The sound of water trickling rises me from my slumber, but I keep my eyes closed, trying to savor that last little bit of sleep. I only let my eyes flutter open when someone groans and brushes up against my back.

"I think I slept with my elbow in my ear," Lawrence grumbles, and I look at him over my shoulder, eyes scanning how his face is scrunched up in pain.

"That's not actually physically possible," Charlie mutters, exhaustion in her tone.

He runs a hand through his messy hair before rubbing the sleep from his eyes. "Oh, that's what I'm saying. It wasn't actually physically possible." A sharp wince passes his lips and I feel a pang of sympathy. "I've got a pain all the way down my back-"

"You've got to move," She interrupts, which makes him frown. "Down into the valley. Maybe the Burn won't be able to find you. Maybe."

None of us argue, given how dire the situation is. It doesn't take us long for us to pack up our things and get moving. I take my medicine as we go, ignoring the side-eye Stanton gives me.

It's no different from having to take blood pressure medication, I want to tell her, but I hold my tongue. I savor the silence, the only sounds being the birds chirping and the trickling of a creek nearby. We get a good five minutes, just enough to be fully awake and aware of everything before Emma shatters what little peace we have.

"You think we've really got a traitor?"

She doesn't ask it to me personally, but I still flinch as if I've been slapped. I understand why she's asked it. It's been brewing for the past two days, but none of us have had the nerve to really bring it up. I can't imagine any one of us being a traitor, not after what the Burn has done.

They captured Lawrence and gave him a nasty bruise on his face that has since healed. They shot Paul, which led to him nearly dying of infection. And Marianne even said he and Stanton were disposable. I can't imagine how anyone here would be willing to work with them after the torture they've put us through these past sixteen days.

"Makes sense," Stanton answers grimly, bluntly. "That's how they keep finding us. One of us is leaving notes or clues maybe. Something."

"So what are we gonna do?"

"We'll have to watch each other like hawks." She sighs when she sees Emma's worried face. "I'm sorry, but that's how it's got to be. We don't split up. No one goes anywhere alone. Either the traitor will have no chance to leave a clue, or they'll try it anyway and we'll spot them."

I tug at the ends of my hair. "And then what?"

"We'll deal with them."

The way she says that makes my blood run cold.

My eyes slide to each person of the group, trying to picture them leaving clues, notes, acting all innocent but secretly betraying us. I try to picture it, but I can't. Not them. Not even Stanton, who's brash and harsh and sometimes downright mean. I just can't picture her being the traitor.

"We'll have to," Paul agrees. "You know how ruthless the Burn are." He looks ahead into the valley and closes his eyes. "Look."

Lawrence pauses from winding his pocket watch, looking ahead. His breathing stutters at the sight before him. "O-oh."

I bring my hand to my mouth, my chest becoming painfully tight as I look down at the torn metal and machinery that are strewn about into the valley.

It's a plane, or what's left of one. There's no smoke, no screams, no cries for help, no sound of the engine still dying off after the crash. Nothing.

This has been here for a while.

A crash like this should have gotten attention from police and the media and who knows who else, but there's a reason no one is here...

The EMP.

"I thought some planes must've come down somewhere. EMP that size wouldn't just affect things on the ground," Emma says. Her hands are curled up into fists, her knuckles turning white.

I reach out for the nearest person, which happens to be Paul. I grab onto his arm and squeeze my eyes shut. I don't want to see it. Paul doesn't question my actions, nor does he push me away. I'm grateful.

Lawrence lets out a shaky breath. "It's sort of.... now I know this sounds stupid, but it's so big. Even in pieces like that, scattered all over the valley. Just even the nose of it there, where it's tipped over and leaning against those rocks, with the cockpit smashed into the cliff. You never think about how big planes are when you're inside them."

I still keep my eyes closed. "Are there... do you think there are... bodies?"

The word leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

"Look, there," Stanton says, but I shake my head, holding onto Paul's arm a bit tighter. I don't want to see it. I've seen dead bodies, obviously, but they were Burn soldiers-people who tried to kill us and killed innocents. They weren't innocent people who just happened to be on a plane when the EMP went off.

