“Take this,” Coden said stiffly.  “I’ll trade you for the scissors.”

I glanced down at Coden’s hand, knowing what I’d find even before my eyes landed on what he was holding.  It was Al’s knife.  “No,” I said immediately, shaking my head and taking a small step back.  “No, you need that—”

Coden let out a short sigh before setting the knife into my empty palm and closing my fingers over it.  “Serenity,” he said sternly.  “Please.”

I folded my lips over each other before finally conceding and handing over the scissors.  Coden took them without saying anything and stuffed them into his back pocket.  Something about handing him the worse of the two weapons didn’t sit right with me.  In all honesty, I hated the thought of him having the scissors while I had the knife; he deserved the better of the weapons after everything he’d done for me and the others.  But I knew that we didn’t have time to argue about it, so I just kept my mouth shut.  We had more pressing matters to deal with right now—like finding Rosalie and Valarie.  Everything else was irrelevant at the moment.  Well, except for keeping us alive.

“Come on,” Coden muttered, gesturing toward the doorway.  I watched numbly as he headed toward the door, back out into the hall.  Something held me back for a short moment, like my subconscious mind thought that if I stayed in this room Rosalie and Valarie would come back eventually and we’d all be together again.  But I knew that those chances were more than slim, so I pushed myself forward and followed Coden out of the room.

“I shouldn’t have chosen that hallway,” Coden hissed to himself, bringing his hand through his hair.  “I should have—”

My eyebrows creased and I frowned.  “You had no way of knowing that Dan would be coming that way,” I said softly, not hesitating before placing a comforting hand on his shoulder.  “Besides, if we had thought for a second that someone was close by, we would have told you to go another way.  None of us knew—it wasn’t your fault, and it wasn’t any of ours.”

Coden glanced at me and down at my hand, but didn’t answer.  After a short moment of silence I removed my hand from his shoulder and looked toward the far wall, my jaw working.  I wanted to comfort Coden, to convince him that none of this fault (which it most definitely wasn’t), but it was obvious that no matter what I said he’d still feel guilty. 

My mind started reeling as I struggled to think of all the possible places Rosalie and Valarie could be.  So many possibilities, each more gruesome than the next.  Samantha or Dan could have come around and they could have fled for their lives.  While fleeing, they could have been run down and killed.  Did Valarie decide it was time to move on so that they could search for the door?  If so, had they found it and made it out, or had someone found them before they could make it?

Were they alive; were they dead?

There was one thing I knew for sure, though: I wasn’t leaving until I knew for sure.

“I can’t look for the door until I find them,” I muttered.  “I don't know about you, but it seems wrong to concentrate on getting out when they could be trapped somewhere.”

Coden nodded.  “Yeah,” he agreed softly.  “We’ll find them.”  He paused for a short moment before looking over at me.  “Can you promise me something?”

I hesitated a second before gesturing for him to continue.  Something in his tone hinted that I wasn’t going to be pleased with his request, that I wasn’t going to want to say, “Yes, of course, I promise” without a second’s hesitation.  The look on his face wasn’t helping much either.

“After we find the girls, if we get separated get yourself and the others out of here.  Don’t keep yourself and the others here just because I’m still stuck in here.”  He frowned as though the thought pained him.  “I’d rather die than have you guys stuck in here because of me.”

I didn’t answer at first.  I was right in my earlier thought—I most definitely did not want to promise to this.  “I know I’m supposed to say yes,” I told him after a few seconds of thinking my reply through, “but I can’t.  If I were to find the door, I’d tell the girls to get themselves out of here, but I couldn’t just leave you in here, Coden.  I can’t just leave you to die like that.”

Coden spun around to face me, his eyes blazing with a sudden intensity that almost froze me to my spot.  If it weren’t for the need to keep moving, I would have.  “You can, and you will.”  Coden reached forward, grabbing onto my shoulders.  In an instant my feet stopped moving and I was forced to look directly at him.  “Listen, Serenity.  If you find yourself in the line of safety, I want you to take it.  That means if we’re separated and you find the door, go out the door.  If Samantha or Dan is attacking me, you run like hell.  You need to keep yourself safe.  If one of us is going to die tonight, I’d rather it be me and not you, all right?”

“You say that like you plan on dying,” I mumbled, my eyes shooting toward the ceiling.  The combination of his tone and expression were too much to take. 

“I don’t plan on dying,” Coden said, his voice softening when he saw how uncomfortable he was making me.  “But if I am going to die, I don’t need you being brought down with me.”

I didn’t say anything to that.  Instead, I kept my eyes skyward, unable to meet his eyes.  What was I supposed to say?  That when the time came I’d leave him there to die?  That would be a lie.  He and I both knew it.

