Renegade (35 page)

“No!” Mother screams. “Get those doors open now! Evelyn must not escape!”

“Let’s go!” Gavin says as he lifts me over the side and drops me into the seat of the submarine.

He got it open, I think. Somehow he got it open.

I immediately twist around and watch in horror as the first of the Enforcers finally push their way through the opening. The doors to the sub slam close just as Mother and the rest push their way through.

She’s yelling again and her eyes and face are dark with rage.

I glance over and see Gavin at the controls. “Just hang on tight. I have no clue what I’m doing, but I’ve played a few video games in my lifetime. Either way this is probably going to be the thrill ride of your life.”

I laugh, but this time the movement pulls on my shoulder and I end up gasping and clutching at my chest.

Gavin shoots me a worried glance, but stays where he is. He pushes a series of buttons on the console and then I’m being shoved into my seat as we blast away from the city and toward the Surface.

Even as the submarine’s computer voice warns us to buckle our seat belts, I quickly turn around to watch as, for the first time in my life, I can see the whole of Elysium laid out along the trench walls and ocean floor like a great mechanical octopus. To my shock, it’s brown, covered in overgrowths of the plant life I’ve always seen through the windows. Nothing like the shining silver beacon in the painting in the Palace dining room. It looks so old.

Soon, I can see only the shine of its lights, before it finally disappears in a curtain of bubbles.

I don’t know how I feel about leaving everything behind. It feels bittersweet. Macie, my gardens, Father. It hurts knowing I’ll never see anyone or anything I cared about, but after everything I’ve learned, it’s also a relief.

I glance over at Gavin and can’t help but smile. At least one good thing came from all of this. Gavin. My knight in-not-so-shining armor.

He keeps glancing behind him. Even when we can no longer see my underwater city and I continue to watch him.

A voice jolts me out of my daze. “Warning! Angle of ascent is not recommended for current cabin pressure equalization protocols. Course adjustment and slower ascent is strongly recommended.”

Gavin frowns at me. “What does that mean?”

“We’re going up too fast for the submarine to automatically equalize the pressure. If you continue to go up this fast, you’ll get the bends.”

His face pales and he immediately slows the submarine.

The pressure from the blast lightens up, but now there’s a terrible pain in my chest and shoulder. Something is wrong. My head is buzzing again, and I can’t understand what the computer voice is saying. I hope it’s nothing important.

My hand is warm. And wet.

I glance down and see the entire front of my dress covered in blood. I pull my hand away and see there is a glove of blood from my fingertips to my elbow.

Too much blood, I think, my head growing foggy. There’s entirely too much blood.

“The pressure…” I murmur. “Why aren’t the nanos working?”

I glance at Gavin, but he’s staring straight ahead now, entirely focused on getting us to the Surface. My head lolls back to the center and I stare ahead. I can’t tell him. There’s nothing to be done anyway.

I can’t quite recall what I meant to tell him.

I feel a sharp pain in my shoulder and glance down. There is blood all over the front of my dress. How did that happen?

Inside my head, I hear lovely violin music and I smile. I do love the violin.

The fingers of my left hand begin to finger imaginary strings in time to the melody and a pain shivers along my arm. I glance down. There is blood all over the front of my dress. How did that happen? I wonder.

The music gets louder, but my fingers can’t keep up anymore. How odd.

I turn to the left and catch sight of the person beside me.

Gavin.

The nanos.

She barely tried to stop us.

“Gavin,” I gasp out, trying to reach for him, but my body won’t cooperate and I only jerk uselessly. He turns. “We have to go back. The electromagnetic fi—” I cut off when a sharp pain tears through my head. I gasp and slump forward. I hear my name as I’m pulled into the blackness.

*   *   *

“Evie…”

I fight to open my eyes, but my sleep is so deep and so seductive.

“Evie, please. Answer me.”

There is so much light pouring through my eyelids. More light than I can bear. I try to pull a hand up to my face, but I can’t seem to move. The whole world seems to move around me. Rocking me.

