The wind blew cold against Juliette’s cheek, and she let it—she let the seconds draw long, squirming against the rope around her waist. They hadn’t bothered securing it very tightly because she was supposed to be dead in seconds. Her hands were still freed. Within reaching distance of the worker to her right, his rifle in line with her face.
Dimitri raised his gun. “The history books will mark today momentously.”
“Yes,” Juliette said. “They will.”
A gurgling noise came from above. That was the only warning that rang into the night. In the next second, a rain of gasoline was showering down, covering the crowd, the workers, the entire street side. It stung her eyes dreadfully, but Juliette had the advantage of knowing what was coming. The worker keeping guard next to her screamed out and covered his eyes with his hands, leaving his rifle free for the snatching. Juliette spared no time in yanking it from him and turning the point down, slashing the sharp end on the rope around her waist. Her hip stung; it had caught a cut, running fresh blood, but Juliette didn’t pay it any mind. She coughed hard against what had trickled into her mouth and turned to Roma.
“Open your eyes, my love. You’ll need to see if we’re going to escape.”
Roma’s eyes flew open just as Juliette sawed through the rope on his arms.
“What is this?” he demanded, shaking the slickness off his arms.
Juliette nodded out into the crowd. She cut through his waist bindings too. “Look.”
Before their very eyes, five monsters burst into shape. The screaming was immediate—the chaos that Juliette had expected. The civilians scattered in all directions; the workers abandoned their posts as monsters roared up into the night. With a brutal curse, Dimitri finally forced his eyes open just as the gasoline came to a stop, screaming, “Release!”
It was too late. Dimitri was too late. Even as the insects poured out, Juliette dropped the rifle and reached for Roma’s hand, tugging him forward, searching for a good pathway. Just as she started to move, there was a click from behind them, and faster than Juliette could react, Roma yanked her down, narrowly avoiding a bullet that skimmed the concrete ground.
They turned around. Dimitri was holding his pistol out. “You should be dead,” he seethed at Roma. A clump of black ran over his shoe. “The insects should be killing you.”
“It would take more than that to kill me,” Roma replied.
Dimitri tightened his grip on the pistol. Destruction tore through the scene before he could shoot: a bloodbath, infecting those who hadn’t run fast enough. Juliette’s eyes swiveled to the side. A woman: dropping to her knees, fingers sinking into her neck and pulling without any hesitation. A scream—a figure, running to her. Her husband: cradled over her corpse and keening a loud, desolate noise. Then he too gouged at his own throat and fell to the ground.
It was utter confusion and pandemonium. Dimitri kept swiveling around, trying to push away the workers who came to dive in front of him. They were all begging, using their last gasp of control to entreat Dimitri to save them, before he shoved them out of the way and they gouged themselves to death.
“Roma,” Juliette whispered. “I thought I was rescuing you, but I don’t know if we can walk away from this.”
Chaos. Complete chaos. Save for Dimitri, only Roma and Juliette stood immune, the three of them like combatant gods in the midst of primordial chaos, and wasn’t this exactly what was wrong with this place? Deciding who deserved to be saved and who deserved to be abandoned. Letting the whole place rot and fester so long as the top was not touched, so long as there was no inconvenience within sight.
Juliette glanced at Roma. He was already watching her.
They could walk away in the physical sense. Could bolt while Dimitri was distracted, take a bullet or two in carelessness and still live to tell the tale. But for as long as Dimitri was alive and these monsters moved under his thumb, how could they ever be free? She would always be thinking about this city, these people—her people—suffering from something she could have stopped.
“Together or not at all, dorogaya,” Roma whispered back. “I’m with you if we run. I’m with you if we fight.”
Dimitri gave a vicious shout and fired on a worker with his pistol, killing the woman before she could prostrate herself at his feet a moment longer. The screams around them were fading. This was one small crowd infected with madness. In days, weeks, months, there could be more crowds in other cities, across the whole country, across the whole world. In the end, the only ones who would ever pay for such destruction, in blood and in guts, were the people.
Keep fighting for love.
Juliette had wanted to be selfish, had wanted to run. But this was their love—violent and bloody. This city was their love. They couldn’t deny their upbringing as the heirs of Shanghai, as two pieces of a throne. What was left of their love if they rejected that? How could they live with themselves, look at each other, knowing they had been presented a choice and gone against who they were at their core?
They couldn’t. And Juliette knew—the Roma she loved wouldn’t let her leave like this.
“We must move fast.” Juliette brought out her lighter from her pocket. “Do you understand me?”
It wasn’t just Dimitri who needed to die. That was the easy part. That only required picking up one of the fallen rifles.
It was the monsters that needed to be destroyed.
A split second passed. Roma looked to the scene around them. The workers in front of Dimitri had at last all collapsed.
“Always, Juliette.”
In a flash, Roma lunged at Dimitri. Before Dimitri could gather his bearings and recover from the pleas of the workers, Roma was distracting him again by turning his pistol skyward, the trigger squeezing and shooting a bullet right up into the air. Juliette, taking the chance, raced forward and tore open one of the bags near Dimitri’s feet. She turned it upside down, scattering the clumps of blue all across the other bags, spread evenly upon every single one of them.
A heavy grunt. Dimitri—writhing out of Roma’s hold. In the tussle, the pistol flew three feet away, clattering into a pool of blood, but instead of chasing after it, Dimitri only spun around, heaving with his hatred. He pushed Roma hard, almost slamming him to the ground. Then, before Juliette could get out of the way, he sighted her with the bags, and his boot collided with her stomach.
Juliette landed sharply on the gravel, wincing when it tore scratches into her elbows. The gasoline on the ground soaked into the wounds. Roma hurried to her aid and hauled her upright again, but it was no matter. The scene was set. Behind Dimitri, the monsters started to lumber near.
They needed to come closer. Just a little closer.
Roma reached for Juliette’s hand. Something about it felt entirely natural even as the world stuttered to a halt around them. It would always be that same feeling as when they were fifteen: invincible, untouchable, as long as they were together. His fingers, solid and steady while they were entwined with hers.
With her other hand, Juliette flipped open the lighter. She met Roma’s eyes, asked him in silence one last time if they were truly to do this. He showed no fear. He was gazing at her as one would gaze out into the sea, like she was this vast, momentous wonder that he was glad simply to bear witness upon.
“To have and to hold, where even death cannot part us,” Juliette whispered.