* * * * *
The rain was so heavy on the rigid plastic siding that I didn't hear them moving outside or whispering. But I did hear the chain clanking against the door, and that was enough to get me moving again.
I rolled dizzily from my position against the wall and scrambled to get beneath a large, moldy heap of canvas under one of the shop tables. Pulling it down around me, I squeezed my eyes shut, trying not to think about what kinds of things I might be huddling up against. The door creaked on its hinges. Always with this creaking. Don't the Hollows know about WD-40? God.
I stayed very still and held my breath. As if it would help. As if those things wouldn't feel the vibrations of my heartbeat.
Slow footfall. Murmuring, careful voices. One of them in particular stood out to me. It was soft and sensible and very, very British.
"Jordan?" it said, in a hesitant, amplified kind of whisper.
I burst out from under the table and stood, causing an avalanche of boxes and jars. It's a miracle that lightning didn't strike me dead that very second, because Ghi was standing right there, practically on top of me. The startled look on his face clearly indicated that he was rushing to tell every photon in the room not to fry me on the spot.
Corin stared from behind him, along with Abe, whose face was new to me. I didn't care who he was. He wasn't a Hollow, and I wasn't alone anymore. I wasn't going to die by myself in this cozy horror shack, and that was all that mattered. All the uninhibited joy was causing my sluggish circulation to speed up, which made my face hurt. It made everything hurt so much I could barely see. I was unable to utter a syllable before the questions started.
"Are you okay?"
"How long have the Hollows been gone?"
"What about your arm?"
"Are they still in this building?"
"Jesus, your lips are blue."
"Can you feel your fingers?"
I clasped the sides of my spinning head. "I don't know," I finally gasped, so baffled and deliriously happy. Until I counted the three of them. A red flag went up in my fizzling mind, flooding it with a sudden, gut-eating worry.
"Where's everyone else? Where's Jesse?"
"He's with Jackson and Khan. We split up to find you," Corin explained calmly, dissolving that particular concern. At the same time, he shrugged off his coat and threw it over my shoulders, pulling it around me securely. Ghi seemed to have had the same idea, but he'd gotten his head stuck in all his layers of sweaters. Abe hummed and began waving some pronged instrument over my head. It beeped at intervals, and he seemed happy with whatever it was telling him.
"We'll meet them outside," Corin continued, pulling the Sabre phone, that Excalibur of his, from the coat pocket now at my hip. We waited while he texted nimbly, steeling ourselves for an exodus of questionable risk. I took one look at Ghi, who now had his head and one arm completely trapped inside his own clothes, and reminded myself that, somehow, these people had made it this far without getting killed. Chances were we could still make it out of here.
"What's that?" Ghi asked, peering over the collar of his outermost sweatshirt as he pulled himself free.
Oh no.
He was staring into the place I had done my best not to notice for the past hour. The dark corner of the room where the four occupied body bags hung in a row. The one on the end was swinging again, wheezing forcefully, awakened by all our racket.
I grabbed Ghi's arm with gusto, dragging him toward the door. He continued to stare at the corner, transfixed. "It's nothing," I pleaded. "Please, let's just go."
"Someone's in there?" He began to step away, all curious and helpful. I almost screamed at him to get my point across, but remembered in time that making loud noises here would be a very bad idea.
Abe turned to see what the stir was about. His eyebrows soared the moment he saw those bags, and he quickly stepped into Ghi's path, rerouting him back toward the door.
"Yes, yes. She's right. Let's just leave that alone."
"But―"
Abe shook his head firmly. "Nothing can be done, Ghi."
Text message sent. Corin was now staring at the same corner with grave concern. "Done about what? Who are they?" He took one investigative step―
―and I stomped down on his foot, looking sharply at Abe. "Who are you again?"
"Oh, do forgive me," he said, and held out a hand. "I'm Abe. Dr. Abraham Sharma."
"Jordan," I said, and I shook his hand for a nanosecond before turning on Corin and Ghi. "You two shut the hell up and listen to Abe."
Vessel, Book I: The Advent Page 58