"I would have thought someone would-" Emma starts.

"It'll be slow going without motorized transport. They're probably doing it a bit at a time," Paul explains. I hold back my own thoughts, the rising question of if they even know what's happened here.

"Probably haven't even picked up the black box yet," Stanton states.

There's a beat of silence as we walk, me stumbling along on Paul's lead because I can't bring myself to open my eyes. Emma speaks again a moment later. "Charlie?"

Charlie gives a noncommittal hum in reply.

"Can you... I don't know, do a scan of the area, see if you can pick up the black box anywhere? We could leave it somewhere useful so whoever comes can find it easily."

A smile tugs at my lips despite the situation. Emma has a good heart.

"Sure. If that makes you feel better, sure," Charlie replies, and I'm surprised she agreed to it. "Black boxes send out a distinctive transmission. We're close enough to Edinburgh now. The network there is up and running. Gives me a few more toys to play with. I should be able to do a broad range sweep of the valley."

Tap, tap, tapping of a keyboard reaches my ears, then a high-pitched ping!

"I'm getting something!" Her excited tone vanishes into a befuddled hum. "It's... something.... right under where you're standing."

"We're on top of it?" Paul asks.

"Looks like it."

I take a chance to open my eyes, focusing on the live people around me rather than the bodies that have been left to decay here for over two weeks. My gaze stays on Emma, who's got her hands on her hips. "Then we'd better get digging. You've got a small shovel, haven't you, Stanton?"

The redhead fishes out a shovel and hands it to the blonde, who thanks her and takes it. She then immediately hands it to Lawrence. "Here you go."

He blinks, a scoff leaving his lips. "What? Why do I have to...?" He trails off when she gives him a pointed look. "Fine."

He starts digging, a small frown on his face that only grows as a minute passes by, then two, then three, and there's nothing there. "Is this sensible? I mean, the Burn could be after us, and I'm not turning over anything except for worms."

Paul shakes his head, and I let go of his arm. I hadn't realized I was still holding onto him. "There's nothing here. Ground wasn't even disturbed before Lawrence disturbed it."

"Could be something a long way underground," Charlie suggests. "It could be important. If it's a transmitter the Burn are using..."

Stanton rubs her temples. "Lawrence is right though. We're using daylight to dig when we could be using it to walk."

I agree with Stanton, even though I don't say it. I do feel bad for these people, these innocent people who had nothing to do with this, and their only crime was that they decided to go on a trip on the same day the Burn decided to set off an EMP. But if we waste time digging for this box, a box that won't bring these people back, and the Burn ends up catching up with us...

Charlie said getting our boxes to Edinburgh would help save the world. If we stay here, we could be putting more than just a plane full at risk.

"You're sure there's nothing?" Emma asks hesitantly, and Lawrence references to the hole he's dug.

"Come and look. It's just stones and mud, and I feel like I've seen quite enough Scottish mud for one lifetime. Can we just get moving?"

"I..." Charlie lets out a huff. "It feels important."

I open my mouth to speak, to ask if a feeling is enough for us to just keep digging when we're not finding anything, but Stanton never gives me the chance.

"No! Situation on the ground is that we could be in danger staying here. We have to keep moving." She starts walking, glaring at the rest of us until we follow. "You can keep scanning, Charlie. You might come across another one."

Emma hangs her head. "So it wasn't the black box after all?"

"Could be the rescuers have already found it," Paul says, placing a hand on Emma's shoulder, which makes her smile. "They've probably already taken it away."

Ping!

"Wait!" Charlie shouts. "Did you find something?

Lawrence cocks a brow. "Uh, no. We're walking on. Because of, you remember, how we're under imminent threat of attack?"

"The signal's moving. As you move, it moves."

"Stand still, everyone," Stanton commands, and we do, silently waiting for Charlie to tell us what's happened.

"It stopped," She says, and the redhead's brows knit together.

"You're sure?" She looks at us. "Start walking again."

We do, and a sharp, recurring ping! comes through the device speaker.

