We needed a shortcut to theEndeavor’s dock before Bridgebane caught up to us. I grabbed Shade’s gun and shot at my uncle. Bullets pinged around his feet and stuck in the impact-absorbent walls. I looked for a ventilation shaft with a blue keypad on it. Red led up. We needed down, and we needed it fast.
“Come back, or I’ll have to find someone else just like you,” Bridgebane threatened. “How do you feel about that? The testing? The searching? Maybe I’ll test every single kid in this place. How would you like that?”
My stomach clenched at the thought.
Another shot rang out. Shade and I ducked, hurrying our labored steps.
“Come back, Quin. Hand over the bounty hunter, come with me, and I’ll tell you everything.”
I paused in my steps. What more was there? What did he know that I didn’t?
“Seriously?” Shade took his gun back and hammered off a few shots to slow down my uncle and keep him at a distance before pushing me along again. “You’re crap in a fight. We really have to work on this.”
“I took you down.” I angled myself to protect him and had to admit that it was a good thing for both of us that my uncle didn’t want me dead.
“I wasn’t trying,” he said. “And I was worried about Bonk.”
The ice in my heart melted a little too much, and a little too fast. It hurt.
“Is he okay?” I asked, anxious. “I don’t hear him.”
Boom!Bridgebane let off a shot, and I jumped.
Boom! Boom!Shade fired back, pushing us up against the wall.
“He’s sedated. I didn’t want the bag to freak him out.”
The bag was mesh on both sides. Ventilation. I looked up at Shade with wide eyes.
“Come on!” He pulled me forward. “How the hell have you survived so far? Or on the fucking Mile?” he ground out.
“I’m not useless.” I was working on getting us out of here, although I wasn’t nearly as panicked since discovering that Shade wasn’t my enemy, and that my uncle would rather shoot himself than shoot me.
Maybe I was still in shock over both those things.
Shade growled something foul when I stopped again. Ignoring his protest and my uncle’s approaching steps, I reached for the blue keypad on the ventilation access panel next to us. I’d created a system-wide code about ten years ago and secretly programmed it toforeverstatus—Queen Bee was the password. The overlying code could have changed a hundred times since then, but the lock would still remember me.
“Shortcut,” I told Shade as I quickly punched in the numbers corresponding to my permanent password. I stayed in front of him, so my uncle wouldn’t shoot. The corridors were monstrously long, the elevators were far away, and Bridgebane would be relentless if he thought he could still catch me without hurting me.
The door to the ventilation shaft swung open. “See? Skills. And on the Mile, I had Jax.”
“I’ll shoot him in the head, Quin.” My uncle was practically on top of us, his gun raised, his finger on the trigger, and Shade in his sights. He’d made up some serious ground the second we stopped shooting to keep him back.
My heart pounding, I covered Shade as he dove into the crawl space, leaving blood on the rim of the panel.
Bridgebane looked livid, but he didn’t shoot. He did start to run, his free hand lifting to grab me.
I dove in after Shade, turned, and slammed the door shut, nearly catching Bridgebane’s fingers in the crack.
My uncle roared.
I roared back. “See you in hell, Uncle Nate!”
“Quin!” He beat what must have been the butt of his gun against the ventilation shaft door.
To thethud, thud, thud, I followed Shade as he started to crawl.
“You’ve left me no choice,” Bridgebane bellowed. “I’ll take one. You choose. Mareeka or Surral.”
