Page 26 of Rat Race

We were boxed in. And I was too damn stupid to notice.

“Get off the fuckin’ table, Ella. We need to figure out the question.”

“No! Oh my God! Oh my God! Cam, they’reeverywhere!” She screamed again, and I covered my ears, irritation lickin’ up my spine. I couldn’t stand screechin’. “Water!”

Maybe it would be easier to just make a show of it and get it over with already.

But I didn’t want to be like that. Likethem.

“Christ on a cracker,” I hissed, shoving the girl off the table to continue workin’ the puzzle. With every move of the blocks, the water seemed to increase in pressure.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

It wasn’t timed! It had a maximum number of moves. And if I had to guess, we were quickly approachin’ the limit.

Goddamn it.

I looked at the pieces of words, tryin’ to guess what the rest of the question could be with the ones left. Made more difficult with Ella blockin’ half the pieces.

Really, I needed her to try and finish this fuckin’ thing. I was dead awful at puzzles, and if every wrong move I made fucked it more… But Ella was too busy trying to rid herself of an ample coating of bugs to be any help.

For a second, I considered if I'd really be better off leavin’ her behind. She was slow, frightened, and easily sent into a panic, not to mention clumsy. I needed an ally that could be an asset. Not another fuckin’ drawback.

But that wasn't who Iwantedto be. The Ranch might’ve taught me tothinklike them, but it was up to me if I wanted toactlike them.

Westons? They used and abused people like they were animals bred for slaughter.

I wanted to bedifferent.

Fair.

To treat people with respect. Be compassionate and all that other bullshit city folk nonsense. I didn’t want to become like them. I wouldn’t allow myself to.

I’d changed. Grown.

Grabbing her arm, I yanked the girl off the table and to her feet as the water began to form a deep puddle in the center of the room, forcing the wildlife closer to the doorway.

“Can you please, for five minutes, act like we are in the middle of somethin’ bigger than a room full of critters? The clue, Ella. What’s the fuckin’ answer, sugar?”

She hesitated, her breath comin’ in wild pants as her eyes darted around the room. I’d seen looks like this before. Usually after finding a horse without a rider on the trails on the back end of the Ranch’s property. Spooked after seein’ a rattler or somethin’. Dumped their rider further up the creek and took off.

As the moments ticked by, and the water continued to rise, the puddle growing until the water was sloshing at our ankles and lapping along the walls of the room, my patience thinned.

“Sugar,” I repeated, tryin’ to empathize with her fear. But if the girl didn’t get a fuckin’ grip and stop moaning, I was pretty damn sure we were gonna drown in a sea of filthy fuckin’ roach water. “Please?”

Ma wouldn’t even bother hostin’ my wake.

Kill her. Kill her. Kill her.

I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to quiet the roar of water and unpleasant demands in my ears. I’d realized my mistake a second too late, with Ella’s rushing footsteps splashin’ as she raced for the wall of ropes. I tried to make a grab for her, but I was too slow, her hands closing around two ropes as she pulled down hard.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” the voice sighed over the intercom, the seam in the wall opening with a roar of water.“Who’s out of time, has to say goodbye, and never getting out alive?”

Didn’t have to be no fuckin’ genius to work that one out.

Us.

A robotic buzzer noise sounded like we’d lost a low stakes carnival game. The dim lights of the room shifted red, a loud siren beginning to blare, making it hard to think. The pipes exploded into waterfalls, the puddle lapping at our ankles rising to our knees in seconds.

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