Savage Run (38 page)

Waiting for the wrecking balls to descend, I
turn my head sideways, exhale all the air from my lungs and close
my eyes. As the balls come barreling down, I just give into the
moment. Whatever happens, happens. If this is it, I hope it’s
quick—I hope Nicholas will find Gemma for me and buy her freedom. I
should have asked him to. I think he will.

Heat is the first thing I notice, followed
by intense burning as the flames brush against the right side of my
face and abdomen. The sweltering pain is more than I can handle and
I cry out in agony. As the balls meet in the middle, I’m crushed
between them, and my abdomen and back are seared raw. When the
wrecking balls finally pass, I lose balance and fall straight down.
But before I hit the swamp, I manage to clutch onto the wooden
stake, my numb hands digging into the splinters, my legs clinging
to the wooden beam.

My abdomen and back burn, and the right side
of my face feels like it’s on fire. Opening my eyes, I see I’m a
mere foot above the swamp and only five stakes away from the end. I
figure that my options are either to climb up the rod or somehow
maneuver my way from stake to stake from down here. I decide on the
latter because if I climb upward, I’ll run into the wrecking balls
again.

Then there’s a faint laugh above me. Johnny.
“Hey, Imp! You stuck? This is awesome!”

He doesn’t wait for my answer before moving
on, and I wonder if it is because of what I told him earlier. Maybe
he wants to prove to President Volkov that he is good enough to be
a Master. And the next president. Or maybe he just thinks there’s
no way I’ll get out of this alive.

I peel one of my hands off the wooden rod,
detaching it from the splinters that have wedged beneath my skin.
Drops of blood fall into the mire below as I reach toward the next
stake. Still clinging onto the first post, I lean over, and proceed
to push off with my legs to get to the next one. In the transfer, I
sink down a few inches, and to stop my decent, I wrap my legs
around the stake, squeezing my inner thighs together so hard that
they cramp, trying to avoid touching the wood with my burned
abdomen. My hands sting something awful, but not nearly as much as
my face, stomach and back where the flames scorched my skin.

I wonder if Nicholas will care if I die. If
my father will care. Or Gemma’s mother. Or Gemma. It’s not like I
was an especially good person toward any of them, only took what I
thought I needed and left them behind. Even Nicholas.

I move onto the next stake, gritting my
teeth, stifling screams of pain, red-faced and tearful. I shouldn’t
cry right now. It will blur my vision and I need all my senses to
make it through this part. Any movement sends stabs of pain through
my body. Then the nausea comes, and I vomit down the side of the
stake, making it even more slippery. How can I make it? The burning
wrecking balls are swinging just as eagerly above my head. I
haven’t seen anyone in some time and I wonder if all the others
beside Johnny have died before they even made it here or if they
just passed me without me noticing.

I cling to the stake, sliding down a few
inches now and then, my legs shaking, and my arms giving out on me.
I tell them to clench harder, but they won’t listen. I reach for
the next stake, and in the transfer, my legs sink into the
swamp.

But then, as if the liquid wakes some part
of me, something inside of me revolts against the weakness. Mai’s
words echo in my mind. “You have to be stronger than ever before.”
This is the moment she was talking about, and though she didn’t
know exactly when that moment would come, I do. Because this is the
moment I want to give up, and I could—easily. Oh, it would be so
easy to release my grip. Sink into the swamp and drown. It would be
over in a few minutes and there would be no more pain. But this is
when I can’t give into what’s easy. If I give in, Johnny takes the
money I could use to set Gemma free. I can’t let that jerk win! I
can’t let him be the victor of this entire program where freedom is
the ultimate reward! He hasn’t a moral bone in his body! And to
think he might be the next president of Newland…

With gritted teeth, I climb up the stake a
few more inches, and swing my leg over to the next one. The pain is
unbearable, but I force myself to remain conscious, thrusting any
thought of giving up out of my mind. Every move is an effort, but
I’m not going to let Johnny win! The balls are swooshing behind me
now, the crackling noise of the flames a constant reminder of the
burns on my face, abdomen and hands. I don’t feel like a human
being at all, just a partial person, being held together by raw
stubbornness.

