Page 16

McScott shakes his head and sighs. "I just spoke with Neal. It's looking like we might be stuck here for the long haul, at least until the others arrive."

I just nod. I'm happy to get this news, though I won't say so out loud—or even to myself. Spending time with McScott is... It's fun. I like it. And if we have nowhere to go, then that means more time to kill with him. We've been talking a lot. He hardly shares around Clarke, but when we're alone, he talks. It makes me feel good. I even told him a little about my parents—Dad, mostly. We have similar fathers, both obsessed with making sure their son turned out 'right'. The difference is that his dad was ex-army. Mine just wished he was.

He offers me a drag off his cigarette, and I take it even though I have a vape pen. As I pull the smoke into my mouth, a pesky intrusive thought flutters right on past the defensive gates set up in my head.

Is this what he tastes like?

"Where's it all end for you, Bird?" he asks later, flicking away the spent cigarette. "A hole in the ground?"

I shrug. Such a blunt and out-of-nowhere question like that isn't unusual for McScott, so it doesn't faze me. "Not exactly my plan."

"Onto the next battlefield if you make it out of this one, then?"

"I don't exactly have much to go back to. Life makes more sense out here."

"I hear you. You get on with the work and no one gives a fuck who you are or what you were back home."

"Exactly," I say.

I realize McScott is looking at me, and when I meet his eyes, the corner of his mouth raises with the slightest uptick. I smile back. I don't know why my heart is beating so hard. I guess it's because I'm not used to seeing him smile.

You know why,you sick bastard. Cut that shit out. You ain't like that, you hear me?

The voice in my head berates me with all the words drilled into my head since I was young.

Clarke begins to snore loudly.

"Bloody hell," McScott mutters, then stands up.

"Where are you going?" I ask.

"Getting away from that racket." He pauses and glances back at me. "I know a spot right at the edge of the forest. Secluded, no one can see it from here."

"Yeah? Maybe I'll come with."

He nods, then in a low voice says, "Give it five minutes before you follow."

He disappears into the darkness. The pulse of my blood hammers in my ears as I sit there, so loud it drowns out the sound of Clarke's snoring. I tell myself I'm going to stay right where I am, that nothing good will come of this, but when the final minute ticks by, I get to my feet and go after him.

At the time, had I known what McScott's invitation meant? I'd always maintained ignorance, because after all, if I had known then I'd have no excuse for the way I'd reacted. But isn't it possible for a man's mind to split in two directions? To act in a way he didn't intend just because of... What? Self-sabotage?

Curiosity?

Maybe that was it. Morbid curiosity, to see if what I was thinking was true. It didn't mean I hadanyintention of following through. It definitely didn't mean I wanted it to happen.

The wood planking around me creaks as I feel the ship banking slightly, tilting me forward. The chains pull taut and the cuffs dig into my bruised wrists. I lurch to the side and spread my knees out to steady myself. We're speeding up. The rhythmic thumpfrom the phoenix furnace comes faster like a nervous heartbeat, and I hear muffled shouts through the opposing wall.

I strain against the shackles, turning my body back and forth in an effort to find some weakness in the chain, some way I might be able to slip out, even if it means breaking my fucking hands.

I'm suddenly slammed into the wall as the ship jolts violently from some kind of impact. It's not turbulence. Did we hit something? Or did something hit us?

More shouts from outside, followed by the thud of boots and paws on the floor above me. Another hard jolt, and a loud bang from outside on the hull. My stomach lurches. The ship is turning hard, like they've slammed it into one hell of a U-turn, or something is pushing us into a spin. Then the floor tilts like a rollercoaster car ticking up for the drop, and I fall against the wall again. All I can see are dim shapes in the darkness as everything not tied down slides across the room towards me.

"Oh, fuck!!"

A large crate flies at me like the grill of a semi-truck, and just before I'm turned into a Jackson pancake, the ship rocks again, throwing the crate into the wall a dick's width away from my head. Then I hear something tapping on the opposite side of the wood behind me, like giant fingernails drumming it. Suddenly, a spear of blinding sunlight shoots into the room from a hole punched through the wall. Then another, and another, and then I'm thrown across the room as the wall comes apart, flooding the space with searing light. I'm upside down and I can't see.Everything is bleached white. My hands are still shackled tight, though the chain has ripped free from the shattered plank it was nailed into. Wind roars through the room along with the sound of a million chainsaws roaring away.

My head is ringing. If I wasn't concussed before I sure as fuck am now. I force my eyes open. The hole in the ship's wall just looks like a huge spotlight pointed at my face, and bizarre shapes flicker in front of it like shadow puppets in a movie theater. And a weird smell, like fried electronics.