Even through my closed lids, the light scorches my eyes. Even if I want to look, I can’t, but I can smell air. I don’t know where I’ve smelled air like this before, but it’s familiar and it’s mixed with the scent of salt and something else I can’t identify. The warmth on my skin feels so good from the chills I’d felt before.

I let myself be soothed back into sleep by the rocking, the comfort of whatever is holding me, and the warmth on my skin.

*   *   *

Blood and pain. That’s what fills my dreams. A voice screaming that I failed. Someone whispering he’s sorry. Another voice screams for me to run.

I wake slightly when I’m picked up from my seat, but a familiar scent and the strong arms that hold me soothe me. I know that scent. I know I do. I try to open my eyes, but it’s too much effort. So I stop fighting and curl into whoever’s holding me.

Then there’s a jarring motion when whoever is carrying me jumps from the steadily rocking platform we were on, to something soft and crunchy. The jar tears at my shoulder and I want to scream, but no sounds escape me. It’s all echoing in my head.

Soon, the steady sound of footsteps and the new, different rocking motion put me back to sleep. Back to the dreams of pain and blood.

I wake when a sharp pain in my arm tears me from my nightmares. Mother! is all I can think.

There’s some type of glasses over my eyes. Everything is a shade of gray. I try to claw them off, but my arm won’t cooperate.

“You won’t want to take those off yet, Miss,” a deep voice says. “Your eyes haven’t adjusted to the light here and we don’t want you to go blind on top of fixin’ up this here wound.”

I turn my head and the first person I see is a withered old man with dark skin and silver hair. I start thrashing around, trying to get away. I won’t let him get me. I have to get away. Find … someone, and get away.

“Shh. Evie, it’s okay. He’s a friend. He’s going to help you,” a familiar voice says.

I look around to find the source of the voice. The room is familiar, yet not. The furniture is all strange and metal. The room scares me more than the strange man. I stop searching when I see a face I recognize. A young man with dirty blond hair and gray eyes.

He smiles when my eyes latch on to him. He reaches out and cups my cheek. “How are you feeling?” he asks. He kisses my lips and pulls me closer into a hug without waiting for an answer. “Oh, thank God. I thought I was going to be too late.”

I don’t say anything. I’ve no idea what to say. He hugs me tighter and his mouth sends tremors throughout my body when he leans in close to my ear.

“I love you,” he whispers.

My eyes widen. He loves me? My stomach flutters, but I don’t know why. How could he possibly love me? What does he want from me?

I stutter out the only thing I can think of to ask. “Who are you?”

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY-NINE

I’ve been here for a few days now, yet I still can’t remember anything from before then. Flashes now and then, but nothing substantial. Nothing that I can say I know is the truth. The only thing I know for sure is that here is not my home.

—FROM
E
VIE’S JOURNAL

I’m on the Surface. I finally made it. I try to look at the sun as it sets, but the bright orangey yellow is still too painful, even with my dark glasses. It’s beautiful, though. Like nothing I’ve ever imagined. More than I could ever have dreamed. I like sunset best, when the light doesn’t hurt my eyes so much, and the heat of the sun is bearable on my pink skin.

The doctor says my sunburn would fade faster if I stopped going out into sunlight, but how can I? It’s fascinating and wonderful and irresistible.

Mother was wrong.

I let the wet sand dribble through my fingers, enjoying the rough wetness. Then I tilt my head to the side and wonder who Mother is. I picture a woman with honey blond hair and a pretty smile, but I know that’s not who I’m thinking of.

I sigh. Why can’t I remember anything?

I glance down at the clean white bandage on my shoulder. It has something to do with this, I know, but all I can remember is getting shot and then hiding inside some kind of ticket booth.

It hurts like crazy. I have to have it packed every few hours. Not exactly an enjoyable experience, but if I don’t do it, I could get an infection. That’s what the doctor tells me.

So I do what he says and hope it heals soon so I can go home.

Home? I don’t even know where that is.

It surely isn’t here, where all the people save one are unfamiliar. Where even the sea and sand is strange. I have visions of glass and metal walls. Hard, concrete floors. Not the wood and metal structures built haphazardly a few meters from the shoreline.

