Ruins

“Home is a few thousand miles away.”

“You know what I mean.”

“No, I don’t,” said Heron. “You think of this place as home? We shouldn’t even be here.”

“You didn’t have to stay.”

“Neither did you.”

“I promised I would,” said Samm. “That means I have to, as surely as if I was chained here.”

“If promises are chains,” said Heron, “you should learn not to make any.”

“You don’t understand,” said Samm. He watched Partial Number Three as he lay in the hospital bed, his eyes blinking rapidly—he was dreaming, and from the intensity of his link data Samm knew it was something terrible. The Partial was running, as fast as he could, blasting the room with his fear.

GET OUT

And underneath it, softer but ever-present, Heron’s unspoken question: WHY?

Samm looked at her, tired of games, and asked her directly, “Why what?”

She narrowed her eyes.

Samm leaned forward. “You really don’t understand why I’m here, do you? That’s what you keep asking about.” He peered into her face, lost in the link and trying to read her eyes, her mouth, her expressions. The way humans did. But it was just a face.

Maybe Heron didn’t have any emotions, on her face or the link. Just questions in an empty shell.

“You stayed too,” he said. “You sold us out to Morgan, but you stayed. Why are you still here?”

“You only have a few months left to live,” said Heron. “Dr. Morgan is looking for a cure, but you can’t get it out here.”

“So you stayed to help me get back?”

“Do you want to go back?”

Yes, thought Samm, but he didn’t say it out loud. It wasn’t that easy anymore. He hesitated, knowing his confusion would be clear to her on the link, but there was no helping that.

GET OUT, linked the soldier, writhing in his restraints, trapped in his own nightmare.

Samm took a slow breath. “I promised to stay.”

“But you don’t want to.”

“It’s my own choice.”

“But why?” Her voice was louder now, and the question hammered into him on the link. “Why are you here? You want to know what I’m asking? I’m asking why you’re here. You want to know why I stayed? Because I want to know why you did. We’ve known each other for almost twenty years now, we fought together in two wars, I followed you through a toxic hell because I trust you, because you’re the closest thing I’ve ever had to a friend, and now you’re going to kill yourself with inaction. That’s not a decision a rational person makes. Your expiration date will come, and you’ll die, and … why? You think you’re saving these people, but you’re only buying them, what, eight extra months? A few more infants saved, a slightly larger generation lives, and then you die and they stop having children and their slightly larger generation grows up and they can’t have any children and the whole world dies. Eight months later than it would have.” Her voice was hot and angry, spitting the words through clenched teeth. “Why?”

Samm pointed at Number Three. “I’m helping them, too.”

“By putting them through this?” Heron yanked on the leather cords.

GETOUTGETOUTGETOUT

“Their expiration dates are even sooner than yours,” said Heron. “You’re waking them up, detoxing them from whatever mind warp Vale put them under, forcing them through this torture, just so they can wake up and die?”

“I’m helping them.”

“Are you?”

“I’m giving them a chance,” said Samm. “That’s more than they had before.”

“Then give yourself the same chance,” said Heron. “Live now, and figure out how to keep living tomorrow. These people are gone, so give them up—come with me back to Morgan and get the cure and live through your expiration. Let’s go home.”

“We don’t even know if she’s found a cure.”

“But if you go home, there’s a chance!” Heron roared. “Go home and you might die anyway, stay here and you die no matter what.”

“It’s not just about living—”

“What the hell else is it about?”

“It’s about living right.”

Heron said nothing, staring at him with fire in her eyes.

“These soldiers kept the Preserve alive for thirteen years,” said Samm. “There are thousands of children who are alive today because these nine men helped them—maybe not willingly, maybe not even knowing what they were doing, but they did it, and they went through hell to do it, and I can’t just leave them to die for that. Let’s say only half of them wake up sane, and only half of those are in shape to make the journey back to Morgan; that’s still two of them she can give the cure to, and two is twice as many as me. Staying here doubles the number of Partials I can save from expiration, at the very least, and even your emotionless calculator brain has to see that that’s worth the trade.”

His fervor grew as he spoke, and he spit the final words like an indictment, feeling good to let his emotions out. He sat watching Heron, waiting for a response, but the link was empty. The soldier had fallen asleep, and Heron was a blank page. An empty shell.

“You can save more Partials …” Her voice trailed off. “But none of them are you.”

She stood up and left, as silent as a shadow, and as Samm watched her go, he couldn’t help but wonder if he’d completely misinterpreted the conversation.

CHAPTER ELEVEN (#ulink_b45b5dd4-9b9c-5ab2-97b2-b32a9b6f6626)

Marcus watched the forest through the broken glass of an old window frame, holding his breath. Commander Woolf had chosen the hiding spot just outside of Roslyn Heights, and it was a good one—a house so covered in vines that no one outside would even know there was a window in this part of the wall, let alone that four people were hiding inside. Galen, one of Woolf’s soldiers, was watching the front door with their biggest gun—an assault rifle they’d salvaged from a dead Grid patrol—while the fourth man in their group, a Partial named Vinci, kept watch from a different window. Their ragtag group were the only survivors from Woolf’s ill-fated diplomatic mission to the Partials. They had been hoping to form an alliance with the largest of the Partial factions, in a desperate bid to fight back against Dr. Morgan’s invasion, but a schism in the Partial ranks had destroyed that plan almost before it could start. The friendly faction fell, and now Morgan ruled them all—all but Vinci, and a handful of tiny, independent factions scattered through the mainland. Woolf’s new plan was to unite those factions to oppose Morgan’s army, but they couldn’t do it alone. They needed to find the only successful group of human resistance fighters.

They needed to find Marisol Delarosa.

Marcus saw a movement from the corner of his eye—just the shake of a leaf, but he’d learned from experience not to take anything for granted. He watched the leaf, and the foliage around it, with a keen intensity, his mind racing with any number of horrifying possibilities: It might be one of Delarosa’s guerrillas, or it might be a Partial soldier; maybe a whole squad of Partial soldiers, slowly surrounding them, getting ready to attack. Maybe it was a Partial sniper, buried in leaves and sticks and camouflage, lining up the perfect shot to drill Marcus right through the eye.

This is when the little bird hops into view and I chuckle derisively at my own paranoia, thought Marcus. Nothing moved. Come on, little birdie. You can do it. He stared at the foliage for two minutes, for five minutes, for ten, but no bird appeared, and no soldiers. Probably just as well, he thought. If I chuckled at my paranoia, I’d probably give myself away and get sniped. Thanks for throwing me off my guard, hypothetical bird.

Commander Woolf crept up beside him, settling into position where they could whisper the latest report.

“Anything?” asked Woolf.

“Just cursing imaginary animals.”