Kristen Simmons - Article 5

Someone shoved into us, knocked undoubtedly by someone else. Chase’s hand was ripped from mine and I was tossed to the side. I didn’t fall. There were too many people buffering my stumble.

But Chase was gone. Swallowed by the crowd.

My ears rang. The blood pumped through my veins.

“Ch— Jacob!” I screamed, hoping he would respond to his middle name. People were shouting, shoving, pushing now. Were they still moving toward the dead man? Or something else? Chase did not respond.

“Jacob!” It was like shouting under water. No one heard me. A hard slap to my back had me jolting forward, toward the concrete, but I bounced off a body in my path. Someone grasped my arm hard and nearly jerked it out of the socket trying to hold himself up. A sea of chaos took me, flinging my upper half one way while my legs went the other, and then the crunch, the sick, soft feel of flesh and bones beneath my boots.

“Food!” I heard someone yell. “Over there!”

They couldn’t be talking about the soup kitchen: That was at the other end of the square. And the dead man only had so much to steal. It had to be the truck we’d passed earlier. What I couldn’t imagine was how these people expected to break through the barrier of armed soldiers.

Just as I regained my footing, a hand latched hard around my elbow.

“Oh, thank God!” I cried, and turned to see the back of a man with clean-cut brown hair and a navy blue collar. He was dragging me out of the riot.

Not Chase. A soldier.

“No! Wait, please!” I tried, planting my feet and jerking back. “There’s been a mistake.”

“Keep moving, Miller,” I heard him call over his shoulder.

Dread punched through me. This soldier knew who I was. They’d found me. Chase had to run. He was in more danger than I was if he was caught. He could still get to my mother.

It took all my power not to shout Chase’s name at the top of my lungs. But I knew that if I did, and if he came, he was as good as dead.

“I’m not… I don’t know who Miller is!” I said, pulling back with both hands now. No one noticed me. There was too much commotion. Too much chaos.

“Help!” I yelled finally. “Help!”

But even if they heard, they didn’t react. I clutched a man’s coat as the soldier yanked me toward a black alleyway. He shrugged me off. I grabbed a woman’s hair. She punched my shoulder, and my fist returned with loose strands.

The world became suddenly silent. It was as though we’d stepped through some invisible force field. The roar of the crowd remained in the square, but the alley was absolutely still, apart from a few rats scurrying behind an overflowing Dumpster. I saw one or two people glance after us as I was dragged inside, but though their eyes widened, they looked away in fright.

I was alone with the soldier.

PANICseized me.

I struggled, my hair a curtain blocking my vision. I refused to stand, forcing the soldier to carry me. I saw flashes of his uniform. The bloused navy pants over black boots. The belt. The gun. A gold name badge — WAGNER. Dusk had come, and back here in the shadows I couldn’t get a clear view of his face.

“Stop!” the soldier demanded. I swallowed my fear and swung my fist at his head, well aware that such an action was either going to land me in prison or get me killed.

“Stop!” he yelled again. “Look at me!”

In a heave, he rammed my body against the alley wall. My head smacked hard against the brick. All of my organs reverberated inside of me, and I gasped, seeing stars.

But I stopped, and that was when I saw his face. Strong, handsome features. Blue eyes, no longer vacant. Sandy brown hair. This was the soldier I had glimpsed by the truck guarding the food. The one who had given me a funny feeling.

“Sean?” I said, shocked. Sean Banks. Not Wagner. Who was Wagner?

I didn’t have time to ask. A second later we were thrown to the ground as some large object was propelled from the side and slammed into Sean.

Not an object. Chase.

I scrambled to clear the fray. There was a thudding sound, then a grunt as the air expelled from someone’s lungs. They wrestled for just a few seconds before Chase pinned Sean, facedown in the cement, holding his arm awkwardly behind his back. He ripped away the gun and thrust it none too gently into the back of Sean’s head.

“Ember.” Chase was too distraught to use my alias. He was asking if I was injured, and I knew immediately that my answer would determine how he would punish my assailant.

“Chase, that’s Sean! I know him!” I said. “It’s okay! I’m okay!”

“What I saw didn’t look okay,” he answered.

“Man, let me up!” Sean’s voice was muffled by the filthy alley floor. He cried out as his shoulder popped. “I’m not FBR!”

“I know,” said Chase. “Your weapon isn’t standard issue.” He turned the gun to look at it. I looked at it too. It was black, whereas Chase’s had been silver.

I realized what Chase must have thought when he’d seen me pressed against the wall. It was the same thing he’d feared when Rick and Stan had told me to get in the car with them.

“Chase, let him up.” I was shaking.

“I was just trying to tell her it was me!” Sean pleaded. “She almost knocked my head off!”

“That’s what happened,” I agreed quickly.

Chase looked my way, reading my eyes for truth. After a moment he nodded, but he didn’t look happy about releasing his captive.

“Don’t touch her,” he warned Sean. His fury did not immediately abate, and he did not release the gun. “Why’d you start the riot?”

Sean had started the riot? Intentionally? When I thought about it, it did make sense. That was why he hadn’t been torn apart by the crowd. That’s why he was wearing a stolen uniform with the name badge WAGNER.

Sean stood indignantly, wiping off his face with his shirtsleeve.

“Because that was today’s mission. Steal from the rich, give to the poor. Now later, when the real FBR shows up and doesn’t give away extra rations, the people get pissed off enough to take them down.”

Sean had joined the resistance. The thoughts began racing through my mind. The uniform truck, stolen here, in Tennessee. The sniper. Were his people responsible for that too? Maybe Sean was who we had been looking for! Maybe he would even know the carrier.

Chase helped me up, placing his thumb on my chin and gently turning my face from side to side to check for damage.

Sean watched us curiously. “I saw you in the square. I followed you and — ”

“—and waited until she was alone,” Chase growled. Sean took a step back.

“Yeah,” said Sean. “Can you blame me?” He waved his arms at Chase.

“Be nice, both of you,” I said.

Chase took a step toward him. Sean balked.

“They discharged me after that night I helped you,” Sean said quickly. “I came here to find Becca.”

“What?” I tried to get closer, but Chase stopped me. “She’s here? With you?”

“She’s inside. In the base. Where they hold all the prisoners awaiting trial. Or didn’t you know?” he said between his teeth, blue eyes flashing.

“I didn’t know,” I swallowed, reliving the last moments I had seen Rebecca Lansing. “They took her away. I didn’t know where.”

Sean watched me speculatively. I knew he wanted to believe me, but he was wary to trust. I wondered how he’d found out Rebecca had been taken here. Did the resistance know? Did they have access to MM records? Would they know about my mother?

“We don’t have time for this,” Chase said. “The safe house — the one in South Carolina—how do we get there?”