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MARA

“ I s everybody ready?” my mother asked, slamming a battery clip into her stunner and powering the device on with a pitchy whirring sound. She was taking point since she pulled rank with Javi being her second in command if anything should happen to her.

“Don’t forget first aid,” Javi ordered. I simply nodded, rummaging through the supplies as he turned his attention to my mom. “Did he give you access?” Javi asked, shoving an assortment of grenades into his backpack.

Liddy swept back the strands of her thick raven-black hair, pulling it into a sleek ponytail. “Commercial?”

“Residential.” My mother checked her handgun, making sure the chamber was clear before loading it.

Wearing the same jumpsuit as the rest of us, she could have been my twin if it weren’t for her age and eyes.

Same locks of mahogany colored hair, only laced with strands of gray.

Same round face and lips and cheeks and long lashes, but stress and worry gave her permanent lines on what was once smooth, youthful skin.

The only thing that we didn’t share were our eyes.

Although Nora’s eyes were brown, they were lighter and not nearly as big as mine.

A tap on my shoulder drew my attention away from my mom.

“Take this,” Lin said, handing me a sheathed knife.

I took it, studying the well-worn black hilt as I pulled the knife out to examine it.

I supposed it was technically a dagger because the blade was double-sided, the silvery steel glinting as it caught the moonlight.

“That one’s my favorite,” she said when I looked back up at her. She lifted a single finger to her lips. “Shh…don’t tell Justice, though, okay?” Then she winked, shaking a second knife in her hand before strapping it to her thigh.

Mimicking her, I began strapping mine to my left leg. “I’m guessing it’s yours?”

She nodded. “That one’s Glory.”

“You named them?”

Wiping her hands on her front, she chirped out, “Yup.”

“Why?”

“Because every blade destined to do great things deserves to be named.”

I smirked, vaguely aware of my mother and Javier discussing the plan between the two of them as Lin and I finished up. “And how could you possibly know that ahead of time?”

“I don’t,” she said, sweeping her thick ponytail off her shoulder.

Lin looked like an exotic princess prepared to carry out at least a dozen executions with the way she was armed.

“A blade is an extension of the person who wields it, Mara. And only that person gets to decide what kind of mark they’ll leave on the world. ”

“But sometimes you don’t have a choice,” I argued back.

“Sometimes you’re forced to do things you don’t want to.

” Boy, that had been the case for me. Since the very beginning, I’d been forced to do things I desperately didn’t want to.

From giving up Chase’s name, to joining the Dissenters, accepting a betrothal to Wes and then subsequently breaking his heart, to leaving him behind now.

Over and over again, I was forced into making impossible choices, some of which I wasn’t particularly proud of.

Liddy faced me then, tipping her head to the side.

“You always have a choice, Mara. We all do. No matter how trapped you feel, there’s always a choice.

You just have to be brave enough to see it.

” I considered her words, weighing them for a moment before tucking them into the back of my mind.

Lin stepped forward, placing a hand on my shoulder.

“When the time comes, Mara…fly. Let her fly.”

I blinked, lips parting at her odd advice. And just as I was about to ask her to explain, Javi’s voice snapped my attention to the situation at hand.

“Are you two ready? We’ve gotta go. We’re down to less than four hours before the airstrike.”

I nodded, pulling my own hair back into a tight bun at the nape of my neck.

My shoulder twinged as I did, but thanks to those little red pills Giza gave me and Javi, the pain was virtually gone.

The pain killers were extremely effective, and I was grateful for it.

Although I had only sprained my shoulder, Javier’s injuries from Apex had been worse.

I doubted he’d still be standing right now if it weren’t for the medication.

“Yeah, we’re ready,” Lin added.

My mother slung her backpack over her shoulder. “We’re going to have to make up for lost time in the tunnel, all right? Let’s move out.”

** *

Twice before, I’d been in the tunnels—once to escape from Telvia, and the second to gain access into the city.

Lit with caged-in lights running along the left side, they did little to push back on the darkness, and the smell of damp earth kept me from forgetting we were deep underground.

Unlike the last time I was in the tunnels, dust wasn’t sprinkling from the ceiling as though the whole thing was going to cave in on us.

That was an improvement.

But last time, my brother had been with me, alive . And I was convinced that, together, we were going to destroy the nanochips.

I had been so wrong.

We hustled, jogging most of the journey to make up for lost time. A glance at my tab showed the ominous timer ticking down.

