Patrick and Alex stared at me like I was crazy. The flies swirled around me now, pelting the nape of my neck. It was impossible to separate the flies from the panic I felt churning the air around us and inside me.
The Chasers would catch up to us. And it would be awful.
“There’s no cover in the square!” I shouted.
One of the Hosts leapt off the roof, hit the ramp halfway down, and tumbled. Even from this distance, I could hear the snap of breaking bones. Part of me wanted to fall to the ground, cover my eyes, and give up. But another part of me rose up, stitching together the final threads of an idea that might just save us.
“What do you propose?” Patrick asked.
Ahead, two Chasers ran smoothly right off the edge of the roof onto the mound of bodies. They kept their feet down the ramp.
There was no time to explain.
“Follow me!” I screamed. “I have a plan!”
I sprinted into the current of flies, right for the oncoming Hosts. I prayed that Patrick and Alex would trust me. I could hardly see through all the flies.
The first Chaser neared, and a blast took off her head from the nose up.
Patrick, running beside me, shucked the shotgun.
As if I’d needed to worry.
I squinted into the onslaught of flies, saw Alex sprint up on my other side. A Chaser came at her, and I impaled her temple with the tip of my baling hook, then wrenched the metal free.
Alex caught the next one beneath the chin with her hockey stick, the head flopping back and nearly off. Through the hatched-open neck, I caught a glint of dull white building blocks—the vertebrae topping the spinal cord.
I thought Alex was yelling in horror and revulsion but realized it was me.
Flies beat at my eyes, my lips.
Ten more Hosts swept down the ramp. Too many.
“Chance,” Alex said, shielding her mouth with an arm. “Might be a good time to tell us what the hell you’re thinking!”
I swallowed a mouthful of panic bile, cut left hard, and bolted for Bob n’ Bit Hardware. Behind me the shotgun roared and roared, Patrick cutting a wake.
I shoulder-smashed through the front door, spilling into the dark aisles. Alex flew through next, knocking into me. We dominoed over into Shower and Sink Fixtures, knocking items from the shelves. Patrick turned in the doorway, facing outside—shuck-shuck boom, shuck-shuck boom.
“I can’t hold ’em off!” he shouted.
“Let them in!” I yelled, scrambling to my feet.
The forge in the back workshop threw off a dangerous orange glow, casting licks of light around the walls and onto the waist-high mounds of bullets. Over by the anvil, a few rifles lay twisted and useless. Beside them a crate held shackles that the gunmetal had been turned into. A few old-fashioned weather vanes leaned against the wall, linked by a glistening spiderweb.
Bob Bitley was still kneeling on the floor where I’d left him, his head bowed, a pair of tongs protruding from his eyeholes. Fluid puddled the floor beneath his knees. His skin oozed around him, his face sitting off-kilter like a too-big mask. Flies circled his head, a buzzing cloud. They’d gotten in through the rolled-open rear door.
I gave him wide berth, scrambling over the heaps of rounds that glittered and jingled like treasure. As I beelined for the forge, a series of loud crashes shook the store. I shot a glance back. Patrick had tilted over a tall display of gardening tools, trying to block the Hosts. They climbed over the wreckage, blank-faced and eyeless, their hands straining in the air.
I positioned myself behind the forge and kicked it as hard as I could. It didn’t yield a bit. It was fastened to the floor. I kicked again, jabbing my heel into the metal side, releasing a fairy dust of sparks. It gave slightly.
Alex finally got what I was doing and sprinted over to help. Her knee brushed Bob Bitley, and he crumbled, keeling over and collapsing, the tongs ringing against the concrete.
We synchronized our blows so we hit the forge at the same time. It tilted up a bit this time, the giant bolts rattling in their holes.
The Hosts kept pouring into the hardware store, driving Patrick back to the doorway of the workshop. The Winchester spoke and then spoke again.
“Guys!” Patrick shouted over his shoulder. “We’re running out of room here!”
Alex’s cheeks were flushed, her eyes lit with the flame. “On three,” she said. “One, two, three.”
