Taking a deep breath, I hung from the branch for a moment and then let go.
Time seemed to slow as I was falling. The wind whistled past, a scream in my ears, and the world turned into a blur of color. And then I was on the ground, my feet impacting the soft earth for a split second before I rolled to a stop.
I stood and brushed myself off, tilting my head to look up at Luz. She stared down at me with eyes as round as dinner plates.
“I don’t think I can do that,” she said, shaking her head side to side.
“Sure you can. It’s not as far as it looks from up there. See? Still in one piece.” Gesturing to my fully intact body, I smiled up at her and waved her forward. “It’ll be fine. Just scoot out a little more-whoa, whoa-wait,” I yelled. Instead of scooting on her bottom as I had, for some reason Luz had decided to stand up and walk farther out on the branch.
One of her feet slipped. She gasped in alarm and tried to grab onto some- thing with her hands but found nothing but air around her. Lunging forward in- stinctively, I tried to break her fall.
It was too late.
She plummeted in free fall before landing with a thud-followed by a sharp crack that reverberated through my brain.
Luz fell over hard on her side, screaming in pain.
I rushed over and knelt beside her as she clutched her leg in agony. It was bent at an odd angle – this was very bad. I’d never seen one before, but I had no doubt she’d suffered a compound fracture to her lower leg.
There was no way she’d be able to walk, much less run a quarter mile to where the car was waiting.
We were both going to be arrested. She might even die. Didn’t compound fractures cause internal bleeding?
Tears streamed down her face as I tried my best to comfort her while my mind scrambled for the fastest way to get her help. We didn’t have our holoconnects with us, having followed Heath’s instructions to leave them behind at Ketta’s house.
I pressed a kiss to Luz’s cold, sweating forehead. “I’m going to get you some- one to help you. I’ll run to the East gate and tell the soldiers where you are. I’ll be right back-if they let me come with them and don’t throw me directly into jail.”
Scrambling to my feet, I turned to go, but Luz’s cry stopped me. “No-you can’t.”
I turned back to her. “I won’t be long, I promise. I’ll just follow the fence. We’re not that far from the gate.”
“No. I mean you can’t. The whole plan will be ruined. None of us will make it to the Haven.”
“That doesn’t matter anymore. Your leg-“
She cut me off, grabbing my ankle and gripping it fiercely. “It does! It matters more than my leg, more than anything. You have to go, Mireya. You have to find the others and make sure they made it to the getaway car and get them out of this place.”
“But I can’t leave you. You could die.”
Tears poured down my face, and terror pulsed through my body. It wasn’t fear of being caught but of losing my friend-and being the cause of her death with my stupid tree-climbing plan.
“I won’t die. I’m sure someone heard me scream. The soldiers will probably be here any second. And I’m about to scream again. Believe me, they’ll find me.”
Her eyes pleaded with me. “You have to go before they get here. Ketta and Jolie won’t make it without you. You have experiences and memories they don’t. They need you. We all need you to tell the world about us-to tell people we’re human. And I’ll tell our friends here. I’ll help them.”
“But they’ll dope you back up again with red pills,” I argued. “You won’t remember.”
“I won’t let on that I’ve changed,” she reasoned. “I’ll just say I decided to climb the tree because I wanted to see a bird’s nest. Even if they did drug me, I’ll be drinking the water. I’ll remember again. And I’ll never forget that you tried to help us.”
Dropping to my knees, I hugged her. “I don’t want to leave you behind.”
She pushed at me, urging me to get back to my feet. “And I don’t want to go back to being numb and ignorant. I don’t want to go back to living a lie. The world needs to know what’s happening, Mireya. You can convince them like you convinced us. Now go. You have to make it to the Haven-for me. For all of us.” And then she started screaming at the top of her lungs. “Help! I need help. I fell, and I’m hurt.”
I pushed to my feet and stumbled a bit over the first steps as I looked back at Luz. Her face was contorted in pain, but her eyes had a fierce determination like she was made of steel instead of fragile bone.
My heart ached at the thought of leaving her there, injured and alone. But she was right. The others were waiting at the car, and they needed me to help them find the Haven.
If I didn’t go now, it would never happen.
She mouthed the word, “Run” before letting out another ear-splitting scream. Apparently it did the trick. I heard the sound of voices and pounding footsteps on the other side of the fence.
“We’re here,” someone yelled. “How’d you get over there, kid?”
Luz only cried louder, buying me time to escape.
It took every ounce of strength I possessed not to turn around and go back for her, but I knew deep down that would be a death sentence for all of us.
So I took off, following the road away from the base and keeping just inside the tree line to avoid being spotted by any passing vehicles—or the search team I knew would be coming after me and the others eventually.
Weeping as I ran, I made my way to the designated meeting spot, a grove of trees just beyond the s-curve in the road leading to and from the base. As I got near it, I could see the silhouette of a small work truck, engine idling, waiting for me.
It was an old, beat-up thing, but it was our ticket out of there. I only prayed my friends had made it there and were waiting for me inside it.
Before I reached the truck, the driver’s side door opened, and Syd got
out. At least, I assumed it was Syd.
I had only the most shadowy memory of him, but this man’s appearance fit -thin, middle-aged and balding with bushy dark brows and tan skin.
He rushed toward the back of the truck, meeting me there and scanning the area behind me.
“Are we waiting for one more?”
