Endgame (The Amnesty Games Book 3) by K. A. Riley

Author:K. A. Riley [Riley, K. A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Travel Duck Press
Published: 2024-07-02T00:00:00+00:00

26

CELL

We’re led by our escort of Finest across the arena.

We pass by the same gaggle of school kids from before. They’re now jostling each other and busily bouncing up and down in the first few rows. They’re stomping their feet and waving their arms over their heads in wild circles as their teachers do their best to stop them from hurting themselves, each other, or the nearby audience members as the kids explode in their jubilant, pre-teen celebration.

As we’re led past, the throng presses forward and leans over the guardrail running along the top edge of the padded retaining wall. They cheer and extend their hands for us to give them celebratory high-fives.

Partly because I do feel victorious but mostly because I’m stunned, I oblige them, raising my hand to let them smack my open palm.

Why not? Who am I to deprive the little snot-gobblers?

A few of the kids shout out how we’re their heroes and about how awesome we are. One of the boys cups his hands to either side of his mouth and shouts out how he’s going to be just like us when he grows up.

Just like us? You mean publicly on trial and then, inevitably, violently executed? You might want to set your career sights a little higher, kid.

Seven or eight shrieking girls scrunch together and wrap their arms around each other.

The giggling, hopping, and hormonal hydra of pubescence squeals as Nico strides by.

As sure as if she’s a character out of some old Victorian novel, one of the girls actually presses the back of her hand to her forehead and swoons, fainting into the arms of her classmates.

The rest of her little coterie stretches as far as they can over the guardrail and beg for Nico to let them touch him.

He growls under his breath and ignores them.

“Your adoring fans,” I tease.

“Yeah. I’d like to see how long they can screech like that while I hold their squawking little heads under molten lava.”

I know he’s annoyed, but he shouldn’t be. Sure, the melodramatic, pocket-sized squealers are obnoxious. But they’re also young. They don’t know what we know. They don’t know the truth about our world or about the real rules of the game. They’re innocent. Naive. And they’re already brainwashed beyond hope.

If that last part were true, you wouldn’t be in this mess, Alora. Remember, even when everything else is gone, there’s always hope.

As the Finest continue to parade us on a victory lap around the perimeter of the arena, the Provincials in the audience shout out to us. Not all of it’s good. The packed stands looming over us are filled with people who’d just as soon see us die.

I know a lot of them have money riding on our performance. During the Tank Trials, the monitors displayed all kinds of prop bets:

That I’d fall in the first tank and wind up hanging onto the edge of one of the platforms while Nico leaped across the other platforms to try to save me.

That I’d

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