ON THE MORNING of the second day after their run-in with the Crank Palace's inhabitants, Frankie showered, then joined the others for a quick meal of canned tuna sandwich.

"I was on the waiting line. Really! I wanted to buy you the most delicious sandwich ever created on Earth, plus a latte," Minho said to Frankie, "Ask Reggie and Jorge!"

Jorge replied, "Let me rephrase that, hermano. You wanted me to buy her the most delicious sandwich ever created on Earth, plus a latte."

"Isn't your magic card WICKED's?"

"I work my ass off for the money in this card."

"Life is not just about saving money, Jorge," Reggie said, munching, "It's about enjoying it, too."

"The food you're eating, that's my money you're enjoying."

"Well. Sharing is caring, right?" Reggie grinned.

As she took a bite on her layers of soggy bread, cold fish, and another soggy bread, Frankie noticed that Thomas and Brenda were continuously sending looks to one another.

Newt's rabid anger was gone, but he was still pissed for being carried back here against his will, and he made that very clear by having a massive fight with Minho's snarky mouth after he woke up. Now the two were awfully quiet to one another, and Frankie was currently sitting between them, so she needed a distraction from the uncomfortable, cold vibe around her. She settled with watching the two lovebirds' secretive interaction.

When their meals were nearly done, Brenda finally realized that they had been caught.

"What— What is it, France?" She said to Frankie with reddened cheeks.

Frankie just blinked with a knowing smile, "Nothing."

Brenda cleared her throat, "Let's get ready. We better move soon. And there's a detector at the entrance, so you can't bring anything metal with you. Just dump your stash of knife, scissors, needles, or whatever in the Berg."

"Bren, my whole leg's metal."

Brenda paused, "We'll talk them into it."

Then she scurried away, clearly still abashed.

Frankie smiled at Thomas before she left the dining table as well.

"So..." Minho caught up to her and fell into her pace as they walked towards the sleeping quarter, "I was thinking. When we got to Denver... Sandwich shop, coffee, just us two?"

Frankie tried to suppress her smile, but she failed. "Are you asking me out on a date?"

"Well, it's just—" Minho ran his fingers through his hair, "Do you remember the last time we actually have fun together and talk?"

"We talk—"

"Without other shanks goggling and listening in? Or when the topic is not what are we going to do after this? What's next? Are you okay? Because I do, and that's back in the Glade."

"Right..." Now that she thought about it, she kind of missed feeling like a normal teenage girl —just carefree, confused, and in love. "Okay."

"Huh?"

"I want to try that sandwich and latte."

"YES!"

Frankie chuckled, hearing his whoop. She must be as red as a tomato right now. "I was thinking, too... Your feud with Newt is making everyone uncomfortable."

"You're the one talking?" Minho raised his eyebrows, "You know how to hold a grudge better than anyone. And that shank's acting like the worst shuckface on Earth."

"I get his point. Don't you?"

"Let's not talk about this right now. It's ruining the mood."

"Okay."

"Okay."

Thirty minutes later, the Berg had landed safely at Denver Airport and everyone had gathered at the hatch door.

"Let me do the talking again," Jorge said.

Brenda nodded, "And when we get in we'll find a cab."

"Do you shanks forget that I'm here?" Newt sighed, exasperated, "I'm not Immune. And I have the bloody Flare. Your genius serum won't change the result."

"Didn't you say that Cranks were planning to infiltrate Denver a few days back?" Jorge asked, "If that's true, we'll get through just fine. If not, when I tell you to run, run."

"Let's quit this yapping and just go," Minho muttered, not even looking his friend's way.

Newt sent unappreciative, dagger-like glare at him.

Jorge pressed a button and the huge ramp of the cargo door started to pivot downward. The door had only opened halfway when they saw four people standing just outside the Berg.

Frankie was aware straight away that they weren't here for peaceful encounter. She spotted six pistols in the three men's hands, a Launcher in the woman's, and their familiar red attires —they were identical to Newt's captors'.

Their faces were dirt-smeared and sweaty, and some of their clothes had been torn, as if they'd had to fight their way through an army to get there.

Minho stretched out his hand in front of Frankie and Newt, moving into a protective stance.

Frankie was about to reach into her pockets for a pair of safety scissors when she remembered that she had obediently followed Brenda's advice.

The one time she let her weaponries go, they were ambushed.

Nice.

"What is this?" Jorge asked.

"Shut your mouth, Munie," one of the guys said. His tone was mechanized and sinister. "Now step down here nice and easy, or you won't like what happens. Don't. Try. Anything."

Reggie nudged her and motioned for her to look past their assailants with his chin.

Over their shoulders, Frankie saw that both gates leading into Denver were standing wide open and two people lay lifeless in the narrow alley leading to the city.

Jorge was the first to respond. "You start firing that thing, hermano, and we'll be on top of you likestink on dookie. You may get one of us, but we'll get all four of you punks."

"We've got nothing to lose," the man replied, "Give it your best shot. I'm pretty confident I'll nail two of you before anybody takes a single step."

He lifted his gun a couple of inches and aimed at Jorge's face.

"Fair enough," Jorge muttered, and put his hands in the air, "You win for now."

Minho groaned grumpily, but he raised his hands, too. "You guys better not drop your guard. That's all I'm saying."

Frankie put up her hands and followed after Thomas, who was the first to walk down the ramp. The others followed right behind, and they were led around to the back of the Berg, where an old beat-up van waited, the engine rumbling.