We hammered our heels into the forge as hard as we could. It groaned upward. When the bolts snapped, they sounded like gunshots. The whole thing toppled, spilling the glowing contents across the mounds of ammunition.
“Run!” I screamed at Patrick.
He fired one last time. As he stepped back into the workshop, Hosts poured across the threshold after him.
We sprinted out the rear door into the back alley. Alex was already outside, rolling it shut. As Patrick flew through, the edge of the door clipped his shoulder and sent him tumbling. A Host arm shot through the gap. Smashing shut, the door took it clean off. Bodies thudded against the other side, fingernails scraping.
As Alex leaned her weight into the handle to keep the door closed, Patrick jammed a shovel beneath the gap, kicking it until it was wedged into place.
The door shuddered, more and more Hosts packing into the workshop. The wood splintered. A leg smashed through, exposed bone and muscle dripping crimson. A hand burst out next, knocking Alex’s hair so it fluffed up beside her head. She reeled back. The whole panel started to give way.
I pictured the orange spill of the forge melting into those bullets and wheeled around.
The general store loomed next to us at the alley’s end, its back tucked into the hillside. We couldn’t see up on the roof, but the moonlight threw stretched-out shadows down onto the alley. Judging from those shadows, the Hosts had thinned out. There were only a few dark silhouettes now, the last stragglers spilling from the woods onto the tar-and-gravel roof above.
We wouldn’t have time to wait for them to clear out.
We took off down the alley toward the general store just as the explosions started.
At first there were a few bangs, followed by moist smacks. They intensified, popcorn getting up a head of steam on the stovetop. Patrick and Alex followed me through the rear exit of the general store. As we hurdled the back counter and barreled up the aisles, the explosions quickened. A few rounds penetrated the wall, zinging overhead.
We careened outside as the detonations reached a drumroll pitch, the ammo snowballing until it sounded like one continuous roar. Most of the Hosts had followed our trail into the Bob n’ Bit, but those that remained outside lunged for us.
We didn’t slow down. We couldn’t. My baling hooks were a blur before my face. Alex’s hockey stick whirred by. We cleared a path to the ramp of squirming bodies.
Then we waded up it.
Our legs sank in to the ankles. We had to fight our way through the last of the Hosts even as we bulled our way up the putrefying flesh. Flies typhooned around us.
Patrick’s shotgun choke was set wide, so we let him lead. He cleared two Hosts with a spray of pellets. I felt a cheek cave beneath my boot, a guppying mouth locking around my heel.
As we charged up the last hard-fought yards of squirming ramp, fireworks erupted behind us, sending shrapnel flying. At last we pulled free of the wriggling slope onto the solid roof.
There were only a few Hosts left when the explosions behind us surged into a massive ka-boom that knocked us off our feet. I flew sprawling over one shoulder, my cheek scraping gravel. As I fell, I caught a crazy sideways glimpse of the general store’s walls and roof flying apart.
A wave of heat ripped across us, the flies dropping dead, hammering the roof all around us like hail. My ears rang. I rolled over to face the threat, but the Hosts who’d stood between us and the woods had collapsed into heaps. The explosion had disintegrated their failing bodies.
Patrick stood over me, his black cowboy hat blotting out the mo
on. He offered me a hand. We grasped around the wrists, and he yanked me to my feet. I staggered a little, and Alex caught me.
“Nice shortcut, boys,” she said.
Together we limped off the roof and up the slope, at last losing ourselves among the trees.
ENTRY 22
Our old house looked haunted.
Not haunted-house haunted, but haunted like when you see a news story about a car accident and there’s an empty shoe sitting on the stained asphalt. Haunted like the kill floor of the Braaten slaughterhouse after hours. Haunted like my mom’s purse filled with colored glass, nestled there in the bottom of a cardboard box from the Stark Peak PD.
Patrick and I stood shoulder to shoulder before the porch of Uncle Jim and Aunt Sue-Anne’s ranch house, staring up. Ever since that muni bus had turned Mom and Dad’s Chrysler into a crumpled tin can, this had been our home.
