Either way, the question remained: How?
Sanghani had been summoned back to the farm, while Valk had stuck around. At one point, she brought me a paper cup of hot tea. “Are they making any progress?” she asked.
“Wish I knew.”
“Hrm.” She sounded disapproving, but I could’ve been imagining that; her face didn’t give me many clues to work with. Was she thinking the same thing as Sanghani? Was she disappointed in me?
“Do you think I was selfish?” I asked without meaning to. “For running?”
“Doesn’t matter. You came back.”
I smiled wryly. “Sounds like a ‘yes.’”
“Look.” She sounded reluctant. “If anyone had to be in this position, I’m glad it’s you. You came back because you’re not selfish. It’s not easy giving up your whole life to protect others. I know. It’s not the same, but . . .” She lifted one hand and wiggled her ring finger. I saw a thin, white line around the base, where a wedding band might’ve been. “Too many secrets. Too much time away from home. Too much focus elsewhere.”
Meaning me. Meaning the rift.
Abruptly, Valk added: “No regrets. Not after these past days.”
“I didn’t realize—” I started.
“Take a break. We’ll leave soon.” She pointed to an open van.
I watched her stalk off, wrapping my hands around the tea she’d brought. I’d learned more about Valk in the past minute than I had in years of working with her. I’d always thought she was neutral toward me at best—that she did her job simply because it was her job—but maybe there was more to it.
I was in this situation because I had no choice. People like Valk did. People like Torrance did. They believed in something.
Inside the van Valk had pointed me at, Torrance sat covered under a mountain of blankets, her dyed-blond locks a ruffled mess. She frowned intently at a screen, but brightened when I entered. She gestured at a stool by her side.
I sat, taking small sips of my tea and observing the monitor. I had to focus. I had a mission. “What are you doing?”
“Grunt work,” she said. “I’m summarizing some of the findings and double-checking the data.”
“Like what?” I tried to sound casual instead of interrogatory.
“I don’t know whether I’m supposed to tell you.”
“I’ve been keeping government secrets for sixteen years and a day.”
She gave me an appraising look.
“I tell you mine, you tell me yours?” I tried.
Torrance laughed. “What do you have?”
“The dragon said . . .” I watched her reaction for any scoffing or grimacing. I vividly recalled Facet’s dismissal at the hospital. So far, so good. “All right. Imagine it’s raining. There’s a hole in your shoe. You don’t know how to fix it, so you just wrap a plastic bag around the shoe. You know? So at least your foot won’t get wet?”
“That’s a very specific example.”
“It was last year and I had to walk back from mini-golf and I didn’t want to bother—Look, you understand what I mean, right? Blocking the hole instead of closing it. Like boarding up a broken door.”
“Yes. Hm.” She blew a lock from her eyes. “Could be interesting. How do we pull that off?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, how literal are we talking about? Is it a physical barrier?”
“I . . . don’t know.”
She snort-laughed. “I guess that’d have been too much to ask for. All right. We’ll look into it.”
“Yeah? For real?”
“For real.”
I knew I should be more skeptical of the MGA, but Torrance said it so decisively, so earnestly, that I felt myself believing her nonetheless.
“So,” I said, “your turn.”
She waffled a bit before giving in. “All right. They have a theory about the reason the rift bounces around. Imagine a piece of fabric, right? It’s wrapped around a basketball, stretched completely taut.” A hand emerged from her blankets. She drew a circle in the air, then tapped at one spot. “Now, right here, the fabric tears. What happens?” She was talking so animatedly she didn’t wait for an answer. “Because it’s under so much strain, the tear rips further. To prevent that, you might try to hold those torn sides together, right? So the weak fabric around the hole doesn’t get strained?”
“Yeah. I think.”