“Serenity, I need you to promise me,” Coden whispered.

With a grimace, my eyes finally met his.  “Fine, whatever,” I all but snapped, my tone sharp.  I bit my lip, looking away again.  “I promise.”

Coden stared at me for what felt like a long time.  I knew that he knew I wasn’t being truthful, and I also knew that he wanted to stand there and shake me until I finally agreed to his terms.  But we didn’t have time to stand there and argue about running or staying.  We had to move before Samantha or Dan showed up.  At this point, I didn’t know who would be worse.  Samantha was sadistic, but Dan was livid.

I was about to tell Coden just that—that we didn’t have time to have a pointless argument in the middle of the hallway—but the sudden eruption of voices down the hall caused the words to die in my throat.  I flinched away from Coden, my eyes darting toward the source of the noise.  Was it Rosalie and Valarie?  Were they here?  Or was it a captor, come to rip us to shreds and let us bleed out on the floor? 

It was neither.

“Don’t mind all the dead bodies around,” a girl drawled.  “It’s still a perfect place to stand around gazing into each other’s eyes, right?”

My eyes landed on the girl who spoke.  She looked about my age with shoulder-length blonde hair.  From this distance I couldn’t tell that much about her, but from where I stood I could see that she was short—and angry.  Who could blame her for being mad, though?  Weren’t we all?

My thoughts of the girl were cut short as Coden grabbed onto my hand and tugged me forward, toward the girl.  As we drew closer I could see that there were two boys standing close behind her, each with terrified expressions on their faces.  Out of the three, the girl was clearly the leader of the group.  She was their Coden.  Except not as friendly-looking.

“Who are you?” the girl demanded, cocking a thin eyebrow as we reached them.  “Did they steal you while you were out on a date or something?”

I glanced behind me, stomach rolling.  The girl herself made me uncomfortable, but the fact that we were a rather large group in the middle of the hallway didn’t exactly help calm my nerves.  We needed to hide, and we needed to find Rosalie and Valarie.  Talking with these people would do nothing for us.  Unless, of course, they knew where Rosalie and Valarie were.

“Coden,” Coden replied.  “This is Serenity.  Have you seen two blonde girls around here?  One girl is twelve, and the other is fourteen.”

The girl glanced between us as though sizing us up, seeing if we were worthy of her time.  Time was not a luxury that any of us had, but this girl seemed to think that it was something she could spend.  “Was the little girl clingy?” she asked.

“Yes,” I piped in, taking a small step forward.  This girl had seen Rosalie.  That meant Rosalie was alive.  Or had been very recently.  “Which way did they go?”

“That way.”  The girl pointed behind her, in the direction Coden and I had just been heading.  “To the left.  I didn’t see them after that.”

I nodded, squeezing tightly on Coden’s hand.  I hadn’t even realized I was still holding it until now, but I didn’t let go.  Something about holding Coden’s hand was reassuring.  It was like when I held Skylar’s hand when I was younger, before both of us grew up.  He was in college now, actually.  Was he enjoying himself right now?  Did he have a nose in a book like he always used to?

The girl glanced down at our hands and smirked.  “The name’s Annabeth, by the way.  These are Tyler and Cole.”

She gestured to the two boys behind her.  They couldn’t have been over fifteen, with shaggy brown hair and dark brown eyes.  They weren’t twins, but they looked alike.  Siblings, I thought dully.  Like Emily and Valarie.  Except these siblings were alive and together.

Coden nodded.  “Thank you for your help, Annabeth.”

As Coden tugged me past the small group, Annabeth drawled, “Stay alive.  And, by the way, the cell phones don’t work.  Already tried.”

Coden and I nodded again, seeing how we already knew that.  “Okay,” said Coden, not even bothering to glance at Annabeth as we moved toward the end of the hall.  “Thanks.”

“No problem.”

Something in Annabeth’s tone set me on edge.  And without meaning to I glanced back at her, eyes narrowed.  She caught my gaze and frowned.  “Just a warning,” she told me.  “Don’t be expecting to find the girls completely intact once you find them.  We saw Samantha heading down there a little while ago.” 

Coden and I shared a glance.  I struggled to keep myself calm as Coden led me away from the other teenagers, fought down the urge to throw myself against the wall and pound my first against it and cry.  If Samantha was down that way, the probability of finding Rosalie and Valarie alive were slim.  We’d be lucky if we found them in one piece.

