Transcendent (9781311909442) Read Free Page B

it into a door.
    He punched at the dirt with his knuckles
until they were scratched and split. He moved on to his palms then
before finally going back to digging with his heels and kicking the
dirt out. Krys worked hard, gasping and trying to keep the sweat
out of his eyes the entire time. When he finally paused to admire
the job, he wondered if he could really get out.
    He tried to twist around in the tiny dugout
and found he couldn’t get his head towards the hole. He was too
big. He sat there, breathing hard and fighting the urge to cry
again. “This isn’t fair!” he whined and punched the tree limb above
him.
    It wasn’t fair. But maybe fair would have
been him being shot like Devon and Lily had been. Maybe fair was in
his favor, because of a random act of kindness from a stranger. Not
just a stranger, but a soldier. He’d read stories where soldiers
were supposed to be nice like that, but he thought it was more for
the officers. The knights. Like those giant robots had been. They
looked like the knights. He shuddered at the memory of his friends
falling.
    Krys blinked back more tears and stared at
the light teasing him through the opening. If he couldn’t get his
head to the hole, maybe he didn’t need to. He twisted back and
shimmied around in the hole until his feet poked at it again. Krys
took in a breath and started pushing himself out feet first.
    He got stuck halfway out and pushed harder.
It worked for a few centimeters, and then he realized he was really
stuck. Krys started to panic but couldn’t find a way to pull
himself back in. He collapsed, exhausted, and pressed his cheek
against the cool dirt of the hole. His hips shifted, allowing his
knees to take up some of the pressure.
    Krys jerked his head up. He’d just moved! He
inhaled and tried again but found the dirt scraping and pressing
against him. “What the heck?” he gasped. As soon as he breathed
out, he felt the pressure release. He tried pushing himself and
slid out another inch. He started laughing, tightening himself fast
against the tree trunk and the ground.
    After he finished laughing at how silly the
situation was, Krys managed a few deep breaths to calm himself and
then breathed out. He pushed and slid, and then repeated the
process. After five more breaths, he pulled his head and shoulders
out and rolled over on the ground. Krys stretched his arms and legs
out and gasped for the cooler air outside of the hole. He was free
again! All the hard work had chased his chills away but now he
basked in the sunlight that the filtered solar shield let
through.
    Sunlight? Krys sat up and looked around,
blinking in confusion. The forest was still there, but mostly it
was on the ground. A wide avenue had been cut through it as the
army marched through with their robots and tanks.
    He looked around, stunned, and slowly
climbed to his feet. At fourteen years old, he should not have been
the tallest thing standing in a three-hundred-meter radius.
     
     

Chapter 5
     
    Lily glanced around the room. She had no
idea where she was but that didn’t even feel important to her. What
did matter was that she hurt everywhere! Her entire body, even her
throat and chest when she tried to breathe, felt like it was on
fire. She tried to groan but that simple effort made her feel like
she’d tried to swallow wooden splinters.
    She gasped at the memory of trees exploding
around her. The gasp made her wince and gag, which left her
shuddering in agony until tears ran down her face. She couldn’t
move, other than twisting and rolling a little. It wasn’t just
because it hurt; something kept her hands behind her back and her
feet wouldn’t respond.
    “You made it.”
    Lily gasped and then coughed at the fire in
her throat. It gave way to a new burning wetness that made her gag
all over again. In the midst of it all, something tickled her
throat and made her feel like she couldn’t breathe.
    A shadow fell over her. Lily twisted, her
panic pushing the pain into