Three

  It hit me then, in a way DeWitt’s words couldn’t. This was really happening. Three was preparing for war, and Chase was preparing with them.

  A cold panic dripped down my spine. I took a deep breath and scanned the crowd for Chase, Billy, Jesse, anyone I might recognize, suddenly aware that I was an outsider here. Everyone seemed to have a job, a purpose, but even in the north wing, I was held at an arm’s length and watched with suspicion. That wasn’t the case here. Everyone was in a constant state of movement but me, like I was standing in the eye of a hurricane.

  Near the weapons tent I caught a flash of short black hair a head above the rest. Without another thought I ran after him, sloshing through the puddles and slipping through the bodies that grew denser as we neared the heart of the camp.

  He ducked behind a group of fake Sisters, and I circled around them, finally catching the back of his sleeve.

  “Chase!”

  But it was Jesse that turned around. He looked different with short hair. Younger, more serious. Just as dangerous—that sharp look was still in his dark eyes—but not as shifty as before. My gaze flicked to the tattoo on his neck.

  “Sorry to disappoint, neighbor,” he said with a fake smile.

  “Where is he?” I asked.

  Jesse scratched a hand through his short hair. “Last I saw he was getting a little taken off the top.”

  So he was still here. At least for now.

  “I need to talk to him.”

  He held his arms out. “As you can see, we’re all a little busy at the moment.”

  “Since when did you care so much about all this?” I nearly spit the words.

  “All this…” He smiled like he didn’t understand what I meant.

  “The cause.”

  “Ah,” he said. “I’m a fast learner.”

  A whistle cut through the rain, and the closest fighters immediately began heading to where the cars were parked, leaving Jesse and I standing alone.

  “Dr. DeWitt told us what’s happening.” He blocked my view when I leaned around him. “Are they really sending Chase out?”

  Jesse gave me a confused look. “They’re sending everyone who isn’t injured or essential to running this place. Or short.” He measured my height with one hand. “The kids, for example. They’ll stay behind.”

  I narrowed my gaze, swiping away the water that had gathered in my hair.

  “Why?” I whispered, more to myself than to him. Rebecca had reminded me that those who went would receive more specific orders in the field, but the numbers I’d seen in the north wing were still embedded in my mind. Too many soldiers, not enough resistance.

  “Because,” said Jesse. “When a government becomes destructive, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government.”

  I peeked out at him through the fingers that had covered my face. “Did you just make that up?” It didn’t sound like anything he’d normally say. Not that I knew him well enough to know.

  He laughed, and it struck me as odd that he spoke of such patriotism while in no apparent rush to join the others.

  “Believe it or not, someone even older than me did. But that doesn’t make it less true.” He took a step back, turned away. “If I see my nephew, I’ll tell him you came by,” he called over his shoulder as he walked away.

  I stared at his back, aware of the encroaching footsteps that came up behind me. I knew who it would be, and wasn’t in the mood to be babysat.

  “The doc is looking for you,” Rocklin said bluntly. “We got a message from your friend.”

  * * *

  THE radio room in the north wing was still bustling with people when Rocklin and I arrived. This time the guards didn’t block my way; they stood aside as if expecting me, and allowed me to enter the tight, dimly lit quarters. A wall of heat drew the sweat to my skin as I stepped over the threshold, and I found myself wishing for an open window.

  “Hope your break was worth it.” I spun around to face DeWitt, standing before the wall that had held the picture of Chase and I in the hospital. “You missed a call from your friend.”

  It took a beat to register what he meant. Tucker.

  “He’s still alive?”

  The muscles beside DeWitt’s mouth ticked, and his scarred jaw was gray with stubble. My throat worked to swallow. Besides learning that Chase had not been sent out for our injured, I had accomplished nothing, and now I’d missed something important. Something that affected more lives than just my own.

  “Is he still…” I pointed to the radio and then realized I couldn’t respond anyway. Besides receiving signals, Three was confined to air silence.

