Hidden (Book 3 of the Immune Series)

Selfless

Mya

The gunshot brings me back to my senses.

I can't just sit here and let President Ashford murder the people who saved me from the infected. The idea of each and every one of them being lined up like animals waiting to be shot makes my chest ache and my stomach turn.

Why did I think I wanted that in the first place?

The gunshot echoes around my room as I begin to jerk at my wrist restraints. My ankles aren't tied down, but I can't put pressure on the wounded one without crying out in unimaginable pain.

As I pull on my wrists, the leather slides down. This setup was made for someone much bigger than me. I can tell by the way the leather slips and drags against my sweaty skin. I flatten out my arms and turn my hands into long cones. With a tug, my right wrist flies out with a pop of release. The next one comes out just as easy, until I'm able to sit up on the table.

At that moment, getting up might not have been the best idea. Mom's body lies in the floor beside my bed surrounded by a pool of crimson blood. The bullet wound in her head cuts clear through the skull. The skin curls away from the insertion point in jagged rips. Blood runs down the hole still, like water from a river racing down over her face and eyes.

The longer I sit here, the higher the chance that the next bullet will fly from Ashford's gun. I don't know who he shot, but if there's still a chance I can save Sakir, I have to do it.

I promised him, just like he promised me.

Plus, with Finn and Mom dead, Sakir is the closest thing I have left to family. I can't let him die.

I swing my legs off the table and lower myself down into the pool of blood. I cling to the table as my feet slide underneath me. Once they settle, I let go and limp over to kneel by Mom's carcass.

When I was little, I used to stare at Mom's eyes and imagine that they were made from pure gold. I would pick out the individual flecks of brown and yellow, watch the ways they were blended together in some parts and separated in others. I pretended that the sun had melted the bars of gold just for Mom's eyes because she was such an important person.

In my mind, only the most important people had golden eyes.

Finn and I had them, too, only his were darker than mine. We had to be destined to do something great. I think maybe that's why I let Mom experiment on us the way she did. If we were helping her get to a cure, that could be our purpose. Maybe I was destined to die from the day my golden eyes were poured out of the fire.

Still, I'm not ready to go, yet. I haven't done anything good for the world.

I raise back on my feet and begin to walk towards the door when a glint of silver in the sea of red catches my eye. I narrow my eyes at it and crouch down to pick up the syringe that floats on the top of the crimson.

The liquid fills the inside of the syringe, ready to be administered. The white sticker on the side reads "Third Strand" in Mom's curling, messy handwriting.

If the third strand is here, then what did Mom give me?

I crawl back through the blood to Mom's still figure and begin to dig through the pockets of her lab coat. My search comes up empty, and I remember that she dropped the syringe right before Ashford shot her. I press my hands around her body until I feel the plastic graze my fingertips.

I wrap my hand around the tube and pull it out from under her. By now, blood streaks my clothes and skin. Its warmth seeps through my pants and settles on my kneecaps. I shiver regardless as I look down at the two plastic syringes in my hands.