Tick-tock. Right before the final turn, I glance to my left and see something crumpled against the wall: a human body.
A dead human body.
Still warm. Wearing a lieutenant’s uniform. Half its face blasted away by a high-caliber bullet fired at close range.
Not a recruit. One of them. Has someone else figured out the truth here? Maybe.
Or maybe the dead guy was shot by a trigger-happy, jacked-up recruit, mistaking him for a Ted.
No more wishful thinking, Parish.
I pull the sidearm from the dead man’s holster and slip it into the pocket of the lab coat. Then I pull the surgical mask over my face.
Dr. Zombie, you’re wanted in the safe room, stat!
And there it is, straight ahead. A few more yards and I’m there.
I made it, Nugget. I’m here. Now you be here.
And it’s like he heard me, because there he is walking toward me, carrying—believe it or not—a teddy bear.
Only he isn’t alone. There’s someone with him, a recruit around Dumbo’s age in a baggy uniform and a cap pulled down low, the brim resting just above his eyes, carrying an M16 with some kind of metal pipe attached to its barrel.
No time to think it through. Because faking my way through this one will take too much time and rely too much on luck, and it isn’t about luck anymore. It’s about being hardcore.
Because this is the last war, and only the hardcore will survive it.
Because of the step in the plan I skipped over. Because of Kistner.
I drop my hand into the coat pocket. I close the gap. Not yet, not yet. My wound throws off my stride. I have to take him down with the first shot.
Yes, he’s a kid.
Yes, he’s innocent.
And, yes, he’s toast.
I WANT TO DRINK IN his sweet Sammy smell forever, but I can’t. The place is crawling with armed soldiers, some of them Silencers—or anyway, not teens, so I have to assume they’re Silencers. I lead Sammy over to a wall, putting a group of kids between us and the nearest guard. I scrunch down as low as possible and whisper, “Are you okay?”
He nods. “I knew you’d come, Cassie.”
“I promised, right?”
He’s wearing a heart-shaped locket around his neck. What the heck? I touch it, and he pulls back a little.
“Why are you dressed like that?” he asks.
“I’ll explain later.”
“You’re a soldier now, aren’t you? What squad are you in?”
Squad? “No squad,” I tell him. “I’m my own squad.”
He frowns. “You can’t be your own squad, Cassie.”
This isn’t really the time to get into the whole ridiculous squad thing. I glance around the room. “Sam, we’re getting out of here.”
“I know. Major Bob says we’re going on a big plane.” He nods toward Major Bob, starts to wave at him. I push his hand down.
“A big plane? When?”
He shrugs. “Soon.” He’s picked up Bear. Now he examines him, turning him over in his hands. “His ear’s ripped,” he points out accusingly, like I’ve shirked my duty.
“Tonight?” I ask. “Sam, this is important. You’re flying out tonight?”
“That’s what Major Bob said. He said they’re vaculating all nonessentials.”
“Vaculating? Oh. Okay, so they’re evacuating the kids.” My mind is racing, trying to work through it. Is that the way out? Just stroll on board with the others and take our chances when we land—wherever we land? God, why did I ditch the white jumpsuit? But even if I kept it and was able to sneak onto the plane, that wasn’t the plan.
There’s going to be escape pods somewhere on the base—probably near the command center or Vosch’s quarters. Basically they’re one-man rockets, preprogrammed to land you safely at some spot far from the base. Don’t ask me where. But the pods are your best bet—not human technology, but I’ll explain how you operate one. If you can find one, and if both of you can fit in one, and if you live long enough to find one to fit in.
That’s a lot of ifs. Maybe I should beat up a kid my size and take her jumpsuit.
“How long have you been here, Cassie?” Sam asks. I think he suspects I’ve been avoiding him, maybe because I let Bear’s ear get torn.
“Longer than I wanted to be,” I mutter, and that decides it: We’re not staying here a minute longer than we have to, and we’re not taking some one-way flight to Camp Haven II. I’m not trading one death camp for another.
He’s playing with Bear’s torn ear. Not his first injury by a long shot. I’ve lost count of how many times Mom had to patch him up. He has more stitches in him than Frankenstein. I lean over to get Sammy’s attention, and that’s when he looks right at me and asks, “Where’s Daddy?”
My mouth moves, but no sound comes out. I hadn’t even thought about telling him—or how to tell him.
“Dad? Oh, he’s…” No, Cassie. Don’t get complicated. I don’t want him having a meltdown right as we’re preparing to make our getaway. I decide to let Dad live a little longer.
“He’s waiting for us back at Camp Ashpit.”
His lower lip starts to quiver. “Daddy isn’t here?”
“Daddy is busy,” I say, hoping to shut him down, and I feel like crap doing it. “That’s why he sent me. To get you. And that’s what I’m doing, right now, getting you.”
I pull him to his feet. He goes, “But what about the plane?”
“You’ve been bumped.” He gives me a puzzled look: Bumped? “Let’s go.”
I grab his hand and head for the tunnel, keeping my shoulders back and my head up, because skulking toward the nearest exit like Shaggy and Scooby tinkle-toeing is sure to draw attention. I even bark at some kids to get out of the way. If someone tries to stop us, I won’t shoot them. I’ll explain that the kid is sick and I’m getting him to a doctor before he pukes all over himself and everybody else. If they don’t buy my story, then I shoot them.
And then we’re in the tunnel and, incredibly, there is a doctor walking straight at us, half his face hidden behind a surgical mask. His eyes widen when he sees us, and there goes my clever cover story, which means if he stops us I’ll have to shoot him. As we draw closer, I see him casually drop his hand into the pocket of his white coat, and the alarm sounds inside my head, the same alarm that went off in the convenience store behind the beer coolers right before I pumped an entire clip into a crucifix-holding soldier.
I have one half of one half second to decide.
This is the first rule of the last war: Trust no one.
I level the silencer at his chest as his hand emerges from the pocket.
The hand that holds a gun.
But my hand holds an M16 assault rifle.
How long is one half of one half second?
Long enough for a little boy who doesn’t know the first rule to leap between the gun and the rifle.
“Sammy!” I yell, pulling up the shot. My little brother hops onto his toes; his fingers tear at the doctor’s mask and yank it down.
I’d hate to see the look on my face when that mask came down and I saw the face behind it. Thinner than I remember. Paler. The eyes sunk deep into their sockets, kind of glazed over, like he’s sick or hurt, but I recognize it, I know whose face was hidden behind that mask. I just can’t process it.
Here, in this place. A thousand years later and a million miles from the halls of George Barnard High School. Here, in the belly of the beast at the bottom of the world, standing right in front of me.
Benjamin Thomas Parish.
And Cassiopeia Marie Sullivan, having a full-bore out-of-body experience, seeing herself seeing him. The last time she saw him was in their high school gymnasium after the lights went out, and then only the back of his head, and the only times that she’s seen him since happened in her mind, the rational part of which always knew Ben Parish was dead like everyone else.