I was looking up some Lunar Chronicle stuff and then I thought, 'What would have happened if Kai stayed in the market place too long when he and Cinder first met?' I can't remember much so this is not by the wording in the book.
Chaos would not be how Cinder would describe it. A better word would have been heck. Chaos would have been if she and Iko were alone in the booth. Heck it was because they were still with Prince Kai. The one life that was over everyone else in the New Beijing Market Square.
Without question, he pushed himself through the booth and curtain and by safety habit, Cinder closed the store and passed him a grease stained rag. The only light present in haughty booth was from Iko's android censor. The closest thing to comfort came from an android that was obsessed with Prince Kai and was somewhat fine in dealing with the disease, Letemosis.
Cinder stole a glance at Kai. In almost a whisper, she managed "It'll be over before you know it." Her comfort words were mostly for her own and Iko's sake. Surely the palace authorities wouldn't let the Crown Prince die? When he glanced at her, the light giving a moon like present to half his face, it was all in her own will power not to look away and to the greased metal filled shelves or any random corner of the small mechanic booth.
Kai's voice seemed sorry. A sigh escaped himself, something supposedly extremely dangerous. "The palace doctors and others of authorities are coming for me," he glanced at his portscreen, "but they are only to take me. I'm very sorry. Taking another would mean taking the whole infected area. That would put the palace at risk." He did seem to be truly sorry. The health officials coming would mean Cinder at the hands of death. Fear choked her.
"You can't be serious." It came more as a question than a statement, but she prayed to the stars above that he wouldn't answer the rhetorical sentence. At his grimace, she started to shake. She looked toward Iko, who despite freaking out in her own nervous ways, treading back and forth, seemed to use the little conversation between royalty and cyborg as a widely dramatic net drama. Cinder tried not to use up too much oxygen in her creeping toward Iko. If she was going to die, despite every cell and her cyborg parts not wanting to stop functioning, breathing, feeling the earth in all the ways she could, she would at least stay close to one of her only friends, even if it was one deeply in love with the crown prince, like every other girl in the Common Wealth.
"Cinder," Iko's small voice drove her from an oncoming depression, "I'm not going to let you go. Think about Peony and dresses and Prince Kai and net dramas and-"
"I know. But Iko, it will be over once they open the booth to rescue him." Cinder nodded toward Kai. "I don't think it matters who he's with as long as they get him out safely."
Kai studied them both, eyes fixating on the next one to talk. It was clear there was a debate going in his head, but they all knew what would come of them if the palace got there before the sirens stopped.
"Maybe," he licked his lips, "maybe I can get you two out a different way. Are there any tunnels here?"
Cinder gave him a quizzical look. "Not that we know of." But now she was downloading blue prints to all of New Beijing's under ground maps.
Iko answered his question. "My data base shows there is one tunnel linking from the center of the market place to here and around the circumference. Every shop in the square has a tunnel that runs to no where or the outside gates of the palace."
There was tension in Cinder's stomach, and she wanted to keep it down. The idea of escaping seemed much to out of reach, and there was no way for her to fully translate what was going on.
Kai's hair shielded his eyes when he checked his portscreen. He addressed Cinder and Iko when the sirens stopped.
"I've been directed to take a tunnel to the palace gates. You both have permission to exit through the back door. Be very careful and you should make it home."