Trevor heard Terrence, his voice tentative and wary.
“Christopher? What is that?”
Trevor looked up.
“Christopher? Why do you have that?”
Terrence was referring, apparently, to what looked like a small black tablet in Christopher’s hands.
Lila was beside him, one hand on her big belly.
Heather was watching them both, while Lila’s eyes, in turn, focused on her mother’s.
“Christopher … ”
“I wanted to ask you about this, Terrence,” Christopher said, his free hand finding Lila’s waist, both of them keeping their distance. “I wanted to get your help, so I think if you just listen, you’ll agree with us.” The tension in Terrence and in Dan, still in the living room, was obvious, though Trevor hadn’t yet figured out why. Both looked like they might be weighing odds. But Christopher and Lila were by themselves in the middle of the combined room, Christopher’s thumb hovering above the tablet’s surface.
“Agree with you about what, Christopher?”
“I figured if you didn’t understand and agree, there wouldn’t be another chance. So there was really no choice. This is what’s best for everyone. But not everyone will agree right away.” His eyes flicked toward Heather, who was still locking eyes with Lila.
“Just set it down. Just put it down, and I’ll listen to your … your plan. Okay?”
“We can’t stay here.” He was looking around the room, addressing them all. “I know this might sound kind of crazy, but … ” He looked at Lila for help.
Lila had looked self-assured while watching her mother. Now, facing everyone — including Raj, who looked wounded that she was doing whatever this was with Christopher rather than him — she seemed far less sure. Lila looked like a girl asked to sing in front of a crowd, suddenly uncertain about the voice she’d once thought so fabulous.
“Terrence,” she began, seeming to find a loophole. “Remember how you felt after finding those rocks outside?”
“Surprised.” Terrence removed his sunglasses and poked them into what was becoming a large, untidy afro.
“No, I mean … we could see it on the video. Or, I guess, since you were wearing the camera, maybe we could hear it. In your voice. Your mind kind of opened up, didn’t it?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
Christopher took over. “Come on, Terrence. We all saw it. You lit up like a Christmas tree. Then for days afterward you were acting like you’d intercepted the secrets of the universe. Don’t pretend you didn’t.”
“Maybe.”
“Well, I think the stones must be doing something to me. Or to … ” Lila looked down, but Trevor thought he could pinpoint the second she decided not to attribute anything to her unborn baby, knowing how nuts it would sound. “To me,” she repeated. “And I can kind of see some things. Or hear them, or whatever. And I know that … that … ”
“You didn’t even go outside, Lila.” Terrence had his palm out, presumably for Christopher to hand over him the tablet. Trevor still wan’t sure exactly what it was, but he could see the way Dan was looking, too.
“It doesn’t matter. I can tell the difference between normal and … enhanced thoughts.”
Terrence turned his outstretched hand into a pacifying, palms-forward gesture then leaned against the kitchen table.
“Okay. What do you think you know?”
Heather stood, apparently unwilling to let Lila hog the floor.
“I know it too,” she said.
Terrence’s eyes ticked toward Heather. So, Trevor noticed, did Christopher’s. If the thing in Christopher’s hand was dangerous, someone on the ball could have easily snatched it. Trevor almost wanted to. He’d thought Christopher was his friend, and yet he hadn’t been told about any of this. Somehow he’d ended up shackled to his mother instead. Was it too late to change sides? Maybe he could just stand and join them, as a show of solidarity.
“This place is important to them somehow,” Heather went on.
“To who?”
Heather looked up. “Them.”
Terrence looked from one woman to the other. “So you’ve talked. You agree about something.”
“Talked, yes,” said Heather. “Agreed? No.”
Terrence stood fully again, moving slowly. He looked again to each party in turn then held out his hand. “If you all seem to know something, we’ll talk. Of course we’ll talk. But we’ve gotta do it rationally. Hand me the controller, Christopher.”
Christopher looked like he wanted to obey but shook his head. “If you don’t agree with us, we’ll have missed our only chance.”
