Chapter 12
Operation Will Resume Shortly
My arm reached for the emergency button to my right, but then the train lurched violently and ground to a halt as the cabin fell into pitch black.
The flip-flop of momentum sent me to my hands and knees. A thick-treaded boot stepped on my fingers as the cabin erupted into pandemonium. I grabbed a metal pole to pull myself up and not get shoved down again as more and more passengers started moving about in the small space.
The Tower had not experienced a blackout in over a thousand years, so the escalation from confusion to panic was breakneck. The air in the train grew thicker and hotter, adding fuel to that flame. It made it damn hard to breathe, but easier to hide. At least in the dark heat, no one could see me.
I was safest with the lights out.
The pressure of the crowd alleviated when someone finally pried open the doors. An ocean of Citizens swept past me to get out, and I allowed them to carry me away as well.
The tracks were on an elevated rail with concrete walls on each side, and I didn’t stop like most of the others, now coughing and gasping for oxygen as they leaned against the wall or stumbled along the rail.
I took in huge gasps of air as I felt my way through the mob, kicking my heels off in the process.
The train’s lights flickered on for a moment, and I took that opportunity to scan my surroundings. My dorm was still three floors away. I could use the emergency stairs to get there if the power didn’t come back on. I needed to reach those stairs alive, though.
I’d made it about forty meters past the nose of the train when the power roared back to life. While the light should have been a relief, it was a hazard I couldn’t risk getting caught in. I kept running, as hard as I could, until I reached a limit I didn’t know I had.
“Please clear the tracks for your safety,” an announcement came from the train’s loudspeaker. “Operation will resume shortly.”
Getting back on that train would be turning myself in, and that would mean execution.
Branded a threat to the Administration’s carefully constructed system, there would be no trial.
So, I kept running and frantically searched for some other way to get off the tracks.
About twenty meters ahead, I spotted a rusted-out ladder leading over the side.
As soon as my left foot was on the bottom rung, I heard the muffled command.
“Stop! Remain where you are for immediate evaluation.”
The only thing that stopped was my heart.
It must have skipped at least three beats.
I looked in the direction of the command as I scrambled up the ladder. Two Moderators jogged toward me from the opposite direction of the train, their full black body armor grotesquely illuminated by the MagFlux’s headlights.
Behind them was a gargantuan Extermin that only needed one step for every three the Moderators took.
Its head dwarfed the concrete siding, and its red eyes trained on me.
The soulless weapon raised its patchwork arm, sporting a canon the size of my waist. The Extermin’s dead skin glowed silver in the backwash of the Mods’ headlamps, and its boots clanged with every stomp.
It had already locked in on me.
I was as good as dead.
My hands slid against the metal as sweat poured out of my glands.
The thing about terror is…it sucks.
I needed to get away, but my own body was making that even more challenging by refusing to breathe at a sustainable pace and sending my blood pressure to new heights.
My wet-with-sweat thigh slipped when I swung my left leg over the railing and half-climbed, half-slid down the ladder on the other side.
I landed in an old alley used for transporting pipes when they first started building The Tower.
Most of these alleys were now used for temporary storage, but this one was bare-bones.
This wasn’t the time to think about my stride or my pace, and certainly not my breathing. I pumped my arms and ran as full-on as I could without falling face-first on the pavement.
The first maintenance hole I found, I shoved the metal plate aside, practically fell into the sewer, and covered the hole as quickly as possible. I hung on the top rungs of the ladder, listening as I counted to a hundred and twenty.
If I had believed in the Creator, I would have thanked him for sending me a friend like Zade who had enjoyed weird games of hide-and-seek in the old wire-laden tubes that ran beneath the streets.
Most people forgot they even existed because they were rendered useless with the advancement of the nanos technology.
Still, Zade and I knew most of them within the nearest hundred floors and had no trouble navigating them if needed.
When I didn’t hear any sounds from above, I cautiously nudged the metal cover open to expose myself as little as possible but enough so I could see the streets.
With the coast clear, I climbed back out and replaced the maintenance hole cover because I was a responsible non-Citizen/terrorist.
Shit! Okay, Eliana. You have thirty seconds to panic, and that’s it.
