Michael studied the area for a bit, and it seemed like she was right. The direction in which he had almost gone ended up ahead at a huge gap that they would’ve had to get a running start to leap over.
“Sounds like a plan. You wanna lead this time?”
He grinned to show he was joking, but she took it seriously and jumped onto the first small island. Her arms windmilled until she caught her balance, almost making his heart explode out of his chest.
“Be careful!” he yelled at her.
“Just trying to give you a scare,” she called back.
“Not funny! At all!”
Sarah jumped to the next island, and as soon as she was safe and settled, Michael followed, hopping onto the first rock.
“Take your time!” he shouted.
“Relax,” she replied.
She hurdled the next gap, and then the next, not waiting for him anymore. Michael followed her quickly, terrified by the possibility of her slipping into the magma. Rock by rock, he bounded across the lava after her, and soon they’d made it safely to the long spit of black rock on the other side.
Sarah pulled him into a fierce hug, surprising him.
“That was scary,” she whispered into his ear. “Oh man, that was scary.”
He wrapped his arms tightly around her shoulders. “Yeah, you were a little reckless, don’t ya think?” Despite being in the middle of a volcano, he was enjoying the hug far too much and didn’t want it to end.
“Better to just do it than worry over every single step.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
She pulled back, looked at him. A tear had leaked out of her eye, cutting its way through the grime down her cheek until it formed into a drop at her chin. Then it fell and landed on her shirt.
“You okay?” he asked.
She nodded, then hugged him again. “Come on, let’s get up to that next tunnel and cool off.”
“Let’s hope.”
They ran across the bridge, which seemed safe compared to the stepping-stones. On the other side there was a slope of dirt and rocks that stretched to the wall of the cavern. They scrambled up to get as far away from the lava as possible, then ran along the edge toward the mouth of the next tunnel, Sarah right in front of Michael.
They were only twenty feet away when it happened.
Michael had just relaxed a bit, allowing himself to think of those moments he’d shared with Sarah. The talk, holding hands, the hug. He should’ve known that was when everything would go wrong.
They were passing a large pool of lava at the bottom of the slope when there was a giant sucking noise, then a roar that sounded like a furnace coming to life. Michael spun just in time to see a spout of molten rock shoot from the pool, a perfect pillar of fiery orange death, headed directly at Sarah.
When it hit her, she fell to the ground—and her scream was like nothing Michael had ever heard before.
6
The horror Michael felt was so consuming that he forgot all about the VirtNet and his Coffin back at home. He forgot that death simply meant that Sarah would wake up in her own Coffin, safe and sound, if a little shaken up.
All he saw was his friend in pain. The lava burned through her clothes and skin in an instant, revealing a nightmarish display of muscle and bone. Her screams faded into gurgling sounds as she collapsed into a heap that shattered Michael’s heart.
And it all happened so fast.
He ran to her but stopped, knowing he couldn’t risk his own life—the lava was seeping back along the dirt toward the pool from which it had erupted.
But Sarah wasn’t dead yet. She lay curled in a ball on the ground, trembling. Michael carefully inched closer to look at her face. Her eyes were open and he could see the pain reflected in them.
“Sarah,” he whispered, searching for words. “Sarah. I’m so sorry.”
She struggled to speak, choking as she did. Michael leaned in as closely as he could, put his ear just above her head.
“Mi—” she started, but was interrupted by a violent cough. As much as Michael hated it that she’d be leaving him, he wanted her to die as soon as possible. To go back to the Wake. Every bit of suffering that consumed her would feel completely real until that happened.
“Sarah, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have let you lead. I should’ve …”
“Shut,” she forced out. “Up.” More coughs shook her body.
“I can’t stand it,” Michael said to her. “Sarah, I can’t stand this. I can’t take it. I just want to go back with you. Maybe I’ll jump into the lava.”
“No!” she screamed, making him flinch. “You … fin … ish!”
He was silent for a few seconds. But he knew she was right. “Okay. I will. I promise.”
“Find … Hallowed … Ravine,” she said between more choked coughing. “I …”
“Stop talking, Sarah.” Michael’s heart ached. He wanted her back home and safe. “Let it go. I swear I’ll hurry through the rest of this and be done. Remember our deal. A day in the sun. A day in the Wake. Everything’s gonna be just fine.”
“De … deal.” Michael thought that was it. That she’d gone. But then she spoke again. “Michael.” She said it clearly and completely, and he felt a rushing in his chest, something that squeezed and burned.
Then her last breath sighed out of her, her chest falling for the final time. A few seconds later she disappeared, her physical body waking up in the real world. Leaving Michael deep within the VirtNet, in a place almost no one knew about, in the middle of a Path that seemingly had no end to its length—or to its horrors.
And he was alone.
He was completely alone.
