Wings of the Walker - CoraLee June Page 0,136

I noticed blood splatter on his arm and clothes. Fuck. We needed to get him to a doctor. We turned the corner, following Mia’s intuition as to where we should go.

“Where are the guards?” Huxley whispered while crouching low and clutching his stomach.

“Probably all responding to the bombs on the other side of the building,” I suggested.

“Surely there would be some sort of commotion? Someone here?” Patrick asked.

“It’s like they all abandoned this place,” Huxley said with a furrowed brow before covering his mouth.

We were all conditioned to know that abandoned places meant disease. Meant X.

We made a sharp turn left at the end of the hall and the lights went out. My vision was already bad, but now I felt defenseless. The only guide I had was Mia’s labored breathing as she led us. I took small steps.

“Maverick?” Mia’s voice whisper-shouted. “Is that you? Why are you holding a body?” she asked, and the world as I knew it collapsed.

Ash. Oh god what happened to Ash? I wanted to crumble to the ground. I wanted to murder Lackley. I felt Huxley tense beside me, and Jacob sucked in a breath. All I could think of was all the time I wasted.

“It’s Josiah,” Maverick’s low voice scratched out. A brief, blinding relief consumed me. “Look, I don’t have time to explain. Ash is safe with Tallis. We need to get out of here. He’s lost use of his legs . . .” he trailed off.

“Just fucking leave him here,” Huxley said incredulously before checking my shoulder and walking ahead of us.

“I’ll help you,” I said to Maverick, and together we continued towards the bombs. I wanted to leave Josiah behind, too, but knew Maverick probably had a good reason for bringing him.

A bright light at the end of the darkened hallway acted like a beacon to us. White smoke and zipping fuses blasted around us. I kept straining to hear the sound of footsteps, but there were none. We were all that was left. As we walked I noticed something like sand on the floor, with bits and pieces of clothing. Surely we weren’t . . . .

“Heat. Whoever is out there fucking has Heat, look,” Cyler said incredulously while bending down and grasping a handful of sand. It seeped through his fingers. We were shuffling through powdered, dead bodies.

I shivered as I covered my mouth to prevent the kicked-up dust from getting in my lungs. Slowly, ever so slowly, we slunk along the wall towards the new entrance to the building.

“Come on out, boys!” a sharp, masculine voice called to us.

We deliberated for a moment. No weapons. No clue where we were. No clue how to get the hell out of here. I readjusted Josiah’s passed-out body on my shoulder and winced at the pain in my side.

Normally we would have debated on the situation and come up with a plan, but Mia had other ideas. She simply smoothed out her pants and sashayed out through the cracked opening in the building.

“Boys, huh?” she asked with a coy smile. “Now I’m offended. It was a girl that saved their asses,” she yelled out while putting her hands up in surrender. We all stayed behind, listening for any indication that it was safe. I felt totally emasculated letting Mia take charge, but all of us were beat to hell and useless in a fight. After what felt like hours, Mia’s face flashed in the opening, startling us all.

“Fuck, Mia! Warn a guy!” Huxley exclaimed. I tried not to grin at the fact that something rattled him .

“Come out, you’re gonna want to see this. Agrio got us an army!” Mia pranced off, as if she didn’t just spend ten days in captivity.

Slowly we all made our way out, and the sight that greeted us was nothing short of amazing. Bright orange and black striped flags waved in the wind around us, and underneath their glory stood about a hundred Ethros warriors. A tall man with bronze skin and a wired mustache walked towards us. He was decked out in an orange cotton uniform with black medals covering his chest.

“Well, hello there!” he said with a head nod. “I’m Commodore Sebastian Cavil,” he introduced himself, outstretching his hand with a smile. None of us took it. Ethros is where Cyler and Patrick were headed when emperorLackley abducted them. We spent our time in captivity assuming Ethros leaked intel.

“Ah, I see you don’t trust us quite yet. Understandable. Perhaps you’ll trust us