Jay Posey - Three

She pressed on, alarms screaming in her head, danger. What was she forgetting? She ran ten more yards, nameless panic rising.

Then it dawned on her.

The traps.

She skidded to a stop, almost fell to her knees under the weight of Wren and the backpack.

A moment later, a thunderous explosion shattered the air. Behind her, plumes of concrete dust filled the sky and alleyways. Heart pounding, she sank to the ground and hugged Wren, doubting anyone would be catching up to her now.

Aminute; five, twenty. Cass couldn’t be sure how long it’d been since the explosion. Not long enough to catch her breath, too long to be safe. She forced herself to her feet, calves searing, thighs hollow and trembling from the effort. A deep breath. Focus. She readjusted her backpack.

“Can we wait? Just a little longer?” Wren asked, hopeful, barely audible.

Cass just shook her head. She didn’t have the courage to look behind her, so she took his hand in hers, and started off again. One step at a time. It was all she could manage. Out of the corner of her eye, Cass saw Wren glance back over his shoulder. She stole the chance to wipe the tears from her eyes.

It wasn’t the loss. At least, that’s what she told herself. They’d been on their own, on the run, too long for their brief time with Three to really make much difference. For the first time, though, she felt an emptiness that hadn’t been there before. A quiet resignation. Her body would go through the motions for as long as she could force it to, but somewhere between the wayhouse and wherever they were now, her heart had given out. Hope can only be offered and snatched away so many times before it becomes a mockery. It didn’t seem to matter now. There was nothing more this shell of a world had left to give that could make her feel safe.

“Mama?”

“Yeah, baby.”

“Are we going to die now?”

The question jolted Cass from her haze. Wren had an uncanny knack for asking the very questions she was asking herself.

“Of course not.”

She wanted to reassure him, but that was all she could muster.

“OK.”

He took it at face value, and for that she was thankful. They walked a little ways in silence, and then Wren spoke again.

“Will you tell me when?”

“When what, sweetheart?”

“When it’s time for us to die.”

Cass’s heart practically stopped. What mother could possibly answer such a question? And what did it say about her, that her child, so young, would even think to ask it? She couldn’t stop the tears then. She sank to her knees, and drew Wren close, hugged him, drawing comfort more than offering it.

Wren squeezed back.

“I’m sorry, Mama. I didn’t mean to make you cry.”

Cass just squeezed harder.

“It’s not you, sweetheart.”

“It’s me,” a nearby voice said.

Cass and Wren both jerked at Three’s sudden reappearance. She swiveled on a knee, instinctively grasping Wren’s arm to pull him behind her. Three stood at the entrance of an alley, just a few feet from them.

“Don’t flatter yourself,” she replied, hastily clearing the tears. “I’m used to you disappearing.”

He grunted at that, the closest thing to a chuckle she’d heard from him.

“Come on this way,” he answered, motioning them over.

Cass stood and readjusted her pack, but made no movement towards him.

“We’ve got about nine hours of light, and ten hours of travel. Sooner is better.”

Still, she held her place.

“You were right, you know,” she said. “No promise. No debt.”

She glanced away, back towards the Enclave. She and Wren had made it a long time without help. They could do it again. Especially now that Fedor, Kostya, and probably Jez were all gone.

“Maybe we should just say our goodbyes, while we still can.”

There was a stretch of silence. Wren shifted beside her, fidgeting as children do.

“Well,” Three said. “I did say I didn’t owe you anything.”

His nonchalant agreement surprised Cass. She’d expected at least some marginal protest, some semblance of noble gesture. But he had left them behind once before. It was probably a relief to do so again, this time without the guilt.

“I never said you didn’t owe me .”

She looked back. He was staring right at her. Grim. Determined.

“I’ve put too much on the line to just let you crawl off and die. So come on.”

He didn’t sound angry. There was no malice or menace in his voice. Just raw determination, as if by his words he’d eliminated any other choice. And to Cass, it was as if he had. Still, she hesitated, more out of pride than uncertainty.

“How do I know you’re not just going to leave again?”

“Because I’m here now.”

She gave a final glance in the direction of the Enclave, feigning the act of weighing her options. Finally, she nodded, and taking Wren’s hand in hers, made her way over.

“Fine.”

“Yeah.”

And without fanfare, Three led them off down his side alley, perpendicular to their previous route. Within the first few yards, he was back to his old self, hesitating every so often when some instinct kicked off a silent warning. He seemed to be straining every possible sense, listening, watching, feeling for any hint or sign of danger. After some indeterminate span of time, Cass began to feel that her own measured breathing was too loud for his liking. Even so, she had to hazard a question.

“How many of them did you get?” she whispered.

Three shot her a sidelong glance, then went back to scanning the way ahead.

“None.”

He must’ve misunderstood. She clarified.

“I meant with the explosion.”

“So did I.”

Cass couldn’t understand Three’s matter-of-factness. All the trouble he’d gone through, the risk he’d taken, and he hadn’t killed even one of their pursuers. She would’ve thought there’d have been some hint of embarrassment, or disappointment at least. He must’ve picked up on that.

“I wasn’t trying to kill them.”

Surely this was some sort of defensive response, a casual I-meant-to-do-that .

“Oh?”

“Nah, I was killing us.”

She rolled it over in her mind, making some sense of it, but not a lot. The explosion, the rubble, the plumes of concrete dust. Maybe the wreckage would disrupt signal enough to buy them some time. Or maybe Asher was busy sifting through the wreckage for her body, or for some trace of residual impulse. Too many maybes, never any answers.

She opened her mouth to ask another question, but Three pressed ungentle fingers over her lips and shook his head. Enough talk. The rough, callused skin left a trace of heat when he pulled his hand away. He set off again wordlessly, silently, a mist of a man dissipating across the jagged asphalt terrain.

For his part, Wren was holding up well, keeping pace without complaint, picking his feet up instead of scuffing them along as he was wont to do. He had declined a piggyback ride, which was practically unheard of. He seemed more relaxed than Cass could remember him being, more confident. Older somehow, though she couldn’t be sure when he’d grown.

Progress was slow, but steady, and after the first two or three hours, Cass grew nearly accustomed to the broken rhythm of the journey, the patternless flow that Three kept without any apparent effort. At first it had irritated her, being unable to predict how long they might crouch in the corner of an abandoned building, or how far they’d travel across open space before they stopped. But eventually Cass discovered the benefits of it. Alertness. Focus. Rhythm bred complacency, and that was one thing none of them could afford.