“We’re only a mile outside East Meadow,” said Marcus. “We just follow this same road, but . . . I can’t say how long it’s going to take us to get there. The snow’s been slowing us down too much.”

“I remember this area from some of our salvage runs,” said Kira. “We’re closer here to the hospital than the hospital is to the coliseum. Do we know where the Partial army is stationed?”

“All over the island,” said Marcus. “That’s what I was trying to tell you earlier—the army’s been scattered, hunting down Tovar and Mkele and everyone else. They’ve been distracting the Partials, leading them away from East Meadow so the rest of us could escape.”

“Escape to where?” asked Kira. “The airport? Long Beach? You can’t just hide thirty-five thousand people, they’ll find us again.”

“We’re leaving the island,” said Woolf. “And we’re running out of time to do it.”

“We can’t leave,” said Kira quickly, shaking her head. “We have to stay—we have to work together, like I told you. We have to forget all our hatred and the wars and everything else—”

“Delarosa has a nuke,” said Marcus.

Kira felt like she’d been kicked in the stomach. “What?”

“She’s planning to set it off in White Plains,” Marcus continued. “The odds are against her, and she probably won’t even make it that far, but we have to plan for the worst. We’ve been making our way to East Meadow ever since we escaped, gathering refugees in the wilderness as we go. We have to warn them, and we have to get out.”

“Even if the nuke doesn’t go off,” said Woolf, “it’s still best to leave. Partials and humans are never going to come to a truce—minor exceptions notwithstanding. We can’t live in their shadow anymore.”

“We have to stay together,” said Kira, feeling her whole world slipping away. “We need them—they need us—”

“But who’s going to agree to it?” asked Woolf. “A few stragglers here and there, sure, but that’s not enough.”

“No, it’s not,” said Kira hotly. “We need to convince them, on both sides, that this is the only way any of us can survive. If we run away, we’re just going to put ourselves right back in the same old position again, losing every new child to RM, with no future and no hope for anything.”

“Kira—” said Marcus, but she spoke right over him.

“We need to stop Delarosa,” said Kira. “Warn East Meadow and evacuate and whatever you need to do, but if what you say about her is true, I don’t have a choice. I’m turning around and going after that nuke. We can’t let anyone else die.” She started to rise, but Marcus put a hand on her arm.

“Somebody’s already gone after her.”