With every single ounce of energy I can
muster, I climb upward. My body is trembling violently, but I
refuse to give in. I’m so close to the end. If I just climb a
little higher, I’ll be able to see it. I wrap my forearms around
the pole instead of using my palms. It makes it harder, but my legs
are strong and I manage to keep most of the pressure there. I reach
for the flat surface of the post and climb up to a standing
position. I want to cry, want the triumph to register, but I’m not
done yet. I hop onto the last post, and landing onto the metal
platform at the end, I collapse to the ground.

But knowing how little time I have left—I
dig deep and find the strength to stand up. In front of me, at the
end of the long track, I see the finish line and there stands
Johnny, whooping and jumping, congratulating himself on his
triumph. Cory stands there too, pulling something out of his thigh.
An arrow? I’m relieved to see that he made it, but who won? And
where are the others? I see a body—someone from another city—lying
lifeless on the track, facedown with blood coming from his chest,
arrows jutting out from his back. He didn’t deserve to die this
way, not when he was so close to victory. The other four—Timothy
included—must have died back in the swamps because surely they
would have made it by now.

I, however, still have a chance at third
place. I stand up and start limping forward. Just as I’m about to
move ahead, I see Timothy zooming by me. No! I push off from the
gritty ground, my leg stabbing in pain but sprint as fast as I can.
Then I feel a sharp pain in my upper arm followed by a sharp pain
in my calf muscle. Tears fill my eyes and Timothy’s body vanishes
beyond my sight. But I don’t slow down. Another sharp pain appears
in my abdomen, exactly where Johnny stabbed me, and it causes me to
fall to the ground, scraping my hands and knees. I gasp, but rise
up again, still without taking my eyes off the end.

I limp forward—the pain is unbearable now,
and yet another sharp pain hits my thigh. Looking down, I see a
small silver arrow. Why are they shooting at us? Haven’t they had
their fun? I hobble forward, commanding my legs to move when all
they want to do is quit. When I’m almost at the end, the tears gone
from my eyes, I see Timothy lying on the ground. An arrow is
embedded in his head and he lies on his stomach, his cheek resting
against the ground. His eyes open and vacant. Oh, Timothy.

I run in third.

Chapter 30

Third! I collapse to the ground onto my side
in a fetal position—avoiding lying on my burned skin. Panting, the
tears stream down the side of my temple and across the bridge of my
nose. It’s a silent cry, a barely there moan—I don’t have the will
for more. Arthor. Gemma. My father. Ruth. Nicholas. All the
sacrifices and heartaches and losses that I’ve endured, now live
and breathe inside of me in this very moment. Was it all worth it?
For my freedom? I’m too exhausted to weigh that right now. And will
President Volkov even let me have my victory? A girl he tried to
have killed? As I see it, he has no choice if he wants to keep the
support of the Konders’ and the other benefactors. But I can never
be too certain. If he does, the money I receive will be more than
enough to purchase Gemma’s freedom. But if he doesn’t…it’s too
terrifying to think about.

I lift my hands to look at them. Inundated
with slivers, they’re swelling quickly and are bleeding. I touch
the right side of my face as lightly as I can, but it stings so
badly that I withdraw my hand at once. And when I look up at my
abdomen, it’s a red, round, blistering mess. Lifting my head, I
pull out the silver arrows that pierced my body during the sprint,
almost too unconscious to feel them.

Cory approaches me and crouches down by my
side. His white hair has streaks of blood in it, and his clothes
are torn, burned, and caked in dirt. “You look like death. You
okay?”

I am too spent to punch him anywhere. “Have
you seen what you look like?”

He laughs dryly, offers me his hand and
helps me stand up. Carefully, very carefully. “Who won?”

“
I did,” Cory says, a proud
look on his face.

At least there’s some comfort in knowing
that Johnny wasn’t the victor, even though I think there will be a
lot more problems moving ahead now that he knows he’s the son of
President Volkov. I suppose I’ll never know if sharing that
information with him was what saved my life, but in the end, it was
worth the risk. Peering over at Johnny, he looks at me, and he
wears a terrifying grin. What’s going on in that head of his?

