Wiped Read Online Free

it, would things have been different? Could I have prevented what happened, prevented Lena’s pain?
    And therein lay the answer. I would do anything to prevent Lena from experiencing pain.
    She’d been right. I would have baulked at an instant attack. And even though the attack proved a monumental fuck-up, would we have been in any better position now if we had waited?
    It was a question that had no answer. A circle of doubt and worry and concern. I didn’t know what these Lunnoners were capable of. I didn’t know why they stayed here when their city had been destroyed.
    We knew nothing. And as much as Lena’s secrets had hurt, she was right about one thing. We couldn’t afford to be cautious. We couldn’t afford to not strike first.
    We just had to make sure our targets were justified.
    But that was the hard part, wasn’t it? Was what we were doing right or not?
    Free Wánměi was one thing. But I’d realised something, holding on to Lena, feeling her pain through the touch of skin on skin. Lena wasn’t prepared to stop at freeing just Wánměi.
    Lena wanted to free the world.
    “OK,” she whispered back.
    “OK,” I repeated.
    OK. We had a plan. One that we were both involved in. Fuck, I hoped this worked.
    ‘Cause there was something about Lunnon that called to us. Always had done. I suspected it always would. Lunnon was the promise.
    The promise of freedom.
    The promise of more than what we’d known.
    The promise of the future.
    Whether or not it was any of those things depended on the Lunnoners. Depended on what we uncovered before Cal said we had to leave.
    The Wiped were waiting.
    Urip hung suspended above our heads like a dark cloud.
    You just had to ask yourself, what would Lunnon be?

Four

His Back Was To Me
Lena
    T his was not how it was meant to go. They shouldn’t have been expecting us. And we sure as hell shouldn’t have killed them all. It’s not what Calvin and I had planned. It would make convincing the others that much harder.
    Who were these Lunnoners? Why had they fought so hard, as though death was a better option than capture?
    All I’d wanted was a chance. The element of surprise before we’d been detected. All I’d wanted was an in. A way to convince the Urip vanguard that the world could be better. Perhaps I was naive as Alan had suggested. Perhaps I was unpredictable as Cardinal Beck had hinted at.
    Perhaps I’d blown my one chance to convince the rebels, to convince Trent , that we had to change.
    Rescuing the Wiped had always been the goal. When Urip had failed to respond to our threats and demands, the only course of action left to us was to infiltrate enemy lines and save them. But saving them would not change things. Would not mend the cracked divide of earth’s remaining population.
    Urip would retaliate. Merrika would fight back. Wánměi would be caught in the middle.
    Or maybe not. I considered talking to Tan. Despite his reluctance, he was in charge of our nation. But Tan had lost so much to Chew-wen. Had lost so much to Shiloh. I couldn’t see him bridging any gaps.
    My father had been next, but try as I might, I couldn’t relate to him. I didn’t understand him anymore. He was not the man who had left Wánměi. Left his daughter. Like Irdina, he was more Merrikan than Anglisc. More soldier than Overseer. And I wasn’t sure I could see the Citizen in him at all.
    It was clear he was in charge of the soldiers who accompanied us. Which made them all think he was in charge of this mission. They knew so much more than us. They knew about where survivors eked out an existence in what was left of our broken world. Which made me realise they’d known about those Lunnoners who insisted on remaining in a toxic wasteland, rather than embracing Urip.
    Urip was the one settlement left in this part of the world who posed a threat, my father had said. The one settlement with technology available to upset the balance. But those Lunnoners had laser guns. They’d fought with