Tremor by Patrick Carman

fool, and everyone knew it. The enemy was holed up in a fortress as secure as Fort Knox. They had firepower, three second pulses, and isolation on their side.
    A few more pieces of paper were pinned around the edges of the whiteboard—aerial views of the location—and then Meredith turned back to the group.
    â€œThose people Hawk listed earlier, the criminals? Add them all up. What they did doesn’t even come close to what Andre and the rest of the Quinns are capable of. You all know it’s true.”
    â€œWhat are they planning to do?” Faith asked. “Why won’t you just tell us?”
    Meredith’s face softened for the first time since she’d entered the room. If Dylan didn’t know better, he’d have said her shoulders had even slumped ever so slightly.
    â€œI can’t tell you what they’re planning to do,” Meredith said. “Because I don’t know.”
    It was a lie. Of course Meredith knew what Andre was planning, or at least thought she did. But no one in that room, certainly not three reckless teenagers, were ready for the truth.
    â€œBased on recent events we know they have the resolve to kill in order to get what they want. And with three second pulses in Gretchen and the twins, they have ultimate power. They can destroy without being destroyed. And don’t underestimate Andre. He may not be a second pulse, but he pulls the strings. He’s the ringleader.”
    â€œWhat do we really know about him?” Hawk asked.
    Meredith knew Andre better than Dylan, Faith, and Hawk could have imagined.
    â€œHe’s come under the influence of some dangerous ideas,” she said. “He’s been poisoned by these ideas. And I have never known a man who could be so firm in his resolve once his mind is made up. They will do whatever he says, because that’s what Andre Quinn causes people to do. They follow; he leads. And he’s leading them and the rest of us over a cliff into oblivion.”
    â€œGreat,” Faith said.
    â€œSo what’s the plan, then?” Dylan asked, narrowing the conversation to a bull’s-eye. “What are you asking us to do?”
    â€œOur task right now is to neutralize the twins,” Meredith said coldly, her resolve returning. “That’s the whole job.”
    â€œYou mean kill them,” Faith said. The words felt delicious in her mouth.
    Even with all Faith’s determination, Meredith wondered if this angry girl would have what it took when it came time to execute her enemies.
    â€œBut we have an advantage, and it’s not the one you think it is. Of course they want us to know where they are. They’d love nothing more than to lure us into that prison and finish us off for good. We’re the only things that stand in their way.”
    She had come to a hidden piece of information that had to be said.
    â€œIt’s time,” Clooger said, looking at Meredith as if he wished it wasn’t so but knew that it was.
    â€œTime for what?” Dylan asked. “What are you two not telling us?”
    Meredith thought of the old song once more, of what it might feel like to have someone who loved her, who would wait for her no matter what. But that was the thinking of a young, naive woman, not a veteran of a long and heartless rebellion. The thought was gone almost as fast as it had arrived.
    She wondered whether she should tell only Dylan the truth, not the whole group. That would have been fair. But for once in her life she was afraid, not of Andre or Gretchen or the twins. She was afraid of losing Dylan’s love and respect. She couldn’t do it alone.
    â€œYou’re not going to like me.”
    â€œMom, please. Just get it over with. How bad could it be?”
    She looked him in the eye, because, in the end, she wasn’t going to cower in the face of the only thing she’d ever really been afraid of.
    And then she said it.
    â€œAndre Quinn, the