Page 156 of The Island

She punched him in the kidneys. He winced and headbutted her in the nose and broke it. The headbutt was almost as painful as the .22 bullet.

Blood poured into her mouth.

Matt was on top of her. He put his big meaty paws around her throat and squeezed. He was squeezing from the wrists. That was good, she thought, her massage-therapist brain kicking in inappropriately; he could kill her without straining his back. The kids were moving in fearlessly. They were going to try to attack Matt with their bare hands. They were too far away to help. Run, just run! she wanted to say. But they weren’t runners anymore.

“Should have done this on day one,” Matt snarled as he choked her.

The world tunneled.

She couldn’t breathe.

Couldn’t think.

How could she have thought water was so important when the only thing important was air?

The last thing she would ever see was Matt’s furious red face.

Even that was fading.

Dissolving into whiteness.

Grayness.

Nothingness.

But there was one hope.

She had to remember that she was the messenger.

The messenger with the meteor iron.

Yes.

Yes…

Do you hear it, Matt?

The message cometh.

Matt screamed as Heather stabbed the penknife into his thigh.

She kicked him off and crawled to where the .22 rifle had come to rest.

It wasn’t there.

Where?

Where on…

Owen was pointing it at Matt’s head.

Matt was crawling toward her.

“That’s enough,” Owen said.

“You think you know how to use that thing?” Matt grunted.

“Heather showed us.”

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