I feel the train slowing and my heart skips a beat.
* * *
Tristan
The train slows and I stand. Roc follows suit, looking rather sick. He tries to pull his sword from his sheath, but it gets stuck three times before he can get it out. I know now is the time for a big speech, something to energize him for the battle ahead. My mouth feels sticky and dry, so I take a sip of water. I don’t know what I plan to say, so I just start speaking, hoping my heart will do the rest.
“Roc,” I say, “you’re my brother. Always will be.”
Short, concise, simple; but I mean every word, more than anything I’ve ever said before. And it seems to do the job. Roc’s hand stops trembling and tightens on his sword, his eyes change to a steely brown, his jaw firms up.
“I’m with you, Tristan. I’d die for you.”
Tears fill my eyes but I blink them away. Now is not the time for tears. “And I you,” I say.
The train rolls to a stop. A heavy mist roils outside the window. Subchapter 26 is dark, but not completely. Something is lighting the sky. We are standing flush against the doors, trying to be the first off—every second will be important in the deadly game we are playing. The doors open and we step out into the mist.
Not mist—smoke. The air is filled with the suffocating stench of war. The platform trembles as a bomb explodes in the distance. The bombing has reached the northernmost subchapter.
I can’t see through the thick smoke, but I run along the train anyway, hoping that Adele is still alive when I reach the end.
When I see Rivet his back is to me. His men are so focused on what he is telling them that they don’t see me. I fade backwards into the fog. I bump into Roc.
“What is it?” he whispers.
“They seem confused as to what to do. Rivet’s giving them orders, but they’re not just rushing the end car like they probably wanted to. The war’s distracted them, I think.”
“Can we get around them?” Roc coughs. His eyes are already red from the smoke. We need to get away from the noxious fumes. They aren’t thick enough to kill us right away, but prolonged exposure surely won’t be good.
“I don’t know, but we have to try.”
We drift right, moving further into the smoke, trying to carve a wide arc around Rivet. Already the smoke is clearing, however, and it won’t be long before we’re able to see them and them us. The bombing hasn’t stopped—we can still hear the rumble of explosions in the distance and intermittent flashes of light—but it is moving away; hence, the clearing smoke.
Ahead and to the left of us I see dark figures huddled together. Not Rivet and his men. We are past them. Adele and her friends—has to be.
We move toward them.
* * *
Adele
“Something’s not right,” Cole says, gazing out the window as the train pulls into the station.
“There’s so much smoke,” Tawni says.
I try to speak but my voice catches. There is a lump in my throat. The star dwellers are bombing subchapter 26. My father is out there somewhere, unprotected, maybe already a victim.
Older-than-her-age Elsey grabs my hand, squeezes, and says, “He’ll be okay.”
Although I know she doesn’t have any proof for her statement, it is comforting. The doors open.
I expected us to race from the train the second the doors opened, but the situation has changed. We can hear booming explosions in the distance. We can barely see anything outside; it is so smoky.
Cole says, “Elsey should hide in the train. They’ll think we’ve all left.”
I like the idea of hiding Elsey away somewhere, but not leaving her all alone. She isn’t too happy with the idea either. “No! I’m coming with you,” she says.
Cole looks at me, hoping I’ll back him up. “We can’t just leave her here,” I say. My mind is racing. Rivet might already be running down the train line, headed for us, and we are still in the car, like sitting ducks. We have to move.
“Move!” I say, pacing to the door and pulling Elsey, who is still holding my hand, with me.
I step out, turn to face the other end of the train. The smoke—thick and puffy when we arrived—is dissipating already. Likely a bomb exploded near the train station just before we arrived. Although it is getting easier to see, I don’t see our hunters. I can only see maybe two cars down, and Rivet’s gang is at least three away. Maybe even four or five—it is hard to tell.
Cole and Tawni step out next to us. “Where the hell are they?” Cole says, thinking out loud.
I feel someone approaching from the left, out of the mist. I quarter-turn to see two dark shapes moving toward us. Rivet—has to be.
“Run!” I yell.
We take off away from the platform. We stay as a group, although Cole and Tawni could outdistance Elsey and me anytime they want to. I hear thumping footsteps on the stone behind us, someone chasing us. I don’t look back, don’t want to see Rivet’s bloodthirsty eyes.
As we move away from the platform, the smoke disappears completely. It is weird, how it is clustered around the train. The bomb must’ve hit really close to it.
Ahead of us I can see the twinkling lights of subchapter 26. It seems everyone has their lights on, probably because of the bombing, although being able to see won’t protect them from death by explosion.
I hear the footsteps getting closer, hear a shout, but can’t make out what the voice says. It doesn’t sound like Rivet’s snarl, but it might be one of his men. It is weird. I felt scared when I first started running, but it changed at some point. It’s like a magic trick, where a magician turns a rock into a bat or something; except it’s my fear turning into anger, to the point where I feel capable of great violence. Even when I fought in the Pen, I never felt capable of anything. I just did what I had to do and hoped for the best. But now I feel strong, like I can fight Rivet, even though he’s a highly trained soldier.
Enough is enough.
I whirl around, ready to face the Devil.
They are right on top of us, having closed most of the distance. I just react, swinging a high kick in self-defense. I catch my pursuer under the chin, knock him off his feet. He rolls onto his stomach. His companion stops dead in his tracks and just stares at me.
He doesn’t look like a trained killer. He is holding a sword, but it doesn’t look natural; it looks more like he’s holding a bread knife. Brown-skinned with brown eyes, he appears more shocked than anything.
“Who are you?” I say, wondering if I am making a big mistake.
The guy opens his mouth but no words come out. The other guy, the one I leveled, groans and rolls over, showing his face.
I gasp.
It is Tristan.
At this point it would probably make sense to run to him, throw myself upon him, and shower him with kisses while apologizing profusely for having practically knocked his head off. Like I said earlier: I don’t always do the right thing in social situations.
“Why are you chasing us?” I demand. Up close, he is so beautiful, even more beautiful than he looked when I saw him from the Pen, or from the outskirts of the Lonely Caverns.
“Trying…to…help,” Tristan murmurs, massaging his jaw with one hand.
“Oh,” I say. I guess I should’ve guessed that.
“What happened?” Cole says, appearing with Elsey and Tawni next to me. They must’ve stopped when they realized I wasn’t with them.
“It’s him,” Elsey whispers. “Tristan.”
“I know,” I say.
“Why’d you hit him? I thought you liked him,” Cole says.
“I didn’t hit him, I kicked him,”—I elbow Cole hard in the stomach—“and shut up about the other thing.” I am mortified. How could Cole say something so stupid? Tristan is going to think I’m just another school girl with a crush on the President’s son. Although that isn’t entirely inaccurate.
“You should probably help him up,” Tawni suggests.
“You help him up,” I retort. My social skills are falling apart at the seams. I’m just shocked, is all. I didn’t expect to see him. Truth be told, I thought he was dead. Thankfully, his friend helps him up.