“Except the fabric is still pulled taut. So when you bring the two edges together, you put the fabric under so much extra strain that a hole might tear open somewhere else. In the next weakest spot. This is the process that we think makes the rift move. Well, it’s nothing like this at all, of course; I’m just helping you visualize it. Maybe I should’ve explained it in terms of weather and air pressure . . . Anyway. Point is, when the rift moves, it could simply be migrating to a welcoming environment. The weak spots.”
“What makes a weak spot?”
“It’s related to the magnetic field. And other things. I have no explanation that doesn’t require a degree in theoretical physics. Sorry.” She grimaced.
“But why? Once the rift opens in a welcoming weak spot, why move to a new spot? What’s the thing that, um, tries to hold the torn sides of the fabric together?”
“Excellent question!” Torrance nodded so enthusiastically that one of her blankets started slipping. She grabbed it before it hit the floor. “That’s one of the things they’re trying to determine. Is the rift too chaotic to remain stationary? Is something pushing it closed so it has to keep moving?”
I thought of the Power’s words: The fabric of nature is fairly resilient. What did that mean? Our world was pushing back and trying to close the rift, only for it to reopen elsewhere?
“I wonder whether this boarding-up-the-door solution you mentioned translates to somehow blocking or canceling out the weak spots. Making the environment inhospitable. We have some people exploring that already, but maybe . . . I’ll bring it up. Anyway.” She shook her head as though snapping herself out of it. “We’re getting close to identifying weak spots early. We can see where the fabric is fraying, so to speak, and determine likely next locations. Four out of five times, the rift reappears in one of our predicted locations. We’ve kept the National Guard informed so they can fully evacuate and lock down the high-risk areas. We also got them to empty out West Asherton so we don’t need to tiptoe around the population as much.”
“You said the rift was expanding further.”
“Yeah.” She scratched her head, messing her hair up even more. “The frayed edges allow it to grow. It’s especially worrisome because those weak spots are clustered around the Philadelphia area. Farther out, the fabric gets more stable. This means the rift is likely causing the weak spots in the area. Its presence destabilizes its surroundings, which then creates openings for it to migrate to. But when it keeps migrating, keeps destabilizing its surroundings, and keeps creating new weak spots, those weak spots eventually start to overlap.”
I mulled over her words. “So the rift itself can grow more easily, too?”
“Exactly. If the rift’s surroundings are frayed enough—and the whole Philadelphia area is looking pretty damn frayed—it’ll be like a bucket of water rushing to fill an open space. And if that space, that weak area, is miles across . . .”
The expression on her face said enough.
“Bye-bye, Pennsylvania,” I whispered.
“Bye-bye,” Torrance said, “North America.”
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
Then—
“Evac!” someone outside shouted. My head snapped up.
One moment: Silence.
The next: Action.
Researchers outside grabbed their supplies and bolted to the vans.
“Oh, crap,” Torrance said. “The rift’s about to jump.”
“Stay in that van!” Valk yelled at me from across the highway. She sprinted toward us and climbed into the van along with the head researcher and a redheaded agent w
hose name I’d forgotten. The doors slammed shut behind them. I stared outside through the windows as our van jolted into motion.
The rift was moving. It angled downward as though it were sliding off a plate. It looked like a smudge distorting the world—like I only needed to wipe my sleeve over the glass and it’d be clean and sharp.
The rift tilted vertically.
It crashed into the asphalt.
That was the only way I could describe it—crashed—not because the rift shattered, but because the ground did. Where the rift touched it, the ground collapsed upward, inward, crumbling and whirling into nothing.
I craned my neck to keep my eyes on the rift as we drove. It tilted further, cutting a narrow crevice into the asphalt. The rift looked thinner from this angle—no, it was thinner—
Then it was gone.
The van slowed. I stared out the window. Where the rift had been there was now only calm air and broken highway.
The redheaded agent was the first to speak. “The drones will spot the new location soon. We’ve got a bet on where. If it’s near Camden, I’ll buy you a soda, Hazel.” He said the last part with a lopsided grin.
“Iced tea?”
“You got it.”