Right now I’m stuck sleeping in what I’m told is the hospital. When I heal completely I’ll be allowed to live elsewhere, but for now I need to stay near the doctors. It’s not much of a hospital as far as I can tell, just a few small, worn rooms. But the people who watch over and take care of me are kind. I’ve been here only a few days, but they already count me as one of them.

“You’re Gavin’s,” one girl told me this morning when I asked her why everyone was being so nice. “That makes you ours.”

I don’t know exactly what that means, but I have to admit it’s been on my mind since she said it, and it makes me happy.

The sound of footsteps crunch behind me and I jump up and spin around, half afraid the monsters from my nightmares are coming for me. But I relax when I see Gavin walking toward me with his hands in his pockets. He comes every day, but only when I’m sleeping. At least that’s what I’ve been told by one of the girls who takes care of me. Apparently he doesn’t want to pressure me.

But I’ve missed him, somehow, and I wish he had come to see me when I was awake sooner. It gives me tingles in my stomach just to see him.

“Hi,” he says, and kicks some sand with the toe of his shoe.

“Hi,” I say back. Although I’m enormously pleased to see him, I’m shy as well. I sit back down and clasp my hands together in my lap.

“Can I join you?” he asks.

I gesture to the spot beside me. “Of course. I hear you saved my life.”

He sits and extends his fingers toward mine before curling them into a fist. “Yes. But you saved mine first,” he says softly, and then looks into my eyes.

“Really?” I smile. “I’m glad. I only remember bits and pieces, but what I do remember isn’t very nice.” The smile fades.

“What do you remember?” He watches me, his hand clenching and unclenching into the dirt.

I stare into space. “Running. Getting shot. Pointing a gun at you.” I look back at him. “Lots and lots of blood.”

“Do you remember anything else?”

I shrug. “I’ve tried. It only gives me headaches.”

“You don’t remember anything else … about me?”

I shake my head again. “I remember your name now, but no. I’m sorry.”

He nods, then stands and starts to walk away.

Panic fills me and I know if I don’t do something right then, I’ll never see him again. “Wait!” I jump up.

He stops and spins around, a hopeful look on his face. I slowly walk to him, not sure what I want to say, but I know I want to—have to—say something.

When I reach him, I still don’t know what to say, so I just reach out and take his hand, keeping my eyes on his. They widen and the hope grows brighter.

I lift his hand to my face and nuzzle into it. “I don’t remember you, yet. But I do know you’re important to me. I can’t stop thinking about you. And just the thought of you, or the sound of your name, or your voice, gives me flutters … here.” I lower his hand to my stomach.

He swallows, but doesn’t say anything.

It doesn’t matter though, because I have more to say. “And I don’t want that to stop. Ever.” I look back into his eyes. “I know this isn’t fair to you, but”—I take a deep breath—“but if you’ll wait for me, I know I’ll remember you. Soon.”

He smiles and caresses my cheek with his thumb. “I would wait forever for you.”

I smile and push up on my tiptoes to press a kiss to his lips. He tenses and I lower myself back to the flats of my feet, staring at the ground as a blush creeps into my face. I have no idea why I just did that.

“I-I’m sorry,” I say.

Without any warning, he snakes his arm around my waist and tugs me to him. Then his mouth crushes mine. Mindful of my shoulder, I carefully entwine my arms around his neck, dragging my hands through his hair.

We’re both gasping for air when we pull back from each other. He smiles and brushes the back of his fingers down my cheek.

We turn and stare out over the gorgeous blue water. It sparkles as the sun catches the ripples. And the sun! Even though it hurts, I don’t want to turn away. It’s turned the most beautiful reddish orange. The sky glows like coals, and the clouds around it are the same fiery orange.

“It’s so beautiful,” I say.

“Yes,” Gavin says, but when I glance over, he’s looking not at the sunset, but at me.

Pleasure flows through me and for the first time, in what feels like forever, I’m truly happy.

Acknowledgments

Writing is an epic journey. A journey filled with ups and downs, wrong ways, detours, and dead ends. Sinkholes and quicksand. One with oceans, whirlwinds, and rainbows. And, ultimately, one that cannot be done alone.