“What chance?”
“To destroy it.”
“Chris … ”
“We can get out. There’s still that one brick we left outside, by the garage. I can blow that one first. That’ll create enough of a distraction to get us out without anyone stopping us or trying to get back in. Slam the door behind us. I won’t trigger the rest until — ”
“Christopher,” said Terrence, his voice mostly steady but beginning to hitch with nerves, “tell me you didn’t wire up any of the other bricks. Tell me you weren’t stupid enough to try and do that by yourself.”
“I saw where you stuck the spare key to the weapons closet.”
“Chris … ”
“And I’m not stupid,” he said, a tad defensively. “I can stick detonators into bricks of clay.”
“It’s not that simple. This isn’t your grandfather’s C-4. It’s — ”
“I know they’re armed.” He held up the small tablet. “I did it right. We’re still here, aren’t we?”
“Where is it, Christopher? Where did you wire the explosives?” Both hands up now, palms out and hoping for peace. Christopher was starting to crack, and Lila had grabbed the back of a chair for stability. She looked like she might cry or pass out. Maybe both.
His eyes ticked toward Trevor and his mother. “In the generator room.”
Terrence’s eyes flicked toward the closed door.
“I set it right, Terrence. Blast directed straight down, just like you explained outside.”
“Christopher, we’re inside a concrete block. It’s not like outside.”
“That’s why we’re leaving before I blow it.”
“We’re not leaving,” Heather said.
“We’re leaving.”
“We’re not leaving.” Then, unbelievably, Heather took a step forward.
Lila spoke up. “Mom, I know you think that — ”
“I don’t THINK! I KNOW!”
“You don’t know, Mom! Just because you’re having dreams of Dad doesn’t mean the real Dad would — ”
“Not ‘would’! ‘Does’! We shared things. I know goddamned well when it’s him I’m talking to rather than just … just dreams … and — ”
“That’s such bullshit!” Lila blurted.
“Why haven’t the ships broken their way in here and killed us all if you’re right, Lila? If they think we’re a threat — ”
Lila jabbed a finger at Christopher’s tablet. “We goddamned well are a threat!”
“And you think they don’t know that? They’re in my head! They’re in your head! They’re in Terrence’s head, for shit’s sake!” A finger jabbed at Terrence. “You saw what happened when they tried to plant just one little explosive outside. What happened, Li? The ship showed up and killed Vincent, that’s what. Then it killed a bunch of those assholes outside to stomp its foot. But it didn’t kill us, did it? And that doesn’t sound like a warning to you? A threat that you’d make if you didn’t want to hurt anyone else but needed to make a point — ”
“That ship killed a whole bunch more people! And you want to do what they want? You don’t want to destroy this thing that’s so important to them, and protect it instead?”
“But look at who they killed! They got Vincent, to make a point. But not Christopher, or Terrence. They left the bunker alone, even though they have to kn
ow we’re here. Why, Lila? Stop your tantrum for a fucking second, and ask yourself why, why they’d leave us alone as long as we didn’t mess up their plans, and what they might do if you go and do something stupid, if … if … ”
Heather’s head cocked to the side.
“If … ”
Trevor could hear what she was hearing, too. A small noise between his mother’s angry words. A tinny, canned sound, coming from one of the control room speakers.
Raj was closest. Ignoring Christopher’s tablet-based threat, he looked around the rest of the group then went through the door without a word.
“Raj, get out here right now or I’ll … !” Christopher stopped when Raj stuck his head back out, his face puzzled.
“It’s Piper,” he said. “She’s outside, asking to come back in.”
CHAPTER FIFTY
Lila looked toward Raj. Christopher looked toward Lila. Terrence looked toward Christopher, and then, in the split second of distraction, kicked hard at his knee.
Christopher crumpled. Despite being the tech wizard and appearing far less impressive than Vincent, Dan, or even Christopher, Terrence must have been trained in combat because his strike was precise, hard, perfect.