They’d died here in front of this house, Jim and Sue-Anne, at my hand and Patrick’s. There was no sign of blood in the dirt, not anymore. We’d brought their bodies upstairs, and nature had cleaned up the rest.
Alex lingered behind, giving us space. The moon had lost itself behind invisible clouds, the sky as thick as ink. We were an hour and fifteen minutes early for our meet with the Rebel. Which, given the dreary mood settling over me and my brother, felt like an hour and fifteen minutes too long.
Patrick said, “Why don’t we rinse off our boots.”
Not a question.
The hose coiled next to the porch still worked. We sprayed off the gunk. After our adventures at the general store, there was plenty.
We finished, walked up to the screen door, and paused.
“Okay,” I said.
“Okay,” Patrick said, and palmed the screen open.
A layer of dust had blown through the mesh, powdering the entryway. We walked in, our wet boots leaving perfect prints. I rested my hand on the newel post and looked up the stairs.
“Should we?” I asked.
“Prob’ly.” Patrick turned to Alex. “We’re gonna pay our respects.”
“I’ll wait down here,” she said. “Take whatever time you need.”
We made our way upstairs and then down the hall. The last time we’d been inside was the night we’d found Hank McCafferty on top of the water tower, spores drifting out of his split-open body and riding a wind current into town. We’d rescued Rocky and JoJo that night. We’d killed Jim and Sue-Anne, too, after they’d transformed. And found Alex locked in a vintage steamer trunk.
It had been a long night.
We paused outside Jim and Sue-Anne’s door. We could smell them from out here, but it wasn’t as bad as it might have been. If it were summer, it would’ve been a whole other story.
Patrick turned the knob.
Two lumps beneath the covers where we’d left them, side by side. Uncle Jim’s hat tilted on top of the pillowcase draped over his head. They looked peaceful.
We stood at the footboard.
Patrick took his Stetson off, held it against his chest. An oddly contrived gesture, especially for him, but we were flying blind here. He cleared his throat. “Glad you guys have each other,” he told them.
“They’re starting to stink,” I said.
“Respect, Chance.”
“Seriously, Patrick. This isn’t respect. This is stupid.” Our run-in with the horde of Hosts at the general store had left me raw and callous. Angry even, in ways I didn’t understand. “We’re talking to rotting corpses.” I gestured at what remained of our aunt and uncle. “How would you like to be like this?”
“Probably not much,” he said. “For a variety of reasons.”
“We should do something. Like bury them.”
“We have more pressing concerns right now. Plus, it’s not like they know the difference.”
“Fine.” I looked back over at their covered bodies. It was clear to me that those decomposing forms on the bed had nothing to do with my aunt and uncle anymore. Like all those Host bodies ambling around, they’d had the essential parts of who they used to be plucked out of them. I had to say something, though, because Patrick was looking at me expectantly, and I was the one who usually found words for stuff like this. I cleared my throat. “Sorry, Uncle Jim. Sorry, Aunt Sue-Anne. I wish we could’ve done better for you.”
Patrick gave a nod at that. “Anything else?”
“Let’s get out of here.”
We closed the door behind us.
Downstairs, Alex had prepared a meal at our old kitchen table. She’d even set out silverware on Sue-Anne’s lace tablecloth and lit a few candles. She must’ve found a can of pumpkin-pie filling and two cans of green beans in the pantry, because there they were, open and placed before Sue-Anne’s hideous holiday china.
“Check me out, getting all domestic,” Alex said. “Now, sit.”
We did.
The smell of human bodies lingered in the air. The green beans were slimy and cold, and even a few twists of Sue-Anne’s big wooden salt mill couldn’t help. The pumpkin-pie filling was gloopy. The flickering candlelight reminded me of those times during power outages after tornadoes blew through, turning the power lines into spaghetti. It was the saddest Thanksgiving dinner ever.
But also sort of wonderful.
“Okay.” Alex wiped her mouth with a fancy cloth napkin and tossed it onto her empty plate. “We all need to say what we’re thankful for.”
“You go first,” I said.
“Fine. If I had to say what I’m grateful for…” Her eyes lowered to her plate, an uncharacteristically shy gesture. “It’s you two. My boys.” She looked at us. “What?”