"It's on the move again," She says. "It's you. It's one of you. Someone's got a transmitter on them."

•

"That's it. We're out of sight lines from the valley. If we walk along this gully, we'll remain hidden while we do it," Stanton finally says, and Emma frowns.

"Do what?"

"We're going to go through everyone's bags. And if we don't find anything, we're going to strip search each other."

She pales as if she's seen a ghost. "No! We're not going that!"

Lawrence holds his hands up. "I-it's okay. Me and Paul will check each other, and you, Stanton and Walker-"

She shakes her head. "No bag searches. No strip searches. It's a violation of our human rights!"

I wrap my arms around myself. While we haven't been able to remain completely modest with each other since we started this trip, I agree with Emma. I don't really like the idea of being stripped searched, even though I know nothing would be found.

"So is being killed by the Burn," Stanton argues with a scowl, "which, though I'd hoped I wouldn't have to lay this out for you, is what's going to happen if we don't find our traitor."

"L-look, it's okay," Lawrence says, again, trying to ease the tension. "It's a good idea. We'll do it quickly. It'll probably turn out to be something stupid like one of us carrying a radio we didn't know was working or something. Or... well, you know, if one of us is a traitor, we ought to know."

Even though he's agreeing with her plan, Stanton sends Lawrence a hard glare. "No one could have been carrying something this distance without knowing. Someone is a traitor."

Emma looks close to tears, wrapping her arms around herself. "I do not want anyone searching me, okay?"

Stanton narrows her eyes and takes a step towards her. "You realize that sounds very much like an admission of guilt!"

Paul shoots a hand out to keep her from getting any closer to Emma. "Hey! Come on. none of us want to strip to our shorts on the cold Scottish cliffside."

"Stanton's right," Charlie pipes up. "We have to know. The sooner the better."

"Well, it's not better for me," I whine. "And it's not me. I just-I haven't gone through these two and a half weeks of walking through the woods, eating cold tinned food, nearly dying of hypothermia, and having to kill people just to betray everyone! I did this because I was given this box and was told it was bio-linked to me before I could give a yes or no!" I sigh, knowing if I keep rambling, I'm going to reveal to Charlie I'm not who she thinks I am, so I get to the point. "It's cold. I'm cold. So I'm not taking my clothes off to be stripped searched."

"And I'm not opening my bag so some soldier can rummage through it," Emma says, stomping her foot for emphasis, "and there's nothing you can do to make me."

Stanton blinks calmly. "Well, there is one thing." She grabs her pistol. "We're going through the bags. Right now."

I tense, along with everyone else. I have my rifle strapped to me, but there's no way I could get into a position to fire before she shot me.

"Or what? You'll shoot us?" Paul sneers. His voice is dripping with ire, but his eyes show the fear he tries to hide.

She smiles at him, although it's so tight and forced it looks more like a grimace. "Yes."

Too stunned to speak, I simply just stare at her. Is she really threatening to kill us over this?

Before I can stop myself, I'm already thinking of how, if she is the traitor, she could simply claim we're being suspicious and shoot us. And she's aiming the gun right at Paul-not me or Lawrence or Emma. Paul.

The disposable one, as Marianne had put it.

But she called Stanton disposable too. Or did she just say that so it wouldn't sound odd if she'd only mentioned killing Paul? Maybe she was willing to kill Stanton to keep the ruse up. She certainly was willing to kill Adebayo, and because of Adebayo we already know the military has corruption anyway.

But if she is the traitor, why would she wait so long? Why would any of us wait so long when there were so many opportunities that they could have turned this around, let the Burn truly get the upper hand?

My head starts to throb, and I close my eyes for a quick moment before a loud ringing hits my ears. My eyes snap open, fear shooting through me as if I'd been shot by Stanton already.

It's not coming from the old piece of technology in my bag. I know that. I can hear it. It's coming from an old signet ring on the ground, half covered in melted snow that's more or less just become mud.

I need to get this over with. The longer I'm out of it because of the newly introduced stress, the more suspicious I'll look. So I grab it and press the small button underneath.

