And with that, I have sealed my fate. For the third time in my short life, I am heading back into the arena.
CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR
I’m raring to go, but the doctor tells me I have to wait a week until I can go on any missions at all. My body was so badly damaged from the time I spent in the desert, I will need to give it time to recuperate. I spend the days in the hospital with my friends, sharing memories of those we lost along the way. I know none of them want me to leave, to do what I have to do, but they know better than to argue with me. If I die on this mission, it’s a sacrifice I am willing to make.
Finally, the day comes when I am to leave. Dad has been in communication with the other compound in Massachusetts in order to coordinate our efforts. The time is now. Today is the day the world will be reborn.
I stand in the meeting room deep beneath the compound, the walls lined with blueprints and strategic maps. For the first time, I am wearing my US Marine Corps uniform. I feel a surge of pride to be standing before my dad in this uniform. Though he doesn’t show it on his face, I know he is proud of me too.
“There’s no need for you to take weapons,” Dad says. “Anything you take will be stolen by the slaverunners as soon as you’re captured. It’s better for them not to get their hands on any weaponry. But I want you to have this, just in case you run into any crazies along the way.”
He holds out a knife. It is the same one I used back on Catskills Mountain, the one that helped keep me and Bree alive and fed for four long years. It was taken from me back in Arena 1. I hadn’t realized how much symbolic value I’d placed on that knife until now, as I hold its replica in my hands.
I stash the knife away and swallow down the emotion in my throat.
“This is your GPS chip,” Dad says, placing a small device securely in my pocket. “Once you’re inside the vicinity of the arena, activate it. It will be our signal to launch the bombs and the tracker inside will guide them to the right spot. Then you’ll have five minutes to get out. So as soon as it’s activated you need to get the hell out of there. Do you understand me, Brooke? No matter what happens, don’t let them take you into the arena to fight.”
I understand what he’s saying. If I end up fighting in the arena, there’s no way I’ll make it out in five minutes. I’ll be at the mercy of whatever fighters they decide to throw at me. It would be a suicide mission. I pray it doesn’t come to that, but I also know I’m willing to give myself up if it does.
It’s time to go. I begin the long walk through the underground corridors, then I’m up into the compound, surrounded by trees and vegetation. It feels so strange standing in this beautiful Eden in a military uniform. That war must exist for peace to prevail is a concept I can hardly wrap my head around.
Up in the compound, my friends have been allowed out of the hospital to see me off. Ryan has shaved his head again, and he gives me his confident, cocky smile. For the first time in a long time, he looks like the Ryan I first met at Fort Noix, the only difference being the sling around his arm and the absence of Jack.
Charlie has bounced back to full strength remarkably. I hug him goodbye, knowing that Flo is watching down on us, grateful that I have gotten him this far.
Ben is still weak from our ordeal. He was always the gentler, more sensitive of us, and it stands to reason that the toll the desert took on his body would be greater than the toll it took on mine. I feel bad for leaving him when he’s still vulnerable, but I know Ben can look after himself, even if his mournful blue eyes are silently pleading with me not to go. Like always, the words we want to speak to each other seem bound up, tied in our throats. Ben and I always struggled to talk about the shared experiences we’d been through, and I vow in that moment that if I make it out of the arena alive, I will open up to him about everything. But for now, I take his hand in mine, noting how the skin has become soft again thanks to a week resting in the hospital, and press a kiss onto the back of it, just like he did with me when we first parted ways all those months ago. Back then he went off searching for his brother, while I went after Bree. Now we’re parting ways again, united in our goal, knowing that the whole future of the world is resting on my shoulders.
Then it’s only Bree and Dad left to say goodbye to. Bree is holding onto Penelope, clutching her against her chest. She looks like a little girl again, like the seven-year-old I raised on the mountainside, the girl who relied on me for everything. It’s as though being back in our dad’s presence has allowed her to regress. She can claim back those childhood years she lost again. I wish I could do the same.
I bend down so my eyes are level with her and Penelope. I address the one-eyed dog first, rubbing her behind the ear.
“Take care of Bree while I’m gone,” I say.
Penelope tips her head to the side as though she’s taking in everything I’m saying. Then she licks Bree’s face, lapping up the salty tears that are rolling down her cheeks.
“I wish you didn’t have to go,” Bree stammers. “I wish there was another way.”
“I know,” I say. “So do I. But this is the last fight, Bree. After this, the world will begin to heal again. I’ll be able to heal again.”
She doesn’t say what we are both thinking; that there is a chance I might not make it back at all.
I pull her into me, hugging her tightly. Over my shoulder, I catch sight of Charlie watching me. I know he’ll take care of Bree if I don’t return. She’ll have Charlie and Penelope and Dad. If there was any time for me to disappear from her life, it would be now.
I let go of her and straighten up before my own tears have a chance to fall. I can hardly bear to look into her sorrowful eyes, and so I don’t. I move along, pain swirling in my gut, and come face to face with my dad.
In unison, we salute.
“Commander,” I say.
“Good luck, soldier,” he says.
Then he reaches forward and pulls me into a tight embrace. “You can do this, Brooke,” he says into my ear. “I believe in you.”
“Thank you, Dad,” I whisper back.
And then there’s nothing left to do but to mount my motorcycle and head off into the desert, alone. I kick the engine to life and rev, making fumes spew out behind me. Then I’m off, heading away from the compound, away from the Eden my dad has created. I am leaving behind everything I care about.
I decide not to look back.
The Texas sunshine is blistering hot. It’s the height of midday and the sun’s rays are burning into me. Being back in the desert makes me uncomfortable. It brings back all those horrible memories, of the wild dog attack, of the slave city in the crater of Memphis. I try not to think about all that I’ve endured because it just serves to remind me that what I’m about to do is only the first step in reclaiming the planet. Ridding the world of slaver cities and crazies and mutated creatures will take far, far longer to do. Eradicating the arenas is just the catalyst needed to start that process.
I head west toward San Antonio, where Arena 3 is located. Remarkably, the road is still intact. It will barely take me three hours to reach the city. Which means that in three hours’ time, I’ll be heading back into an arena, back into the place of my nightmares. But for now, everything is peaceful. The road stretches on forever, seemingly into oblivion. There is nothing left of the civilization that once used this route. No gas stations at the side of the road, no fields growing crops. There’s just desert as far as the eye can see, and above it a cloudless blue sky. If there was anything that could make me feel insignificant, it would be driving along this road alone.