The Aftermath (8 page)

“A few days. Maybe a week at the most.”

“Won’t you get in trouble for helping me? Thirty minutes ago you told me escape is illegal.”

He shrugs and gives me a smile that looks more like a grimace. “You said it yourself—you’re only one person. My boss will never know I busted you out. I need to find this character, and I’m willing to break a few rules to do it.”

This situation is wrong on so many levels. I’ll have to go back to the bar on Demonbreun and allow Olivia to play me whenever she feels the urge to, which is much too frequently. And whatever Olivia free time I have will be spent with a boy who’s just as shady as she is.

But he won’t turn me in if I do this. And there’s a chance—even though it feels much slighter than before—that I’ll still escape.

My answer comes out in a whisper that’s so soft, I barely even hear myself. “Yes, I’ll help you.”

CHAPTER TEN

We start our trip in bitter silence. I’m raging inside, terrified. I’m furious at myself for giving in to Declan, but also I don’t know for sure if he’ll follow through on his end of our bargain. What happens to me if he turns on me? I kick at loose crumbles of asphalt and grip the straps of my bag so tightly my knuckles turn white and my shoulders slump from the pressure.

But I think the worst part of this trip is the obvious: I’m going back the way I came.

My journey was a failure.

No matter how I look at my situation, I’m at a severe disadvantage.

Declan follows several paces behind me. When he’d suggested it, he’d sworn it was to protect me in case we were attacked from behind—this right after he had told me we were taking the highway instead of the woods for safety and the sake of efficiency. Yeah, sure. What he meant was he didn’t want to deal with me attacking him. I haven’t turned around to check, but I’m certain his electroshock gun is drawn, ready to send pain slicing through my body at the slightest provocation.

I can almost feel the electricity thrumming from the probes.

Breathing in deeply, I finally steal a glance over my shoulder. I was wrong. He doesn’t have his weapon pointed at me. With his head down, his hands shoved into the pockets of his black pants and his lips drawn into a thin line, Declan looks deep in thought. I don’t want to care what he’s thinking about, don’t want to waste my time and energy letting his pensive expression bother me, but I can’t help it. Because even though he works for the people responsible for so many others’ personal hells, he’s the first person I’ve met in at least three years with life in his eyes and the ability to speak for himself.

So what is it he’s not saying to me?

Does he congratulate himself for scaring me into submission? Wonder what I’m thinking about at this exact moment? Ask himself if I’ll make a hasty, stupid decision and try to attack him again?

“Claudia.” His voice is questioning as it interrupts my thoughts. I whip my head around to see he’s no longer staring at the ground. Now his dark gray eyes are focused on me. “How long have you been sentient?”

Don’t tell him,
a warning voice screams in my head.

My sudden dry mouth has nothing to do with the fact that I’ve been conservative with the little water I have left. I flick my tongue over my lips, tasting fear. “As in?”

“Self-aware.”

Three years. I’ve been partially self-aware for just over 150 weeks and completely cognizant for the past few. And it’s all thanks to you.

I could tell him the truth, but I don’t think honesty will ensure my safety. Not when the person questioning me is a game moderator. And I don’t think being sentient in this game is a good thing, at least not from the outside looking in.

“Virtue?” Declan releases a deep sigh. When I choose to ignore him, he narrows his eyes at me. “You could at least give me a straight answer. After all, I’m the only person who can help you find your way out of this game.”

Coming to a complete stop in the middle of the road, I spin to face him. He looks slightly stunned when I stalk toward him, so close I can see the tiny scar just above his lip, can count the three freckles that are nearly invisible on the bridge of his sunburned nose.

“A straight answer?” I ask. “You threaten to shock me to death, bullied me into helping you do your job and now you’re demanding answers from me?” I jab the center of his chest with my knuckles, and he winces. He grabs my wrist in a quick motion that’s not forceful, not harsh, but, nevertheless, it steals the breath from me.

“Look, all I care about is—”

“It should be doing your job so we can get out of this game. You shouldn’t care how long I’ve been awake, just that I’m that way right now,” I whisper.

His gray eyes harden. Standing there red-faced and strained, Declan seems to grow a few more inches. I refuse to let him get to me. Inside, I’m trembling and my head screams for me to back down, but I stare directly into his eyes, thrust my shoulders back and cross my arms over my chest.

