I WISH I could find my pistol so I could put a bullet in my brain. Rubble and debris are scattered all around me from the remains of the Center in Screven. Fire threatens to burn me, but I don’t care. In the distance I can see several people running toward me. Are they allies? Enemies? At this point, it doesn’t matter.
My pistol must have been flung from my belt in the explosions. I need it. Death will take me any second now and I can’t wake up as a greyskin. I can’t imagine myself as a greyskin. What kind of monster would I be?
My stomach wrenches and I dry-heave, trying to throw up onto the road in front of me. I haven’t seen a mirror since yesterday, but I imagine my eyes have darkened. I remember they had been bloodshot. Mucus drips down the front of my face and I know what comes next is death and a desire to eat flesh.
The people running toward me look like they are a mile away, though it’s probably only a hundred yards or so. I roll onto my back and stare up into the sky. When I look up, the sky is so hazy I can’t tell if it’s day or night, even though I know it is just after dawn. There is so much smoke. I can’t hear much. My ears are ringing from the explosions, but I’m sure my hearing will return if I don’t die first.
The past twenty-four hours have been nothing but a blur. As I lay on my back, echoes of my last day whiz by. It’s like when a person sees her life flash before her eyes before she has a close call or is in a terrible accident. That’s kind of what this feels like; my brain is trying to reflect on how I came to be lying in the middle of the street in Screven with destruction all around me. My brain takes me to the moment I saw the blinking red light. The sinking feeling of defeat was like none I had ever felt.
I was numb. I don’t know how long it took before I tossed the cylinder to the side and set my head against the tree house wall. I closed my eyes and just thought about my parents and what they must have felt when they knew they had the virus. Was I going to be shot like they were? Was this how it was supposed to end? My life was over. My body was going to be nothing more than a pile of ashes soon. I wondered how big the pile would be by the end of the night. How many people in Springhill were facing infection like I was?
After about twenty minutes, I decided that I couldn’t just stay in the tree house. I didn’t know what I was going to tell the others, though. First, I didn’t want all the attention. I knew the moment I told my grandma that I had been infected, she would scream and moan for the entire village to hear. The village didn’t need that. Especially not my little brother, Jake.
That’s when a thought hit me. I didn’t have to tell anyone. Not yet, anyway. On average, I still had about twenty-four hours until the virus killed me. Wouldn’t that be enough time to gain an audience with Jeremiah and do everything in my power to just kill him? Honestly, it would even be better if I died with him. I would need to be shot in the head or something so I wouldn’t reanimate, but it was a great idea. An act of terrorism as my last act of defiance. I knew I was dead anyway. Why not entertain the thought of going out with a bang?
The thought left me about as quickly as it had come. It would take hours for me to travel all the way to Screven. Once I got there, it might be even more hours before they would consider granting me an audience with Jeremiah. It was a foolish thought. Then and there I simply decided to spend my last little bit of time with my family. Then I would die.
Someone else would have to carry on the mission. That wouldn’t be a problem considering Evelyn was Jeremiah’s sworn enemy. She had told him long ago that she wanted to be there when he died. I didn’t doubt that she would. I may have started the recent uprising of Starborns, but someone else could finish it. Someone else would have to.
Eventually I mustered the courage to get out of the tree house and climb my way down into the muddy village street. I could hear a lot of commotion down toward the Tower. Many people had come in from Sudyka, though I never really took notice of the number. All I really remembered was that Jeffrey, the man that I had only seen in my dreams, was among them.
I first considered walking to the Tower to see what I could do to help, but quickly changed my mind. I still wasn’t ready to tell anyone about the scratch. I knew my limitations. I knew I would need to be shot before it was too late, but that didn’t mean it had to be done right now.
On the rain-drenched road, I changed my course to the left and made my way toward my house. The door was barely hanging on by the hinges. Windows were shattered. My family had come so close to being overtaken by the greyskins it was scary. Of course, this is where I was scratched. This was the place I began to die.
I went inside the house and walked to my room in the back. I peeled my bloody shirt off and tossed it to the floor. I grabbed a small hand mirror off the dresser so I could get a better look at the cut. The blood had done more than clot. It had turned black. It actually didn’t look all that bad, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t infected.
