Article 5 (Article 5 #1)(54)

“The worst thing you can think of.” His voice was very low. “It might be worthwhile to consider the … reality of the situation.”

I slammed on the brakes; the inertia after so long in motion made my head spin.

“Worthwhile?”

He turned back to face me, eyes guarded and unreadable. His jaw twitched ever so slightly.

“Worthwhile?” I shouted at him.

“Keep it down,” he warned.

“You…” My voice shook. My whole body shook. The simmer had jolted back up into an overflowing boil. “I need your help, as much as I hate to admit it. You say jump and I’ll jump. You say run and I’ll run. Only because you know things I don’t have the time to learn right now. But you will not tell me what is worthwhile to think about when we are talking about my mother! Not a minute goes by that I don’t consider the reality of this situation!”

He stepped forward, grabbed my shoulder, and leaned close to my face. When he spoke his voice was grounded by a very controlled fury.

“Good. But does it ever occur to you that I don’t need you? That if I’m caught, I’ll be lucky to die as fast as that poor bastard back there? Here’s my reality: There’s no going back. I am risking my life to get you safe, and as long as I live, I’ll be hunted for it.”

I felt all the remaining blood drain from my face. He released me abruptly, as though he’d just realized he was clutching my arm. I focused on his Adam’s apple. It bobbed heavily as he tried to swallow.

The shame suffocated my anger. Hot, ugly, gut-wrenching shame. I could have melted from it, but with his eyes locked on mine, I found myself unable to look away.

“I-I haven’t forgotten how dangerous this is for you,” I said carefully, trying to control the hitch in my voice.

He shrugged. I wasn’t sure whether he was dismissing my apology or the worth of his own life. Either way, it made me feel worse.

As cruel as his tone had been, the earlier appraisal of his fate had been the devastating truth. That I had so much influence over someone else’s mortality seemed impossible; I couldn’t conceive of it. So, awkwardly, I motioned us back in the direction we had been heading.

Time was ticking.

*



WE walked all night and then through most of the next day, taking breaks only when we had to. He caught me more than once startling at shadows, and at times I could see his eyes darken as some terrible memory consumed him. We didn’t speak of our mutual vigilance. When the pressure got too tense, we moved out.

It was hard hiking. No trails had been carved through these hills, and when we weren’t shoving aside swollen brush, we were wading across streams or slopping through the mud. As the adrenaline wore off, our bodies stiffened and slowed like machines without oil.

We didn’t talk about what had happened at the house or what we had both said afterward. These things were tucked away in a locked box in the recesses of my mind. Instead I became consumed by thoughts of my mother’s safety, thoughts that brought me to the edge of hysteria before the fatigue finally numbed my mind.

As dusk descended, Chase finally forced us to stop. We were both stumbling regularly now, and getting clumsy.

“No one’s following. We’re making camp here.” His tone was so firm and so exhausted I knew I would lose any argument otherwise.

We were in a small clearing, a lopsided circle lined by pine trees. The ground was relatively flat and not too rocky. Chase checked our perimeter for safety and escape routes, then went to work connecting the curved aluminum poles of the tent he had stolen.

When I grabbed the pack to take out the food, he quickly stopped his task to retrieve the supplies himself. I wondered what he was hiding, but was too tired to care. I used the last of the smashed bread to make sandwiches, and inventoried our supplies. We still had two packages of freeze-dried soup and eight FBR-packaged granola bars left, but they wouldn’t last long. We were going to have to find some food fast.

“Chase?” I asked after a while. My thoughts had returned to the reformatory.

“Yeah.”

“If a guard at rehab was, um … caught … with a resident … do you think he’d be executed, too?” I hoped he understood what I meant, because I didn’t really want to go into a whole twisted explanation of what had happened.

Chase began stuffing the long pole into the nylon loops with fervor. I thought his face had darkened some, but maybe it was just the low light.

“Probably not. He wasn’t committing treason. He’ll probably be court-marshaled. Dishonorably discharged. It’s not common, but it happens.”

My face rose. I felt a little better at this news. Freedom from the FBR was what Sean and Rebecca had wanted.

“It’s not a good thing,” Chase added, seeing my face. “The civilian sector blacklists dishonorably discharged soldiers from everything. Getting a job, buying a house, applying for public assistance. Anything on the books. He’ll be held in contempt if he’s caught collecting pay.”

“But how’s he supposed to live?”

“He’s not. That’s the point.”

My shoulders slumped. Sean would still be a soldier, conflicted as long as he loved his Becca, but safe, if it hadn’t been for me.

Chase had stopped and was staring at me. “You seem pretty concerned about him,” he blurted.