Get up, I thought, before Nick or Sam does something worse.
I couldn’t help but see my dad in this man’s place. Even if he worked for the Branch, I wasn’t sure he deserved to be tortured.
Finally, he crawled to his knees, then used the wall for support as he stood up. He shuffled toward the lab, the rest of us trailing behind.
He punched in the code, and the door hissed open.
Nick went in first, gun at the ready. Sam nudged the man inside. Cas and I followed.
The lab was dark. I could only make out the shape of the cells straight ahead, so I tried to focus on all the things Sam had taught me in the last few weeks: What do you smell? What do you feel? Don’t tense up. Keep your finger near the trigger of the gun, but not on it, not till you’re ready to shoot. Listen to your gut; it’ll always be right.
But even with his advice running through my head, I couldn’t focus on any of those things as the lab widened before me. It was like I was home again, like Dad was to my right working at his desk, chewed-up straws piled around him. Cas in the cell farthest to the left. His room full of junk. Nick all the way to the right, ignoring me. Trev next to Cas, in his room reading. Sam, at the glass wall, watching.
My throat closed around a lump.
If we found Dani here, what would happen between Sam and me? The thought hit me square in the chest, till I felt like I couldn’t breathe. I’d been so concerned with my past and my family, and saving the one member I might have left, that I’d forgotten to consider what might happen when Sam saw Dani again.
“Turn on the lights,” Nick ordered.
The man went to the control panel and hit a button. The ceiling lights flickered on.
Unlike the lab at our farmhouse, which had only four cells, this one had six. And there were boys in at least two of them. They stood at the front of their rooms, in the same Branch-issued gray cotton pants and white cotton shirts that the boys had worn all those years.
They were just like us.
I scanned the remaining cells, looking for Dani. The other rooms were dark.
“Is there a girl here?” I crossed the lab to the control panel. “Reddish hair? Beaten, maybe. Dani. Is Dani here?”
The man shook his head, eyes wide, hands held up in front of him. I looked down at the gun still in my hands, the barrel pointed at the man’s chest. I pulled it away.
“You’re sure?”
“I don’t have any Danis here,” he answered.
“But do you have any girls?”
“Um.” He licked his lips. “There’s a—”
A floorboard creaked from somewhere beyond the lab. All four of us froze. Sam gestured to Cas and Nick, then pointed to the left side of the mouth of the hallway. They took their positions and Sam went to the opposite side.
I slid in beside him. Footsteps edged nearer. I closed my eyes, listened. One set of steps. Another. Another. And finally, a fourth. The person at the front of the pack shifted, and I caught the faint sound of metal rattling. A gun. They came forward, one slow, agonizing step at a time. It was the gun that entered the lab first.
Sam grabbed the gun barrel first and pushed up and clocked the person—a man—across the jaw with a left-handed punch. The gun dropped to the floor with a clatter as Sam swung the man around, tossing him into the front wall of the third cell. The thick glass vibrated from the hit, and the boy inside stepped back.
Cas lunged at the next person to enter the lab. A woman, dressed in black combat gear—thick pants, boots tied at her calves, rubber padding on the shoulders and elbows of a thick black jacket, bulletproof vest.
Agents.
Cas punched her in the face. The woman went straight down, knocked out.
Nick went after the third agent. I went after the fourth.
I threw a knee into the man’s groin, then drove another up into his chin. When I gave him a shove, he slumped to the floor, unconscious. I breathed out, the gun still in my left hand.
A fifth agent dropped me with a swipe of his foot. I landed on my back, and my spine seized. My gun skittered away. The agent grabbed one of my feet and yanked me toward the door. The rough concrete tore the skin on my palms as I struggled to grab hold of something.
The man dragged me into the main part of the basement and tossed me against the wall. I hit the edge of the bench as I came down, knocking it and the tin bucket over. The logs spilled every which way. I snatched one up, swung. The agent ducked. I swung again, grazing the top of his head, and when I came back for another hit, he threw a blow to my gut.
The air rushed out of me. I doubled over. The man tore the log from my hand, raised it over his shoulder as if he meant to hit me with it. I braced myself for the impact as a shot rang out.
