Atlas eases the zippers of his bags open halfway, and I use my sweaty, shaking fingers to do the same with mine. “Hand out the dictionaries first. Each has one of the papers Dewey created stuffed inside it,” Atlas says quietly. “The less you are weighed down, the faster you’ll be able to run if you need to.”

Good advice, I think as Atlas takes my hand and we wait—together. Just days ago, the city seemed safe. Atlas was a stranger. I felt alone. Now the city is filled with danger, and I can’t imagine navigating it tonight without Atlas by my side.

My phone buzzes.

DAD JUST GOT A CALL. HE ASKED TO KEEP HIM UPDATED.

“I think Stacks has gotten the attention of the Marshals,” I say as my phone sounds again and there is only one word with this message:

GO!

My stomach trips as I shove my phone into my back pocket. Before I can step onto the sidewalk, Atlas grabs my arm. “Merriam, you’re going to run if you see the Marshals, right? You’re not going to try to be a hero.”

“I wouldn’t know how to be a hero,” I say. “We have to go.”

“Promise me.” He cups my cheek with his hand so I can’t avoid his eyes. “Promise when you see a Marshal you’ll run.”

“I can’t help Isaac or your father if the Marshals catch me,” I say. “I promise.”

Relief and something I can’t identify fills his eyes. He brushes my cheek with his hand. I lean into his touch as I study his face, which has become so important to me in just a matter of days. Finally, he steps away and nods. “Then let’s do this.”

It’s strange. In movies, when a character is risking everything there are explosions or major car chases. But there are no fires or floods or things falling from the sky as Atlas and I walk out of the alcove and onto the sidewalk. There is nothing about us walking in the twilight—Atlas in red shorts and a black hooded sweatshirt and me in my jeans and battered blue baseball cap—that would strike any observer as brave. I wonder what quote Dewey would have for this moment as I pull a faded Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary out of my bag, walk up to a dark-haired woman in a dove-gray suit, and say, “This is for you. I hope you read it.”

She looks confused as she takes the book, but she takes it.

Atlas approaches a couple pushing a toddler in a stroller and does the same. Quickly, I move down the sidewalk, pulling books out of my bag and asking people to let me put the truth in their hands. There are gasps of how expensive paper is and some shouts about how we are being selfish for not recycling. A few even wonder if this is a reality show stunt as they take the books from my hands and turn them over, as if waiting for something magic to appear—intrigued by the paper—just as I was when I saw a man arrested for having it. Each time I ask them to read the paper sticking out of the book and dig into my bag for another. Every book I hand out makes me reach faster for the next, until I have no more dictionaries to give and I am reaching for the stacks of papers Dewey created.