going to make the boundary line. He doesn’t stop, but instead yanks me forward again. “Ethan!” I shriek, almost nose diving into the wild grass.
“There’s the boundary marker. Just run, Jai.” His voice is filled with an urgency that makes panic explode inside of me.
Are we running from something? Are we running into the arms of our impending death? What is waiting for us on the other side of the boundary marker?
The boundary marker is a brilliant blue line that fades up into dome’s lighter tinge. I’ve always wanted to see it and now I can’t even appreciate it. I’m too tired, too frightened.
“We can’t go … through it. The dome, it … will kill us,” I puff the words out.
I really shouldn’t talk, it’s making my saliva thicker and that’s making me feel nauseous.
“My brother is meeting us here.”
He starts to slow as we reach the boundary marker. Now that the sun is practically gone, the boundary marker lights everything up alongside of it. I see Aaron as he comes up out of the wild grass. The light makes his skin look even paler than earlier.
“Tell me no one saw you,” Ethan says.
“No one saw me. What took you so long?” Aaron sounds different, younger and scared, not as official as he did when he addressed us back at the Haven. I didn’t know Ethan and Aaron were brothers, they look nothing alike.
“We had to walk with the others. We could only break away now. Where is it?” Panic makes Ethan’s voice dip low. He lets go of my hand and darts forward, searching for something.
I almost scream, thinking he has lost his mind and he’s going to walk into the force field, when he ducks lower and I see it. It’s a black hole in the dome, big enough for us to climb through.
“Come on, you first,” Ethan says, turning back to me.
I stare at him. Now I really think he has lost mind! There is no way I’m going near the boundary marker. It will fry me to a crisp.
“Where are you going to go, Jai?” he asks. “You can’t go home and the others are long gone. You have three seconds to climb through or we’re leaving you here,” Ethan warns me.
I don’t want to stay out here alone. I’m scared of the dark. I walk toward the boundary marker, my fear of being alone in the dark by far greater than my fear of being fried.
I peek through the hole but all I see is darkness on the other side. The light from the dome is blinding me. I hope the hole doesn’t disappear on me. I fear my legs might shake right from under me as I put my first leg over. The bright blue light hurts my eyes. It’s the brightest light I have ever seen.
When my arm and right half of my body is through the hole a pair of hands comes out of the dark. They grab hold of my waist and as they lift me through the hole, I shriek. Ethan had to have heard me! A hand slaps hard over my mouth, smothering my next shriek. An arm yanks me up against a hard chest. It’s definitely a man, there is no way a woman can be this big!
I watch Aaron, and then Ethan come through the hole with ease, as if they’ve done this before. I try to shout a warning to them, but it’s stifled by the hand.
“What’s this?” The voice above me is deep and edgy.
“Relax, she’s Jasper Matthias, the daughter of the engineer. I told him I’d bring her,” Ethan says. He doesn’t seem to be caught off guard by whoever is holding me.
But the hand isn’t relaxing. This cannot be good.
“The daughter? You brought the daughter? You put a bullet in her, right now! She is of no use to us. You said only one, Ethan! Aaron we can use, he has been there before, but her they will break.” I was wrong. The voice isn’t deep and edgy, it’s cold and heartless.
He lets go of me and I stumble forward, but luckily I don’t fall. I keep my eyes down, too scared to look up. My heart is beating in my throat, making it difficult to swallow.
“I’m not shooting her. We’re wasting time here.” Ethan snaps.
There’s a moments silence and then I hear a sizzling sound to my left. Everyone looks in the boundary markers direction and we watch as the hole in