Not wasting time on words, he leaned a shoulder into her stomach, wrapped his arms around her, then lifted her as easily as a sandbag—a task he’d performed often in training, and so recently with the boy named Kit. She made a sound that was awfully close to a giggle, a thing he might’ve expected her to do in the face of so much chaos and destruction and madness. He spared a glance for the line of Cranks, half of them strewn about the logs, dragged by the others. What a pitiful sight it was—these bloodied and half-naked, raving things who’d once been sane. Minho wanted to kiss those greasy chains that slowed the group to a splinter-filled crawl.

He headed back toward the Berg and away from the writhing monsters that represented the very worst of what the Remnant Nation fought against. The Flare, someday to be eradicated by the godlike Cure, blessed be Her name, he thought with a heavy roll of his eyes. As he leaped from one huge chunk of wood to another, he allowed himself for once to see the good in his nation’s intentions. Who wouldn’t want to rid the world of those things crawling and hobbling along behind him? But which was the enemy—the virus or those trying to destroy the world to be rid of it?

Did it even matter? He’d chosen his path and there was no going back.

“Here, let me help.” The one known as Frypan helped him gently lower Roxy to the ground once he’d made it back to the Berg. She seemed well enough, and gave Minho the biggest hug ever known to humankind. He returned it, but quickly pulled away.

“We need to get inside,” he said to Roxy and the old man. “We can barricade ourselves in the Grief Walker for now. It probably doesn’t work well, if at all, but I know it’s intact.”

Frypan nodded, leaning on Roxy for support. “Best plan I’ve heard all day. Those Cranks are gettin’ too close for my liking and I’m done running. My legs feel like rotten carrots.”

Minho noticed Jackie, climbing down the side of the Berg—she jumped the last several feet, stumbled, then ran straight to him.

“They’re unlocking them,” she panted. “There’s people out there, unlocking the Cranks!”