17. Field Trip
Mina
After his first bout of inquisitiveness, Ben slipped in and out of consciousness a few times on the drive to the barrier, fighting it each time he began to drowse.
I tried to help at first, shaking him when he started to nod and turning up the car’s air conditioning. When it became clear it was a losing battle, I let him rest, reminding myself that, of all the people we’d rescued from the Sliver Warehouse on the day after prom, none of those who’d regained consciousness at all had gone on to lose it permanently again.
Haley had been senseless for most of a day after we’d pulled her from her pod, and she was fine now.
Even so, I hoped Ben’s relatively short captivity would show itself in a proportionate recovery period.
For the last couple miles of forest road, I k