“Is the rift always like that when it closes?” Valk’s voice was as neutral as ever, but she looked pale.
“Nah,” the agent said. “Sometimes it’s worse. Three rifts ago, it caught one of our tires as we were driving off. Scariest moment of my life, hands down.”
The head researcher nodded. “Agreed. And I was present when the rift first went rogue.” Her cool eyes flitted over to me. “Hi, Hazel. Welcome back.”
By the time we drove onto the lawn of my house, I was half asleep.
The other Hazels climbed from a van that arrived moments after ours. I suppressed a yawn as I walked up to them. “I’ll show you around the grounds,” I said. Four had never seen this version of the house and surroundings. “They’re . . . not usually this badly destroyed.”
I looked around the lawn with a lump in my throat. The last time I’d been here had been with Red, Rainbow, and Neven, right outside that barn, on the cusp of leaving while everyone around us pleaded with us to stay.
And before that, it’d just been me and Red—frightened Red in her dress and that flower in her hair, running into the house and not knowing where to find her room.
It had been evening then. Much of the light had come from fires. Now, in the cold hours of dawn, I could see every inch of the destruction the rift had left behind. The crumbling holes in the barns, the splintered tree trunks, the gaps in the fence, the scorched grass. They’d removed most of the wreckage and blocked off gaps in the fences with metal plates, but it looked like a rush job. Security must no longer be a top priority. That also explained the lack of guards and agents in the area. The sky, however, was still crowded: Two helicopters hovered overhead, and a third in the distance.
Agent Valk trailed us as we crossed the lawn. She seemed more in her element here, away from the rift.
I cleared my throat. “The barn over there is normally Director Facet’s office. When I had my regular testing, it was usually in those neighboring barns. That one’s where we found Rainbow and Neven, and . . .”
Red and Rainbow looked grim. They’d known what to expect. Four stayed close by, glancing around nervously. Every few moments she pasted a transparent smile onto her face and nodded like she was paying attention and not at all freaking out.
“How did Alpha manage to escape this place? It’s like Area 51,” Rainbow said. “Badass.”
“Yeah.” I stared at the off-limits barns. Where had they kept Alpha? I couldn’t imagine the MGA putting her in a cell like Rainbow’s for two years. They must’ve given her more space. Made it look like a home. Right? God, I hoped so.
I shook my head to snap out of it. “And that’s”—I gestured—“the rift barn. When I was a baby, they built it around the rift to keep it contained and hidden. They expanded it into a proper research facility later.” One wall was blown out. Scorch marks painted the north side of the building.
The doors were open, I realized. I’d never seen them be open for longer than the few moments of someone entering or exiting before the doors would slam hermetically shut behind them. The area in front of the doors was a muddy mess with patches of burnt grass.
I abruptly turned. This tour was freaking the others out, and I wasn’t doing much better. “You get the idea. Let’s go into the house.”
Mom met us halfway down the lawn, fussing over us—were we OK? Were we tired? What did they have us doing?—but seemed to get the message when she was met with only wan smiles and half answers.
I took her arm and leaned my head against her shoulder. “I wasn’t sure you’d be here,” I said.
“Like I was going to leave you here by yourself.” We headed inside through the kitchen door.
“And Caro?”
“I sent her to your grandparents.” Mom shook her head. “Girls, it’s eight in the morning. Do you want breakfast or . . .?”
“They gave us pizza,” Red said.
“I need to sleep,” I confessed. “Feel like I’m going to collapse soon.”
After sleeping I might be in better condition to figure out what to do with the information I’d gotten from Torrance. I hadn’t been able to pry anything further out of her—or the other researchers, for that matter.
“Facet arranged extra beds. I’ll grab sheets.” Mom headed to the basement door.
Just like that, it was the four of us in my kitchen. I looked around, quietly marveling. As different as the lawn had looked, the kitchen was the same as always. Same induction cooktop, same granite countertops.
