The Gender End by Bella Forrest (the giving tree read aloud TXT) 📕

think. We’d known we could possibly get separated, so there were people whose parts of the mission were supposed to override others so that we could work with the groups we had. But I was alone. Did that mean I should keep at the mission originally given to me? Probably.

But I didn’t even know where I was going in the caves—and other people had had the same mission as me. It was probably already getting done without me. I’d been on my own before, but then I was just taking care of myself. This time, I wanted to know what to do that would work best for the mission.

It wasn’t the solution, but I found myself reaching for a little pocket in my sleeve, where a small envelope was tucked. Violet had given it to me before we’d gotten onto the heloship. She’d made me promise not to open it unless something horrible happened. Unless she got hurt or… or… I cut that thought off. I knew my sister wasn’t dead. But I needed to open her letter now.

Reading was difficult for me. I had learned in the orphanage—Violet had helped me—but after I fell into the river and was taken to the facility, I hadn’t been allowed to read. Well, there was nothing to read, really. Sometimes I wrote Violet’s and my names into the window when the condensation got high, but that was pretty much the only chance I’d gotten to practice.

It took me several seconds to puzzle through the small script.

Dear Tim, it began. She didn’t bother saying a bunch of things about what might have happened to her. I read through it, and though my hands never shook, I felt light and strange inside.

Among everything she’d written—and it was a lot—some phrases stood out to me:

I know we’ve only been back together for a short while, but it has been worth all the times I’ve searched and waited for you to have you back with me.

I’ve watched you grow so much since we rescued you from the Facility.

Viggo and I are married now, but that doesn’t change my feelings for you one bit. You’ve always been my family, and you will always be my little brother. If something happens to me, Viggo will always be your family now, too.

I know you’ll make the right choices.

I’m so proud of you.

It didn’t help me with the mission, but it helped.

I looked back down at the note, and frowned when I saw a few letters printed facing me. I had folded it so the words would be inside, like wrapping them in a blanket. Curious, I unfolded it and realized there were words on the other side, too.

I love you, Tim, it read. A secret message within a secret message. I felt warmth growing inside me, even in this horrible place.

Refolding the paper and stuffing it back into the pocket of my suit, I took a few steps forward and then sidestepped the python that had been waiting for me to move for several minutes. I wasn’t sure if its vision was bad or what, but as its jaws snapped closed on nothing, I leapt back over its coiled body, and then began to run again, trying to give it the slip.

I thought as I ran. Violet’s letter hadn’t changed the situation, but it had filled me with more confidence, like a hug from her—always worth it, even though it made my skin ache—or laughing and joking around with Jay. I would follow the mission I was given, unless I had to improvise.

It turned out to be a good decision. I found a passage and took it, the steady sound of the snake slithering behind me filling my ears. Then I rounded a corner and came to a sudden stop, regardless of the creature chasing me.

A group of boys were standing in the chamber, right in front of an airlock door, as though they had just come through. My brothers, wearing all black and horrible masks that covered their faces, making them into blank-faced soldiers.

Without thinking about it, I tensed my muscles and activated the suit.

Fire exploded over my skin, and I clenched my teeth together as I tried not to cry out. Now my hand did shake, uncontrollably—I could feel it, not see it—and I felt like I was going to die.

The serpent slid in beside me and then reared back, its head moving up in the air and hovering at least six feet over my own, seeking back and forth. Somehow I managed to take a few steps out of the way, and then the other boys swarmed it. Some of them leapt up in the air, while others went low. Two grabbed it and began pushing it back, their legs and arms straining against its muscular body.

One boy lashed out with his foot, kicking it in the jaw, while another pulled out a gun and began firing at its head. The snake started to coil around one of them, opening its mouth, when a fourth boy leapt up and, without apparent effort, thrust his fist right through one of the snake’s beady red eyes. His arm disappeared into the eye, and the snake writhed back and forth as he jammed his arm even deeper. Then the beast started to fall. The boy leapt off of him, landing in a crouch, his arm soaked with blood. But he just stared at the snake, motionless, not even bothering to wipe the blood away.

I fought to breathe through the pain as the snake collapsed, trying to think about what I could do as the boys began standing up. I needed to get through that door to…

My legs were beginning to tremble from exertion. I paused, and, slowly, each movement adding more fuel to the fire burning across my skin, I reached into my pocket and pulled out the vial Dr. Tierney had given me.

Liquid to gas, she had said… Were those black masks that left only their eyes exposed