Page 96 of Echoes of War

Blood that dark was never good. Reina had said it enough that it was ingrained into my mind. It meant he was fucked.No.I’d be damned to not bring him home for his last moments.

“Come on, old man!” Elie yelled at him, tears catching in her throat. “Keep moving!”

Her determination pushed me, him too by the looks of it. Prescott willed himself to his feet as we moved toward the gate that marked our only escape.

My eyes never left Prescott. I could see the pain etched on his face, the effort it took him to keep going. The desire he had not to give up. For Elie. For me. For Amaia. The kids he had left.Fuck. It was unbearable watching him suffer.

“We’re almost there,” Elie urged, her voice trembling with a mixture of exhaustion and hope.

Any essence of hope was sucked from us the moment dozens of soldiers burst over from the cliffside. Pansies sprinted from the other direction. I spared a glance behind me, all of my survivingsoldiers were ahead of us, no one on our side trailed. We were cornered and we would be out of luck here quickly.

Elie and I continued holding Prescott’s weight, our arms supporting him. Prescott’s mossy green eyes met mine, and I knew what he was asking. Telling.

“No,” I refused, his request tugging at the tendrils of my heart.

“They can’t …” Prescott panted, the words costing him energy. “They won’t be able to hold the gate. I’m slowing you down. If it stays open for a minute longer … It’s not built to withstand that level of attack.”

He was right. I knew he was right. That didn’t make reality any easier to digest. We could fight off a few strays that made it inside, but if the brunt of the attack made it to the gate, they would bombard us and who knew how long it could hold. The strength of the gate was built entirely on the premise that it remained closed, the bolts within hard to break down without significant force.

Elie faced me, distraught consuming her soft features. She squinted back-to-back, fighting off tears, “It’s less than a few hundred yards away, we can make it.”

“Go,” Prescott prodded, “I’ll hold them off.”

Elie dropped his arm, turning on him, slapping him across the face, his blood splattering across my lips. I grabbed under his other arm, taking on the entirety of his weight.

“No, we don’t leave family behind.”

She was too stubborn. It would be impossible to convince her to go. Truth was, I didn’t want to leave him either. I released a scream, the decision placed upon me one I never expected to have.

I could stay here, fight with Prescott to keep going, drag him back with Elie and the others would keep the gate open. They wouldn’t leave me out here, let alone Prescott, not without my orders. Even then, they were likely to push back. Everyone here loved him so much. With Jax dead and Amaia gone, Prescott was the last tendril of hope these people had left. Then what? I runit all? I wasn’t prepared for that. It was a future no one had ever thought would come to pass. The three of them had thought of everything, every protocol in the book for every situation, but never this.

There were three of them, how could it? But the impossible was about to happen and I was going to have to make the decision. Prescott would die whether I brought him inside those gates or not. It would be up to me to decide whether I would bring The Compound down with him.

“Give me his arm,” Elie pushed me out of the way. “On three we go. Just like before!”

Prescott turned to Elie, “I’m sorry, Eleanor. You’re too young to know violence like this.”

My heart shattered in two. It was exactly what Amaia had told me he’d said to her the first time they met. When he’d saved her.

“You two are the future of this place, take care of her, she is all the two of you have left.” Prescott said, and I knew he meant both Monterey and Amaia. “I love you, kid. Tell Amaia it’s okay to be angry but never okay to give up.”

He pulled his knife from his holster, cutting the corners of my hand, making me pull back at the sudden pain. I dropped him and he rolled to his knees, pistol out in hand, aiming at the soldiers closing in on us.

“Remember, Riley, history is written by the victors. Make sure when this ends, we’re the ones left standing. The Compound must survive at all cost, lieutenant. Compound first,” he yelled over his shoulder.

I stared at him, taking in those last few moments we’d share. Making sure the only father I’d ever known remained forever ingrained into my mind as the strong, selfless man I would forever love. “Compound first,” I muttered before turning away.

Elie jerked away from me, dodging my reach for her arm. She put up a fight, using moves I taught her myself to keep me awayfrom, reaching back out for Prescott. Air circled around her in a furious storm.

“Eleanor, fuck. Enough!” I yelled over the wind and commotion.

Focusing on the ground beneath her, I made it tremble, the shock of it distracting her, spilling her to the grass. Scooping her up, I tossed her over my shoulder. Elie beat into my back, her body tense with the distance placed between us and Prescott.

“No!” She cried out, “No, no, no! Put me down, we have to go back! What are you doing? Are you crazy? We can’t leave him.” The latter coming out as a whisper.

We fell in the confines of the wall. I dropped her, clasping my chest for air, pain radiated through me. Not from a physical injury, but for what I’d just done.

Tears fell down my face, and I shook them away, “Close the gate.” I ordered.

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