Page 18 of Shadow's Chosen

He thought for a moment. "It may have only collapsed...some."

"Some?"

His eyes narrowed. "Not..." He was trying to find the right word. "Not...fully."

"Then I need to get back. I need to help."

He laughed again in that low husky growl, and her frown deepened. "You don't listen well, do you?" he said slowly, still trying to make the right words. "There is no way to get back. The tunnel exit is rubble. It is gone."

"Then there must be another way to—what?"

"We can't go back."

Elise stared at him then glanced up as the light passed by and shook her head. "Why?"

"You know why. They are looking for you."

She remembered what the masked gunman had said back in the tunnel.

Make sure to get the others.

Elise closed her eyes, not wanting to believe it. "Why?" she whispered, more to herself than him. "It doesn't make sense." She shook her head again then rubbed at her still throbbing head. "I don't understand."

"The mission was compromised. Someone planned the attack. And others on the inside were in on it." He too glanced up at the open roof then turned back to her. "If you go back, they may still be waiting. They will take you."

Elise rubbed at her temples as the throbbing turned into a dull headache. She wanted to scream, to curse at anything and everything, most of all at him for some reason. Even though it wasn't his fault technically, it was still him she was angry at. It made little sense at first, until she started to really make herself question why and found her answer when she remembered the last moment before the tunnel broke.

She stopped rubbing to glare over at him. He had been the one to pull her out. It had been him who had saved her from getting crushed, who had brought her here. Perhaps she should be grateful, but she wasn't. If anything, it only made her grow ever more suspicious of his motives.

Then she realized something he had said only a few minutes ago.

"You said 'we' not 'I.' What did you mean?" she asked.

The alien tapped at his thigh. "I don't follow."

"You said 'we can't go back.' And you brought me here. You could have killed me while I laid here or left me to die or to be taken by those thugs."

The dark beads along his brow, which Elise hadn't caught before, rose slightly. "You think I wanted to...kill you?"

"I don't know," she said low, watching him carefully. "But you said 'we' as in together. Why?"

He didn't speak for a long moment. The light passed over several times and Elise was close to losing her patience and forcing him to talk when he said, "Your Ulink is broken."

Shocked, Elise looked down at her arm and saw it was gone. When she looked back up, it was in the alien's hand. She opened her mouth to order him to give it to her when he threw it over, and she caught it, only for it to crumble in her hands.

"Did you do this?" she asked.

"No. But I was planning to."

She glanced back at him, wide-eyed. "What the hell for? I could have called for help if it worked! I could have—"

"It was being tracked. All of them were."

She gave him her best 'yeah, right' face. "And how the hell would you know that, exactly?"

"The woman drogin, the one who gave me this." He pointed to the translator in his ear.

"Toni, " Elise said.

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