Citizen

Chapter twenty-four

Kyra dashed between two factory buildings. Footsteps silent, heart pounding, legs weak. For the third time that day she felt breathless, like her lungs were full of fire that burned her throat whenever she tried to exhale. She liked it; for her, running wasn't about getting somewhere, it was about how it made her feel. She liked the pulsing of her heart, the numbness of her legs, the emptiness of her brain... Even if it was only momentary. It was a break from her constant thinking and anxiety. Moving at such a fast pace was exhilarating, made better by the knowledge that she was fast – maybe even faster than James.

"We're close enough to walk now," Hayes called from ahead. It may have been a suggestion but the authority in his tone was unmistakable. Despite the faint wrinkles around his eyes that suggested his age, his body was in top form, and his chest was rising and falling more evenly than the young people trailing behind him.

Their pace slowed to a walk. Kyra strolled into the centre of the path and looked up at the thin gap between the rooftops; all that could be seen were murky grey clouds and snippets of the city. The fence would have blended into the sky if not for the Enforcers pacing around its top. Guard towers that reached higher than the skyscrapers in the city centre pierced the sky like knives. As they watched a drone flew over the sector, speeding by so quickly it was a blur.

Kyra glanced sideways; the goofy smile she'd grown accustomed to was missing from Ethan's face. His gaze was steely, his jaw set.

"Are you okay?" she whispered.

"Just nervous, and when I'm nervous I tend to talk until I run out of air or topics to talk about, which, you know, generally never happens. So I'm trying to avoid talking," he added, forcing his lips into a smile. "Have you... decided?"

He didn't have to elaborate; she hadn't been able to stop thinking about his request to take her to outside since he'd asked. Her desk at home was littered with pro and con lists and books ranging from native birds in their area to moral philosophy. No matter how much she researched, she still had no answer for him.

"No, not yet." Pursing her lips, she looked forward, trying to ignore the churning pit in her stomach. At the end of the alley was a door. It was rusted and hanging off its hinges.

James turned to them and said, "This is the entrance."

"Why don't they fix the door?" Ethan asked, frowning.

Hayes carefully pulled it open, grimacing as a cloud of dust came with it. "It's a desired look. No one wants to enter a building that appears seconds away from falling apart."

It was smart, really, far too clever to sit comfortably with Kyra. She shot Ethan a look but he was already gone.

Inside there was nothing but darkness. Kyra blinked against the endless void of shadows. As her eyes adjusted, she took in the space around her. The concrete floor was full of old furniture and devices the city had grown out of; for an organised place, it sure knew how to make a mess. Broken chairs and battered circuit boards lay scattered around the room, like booby traps waiting to trip her up. Kyra's heart raced as a familiar hand touched her shoulder, pushing her this way and that. It was strange, knowing that James cared enough to do little things that like but still lied to her for so long - and that they were still lying to each other, even now. She pushed the thought away as quickly as it had come.

As Hayes opened the door light cut through the shadows, allowing Kyra to traipse a clear path through the maze of unused objects and enter the new room behind Ethan. The golden rays filtering in through the boarded-up windows shed light on the large space. It was five times the size of the last and looked just as unexploited; it did, however, hint at what the factory might have been used for before it fell into disarray. Stairs led down from the observation deck to the factory floor, where row after row of desks stood, covered in machines and clipboards as though they'd been left in a hurry.