I shook my head, still struggling for breath.
“No,” I wheezed. “She’s not coming. Did my other friends make it here? There were two of them.”
Syd gave me a quick nod. “Both inside. I didn’t think you were going to make it, Reya, but I’m glad you did. Heath woulda killed me if I left without you. Okay, we gotta move fast. We’re behind schedule, and it won’t be long before the sirens go off at the base. Once that happens, these woods’ll be crawling with soldiers. Turn around.”
“What?”
“I’ve gotta take out your chip.”
He lifted one hand, which contained an ominous-looking device. “You’ve been through this before, remember?”
“No… oh wait.”
As soon as he said it, I did have a foggy recollection of a seedy looking hotel, a little boy jumping on the bed, and Heath warning me there might be blood when he… removed my chip.
Instinctively I clasped the back of my neck, feeling for any sort of bump or ridge indicating its location. I felt nothing, but I followed Syd’s instruction and turned, lifting my hair and giving him access to my nape.
He worked quickly. A few beeping noises, a sharp pinch, and then he was rubbing incision sealant over the wound.
“Okay all set.” Syd drew an arm back then whipped it forward. The tiny tracking device sailed into the woods where I heard it strike a tree.
“Let me see your hand now.”
I held both hands out to him, and he turned the right one palm up, applying the chip remover to it, too.
“Gotta get that nano-beamer out-it’s Gideon tech. Never know if they might be able to use it to trace you.”
The sting this time was not as painful but still less than pleasant. Syd flicked the eyelash-sized device onto the road and stomped it under the heel of his boot. Then he turned and headed for the truck.
“Already did the other girls’ chips. Time to go,” he said and swung open the back doors.
I dove inside, panting and sweating from the run and from the adrenaline of the painful extractions. Once he closed the doors again it was dark, but a small amount of daylight filtered in from a sliding window between the cargo area and the driver’s compartment.
Ketta and Jolie were there, and they appeared to be unscathed. They stared at me wide-eyed.
“Are you okay?” Ketta asked.
At the same time, Jolie asked, “Where’s Luz?”
The window slid open noisily. Syd peered through it. “Stay quiet till we get out of the area and onto the open highway just in case they’re using voice scanners to try and locate you.”
The window shut again, the driver peeled out, and we were off, leaving the base and all our friends there-behind.
Ketta, Jolie, and I hugged noiselessly then crouched together in the truck’s cargo area atop the blankets and sleeping bags Syd had spread out on its floor. Our hands were locked, and we leaned into each other for support, heeding Syd’s warning not to talk.
With each passing mile, the silence grew more deafening. I knew they were waiting for me to explain what had happened to Luz.
What was I going to say? It felt like if I opened my mouth, crying is all that would come out.
Eventually, the road beneath us smoothed out, and the ride became quieter. Syd opened the window again.
“Okay coast is clear, ladies. Hey, nobody brought a holoconn or anything else electronic, right?”
We all confirmed we’d left our devices and smart clothing at home.
“Good. Okay then,” he said. “Should be about four or five hours till we get to the state park. Just FYI, not gonna be making any bathroom stops or anything – too much risk. If you’ve gotta go, I put a portable toilet back there. Plenty of food and water in your packs. Just knock on the window if you need anything.”
We thanked him and then sat, looking at each other, each probably waiting for the other to speak first.
“Is she… dead?” Ketta finally whispered.
“No. No, she’s alive, but she’s hurt.”
“What happened?” Jolie demanded.
I did cry, but I also managed to spill out the whole terrible story of Luz’s injury, how she had been too hurt to run but refused to let me stay and help her, how she’d distracted the soldiers and planned to lie to them for as long as she could to give us time and distance.
“She sacrificed herself so that we could escape,” I said, choking up again. Ketta shook her head in disbelief as Jolie’s eyes filled with tears.
“Do you think she’ll be okay?” Jolie asked softly.
“I don’t know.” I said honestly. “I think so. I mean, they can totally save her life, which is more than we could do for her. Even if she’d been able to get to the car with me, she’d have bled to death long before we made it to the Haven. But Dr. Rex can re-set her leg-or give her a new one if it’s too damaged to fix.” I was overcome with sadness and regret. What else would Dr. Rex reset? Would he kill her and autopsy her brain to look for the kind of anomalies he said my rebellious brain demonstrated?
In my absence would she become his new favorite guinea pig?
“It’s my fault. This whole thing was a bad idea,” I said.
Ketta put her arm around me. “And staying there to get brainwashed again -or recycled-was a better idea? No, Mireya, you did the right thing telling us and trying to save us all. And I know Luz can do it—she’ll talk to the others and tell them what’s really going on. She got the green pills into the water supply, didn’t she? She’s a badass.”
I nodded vigorously, gripping Ketta’s hand and the one Jolie offered.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen next,” she said. “But I do know this- leaving was the right thing to do. Thanks to Luz’s courage and quick thinking, we got out of there-and now the best thing we can do for her and the others is find the Haven and talk to the Gebbies there. Maybe they can help us set our friends free—or at least tell us how to do it. They escaped from their own bases, didn’t they?”
“That’s true,” Ketta said. “If they really are like us, they’re bound to want to help us.”
For the next several miles we were all quiet as we thought about the im- mense sacrifice Luz had made for us.
And wondered what waited for us at the end of this road.
