“Still sleeping,” I say. “But she looks good. Her color is coming back.”
Koi nods. “She’ll wake up soon. I know she will.”
Sketch sighs, chugs down a metal cup of water. “I’m gonna kill her when she wakes up, for what she did.”
I glare at her.
“What?” she holds out her hands. “Too soon?”
I’m about to tell her that yes, it’s way too soon, when the room falls silent.
The General walks in. Everyone stands, salutes him.
Our table is the only one that doesn’t.
“At ease,” he says, and then he’s marching through the rows, heading for us. He stops just a few feet from me, arms crossed behind his back. “I’ve got good news,” he says.
We all whirl to look at him, questions in our eyes.
“She’s awake.”
CHAPTER 113
MEADOW
I am too weak to ask questions. Too weak to ask what’s going on, where we are, as voices carry, and faces of people I love flood the tiny room.
I let them come to me. Sketch curses at me, and calls me a ChumHead, and then she actually sheds a single tear.
Peri and Koi stay with me for a while, talking. We share stories about old times. We don’t talk about our father. I don’t tell them that, when I crossed over, I saw him. That he was safe and at peace, and that someday, he will be waiting for us, ready to welcome us with open arms when we reach the other side.
After a while, the Surgeon tells everyone I need to rest.
Peri kisses my forehead and leaves her doll at my side. Koi squeezes my hand and places a carving of our father on the pillow next to my head.
Everyone leaves, and I fall asleep.
Later, I wake up to the sound of snoring that isn’t my own. I roll over, see Zephyr lying beside me on the tiny cot. I close my eyes, lean close, and listen to his heartbeat until morning comes.
EPILOGUE
THREE WEEKS LATER
MEADOW
The ocean is endless, at night.
I stand on the deck, on the highest level of the tanker, watching the waves far below. They crash and groan against this great metal beast, whispering, calling to me, speaking in voices that only the sea understands.
Footsteps come up behind me. I tense, but then I remember.
I don’t have to be afraid anymore.
“Beautiful night, isn’t it?”
I turn to look at the General.
He is dressed in his usual uniform of army greens, pressed neat and clean. Even in this world, where we have almost nothing but what we need to stay alive, he manages to make sure he always looks in control.
“It’s like any other night,” I say. “Cold. Dark. Somewhere out there, people are still dying.”
“But not you,” he says. He stands next to me, leans against the railing. His breath comes out in a puff of white that is carried away by the wind.
“No,” I say. “Not me, and not my friends or family. Like you promised. I’m grateful to you, for saving us.”
I look down at the scar on my wrist, where the tiny tracker used to be. When my heartbeat stopped, it sent a signal to the New Militia.
I have hundreds of scars. But this one is is my favorite.
The General nods. “I’m a man of my word, and it seems that you are a woman of yours, too. Not many would have done what you did, Soldier.”
He doesn’t know that my mother’s secret is the reason why I died. Because she wanted me to stay in the Shallows, so badly, that she rigged the system to kill me if I ever left.
I should hate her.
But lately, all I can do is remember who she used to be. Remember that once, she was the woman who gave me my name, who gave me my brother and my sister. I can love the memory of her, if I leave out the darkest parts.
White flakes dance from the sky. Snow, something I had never heard about until I came here. It’s cold, and when it touches my nose, I shiver. I was not made for this place.
But I can’t go home.
I have no home.
Not anymore.
“What happens next?” I ask. Somewhere out there, my father’s ghost is watching me. I can feel him as surely as I can feel the wind, an ever-lingering presence that makes me feel safe. And there is always his voice, strong enough to carry me into each new day.
The General shifts beside me. “The old man you brought with you.”
“Tox,” I say. “What about him?”
“He seems to have made advances on finding this . . . Green.”
Zephyr and Sketch told me about it. Fantasies of a world where the darkness stays away, where people live in the constant light. I don’t know what I believe about it.
I know that the soldiers have hope in their eyes that I didn’t see before.
I know that we got new word on the Shallows just last week. The New Commander is Rhone, and he is the only reason why I was able to continue on into the Ridge, why they didn’t ship me back the second they discovered who I was. He told us the Initiative fell at the hands of Patients, and the ones who remain are being held captive. Soon, Commander Rhone will work with the New Militia to safely take down the walls.
The Ridge is a graveyard. The Initiative soldiers that weren’t killed in the fight scattered like ants across the country.
My father’s body was probably buried beneath the rubble, never to be seen or disturbed again. When the New Militia went back to find him, he was gone.
I know I should fear the reality that the Initiative might have found his body, that they might have gotten the Death Code from him.
But I don’t have room for fear anymore.
“The world is broken,” I say. “How can we even imagine trying to piece it all back together?”
The General turns to look at me. The moonlight casts a glow on his face, the smoothness of his clean-shaven chin. “One day at a time,” he says.
“And you’ll expect me at your side.”
He nods. “Yes.”
I shouldn’t have hoped for freedom. Even now, I am still a prisoner to my debts, my promises.
“Unless you wish to go elsewhere,” the General says.
I turn.
He is staring out at the sea again. “I can’t afford to lose a good soldier,” he says. “But I can afford to let you choose your way, from here on out. I need to know if this Green exists. I need to hear the truth with my own ears, from someone I trust.”
I listen closely, hardly believing his words.
“You can take a small team. Weapons, rations.” He takes a deep breath. “Your friends and family. Mind you, it won’t be easy to find. But we’ve gained control of the outer Perimeter. We can cross it now. For once, I can’t tell you what’s on the other side. But wouldn’t you like to know?”
It isn’t freedom.
But it’s close.
What he’s offering me is a chance to forge my own path. See the world on the Outside, truly, for the very first time.
“You’ll be monitored, of course. We’ll be in touch at all times. And should you find this Green, you’ll show us the way.”
“Yes,” I say, my heart racing. There is still pain in my chest, even though the wounds have healed. This is the kind that takes time. Years, and maybe not ever, to fully fade away. “Yes, sir.”
“You have one week to prepare,” the General says. He starts to walk away, but before he’s out of earshot, he stops. “You’re nothing like her, you know,” he says. “Your mother. You might be a killer, Meadow Woodson. But there is light in your heart.”