his ex-wife through the parks, as he used to do. The other part was blackened by the rage that left him sweating and breathless at times. And the night that it was raining the half that was purely rage was in complete control. He had followed him to the store and—
Hiraku finds himself passing two men waiting at the head of the stairs one level up. They straighten as he moves by, not pausing as he says, “Take care of him.” Then he is moving to the next stairway and climbs—
—out of his car as the man exited the store, a paper sack clutched close to his chest, trying to shield it from the pounding rain. Perhaps a late-night snack for Jiaying, some craving she demanded due to the pregnancy. Hiraku moved forward, blocking the man’s way to his own car, and saw a flicker of alarm on his features before recognition and surprise took its place in the dim—
Morning light streaming through several windows to his right as he turns away from them, away from several sets of watching eyes, into the hall leading to his quarters. Then he is inside, the door shut behind him, but he can still feel the water on Shirou’s skin, can still feel it soaking through his—
—clothes as the rain pounded down on them. There were flecks of moisture on the man’s glasses and a soft look about his mouth, as if he were used to keeping it shut while others told him what they wanted. They stood absolutely still for a moment, eyes locked on one another until a flicker of lightning lit the empty parking lot, and Hiraku launched himself—
Forward and puts his fist through the cabinet beside his bed.
Wood splinters and—
—teeth broke against his knuckles.
He throws a chair and its legs snap, pieces flying as—
—his ex-wife’s new husband crumpled to the wet cement, blood streaming from his face. And Hiraku wound back a foot and kicked him, again and again and again, all of the rage boiling out through him.
The bedside table snaps beneath his foot and he kicks it against the wall, battering it into—
—a pulp that he couldn’t recognize anymore. And the rain fell around them, mixing with the river of blood that flowed steadily away toward the—