Already, the memories of Philadelphia and Damford and Neven felt curiously distant. They just didn’t fit. Not with the house. Not with me. Not with all this familiarity.
“The house is so different,” Red said.
“It’s fancy.” Four touched her hand to the tap over the cooktop. “What’s this? It looks like a faucet.”
“It is,” I said. “It’s to fill the pots.”
“Really fancy,” Four added.
“Is it?” I said, uncertain. “Let me, um . . . pour us some iced tea.”
Playing hostess was new for me. I whirled to grab the glasses, feeling the others’ eyes on my back.
“The house is so much bigger.” Four glanced out through the window blinds. “And all those barns . . . Wow. We had most torn down years ago. I doubt we had this many in the first place.”
“The MGA built new ones matching the style of the existing barns.” I poured the iced tea. “They renovated the house years ago—a bigger garage for my parents, a bigger room for me.” This wasn’t the right moment, but I blurted out: “Want to see it?”
“Definitely,” Red said.
Up in my room, my desk lamp had gotten knocked to the floor, probably from the commotion on my birthday. The rest was as I’d left it. My sheets messy, pajamas slung over my desk chair, the remotes and game controllers in a pile in the center of the beanbag.
Hesitantly, I looked at the others. I’d never had anyone to show my room to. I wanted them to love it as much as I did—and surely they had to, surely we had similar tastes—but I couldn’t tell what stood out at them. The size? The mess? The helium balloons Dad had brought in on the morning of my birthday? The hanging wicker chair and reading nook and that swirly wallpaper I’d spent so long choosing? How expensive it all was?
Were they wondering how different Alpha’s housing across the lawn must’ve been?
Maybe seeing my room would show the others my life wasn’t as bad as they’d thought. Although that only worked if they liked it—
It took a second for that to race through my mind and start all over again. Finally, Four said, “This is your room?” She gawked. “Oh my God, it’s like something out of those home renovation shows.”
“How big is that TV?” Rainbow asked. “And holy shit, are th
ose all games?”
“You have your own bathroom! And a walk-in closet!”
“I love this wallpaper, it’s amazing—”
I masked my sigh of relief. “Right? I love it, too. It’s cerise.”
Four studied photos on a shelf. Her puzzled look spoke volumes. Her family photos would probably look strange to me, too. They might’ve been taken on vacation, in Philadelphia, on the West Asherton main square with me and Carolyn digging our spoons into matching frozen yogurt cups, during a summer barbecue on a barn-free lawn . . .
I had wondered What if about my future often enough, but rarely about what I could’ve been under other circumstances.
Now I had so many versions of Could’ve been—
And it still told me nothing if none of them were me.
CHAPTER FIFTY
My room was big enough for all of us.
My bathroom wasn’t, though.
With Red using it and Four waiting at the door, I stepped into the hallway to try the shared bathroom. Locked. I slumped against the wall to wait. Exhaustion drifted across my mind like a fog.
You made a mistake, a voice whispered. You made a mistake and now there’s agents all around you and it’s too late to turn back.
Rainbow stepped from the bathroom. Both of us startled. “I didn’t know you were waiting,” she said.
I hadn’t been alone with Rainbow since the car. My eyes dropped to her bare neck. “Do you take your necklace off every night, or—? I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to freak out at it in the hospital.” I kept my voice low, although Mom was downstairs on the phone with Dad.
“I always take it off. And yes: I’ll keep it off tomorrow.”
“Thank you.” I cringed at the relief in my voice. “I’m really sorry. It’s just that I haven’t told my parents anything, and I’m not sure . . .” I’m not sure I want them to find out like this; I’m not sure I want them to find out at all; I’m not sure I’ve even found out myself, no matter what I told you.
“I get it,” she said.
Did she? I smiled wryly. “This must be a letdown for you, huh? You get to see what you could’ve been in another world, and it’s just watered-down versions of you. You must’ve expected cooler hair.”
The Art of Saving the World Page 25