And I'm suddenly in that weird interrogation-esk room with the steel chair and the steel desk with the recording device sitting alone on it. It's been many days since I've seen this, but I remember it to the T. It's quiet in here, and for a moment I'm almost glad I've found myself in the corners of my own mind rather than out in the real world where a gun is being pointed at us for what feels like the hundredth time.

The people that were there last time-Chris, and before that, the Russian nameless woman-are not there now. This time, it's Adebayo that sits in the chair, looking annoyed.

"I don't know why you want me to do this," He says. "This-I don't know what you're callin' them-messages from beyond the grave. They're Burn, not New Tomorrow."

"We're allies now, Sargent. Common cause. Common enemy. And that enemy needs to know who they're fighting and why," Soleil replies through the speakers, and I wince. I hate that I'm hearing her still, someone I've never met and has done nothing to make me think of her like this. It would be nicer if it was a different voice I was hearing so I could pretend it was Marianne.

She's the real villain here.

"Still don't know why I have to-" He starts to argue, but he's cut off.

"It's an order, Sargent, from your own superiors at New Tomorrow."

He blinks in surprise but doesn't question it. "Yes, ma'am. Okay. I... I don't know where to start."

"How about why you chose to join New Tomorrow."

"Why did I choose to join? L-look around," He scoffs, gesturing his arm around the empty room as if she's actually in there with him. "Look at what we've done to the world. It's bad enough here. Hurricanes in a country that's never had them before. Sea levels are so high, they've had to rebuild the Thames barrier twice, and even that won't be enough. They might not be admitting it yet, but they know someday soon London's going to be evacuated. And we won't ever be going up.

"And then other countries. If anyone stopped to speak to the refugees flooding from everywhere else..." He trails off and sighs. "Of course, they can't. There's a reason they build all those holding centers on Dartmoor and Morten Kent-so no one has to hear about what's happening. Gambia, Senegal, Cameroon, half of the Sub-Saharan Africa are uninhabitable and other parts are at war over what few natural resources are left.

"And we did this! Us! We act like it was some natural disaster we can sigh and shake our heads over, but there's nothing natural about it!"

"So, you decided to do something about it?" Soleil prompts.

"Yeah. Yeah, I did. I made myself a traitor. But you know what? The real betrayal is to do nothing. I'm a soldier, and I wasn't trained to stand by and watch bad things happen. I was trained to act, and I did. And I'm not sorry." Adebayo shakes his head, and the look on his face tells me he's trying to convince himself more than he is her. "I'm not sorry. Someone had to do something, and it turned out that someone was me."

I'm ripped out of the room by the feeling of something being ripped out of my hands. The sudden return to reality is jarring and almost painful, and once the smoke clears from my vision, I'm met with the cold gray eyes of an angry Stanton.

"What is this?" She hisses out, eyeing the ring that she rudely snatched away from me. One hand holds the ring so she can examine it, and the other holds her pistol, which she has pointed at me.

"It's a ring," I answer plainly, stupidly. "I found it."

"She did," Paul agrees. "I saw her pick it up."

"She picks up random things," Lawrence says with a slight frown. It deepens when Stanton nudges us to keep moving, as she's noticed we've stopped. "She's been doing this ever since we started. It's her thing."

Stanton doesn't look very happy, and she asks Charlie if any type of signal appears to be coming from it. Charlie affirms it's not, and so Stanton tosses it aside, a scowl still remaining deep on her face. When she says something about starting the search but doesn't stop walking, Paul frowns at her.

"It would be easier to search while we're standing still," He says.

"If we stay still, we're sitting ducks for whoever's receiving that signal. Now walk," She growls, and Emma quietly sniffle, tears springing to her eyes. Lawrence looks at her with sympathy.

"Emma, don't..." He trails off. "Charlie, is there some kind of alternative to this? You know I'm not massively excited about you all going through and looking at my dirty underwear. Is there... some, I don't know, special high-tech way of doing this?"

He frowns when Stanton grabs my bag, awkwardly keeping her pistol trained on us while she struggles to unzip it. I don't volunteer to help her.