A bullet wound appeared in the man’s chest, and when he fell over, I saw Sam standing just a few feet away, lowering his gun.
“Thank you,” I started as the door burst open behind me.
“Go!” Sam yelled, motioning me toward the stairs.
“I’m not leaving you!”
Agents filled the room. I had no gun. No weapon at all.
“Damn it, Anna!” Sam yelled, tossing me his gun as an agent rushed toward him. Sam stomped at an angle with his boot, and the agent’s ankle snapped. He slammed down to one knee, and Sam punched the man in the back of the head. The man pitched forward.
I snatched the gun easily from the air, pointed, shot. Another agent down with a bullet hole in his knee. I sighted a dark-haired man as Cas appeared next to me, shooting two agents with a quick squeeze of the trigger.
I shot until my clip ran empty.
“Sam!” I called. He tossed me a full magazine without question, and I slammed it into place, taking out another agent before he could get close.
Cas turned to me, a grin spread across his face. But it slipped away quickly and he brought his gun up, pointing it right at me as an arm wrapped around my throat and dragged me back. Cas was too distracted to see the dark-haired woman come up behind him. She kicked him in the kidney. His face contorted with pain.
My attacker dragged me around a corner, out another door, and into the frigid December air. I swung backward with my foot, grazing the agent’s calf. I still had my gun, so if I could get away, I might be able to land a good shot.
I tried another kick but slipped in the snow and lost my footing. The agent—a man, judging by the size of his biceps—grabbed my arm and slammed it against a tree, jarring my bones. Another blow. Then another, and my gun fell to the ground as I lost all feeling in my fingers.
Still holding my arm, the agent brought it down toward his knee, but I twisted, leaned forward, and kicked back with my boot, hitting him in the groin. He shoved me to the ground. The black rubber grip on my gun handle stood out from the white of the snow. I scrambled for it, rolling to my back once it was in my hands. I pointed and shot, and the man went down just as a black boot kicked me. My gun went flying again.
Another agent stood to my right. Without my gun, I didn’t stand a chance.
I staggered to my feet and ran. Fire burned from my throat down to my lungs. The land crested to a hill, and the river came into view. I barreled toward it, having no plan other than escape.
When I reached the bank, I cut left and quickened my steps, ignoring the voice in my head that said I couldn’t run far enough, fast enough.
Someone crashed through the pines several feet downriver. It was the same agent who had kicked me.
He’d already outpaced me. I was dead.
I staggered back as he charged. I swung with a right-handed punch, but he dodged it easily and countered with an uppercut that landed at my side.
The force behind the blow threw me off-balance, and I stumbled off the riverbank and into the frigid water.
The agent jumped in after me and wrapped his hands into the folds of my jacket collar, yanking me to the surface.
He head-butted me, and I whipped back, the dull ache of the hit vibrating through my skull. My eyes blurred, crossed. My teeth chattered together. I couldn’t think straight.
I blinked, trying to clear my vision, when I saw the man pull a needle from his inside jacket pocket. He bit off the orange cap and spit it out. The current rushed through my legs.
Summoning every ounce of strength I had left, I wrapped my hands around the agent’s wrists and pushed upward, trying to kick his feet out from beneath him. But his stance was solid, and my legs felt weighted down. I couldn’t get enough momentum to do any damage.
He brandished the needle with a closed fist, like a knife.
I fought against it, teeth gritted, feet planted in the river muck. But I was losing fast.
I tried to memorize the man’s face, so that when I finally had the opportunity to get revenge, I would know exactly where to start.
A shadow stretched across us. Sam? Cas? Another agent?
The needle sank into my neck and I cried out.
The shadow came closer in a rush of movement. Whoever it was, he took the agent’s head in his hands and yanked to the right. The man’s neck popped and cracked, and he sank into the water, eyes wide and blank.
The current fought against me and I lost my footing.
“Come on,” someone said, and grabbed a fold of my jacket, pulling me toward the bank with one quick yank. The needle was carefully extracted from my neck with gentle, gloved fingers.
When I was on solid ground again and I could focus, I looked up to see which of the boys had saved me, but it wasn’t Sam or Nick or Cas.
It was Trev.
