To The Moon And Back

Chapter 32

We reach the point of danger, the Dome Departure Customs. Just as Landon had anticipated, security measures have escalated dramatically, with guards manually searching each vehicle and passenger along with the typical machine check.

My hands start shaking in terror. Please, God, help us escape this.

The guard inspects the car then starts with Rosalyn, then Landon, then me. I clench my teeth and tense my muscles to prevent myself from trembling. He sees the flash drive in my pocket and asks if he can check it.

"Of course," I say. I hope the signal diverger I used works. If it does, his reader will stop working and give us the opportunity to hack it.

He frowns at his reader and presses a few buttons. I swallow, trying to dampen my nerves. I have practiced this one million times. I did not fail. Hopefully.

"It's giving me an error," the guard says. "Ugh, the system is being overloaded with all these checks."

"Why did you guys start these vigorous checks out of the blue?" I ask innocently.

"Something was stolen from the data servers in HQ, I don't know what exactly," he replies, restarting his flash drive reader.

"Oh, dear, I hope they find whoever did that as soon as possible."

"Same." Rosalyn rolls her eyes. "Dude, give me that reader, I'm a mechanical engineer."

"I don't know, ma'am, I'm not supposed to—"

"We're all Government workers here, you don't need to worry about us," she says. "I was only trying to help."

The guard nods when he sees the error message on his device. "Very well, go ahead."

She presses a few buttons and tightens some screws and the device works again. Magic.

"Thank you!" The guard takes my flash drive and examines it, and it shows him a few movies and nothing more. No protected data.

We did it.

Rosalyn drives away and the three of us celebrate having gotten out of the Government's grip. We reach HQ at night and I dash straight to Jay's room.

"Jay?"

"You're back?" He swings the door open and kisses me firmly. "Thank the heavens, I was so worried."

"I'm okay, we all are," I say. "We did it!"

"For now," he says.

"Don't be a party pooper, Jay," I say, getting into the room.

He closes the door behind me. "You don't wanna get these clothes off?"

I nod, walking into the bathroom to take them off and wear one of his t-shirts. A drop of blood on my neck startles me. I gasp, remembering exactly where this came from. The splatter of blood from the man I killed.

I killed him.

Tremors run through my body as I absorb the realization, I killed him. I'm a murderer.

"You okay, babe?"

I cannot reply, my lungs are stuffed to the brink. My tear ducts are blocked. I struggle for air, choking on my thoughts.

I killed him.

"Aurora?"

I am no better than the Government. I'm a murderer, just like them.

"I'm coming in."

My parents would be ashamed. I plummet to the floor, drowning from the weight of my sins.