Before they had a chance, I was on top of them. I swung out wildly at one, my fist connecting with his jaw. It crunched satisfyingly. He fell forward, clutching his face. I elbowed him hard, and he collapsed into the field. The other guy took one look at me and turned to run, but I grabbed the back of his shirt and pulled him back, flinging him to the ground. He squirmed under me and opened his mouth to shout for help. Desh was there in a second, covering it with his palm.

This kid was a coward. He was going to leave his partner and run. Just like I did. I thumped his head into the ground hard, and his eyes stared up at me woozily. I could have killed him right there. But I had to do something. I might have failed Rosa, but there was one thing I could do before I left. It was why we came here.

I shoved Desh’s hand off and stared down at the young soldier shaking under my hold. “You tell your Superiors some of the babies may have a G6PD deficiency.”

He looked at me blankly. “Say it!” I threatened, lifting him by the shirt, ready to slam his head into the hard stone path beneath us.

“G6 P...?”

My hands crept around his throat. I wanted to hurt him. I wanted him to refuse me and give me an excuse. “G-6-P-D,” I said slowly, emphasizing each letter and number.

Alarm sharpened his senses. “Ok. Ok. G6 PD deficiency. I’ll tell them. I-I promise,” the soldier said quickly.

I saw myself reflected in his eyes, and I dropped him. Grabbing his gun from its holster, I training it on his chest, my hands shaking. “Don’t move until we’ve passed through the gate,” I said as I walked backwards, letting the fear in that kid’s eyes punch me over and over. I needed to get a handle on my emotions, but I didn’t know how.

We went through the gate, and I heard his footsteps running away from us.

The sirens brought everyone who lived in the outer ring onto their doorstep and into the street. At least a hundred people crowded near the little shed, which I knew led to the elevator underground. There were several guards ushering everyone into one area, as they prepared to address them.

I pointed subtly towards the shed. “There. We need to get into there.”

Desh nodded, his expression tired. The events of the night were catching up to him too.

I looked down at my blood-crusted hand, quickly shoving it in my pocket. I put the other arm across my chest, trying the hide the blood spatters. The realization of what I’d just done hovered over my head like a blinking arrow.

I killed a Superior.

Desh and I melted into the crowd, searching for a way to slip past everyone and head for that shed. Its door was hanging slightly ajar. The sirens had everyone confused and wandering aimlessly, like they’d never heard one before.

I looked sideways at Desh, who was moving his face around, scanning the area. We were only about ten meters from the opening but making a run for it would attract too much attention. We were enclosed on all sides by a crowd of people that was getting tighter and tighter. A woman pushed me in the back, and I turned around. She looked up at me, and her eyes widened. It was the woman from Este’s house. The one who had to vacuum the tapestries over and over.

A guard yelled over the crowd. “There has been a disturbance in Este’s compound.” The crowd grew quiet. “We are unsure how many casualties at this point, but we can confirm that Este had been murdered.”

Murdered.

The word pounded me in the chest.

Murdered.

Murderer.

I gasped for air, and the small woman pursed her lips as she stared at me. She gripped my hand for a moment and squeezed it. Then she let go and pushed her small, round body through the crowd. She was enveloped by the sea of people.

“No!” A tortured scream echoed over the crowd. “Superior Este is dead. No!” The woman’s screams flowed over the crowd. “Is it a takeover? Is it war? What do we do?” she shouted. Her arms waved about frantically in front of the guards. Their eyes were all on her.

Others picked up on her false panic and started throwing questions at the unwitting guards.

“How did they get in?”

“How many are there? Are they dangerous?”

The people surged at the men standing, clueless in their black uniforms, as their emotions started to build.

We took the opportunity, broke from crowd, and entered the shed.

*****

The voices outside rose in volume, and I could hear the clamor of people bumping up against each other and the guards getting more and more frustrated. Responses on both sides got louder and angrier.

Desh and I stood in the dark, breathing hard, not knowing what to say to each other.

“It’s going to be all…” Desh started

I cut him off. I didn’t want to hear it. It wasn’t going to be all right. How could anything be after tonight?

I grabbed his hand roughly and tried to scan his wrist against the reader for the elevator.

Nothing happened.

“Damn it,” I said. But a big part of me didn’t care. I was ready to surrender.

“Relax,” Desh said smoothly as he pried the control panel open, and manipulated the wires inside until the lift light came on.

We stepped in, and he pressed the button. The sound of voices instantly cut off once the door closed.

We stood there, side by side, nothing but our breathing to break the silence. My eyes went to the poster. A girl with blue eyes and dark hair, her skin that perfect All-Kind tone. I snorted. She was boring looking, her expression dull. It was what all of us felt like inside the walls of the Woodlands. The doors slid open, and we ran down the dark tunnel.

When our heads popped up from underground, we both scrambled out and hit the ground running. I just did what I was told to do. I ran towards the meeting point, the sirens and Rosa getting further and further away with every step.

My body was reacting, fleeing. But I got the sense that I wasn’t really there. That the real me was still pressed up against the glass, waiting.

I was light, my feet barely seeming to touch the ground. Because I was empty. I would be empty until I knew what had happened to her.

She was too brown. The color of Cocoa. I shook my head at the comparison. No, Cocoa was rich and delicious. She looked more like an overcooked bird. Bony, dark, and delicate. I ran my hand over my jaw. The guards were watching me intently, gauging my reaction. I tried to maintain a balance between mild irritation and looking unsurprised, like I had expected a girl to be lying in my untested healing machine.

I swept my hand over the cabinet, avoiding the unsavory blood smears on the glass near the girl’s head. It was beautiful, an elegant, effortless reproduction of the original. President Grant had hugely underestimated the Chinese. When they bombed the US, he thought of nothing other than revenge. He didn’t think to poach their scientists or take control of their technology. He was a fool, as foolish as Este.

I moved around the glass container, weighing up the best response to this disaster. Fifteen minutes ago, we found Vivienne and all eight of her personal guards in a pool of blood. I couldn’t say I was sorry to see her go. The woman was obsessive, unpredictable, and paranoid. Not good traits for a leader. I snorted, thinking of the number of times I had ignored the alert. She had called me and the others to her home for what she called ‘Serious matters,’ so many times that it had become protocol to ignore her. Topics such as pest control and double-glazing on her windows were some of the more ridiculous panics. Her absurd behavior had been her undoing, as no one responded for well over an hour when she sounded the alert this time.