Michael leaned his head on my shoulder for a moment. “Nope.” He sat back in his chair.
“And my chip is different. I don’t know if that means they’d want to remove it or if they’d want to preserve it in me.” I touched the back of my head. “Who knows if it would make the next donor act the way I did?”
“You mean giving that person the ability to kill?”
“No, I mean the way I can stay aware while someone is jacking me. I can hear them talking to me. They see out of my eyes, but I’m still there, conscious.”
“That had to be scary when you watched yourself shoot me. It sure was for me.”
I swung my legs over the side of my chair so I sat facing him.
“I don’t ever want anyone jacking me again. Emma’s right. Our best hope is to get the chips out.”
“You sound like the next volunteer.”
If I died, Tyler had no family left. If I made it through, then I was free.
“I could be a normal girl again. It would be a nice life, in the mansion, Tyler and you. Emma could come back and live there too.”
He let out a soft laugh. “Seeing as she owns half of everything, I think she might.”
“What about you? Are you going to volunteer?” I asked.
“Somehow, I don’t think it’s going to be up to us,” he said. “But yeah, if given the choice, I will. Otherwise, we’ll be running for the rest of our lives. The war may be over, but it will never be over for us.”
I looked into his eyes. I hadn’t realized it, but at some point his hand had traveled down from my shoulder to my hand. It felt so warm and comforting to have human contact again beyond being shoved around by guards. This was how people were supposed to treat each other.
Tears sprang to my eyes, but I forced them back. This wasn’t the place or the time to get emotional. Soft. Too much was at stake.
I let go of his hand and stood.
“Shouldn’t they be done soon?” I said. “How long is this going to take?”
Hyden was at the far side of the room, pacing like a caged animal. I walked over to him and tugged on the collar of his shirt. “How much longer do you think it’s going to be?” I said.
“Dunno.” He shook his head.
“Will you volunteer?” I asked.
He looked at me like I was crazy. “Are you kidding? It’d be suicide. Of course not. And you better not.”
“It’s my only way out of a lifetime of being someone else’s puppet. If they’ll remove it from me.”
“I don’t know who these people are, but they’re not as bright as you think to risk this. We have to find a way out of here.”
“How can we get out? They have guns. Guards.”
“Did you ever escape from someplace before?”
“Yeah. Institution thirty-seven.”
“That’s rough. But you got out.”
An Ender guard stood against the far wall, staring at us with an icy face.
“This place seems a lot harder,” I said.
“I know.” He looked around and then lowered his voice. “The guards were talking about my father and the summit meeting.”
“What did they say?” I whispered back.
“Just confirming what you heard when they raided my lab. Some of our enemies—some countries, some shady groups, are gathering at my father’s lab. He’s going to sell the technology to the highest bidder, along with the Metals he’s collected.”
I put my hand on my stomach. “That’s horrible. Not just for the Metals, but for the country.”
“It’s just like my father.”
I was going to ask him more about his father and what he’d do, but a loud sound interrupted us.
An explosion.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Hyden, Michael, and I ran toward the sound, down a hallway past peaceful waterfall projections. Guards spilled out of rooms along the corridor and followed us. As we approached, we heard agonizing screams.
A group of Enders bunched up in a doorway at the end of the hall. Frantic voices, confusion, and a bitter odor in the air—a chemical, burnt smell—assaulted me.
I heard a man screaming in pain, but I couldn’t see him over the tall Ender guards. I hunched low and caught a glimpse of an Ender sitting on the floor. It was the surgeon. He clutched one arm, which shook violently. His hand was burnt, his arm black up to the elbow. His cries subsided to a horrible moan, but then they started up again, just not as loud or as constant. The hairs on my arms rose. The pain must have been unbearable.
Someone shouted, “Get a doctor!”
“He is the doctor,” an Ender guard said.
A few of the Enders in front of me left and I straightened to get a better view. A shield meant to separate patient and surgeon was blackened and shattered but might have saved the doctor’s life. Next to it, Emma’s body lay on the operating table. Someone had covered her upper body and head with a sheet. All that was visible were her feet and her anklet that spelled out