Breaking Point (Article 5 #2)(84)

The main tunnel was mostly empty, but I could see lights down the way where the train car with the medical supplies still stood. My eyes landed on someone thick, muscular: Truck.

I blinked, and kept moving toward them, pushing the St. Michael medallion that had saved my life into my pocket.

Truck was holding someone around the waist, struggling to contain him while his arms flailed. I recognized Sean off to the side. He looked so tired; his hands were on the knees of his dust-skinned pants and he was shaking his head.

And there, the person Truck was fighting. Chase.

Truck was hauling him away from the wreckage: the passage where the shower bags had hung had been consumed by a concrete avalanche.

“She’s not there!” I heard Truck yell.

Chase twisted and elbowed him in the side of the head.

“Chase!” Sean shouted. But he wasn’t looking at Chase, he was looking at me.

Chase turned. Our gazes locked. The voices, the crackling of rock, it all faded.

I ran forward, sobbing, limping, latching my busted wrist to my chest. He took three steps toward me and stumbled to his knees, as if his legs had lost their strength.

I collapsed before him, inches away. Blood was smeared across his cheek. Dirt and what looked like oil marked his clothes and skin. Sweat carved jagged lines down the dust coating his jaw. Until that moment I hadn’t thought what I must have looked like. I didn’t much care.

His hand lifted slowly toward my cheek, his eyes deep and afraid, his cracked lips open slightly. I longed for that touch, I craved it, knowing it would make me real again instead of some player in my waking nightmare. But he didn’t touch me. He couldn’t. When I glanced to the side, his bloodied hand was trembling, and he lowered it, wiping it on his jeans.

I could almost hear his thoughts. Or maybe they were mine.

Please be real.

With no more hesitation I grabbed that hand and kissed his palm and watched it dampen and fill with my tears. A strangled sob came from his throat, and then he grabbed me firmly by the waist and crushed me into his body so hard I gasped. Finally, finally I was back, locked within his sheltering arms, hidden within his bones.

“I thought you were dead.” His voice broke.

I closed my eyes for a moment, thankful to be alive.

“I saw my mom,” I whispered. “Maybe I was dead.”

His chest rumbled with a short, wet chuckle. “How did she look?”

“She looked like my mom,” I said with a smile. “You know, short hair. Big eyes. Little.” It was the same literal translation he’d once given me when I asked the same question. “I thought you went to the meeting.”

His breath whistled through his teeth. “I did,” he said, his voice still unsteady. “But you weren’t there. I ran into Sean on the way back. He said he’d seen you at sick bay.”

A sudden wave of drowsiness crashed over me. “I think my wrist might be broken.”

He jerked me back immediately, nearly giving me whiplash, and then cradled my arm with the gentleness that only a big person can summon. Sean crouched beside us.

“We ended hide-and-seek an hour ago,” he said. “Maybe you missed it.”

A smile cracked my lips.

He grinned reluctantly. “Glad you’re not dead.”

“Me, too.”

“Get the medic.” At Chase’s order, Sean rose and darted away.

“What happened?” I rasped.

He’d begun a full inspection, feeling my arms, forcing me to sit back, and then lifting my pant legs and cringing at the bloody bruises on my shins. He shifted to feel his way down my back. Any other time I might have laughed at the diligent expression on his face.

“Bombs,” he muttered. “I’m starting to feel unwelcome.”

Once was enough, but Chase had been here during the War, too, when the Insurgents had flattened the city.

Truck took a knee, wiping his brow with the back of his hand. “Someone gave us up. They bombed it from topside, sent the ceiling down near the Loop. Got fifty people, maybe more. Mags was there.”

His once carefree face filled with sorrow. The number was staggering, and somehow unreal at the same time. So many people gone, so fast. And Mags, their leader, wiped away just like Wallace.

“We have to go,” I said, suddenly aware of the still-prevalent danger.

Chase’s expression was grim. “We’re blocked. There’s an exit near the barracks that lets out near the lake. Scouts are working on clearing it now.”

No way out. I shuddered.

“But what about the others?” I said. “I was trapped under a table, who knows how many people are still alive!”

“We’ll find them,” said Truck dutifully. “It’s not like the Bureau’s going to come down here anyway when the ceiling might buckle.”

In response to his words, I looked up, noting the way the dust sprinkled down like snow. We didn’t have much time.

The medic arrived a moment later, carrying a blue canvas FBR bag over one shoulder. He looked flustered.

“Thought you were toast,” he said. He felt around the back of my head and I hissed as a new bright pain ricocheted behind my brows.

“Keep the wound clean,” he said. “Let’s see that wrist.”

I held it out, and Chase’s jaw tightened.