Where Agent Martinez should have been.
The pressure on my arms increased again. My eyes were raw, streaming with tears, as the boy adjusted his stance to block the destruction. His mouth was moving, but I couldn’t make out more than a few of the words—they were pops of muted sound, like he was shouting at me underwater.
“—go—back—hear—?”
He realized I couldn’t hear him at the same moment I did. I flinched, trying to shove myself away. My heartbeat kicked so high, so fast, my vision went black. He held on tighter, this time clasping my face in one hand, forcing my gaze back toward him again.
The storm of panic and fear swirling in my mind abated, just for a moment. He kept talking. One word. I couldn’t tell if I was actually hearing him, or if I had imagined his voice, deep and gravelly: “Okay? Okay?”
My hearing wasn’t totally gone, but nearly everything was being drowned out by a keening whine that came from everywhere and nowhere.
“Okay?” he shouted, inches from my ear. “Okay?”
I nodded, because I was alive. I nodded, because it was the only movement my body seemed capable of making in that moment. It wasn’t okay—none of this was okay—
I couldn’t even cry: My eyes were already streaming hot tears to clear out the dust and smoke. My brain couldn’t sink into the grief.
He reached for my arm again, pulling me forward down the remaining steps. Toward the bodies.
I tried to pull back, to head into the safety of Old Main. None of this made sense. The explosion. The Defenders. This stranger—I hadn’t made a habit out of following strangers since I was a child, so why was I doing it now? He could be involved. He could have…he could have rigged the explosion.
You did it, a voice whispered. You lost control.
I shook my head, trying to wrench myself free. I didn’t. I knew my power.
The thought steadied me, echoing through my mind. I know my power.
It wasn’t me. Dissolving into panic, getting caught in the snare of that horrifying possibility, wasn’t going to do me any good. I clenched my jaw, willing my hands to stop shaking.
Plan: Get to the car. Find Cooper. Drive myself, and anyone else who needed help, away.
Focus.
The boy released me when he felt me tug against his hold. I straightened, looking up to meet his gaze.
“Not safe!” he shouted.
“No shit!” I shouted back. I pointed in the direction of where we’d left the SUV. “Car!”
His face changed beneath the streaks of grit, the intense gaze slipping into a look of surprise. Recovering quickly, the steely look of determination returned. He nodded and gestured for me to take the lead.
I turned. The girl I’d seen with him before appeared without warning, her yellow dress bright in the haze of smoke. There was a burn on her right forearm, as if she’d thrown it up to shield herself from the heat of the blast. She shouted something to the boy, who swung back around to see what was happening.
A rush of uniformed police and clusters of horrified spectators came toward the wreckage. Some of the survivors fell to their knees, putting their hands behind their heads; others ran blindly forward, toward the rifles in the police officers’ hands. The Defenders among them had taken out their batons, but most broke away to tend to the wounded.
The first bullet hit the smoldering remains of the speaker seconds before the crack of the shot’s discharge split the air.
The girl in yellow dove to the right. The boy reached for the back of his jeans, only to realize whatever he was looking for there was gone. Without a word, he turned sideways and gestured for me to do the same.
For a second I thought he was trying to direct my gaze toward something, but no—I knew this trick. Vida had taught it to me years ago, before the new government had taken root.
Turn to the side to give your attacker less body mass to shoot at.
Another flash appeared in the smoke-clogged distance. This time the bullet struck at my feet, splintering the stone. A shard sliced across my shin, nearly taking me down.
The boy surveyed the steps around us, his eyes landing on a different, smaller panel of the temporary stage that had been blown out in the explosion.
He bounded down toward it, and, in one smooth motion, kicked the sheet up in time for the next bullet to glance off it.
It was the smoke. They didn’t