“How could she say that so calmly?” I whispered, my voice shaking.  I gripped Coden’s hand tightly.  From the expression on his face I could tell that I was hurting him, but I couldn’t bring myself to loosen my grip.  I was too upset from the prospect that Rosalie could be dead.  She was only twelve.  Twelve.  “How could she say that like she doesn’t even care?”

 “Because she doesn’t.”

My head whipped over to Coden.  “What?  How does she not care?”

“To her, the only people she has to take care of are herself, and those two boys.  Rosalie and Valarie aren’t her concern.”

I didn’t answer to that, just kept my gaze straight forward, tears burning my eyes.  If we found Rosalie and Valarie dead, I was going to lose it.  All of the cries and screams that I’d been shoving down within myself would fall out into the open.  I would scream and I would cry until Samantha found me and killed me herself.  And at that point?  I’d probably welcome it.  How was I supposed to go on living when two young girls had been murdered because I hadn’t been there to save them?

“Please don’t be dead,” I whispered.  “Please don’t be dead.”

Coden glanced at me but said nothing.  Not for the first time, I wondered what was going on in his head.  How scared was he?  How many times had he envisioned Rosalie and Valarie on the floor, still and lifeless?  How often did he resist the urge to throw up or cry?

“Coden, what if they’re dead?” I demanded as softly as I could.  I should have been concerned that Samantha was lurking around and that talking could get us killed, but all I could see was Rosalie on the floor, mauled, with an equally as mangled Valarie by her side.  Their images corroded my mind, crumbled my judgment.  Nothing mattered but seeing that they were safe.

“They’re not,” Coden replied.

“But what if they are?  What are we going to do if they are?” 

Coden’s hand tightened around mine and he tugged me to a stop.  I barely had any time to react before he was pushing me into the closest room, moving behind a wall so that we were out of view from the hallway.  I didn’t even get a chance to see what was in the room before Coden let our hands fall and wrapped his arms around me, his chin resting on top of my head.  “They’re not dead,” he said comfortingly, his grip tightening.  “Okay, Serenity?  You would feel it if they were.  Do you feel it?”

Without a word I wrapped my arms around him and hugged him back.  Whether his words were actually true or not, I wasn’t sure, but I thought them over all the same.  Did I feel it?  No, not really.  The images of their deaths were all but imprinted in my mind, but I didn’t feel it deep down.  Would I actually be able to feel when they passed away?  I didn’t know.  But it was comforting to know that I didn’t have a gut feeling that they were no longer alive.

“No,” I mumbled, my voice thin even to my own ears.  “No, I don’t feel it.”

Coden pulled away from me.  “See?  So just hold on to that until we find them, all right?”

I nodded and let my hands fall away from them so that I could wrap my arms around myself instead.  “Okay,” I complied.  “Let’s go.”

Coden gave me one last glance before leading me out of the room.  We both pulled out our weapons, tense and on edge as our feet moved us toward the end of the hallway.  If Samantha was around here then we needed to be on guard.  Facing Al and Dan was one thing.  Samantha was the leader of this.  Not only was she messed up in the head, but she also had the brains required in order to pull off this operation. 

I tried to keep this thought in mind as we shuffled onward.  Samantha—that was who I needed to concentrate on, not demented thoughts about Rosalie’s and Valarie’s cut up bodies.  No, I needed to think about what would happen if Samantha appeared out of nowhere.  Would we even have time to run before she was on us, or would we instantly have to try and fight her off?

We made sure to check each room for Valarie and Rosalie as we passed by.  All of them were empty, apart from one.  I have no way to explain how upset I was when I looked under a desk to find a hiding girl, thinking that it was Rosalie or Valarie when it was really another person.  To get my hopes up and then have them shattered almost immediately after.

Every room we checked.  Each room more disappointing than the next. 

“They could be anywhere by now,” I muttered in defeat as we exited yet another room.  “They wouldn’t stay in one place for long.  Especially not with Samantha around.”

Coden nodded in agreement.  “Yeah, but we have to keep—”

He cut off suddenly, and he froze where he stood.  I frowned, looking up at him for an explanation.  Why had he suddenly stopped?  Coden was not one to just stop without a reason.  He was one to keep going, to push forward no matter how hard things got.  For him to stop now…

A cold feeling spread throughout my entire body as I turned my eyes in the direction of Coden’s gaze.  And it was then that I realized why he’d come to a halt.

Samantha stood in the distance, her teeth seeming to gleam in the darkness as she held up the knife in her hand, pointing it toward us with a nonchalance that made me sick.  “What do we have here?” she drawled, taking a step forward.  She grinned maliciously.  “Some little gamers who have lost their way?" 

Coden’s carefully blank gaze met my frightened one.  “Run,” he said.