Lila gasped. Christopher slid almost sideways, leg buckling, grasping at his knee, face twisting in pain. Lila saw it all. And she saw the tablet seem to leap from his hand, flat like a place setting atop a yanked-away tablecloth.
She tried to grab for it, but it had been in Christopher’s other hand. She’d lost her agility to pregnancy and wasn’t close. The thing struck one of the kitchen rugs on its corner, and she gasped again, somehow certain that a strike to the trigger would cause the explosives to fire. But as the tablet seemed to bounce and settle on its face, she realized that didn’t make sense. Attaching the detonators and programming the trigger had been far simpler than they’d imagined. They didn’t need Terrence’s help for something so idiot proof.
And of course, idiots dropped things.
Lila tried to dive for the tablet, but Terrence beat her to it, stepping on the thing and pinning it to the floor. He swung back as if to hit her but seemed to reconsider striking a pregnant teenager and reached to help her up instead, still pinning the tablet.
Lila liked Terrence a lot. But stopping whatever evil stuff the aliens had in mind was important enough to risk killing them all, so instead of taking his offered hand, she punched him hard in the groin.
Terrence, unprepared, teetered with abject shock. He didn’t fall but did stutter-step, sending the tablet under his foot backward, toward the living room.
Dan watched it skid out of the kitchen and leaped gracelessly over the back of the love seat, landing awkwardly in a heap. Terrence had fallen to one knee, nowhere near it.
Christopher was back on the move. Hobbling, he fell forward. His fingers grazed the tablet’s brushed-metal back, but Dan’s feet had landed close, and he kicked at it with the backs of his shoes, trying to knock it away from Christopher, toward his hands.
Christopher heaved, got his hand on the tablet. Dan kicked down hard, driving his rubber heel into the back of Christopher’s hand.
Lila, still on her knees, could only watch. She stood in slow motion, finding herself beside her mother: the two Dempsey women reunited by turmoil. Raj was to Heather’s right, still with his head stuck out of the control room like a groundhog heralding spring’s arrival. He seemed torn between the screen that had so recently shocked him and the fighting outside.
Lila felt the ticking clock. Christopher had wired the bombs, placing most of the stash directly above the hole her mother had squirreled in the generator room. Lila had watched with mixed feelings. It was hard to believe that a handful of hours ago, her biggest concern hadn’t been the thunderclap they were setting to destroy all her father had built — but was instead her newly implied obligation to Christopher, and what it might mean in her conflicted relationship with Raj.
For a while, Lila could only see bodies and limbs. Her heart hammered under shallow breath as time slowly unfolded. Terrence had kicked the trigger from Christopher’s possession maybe twenty or thirty seconds ago, yet it felt like an eternity gone.
Dan reached. Christopher lashed out. Terrence punched Christopher hard on the side, but then Christopher took a page from Lila’s book and kneed him hard in the jimmies.
The tablet skidded across the living room’s glassy floor and came to rest against a pair of white-soled sneakers.
Trevor stooped and picked up the tablet. Nobody moved.
He turned the tablet over, and Lila could see that the front, made of unbreakable sapphire crystal, was undamaged. The on-screen trigger controls were still active.
Beside Lila, Heather exhaled heavily, sounding relieved that her team had the ball. She looked about to step forward when Trevor said the least likely thing anyone expected.
“Where is she?”
Heather stopped. Then, sounding out of breath despite having barely moved, she said, “Where’s who, Trev?”
Trevor ignored his mother and turned to look at Raj, the tablet held firmly in his hands.
“Where is she, Raj?”
It took Raj a moment to understand. Then he blinked, looked over his shoulder, and said, “East. Looks like one of the cameras strapped to a low tree. She’s talking right into the mic, which is the only reason we heard her.”
“What’s she saying?”
“‘Let me in.’” Raj recited. He swallowed then added, “‘Please.’”
“Let her in.”
