Chapter-102. The Last Survivor

[Xanthea]

'We'll make it..."

Words stabbed out of Ezra's dry throat.

'We'll make it...'

His legs buckled under the unbearable weight of exhaustion and starvation, but he gritted his teeth, refusing to fall.

'We're almost there...'

His every step was a cruel punishment, as he pushed through the pain, punishing himself for his own weakness, but determined to keep going no matter the cost.

'We'll make it. Stay with me, Ellery. A little longer. A little further.'

His voice cracked, as hope and desperation bled into every word.

He had chanted the same words like prayers over a thousand times during their ten-day journey through a hell called hope.

And when they finally reached the gate, it was just the two of them - the last survivors. Everyone else had fallen.

Ezra collapsed against the gate, his breath ragged and uneven. With trembling hands, he gently eased Ellery to the ground, her back resting against the cold wall. Impatience surged through him when minutes passed, but the gate didn't open. 'We made it! We're here!' Ezra's fist slammed against the gate. 'Let us out! Open the gate!'

Ellery just stared at Ezra, her hollow eyes brimming with tears, silently begging him to stop.

'The gate... will open for... the last survivor...' Ellery mumbled, her voice barely more than a whisper.

Panic sank its claws into Ezra's dying hope, tearing it apart, but the gate didn't budge. He turned, frantic, searching for the hidden cameras, the eyes that monitored them.

'J-just take her out! I'll stay here. Help her. Please! I'm begging you...' he cried, his voice breaking as he got to his knees. Tears streaked his grime-covered face. Ellery weakly shook her head.

'Don't kneel... don't beg...' Ellery reached out to him as tears streamed down her hollow cheeks.

Scrubbing his tears away with the back of his hand, Ezra took Ellery's frail hand in his, his fingers shivering as they closed around hers.

'I'm sorry... Ezra... I-I...' Ellery took in laboured breaths.

'Don't talk. Save your energy-'

'I w-w-won't make it-'

'You will...' Ezra shook his head, refusing to accept the truth, his grip tightening around her hand as she caressed the dirt off his cheeks. 'Listen to me for once...' she smiled faintly through her tears, her chin quivering. 'You are our last hope.'

'No-'

'Live a long life, Ezra-' 'No-'

'Live for me...' Ellery struggled to breathe. 'Live for all of us... for e-everyone who couldn't make it. Ok? P-promise me... you'll live. Live a long happy life...'

a soft, serene smile. Her gaze took him in for one last time as if

dimmed in them. It was as if she

fists met the concrete with relentless fury, each punch shattering his own bones, blood splattering from his fingers and

a force so powerful it felt like a creature trying to break out of my ribcage. It was a pain I had never known, and now

don't you fucking abandon me now...' he

imploded into a void of ringing silence. Forcing himself to stand, he limped to

as though the name itself would revive her. 'Stay with me, Ellery. We can still make

that moment, her weight seemed both impossibly heavy

voice distant, broken. 'You heard them, didn't you,

shook my head, biting down my

please... stop... just stop now..." I choked on my

breath and spoke in a

kept carrying her dead body for days... until her body started to

shaky breath felt like it might be my last. I shut my

to bear. It

down, and he fell," Asher said, staring at Ezra's eyes peering at Ellery's dead body with eyes more dead. An ominous panic bubbled inside me, rising like a storm in my chest. Before I knew, I was on my feet, scrambling forward as though I could cross time and space and walk into the bloody grounds where Ezra laid,

the clouds of memories, as though I could

could, Asher's hand gripped mine, pulling

words exploded in my mind with every heartbeat - Ezra is

process the past from the present. All I knew was the truth of

into his embrace. I clenched his overcoat, my ears ringing from the deafening impact of my own

***

events that happened in silence - in the dark, empty memories that followed. I didn't see the way the darkness in those memories shattered like black

danger alarms that blared and howled and screeched in my mother's private office. I didn't see my mother frantically looking around at

her try everything she could to suppress whatever

she drove from her home to the FA facility,

anything that Asher didn't want me to

I no longer knew if they were to hide me from the painful memories or to hide

***

my mother reached the FA facility, it was all in ruins. The walls were shattered; the ground scorched black like charcoal, and everything had scattered like a

when Ezra walked out of the walls walking amidst the raining embers. Flames of disasters

Alpha Deimos and Raven, who were standing on the ruined grounds at some safe distance from

can create history just like my healers. Prove your worth. Go, bring Ezra home.' Deimos urged Raven to enter the flames that burnt everyone to dust

was constantly spreading,

in the fire to stop Ezra were reduced

around Ezra like looming shadows, dancing with the flames that boiled the

subject's DNA is mutating

is breaking

It's rearranging,

of surviving healers read out the data loudly from their monitoring

I saw

body is showing a power surge. The source

walls is showing a rapid

assembling

researchers yelled above

too

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