“What are you doing here?” I took a step back, getting a better look at his clothes. He was in full combat gear, too, the same gear all the other agents wore.
“Oh my God,” I said.
He held up his hands. There was a rifle on his back, the strap slung across his chest. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
Cas called my name somewhere in the distance.
“What are you doing here?” I repeated. Panic edged into my voice. “Did you set us up?”
“No, I didn’t. I swear. I didn’t know we were going to be here tonight. I just found out. And when I did… I came looking for you as soon as I could. I…” He paused, searching for the right words, in the way that only the old Trev would. The Trev I knew best. “Something else is going on here. I don’t know what. But… be careful. Okay?”
“Anna!”
Cas again.
I didn’t look away from Trev. I couldn’t. He’d saved me. If he were here to set me up, I’d already be in the Branch’s hands, wouldn’t I? I tried to think of all the other ways he could twist this to the Branch’s advantage.
“You should go,” Trev said. “Don’t tell them I was here. Please.”
When I didn’t answer, he took a step closer. “Anna? Please?”
I let out a breath. “Fine.”
He nodded, grabbing hold of the gun strap across his chest, as if he needed to lessen the weight on his back. “Be careful, please.” He started off in the opposite direction.
“Thank you,” I called quickly.
Trev looked over his shoulder. “You’re welcome.”
I watched as he disappeared into the woods.
“Anna, that you?” Cas said a second later.
“It’s me.”
“You okay?” He pushed aside a pine branch and came up beside me on the riverbank.
I was soaked. Shivering. Sore. “Yeah, I’m good.”
“You gotta hurry up and get back to the lab, then.”
Instantly I went into panic mode. Was something wrong with Sam or Nick? Had they been injured?
“Why?” I said quickly. “What happened?”
“We found your sister.”
11
WHEN I RETURNED TO THE LAB, THE boys were pushing wounded agents into the last cell on the left.
“Lock it up,” Sam ordered, and the handler punched in a series of commands on the control panel. The glass wall slid into place, sealing the remaining agents inside.
“Open the others,” Sam said next, and the handler followed the order, freeing the two boys I’d seen when we’d first arrived.
I couldn’t help but see my dad in this man’s place. Even if he worked for the Branch, I wasn’t sure he deserved to be tortured.
Finally, he crawled to his knees, then used the wall for support as he stood up. He shuffled toward the lab, the rest of us trailing behind.
He punched in the code, and the door hissed open.
Nick went in first, gun at the ready. Sam nudged the man inside. Cas and I followed.
The lab was dark. I could only make out the shape of the cells straight ahead, so I tried to focus on all the things Sam had taught me in the last few weeks: What do you smell? What do you feel? Don’t tense up. Keep your finger near the trigger of the gun, but not on it, not till you’re ready to shoot. Listen to your gut; it’ll always be right.
But even with his advice running through my head, I couldn’t focus on any of those things as the lab widened before me. It was like I was home again, like Dad was to my right working at his desk, chewed-up straws piled around him. Cas in the cell farthest to the left. His room full of junk. Nick all the way to the right, ignoring me. Trev next to Cas, in his room reading. Sam, at the glass wall, watching.
My throat closed around a lump.
If we found Dani here, what would happen between Sam and me? The thought hit me square in the chest, till I felt like I couldn’t breathe. I’d been so concerned with my past and my family, and saving the one member I might have left, that I’d forgotten to consider what might happen when Sam saw Dani again.
“Turn on the lights,” Nick ordered.
The man went to the control panel and hit a button. The ceiling lights flickered on.
Unlike the lab at our farmhouse, which had only four cells, this one had six. And there were boys in at least two of them. They stood at the front of their rooms, in the same Branch-issued gray cotton pants and white cotton shirts that the boys had worn all those years.
They were just like us.
I scanned the remaining cells, looking for Dani. The other rooms were dark.
“Is there a girl here?” I crossed the lab to the control panel. “Reddish hair? Beaten, maybe. Dani. Is Dani here?”
The man shook his head, eyes wide, hands held up in front of him. I looked down at the gun still in my hands, the barrel pointed at the man’s chest. I pulled it away.
“You’re sure?”
“I don’t have any Danis here,” he answered.