  “No,” said DeWitt. “He’s gone now.”

  The disappointment weighed heavily on my shoulders.

  “What did he say?”

  DeWitt sighed and strode past me to the radio. He said something to the operator, who flipped a few switches on the high right corner of the machine, and then removed his headphones.

  “Lucky for you, we recorded it.”

  The transmission was not as clear as it had been before. Now it was glitchy and clicked on and off in intervals. But that didn’t stop Tucker’s voice, stretched thin with panic, from filling the room.

  “… if you’re even still there … gone … all of them … just me left … if you’re still … meet … at the beach. I’ll be … soon as I can…” A crackling burst of static followed, and in it I realized I’d been holding my breath and quickly gulped down the air.

  Then Tucker whispered, almost as a prayer, “Please be there.”

  The transmission went silent.

  A stitch popped in the neck of my shirt. During the recording I’d gripped the hem and stretched it down my hips as far as it would go. I released it now, but my hands were still shaky. Old scars stood out on the backs of my knuckles, white on red blotchy skin.

  Tucker was all that was left of the team we’d sent into the interior. It felt like he was coming back to find me, just as he had in Louisville after Cara’s death. Just as he always would.

  DeWitt broke the silence. “The beach—I assume he means the safe house?”

  I backed into the wall and leaned against it, grateful it was sturdy while I was not.

  “Yes,” I managed. “That’s where we split up.”

  “I don’t suppose I have to tell you that he could be responsible for the FBR’s attacks on our posts. That he could be baiting you into a trap.”

  He didn’t have to tell me those things; I had already considered them. But there was another possibility, too: that Tucker was honestly in danger and needed our help.

  The pulse pounded in my ears.

  “Someone’s got to meet him,” I said finally. “We need to find out what he knows about the resistance posts.”

  “And if he’s been compromised?”

  I breathed in slowly, let the air fill my lungs. “Someone’s got to bring him in. Keep an eye on him if you don’t trust him. Rocklin seems bored following me around.”

  DeWitt raised his brows, contemplating this.

  “Send me,” I heard myself say. “And Chase. He trusts us.” If Chase was with me he wouldn’t be back in the interior, hunted by soldiers.

  “That may be difficult,” said DeWitt, staring off at the map with the red pushpins, the fallen posts. I couldn’t imagine why anyone would have a problem with this. We weren’t crucial to Endurance’s operations.

  I pushed off the wall, meeting his eyes. “You want to send Chase to Charlotte.”

  DeWitt didn’t answer.

  “The MM’s looking for him after what happened in the rehab hospital in Chicago.” I paused to steady my voice. “I saw the census numbers yesterday. We don’t have enough people to beat them.”

  “I know,” said DeWitt softly.

  “Then why?”

  “Because half the country is too scared to stand up for themselves, and the other half is sleeping.” He wandered around the room, distracted. “Do y
ou know how many people have no idea the threat the FBR poses on their freedom? So they’ve had to cut back a little since the War, so they’ve moved to a smaller house, gotten a generator so they don’t lose their power at curfew. They believe what the news tells them—that these attacks on our posts were for their own good. The FBR’s gotten rid of more insurgents, more scum endangering their children’s futures. They’ll never see a city of starving people, living in tents. They’ll never wait in a line for food or hide in a check point and wait for a carrier to take them somewhere safe.” He stopped now, and slowly smashed his fist into the tabletop. “They will never watch someone they love murdered for helping their fellow man.”

  I could still hear my mother, arguing with the officers that took her away. We’re not animals, she’d said. But they’d gotten rid of her like she was one.

  It didn’t seem possible that half the country had adjusted to the MM’s demands, that they carried on as if nothing was wrong. It didn’t seem possible that my mother and I had been doing exactly that just months ago. I pictured the neighborhood Tucker had told me about in his first radio transmission, the one that had boasted its compliance to the Statutes. These places did exist. They were why the MM could do what the MM did.