A lady in a protective mask sat at the steering wheel, and there was another one holding a Launcher, sitting on the bench seat behind her.

One of the men opened the side door, then gestured inside with a nod of the head.

"In you go. One wrong move and bullets start flying. Like I said, we've got nothing to lose. And I can think of a lot worse things than the world with one or two less Munies in it."

Thomas climbed into the back of the van and asked as his friends clambered in to sit beside him, "Who's paying you to steal Immunes?"

Nobody responded.

The four people who greeted them at the Berg got into the van and closed the doors. Then they aimed their weapons toward the back.

"There's a pile of black hoods in the corner," the lead guy said. "Put them on. And it won't sit well with me if I catch you peeking during the ride. We like to keep our secrets nice and safe."

Frankie worked on the odds. Seven versus six. But they all had nasty weapons, and her group didn't.

Fighting would lead to death and arguing would be pointless. She grabbed one of the hoods and slipped it over her head. All she saw was darkness as the van lurched into motion with a roar of the engine.

〰️

ALL IN ALL, it was a smooth ride, but it seemed to last forever.

Too much time to ponder and think about things, which, combined with the lack of ability to see, caused Frankie to develop a headache.

When they finally stopped and she could heard the door of the van opened, Frankie instinctively reached up to take off her hood.

"Don't do it," a guy snapped, "Don't you dare take those off until we tell you to. Now get out, nice and slow. Do us a favor and keep yourselves alive."

"You sure are a tough shank," Frankie heard Minho remark, "Easy to do when you've got six people with guns. Why don't you—"

He was cut off by the thump of a hard punch, followed by a loud grunt.

Serves the guy right, Frankie thought. After all this time, he should have learned to read the situation and control his tongue.

She just hoped it wasn't too painful.

Hands grabbed Frankie and pulled her out of the van so roughly that she almost fell down. Once she got her balance back, the person yanked again and started leading her away.

Frankie was barely able to keep her feet under herself.

She kept quiet as she was led down a set of stairs and then down a long hallway. They stopped, she heard the swipe of a key card, the click of a lock, then the creak of a door opening.

As it did, murmurs of hushed voices filled the air. The guard gave her a push and she stumbled forward onto the floor.

She immediately reached up and yanked the hood off her head, just as the door closed behind her.

Frankie only had a second to scan her surrounding —a huge room filled with people sitting on the floor, before a woman tapped her shoulder and asked, "What's it like out there? We've been in here for a few hours, and things were falling apart. Has it gotten worse?"

Thomas answered at her stead, "We were outside the city—they got us at the gates. What do you mean things were falling apart? What happened?"

"The government declared a state of emergency, without any kind of warning. Then the police, the cop machines, the Flare testers—they all disappeared. All at once, it seemed. We got snagged by these people trying to get work at the city building. There wasn't even time to figure out what was happening or why."

"We were guards over at the Crank Palace," another man said. "Others like us had been disappearing left and right, so we finally gave up and came to Denver a few days ago. We got nabbed at the airport, too."

"How'd everything get so bad, so suddenly?" Reggie asked, "We were here three days ago."

Frankie's gaze wandered around the room and she froze when she spotted Marie at the back of the room.

"Marie," she called out before she could stop herself.

The said girl broke into a grin and ran over.

She reached Reggie first and embraced him for a few seconds, Harriet hot on her tail. Then she pulled away just as Minho helped Frankie got up to her feet.

At first, the two girls stood in front of her as if she was about to shake her hand. But they ended up hugging instead.

"Glad to see you you're okay, Frannie."

The three of them smiled —their long forgotten friendship now restored.

"You, too."

Marie looked around to Reggie, Minho, Newt, Thomas, Jorge, and Brenda, "All of you."

They were joined in by Aris and some of the other ex-subjects.

"Where's everyone?" Newt asked.

Aris' face darkened, "Most of them aren't with us anymore. They got taken by another group of bounty hunters yesterday —they've probably already been taken back and sold to WICKED. Including Frypan. I'm sorry."

Before they could process it, Teresa appeared.

"Teresa?" Thomas blanched.

"Hey, Tom," she stepped closer to him with eyes moistened by tears, "I'm so glad you're okay."

"Yeah, you too."

"Where did you guys go?" she asked, "How did you get all the way to Denver?"

"What do you mean, where did we go?" Minho spoke, "You are the one who left us five to be poked around or die."

"There's obviously been some miscommunication," Teresa countered as calmly as possible.

He leaned in with a sarcastic smile, "I can see you're as cheerful as always. So glad to be back in your sunshiny presence."

She completely ignored him.

"Tom, they'll be moving us soon. Please come talk to me. In private. Now."

Thomas sighed, though anybody could tell that he was eager for a one-on-one with Teresa, "The Rat Man already gave me his big speech. Please tell me you don't agree with him and think I should go back to WICKED."

"I don't even know what you're talking about."

Thomas stared at her for a long moment, not sure how he felt.

"Well?" Teresa asked. She motioned to their surroundings. "Not a lot to do in here but wait around. Are you too busy to talk to me?"

Thomas pointed to a couple of empty chairs in the corner of the large room. "Let's go, but make it quick."

"Their love hate relationship is killing me," a girl Frankie recognized as Angela said.

"Brenda," Reggie walked over. Brenda glared at him, daring him to say anything.

But he dared.

"How does it feel to be Thomas' mistress?"