Three (Article 5 #3)(102)

My mind struggled to make sense of what I was seeing. Billy was just here, just helping to free the others. He’d found the keys. He’d let me out of my cell. He could not be gone.

“Billy!” I shouted.

Chase’s arms surrounded my waist and hoisted me to a stand.

“Can’t say I ever thought I’d see you two…” Wallace trailed off as he saw the boy lying on the ground.

He crouched, and laid two fingers aside Billy’s neck. His head fell forward.

“All right, kid,” he said. “You did real good back there.” He closed Billy’s eyes. “Real good.”

The sob in my throat choked out. The tears stung my eyes, but cleared them. Cleared away all the distractions, all the departures from the one road we should have been following the whole time. The road that led us away from this.

I looked at Chase and knew he felt the same.

“We need to get out of here,” I said.

As if nothing else in the world mattered, Wallace carefully removed the boy’s MM jacket, button by button, and gently placed it aside. I said his name, I begged him to come, but he acted as if he couldn’t hear me.

The resistance leader who we thought had died on the rooftop of the Wayland Inn folded Billy’s hands over his chest.

“That’s my boy,” he said. He straightened Billy’s undershirt. “That’s my boy,” he said again.

An outcry came from the open side of the base, and we turned just in time to see the men and women, dressed in civilian clothing, cresting the wreckage. The MM regrouped, and orders to stand and fight brought on a hailstorm of bullets.

Chase and I dove behind the stage, hearing the ping of bullets slap against its metal underbelly.

Wallace stood slowly, the MM gun from Billy’s belt in his hand. He didn’t seek cover as the bullets flew.

“We did it,” he said, staring blankly into the battle.

Wallace was right. We had done it. Jesse had killed the Chief of Reformation, Three had broken into the Charlotte base. It should have felt like victory, but all I felt was loss and the gallop of my heartbeat repeating the same urgent message: get out, get out, get out.

I took one final look at Billy, and Wallace walking calmly to join Three as they attacked the remainder of the soldiers in the courtyard. Those in uniforms fell around us, fell from the high remaining floors that were still intact. Some surrendered and were taken prisoner. Some were not offered that option.

“Ember.” My name on Chase’s lips brought me back.

Now came the point of decision: to join Three’s ranks and destroy the MM—to risk the chance at being destroyed ourselves—or to leave all of this devastation behind. Soon the choice would be made for us; a battle was underway and in a moment we were going to be caught in the middle of it.

“Follow me,” I said.

Keeping low, we picked our way through a path of debris greater than the wreckage we’d seen inside the Chicago tunnels. Away from the fighting. My chin lifted; I didn’t know if another bomb would come, but I wasn’t about to wait and find out.

The two of us raced through the exit, down the hallway where I’d walked with the girls, toward the parking lot. As we neared the door, the patter of gunfire had us taking cover against the wall.

The buzz of the lights flickered on and off, grating on my raw nerves. Two shots embedded into the wall above us, then a third. Over it all, the siren screamed, constant and demanding. Outside came a cry of victory from the men and women of Three.

“You hear that?” shouted Chase. “That’s the sound of you losing. If you don’t want to die today, I suggest you get out of here fast.”

A few seconds later we heard the clatter of retreating footsteps.

I kept close behind Chase as we exited the building. The parking lot lights had gone dark from the blast; some of the poles had been knocked over. Cars were crushed beneath them.

“There!” I pointed to the exit, but even as I spoke the terror punched me in the gut. The retreating MM troops had used this lot to regroup. A hundred or more soldiers gathered near the perimeter fence, their dark uniforms only degrees of shadow in the moonlight. They saw us at the same time we saw them, and instantly raised their weapons.

“Get back!” Chase shouted. We tried to return to the building, but now the retreating troops were pouring from the exit. When they saw their fellow soldiers they skidded to a halt, making one last play against the rebels fighting their way through the building.

We were caught in the middle.

“Under the car!” Grabbing Chase’s sleeve, I dove behind the nearest van, furious at myself for not having grabbed a weapon from one of the fallen soldiers within the courtyard.

The sound of gunfire came from all sides. The interior of the base was on fire now and the smoke was tinged with electricity and something sweet. To the left of the base came the sounds of battle—the scrape of metal and a chorus of angry voices, yelling.

“The prison,” said Chase, a grim look on his face.

Bullets sprayed around my feet and I tucked them close to my body, shaking with adrenaline, with fear, with anger that we were so close to freedom only to be pinned in place as target practice.

“I love you,” I said to Chase.

He turned to me, a hard look on his face.

“Don’t you give up.” With that he stood, and disappeared around the corner of the van. I screamed as another shot embedded in the sliding door over my head. The MM had surrounded us. It was just a matter of time before we were discovered.