  A horrible realization sunk into my bones.

  “You’re going to attack the MM knowing we’ll lose.”

  “Nothing is certain,” he said again. “We’re going to set an example—show the Bureau what Three is capable of. We’re going to wake up the country, and once they see the horrors of how their government will respond, they won’t be able to stand by any longer.”

  “And the prisoners? The thirteen others that were with Truck?”

  DeWitt hesitated. “We’ll do what we can for them.”

  He might as well have said, “They knew what they were getting into.” He would do nothing, and they would die.

  My stomach turned. “There has to be another way.”

  His eyes flickered with desperation, and in that moment I knew he wanted another option, too, but then they hardened and went cold.

  “You’ve got an idea, I’m willing to listen,” he said. “In the meantime stay close. I’ve got to meet with the council.”

  * * *

  IT was nearly dusk when Rocklin appeared at the kitchen door. I’d been scrubbing dishes since after lunch, and my hands were pruned and sore from the diluted lye soap. I removed them from the water and dried them on my pants, feeling the sharp corners of a plastic condom package in my left pocket, and the crinkle of paper in my right. Consumed by thoughts of Three’s mission, Tucker’s plight, and Chase down with the fighters, I’d forgotten about the gifts my friends had bestowed upon me. I still hadn’t read the note Sean had given me this morning.

  “Well?” I asked. I didn’t expect an answer—DeWitt had said he would meet with the council, and Panda had yet to leave the kitchen.

  “A team will be sent back to the safe house at dawn,” said Rocklin.

  My muscles tensed in anticipation. It would take hours to reach Tucker, and hours before we could return with the vital information he possessed. Another of our posts could fall in the time we wasted.

  “We should leave now,” I said.

  Rocklin’s nostrils flared. “You’re not on the roster.”

  DeWitt still didn’t trust me. He thought Tucker had been compromised and I would lead him and the MM straight back to Endurance. I didn’t know how I was supposed to prove my loyalty to the cause on such a short leash.

  “All right,” I said. Rocklin left me staring at the door.

  Rubbing the lines from between my brows I reached into my pocket and retrieved the crinkled note Sean had shoved my way earlier. I unfolded it carefully, blanching at the Statutes that were printed in bold type. Words on the other side of the paper had soaked through when I’d been outside in the rain and I flipped it over, skimming the grocery list of items in blank ink that bled across the page. Zucchini was first, followed by cabbage, kale, carrots, and a dozen other vegetables, along with their quantity by the crate.

  I suspected Sean had given me the wrong note by mistake—this looked like the notes Panda had pegged on the wall of the kitchen that came from the gardens. But when I read it again, I saw that halfway down the page, between sweet potatoes and beets were two words, scratched in subtly different handwriting.

  Barn, and Tonight.

  I folded the note, a smile brushing my lips.

  CHAPTER

  12

  I LAID in my bunk until dark, convinced that time had stopped while I waited to meet Chase. The dorms were less full than last night; many had volunteered to join the fight, and those that remained were restless.

  The faces of those I’d come here with passed before me. I wondered if I would ever see them again. I could only imagine how Jack was feeling after hearing what had happened to Truck or what Wallace would think if he saw Billy now, hardened by grief. They’d both joined Three’s army now; I almost pitied any MM soldiers that got in their way.

  When the last candles finally flickered out and the last whispers faded, I climbed down the ladder again, but this time found Rebecca curled in a ball, alone. A solid, cold stone settled in the pit of my belly at Sean’s absence. Too many friends were already unaccounted for.

  I tiptoed around the bunks, past where Sarah slept on the mats near the children. I was almost to the exit when someone emerged from the supply room and took me off guard. I jumped to the side before we could collide.

  Sean clutched his chest. When he recognized me, he tossed his head back.

  “You scared the holy…”

  “Where have you been?” I asked at the same time.