I dropped to a squat with my fingers threading through my tangled hair as I buried my face in my knees. I was hyperventilating, breaking out in a cold sweat, and about to puke.
“Shit! Shit! Shit,” I whispered to myself. It was the cracks in my panicked pleas that let me know I had started crying.
Someone, please, help me.
I think I was hoping that Soren or Veda waited nearby, spying on me and ready to swoop in.
Though it had truly and completely terrified me to wake up to Soren in my room the day before, I had also foolishly allowed myself to believe that someone cared enough to keep an eye on me, to watch out for me.
I hadn’t known that I’d wanted that for so, so long until the idea of it was dangled in front of me.
Maybe a part of me also wanted to believe there was a Creator who cared.
The truth is, Lillemore hadn’t cared even in the slightest when she was alive.
Rui Xi didn’t either. Zade thought he did, but I was pretty sure that was the thrill of the chase and his own brand of loneliness.
There had to be someone or something out there that cared enough to create such a ridiculous lifeform as myself. Right?
That’s probably why I imagined the still, small voice again.
“I am with you always. To the end of the age.”
I lifted my head to look around. My vision was never that great at night, but now, with tears coating my eyes, all I could see were blurry bits of light and shadow and color. Then I took a deep breath and hauled my ass up.
This was all on me. It always was.
I snaked my way through back alleys until I reached the stairs. Even with the power back on, the stairs were my best bet at getting up to my floor alive.
I climbed the stairs two at a time until I reached my level. Then I used the sewer systems to get as close to Babel as I could. Eventually, I had to crawl out of another utility hole and dart along the shadows.
I ducked through an alley and ended up in a market where I hid behind a stall to catch my breath and go over the best route I could take to get to my dorm and grab my stuff.
What if the Mods are already there?
I didn’t have time for another panic attack blossoming at the possibility of Mods waiting for me because a little girl with bright red braids pointed at me and shouted, “That’s her!”
Then a Moderator pointed his gun at me from fifty meters down the line of stalls selling luxury accessories to the young Babel students spending all of Daddy’s credits to impress their classmates.
“Stop! Do not resist!” came the muffled shout.
My toes and fingers tingled from the lack of adequate oxygen and the overdose of adrenaline, but my eyes were clearing up as the tears had dried enough for me to see.
I snatched a scarf from the nearest stall and draped it over my head.
Then I sprinted behind the stalls, jumping over boxes and dodging stools, and used the shopkeepers as human shields so that the Mod wouldn’t immediately open fire on me.
The Administration wasn’t stupid. A public bloodbath wouldn’t be so easy to cover up. They’d wait until it was safe to execute me and only me. They knew they had the upper hand and didn’t need to risk their reputation to hurry and catch me.
Foolishly hopeful for that minuscule chance of escape, I ran until I found the next possible turn.
Then I rammed my body through every small nook and cranny I could shimmy through or dive into.
No longer heading in the direction of the hovel, I made my way toward the ManDrop at the soccer field instead.
I knew the only way I would live long enough to kill Azazel—or maybe even do anything else with my life—was to find Zade and beg him to get me to Hearth Haven Inn.
I could take the ManDrop down twelve floors to find Yu Ting and get her to smuggle me to the archery range in her dad’s HovLux.
Even getting to the soccer field seemed impossible, though, as every other corner I turned brought me face to face with either a Mod or someone trying to narc on me.
Are they offering a whole floor as a reward?
Jeez! Lay off, people.
Covered in grease, sweat, and goosebumps, I finally climbed out of a maintenance hole two blocks away from the soccer field containing the manual drop chute that Zade and I had discovered when dodging a Mod after skipping middle school detention.
The ManDrops were for emergency use only, but with no emergencies over the past millennium, they weren’t monitored.
“Eliana Glory Kai Xin Chapman-Chen,” a muffled shout came from behind me. “You are under orders to report immediately for evaluation.”
“Shitballs,” I muttered and sprinted off again, running until I turned onto an older concrete road with brick walls rising on both sides and nowhere to go but forward or backward.
The problem with forward was the massive Extermin blocking my way, his weapon pointed right at me as he marched steadily closer.
And behind me were three Mods, their guns drawn and aimed.