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Of course the patrol—the person—Razor had in mind would be Thomas.
Thomas must’ve been assigned by Commander Jameson to track me down. He’s using Ollie to help. But of all the patrols I’d prefer to be arrested by, Thomas’s ranks last on the list. My hands start to shake. I don’t want to see my brother’s murderer again.
Ollie’s barking grows steadily louder. With it come the first sounds of footsteps and voices. I hear Thomas’s voice out in the corridor, shouting to his soldiers. I hold my breath and remind myself of the numbers I’d calculated.
They’re right outside the door. Their voices have gone quiet, replaced by clicks (safety on loaded guns, sounds like some M-series, some standard-issue rifles).
The following seems to happen in slow motion. The door creaks open and light spills in. Immediately I make a small jump and step one leg up—my foot lands silently on the doorknob as the door swings toward me. As the soldiers enter the room with their guns drawn, I reach up and grab the top of the door frame by using the doorknob as a step. I pull myself up. Without a sound, I perch on top of the open door like a cat.
They don’t see me. They probably can’t see anything except the darkness in here. I count them all in a flash. Thomas leads the group with Ollie at his side (to my surprise, Thomas doesn’t have his gun drawn), and behind him are a cluster of four soldiers. There are more soldiers outside the room, but I can’t tell how many.
“She’s in here,” one of them says, with a hand pressed to his ear. “She hasn’t had a chance to board any airships yet. Commander DeSoto just confirmed one of his men saw her enter.”
Thomas says nothing. I watch him turn to observe the dark room. Then his gaze wanders up the door.
We lock eyes.
I leap down and knock him to the ground. In a moment of blind rage, I actually want to break his neck with my bare hands. It’d be so easy.
The other soldiers clamor for their guns, but in the chaos I hear Thomas choke out an order. “Don’t fire! Don’t fire!” He grabs my arm. I almost manage to break free and dart through the soldiers and out the doorway, but a second soldier shoves me down. They’re all on me now, a whirlwind of uniforms seizing my arms and dragging me to my feet. Thomas keeps shouting at his men to be careful.
Razor was right about Thomas. He’ll want to keep me alive for Commander Jameson.
Finally, they cuff my hands and push me so hard against the floor that I can’t move. I hear Thomas’s voice overhead. “Good to see you again, Ms. Iparis.” His voice shakes. “You’re under arrest for assaulting Republic soldiers, for creating a disturbance in Batalla Hall, and for abandoning your post. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.” I notice he doesn’t say anything about assisting a criminal. He still has to pretend the Republic executed Day.
They pull me to my feet and lead me back down the hall. By the time we’re in the sunlight, more than a few passing soldiers stop to watch. Thomas’s men shove me unceremoniously into a waiting patrol jeep’s backseat, chain my hands to the door, and lock my arms down in metal shackles. Thomas sits next to me and points his gun at my head. Ridiculous. The jeep ushers us back through the streets. The other two soldiers sitting in the jeep’s front watch me in the rearview mirror. They act like I’m some sort of untamed weapon—and in a way, I guess that’s true. The irony of it all makes me want to laugh. Day is a Republic soldier on board the RS Dynasty, and I am the Republic’s most valuable captive. We’ve switched places.
Thomas tries to ignore me as we travel, but my eyes never leave him. He seems tired, with pale lips and dark circles rimming his eyes. Stubble dots his chin, a surprise in itself—Thomas would normally never show his face without being perfectly clean shaven. Commander Jameson must’ve run him ragged for letting me escape from Batalla Hall. They probably interrogated him for it.
The minutes drag on. None of the soldiers talk. The one who drives us keeps his eyes firmly on the road, and all we can hear is the drone of the jeep’s engine and the muffled sounds from the streets outside. I swear the others must be able to hear the hammering of my heart too. From here I can see the jeep driving ahead of us, and through its back window I see occasional flashes of white fur that make me feel incredibly happy. Ollie. I wish he were in the same jeep as me.
Finally, I turn to Thomas. “Thank you for not hurting Ollie.”
I don’t expect him to answer. Captains don’t speak to criminals, he’d say. But to my surprise, he meets my gaze. For me, it seems, he’s still willing to break protocol. “Your dog turned out to be useful.”
He’s Metias’s dog. My anger starts rising again, but I push it back down. Useless to rage over something that won’t help my plans. It’s interesting that he kept Ollie alive at all—he could have tracked me down without him. Ollie’s not a police dog and has no training in sniffing down targets. He couldn’t have helped when they were trying to track me across half the country; he’s only useful in very close range. Which means that Thomas kept him alive for other reasons. Because he cares for me? Or . . . maybe he still cares for Metias. The thought startles me. Thomas’s stare flickers away when I don’t reply. Then there’s another long silence. “Where are you taking me?”
“You’ll be held in the High Desert Penitentiary until after your interrogation, and then the courts will decide where you’ll go.”