I did what I could to bandage it up in case for some reason it started to bleed again. Though I was infected, I was surprised by how I didn’t feel any different. I thought surely by now I would be feeling some effects of the grey virus. Perhaps the cylinder had misread my blood. Maybe I wasn’t infected at all. Technology wasn’t perfect. I took a deep breath and shook my head. It was wishful thinking. There was no reason for me to feel the effects yet. I was sure it would take hours. From what I had seen in other people, it was a slow, gradual process. In the last hours of life, I knew that many just wanted to die. I hoped that I didn’t make it that far. I planned to be dead long before then.
When the wound was fully bandaged, I pulled out a dry shirt and put it on. Looking out the window, I was glad to see that the rain had stopped, though the clouds were still dreary and dark. I walked out of my room and was about to leave the house when Grandma and Jake walked through the front door. One look showed that she had just been crying. Without a word, the two of them walked up to me with open arms and held to me tightly. It felt good to see them alive. I really thought I was going to lose them.
“Mora,” Grandma said, pulling away but holding my shoulders at arm’s length. “Austin has died. Knife wound.” Another tear slipped down her cheek when she told me this.
I pulled in closer and hugged her even tighter. I knew how much Austin had meant to her. I never knew the extent of their relationship, but it was apparent that the two had been close over the years.
In this tight embrace, I couldn’t help but hope that Springhill had seen the last of these devastating attacks for a while. Now that I knew Jeremiah was the one sending the greyskins the whole time, it made me want to do something about it even more. The longer I held on to Grandma and Jake, the more I wanted to take the fight directly to Jeremiah. The more I wanted to kill him.
We finally let go of each other and Grandma told Jake to go change his clothes while she sat at the kitchen table. She wiped her nose with the bottom of her shirt and then set her cheek in her palm. Her tears didn’t cease because the pain was too fresh.
“I haven’t felt this way since your parents died,” she said to me.
The mention of my parents struck a chord with me and it was everything I could do not to break down right in front of her. She wouldn’t be able to handle the news that I had been infected by a greyskin. I sat down at the table and placed my hand in hers and she rubbed my knuckles with her thumb affectionately.
“At least we still have each other,” she said almost as if she were trying to add to my misery.
This time, I was the one who wiped away a tear. “You know we aren’t finished fighting,” I said. “We have to take Jeremiah down or this is all going to keep happening.”
She nodded quickly, swallowing more tears. “I know,” she said. “And I know you will lead them well.” She sat up straight, letting go of my hand. “It’s your duty to lead them well, Mora. Your father always said you were born to be a leader. We all saw it in you ever since you were a little girl.”
“What if I can’t do it?” I asked her.
She just shook her head. “Nonsense. I’ve seen the power you have. Not just with your Starborn stuff, but everything else as well. You command respect. People look to you for help. Your enemies fear you. I think it’s your determination. Our village now has a secure wall. We’ve got food, medicine. We’ve got all of this because you decided to go out one day and get help.”
“That help turned on us,” I said.
“That help was never truly with us from what I understand,” she came back. “But you fought them off and we were left with the things we needed.”
“And with more bodies to throw on the fire,” I said, looking away.
“Mora, I will not hear you talk like that.” Her sudden change in tone was unnerving for a moment. She was rarely stern with anyone. “The point is, it’s a terrible world out there and you are clearly making it a better place. Any thoughts of you quitting or staying behind just so you can be with Jake and me ought to be thrown out the window until all your work is finished.”
I was stunned by her words. All this came out of the same mouth that had nearly begged me not to leave when I had to return to Salem and pick up the healer, Christopher.
“It may have taken me a bit,” she continued, “but over the past day or so, I’ve seen what you can truly do now. I had no idea the world needed you so much. You’ve got to finish what you’ve started.”
I was silent through the entire exchange. It was almost as if she had been reading my mind. That, for some reason, she knew that I had been infected and that I was running out of time. I wondered if it would have been a different conversation if she had seen the cylinder blinking red when I did. In any case, what she told me was true. I had less than twenty-four hours to live. There was no time to waste.
“The other Starborns are meeting with the new man,” Grandma said. “I think his name is Jeffrey. They were asking where you were and I told them I would send you their way if I saw you.”
“Sorry I was gone for a little bit,” I told her. “I needed to be alone for a few minutes.”
“I understand, sweetheart.”