“Trust me, I care about a lot more than just getting my job done.” He twists me back around and nudges me forward. I stumble but quickly catch myself. “You, Claudia Virtue, are no good to me if you can’t hold your own, if you have no idea what you’re doing and I end up guarding your ass at every corner.”

“You guarding
my
ass? How’s your stomach feel?” I look back just in time to witness him cringe and drop his gaze to where I’d kicked him in the gut more than an hour ago.

“Maybe I stand corrected.” Smirking, he jerks his head forward. “Let’s go.”

This time I walk beside him. The quietness is back, although I don’t feel as though he’ll shoot me now. Every few moments, he casts a sideways glance at me. And it makes me uncomfortable.

“Your reason for needing my help is kind of...ridiculous.” I rub the back of my hand across my cheeks and forehead. My skin is so hot to the touch I just know the painful blisters will come soon. “You work for the game. So, how’s it possible for you not to be able to find characters?”

“You’ve been aware of yourself for what—a few days—and you’re telling me how to do my job?”

“No, I’m telling you your job doesn’t make sense.” I’ve spent too many years with everything around me an illogical mess not to ask questions now.

“There are literally hundreds of firewalls that prevent bringing any outside navigation devices into the game, even if it’s a moderator trying to find a character. Our bosses would rather drop us off by aircraft onto the game board with a ‘good luck’ and some food than risk a rival company getting their hands on a valuable character.”

“But—”

“It’s complicated,” he snaps.

Of course it is. Which is why asking about it means even more silence from Declan.

We take our first break after something in his bag starts beeping. Stopping in the street, he leans against the remains of a windowless seven-passenger van and pulls out his AcuTab. “Why’s it making that sound?” I ask as he moves his fingers swiftly across the flat screen.

“I’ve got it set to monitor our food and water. It beeps—we rest. In the Provinces, though, we link them to our homes so that the central system installed in the house can just announce what it is we need.”

Ingenious, but I don’t tell him that as I focus all my strength on dragging myself from the highway and into the woods. Declan walks ahead of me, his steps energetic. Excited. Almost as if he’s mocking my inability to keep up with his quick movements. I shake the idea from my head. Right now, thoughts like that will only make this trip worse for me.

I’ll have plenty of time to loathe Declan while I’m helping him locate who he’s looking for and letting Olivia take control of me in the meantime.

Gritting my teeth, I slide down beneath the shade of a willow tree, drop my head onto my lumpy backpack and curl into a tight ball. A few feet away, Declan rummages noisily through his bag. “It’s impossible to get any rest with you doing that,” I point out, opening one eye.

He pulls out two plastic packages and tosses one to me. It lands a couple of inches from my face. “You’re welcome, Virtue.”

I prop myself up on my elbow and pick it up. Small and rectangular, it’s slightly bigger than a protein bar and in a similar wrapper. There’s a picture of a creepy smiling boy on the front. He’s holding his thumb up in approval; below him, there’s large block writing: “CDS. Complete Nutrition in Every Pack!”

“Is this food?” I wiggle the packet. “You’re not trying to drug me, are you?”

Declan cocks his head to one side and gives me a funny look. “It’s a CDS. You know, Complete Daily Sustenance. They make them in the same factory as your nasty energy bars, except they taste a hundred times better and have triple the calories.” When I continue to stare at him blankly, he adds, “You really don’t know what it is?”

I shake my head. Am I supposed to?

He drops down beside me, brushing aside the willow leaves that fall into his face. “What all do you remember before becoming sentient?”

Flipping the CDS packet between my hands, I shrug. I don’t remember anything other than The Aftermath, but I don’t want to tell him that. And that’s the thing about being sentient: I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to do.

At least when Olivia’s not playing me I don’t.

He snorts. “Okay, so you’re not going to answer me. How about this one—what all do you remember about the day you woke up?”

I stick with silence for now. When he climbs to his knees, leans over my head and examines it with his eyes and hands, I cry out.

“You were hit recently.” There’s something different about his voice—a note of sudden apprehension—and I know without a doubt he realizes that he’s the cause of this. The question is, will he tell me?

“You were hit hard recently,” he continues.

Once again, yes...because of you.

“I don’t remember what happened that day,” I lie. “And I don’t remember anything about who I was before all this.”

Sighing, Declan sags against the tree trunk, tilting his head to one side to stare at me with his piercing gray eyes. “Your memories from before you were put into the game should come back sooner or later.” There’s relief in his voice.

