The Reaping by Annie Oldham Read Free Book Online Page A

take. It’s the only way we’ll get to Salt Lake City in time.
    We’re running full speed now as the last five cars come into view. We dart along the edges of the bushes. The gun is well away by now, but I don’t know if the soldier wears nighttime goggles and can see us.
    Then Jack hisses, “Now!” and we dash across the open space in full moonlight. The train is going much too fast. My legs churn, and I don’t know how we’ll make it in time. A loud pop shatters the absolute stillness, and the ground by my feet explodes in a shower of dirt.
    The soldier sees us.
    “Doesn’t matter,” Jack gasps, his breath ragged. “Keep running. Make the train and we’ll hide.” His legs stretch longer as his arm reaches for a handle to slide open a cargo car.
    I force my legs to pound alongside the train, faster faster faster. Jack has his hand on the handle and has managed to wrench open the door just wide enough for us to squeeze through. But still the train goes too fast. The gun fires again, but we’re too close to the train for it to hit us. I remember Jack’s story—how the soldiers spilled out of the train like ants protecting their nest. I eye the opening warily, waiting for soldiers to pour out, but none come. There’s nothing but black in there.
    I’m running too fast and stumbling over my own feet trying to keep up. Jack clings to the handle with one hand and stretches out toward me with the other. My fingers fumble for his, and then I grip his hand and he holds me tight. The speed of the train starts to lift me off my feet. My arm is going to be ripped from the socket and I grit my teeth, but Jack doesn’t let me go. My legs cartwheel behind me, my toes barely skimming the ground.
    “Jump, Terra!” His voice strains and the veins in his neck are bulging. He can’t drag me along like this for much longer. “Come on, we’re almost there!”
    I gasp in a breath, urge my legs faster, and launch myself toward the open door. Jack heaves me in at the same time I jump, and he falls back on the floor of the train. Only my upper body clears the train, and I land on my stomach with my feet dangling into thin air, and all the breath is slapped from me. My fingers scrabble on the smooth floor as I slip several inches out the door. I cry out.
    Jack’s hands clamp down around my wrists and he tugs me inch by inch onto the train. “You’re lucky you’re so skinny,” he says between clenched teeth, and I want to laugh, but there’s a fiery pain in my ribs. The absurdity of it all is not lost on me—running like maniacs for a train that by no stretch of the imagination would kill us, so we can go to the lion’s den to rescue some friends that may or may not be there. Now I can’t even take a breath without a hitch. The whole thing is ridiculous. And then there’s Jack, trying his best to help me relax because surely he’s seen what a wreck I’ve been all night.
    Jack pulls back again, planting his feet and scooting away from the door until my thighs, then my knees, and then my feet are firmly on the train, and I’m lying alongside him, and I feel his chest hammering into my back as he struggles to catch his breath.
    “We’re never doing that again.”
    My lips turn up wryly. I haven’t told him this yet, but how else does he think we’re going to get to the ocean once we have Nell and Red? But then the thought stops dead in its tracks. How will Nell and Red possibly catch a train the way we just did?
    I don’t have time to think this through—I honestly don’t want to think it through—and I try to stand, but I double over and clutch my ribs.
    “Are you okay?”
    I shake my head. Just touching my side sends pain shooting through me.
    “Let me see.”
    I slowly take my hand away, and Jack reaches for me.
    “I’m just going to touch your ribs.”
    I nod and squeeze my eyes closed. Jack’s fingertips touch my side so softly I can barely feel him, and then he presses harder. I hiss in a