“But do you have any girls?”
“Um.” He licked his lips. “There’s a—”
A floorboard creaked from somewhere beyond the lab. All four of us froze. Sam gestured to Cas and Nick, then pointed to the left side of the mouth of the hallway. They took their positions and Sam went to the opposite side.
I slid in beside him. Footsteps edged nearer. I closed my eyes, listened. One set of steps. Another. Another. And finally, a fourth. The person at the front of the pack shifted, and I caught the faint sound of metal rattling. A gun. They came forward, one slow, agonizing step at a time. It was the gun that entered the lab first.
Sam grabbed the gun barrel first and pushed up and clocked the person—a man—across the jaw with a left-handed punch. The gun dropped to the floor with a clatter as Sam swung the man around, tossing him into the front wall of the third cell. The thick glass vibrated from the hit, and the boy inside stepped back.
Cas lunged at the next person to enter the lab. A woman, dressed in black combat gear—thick pants, boots tied at her calves, rubber padding on the shoulders and elbows of a thick black jacket, bulletproof vest.
Agents.
Cas punched her in the face. The woman went straight down, knocked out.
Nick went after the third agent. I went after the fourth.
I threw a knee into the man’s groin, then drove another up into his chin. When I gave him a shove, he slumped to the floor, unconscious. I breathed out, the gun still in my left hand.
A fifth agent dropped me with a swipe of his foot. I landed on my back, and my spine seized. My gun skittered away. The agent grabbed one of my feet and yanked me toward the door. The rough concrete tore the skin on my palms as I struggled to grab hold of something.
The man dragged me into the main part of the basement and tossed me against the wall. I hit the edge of the bench as I came down, knocking it and the tin bucket over. The logs spilled every which way. I snatched one up, swung. The agent ducked. I swung again, grazing the top of his head, and when I came back for another hit, he threw a blow to my gut.
The air rushed out of me. I doubled over. The man tore the log from my hand, raised it over his shoulder as if he meant to hit me with it. I braced myself for the impact as a shot rang out.
A bullet wound appeared in the man’s chest, and when he fell over, I saw Sam standing just a few feet away, lowering his gun.
“Thank you,” I started as the door burst open behind me.
“Go!” Sam yelled, motioning me toward the stairs.
“I’m not leaving you!”
Agents filled the room. I had no gun. No weapon at all.
“Damn it, Anna!” Sam yelled, tossing me his gun as an agent rushed toward him. Sam stomped at an angle with his boot, and the agent’s ankle snapped. He slammed down to one knee, and Sam punched the man in the back of the head. The man pitched forward.
I snatched the gun easily from the air, pointed, shot. Another agent down with a bullet hole in his knee. I sighted a dark-haired man as Cas appeared next to me, shooting two agents with a quick squeeze of the trigger.
I shot until my clip ran empty.
“Sam!” I called. He tossed me a full magazine without question, and I slammed it into place, taking out another agent before he could get close.
Cas turned to me, a grin spread across his face. But it slipped away quickly and he brought his gun up, pointing it right at me as an arm wrapped around my throat and dragged me back. Cas was too distracted to see the dark-haired woman come up behind him. She kicked him in the kidney. His face contorted with pain.
My attacker dragged me around a corner, out another door, and into the frigid December air. I swung backward with my foot, grazing the agent’s calf. I still had my gun, so if I could get away, I might be able to land a good shot.
I tried another kick but slipped in the snow and lost my footing. The agent—a man, judging by the size of his biceps—grabbed my arm and slammed it against a tree, jarring my bones. Another blow. Then another, and my gun fell to the ground as I lost all feeling in my fingers.
Still holding my arm, the agent brought it down toward his knee, but I twisted, leaned forward, and kicked back with my boot, hitting him in the groin. He shoved me to the ground. The black rubber grip on my gun handle stood out from the white of the snow. I scrambled for it, rolling to my back once it was in my hands. I pointed and shot, and the man went down just as a black boot kicked me. My gun went flying again.
Another agent stood to my right. Without my gun, I didn’t stand a chance.
I staggered to my feet and ran. Fire burned from my throat down to my lungs. The land crested to a hill, and the river came into view. I barreled toward it, having no plan other than escape.
