Fear My Mortality Read Online Free PDF

happened with hearts, maybe they reacted differently. But Michael hadn’t reacted like this. He’d pulled out the knife and he was okay.
    Josh would be okay too.
    He opened his eyes and I breathed relief. He was back. Now he’d pull out the knife and get to his feet and we could find a place to answer the thousand questions racing through my head.
    He didn’t move. He gasped, breath gurgling in and out. He met my eyes. “Little sister.” My arm stung as he gripped it, fingers pressing, pushing me, as though he wanted me to get away from him, as though he wanted me to run away.
    I shook my head at him. “Josh … what … ”
    His eyes closed and his hand dropped away. I waited for him to speak again, to move like he should. I shook his shoulders, but he didn’t respond. Confusion threatened to overwhelm me.
    I needed to help him, but I couldn’t do it alone. I searched the room for some kind of emergency alert system. There’d been a big deal about it when they opened. It was all over the news. The Terminal was totally safe, they’d said.
    I found the emergency intercom on the far wall, a black rectangle in the center of a pink-tinged mirror, and I ran to it and bashed the red button. “Hello? We need a recovery dome! Now!” No clinical voice came out of it, telling me to stay put, that help was on the way. “Hello? I need help! Oh … ”
    The red button wasn’t glowing. I ran desperate eyes over the box, wondering if it was switched off, but the only button was the red one I had struck. I screamed into the plastic grill. “Answer me!”
    The silence was horrifying. When I turned back to Josh, Michael leaned over him. I ran over, meaning to push him away, but he stepped back before I had the chance and shook his head.
    “Ava. He’s … I’ve never seen anything like this before. I think he’s … ”
    Dead.
    “This isn’t possible. It’s not possible.” I shoved at Michael, glaring into his eyes, the eyes of a monster. “You killed him!”
    He put his hands up, but didn’t touch me, backing away.
    As I watched him, all the panic in my body slid away. The fear and horror were gone, and I knew that this time, when I bent over Josh, I’d be able to pull the knife out; his heart would let it go.
    The knife slid out and I willed Josh’s chest to rise and fall, to breathe, but it was too late. I clambered to my feet and stabbed at Michael with all my strength. He stood there, letting the knife fall. And fall again.
    The slash across his face healed in an instant. The gashes I left on his chest and arms turned pink with new skin and faded. I raised the knife again as tears slid down my cheeks. He reached out and pushed my arm away. Really gently. His guarded face and stern mouth blurred as my vision turned to water. I pressed my eyes shut and clutched the knife so hard I was in danger of cutting myself, but I didn’t care. What would it matter?
    His hand covered mine, tugging at the knife, trying to make me let go, but I heaved at him, pushing as hard as I could. “Get away from me!”
    When I opened my eyes, he was gone. The mirror-plated walls reflected only hundreds of me, back and forth, around and around, standing alone with the weapon in my hand, each drop making a larger puddle next to my black heels. A puddle that threatened to slide across Josh’s Basher uniform.
    I had to get it off him. If anyone found him like this, they’d know what he was. They’d hold him responsible for the explosion at the ceremony and all that property damage. In the last year, I’d heard of only one other Basher being caught. He was tried for hate crimes against slow healers and sentenced to life in prison. If Josh lived … No, not if . When he came back to life, they’d lock him in solitary for the rest of his life for being a member of the gangs. He may as well be buried under rubble.
    I snatched at the brown suit, using the knife to rip it at the seams, not caring whether he had other clothes underneath, but