Would it still be there if he knew I was already somewhat aware of myself well before that day in the courthouse? That I had no recollection of my life before The Aftermath even then? That I’m fully aware of what had happened with him?

I smile, despite the panic building in my chest. “You sound so sure.”

“I am. And hopefully it’ll happen before I take you to the border so you can find the people out there who love you.”

There’s nobody on the outside for me. I’m sure of that because if there were, nothing would stop me from remembering them. No, whatever happened to me must be too traumatic to recall. I bite the tip of my tongue and listen to him explain the tiny packet I’m holding. Apparently, the CDS will keep my belly full all day and then some.

But despite how delicious that first bite is—and it really is the best thing I’ve ever eaten—all I can think of are stale protein bars.

* * *

We don’t stop again until after nightfall. Declan says we’ve gone twenty miles, but I swear it’s more. Every muscle in my body feels like molten lava as I curl up with my backpack again. He pulls a cushiony sleeping sack out of his bag and rolls it onto the forest floor. Staring at him enviously, I hate that I didn’t bring my own blankets from the shelter. Tonight is an anomaly, so cold it reminds me of midwinter—not the end of summer. It’s a startling contrast from just a couple of hours ago, when the sun was so hot, the path ahead of us seemed to blur, and the asphalt burned the bottoms of my feet through my flimsy shoes.

Declan shines a flashlight over my face and gives me a half smile. “You’re welcome to share.”

I don’t know if he’s being sarcastic or just kind, but I don’t budge. I purse my lips together and bring my knees as close to my chest as my muscles will allow. “I’m good, thanks.”

“You know pride is man’s number one downfall, right?”

I roll my eyes. I don’t need a lecture from this boy. What I need is sleep—a few hours away from this world of cannibals and deceptive gamers—and away from him. Especially him.

“Funny, I thought my downfall was having my brain screwed with on a daily basis.”

Shaking his head, he chuckles. I stare up at the night sky and hug myself tightly, clenching my teeth to keep them from chattering. Declan rustles around for a few minutes and then he’s silent. I’m just about asleep when he whispers softly, “You’re lucky.”

I open my eyes. In the darkness, I can see the outline of his body through his sleeping bag. The soft glow of his tablet screen casts a bluish glow over his face. I wonder what he’s looking at.

“Why’s that?” I ask. “Why am I lucky?”

“You’re sentient...you’re getting out.”

But I don’t feel lucky. I feel beaten and bruised. Like there are so many obstacles standing in the way of me leaving this game that I may never reach the border Declan promises to escort me to.

No, I’m not lucky at all. Because even if I do break free, I’m selfishly abandoning everyone I know. A little noise escapes from the back of my throat.

“The game is just going to get worse in the coming months,” Declan says. “They’re introducing something new and even more dangerous than before. You’ll be out before it takes over, though.”

What he says sends a million questions pinging through my skull. What could be more dangerous than using humans as game pawns, fighting off cannibals daily? Will he tell me what he means?

But when I softly call out his name, he doesn’t answer. I roll over onto my side, cold and even more lost than before.

* * *

I dream of cold metal tombs, of electroshock guns with fiery metal probes and moderators dressed all in black chasing after me. I wake up hot and sweaty, with sunlight burning through my eyelids. As I stand, my legs tangle up in thick fabric, and I nearly fall back down. Two rough hands grip my shoulders and steady me. I peel my eyes open to find Declan grinning down at me.

“You snore, Virtue,” he says. “And I mean, loud, obnoxious snoring that’s bad enough to—”

I knock his hands off my shoulders and hop backward. The sun catches his face—the flesh around his nose is bruised and purplish from where I hit him yesterday, and I feel a tiny swell of pride. That is, until I realize I’m wrapped in his sleeping bag. At some point during the night he must have put it on top of me. Something large and uncomfortable forms in my throat, but I fight it down.

“Thanks,” I whisper. I disentangle myself and roll the bag into a tight bundle. When I place it on top of his rucksack he gives me a curt nod.

“You’re a girl. And when it started snowing, you were shivering like a freezing puppy. I don’t want you to die before we both do what we agreed on.”

My head snaps up. “It snowed?” What was the deal with this ridiculous weather?

“For about an hour just after one.” He begins stuffing the sleeping bag into his sack. “Don’t think it really bothered you, though. You never stopped snoring.”