Tristan and I crashed to the road as we backed out of the bank, landing in a puddle. I kept firing, hitting two of the mechanical creatures that sprinted across the bank after us. They dropped in a heap.
But three others barreled right out of the building into the rain.
Hissing filled the air as two of them instantly shorted out and dropped to the ground as Tristan and I scrambled backwards. But the last one with more flesh than the others kept rushing forward.
Slipping in the rain, I lost my footing and was taken down just a moment too long.
The Bane was on top of me, its hands around my throat. My head was forced into a puddle. Water lapped just over my eyes, making my vision wave under the water.
It jerked over and over again as Tristan fired at it, but it didn’t go down.
That familiar red rage flooded my system again and I wanted with everything in my system for this creature trying to kill me to meet a horrible end.
I watched as its hands left my throat and went to its own head. In one movement, it twisted its head violently to the left and up.
The head was ripped clean from its body.
It collapsed to the left of me with a splash that sent currents of electricity through the water to shock me endlessly.
A screamed leapt from my lips and then there were strong hands dragging me out of the puddle. Tristan swore, stumbling under my weight and stopping in the middle of the road.
“You’ve got to do it now,” I faintly heard a voice. My system recovering from the electrocution, I stood and my vision cleared. The two Bane who were left stood just under the cover of the bank’s opening, staring at Tristan and I. They wouldn’t come out after us into the rain.
But next to them stood four people, and I saw Alistar’s body lying on the floor behind them. He’d been mauled to death.
It was strange, seeing the Bane stand next to the four humans. But their only task in life was completed. They had no reason to pay them anymore attention.
“We’re as good as dead,” a woman said. “End us now before we end anyone else.”
There was terror in the other three’s eyes, but they each slowly nodded.
“I can’t,” Tristan said. His voice cracked.
“You have to,” I said quietly, thinking of Tye.
Tristan’s eyes fell to the ground and he wiped the back of his hand across his nose. He shook his head, swearing under his breath again.
“Will you help me?” he said, his eyes rising to meet mine.
It took me a moment to nod.
Tristan took four steps closer to the bank, his shotgun held loosely in his hand.
“I’m so sorry,” he said, his voice rough and scratchy. “You’ve made it this long.”
“No need for speeches,” the woman said, tears streaming down her face. “Just get it over with, please.”
Tristan nodded and waved me forward. I held my shotgun ready.
“You take the two on the right,” he said to me. “I’ll take the two on the left.”
A lump formed in my throat as I raised my shotgun, leveling it on a very terrified looking man who had to be in his sixties. I was glad Tristan hadn’t told me their names.
“Fire!” Tristan shouted.
And for the first time, I shot at a man who was still mostly human.
He dropped to the ground at the same time another woman did. The others screamed.
I couldn’t wait for Tristan’s command. I shot the woman who had spoken for them.
Apparently Tristan couldn’t give the command again, because he fired at the same time I did.
We both stood frozen for a moment, Tristan with his shotgun still leveled. I was fairly sure he wasn’t breathing.
“Let’s go,” I said, swallowing the lump in my throat.
The rain continued to fall harder and harder as we made our way back. Plenty of Bane had woken and watched us from the cover of the buildings. But as long as we stayed in the middle of the road, far from their reach, they left us alone.
I froze outside the hatch, unable to make myself go back down into that hole.
“Is she going to kill me?” I asked. “Since we failed?”
“I don’t think so,” Tristan said, clearing his throat. He had been trying hard the entire journey home to control his emotions. “You seem to be pretty valuable.”
“Margaret has a short temper,” I said hollowly.
His green eyes met mine. “I won’t let her do anything to you.”
“Somehow I don’t think you can stop her from getting whatever it is she wants from me.”
“That doesn’t mean I can’t try,” he said, his grip tightening on his shotgun.
“Why are you here, Tristan?” I asked, my eyes narrowing at him. “You don’t seem to fit in with this crowd.”
He shrugged. “What else am I supposed to do? It’s safer to stay in groups. I’d never last out there on my own. We’ve got to stick together.”
I looked at him for a long time. Maybe it was all about uncontrollable fate. You had to live with the people you could find these days. West had first been with a harsh military group, and then a group that was only a step above marauders.
But I’d found Eden. A place where people were good, where people did their best to help one another.
Tristan had crazy Margaret.
My fate was better than his.
And even though I had only known him for an hour, I wanted to save him from his fate. But I was powerless to do so.
“Are they really going to help my friend?” I asked.
Tristan broke eye contact and gave a sniff before wiping the rain water from his nose with the back of his hand. “Margaret will keep her word. She’s insane, but she’ll do what she says.”
“Will you make sure?” I asked. “That she helps him? If I can’t do it myself?”
He met my eyes again for a long time and finally nodded.
“Thank you.”
“Ready?”
“No,” I answered honestly.
There was sympathy in his eyes, but what was he supposed to do?
He bent and unlocked the hatch and held it open for me.
FOURTEEN
I didn’t even see Margaret.
As soon as Tristan and I entered the tunnel we were greeted by four guards. Tristan explained what happened and I was instantly bound.
Tristan held my eyes as they started dragging me away.
“I’ll make sure,” he had said. “I promise.”
And so I went willingly with the guards back to my room.
The doctors were waiting for me.
Sometimes there was darkness. Heavy and warm and light and cold.
Sometimes there was a fuzzy gray ceiling and voices in the haze that I couldn’t see.
But most of the time there was a kaleidoscope of broken memories and nightmares.
“Would you like a balloon?” the man asked as he crouched in front of me. He had a lot of hair above his lip, but the rest of his face was smooth.
“Do you have a red one?” I asked. I sat on my bed, my legs tucked into my chest.
“I think I do,” he said, his voice excited and kind. He dug into the pocket of his white jacket, and produced a floppy red balloon. He pulled something black out of his other pocket and blew up the balloon with it. It filled, long and skinny.
He then twisted it in different sections, the rubber squeaking high pitched as he did.
“It’s a dog!” I said excitedly as I recognized the form.
“That’s right,” he said with a laugh and a smile. “Here you go.”
He handed it to me and I took it, absolutely delighted.
“Are you ready for your test?” he asked.