Light (Gone 6)

Electricity and freedom from fear. Food and warmth. Her mother and father, cousins and aunts and family friends, and all of them saying, So what was it like? And I bet you’re glad to be out of there.

Were you afraid?

So afraid.

I guess you saw some bad things?

So many I can’t even tell you. So many I can’t remember them all. And some that I can’t get out of my head.

I have scars. Want to see my legs and arms and back? Scars.

Want to see my soul? Scars there, too, but you can’t really see them.

I’m sure you did your best.

Did I? Are you sure I did my best? Because I’m not.

I lied. I manipulated people. I hurt people at times. I was cruel at times. I betrayed trust.

I threw my brother to his death. Yes, to save my life and other people’s lives; does that make it okay?

“In the old days I would have talked to you, God,” she said. “I would have asked for guidance. And I would have gotten nothing, but I’d have pretended, and that would have been almost like the real thing.”

Lana would heal Sam. And then he would march out to fight Gaia.

And Gaia would kill him. But only after she had killed Edilio and Sinder and Diana and Sanjit and Quinn and and and . . . Then she would kill Sam, but before that she would kill Astrid, so that Sam would see, and he would cry out in despair, and only then would Gaia kill him.

Sam would die, and he would die knowing he had failed to save Astrid.

As if summoned from her thoughts Astrid saw Sinder passing around the side of the hotel, heading perhaps to join the desperate crowd huddled down by the highway. Was Sinder’s mother there? Astrid hadn’t really ever talked to the girl about her life before the FAYZ.

A lot of them she had never come to know. A lot she would never now be able to know. She closed her eyes and saw the terrible light from Gaia’s hands. She smelled again the burning of tires and varnished plywood, canvas and flesh.

If Sam died right now, right this minute, it would weaken Gaia, and the rest of them might survive.

“I made that choice once before,” she said to the dark sky. “I did that with Petey, didn’t I?”

The sky had no answer. The sky was bright to the south with burger lights, and to the west the ships glided by, carrying cars, iPads, and oil, and old people who wanted to see whales.

To the north the red glow of fire. It was brighter each minute. It must have spread beyond the forest now. Was it racing across the dry grassland? Was it burning across the fields that had fed them?

Fire? She wanted to laugh. Well, why not? Why not fire? This was the FAYZ, after all.

Somewhere out there the monster plotted their deaths. And if Astrid was going to do anything at all to stop it, it would mean sacrificing someone, either some nameless victim or Sam.

What was the lesson? What was all this teaching her? That sometimes there were no good choices?

“I learned that a long time ago,” Astrid said.

She had told Sam—insisted on it—that he had to do whatever it took to win, even if it meant attacking Diana, even if it meant burning down the world, but only survive, only live, Sam, because I can’t do it without you.

Live.

I can’t walk out of this place without you.

Astrid closed her eyes, shutting out the ships and the stars and the burger lights and the distant fire.

“Petey . . .”