Bound to Ashes (The Altered Sequence Book 1) by Maranda Cromwell Page B

can’t last much longer.” It’s almost like dad’s words are coming out of my mouth.
    “So what does this have to do with me ?” E4-17 looks at me from the corner of the room. His voice, and his posture, the way he looks at us. The only time I’ve seen anything like it, some of Heydrich’s men were torturing a stray dog, kicking it against a corner. What I’m doing is about as crazy as asking that dog to do tricks afterwards.
    “You,” I say, and pause, “are going to help get us in.”
    Then he laughs, and my skin crawls, because it’s not a laugh because he thinks it’s funny, it’s a more manic, panicked laugh. “Yeah,” he says. “ We’re going to help you .”
    I feel the hot anger rising in my throat. “Let me get a couple things straight.” I take a step forward and his expression drops. “We might need your help, but you sure as hell need ours more. We’re not the ones trying to kill you. We took care of the other guys, if you’ve been paying attention. And this dome, as crazy as it sounds, is the only chance of any humans living on Earth today to survive. You included. Okay?”
    E4-17 and Vinder are both staring at me, immobilized. I stand up straighter and clear my throat. “Anyway. Do you have anything to add...?” I glance over at Vin, who shuffles uncomfortably.
    “Er,” he says quickly. “Nope, think that just about covers it.”
    I look back to E4-17, who looks a little less like he thinks we’re going to kill him, and say, “How about you?”
     
    [Dev]
    I’m standing in a white room with no windows and only one door with two humans, things which I previously thought were horrible things that would manipulate and destroy you. And they’re asking me for help.
    What the hell is going on?
    I rub my eyes with one hand and say, “I can’t make a decision like that.”
    Alessandra furrows her brow at me. “Why not?”
    My heart aches when I think about Ashton and the others and how they’re probably wondering where I am. I almost ask, ‘Where are they?’ But my tongue holds the words back. I can’t give away something like that. I won’t give the humans leverage. So instead I say, “I just can’t.”
    Alessandra sighs, her small body rising and falling with sharp movements, and she heads for the door. Vinder awkwardly follows her.
    She stops by the door and looks back at me. “Come on.” Like it’s expected that I follow her.
    My muscles won’t move for a second. But, well, any kind of movement is better than staying still, right? Though I can’t tell if this is progress, moving backwards, or walking straight into danger.
    Vinder avoids my eyes when I pass him. He’s not so courageous when I’m not restrained. He follows a generous distance behind me.
    We must be in a storage basement, boxes and broken machinery lie shoved against walls everywhere. The place looks like it’s falling apart. The basement is thin and crowded and the ceiling is bowing inward ever so slightly. There’s only room for one person to walk through it at a time. I fight off the tingling claustrophobia.
    On the other side of the wall, I can see the white room through a tinted floor-to-ceiling window. They used one-way mirrors a lot at CadTech in testing observation rooms. A gun is on the counter next to it. Alessandra walks right past it like it isn’t even there. Behind me, Vinder’s hand twitches out of his pocket, hovering for a second, then he shoves it back in. Following Alessandra’s lead. She’s the one with the power here, she makes the decisions.... The gun sits on the table like an artifact on display.
    It’s now or never.
    “H-hey, wait a second—!” Vinder’s sputtering voice, but I’m gone. The gun’s in my hands, a fork in the hallway my escape....
    The grey corners all look the same. Around one, a hall full of doors, around another, the same—more storage and boxes crumbling. The doors blur past me. Every new corner could mean escape, just have to keep going, keep