Page 20 of Echo: Line
I check his pulse again. Stronger than before. Not good, but better.
The phone screen dims. I tap it awake, and the light returns. Battery dying.
Alex watches me. Even half-conscious and bleeding, there's awareness in his gaze. Assessment. Calculating whether I'm a threat. Whether I'll run. Whether my helping him was a mistake.
"I'm not going anywhere," I say.
"Wasn't thinking that."
"Yes, you were." Moving, trying to find a position where my back doesn't ache from dragging him inside. "It's what I'd be thinking if our positions were reversed."
He doesn't deny it. Just watches with those unnervingly steady eyes.
Outside, wind moves through trees. Something small skitters across the cabin roof. The phone screen dims again, and I let it. Save battery.
In the darkness, Alex's breathing. The copper tang of blood mixed with gun oil and pine and something else—smoke, maybe.Old smoke, like he's been around fire so much it's soaked into his skin.
"I need to look at the rest," I say finally. "Make sure there aren't other injuries I missed."
"There are." His voice carries a bitter edge. "But most of them are old."
Phone flashlight on, and the beam cuts through the darkness. Alex flinches slightly from the brightness, but doesn't protest as the blankets push aside.
His shirt is destroyed—torn, blood-soaked, barely holding together. Helping him sit up enough to pull it off, and the movement makes him hiss through his teeth. But then it's off, and the map of violence written across his body becomes visible.
My breath catches.
Scars. Everywhere. Some old and faded, thin white lines that speak to clean cuts healed properly. Others more recent—angry red tissue, poorly healed, the kind you get when medical care isn't available and survival is the only goal. Puckered scar tissue on his left shoulder that looks like a bullet wound. Shrapnel marks across his ribs, small constellations against skin. And burns—distinctive burn patterns on his right side and arm, textured and deliberate.
Not accidental. Not from a fire or explosion.
Torture.
"Jesus." The word escapes before I can stop it.
"It looks worse than it is." But his voice tightens.
Forcing myself to focus. "Any of these need attention?"
"No. Just this one." He gestures to the wound I already packed. "The rest are history."
History. Like torture is just something that happened, filed away under past events.
Examining him anyway, checking for other bleeding, other damage. Fingers brush over the burn scars and he tenses.They're old enough to be fully healed, but sensitive. The kind of injury that never really stops hurting.
"Who did this?" I ask quietly.
He meets my eyes. "Interrogator called Scorch. The Committee's specialist."
The clinical description makes my stomach turn. "This is what Kessler authorized."
"Kessler gave the orders. Scorch carried them out." His voice stays flat, matter-of-fact. "Four days."
The single word carries everything. Confirmation. Admission. A challenge to see if I believe him or if I think he's lying like Patterson said.
I believe him.
The truth clicks into place. Not just about the torture—the scars prove that—but about everything. The Committee. The conspiracy. The assassination plot. All of it.