Charlie hums. "You could... I'm picking up that transmission fairly clearly now. It's sending out a steady pulse. You could fan out across the hillside. I'd be able to see quite quickly which one of you had it."

I huff, looking at Stanton as she continues to struggle to get my backpack unzipped. "That sounds a lot better than someone going through my-"

"And let you make a run for it?" Stanton interrupts, and my eyes widen as I realize she's actually accusing me of being the traitor. "I think not."

Lawrence grits his teeth. "God! Why are you always like this?! Why do you have to be such a hardass? What happened to you when you were a child to make you such a-"

"When I was a child, since you asked, I learned that no one comes to save you." She's stopped trying to open my backpack, her gray eyes trained on Lawrence, her voice ice cold. "You have to save yourself. You have to look after yourself. You know nothing about me, Lawrence."

He keeps his glare. "Yeah? Well, I know enough about you to know I don't want to know you anymore. As soon as we have things delivered to Edinburgh, I-I'm off. And I hope to God I never see you again."

He stomps up to her, ignoring the gun, and snatches my backback from her before pulling off his own and shoving it into her arms.

"There! Go on. Start with my pack." He taps his foot impatiently. "Go on. I don't care! And if you like, I'll strip off in front of you just so we can have this whole stupid business over with!"

I flinch. Even with all we've been through, I've never seen Lawrence this angry until now.

"It-s probably-it's probably sensible," Paul murmurs, and Stanton unzips the backpack and hands it to Paul.

"Pull everything out one by one so we can see it. No secrets."

Paul opens the large backpack and slowly pulls out the shirts, jumpers and trousers, shaking them out as he does so. I take what's clean, since I wouldn't want to put them on the ground and Lawrence's clean clothes get dirty. I glance over at him, listening to Paul as he mumbles each item he pulls out from pop-up tents to camping stove. Lawrence is fuming, glaring daggers into the side of Stanton's head.

His fingers grab at his jacket, as if ready to strip down just like he promised to prove the whole point.

"...food packets we picked up at the last safe house," Paul continues, quirking a brow. "Do you want me to-"

"Not if they're all sealed," Stanton answers, and Emma scoffs. Paul goes back to pulling things out until the bag is nearly empty.

"Do you want me to check the one-ringers in here too?"

"Dump the whole bag out. Feel around to make sure nothing's stuck to the inside."

I clench my jaw so hard it hurts. "I think it's pretty clear that Lawrence didn't do anything. He's not-"

"Wait," Paul says, reaching into the bag. I hear the distinct sound of fabric ripping before he pulls out something that's... pinging.

I look at Lawrence, whose eyes are wide with confusion and shock, same as everyone else.

"What... what is that?" Emma asks.

Paul holds the round metal device. It's got a single red activation button on the top with the words 'emergency transmitter' on the side. "Well, I'd say it's a transmitter."

•

"No, don't!" Lawrence shouts as he struggles against Stanton and Paul's grips. "Just-don't do that! If you let me, I'll do it myself." He struggles more when they grip him tighter. "I-I said don't!"

"Then put your hands behind your back," Paul commands, and he does, wincing as they tie his hands.

I just stand there watching, useless. I try to wrap my head around it, but something isn't right. It can't be. It couldn't have been Lawrence. It couldn't!

"I didn't know anything was there, you know. I didn't!" He exclaims, despair in his voice. "You saw how hard it was to find. Someone must've planted it on me to make you think I was a traitor."

Emma sneers at him, and my lips part in shock at how quickly her tune changed about all this. "Yeah? Well, they're doin' a pretty good job."

Stanton holds the transmitter up to examine it and hums. "Looks military grade. Panic button for pilots to be traced if they come down in the desert. Will you be able to get anything useful from this, Charlie?"

"I... shouldn't think so," She replies hesitantly, and Stanton drops the transmitter on the ground and stomps on it.

"There. It can't have any tails on us anymore. Now get moving, everyone. Lawrence, you're up ahead. If there's danger in front of us, you're walking into it."

He doesn't protest, walking along, and I stay a step behind him. My mouth opens and closes several times as I try to think of the words to say because this just isn't right. I know it isn't.