I stood from the table and gave Grandma a tight squeeze on the shoulder as I passed to go out into the street toward the Tower. I wasn’t ready for what I saw there. As I passed through the village, I saw bodies on the ground everywhere. Greyskins. Villagers. Screven soldiers. It was all too devastating. There were too many. I tried not to hold eye contact with the two remaining village elders, Bill and Linda, as I walked by. Their bewildered expressions were unnerving at best. Then there were the people who had landed in the helicopters from Sudyka - survivors from an attack it seemed. I had still yet to learn of why they had been under attack, but I was sure to find out soon enough.
I walked through the entrance of the Tower and up the stairs until I finally made it to the top. All eyes fell on me as I walked through the door. I gave a halfhearted smile and the others did the same. Heather and Danny sat in a couple of chairs near the back wall while Christopher leaned against the doorframe next to me. Aaron sat next to the screen that showed the satellite activity. Evelyn stood farthest from the door next to Jeffrey. The man was tall. His black hair was beginning to turn grey and his salt and pepper stubble gave him the look of one who hadn’t slept in days.
“So, you’re Mora?” Jeffrey asked.
I nodded.
He cleared his throat and then looked at each of the others in the eyes, then back to me. “The time to go after Jeremiah is coming soon,” he said.
“It’s now, actually,” I said.
He wasn’t ready for such a quick interruption. Everyone looked at me with furrowed eyebrows.
“There’s no time to wait,” I continued. “If we could attack him today, he would never know what hit him.”
Jeffrey held up a hand. “I couldn’t agree with you more, but you should hear what I have to say first.”
I held my tongue, although I felt every second we stalled was a waste of precious time. I was dying. There was no time for talk.
“First of all,” Jeffrey said, “just to clarify, for those of you that don’t know, Jeremiah created the greyskins. Jeremiah controls the greyskins. Jeremiah is a greyskin himself. He was once bitten by an infected Starborn. That Starborn just so happened to possess the gift of long life. Somehow, the gift transferred over to him.” Jeffrey pointed at Christopher. “The man has been searching for a healer for the past sixty years. Someone that can take away his greyskin flesh and make him a whole person again.”
Jeffrey paused to take a deep breath. It was fascinating to see how the others knew so little about Jeremiah. Sure, most of them knew bits and pieces, but they had obviously never been told in such a straightforward way. I had learned of it through a series of dreams that Evelyn had planted in my mind. I knew every gruesome detail of how it all began. Christopher knew about it because I had told him.
“I tell you all this,” Jeffrey continued, “because I want you all to know exactly the kind of enemy we are dealing with.”
The room was silent. All of them had known how bad Jeremiah was. None of them had any love for the man, but this information was heavy. This was something the common person had no idea about. This is what the world needed to see.
“You all have been a part of something much bigger than you realize,” Jeffrey said. “You are part of the Resistance.”
“We know,” Heather said. “We started it.” Danny nodded his head in agreement.
Evelyn spoke next. “Not exactly.” We all looked at her with confused looks on our faces. “You have been part of the Resistance, but you were not the beginning of it.” She paused for a moment. “It’s been in motion for almost twenty years now.”
My mind went straight to the last dream I had when Evelyn had attempted to assassinate Jeremiah. She had told him that she was going to kill him no matter what. She said this just before Jeffrey grabbed her and he teleported away from Jeremiah’s reach. Had the Resistance been part of that? Had all this been her plan?
“Jeffrey is a teleporter,” Evelyn continued. “For the past eighteen years he has been going between colonies, setting up pockets of defectors, telling people the truth about Jeremiah and what he has done.”
Everyone looked at Jeffrey but remained silent as Evelyn explained further.
“It took years to get people to catch on that Jeremiah was somehow causing the greyskin attacks. The very attacks that he swore to protect them from.”
“So it was all an act?” Christopher asked. “All the attacks? Even the ones after villages became colonies?”
“We don’t know about all of them,” Jeffery answered. “We do know that he sent attacks to places like Springhill just so someone would eventually come to him and ask him to be a part of Screven. I don’t doubt that he often sends greyskins to established Screven colonies just to show that he is still protecting people.”
“The trucks full of blood,” Heather blurted out. “I saw trucks spraying blood on the ground to make a trail for greyskins. That’s how they were led here. Still doesn’t explain where they found the greyskins though.”
Jeffrey shrugged. “I don’t know that either, but we know that Jeremiah is behind it.”
