Burn (Pure #3)(66)

El Capitan wonders how long Bradwell is going to take. He seems pained. His whispers—El Capitan can’t make out the words—sound urgent. Is he praying to the saint to keep Pressia safe? Is he praying to be forgiven? That’s something that always comes up with religions, isn’t it?

El Capitan props his forearms up on his knees and clasps his hands together. He sits that way for a while before he realizes that his hands are linked almost like someone who’s praying. He closes his eyes, wondering if in a place like this, something might come to him.

He whispers, “Saint Wi.” He tries to imagine who she was. Did she help children? What were her miracles? He thinks of her face. He doesn’t have to look at her. Her face is locked in his mind—her way of gazing. She’s waiting patiently. For El Capitan? For him to say what he needs to say?

Say it, he hears the words in his head whisper. Say it.

He sees the face of someone he killed. And then another. He remembers driving that truck, making rounds, picking up kids he knew wouldn’t ever be soldiers—too sick, too weak, too fused and deformed. Say it. He sees a mangled arm. A festered leg. He sees the cage where he kept the ones who would never make it. He remembers the smell of death in that cage. Say it.

There was the time he took Pressia, just a fresh recruit herself then, out into the woods to play The Game—hunting down a sickly recruit. Ingership gave the order to have Pressia play The Game, but would Ingership have ever really known if El Capitan hadn’t gone through with it? No. He could’ve faked it. And then the boy, crawling through underbrush, got caught in one of El Capitan’s traps. The metal spokes drove into his ribs, punctured his chest. He begged for them to shoot him. Pressia couldn’t, but El Capitan could and did. It was easy.

So why does he see the boy’s face now, begging him to pull the trigger? Why does the pain of it dog him still?

He takes a breath. He feels sick. Say it. He gulps air.

He knows he should ask for forgiveness. The thought is there in his head.

Say it. Say it.

He opens his mouth, but instead of saying I’m sorry, he says, “We got to go.”

Bradwell lifts his head, turns, stares at him. “Give me a minute.”

“Okay, but that’s all—just a minute.” El Capitan gets to his feet, but his head doesn’t feel right. He lurches toward the statue of the saint, dizzy now. He presses his pale, scarred hands to the splintered Plexiglas, and lowers his head so that it touches the plastic too.

“You okay?” Bradwell asks.

El Capitan straightens up, rubs his face. “Fine,” he says. “We’re fine. Right, Helmud?”

“Right?” Helmud says.

And El Capitan turns and runs up the stone stairs, moves aside the piece of cast-iron gate, and steps into the dusty air. He breathes deeply. He looks up and down the streets. He remembers running through these streets—in Death Sprees. He leans over and spits on the ground.

“Right?” Helmud asks again.

“Not right,” El Capitan says. “Not right at all.” He imagines Pressia making her way to the Dome. She’s the one who has hope, who still believes in Partridge. He’s glad she’s free of them. “She’s out there trying to make something right. And you and me, Helmud? What should we do? What’s the point of the two of us on this earth? You tell me that.”

“You tell me,” Helmud says.

Bradwell climbs up the steps, covers the opening again, and says, “I’m going after her.”

El Capitan feels a spike of jealousy. He wants to tackle Bradwell and beat his head with a rock. That’s how he would have handled something like this—before he met Pressia. “Let her go.”

“No. I have to find her—not to protect her. I have to tell her something.”

El Capitan knows that he loves her, that he’s figured that this might be his last chance to tell her the truth. Bringing down the Dome will likely lead to something like war. God, it would feel good to grind Bradwell’s face into the ground, but this is beyond El Capitan. He has to bow out. He’s got no shot at love. He says, “You’ll go this one alone.”

“I know the ending, Cap.”

“What ending?”

“My own.”

“How does it turn out?”

“It could be better, but I have to see it through.”

“I guess that’s all we can do—see it through.”

“See it through,” Helmud says.

“Will we meet up?” El Capitan says.

“We can meet at the old vault. Should be safe and dry there.”

“The bank?”

“What’s left of it.” Bradwell is about to go, but then he turns back. “What happened to you in there?”

“In there?” Helmud says, reaching around and tapping El Capitan’s chest.

El Capitan doesn’t know, so he doesn’t answer. “Promise me you’ll really tell her.” His chest burns. “Tell her the whole truth. Whatever it is. She deserves that much.”





PARTRIDGE





PROMISE




The wedding plans come at him nonstop. Iralene insists that he be involved. “You have to be emotionally invested in this,” she whispers, “or they’ll be able to tell. They’ll know! The whole thing could backfire!”