"Who gave it to you?" Paul questions lowly.

"No one gave it to me, okay? I told you. Someone must've planted it."

Emma scoffs. "When did that happen, Lawrence? When could that have happened?"

"I don't know. I don't know! Maybe it was Jackson? He disappeared all mysterious in the night. Maybe he was some kind of agent."

"They've been following long before that," Stanton says, and Emma places her hands on her hips.

"Any more stories for us, Lawrence?"

"What about when he got captured by the Burn?" I ask. "What if they planted it on him then and he didn't notice?"

Stanton narrows her eyes at me coming to his defense. "And how do we know he wasn't just meeting up with them and faked to make it seem like he was captured?"

I feel my temper spike at that. "Because he had the bruise the size of a cookie on his face! And you said the Burn has been following us long before Jackson, but we just heard that pinging recently. So which is it? Has it been here the whole time, or was it activated just recently? It seems like you just want Lawrence to be guilty!"

"And would you rather I search you then?"

"Go ahead!" I shout, tears of anger burning my eyes. "Search my bags. Look through it. And take a good, hard look at my meds because I know that's why you don't trust me, because you think you were somehow entitled to know about my medical history even though I've never been a danger to anyone else, unlike you who points guns at everyone the first chance she gets."

I wipe my eyes. "I don't think Lawrence is the traitor. I think someone planted it on him."

Emma huffs. "Yeah, but you would. We all know the real reason you're protecting him is because you've got some crush on him."

A squeak leaves my mouth, and from the corner of my eye I see Lawrence's eyebrows shoot up in surprise.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I lie, although it's not very believable. "And you haven't said anything to disprove what I said."

They don't, but they don't go to untie Lawrence either. I know if I even look like I'm going to try it, Stanton will shoot me in the leg.

"How do we know if wasn't Stanton?" Lawrence asks, and the redhead's eyes widen at his accusation. "She said that stuff was military grade, and she doesn't have a device, and she was thick as thieves with Adebayo, and she's seemed to dislike me from the start. What if she planted it on me?"

Paul rolls his eyes. "For God's sake! Your lies don't even make sense."

Then, to my surprise and horror, Paul clenches his fist and hits Lawrence across the face. The taller man grunts at the blow, and I scream.

"What is wrong with you?!" I shout, and Lawrence blinks as if trying to process what happened. Paul doesn't look at me, instead just glaring at our bound friend.

"I don't want to do it again. Just tell us the truth."

"I am!" He stresses. "I am. It's Stanton."

I don't know if I completely agree with this theory that it is, but I know that thing doesn't belong to Lawrence, and I say so.

"Think about it," I reason. "Lawrence was the first to volunteer to get searched. Why would he do that if he knew he had something? And it was pinging so it's not like he could hope you wouldn't hear it. And why would anyone keep a thing like that on them?"

I look to the dark-haired man, who nods frantically in agreement. "Exactly! You wouldn't! You'd put it in someone else's bag! And the Burn has been on us since the military camp. It must've happened there-"

He's cut off by gunshots.

"What the hell?!" Paul shouts, and I spot a figure in the trees. I grab the rifle strapped to me, but a bullet hits the ground near my feet as awarning. It came a different angle.

There's more than one.

"Stay right there!" A male voice shouts. "Don't move."

"I'd do what he says if I were you, They're the best private security money can buy." A woman replies, walking out of the shadows. My jaw drops.

No... That can't be possible.

How is she here? We heard her die!

Jo places her hands on her hips, glancing over her shoulder to look back at her security guards. "Used them in Basra myself and I can tell you they're very handy with those guns. Not strictly legal to carry them in this country, of course, but I can be very persuasive when I'm on the trail of a good story."

She smirks at Lawrence, who looks like his brain has stopped working. "How clever you were to work out that someone put it in your bag at the military camp. I thought there was something suspicious about all of you from the start." She laughs. "I was right. You're terrorists. And you're all nicked."

A/N: Happy Birthday to me! Guess who is 23! I hope you all like this chapter! Please be sure to vote and comment! Thank you and have a blessed day!