Page 124 of Anarchy Chained: Alpha Thomas

We both take a moment to appreciate the joke.

We made it. They threw everything they had at us, and we made it.

I turn both of us around and look at my friends. Case is healed already. Lincoln looks charged with adrenaline and satisfaction as he looks around the city.

“It’s not exactly how we planned it, is it?”

“No,” Case laughs. “Not exactly.”

“There’s still time,” Sheila says. “The program is still running. I made the necessary adjustments. They didn’t mess with it.”

“You mean couldn’t mess with it,” Lincoln sneers. “I made that shit bulletproof.”

“Where’s Iziah?” Sadie asks.

“Over here,” he calls. He’s standing over Randy Shits’ body, tugging on his shirt. He takes a knife out of his pocket and starts cutting it off, then holds it up for us all to see.

“Anarchy,” I say.

“Anarchy,” Case and Linc repeat.

“It belongs to us, motherfuckers.”

“You ready then, asshole?” Lincoln asks me. “Finish what we started and all that good shit?”

I take one more look around the city. Remember it the way it was.

It was nice, once. The unknown voice inside my head is back.

Yeah. I think it probably was. But it’s not now.

No, she agrees.

Thanks, Yasmine.

You knew?

No. But I figured out just now. I’d know you anywhere. But what I don’t understand is… why you helped me break free. Especially after I killed you back at the hospital.

Because, dear Thomas, there’s a saying that goes a little something like this: The enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Are we enemies? I ask.

Until death do us part.

She fades away after that. I don’t know where they go when they leave me. The dead memories. And I don’t know if that’s all they are. Just memories. If she was just a memory she’d be no help at all. Maybe I’m just insane. Maybe I’ve been chained to the anarchy in my head for so long, I don’t know the difference anymore. Or maybe I just need to get used to the fact that I’m whole again.

At any rate, Sadie and I follow Linc, Iziah, and Case over to the warehouse where Sheila and the little helicopter are waiting on the roof. We take the stairs up, slowly, since I’m definitely in need of a nanite upgrade, then pile in. Linc and Case are up front. Iziah and I are squished into the back, and Sadie sits on my lap.

All five of us look down on our city as we ascend into the sky to wait things out up in the mountains, wondering what will happen when our plan finally takes hold.

People start to wake up. Just like last time when the Red Robber had Case in his grips. At least that threat is over.

No more Blue Boar.

No more Red Robber.

But Prodigy… yeah, those motherfuckers are still out there. But in a few days, it will be impossible to hide from the justice we’ve unleashed on Cathedral City.