Agent (Book 1)

Next Book: Sneak Peak! (Nolan)

"Nolan, let me show you just how strong you really are."

Commander Pyle's words. Maybe I would've believed in them sometime. But that was long ago.

How long has it been since she died? I've lost track of the days now.

But I do know how long we've been out here. Exactly 53 hours. And with every passing moment, all I'm thinking about it the walls of blazing fire, the bodies encircling a mighty red cloak. There is only one person holding me all together. Her innocence makes it easier to put on a brave face, I suppose.

She's been asking me the same question, repeatedly. What's going to happen to us? And I tell her that we're going to be okay, even though the adrenaline that had once fueled that answer, has disappeared.

The second most common question: What happened to her brother? The little boy she was hugging, just as I was about to pull her away. The flash of red blood covering his chest. Her cries. I tell her he's gone now, to a better place. She seems to hang onto this. She keeps asking what this place looks like.

I stick to something I read in an old children's book somewhere. "You see all of the things that are happening down here, and you glide on the clouds, and ride the stars. You become anything you want, the sun, peaking over the orange horizon. Or a bluebird, flying over golden pastures." I make it up because it makes her happy. For once, she stops crying.

It's selfish, and wrong of me. But I want someone to tell this to me too. Tell me that it's going to be alright. But Ava, in and of herself, is almost enough. She has me, and I have her.

I see the others lying beside us, deep in disturbed sleep. Of the faces here, how many can I trust?

I know I've got no other choice but to believe all of them. Because if I can't, there's no hope for any of it.

I've spent so long thinking about this, all I can do is replay the same words over and over. You have to trust them. You have to trust them.

And I'll make them trust me.