"No you aren't. I know it feels like that. But you're okay. Your heart is breaking," he says. He tries to lift me from the ground. "Get up, Bea. Your parents would want you to live." And he continues to talk, but I have no idea what he's saying because the pain in my chest is so strong it has cut off my senses. I cannot hear a thing, but I can see the light at the end of the alley and people dashing past. They are running. Everyone in Zone Three is running.

53.

QUINN.

Apart from a single dim light bulb hanging from a wire in the ceiling, it's dark. From somewhere deep inside the building, I can hear water gurgling. The stone floor has brown stains all over it, and there are manacles on the walls. In the corner there's a bucket in case I need the toilet and on the floor in the middle of the cell there's a thin, soiled mattress. There's only one thing they do in this room.

But they didn't chain me up. They just threw me in here and locked the door. There's no escape route anyway, unless I find a way to eat through stone. I've spent the last hour lying on the stinking mattress imagining the kinds of things they'll do to me in here. I imagine the Pod Minister's face, his wet mouth, as he personally rips out each one of my fingernails or teeth with a pair of old pliers. Death won't be enough for him. I shudder and begin to pace the cell.

I am scared to die, but death will be better than having to see Bea and tell her that her parents are dead and that I'm responsible for it.

The door buzzes to life and one of the stewards who arrested me appears. "You don't look like you're praying," he says, and chuckles, as though keeping me locked up were the most pleasant thing in the world. He strolls around the cell, his hands in the pockets of his pants.

"I'm not," I tell him.

"Well, that's probably best. I don't think angels visit this place much anyway." He stands under the light bulb and flicks it with his finger so that it begins to swing gently, carrying the light from one side of the cell to the other and back again. "So who are you working for?" he asks. "You a RAT?"

"I'm not working for anyone."

"We hear your girlfriend is a major player. I guess they'll let you buy your way out-her life or yours. Do you know where she is?"

"You've got to be joking."

He cackles. "It was worth a try."

"So when does the torture begin?" I ask.

"He'll be here to deal with you before long."

"Who? Who will be here?" So this guy isn't the interrogator. Of course he isn't: he hasn't laid a finger on me.

Any minute now the Pod Minister will storm into the room. He will put his hands around my throat and finish what he started. "Who am I waiting for?" I call out as the cell door bangs shut. "Who will be here soon?"

54.

BEA.

I feel myself being lifted off the ground and carried along the alleyway. "You're okay," I hear. It sounds like Old Watson, and it could be him, but it must be my imagination because he wouldn't have the strength to lift me.

I open my eyes and there's a man's face looking down at me. He smiles and says, "She's awake."

"Watson, she's awake," a different voice repeats. A woman. I struggle to free myself from the man's arms and manage to stand up.

"How are you?" Old Watson asks from behind me. I have no answer. It seems an absurd question.

"Where are we going?" I say.

"Like I said, I'm getting you out of here. Can you walk?" Old Watson asks.

"I'll try," I say. I hold on to him as I wobble forward.

"We'll be quicker if you carry her, Gid," the woman says.

"Is that okay?" the man asks. I shake my head no, and force myself to walk more quickly.

We move down alleyway after alleyway, changing direction when we come upon a mob. Everyone seems to be going in the opposite direction to us, and as we advance, we come across fewer and fewer people. At last the man and woman leading us stop, and I find myself right up against the unbreakable glassy shell of the pod, next to a garbage chute. Usually this is where we come if we have to throw away items too large for our home chutes, and usually it is monitored by stewards. Today it is deserted. "We're here," Watson says. He leans against the pod. He is sweating and breathing uneasily.

"Did they reduce the air?" I ask.

"I'm old, that's all," Old Watson says.

The man and woman smile gently and the woman rubs Old Watson on the back. "You should go with her. You should get out now while you can," she says.

"There is still work to do here. You can't do it alone," Old Watson tells her. Then he turns to me.

"This is Harriet. And this is her husband, Gideon." The couple smile. "When you get to The Grove, tell Silas you've seen them, that they're alive."

"You're his parents," I say, and they nod. I try to smile because someone's parents are alive and that's better than nothing. But they are not my parents, and for a brief second I wish these people were dead and my parents alive in their place.

"Here," Harriet says, handing me an extra-large airtank. "Use it sparingly and you'll have four days, maybe more. I've it set to eighteen percent. You'll have to tighten it as you go. Move slowly."

"And take this. Go west," Gideon says, handing me an antique compass. "You can't use a pad. They'll track you." He hands me an antique map, too, and points to a dark spot. "That's The Grove. You'll remember most of the way, I'm sure."

"Ready?" Harriet says. She unlatches the door to the garbage chute and looks down into it. From somewhere deep inside the pod there is the sound of an explosion and an alarm begins to whir.