Still afraid that Johnny will come after me,
I limp alongside Cory to the UVC station just outside of the track.
He offers to help me walk, but I hurt everywhere so it’s just as
good if I struggle on alone instead of incurring further pain. Just
as we’re about to get on the capsule, a few other participants run
across the finish line—the next round of eight, in which five made
it. Their faces are beaming with all sort of emotion—pride, relief,
and sadness. Everything I felt and still feel. Though most of them
are smiling, some of them fall to the earth and kiss the ground,
while others kneel and lift their arms up toward the heavens.

In the distance, past the corpses on the
track, I see others swinging on the monkey bars and jumping from
stake to stake, avoiding the burning wrecking balls. But way back
in the jungle is Arthor—my friend, if they haven’t taken his body
down already. Tears well up in my eyes and I am incapable of
silencing a sob. He almost made it. And he easily could have had I
forced him to stay behind with me—had we stayed together. We were
stronger as a team. A sudden rush of guilt clenches me when I
remember shooting him in the Caves of Choice. Maybe he knew that I
did it, and this is why he decided to abandon me. Maybe he was so
hurt by what I did he had no other choice but to leave. The only
reason I survived is because he helped me—I stand on the shoulders
of a giant. I’ll never know why he truly decided to do it. Like
I’ll never know if Gemma would have survived had she come with me.
And I still don’t know for sure whether or not she’s alive. But I
will persist until I know.

Back home, my father might be expecting me,
waiting for me to show my face so he can tell me what a dishonor I
am to the family. Maybe I won’t go home. Maybe if President Volkov
is set on killing me, I’ll have to take Nicholas’s offer and flee
to the Konders’s. But I won’t until I have freed Gemma and her
mother.

I tag along with Cory onto the capsule and
sit next to him. Johnny stares at me from the other side, but I’m
past caring or reacting to how he treats me. I ease into the
harness, but there’s no way to prevent my burned back from pressing
against the seat and my abdomen from coming in contact with the
straps. Soon after, the capsule takes off with a jolt. In a daze of
pain and shock, I glare out the window, for the most part unaware
of all the trees and mountains that start to pass by. We pass
through a tunnel, and the fluorescent blue lights make everyone’s
faces look like ghouls, the humming sound muffling the whispers and
muted laughs.

Slipping in and out of consciousness, I
don’t know how much time passes before the capsule stops. I peer
out the window and see the Newland flag flapping in the wind, and
the familiar upside down spin-top structure and shiny metal
buildings that makes up Volkov Village.

The participants file out of the capsule,
and as they step outside, I watch them one by one raising their
arms in victory. Cory nods to me as he’s about to leave the
capsule. “You good?”

“
Yeah, just need a minute.”
Cory leaves and I hear the crowd of representatives cheer for the
victor. Sitting here, I try to gather my strength to stand up, but
the longer I sit, the weaker I feel. Just one more minute and I
think I can gather some strength. But it doesn’t come.

After some time, Mai peeks her head in the
door. “Heidi?” She rushes to my side, but doesn’t touch me, only
gasps. I’ve never seen fear in her eyes until now. “Just lie still.
I’ll have the paramedics right here.”

“
Where are we?”

“
We’re stationed outside of
Asolo, Cory’s hometown.”

“
I placed third?” I mumble,
not sure if I remember correctly.

“
Yes. My brave little
girl.” Her eyes brim with tears. “We’re going to take good care of
you.”

“
Where’s…” Just as I’m
about to ask where he is, Nicholas enters. I tell my lips to smile,
but now even that is asking too much.

“
You made it. You placed
third.”

Hearing him say it, it becomes all the more
real. He walks over to me as Mai walks out, and though his
expression is reserved, beneath his calm demeanor I sense great
alarm.

Mai steps out of the capsule with two men
dressed in white scrubs, rolling in a gurney. She keeps turning
away, but I can see from here how she keeps whisking her tears
away.

“
She’s severely dehydrated
and she’s lost a lot of blood,” Nicholas says.