“No. I have to get James. I have to be there. I have to be the one to get him—”
“But Juliette—”
“You said yourself that Warner isn’t going to kill her—she’ll be okay there for a little while. But right now they’re going to blow up Omega Point, and James—and everyone else—is going to die. We have to go now—”
“Maybe I can stay here and look for Juliette, and you guys can go—”
“Juliette will be fine. She’s not in any immediate danger here—Warner isn’t going to hurt her—”
“But—”
“Kenji, please!” I’m desperate now and I don’t care. “We need as many people at Omega Point as possible. There are tons of people left behind, and they don’t stand a chance if we don’t get to them now.”
Kenji stares at me for just a moment longer before he nods. “You guys go grab Brendan and Winston,” he says to Castle and the three others. “Kent and I will commandeer a tank and meet you back here. We’ll do everything we can to get back to Point as soon as possible.”
The second everyone is gone, I grab Kenji by the arm. “If anything happens to James—”
“We’re going to do everything we can, I promise—”
“That’s not good enough for me—I need to go get him—I need to go right now—”
“You can’t go right now,” Kenji snaps. “Save your stupid for later, Kent. Now, more than ever, you need to stay in control. If you go crazy and head back to Point on foot with no regard for your own safety, you’ll be dead before you even get there, and any chance of saving James will be lost. You want to keep your little brother alive? Make sure you don’t kill yourself while you’re trying to save him.”
I feel like my throat is closing up. “He can’t die,” I say, my voice breaking. “I can’t be the reason he dies, Kenji—I can’t. . . .”
Kenji blinks fast, forcing back his own emotion. “I know, man. But I can’t think like that right now. We have to keep moving. . . .”
Kenji is still talking, but I can hardly hear him.
James.
Oh God.
What have I done.
NINE
I have no idea how we all fit inside this tank. We’re eight people jammed into cramped quarters, sitting on laps, and no one even cares. The tension is so thick it’s practically its own person, taking up a seat we don’t have to spare. I can barely think straight.
I’m trying to breathe, trying to stay calm, and I can’t.
The planes are already overhead, and I feel sick in a way I don’t know how to explain. It’s deeper than my stomach. Bigger than my heart. More overwhelming than just my mind. It’s like fear has become me; it wears my body like an old suit.
Fear is all I have left now.
I think we all feel it. Kenji is driving this tank, somehow still able to function in the face of all this, but no one else is moving. Not speaking. Not even breathing too loudly.
I feel so sick.
Oh God, oh God.
Drive faster, I want to say, but then, actually, I don’t. I don’t know if I want to hurry up or slow down. I don’t know what will hurt more. I watched my own mother die, and, somehow, it didn’t hurt as much as this.
I throw up then.
All over the floor mats.
The dead body of my ten-year-old brother.
I’m dry-heaving, wiping my mouth on my shirt.
Will it hurt when he dies? Will he feel it? Will he be killed instantly, or will he be impaled—injured, somehow—and die slowly? Will he bleed to death all alone? My ten-year-old brother?
I’m holding fast to the dashboard, trying to steady my heart, my breathing. It’s impossible. The tears are falling fast now, my shoulders shaking, my body breaking. The planes get louder as they come closer. I can hear it now. We all can.
We’re not even there yet.
We hear the bombs explode far off in the distance, and that’s when I feel it: the bones inside of me fracture, little earthquakes breaking me apart.
The tank stops.
There’s no going forward anymore. There’s no one and nothing to get to, and we all know it. The bombs keep falling and I hear the explosions echoing the sounds of my own sobs, loud and gasping in the silence. I have nothing left now.
Nothing left.
Nothing so precious as my own flesh and blood.
I’ve just dropped my head into my hands when a scream pierces the quiet.
“Kenji! Look!”
It’s Alia, shrieking from the backseat as she throws the door open and jumps out. I follow her with my eyes and only then see what she saw, and it takes just seconds before I’m out the door and bolting past her, falling to my knees in front of the one person I never thought I’d see, not ever again.
TEN
I’m almost too overcome to speak.
James is standing in front of me, sobbing, and I don’t know if I’m dreaming.
“James?” I hear Kenji say. I look back to see almost everyone has gotten out of the tank now. “Is that you, buddy?”
“Addie, I’m s-sorry,” he hiccups. “I know you s-said—you s-said I wasn’t supposed to fight, but I couldn’t stay behind and I had to l-leave—”
I pull him into my arms, clutching him tight, hardly able to breathe.
“I wanted to f-fight with you,” he stammers. “I didn’t w-want to be a baby. I wanted t-to h-help—”
“Shhhh,” I say to him. “It’s okay, James. It’s okay. We’re okay. It’s going to be okay.”
“But Addie,” he says, “you don’t know what h-happened—I’d only been gone a little while and then I saw the p-planes—”
I shush him again and tell him it’s okay. That we know what happened. That he’s safe now.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t h-help you,” he says, pulling back to look me in the eye, his cheeks a splotchy red and streaked with tears. “I know you said I shouldn’t, but I really w-wanted to h-help—”
I pick him up, cradling his body in my arms as I carry him back to the tank, and only then realize that the wet stain down the front of his pants isn’t from the rain.
James must’ve been terrified. He must’ve been scared out of his mind and still, he snuck out of Omega Point because he wanted to help. Because he wanted to fight alongside us.
I could kill him for it.
But damn if he’s not one of the bravest people I’ve ever known.
ELEVEN
Once we’re back in the tank, we realize we have no idea what to do.
Nowhere to go.
The depth of what’s happened has only begun to hit us. And just because I was able to salvage a bit of good news from the wreckage doesn’t mean there isn’t a lot left to grieve.
Castle is practically comatose.
Kenji is the only one who’s still trying to keep us alive. He’s the only one with any sense of self-preservation left, and I think it’s because of Castle. Because no one is leading us anymore, and someone has to step up.
But even with Kenji doing his best to keep us focused, few of us are responding. The day has come to a close much more quickly than we could’ve expected, and the sun is setting fast, plunging us all into darkness.