Page 81 of Pet: Genesis

I grip his shirt, pulling him inches from my face.

“I’m not leaving you here to die!”

Suddenly, the room around us rips apart as heat and a force of power blast through, tearing me and Cypress apart. I cry out as my body is violently thrown across the room by the force of the explosion. My skin burns, and a loud ringing warbles in my ear as nothing else is able to penetrate the sound. I can’t stop coughing from the smoke and debris I inhaled, and the heat burns my lungs in my chest, making it more difficult to breathe with each passingsecond. My eyes are swollen and blurred as I attempt to crawl around.

“Cypress!” I scream his name as another explosion sounds, drowning out my voice. I can’t see anything in the room other than the blur of color from the flames. The heavy groan of wood collapsing around me accompanies the cacophony of noise in my head at the moment, and suddenly, the heat feels much worse as more piles of burning wood surround me.

I blink, trying to clear my vision, but I am still blinded by the heat. The muffled sound of my name drifts through the air, pulling my attention.

“Cypress?”

I slowly move, pushing debris out of my way as I try to rise from my place in the rubble, but the heat and flames are too much. Another tremor shakes the ground around me, and I look up just in time to see what remains of the solid beams breaking apart and falling. Everything seems to move in slow motion, and I can’t move fast enough to dodge. Nor is Remus here to save me. I cry out as everything collapses on top of me. My body is immediately crushed, and I feel pain. Unbearable pain. The boards that aren’t completely intact are on fire and burn viciously into my flesh, the weight crushing my bones beneath.

I scream in agony, but it comes out as a gurgled cry. Even my voice is crushed. The prickling sensation overwhelms me as the fire burns through my flesh, and I wish more than anything that I could die now. Anything to escape this pain. I feel the boards slowly lift from my body, but it’s not enough. It’s not moving fastenough. With every passing second, more and more of my body catches fire underneath the heated boards. I can’t decipher pain from anything else, not even common knowledge.

“Iris, listen to me.”

It’s Remus’s voice. It’s particularly soothing, and although I can hear him, my mind doesn’t fully comprehend what he’s saying to me.

“Cypress...” I say my brother’s name over and over again, hoping that he’s okay. He’s all I have left. The world ripples in and out of focus as my consciousness wanes, pushing me to the brink of blacking out. But the soothing voice won’t let me. My mouth is dry as I desperately wheeze through my constricted lungs, and when I try to look around, the world is a blur of color.

“Stay with me, Iris.” I know that voice. It’s the voice that I adore. I always find myself leaving unconsciousness to follow it.

“That’s it, come back to me...”

There’s a hint of panic to it, though. I cry out, screaming in agony as another wave of pain washes over me, pulling me from my dreamlike state.

“Please, please, please!” I scream. I don’t know who I’m begging, but I pray that anyone hears my pleas and gives in to my request. I vaguely register Remus shouting something in his language, and I can’t understand it. I feel hands on my face, pushing my hair away and lightly tapping my cheek, but I can’t find it in me to focus. I feel... faint.Remus’s shouting becomes frantic and aggravated, and I feel sharp prickles of pain washing over me until I finally feel fingers pressing against my temple, and darkness overcomes me.

1. Translated: Traitor

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Remus

They’vefuckedthemselves.

My attention is focused on Iris’s unconscious form through the glass. Petra is trying her best to save her, and the process is grueling. She looks lifeless lying there, and that doesn’t sit well with me. Her skin is burned and bloody, her body disfigured from the heavy beams that crushed her spine, ribs, and lungs, all while burning her through. The high heat, combined with the weight of the beams, caught fire to her skin easily. Had I not abandoned my original plan to capture Iriel, she would have died in that room. Humans are such fragile beings. One wrong slice to the neck, one unlucky break, one horrible accident could end their lives swiftly. And Iris is no exception to that fact.

She almost died.

Her brother had a tracking device in his arm, something that I was counting on to reveal the location of rebels within the vicinity. The signatures on each of the inhibitors in the city aren’t erratic enough for me to pick up. So, I needed to figure out which ones belonged to the rebels as opposed to slaves. I knew they would come for their leader once he was not only somewhere they could easily locate him but also the location of the Leviathan leader. I didn’t, however, suspect they would use that to their advantage, using weapons created formydestruction to attack. It never occurred to me that they wouldn’t consider three humans’ safety. Iris’s overwhelming belief that humanity is generally “good” got in the way of my logic.

Once again, my feelings for her overruled my reason, and for that, she paid the price. Now, her brother and Zaya’s pet have been taken into the rebels’ custody, and Iris is holding onto life by a thread. The faint sound of her heartbeat is the only thing keeping me both calm and fearful in the same breath.

Iriel has taken things too far. He’s been backed into a corner, and that doesn’t bode well for Ezra, wherever he may be. The weapons they created are powerful, meaning they can only get this information by testing them on my brother.

One of Petra’s assistants brushes past me into the room with more mineral-soaked cloth gauging my attention. She immediately begins working on Iris’s legs, one of which I can see the bone peeking through the skin. The weapon fired into the room she was in was created using our technology and was able to deconstruct matter while emitting an explosion. Not only do the rebels havedangerous technology, but technology targeted toward me, which is puzzling. I know Ezra would never reveal that information, no matter how violently he was tortured. The only person close enough to me who could give that information is currently on the table fighting for her life. But Iris would never do that. She couldn’t. How would she even get the information out?

I’m pulled out of my thoughts when I notice Petra’s heart rate is growing more erratic by the second. She’s beginning to panic herself. My gaze shifts to Iris’s body. I’ve never felt so helpless. The longer I stand here, the closer she gets to death. I did what I could to keep her alive on the way to Petra’s facility, but I can only do so much. The cells where her skin was burned have long since died. So they won’t be receptive to my touch. I suck in a deep breath as my thoughts circle back to one solution.

Giving her my essence.

It’s dangerous and may do more harm than good, but I’m desperate. Iris is extremely weak compared to me. I’ve not only existed for a long time but have mastered the art of essence. It could be too much for her, seeing as our bodies are not compatible, nor does the human body have any kind of understanding of how to process it. But, like I said, I’m desperate. If I don’t do this, she’ll die.

I make my way into the room, and Petra immediately notices my entry. Her eyes widen as I approach and she steps back with her head bowed as her fear becomes clear to me.

“I’m sorry, Remus... the damage is too extensive. We may have to amputate—”

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