"That'll be the gas," Gideon says. He is carrying an airtank and slips the facemask over his mouth and nose. Harriet and Old Watson do the same as Gideon helps me into my mask. He slides a belt around my waist and attaches the tank to it.

"Watch out for glass at the bottom," Old Watson says, leading me by the hand to the escape route. I still feel weak. It's as much as I can do to climb up onto the lip of the chute. I don't want to flee. I want to bury my parents. I want to find Quinn. I left him once before and it was the worst thing I ever did. I glance at Harriet and Gideon, and then at Old Watson, who nods sternly. "Go on," he snaps. I am about to protest, but I know that what I want is less important than what I have to do, and what I have to do is survive. For Quinn. For my parents. So I shove my body away from the edge of the chute and I am gone, devoured by the chute and sliding right out of the pod, just like any other broken thing.

55.

QUINN.

The door buzzes and a tall figure bursts into the room. I cower against the wall, and when I look up, I see my father, his uniform dusty and torn in places. "They sent me to deal with you. Me! he shouts. "Do you realize what you've done?"

"Do you know what you've done?" I shout right back. "Do you know what you've spent half your life doing?" He takes off his cap, folds it, and pushes it into the pocket of his coat. When he speaks, he is surprisingly quiet.

"I've been protecting your way of life. Do you think it's easy to keep the Premiums in power? It isn't. And you have the audacity to judge me? You enjoy all the pleasures of my work and now you question the way in which those pleasures have been secured. Every fine piece of clothing you've worn in your life and every gourmet meal, all the air you breathe has been possible because of what I do."

"I don't want that. I want-" I pause.

"What? What is it you could possibly want that I haven't given you?"

"I want to be free," I say. My father squints as though I'm speaking a language he barely understands. He stares down at the floor and sighs.

"The Pod Minister has been killed. You'll be tried for that and executed." I nod. It's no worse than I thought. "Can you breathe without supplemental air?" he asks. I shake my head.

"I'm getting there," I tell him. He raises his eyebrows. He probably never thought I had it in me to be good at anything.

"So you trained," he says, and I nod. It feels like we are having "A Moment," the first one of our lives. Eventually he says, "You can never come back here, you know. Follow me."

"What are you going to do to him, General?" the steward who first questioned me asks, scurrying after us as we proceed down an unlit, tapering tunnel. My father turns and glares at him.

"We are treating him as we would treat any other terrorist. Now get back to your damn post!" he barks. The steward shuffles to his place by the cell door and watches as my father drags me along. We stop at the end, when we cannot go any farther. We are in front of a door marked with a black and yellow sign: CAUTION-AIRTANKS REQUIRED. "Good luck out there," my father says.

"Out there?"

"When I push you outside you'll have to scream and shout. Knock hard. Beg to be let back in. I know you can act." He half smiles and I realize he is only pretending to punish me; really, he is saving me. I clench my teeth to stop myself from crying. I know it would only annoy him. "I've left a few airtanks outside for you. They're full," he whispers.

"Say good-bye to Mother and Lennon and Keane. And my new brother."

"Drama, even at the end," he says, unlocking the door and opening it. With a heavy sucking sound, white light fills the tunnel. And then he says, "In another world I think we would have been friends, son." I nod and hold out my hand for him to shake it. He sniffs and pats my shoulder. Then he pushes me outside.

PART V.

THE ASHES.

56.

ALINA.

The water is forcing the rickety boat to smash against the dock with such force it's possible the old thing will turn into a wreck before we've even hauled up the anchor. The sails flap and huff. No one is speaking. We all look back one more time to take a mental picture of the land we are leaving behind. Buildings glimmer in the distance like small crystals, light glinting against their windows. I have an urge to go back. Now that we are here next to the winding gray river, I want to go home.

Maude and Bruce are sitting on the dock, their feet dangling above the freezing water. A couple of members made it along with us and they are standing in a quivering huddle waiting for instructions, as though Dorian, Silas, and I are their new leaders. I want to reassure them, but there isn't much I can say. We are sailing into the unknown, where we will all be at the mercy of strangers.

It is still snowing, and in a few hours the land will be covered again. The smog in the east is no longer threading its way into the sky. The Grove died a long time ago.

Dorian has a hand on my shoulder. "Maybe we should have surrendered," he says.

"Let's go," Silas says, glancing at him. "Our tanks won't last forever." He's right. We should go. We are taking the boat as far along the river as we can and from there walking to Sequoia. Dorian claims to know its location. And Silas has a map.

"We've lost everything," Dorian says, looking up at me, his eyes still bloodshot from the foam. I nod. We've lost everything. And what have we gained?

"We're alive," I tell him.

Just about.

57.