  He muttered something about sneaking around a heart attack, but I had focused on the stack of blankets tucked under his sling and cut him off.

  “What’s all that for?”

  His shoulders fell an inch, and I knew. He didn’t even have to tell me.

  “They’re sending you after Tucker,” I said.

  Sean nodded, eyes narrowing. “Me, Jack. A few others.”

  I’d told DeWitt someone had to go, even volunteered myself. I hadn’t thought he’d send Sean.

  “What happened to your busted shoulder?” I asked. “I thought they made you a farmer because you couldn’t fight.”

  “I’ve been assured there will be no heavy lifting.” He shrugged, then winced and grabbed his injured shoulder with his other hand.

  “You have to stay with Rebecca,” I said. “You promised.”

  Immediately he shushed me and pulled me inside the supply room.

  “You think I didn’t try everything to make that possible?” he said, moving the blankets under his other arm. “You think I volunteered for this?”

  No. I’d unintentionally done that for him.

  “We’ll switch. Chase and I will go instead.”

  He gave me a look like I was crazy. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were itching to get back out there.”

  “I’m not,” I said. “It’s just that Tucker might have information about the fallen posts, or about the prisoners. Something that might help us.”

  “Us,” said Sean, making a noise of disbelief. “Wow. They got to you fast. Next you’ll be chanting at the full moon and shaving your head.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “This place,” he said. “It’s all smoke and mirrors.”

  I flinched. “What do you mean?”

  “Don’t,” he said. “I’m not one of them, okay? You could have told me you talked to him. You actually can trust some people, you know.”

  As he adjusted the length of the sling, I shrunk into the floor.

  “I know,” I said in a small voice. “DeWitt asked me not to say anything.” It was a stupid excuse. If our places were switched, Sean would have told me.

  One of his brows arched, which was enough to call me out.

  “He’s not a bad guy,” I said. “He runs this place al
l right, doesn’t he? All these people wouldn’t follow him otherwise. If anyone can stand up to the MM, it’s Three.”

  “DeWitt’s running this place like the FBR,” he argued. “Training soldiers to kill the bad guys.”

  “It’s a war,” I said. “What else is he supposed to do?”

  I was defending the same man who didn’t even let me walk across the compound alone. I busied my hands straightening a stack of threadbare towels.

  “He’s helped Rebecca, hasn’t he?” I felt certain about that at least.

  “I never said he wasn’t a good doctor.”

  “Then what are you saying?”

  “I’m saying I need him to keep helping her, that’s why I’m going.” His voice had raised, and at my expression he lowered it. He stepped closer. “I’m saying this never stops. Soon they’ll be bombing the cities and evacuating and it’s chaos, all over again.”

  “It’s different this time.” Before it had been about the rich and everyone else. The insurgents, who tried to level the playing field and plunged the country into depression and madness. This was about surviving, about defending our rights as humans and taking back what was rightfully ours.

  “Does it feel different?” he asked. “Because I’m not sure it does to Becca. Or those people starving in the Square in Knoxville. Or my brother, wherever he is.” He shook his head. “It’s the same. It’s always the same. We’re the good guys, they’re the enemy.”

  I pressed the heels of my hands against my temples. “What are you talking about? Of course they’re the enemy.”

  His blue eyes glinted in the dark. “You know, not that long ago you thought I was the enemy, too.”

  A shadow fell over the door, interrupting our argument. I recognized Rocklin’s short stature immediately. As he moved closer his clothes glowed pale silver from the moonlight outside. I slipped deeper into the supply room, hiding behind the door.

  “I’ll take one of those,” Rocklin said.

  I watched Sean offer him one of the blankets. My mouth pulled tight in a grimace. With Rocklin guarding the door I’d never get past.

  The old gym floor groaned when I shifted my weight. I fought the urge to backpedal and held absolutely motionless. Before me, Sean dug his heel into the floor, as if he’d been the one to make the noise.