“Makes you wonder where all that blood came from too,” Aaron said with his arms crossed as he stared into the floor. He then looked up at Jeffrey and Evelyn. “Is the Resistance everywhere?”
“In many colonies,” Jeffrey said. “Sudyka, Seymour…a lot of places. Even Screven.”
“And we were just one of the groups?” Danny asked Evelyn.
“The most important one,” Jeffrey answered. “Once you three came along,” he said to Aaron, Danny, and Heather, “we knew we would use Salem to lead the entire cause.”
“Because you are all Starborns,” Evelyn said.
“Are there others in the Resistance that are Starborns too?” Danny asked.
Jeffrey shook his head. “Most of them are just normal people.” He looked at Evelyn almost as if to ask if it was okay to move on. She gave him a slight nod. “Which brings me to the next point.”
He looked at me when he said this.
“When Mora showed up at Salem, things started rolling,” Jeffrey said.
Aaron looked over at me with a grin. I recalled a conversation we had some time ago where he told me that I had caused the little rebellion and didn’t even mean to. That I would be the one to lead them.
“Even though she never meant to start a fight with Jeremiah,” Jeffrey said, “it happened anyway. Evelyn saw the potential immediately and then the fighting began before we were ready.”
“We had always meant for the fight against Jeremiah to start in Salem,” Evelyn explained. “News of a Starborn revolt in Salem was the original signal to Resistance leaders in the other colonies to lead their soldiers to do the same.”
“When we got the news in Sudyka that Starborns in Salem had killed a bunch of guards, we were surprised,” Jeffrey said. “But we knew what we had to do. We started fighting.”
I was shocked by his words. “But we were framed,” I said. “We never killed those guards. In fact, we tried to save the colony, not take it over.”
“But that’s not what it looked like to us,” Jeffery answered. “And in a way, Jeremiah hurt himself by trying frame you. In a way, he signaled the revolt on his own.”
Aaron cleared his throat. “So that’s why someone was trying to get help over the radio.”
Jeffrey nodded. “Springhill is our closest neighbor and we were desperate. We didn’t do well in our part. Somehow Jeremiah had greyskins and guards attacking us. The fifty or so people outside are all we have left of the Sudyka Resistance.”
Evelyn’s head dipped at this. A look of sadness betrayed her. They had not been ready for all of this. Her plan to take down Jeremiah had started as a personal matter. Jeremiah had killed her love, Mark. He had taken everything away from her. When I looked at Jeffrey, I remembered that he, too, lost someone dear to him. Sarah. I remembered seeing his heartbreak as the tears streamed down his much younger face. But when I thought about it, we had all lost something because of Jeremiah. There wasn’t a person in the room that remained untouched by the pain Jeremiah had brought upon the Earth. The thought brought confidence to me in what we were doing.
“Has fighting started in other places?” I asked.
Jeffrey nodded. “All of them.”
“Even in Screven?” Aaron asked.
“Even in Screven,” Jeffrey answered. “Jeremiah is getting nervous.”
“As he should,” Evelyn added.
“So why haven’t we ever been told of these others in the Resistance?” Aaron asked. “Why have we been made to think that we were the only ones?” His question was obviously directed at Evelyn who shifted slightly.
“I know that to you it may seem like a betrayal of trust because I haven’t told you,” she said, “but it was for your protection. For the protection of others. We didn’t want Resistance soldiers contacting each other from different colonies.”
“For instance,” Jeffrey said, “if someone in Sudyka knew about the Resistance in Salem and one of them were caught and interrogated, everyone would be in trouble. Only Resistance leaders in other colonies know that there are more of us ready to fight at the same time.”
“Keeping you in the dark was the safest thing we could do,” Evelyn added.
The room was too silent after this. Every person sat and considered what it all meant for them. I knew what it meant for me. It meant that we had to go to Screven and finish what we started. And I needed to do it quickly before my condition worsened.
“Do you know what needs to be done in Screven?” I asked them.
Jeffrey nodded and shrugged. “A lot. It will be the most difficult place to take down, obviously. The Resistance there is smaller than I would like, but it’s also the hardest place to get anything done without being seen.”
“What’s been done already?” Aaron asked.
“We don’t know,” Evelyn said. “They are afraid to communicate outside of the city for fear of being picked up. Could be chaos, could be very little happening.”
“We need to get there now,” I said, hoping I wasn’t being too obvious. I nod at Jeffrey. “You’re a teleporter. Can you get us into Screven from here?”
