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Cole was looking at me with a curious expression

"What?" I said

He shook his head "I justyou and Jack How long have you been together?"

"Years But it’s felt like an eternity" I used my hands to shoo him forward "Why?"

"Because I don’t see it The two of you"

I sighed, re that day we silk-screened Dead Elvises T-shirts in the GraphX Shop And noere being digested by an oily tunnel, and ere still talking about it

"What?" he said As he inched farther down the tunnel, he resorted to ar after a few yards I followed suit

"We’ve had this conversation before," I said "When we first ht before you" My voice faded away

"Before I what?"

I looked away "Let’s get going"

"No Finish what you were saying" He stopped ain until I talked

So I blurted out the answer "Right before I went to the Feed with you"

He was quiet for a o to the Feed with me?"

"I don’t know It doesn’t o"

"Yes, it does," he said, his voice a whisper "It hed and then looked beyond him to where the tunnel disappeared in darkness "We don’t have time"

"In a hundred words or less"

A hundred words to explain how otten off on a technicality, and then how I thought Jack had cheated on me And Cole was there forcould be worse than feeling so lanced up at hi worse than the worst pain you could bear"

I nodded slowly

"I’ in the cra time "I’m sorry I did that to you"

I didn’t knohat to say Cole had never been apologetic for anything that he had ever done In fact, he’d always believed that being an Everliving, and sucking the life out of someone, was morally defensible Because it was the Forfeit’s choice Because it was about life triu over the absence of life

I couldn’t believe he was apologizing now And suddenly, knowing that he heldit up, knowing that he had betrayed , I was furious

"You took everything fro an Everliving You did this to ain He put his hand over his heart as if he needed to keep it froizing!" The words were loud, but they were digested quickly in the pulsating walls "There are sos are too big for an apology So so similar to Jack when I’d first Returned

So someone else, it beco anywhere," I said "Let’s just go"

Cole nodded as if there were nothing in the world he wanted et out of the current conversation

He pointed ahead of hiht about it If I went last, all I would be thinking about was that if soet me first Maybe the same was true if I was in front, but at least in front I kneas facing the danger

"First," I said

He moved to the side and then held his arms out in an "after you" kind of way I scooted past him and started to crawl

SEVENTEEN

NOW

The Everneath The craay to the Shade network

The only illuhter behindmost of it

"Just keep it off," I said "It doesn’t help"

Cole clicked it off I could see, far up in the distance, a spot of lightup and down But the more I focused on it, theIt was the wave of the tunnelto do e get there?" I said

Cole grunted as he navigated through a particularly narrow part of the passageway "I don’t know I hadn’t thought that far ahead"

"What do youthe beans about our plan to Ashe, I assuer than it did It wasn’t part of the plan for Ashe to actually take the bait so quickly"

"So, what, your plan was to, A, get Ashe to take the bait, and then there was no B?"

"Basically"

"Suddenly I don’t want to be first in the tunnel"

We kept crawling The waves started to take a toll on e at the end, but also not to puke along the way It didn’t help that I kept picturing digestive juices along the walls and floor Juices that were slowly disintegrating ot closer And the air in the tunnel becaet there," Cole said, "don’t do anything We’re just going to get a glimpse of where their headquarters is located and see if we can see anything that will help Don’t take any chances"

I rolled h Cole couldn’t seeto do? Announce our arrival?"

As we approached the opening, I could see that the light wasn’t colowing ball shaped like an egg Shadows danced back and forth in front of it Shades Gathering around the ball as huather around a campfire

The walls of the roous of the snake, this was the stomach

"What do you see?" Cole asked

"A glowing ball In the center ofa cavernoussto the scene "It’s as large as the Feed caverns The Shades are gathered around the ball, touching it And where they touch it, the light froers It’s like they’re drawing power froure approached the ball and placed a ht toward his hand, the contact thrust the light farther away