Ruins

It’s not enough to save us. We have to be worth saving.

She took another step back, standing now in the exact center of the wide hospital hallway, staring at the closed door.

There are other Partials, she told herself. Other factions living out in the towns and the woods and the wasteland. They haven’t sided with Morgan, and I don’t have to either. If I can get even some of those groups, even one of those groups, to join me; if I can get them to help the humans like Samm did, to join them and live with them and work together, then we can do it. We can save the world. Not just our lives, but the reasons our lives are worth saving. Our thoughts and our dreams.

Our hopes.

Kira turned and walked back down the hall, striding purposefully now, her hesitance gone and her decision made.

She could only hope that her decision was the right one.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Ariel ran, clutching her rifle, her heavy pack thumping frantically against her back. The others ran ahead of her, gasping desperately for breath, never daring to look back: Isolde with her baby, Madison with hers, Nandita surprisingly spry, and Xochi and her mother leading the way. They didn’t know what had given them away, but it didn’t really matter: A routine patrol had found them in the wilderness, and now the Partials were close behind them, roaring through the broken streets in Jeeps and motorcycles, and behind them a flatbed truck, barred with iron and bound with chicken wire.

A cage.

Kessler turned left into an overgrown yard, leaping ahead as she sought for a path to escape, and Xochi stayed behind, waving the others through the gap in the fence. Khan and Arwen were screaming, reflecting their mothers’ fear. Ariel caught up as Nandita struggled stiffly through the fence, and she spun around, risking a look behind. The Partials were practically on top of them. Xochi fired a burst from her rifle, shattering the lead Jeep’s windshield and forcing the driver to duck; it slowed them just enough to get through the fence, and then the women were running again, weaving through the bushes and saplings and overgrown debris. This yard was full of old appliances, a repair shop maybe, dishwashers and fridges rising up like monoliths. Ariel heard a bullet ping against one as she passed it.

“They’re too close,” Xochi panted, barely able to speak as she barreled headlong through the weeds. “We’re not going to get away this time.”

Ariel grabbed Nandita’s arm as she ran, pulling her through the maze of obstacles. “Think how easy this would be if our crazy witch lady would use her magical Partial mind control powers.”

“You know I can’t do that,” said Nandita, wheezing from exertion. “They’ll know they’ve been controlled, which means we either keep them with us forever or send them home with the knowledge that one of the Trust is on the island.”

“Can’t have that,” snapped Ariel, diving for cover as another burst of bullets flew by. “If they start hunting us, this might start to get serious.”

“This is a patrol team rounding up strays,” said Nandita. “A dedicated hunt would be orders of magnitude worse.”

Xochi fired over the rim of a rusted dishwasher, slowing the pursuit by forcing the Partials into similar cover. “In another minute or two we won’t have any choice,” she said. “They’re better at this, and there are more of them.”

“Wait,” said Ariel, cocking her head as she listened. Something had changed. Xochi fired again, and Ariel shushed her with a wave. “Quiet, can’t you hear that?”

Xochi dropped back into cover, and the three of them listened carefully as the others ran ahead. Ariel closed her eyes, trying to concentrate on the sound. What was it?

“The engines,” said Nandita. “They’re idling.”

Yes, thought Ariel, the sound of the engines has changed, but there was something else first. Something bigger, like a . . . She couldn’t put it in words.

“Remind me what idling means,” said Xochi. “I’ve heard, like, four engines in my entire life.”

“It means they’re waiting for something,” said Nandita. “They’re not pursuing us anymore.”

“They can’t get the vehicles through this junkyard anyway.”

“They revved them again,” said Ariel, still concentrating on the sounds. “But it sounds like they’re . . . leaving.”

“How can you tell?” asked Xochi. “I can hear engines, but none of this deep emotional nuance you two are pulling out of them.”