Three hours until the airstrike.

If we didn’t convince my father to surrender or somehow destroy the NIT-V2 tech before then, the entire city would be destroyed. An air raid would lay waste with firebombs, striking the city center and District 1 first. District 2 would follow, and then subsequently District 3.

All of Telvia would burn alive.

After the airstrike, teams of Dissenters and Northern military would search the city on foot, seeking survivors.

It was an awful plan and a waste of human life.

I understood why Sasha and Wes felt this was the only choice left to them because even though nobody here had said it, it was ludicrous to think we would convince my father to step down.

He was a man hellbent on power, and he was on the cusp of victory.

The North was the only thing that stood as a true barrier to Raúl.

But with Fisher at his side feeding all our secrets, and the ability to control the minds of every soldier captured… Raúl had already won.

Nobody wanted to say it, but they didn’t have to. Only that striking and terrifying truth would force Wes to make the decision he had. To bloody his hands and mar his soul with the lives of thousands of innocents.

But he was wrong.

They were all wrong.

Because no matter how bleak the odds, taking out an entire faction of people was never the right choice.

That’s what Raúl did all those years ago, and we couldn’t keep repeating the mistakes of the past. We had to do things differently—be better versions and stay on the honorable side of history.

So I ran.

I ran and I didn’t stop. Even when my lungs ached for air and my legs cried for rest, I kept pushing.

But no matter how far I traveled through the darkness, I kept looking over my shoulder.

It was a gnawing feeling, like an itch that refused to be quelled.

And no matter how many times I glanced backwards, the persistent urge continued.

It took me several minutes to figure out that I expected someone to be following us. But there was no one.

It was just us.

“When we reach the access point, we’ll be in District 1’s residential zone,” my mother said over her shoulder breathlessly, never slowing her gait.

“Friendly?” It was my cousin, keeping pace just behind her.

“Unknown. Former Dissenter, but he failed to report in following the events of the Apex mission.” We reached a fork in the tunnel, four paths snaking off in four entirely different directions. It only took Nora a minute to consult her tab before taking off toward the center, left-side tunnel.

“Modified?” That was Lin, jogging just behind me .

“Unknown,” my mother repeated.

My stomach dipped at her admission. Damn, I did not like the sound of that.

It wasn’t much longer when we finally arrived at a ladder composed of bent rebar driven into the wall. Its distressed yellow paint seemed to glow like a beacon in the dark. Nora finally slowed, coming to a stop as she closed her eyes and panted for a moment.

“This is it. I’ll go first, followed by Lin, Mara, and Javier. Whatever happens, remember this man is a Dissenter. Use stunners first and lethals as a last resort.” We all nodded, our breaths just as ragged as hers.

Then my mother climbed, followed by Liddy. My hand wrapped around the cold metal, feeling the ridges as I looked down the long tunnel and swallowed.

“You’re next, prima.”

“I know.”

“Doubts?”

I jerked my head to face him. “What? No , of course not.”

“?Entonces?”

I knew what that word meant. It was a question…him wondering why I paused. I shook my head softly. “Nothing.” Of course it wasn’t nothing. It was something . It was the fact that I was about to go into something that would most likely lead me to my death and—

“He’s not coming.”

I reared my head at him. “Excuse me?”

Javi took a step closer, placing a hand on my shoulder. “Tu comprometido…your promised. He’s not coming.”

My face wrinkled with the stab in the heart.

That was it. That was why I kept looking back.

It wasn’t that I was worried I’d see something, it was that I hoped too.

And not just something, but one specific person.

I wanted to see Wes. Because despite the fact that he was making the wrong choice, I wanted him with me.

Throat sealing up, I managed to mutter, “I know.”

Javi leaned in, dipping so that he could look into my eyes better.

“I know he loves you, primita. But sometimes the people we love make the wrong choices, and we have to be brave enough to stand against them.” I tried to swallow, but there was no shoving down the knot that had consumed my throat.

“But I’m here with you now, cousin. And so is your mom. You’re not alone…you never have been.”

My lips parted, ready to argue the point, to argue that I had spent a lifetime alone, suffering in cold dark places when—

A scream.

Liddy’s scream.

Javier jerked back, eyes staring up the ladder into the abysmal black. “Lin!” he yelled up into the dark. Then we were climbing, him in front of me. Already something had happened. Already something had gone wrong. And already I wanted the one thing I couldn’t have…Wes.