Julio scrambles away from Hunter’s transmitter, his breath wheezing through his injured throat.
“What just happened?” Amber’s voice is thin, close to breaking as a tremor takes hold of her. She wraps her rms around herself and chokes out a sob.
Julio opens his mouth, but no words come.
We killed him. We sent a Season into the wind. We were supposed to disappear. To quietly fall off the grid. But now... now we’ll be lucky if they ever stop searching for us.
“It was my fault,” Julio croaks. “He had me by the throat. I couldn’t breathe. I just—”
Marie snatches up Hunter’s transmitter. She switches it off, shutting down its signal to the Observatory. She rounds on all of us as she closesit in her fist. “We protected ourselves. Do you hear me?” Her voice shakes, but her face is a mask of fierce determination as she stares every one of us down. “They attacked us and we defended ourselves. We’re alive. All of us. And I refuse to let a single one of you regret that!” She jams her trembling fist into her pocket. “Now, quit blubbering and let’s get out of here before any more of them show up.”
Fleur throws herself at Julio, wrapping him in a bone-crushing hug, whispering reassurances in his ear. Poppy and Chill approach slowly, hefting Woody between them. Amber and I rush to help.
We ease Woody to the ground. Poppy rifles through her backpack for a sewing needle and thread. Chill cuts a hole in Woody’s pants and Marie preps his leg for stitches.
Amber and I back out of their way. She must feel me watching her. Her eyes brush mine, holding on for a painfully short moment before darting away. I can’t tell if it’s her broken nose or grief that brings the tears to them. She wipes her nose on her sleeve as she stoops to retrieve Hunter’s combat knife, her hands shaking as she cleans dirt from the blade. She starts to tuck it into her belt, then stops. Instead, she turns the hilt toward Woody.
“Take it,” she says. He turns his head away, swiping tears from his eyes. “You took a knife in the leg. You’ve earned it.” She presses it into his hand and sinks to the blacktop a few feet away, frowning at the charred hole in her sleeve. The skin underneath is blistered and raw. Blood trickles over her lip, and she winces as she runs her tongue over her teeth.
“I saw those Guards chase you into the woods,” she says to Fleur, cringing as she tests the cartilage in her nose. “How many were there?”
Fleur’s eyes flick to mine and I look away, unable to bear the weight of her stare. She clears her throat. “Only two,” she says. “Jack and I took care of them. No big deal.”
Amber raises an eyebrow, clearly suspicious of Fleur’s lie. But before she can say a word, Julio kneels in front of her. “Here, let me fix it,” he says gently. He grimaces as he inspects her nose. “Sorry, this is going to hurt.” He places his hands gently on her face. Their eyes hold. With a quick snap, he sets the break. Her watering eyes squeeze shut and she lets out a yelp.
Julio peels off his sweatshirt, balling it up to stanch the flow of blood from her nose, but she grabs him instead, bringing his hands to her face and holding him there. She leans into him with an exhausted, shuddering sigh as her bruises fade and the bleeding slows.
Fleur slides her hand into mine.
After a long moment, Amber’s eyes snap open.
A pink flush shines through the gore on her cheeks when she finds us all staring. She brushes Julio’s hands away, prodding the bridge of her nose as she stands. “I’m going to get cleaned up. Somebody steal us a car.”
“I’ll go,” Julio offers, a little unsteady on his feet.
“Don’t get arrested,” she warns him.
“Me?” he laughs. “Never.”
“September 1989?” Their eyes catch. Her cheeks burn. “Just be careful,” she says. “I might need you later on.” She starts up the ramp to the bathhouse. Julio watches her go.
“I’ll go with you.” Fleur gives my hand a quick squeeze and jogs after him. I want to pull her back. Keep her here. Hunter’s death is fartoo fresh in my mind. There are no more ley lines for us. No transmitters or stasis chambers. I brought her here to keep her safe. To keep her alive. But when those Guards came for us, I couldn’t do a damn thing to protect her.
Chill clears his throat behind me, and I tear my eyes from Fleur.
“Woody okay?” I ask him.
“Yeah.” He strips off his glasses and rubs his eyes. “I think so.”
“How about you?” Chill’s shivering. Or just shaken. Fear and cold look the same sometimes, and the deepest breaks can be the hardest to see.
“You were right.” Chill squints down at the frames in his hands. “It’s different back at school. Just red dots on a screen. I thought I’d know what to do if I ever got in a real fight, but I froze.”
I rest a hand on his shoulder. “No one expects you to be a hero.”
“But that’s the thing. All this time, I expected you to be.” He looks up at me, no plastic frames. No lenses, real or imagined, between us. The truth stings. I’m feeling pretty far from heroic right now. All I wanted was to disappear quietly and find a place where we could all be safe. I thought I could be the one to keep us that way.
I force myself to smile. Squeeze his shoulder to remind him his padding is gone. “You did it. You conquered your fear. Seems pretty heroic to me.”