Jeffrey let out a little laugh and scratched the back of his neck. He looked at Evelyn then back at me. “My ability isn’t very accurate. That’s the only problem. I could get all of you into Screven, but I couldn’t guess where we would end up. We could appear in Jeremiah’s living room for all I know.”
“Sounds good to me,” Heather said. “We can take him.” Danny smiled at this.
“It’s the only option we have,” I told him. “Going inside secretly is the best way. We won’t stand a chance if we try to take a car or helicopter.”
Jeffrey looked at me with a concerned expression on his face, obviously taking the suggestion to heart. I didn’t think he had expected to go into Screven so soon. None of them had.
“I’ll have no shortage of electrical sources there,” Aaron said. “It’s no problem with me, though I’m not sure what the plan is when we get there. I wouldn’t mind running into Connor.”
He said this with a hint of anger in his voice. A big part of me wanted to blurt out that Connor had gone to Screven to help us get information about Jeremiah’s plans. But Connor had told me not to tell anyone. He didn’t want to take the chance that Jeremiah could find out about him. All Connor had going for him was knowledge of us and how we operate. I feared greatly that Jeremiah would soon find him useless and kill him, but I figured he still had some time left. I was conflicted about telling the others about him. So, I held my tongue.
It pained me to see Aaron so angry with him. The two had never truly been able to reconcile with each other over the death of their parents. I had recently learned that Aaron was the adopted son. In a terrible twist of fate, Aaron had once been forced to kill their undead parents in order to survive. The whole situation was tragic.
I couldn’t understand my emotions. I had feelings for both of them. For Aaron it was the allure of learning more about who I was as a Starborn. I had always felt that he would be able to take me on a journey to show me who I truly was. But then there was Connor who showed me more about myself than anyone ever could. He had shown me that I am not immortal. He had shown me that despite the great gift I had, we were all in this together.
I had spoken to Connor only minutes ago. I had told him that I loved him. And for the first time, I was honest with myself and I knew that I meant it. I couldn’t explain it, nor did I want to. All I knew was that I was sad and I was scared of him being near Jeremiah. He was so brave, and yet I couldn’t help but think it was a stupid move too. What made him think Jeremiah would let him live? Yet there he was. Alive. Having Connor there would be beneficial when I would attempt to take on Jeremiah. Because of Connor, I would know where the Screven leader was. I would be able to stay a step ahead of the enemy.
My urgency to face Jeremiah only reminded me that my life was coming to an end soon. I knew I would never be able to enjoy Connor’s love. I would never be able to hold him. It struck me that with the virus overtaking my body, I wouldn’t even be able to kiss him goodbye.
The thoughts running through my head were enough to make me sick. I needed a distraction. I needed to get out of Springhill. I needed to get to Screven.
“I don’t mind giving myself up,” I said to them all. “Jeremiah will see me if I surrender. Then I can just kill him.”
“You don’t fear for your own life?” Aaron asked.
“I don’t,” I said. I’m going to die anyway.
Aaron shook his head and set his jaw firm.
“Your willingness is appreciated,” Jeffrey said, “but Jeremiah will have precautions set in place. It wouldn’t be that easy. What we need to do first is meet with the Screven Resistance leader, Allison. She will know what needs to be done. She knows Screven better than any of us.”
The spirits of everyone in the room felt heavy. We could hear each other breathing, but, to me, it was a welcome sound. The sound of life.
All of us were exhausted. It was only midmorning and we had all given so much of ourselves already. We needed a break. We needed a rest. But I knew I couldn’t afford to wait. The others might not have understood my haste, but it seemed to be interpreted as determination. Though I was determined, I was also afraid. Terrified actually. I didn’t know what this process was like. I didn’t know what it would involve to try and take down Jeremiah as my body moved rapidly toward death.
The talk was finished and it was decided that we would all meet in exactly one hour. I knew I had to give Grandma and Jake a final goodbye. I wouldn’t tell them about what was happening to me. I would die on the mission and hopefully that was all they would know.
Before leaving the Tower, I placed a hand on Christopher’s arm and told him that I needed to talk to him about something. He nodded with a smile, but I didn’t think he would be smiling when I told him what my idea was.
But first, I wanted to spend some time with my family.
It had been a long morning already and I couldn’t help but think that this day, my last day, would be the longest day of my life.