Crashed (33 page)
Authors: Robin Wasserman
Tags: #Juvenile Fiction, #Love & Romance, #Fantasy & Magic, #Social Issues, #General, #Death & Dying, #Science Fiction
"It was," I said to the stranger who wasn't a stranger, with a hand that looked so wrong in my own.
We stood with our backs to the hill and everything it led to. Somewhere up there, beyond the horizon: the Brotherhood regrouping, Savona lying in wait, orgs hating us, orgs fearing us, BioMax holding us under absolute control, pretending we walked free, Auden knowing I'd saved him all over again and knowing I was the reason he'd needed to be saved. Somewhere up there: a home, my father asking God to forgive him for creating me, expecting me to be someone long dead, my sister, wanting to be anyone but my sister, not wanting me to die. Somewhere up there: Jude, who knew the truth.
All behind us. And ahead of us, nothing but a stretch of murky blue. We couldn't run away. Or hide, like children, behind wishes and lies. We wouldn't fight like Jude--but we would fight.
We would, but only when we climbed the hill, trekked to the road, returned to the world, where we were mechs and they were orgs and nothing made sense. Here, now, alone, we joined hands, and it didn't matter what we were or what was waiting for us. We stepped forward, water lapping at our ankles, our knees, our thighs, our waists. We stepped forward together and let ourselves drift, the muddy seabed dropping out beneath our feet, the water carrying us toward a buried ruin, carrying us away from the noise and chaos waiting for us onshore, and together, we dipped below the surface and let our bodies sink into the silent deep.
About the Author
ROBIN WASSERMAN is the author of
Skinned
,
Hacking Harvard
, the Seven Deadly Sins series, and the Chasing Yesterday trilogy. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.
