In the Afterlight

by Alexandra Bracken

  By the time we reached Glendale on foot, the sun was up and shining over us. The area, despite being outside of the de facto perimeter the military had set up, was still close enough to the damage to have prompted either an official or panic-induced evacuation. There wasn’t a soul alive around us. Cole had gone ahead to scout the nearby streets just to be sure, but there was this feeling, an unnatural buzz along my skin, that prevented me from relaxing. I kept my head up, scanning every corner, the nearby roofs, even the horizon of Los Angeles’s ruined skyline for its source. What started as a billowing thundercloud of unease was becoming sharper, taking on more distinct edges. I was afraid it wouldn’t fully take shape until it was already raining down over us like knives.

  The dusting of ash and soot out here had been washed into stagnant puddles by the rain a few nights before. I shook my head. It all just seemed...strange. The buildings weren’t wearing any open wounds; were stained a faint gray, not the menacing black of the inner city. I stepped over the cement block marking a parking space, and squinted at the building—a locked-up grocery store.

  “There—” Cole said, pointing at something past the small shopping center. A parking lot. With its tall streetlamps on and flickering.

  “Thank God,” Chubs said as we crossed from one parking lot into the next. He stared up at the lights like he’d never seen one before.

  Liam was already moving toward the nearest dark blue sedan, pulling a bent, wire coat hanger from the black backpack slung over his shoulder. He jimmied the lock so quickly, Cole didn’t even catch on until Liam bent over the driver’s seat, pulling out wires from beneath the dashboard, trying to spark some life back into the engine by hot-wiring it.

  “What?” Chubs called. “No minivan?”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa—” Cole said as the engine finally sputtered to life. He pulled Liam out and did something that killed the motor. “Christ, who the hell taught you that?”

  “Who do you think?” Liam snapped, ripping his arm out of Cole’s hand.

  “Harry?” Cole let out a disbelieving laugh. “Don’t they take away your halo if you teach an impressionable youth how to steal a car?”

  Liam’s look could have peeled the paint off the sedan. “Are you finished?”

  “No, I’m just—” Cole was picking at a scab, I realized, and he didn’t even know it. “Harry. Harry Boy-Scout-Troop-Leader Stewart taught you. Why?”

  “Because he trusted me not to abuse it.” Liam turned a bitter smile on him. “What, you didn’t get a lesson?”

  The look Cole shot back was even colder than Liam’s words had been. The fingers on his right hand gave a small spasm before he could tuck his hand into the back pocket of his pants.

  “God. Even Stewart family drama is boring,” Clancy said sullenly. “I thought we were in a hurry?”

  “We are.” I turned to Liam. “Did that car have any gas in it?”

  He nodded. “Enough to get us a hundred miles, I’d guess.”

  “Grand,” Cole said, “except we’re not taking that one. There’s a tan SUV over there that has your name on it.”

  Liam turned, took one look at it, and shook his head. “It’s a gas-guzzler. They’re top-heavy and more likely to roll in an accident—”

  His brother silenced him by holding up his hand and pressing his fingers together in such a condescending way, it pissed me off, too. “Are you planning on getting into an accident? Then shut the hell up and do what I tell you—”

  “You don’t get to make that call—”

  “Yes I do! I’m in charge here, whether you like it or not. I’m the one that’s been out in the field. I’m the one that’s going to get us out of here. And I’m the one telling you to pick yourself a SUV in case we have to take it off the road.”

  Liam took a step forward. “If we have to go off-road, we’re pretty much screwed anyway. I’d rather have a car that won’t devour gas.” He glanced my way, tilting his head in a silent back me up. I bit my lip, shaking my head. Not this fight. This one wasn’t worth it. Cole was making quick strides back in our direction from a nearby red pickup truck, and nothing was going to turn him from it.

  All those months ago, when it had just been the four of us in a minivan making our way along back roads, siphoning gas from other cars like vultures picking the last stringy pieces of meat off bones, we’d functioned on two simple principles: move fast, don’t get seen. For better or worse, most of our decisions had been gut reactions, and I wasn’t about to pretend we hadn’t made some questionable choices, but it was the only way we knew how to live and survive—it was how all of us freak kids had to scrape by, whether it was to avoid camps or skip tracers. And looking at Cole now, at the irritation sweeping over his features, it was never more obvious to me that he knew almost nothing about what his brother’s life had been like after Liam escaped the League’s training program. He was one of us by technicality, but outside of witnessing the cruel treatment of the kids in Leda’s psionic research program, he’d never been forced to adapt to our reality.

