Link City

Captured *

Chapter 13: Captured

I felt my eyes widen as shock set in. Chills shot up my spine, and I couldn't stop myself from kissing back. His hand pressed down on my hand, so warm. The part of my brain that controlled the logic screamed and thrashed, trying to get my body to listen. But I knew as soon as I pulled away all the anxiety and sadness would come back, and his arms felt so good around me. As soon as I forced myself to do what had to be done, everything would get complicated.

It felt like a beautiful lifetime, but I knew it had only been a moment, when I pulled away. He looked at me, so much question and fear in his eyes. What was he afraid of? He was perfect, and good, and kind. I was the one who had killed that homeless man, and Jason was the one who hadn't been able to bring himself to do it. I didn't deserve him.

Swallowing, the right words came to me as if on their own. “I'm not sure what just happened, but whatever it was or wasn't, I'm still volunteering for that mission. If I come back alive, we'll figure it out, okay?”

He nodded. “When. When you come back alive.”

Even as Dustin and I stood in front of Alec, awaiting our fate, my mind was somewhere else. My hand subconsciously moved up, toughing my lower lip. I liked him. I really did. It felt different than the way in which I'd liked my last boyfriend, but the strange clenching in the pit of my stomach could have just been fear.

“I can't believe I'm actually considering this.” Alec ran his hand back through his hair. “It's so ridiculous. I never would but... but you're the only ones who have volunteered. We're an organization of freedom fighters, not martyrs.”

He said it as if he'd asked them before. I suddenly had a horrible image of Dustin and I running into a building with bombs strapped to our chests, but I quickly shook it off. That was, thankfully, not the plan.

Alec did agree, and I had to accept that there had been a part of me that had wished he wouldn't. But he was just crazy enough, and just uncaring enough about life; I was truly beginning to see that. As plans for the operation began to take shape, I did not get to see Jason half as much as I would have wanted to. He was sent back to his sister, much to my surprise, to gather some materials Grey would need. I was surprised by this, and I knew that there were many in Alec's organization who believed he was playing us. But I trusted him. I had to. I couldn't imagine what he must be going through, lying to his sister, working for the people who had blown so many of her friends—his friends—to bits. I tried to imagine what I would do in his position, but I couldn't.

“Lay still Nance,” grunted Sarah.

It was two days after Alec had agreed to allow us on the mission. We were testing whether or not the tech Grey had salvaged from their brief partnership with the ECI would work for the purposes they intended. Currently it felt like Sarah and Grey were giving me a massage on my lower back, but true they were applying a skin graft. Between the fake skin and my own, we would conceal what we needed inside the prison. It was really quite clever, if not really strange feeling.

“Done.” They moved away from me.

I peered in the mirror, trying to determine where the artificial skin ended and mine began. I couldn't, not until I started touching it. It felt like my skin, but I could tell when my fingers were touching it in comparison to not.