Raj looked helplessly at Terrence, who was still on the floor, then back up at Trevor.
“Me?”
“Let her in, Raj.”
“I can’t let her in.”
“Do it. Now.”
Raj didn’t seem to know what to think, but Lila could only hear her father: Meyer Dempsey in Trevor Dempsey’s words.
“I … I can’t. Only Terrence can … ”
Heather took another step, reaching out. Trevor turned away.
“Get back. Everyone just stay where you are.”
“Trevor, honey. Why don’t you give that to me?”
Trevor shook his head, looking past Raj and into the control room.
“For safekeeping, Trevor. We did it. We stopped them.”
Christopher was getting to his feet. He moved to stand beside Lila, limping. The same confused, betrayed expression returned to Raj’s dark features as he watched their reunion.
“Trev,” said Christopher.
“Shut up.”
“I need your help, buddy. We both do.”
“Quiet, Christopher.”
“That’s right.” Heather touched Trevor’s arm. “Shut your fucking mouth, Christopher.”
Trevor ripped his arm away and took a step back. Heather looked momentarily wounded, then hard and jaded.
“Everyone stay away from me. Give me a minute.”
Distant and small, Piper’s voice cut the silence. Trevor looked toward the control room, but Lila couldn’t make out the words.
“We’re going to get her.”
“Trevor,” Heather said, “the bombs.”
“I’ve got it under control.”
“Then give that to me.”
“No.”
Lila met her brother’s dark eyes. “I told you about this. Remember? About what I was seeing and hearing?”
“And I told you I hadn’t seen or heard shit.”
“But you understood. You understood about what I said, about Dad and — ”
“I’m the one who’s talked to your father,” Heather said, casting daggers at Lila.
“Terrence,” Trevor said.
Terrence looked over.
“Open the front door.”
“Can’t do that, Trevor.”
Trevor raised the tablet. “Do it, or I set off some fireworks.”
“Careful, Trevor. You press that, and we’re all — ”
“Dead?” Trevor laughed. “Maybe. Mayb
e Lila’s right, and we’re supposed to stop something. Or maybe Mom’s right, and we’re supposed to protect it. I wouldn’t know. I’m just a dumb kid who’s spent half a year living in a hole — something we’re clearly not going to be able to just ‘go back to’ after this little fight. One way or another, I think we’re done here. At least some of us are.” He looked up, shaking his head. “There are aliens in the sky, and they’ve surrounded us with big rocks. A bunch of people are camping above us, not even caring that the ships keep coming back and frying a few here and there. I don’t know that I want to be in here anymore, and I know I want to go outside.” He stared directly at Terrence. “Maybe we’re already dead, and we just don’t know it yet.”
His finger shook above the tablet. Lila felt her breath catch, waiting.
“I’m not asking everyone to run out there. Just me. I’ll go alone.” Trevor moved one hand from the tablet and touched the pistol he’d taken to wearing on his hip in order to, Lila thought, look like a big shot. This time, it had worked out. Terrence and Dan, not cavalier enough to arm themselves indoors, had missed their opportunity to seize control.
“I’m tired of being down here, doing nothing,” Trevor said. “I’m going out there to get her. I want to do some good for once.”
“If I open the door,” said Terrence, raising his hands, “all those people up there will come in. They’ll see you walk out, and they’ll swarm.”
Lila flinched as Trevor’s finger touched the tablet’s screen once, twice, three times.
The entire bunker shook with the force of an explosion. She felt tremors climb the walls, radiate through the floors, run up her legs as if to convey news. Dust sifted down, and she felt her ears assailed, assaulted with concussive noise. Her eyes closed.
Lila was still alive when she opened them. Screaming turmoil erupted above.
Raj’s attention seemed split between the group and the control room behind him — where something terrible had happened at the home’s garage end, where a single brick of directional explosive had laid buried for three months.
“There’s our distraction.” Trevor nodded to Terrence. “Now open the door, before time’s up.”
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