The Other Side Read Online Free PDF

jerking along, then faster, and I imagine myself back in Arlington, where I grew up, shooting out of a Metro station, the constant thrum of wind cocooning us. We reach our cruising speed, and I no longer need to brace against falling.
    I’m tempted to turn on the LCD that connects to cameras on the outside of the crate, but there’s nothing to see but darkness, and Preston encouraged us to save power whenever possible. After making sure Colin’s secure, I reacquaint myself with the rest of the escape crate.
    Besides the bed and jump seats that double as flotation devices, there’s an altimeter, an oh-shit lever in case we need to manually deploy the parachute, a thermostat—currently set at a balmy fifty degrees Fahrenheit—and an electronic map of North America decorated with colored circles and a red arrow in the Bering Sea with the words You Are Here written beneath it.
    The legend at the bottom of the map identifies the multitude of black circles as Avoid at All Cost locations, the few reds scattered through the evacuated territories in themiddle of the map as Allies , and the remaining beiges, most outside the U.S., as Neutrals .
    I press the beige pin nearest our arrow. Aerial photographs, demographics information, and a street map of Dillingham, Alaska, appear beside it. A coastal town near a mountain range. Perfect for dragon anonymity. I search the street map until I find the hospital, a building not much larger than the minor-care clinic in Mason-Kline. Not perfect for gunshot victims, but Dillingham’s an hour closer than any of the other pins, so it’ll have to do. I send an image of the map to Grackel.
    â€œThat’s where we’re going?” Allie asks.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œThen what?”
    â€œAfter Colin’s all fixed up, we’ll get in touch with Keith and figure out what to do from there.” I force a smile. “Piece of pie.”
    She grins. “Easy as cake. Ooh, you think we can eat at a restaurant, and I can have some? I haven’t had cake . . .”
    She goes quiet, but I know she’s thinking of her parents, dragon-talking insurgents who were assassinated days before her capture and transfer to Georgetown. “You bet. You can have all the cake you want if you promise me you won’t try to hurt Colin again.”
    â€œCross my heart, yes, yes.”
    As she returns to her poems, I sit on the floor next to the bed and retrieve the backpacks lodged beneath. I listen to Colin’s raspy breathing for a while, occasionally wiping the blood that dribbles from his lips, then investigate the contents of our go bags. Fake IDs, national registration numbers, backstories written on flash cards. A change of clothes, a bathroom kit, some cash, MREs, and one emergency cell phone.
    The phone won’t have a signal until we reach the mainland, so I attempt to contact the dragons again. Tell them where we’re headed. Plead for information and help.
    Nothing.
    Between the silences, I read over my flash cards until I know my new identity by rote. I check our location on the map, give course corrections to Grackel and Randon, talk to Baby, reexamine Colin. After memorizing his backstory, wondering if he chose the particulars or if it’s Preston’s unfunny idea of a joke, I quiz Allie on her character until she’s too tired to continue.
    I slide the book of poems from her small hands, roll up the sweatshirt from my go bag, and place it behind her head. Once I’m sure she’s asleep, I return to my spot on the floor and read the page she’d bookmarked with her finger.
    â€œThe Fatal Sisters” by Thomas Gray. Long and dreary. My breath catches in my throat as I scan the final passage she’s highlighted.
    Horror covers all the heath,
    Clouds of carnage blot the sun.
    Sisters, weave the web of death;
    Sisters, cease, the work is done.
    I tear out the pages in a neat line so you wouldn’t realize they