4522 {The Number Series}

19

Boom!

The explosion caused the truck to jerk as Macallister struggled to maintain control. The terrain with the snow was hard enough to navigate off road already without the ground shaking. I glanced briefly out the back window to see several trees falling away from the blast as well as large amounts of dirt mixed with snow raining back down.

"Not too bad, I think," Jericho said. "We didn't die."

"Yet." Archer mumbled. I struggled to stay on his lap with Macallister's wild driving.

"I don't know how long I will be able to do this for," I said as I hit my head on the roof of the truck.

"Only for a little longer, Remi." Macallister said. "We'll be on a road soon enough."

"And then what?" Archer asked.

"And then we have to sneak back into the city," Macallister swerved again. I gripped Archer tightly, too worried for our lives to really be embarrassed. "As if we never left."

"Yeah," Jericho said sarcastically. "Sounds so easy."

"As long as we steal some uniforms it should be," Macallister smiled.

"Seriously? You guys spend the majority of the time being watched," she said. "And yet you can just do whatever you want?"

He shook his head. "They control with fear. They don't really watch like they have convinced everyone they do. They trust that they do enough when they do see something wrong that everyone will take it as a lesson and not repeat mistakes."

"You have got to be kidding me," she sighed.

"They have cameras everywhere but I sat in a room for the school for several hours when Remi was sneaking off to read. The catch?" He laughed. "I wasn't even supposed to be in there. They only check it if someone tattles."

"Tattles." Jericho repeated the word.

"Yes. As in they can tell the authorities, the Officers, in person or leave a note with what they suspect is going on. People get in trouble by doing 'wrong' things in the open or when their neighbor tells on them."

"That sounds like a waste," she said. "And not a very solid plan at all."

"What ever works best for those of us who broke the rules," I shook my head.

"They never really expected anyone to break the rules," Macallister explained. "The punishments are so harsh if you were found out that you would never want to commit wrong doing in the first place."

"Death is one of their favorites," I explained to her.

"Remi should have been killed long before we escaped." Archer smirked. "She kept getting her chances some how."

"You can only play with fire so many times before you get burned," Jericho warned.

"What is that supposed to mean?" I snapped at her. It felt threatening.

She shrugged. "Nothing. I was just letting you know."

We reached a road not long after the conversation had ended with an awkward hostility filling the small cab of the truck. We bounced along until I felt the relief of a smoother surface below us. No one had followed us much to my surprise. It was important to take a head count when in an emergency situation to see how many, if all of us, were safe inside the bunkers. Not to mention I would have been one of the first people they would have made sure reached safety. Or, at least, I would have been if Marie had not given the order for someone to kill me first.