When I reached the bank, I cut left and quickened my steps, ignoring the voice in my head that said I couldn’t run far enough, fast enough.
Someone crashed through the pines several feet downriver. It was the same agent who had kicked me.
He’d already outpaced me. I was dead.
I staggered back as he charged. I swung with a right-handed punch, but he dodged it easily and countered with an uppercut that landed at my side.
The force behind the blow threw me off-balance, and I stumbled off the riverbank and into the frigid water.
The agent jumped in after me and wrapped his hands into the folds of my jacket collar, yanking me to the surface.
He head-butted me, and I whipped back, the dull ache of the hit vibrating through my skull. My eyes blurred, crossed. My teeth chattered together. I couldn’t think straight.
I blinked, trying to clear my vision, when I saw the man pull a needle from his inside jacket pocket. He bit off the orange cap and spit it out. The current rushed through my legs.
Summoning every ounce of strength I had left, I wrapped my hands around the agent’s wrists and pushed upward, trying to kick his feet out from beneath him. But his stance was solid, and my legs felt weighted down. I couldn’t get enough momentum to do any damage.
He brandished the needle with a closed fist, like a knife.
I fought against it, teeth gritted, feet planted in the river muck. But I was losing fast.
I tried to memorize the man’s face, so that when I finally had the opportunity to get revenge, I would know exactly where to start.
A shadow stretched across us. Sam? Cas? Another agent?
The needle sank into my neck and I cried out.
The shadow came closer in a rush of movement. Whoever it was, he took the agent’s head in his hands and yanked to the right. The man’s neck popped and cracked, and he sank into the water, eyes wide and blank.
The current fought against me and I lost my footing.
“Come on,” someone said, and grabbed a fold of my jacket, pulling me toward the bank with one quick yank. The needle was carefully extracted from my neck with gentle, gloved fingers.
When I was on solid ground again and I could focus, I looked up to see which of the boys had saved me, but it wasn’t Sam or Nick or Cas.
It was Trev.
“What are you doing here?” I took a step back, getting a better look at his clothes. He was in full combat gear, too, the same gear all the other agents wore.
“Oh my God,” I said.
He held up his hands. There was a rifle on his back, the strap slung across his chest. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
Cas called my name somewhere in the distance.
“What are you doing here?” I repeated. Panic edged into my voice. “Did you set us up?”
“No, I didn’t. I swear. I didn’t know we were going to be here tonight. I just found out. And when I did… I came looking for you as soon as I could. I…” He paused, searching for the right words, in the way that only the old Trev would. The Trev I knew best. “Something else is going on here. I don’t know what. But… be careful. Okay?”
“Anna!”
Cas again.
I didn’t look away from Trev. I couldn’t. He’d saved me. If he were here to set me up, I’d already be in the Branch’s hands, wouldn’t I? I tried to think of all the other ways he could twist this to the Branch’s advantage.
“You should go,” Trev said. “Don’t tell them I was here. Please.”
When I didn’t answer, he took a step closer. “Anna? Please?”
I let out a breath. “Fine.”
He nodded, grabbing hold of the gun strap across his chest, as if he needed to lessen the weight on his back. “Be careful, please.” He started off in the opposite direction.
“Thank you,” I called quickly.
Trev looked over his shoulder. “You’re welcome.”
I watched as he disappeared into the woods.
“Anna, that you?” Cas said a second later.
“It’s me.”
“You okay?” He pushed aside a pine branch and came up beside me on the riverbank.
I was soaked. Shivering. Sore. “Yeah, I’m good.”
“You gotta hurry up and get back to the lab, then.”
Instantly I went into panic mode. Was something wrong with Sam or Nick? Had they been injured?
“Why?” I said quickly. “What happened?”
“We found your sister.”
11
WHEN I RETURNED TO THE LAB, THE boys were pushing wounded agents into the last cell on the left.
“Lock it up,” Sam ordered, and the handler punched in a series of commands on the control panel. The glass wall slid into place, sealing the remaining agents inside.
“Open the others,” Sam said next, and the handler followed the order, freeing the two boys I’d seen when we’d first arrived.
