This Shattered World
Page 68

I can’t let myself continue to fall for a boy who represents everything I’ve been fighting against since I was eight years old.
But since I can’t actually stop myself from doing any of those things, at least I can stop myself from touching him ever again.
I’m not on duty the next day until mid-morning, but I wake at sunrise anyway, the habit too well ingrained to set aside. There’s no word from Merendsen about our next move, giving me no outlet for the need to act, to keep my thoughts away from dangerous territory. I should be giving my body as much time to recover as I can before I’m out on the fences again. It’s cold, wet, hard work out there; the rebels are invisible in the swamp, the bullets coming from nowhere. They keep too close to the base for us to call in an airstrike, but too far for us to pick them off from behind our fortifications. We’re forced down low, and the mud oozes inside my combat suit, itching like mad once it dries, and I smell like a swamp no matter how hard I scrub afterward. When we follow them farther into the swamps they vanish into nowhere, drawing us onto unsafe ground like will-o’-the-wisps.
It’s hours before I’m on duty, but my skin’s crawling for action, and every time I sit still—every time I close my eyes—Flynn’s there.
One true thing, he said, his lips finding a hidden spot behind my jaw. This is real.
I throw on the fatigues I was wearing yesterday, wrinkled and untidy—but laundry is the last priority on the base right now, and no one’s about to judge me for looking disheveled while going for a run. Hesitating only briefly, I buckle on my holster and my Gleidel. Awkward to jog with, but this is the wrong time to go anywhere on Avon unarmed. I choose my running shoes over my regulation boots and duck out into the misty, cold dawn. With Avon’s overcast skies sunrise is slow to take, as though the light itself is slowed down, oozing over the landscape gradually. It’s still dark, but I can see the fog lit overhead as the diffuse sunlight peeks through.
It’s too dangerous to do the usual training run, the eight-klick perimeter of the base that culminates in the obstacle course by the gym. There are rebels beyond the fences who know the land better than we do, and I don’t relish the idea of running ten feet away from someone with a gun pointed at me that I can’t see.
So instead I weave through the buildings, ignoring the way the mud splashes up at my pants legs. It’s a struggle not to push myself harder, to get to the point where I don’t have the focus to think about anything but one foot in front of the other, but I can’t waste all my energy while off duty.
I head past security, my breath steaming in the clammy air, and aim for the road that heads toward Central Command. It’s less torn up than the other paths, not as muddy. Easier to run on.
My path takes me straight up past Central Command in time to see Commander Towers disappear into her office. I stop short in a spray of mud. We need proof of what’s happening—Lilac LaRoux said as much. And while she and Merendsen might be content to put our fates in the hands of some hacker on the other side of the galaxy, I’m not used to waiting for someone else to save me.
I know Commander Towers knows more than she’s telling me. And I can’t believe she’s dirty. If she was in LaRoux’s pocket, why would she have warned me about telling Lilac’s fiancé what was going on here?
I wish Flynn were here. I hate the idea of leaving him in the dark, especially after seeing his anguish last night at having to continue hiding instead of finding justice for the massacre. But I’m not ready to face him yet; just the thought of him makes my cheeks burn. I shove his image away and turn toward Commander Towers’s office. My feet thud in time with my heart against the wooden stairs up to the prefab trailer.
“What?” Her voice shouts from inside; she’s not happy about being interrupted.
“It’s Chase, sir. Can I speak with you?”
The silence from the other side of the door stretches a fraction too long. “Of course. Come in.”
I shove the rickety door open and slip through. “Commander.”
“Shut the door!” she hisses, standing by her desk.
I blink, taken aback, but instinctively slam the door behind me.
“Sorry about that, Captain Chase. But you can’t be too careful. You don’t know who’s watching us.”
I suppress a shiver and take the seat she gestures at, expecting her to take a seat behind her desk. Instead she starts to pace, her eyes on the door instead of on me. I wait for her to gather herself, to speak to me, to let me explain why I’ve come—but it’s like she’s completely forgotten I’m in the room.
“Uh—sir?”
She stops pacing mid-stride, turning toward me. Her blue eyes are glittering, too bright. I don’t think she’s slept since I last spoke to her. “I’m sorry, Captain. You wanted to speak with me?”
“Yes, sir.” I swallow, my mouth suddenly gone dry. Trust what you feel, Lilac LaRoux told me. I believe in Commander Towers. “Sir, I know what’s going on. I know about LaRoux Industries, I know there was a hidden facility to the east, and I know it all has something to do with the Fury. And I know you know something about it.”
The silence is broken only by the frantic pounding of my heart, echoed briefly in the distance by a patter of gunfire. Commander Towers watches me, her breath coming rapidly, the circles under her eyes more pronounced than ever. I find it hard to meet her gaze; there’s fear burning behind her blue eyes, the desperation of a woman on the edge.
Then she closes her eyes. “God, Lee, you don’t know what a relief it is to hear you say that. This can’t leave my office, but…” She trails off, shoulders drooping as if with the weight of her secret.
My own relief is like a gust of fresh air, letting me breathe again for the first time since I stepped through her door.
She turns away, leaning on her desk. “I know you went out to that facility; I know that’s why you were asking about it. I was afraid of what you might have seen there. You don’t know what they do to people who know too much. They know everything—they can see inside your mind.”
Lilac LaRoux’s warnings echo in my mind, and I try not to let my own fear rise in response to my commander’s. “Sir,” I begin, “LaRoux Industries is—”
“LRI?” Towers stares at me. “I’m not talking about them. I’m talking about the—the things that are out there. In the swamp.”