Patrick’s lips pursed in that not-quite-a-smile thing he did when he was amused. “We didn’t say anything.”
She threw her napkin at him. “I’m serious. It’s always been us, and it’ll always be us. And that’s what I’m grateful for on this screwed-up Thanksgiving.” She adjusted her silverware, though it needed no adjusting. “You next.”
“My little brother,” Patrick said. “And…” He pretended to think awhile until Alex glared at him. Then he half grinned and said, “And the love of my life.”
Alex had her jigsaw pendant out, and she was rubbing it with her thumb. She realized and dropped it back beneath her collar. They both looked at me.
“Same thing,” I said. “It’s you two bozos. Duh.”
“And Eve,” Alex said, ribbing me, but I could tell her heart wasn’t in it.
I kicked her shin gently under the table, and she said, “You’d better eat more, Little Rain, if that’s the strongest kick you can manage.”
We laughed, but then all at once Patrick stood up so fast his chair toppled over.
Standing past the threshold of the kitchen a few steps into the living room, a form stood in darkness.
ENTRY 23
We stared across the kitchen table at the shadowy figure in the living room.
Charcoal space suit, tinted face mask.
Patrick grabbed for his shotgun, but I said, “No, it’s okay. It’s him.”
Alex twirled her hockey stick. “Looks just like a Drone.”
“That’s what I told you guys.”
“Patrick Rain. Chance Rain. And … Girl.” Amplitude bars wobbled on the face mask with each word as it translated, a blue glow that widened and closed like a mouth.
“Really?” Alex said. “That’s all I get? Unnamed Girl?”
I moved toward him. “It’s us.”
Patrick and Alex came reluctantly, keeping their weapons. I brought my baling hooks, too, because—why not?
We stood in a loose ring on the carpet.
It was all so surreal. Standing in our living room, talking to a Rebel from another planet, a planet that had been overtaken by the Harvesters just like they were trying to overtake Earth now. The few surviving Rebels had tried to fight back, had come here to warn us before the Harvesters wiped out another people and notched another planet in their win column.
I
cleared my throat uncomfortably. I didn’t exactly have a lot of experience dealing with saviors from other worlds, but I imagined there was some kind of etiquette for it. “Would you like to … um, sit down?”
“Why?” The digitized masculine voice sounded not so much robotic as perfect, all the flaws and irregularities smoothed out.
“I don’t know,” I said. “To relax.”
“Why would I want to relax?”
“It’s just what people do here,” I said. “When we talk.”
The Rebel sat abruptly on the carpet. Alex stifled a laugh.
“I meant on the couch or an armchair or whatever,” I said.
He repositioned himself, and then we all sat around the low glass table like we were having tea. Moonlight seeped through the closed metal slats of the venetian blinds in the big front window, laying patterns across the carpet and our faces.
I could sense Patrick and Alex studying him. They hadn’t seen a Rebel up close like I had. His suit was airtight and seamless like those of the Drones, but in contrast to their sleek, polished armor his was chipped and scuffed up. The color was different, too, a matte charcoal compared to the shiny black of the Drones’.
Patrick leaned forward, elbows on knees, folding his hands. “This mission I keep hearing about. You came here looking for us.”
“Yes,” the Rebel said.
“Why did you know who we were already?” I asked.
“Because,” he said, “we put you here.”
I tried to swallow. “Uh, what?”
Patrick pulled back, his spine straightening one vertebra at a time. Alex’s mouth was hanging open.
The amplitude waves flared back to life. “We managed to smuggle a group of genetically modified human ova into the fertility banks here.”
A blue light shot out from his chest plate, projecting a hologram above the glass table between us. We watched, captivated.
It showed a guy in an old-fashioned-looking biohazard suit, like something from one of those atomic-bomb documentaries. We couldn’t see his face behind the tinted eye shield. He lumbered down a cold tile corridor in a building that had been shut down for the night. In his puffy glove, he held a medical canister made of surgical steel. He pressed a code into a keypad, and two doors to a freezer unit opened with a hiss. He disappeared into the wisps of cool air.
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