CHAPTER 20
A BODY OF SILVER
1
Michael tried not to think for the next few hours. He had no time to be sad or wallow in self-pity. He’d promised Sarah he would make it the rest of the way, and that was all he allowed himself to focus on. It helped to know she wasn’t really dead, although whenever the memory of her last moments crept back into his thoughts, waves of pain washed through him.
Which was why he had to push it all away. Turn it off.
There was another long tunnel, cut through in several places by rivers of lava. Michael jumped over them as carefully as possible. He approached a nasty spot where magma sporadically shot down from a crack in the ceiling. He waited, guessed, relied on his instincts. Barely missed getting burned when he sprinted past. Shortly after, an entire side of the tunnel collapsed just as he passed by, and a gushing river of molten rock, sparking with fire and heat, came streaming after him. He ran, ran hard, the edge of the hellish river right at his feet. But eventually it began to cool and he was able to slow down.
There were longer tunnels and bigger caves. Lava everywhere. The heat rising to impossible temperatures, then rising again. Michael’s body, dripping with sweat. His throat more parched than ever before—like a desert, a moonscape. He would’ve drunk water from the filthiest stream, from a swamp, from a sewage plant. He lusted after it, but there was none to be found, and gradually his strength was sapped, hunger aching inside him.
But he kept going and going and going, heading where the code—the Path—sent him.
Mind tuned only to the programming.
2
Hours passed. And not a one where Michael didn’t spend every minute thinking the next would be his last. That he’d collapse and not be able to move ever again until he shriveled up from the heat and died, went back to the Wake, to his Coffin.
He was heading down another endless tunnel when his head hit a low-hanging rock. He yelped and ducked, then crouched on the ground, twisting around as best he could to gauge his surroundings. The pain had brought him back to his senses. And he was shocked to see that the black stone passageway had narrowed. It had shrunk so much that only two people at most could squeeze along its path. The light had died significantly, too, though Michael could still see well enough.
Farther ahead, it looked as if he might have to start crawling.
Panic and an overwhelming surge of claustrophobia struck him hard. Questions besieged his exhausted brain—had he done something wrong? Missed a turnoff? A doorway? A Portal? Michael curled into a ball, hugging his legs against his chest, and rocked back and forth, eyes closed, willing himself to calmness.
Gradually the attack passed. He stretched out and, despite the rocky surface, fell asleep.
3
When he woke, body aching and stiff, Michael looked down the narrowing tunnel and knew he had to keep going in that direction. At every part of the journey through the volcanic mountain, he’d scoured the code for other ways to move on, and so far there’d only ever been one. The Path had been clearly designed as a one-way ticket. And he couldn’t give up now.
Hunger racked his insides, weakened him. But even that didn’t compare to the thirst that made his throat feel like something baking in a desert sun.
Water. He would kill any person standing between him and a single cup of it.
Groaning, he pulled himself to his hands and knees and crawled along the rough floor of the tunnel, only looking up to scan the path ahead. And the tunnel through which he crept was getting narrower.
Somehow he kept moving.
Eventually the ceiling of the tunnel touched his back, and he had to crouch lower. Soon he had to drop to his stomach, pulling himself with his arms as he pushed off the ground with his feet, like a soldier crawling under a web of barbed wire at boot camp. The walls pressed in as well, and before long he had a hard time angling his arms out enough to get any leverage.
And then he got stuck.
4
He’d been claustrophobic before, but now the fear was a monstrous thing that lit his brain on fire. He thrashed, screamed at the top of his lungs. But he’d wedged himself into the passage so tightly that he couldn’t move forward or backward. The echoes of his shouts came bouncing back at him, and the black rock seemed to be closing in, crushing the breath from his lungs. He tried to close his eyes and analyze the code, but his mind wouldn’t focus and he had to give up.
Michael kicked and squirmed, clawed at the ground with his fingernails.
He slipped a couple of inches forward. Doubling his efforts, pushing with his toes and pulling with his fingers, flexing and unflexing muscles, he lurched forward again. And again. A foot, then two, then three.
A blue light appeared ahead of him, like a plane of sky. He swore it hadn’t been there before—was it a way out? There was no breeze or sound of life, no clouds. Just pure blue, an inexplicable hole of color.
He screamed again, willing himself to throw everything he had at reaching that spot. It was a Portal. It had to be a Portal.
Grunting, twisting, digging his fingers into the dusty rock. Inch by inch, he was able to move. The bright blue got closer. Within several feet. Within a couple of inches.
By the time he reached it, Michael felt as if he’d almost lost his mind. There wasn’t a single coherent thought left, just a desperate desire to get to that wall of blue, no matter what awaited him.
He threw his arms out, reaching through the Portal, saw them disappear as if they’d been dipped in liquid. Then something grabbed his hands from the other side and pulled him the rest of the way. His body flew forward and out of the volcano forever.