Page 105 of The Most Dangerous Games

They pass a stretcher team and stop. They gently transfer Conner Lynch. Someone covers his face with a blanket and then Jack and Tipton continue to carry him through what is left of the ravaged city.

Hannah walks beside the stretcher and holds Conner’s hand, like she can still feel some last warmth through the sheet. Wyatt reaches for her other hand. She lets him take it.

“I’m sorry he died,” Wyatt says to her. “But so grateful that he saved you before he did.”

As they’re finally approaching the National Museum, Jack turns to Ant Tipton.

“Maybe Lynch was supposed to be The One,” Jack says. “Maybe he was supposed to save the world.”

“Hate to admit it, mate,” Tipton says. “But you just might be right.”

The other pod is waiting for them once they’re inside the barracks.

Carlos Lopez, Amos Meyers, Gabrielle Fontaine, and Fumio Hase, player #38, who’d gone from being a multiple winner of the All Japan Karate Championships to being elected governor of Tokyo. Jack had come to like him in the short amount of time they’ve been together, mostly because the man clearly didn’t take crap from anybody.

The rest of them watch Jack and Tipton walk past the sandbags and into the front hall of the barracks, where they set down the stretcher.

Jack pauses and touches the blanket once, just once, like that contact is a promise.

He says to Fumio Hase, “Conner kept telling me he’d always wondered what a war was like.”

Jack hates the thought. Hates the irony. Hates how the universe can be cruel and still be clever.

“Now he knows,” Jack says.

In the middle of all this, Jack’s brain does a cruel thing.

It remembers Elena Torres’s voice.

“I’ll be right behind you.”

He hears it close by, close enough to touch. Spanish flickers in his memory—Elena snapping at her AI opponent, Elena laughing at his stupid jokes, Elena’s accent wrapping around words like they were a dance.

“May I have your attention please?” they hear now from the speakers in the barracks lobby, the sound shattering what had been a somber silence.

The Host.

“I want you all to know how truly sorry I am for this latest loss of life,” he says. “And also want to acknowledge the bravery that some of you just exhibited in that shelter.”

“Do you now.” Jack laughs once, without humor.

“I do, whether you believe me or not,” The Host says. “Mr. Lynch proved that he was willing to pay the ultimate price to save the life of another. I sincerely honor his courage and selflessness along with the rest of you.”

They hear bombs falling in the distance.

“We always hear about people dying for their country,” he continues. “Mr. Lynch died for someone else’s life. Regardless of creed or background. A noble exchange.”

He pauses. Alek’s stomach twists.

Then another cluster of explosions hits closer. The lobby shivers. People stumble. Someone drops to a knee.

The Host’s voice doesn’t change.

“But even in the aftermath of a tragedy like this, you must understand,” he continues. “This is why we’re all here. This war is the world. Even the ones of you who’ve fought needed to see this.”

Alek steps up. Stares at the speaker like she could stab it with a dagger. “This isn’t just tone-deaf, it’s cruel.”

Jack comes in afterward. “I didn’t need a reminder of how cruel the world can be. It’s in my head every second of every day.”