  They’d already fought about the driving arrangements earlier that morning, saving us a little time now. I spared one last glance at the three figures piling into Cole’s chosen SUV before tugging Clancy in the direction of the red truck Cole gestured to.

  It felt strange to not have all of us piled into one car, but I understood Cole’s reasoning immediately, even if Liam didn’t. It was the same reason I’d basically had the sole pleasure of babysitting Clancy over the past two weeks, feeding him, and dealing with his wounded ego. If I drove, the other Orange had less of a chance of commandeering the car because I could block him out. If one of the others was driving, it would only be a matter of time before Clancy slid into their thoughts and took control. I could see it happening as clearly as if the kid had planted the scene in my mind.

  I would have preferred Cole in the other car, too, but that had been non-negotiable. The fact that it was just as likely for Clancy to hijack his mind, and command him to use his gun or knife on me, hadn’t seemed to occur to him.

  The gas tank was half full and the engine already hot-wired and running. Cole had snapped Clancy’s zip ties off and attached new ones, so his hands could both rest in his lap and be hooked through the seat belt, and his feet could be bound to one of the bars running under the seat. Cole pulled the pillowcase over the kid’s head.

  It was just a matter of taking a deep breath and shifting the truck out of park. I looked up one last time at the skeleton of a city caught in my rearview mirror and tightened my hands on the steering wheel.

  We were finally leaving that terrible place, and what we’d buried there.

  Twenty minutes of driving, however, made a few things crystal clear: the truck didn’t have working air conditioning, its owner’s body odor had been absorbed into the faux-leather seats, and, yes, my window was broken.

  To my right, Clancy had bent over at the waist, and was either sleeping or trying to subtly rub the pillowcase against his legs to pull it off. Cole, just to his right, was scanning the passing streets. The early afternoon light stood out in sharp contrast to the dark smudges beneath his eyes. It was like now that he was still, not rushing around or barking out orders, his body had finally settled into its aches and exhaustion. He rolled his shoulders back against the press of the seat belt and grimaced.

  Cole had shown me where we were headed on a map—a town called Lodi, a little ways south of Sacramento. If we’d been able to take the freeway, it would have been a straight shot up the coast, five hours max. Less than that, if flights and trains had still been operational, and Gray hadn’t ordered ships to patrol the Pacific coast.

  I looked back over my shoulder to the SUV behind us. Liam must have been waiting for it, because he lifted his hand in a reassuring wave. In the front passenger seat beside him, Chubs was going on and on about something, his hands waving to emphasize each word. The sig
ht was familiar and comforting enough to almost chase away the strangeness of the city around us.

  Burbank, California, had been, by all definitions, a city brimming with life and commotion. Its importance had only grown in recent years; so many media companies already had studios or headquarters there, and many of the others in nearby cities had moved as well, either through mergers or deals to share equipment. Seeing the city streets so silent and empty, I wondered if Gray had already swept in to shut the place down.

  Where the hell is everyone? It was like driving through the worst of the economically ravaged towns back east. I half expected to see an old newspaper dramatically catch the breeze and fly across the street like a tumbleweed. I felt my pulse kick up; the same shadow I’d felt behind us in Los Angeles was back and growling in my head like thunder.

  “I don’t like this,” Cole said, as if sensing my thoughts. “Make your next right—”

  If I hadn’t looked back into the rearview mirror to signal to Liam, I wouldn’t have seen it at all. The SUV was there one moment, and gone the next—the sound the military Humvee made as it crashed into the Ford Explorer felt like someone took a bat to the back of my skull. I jerked the wheel as the other car rolled once, glass and rubber exploding in every direction as it righted itself again, rocking hard against the sidewalk.

  I slammed my foot onto the brake pedal, sending the truck into a skid. Clancy choked as his seat belt snapped tight over his chest. He tried to brace himself with his bound hands against the dashboard.

  “What?” he demanded. “What the hell was that?”

  But it was Cole I should have been worried about.

  I was still fighting with my seat belt when his face, rigid with shock, transformed. The sound that escaped his throat was too ragged, too strangled to be a scream. It didn’t sound human at all.

  He threw his door open, but didn’t run toward the military vehicle or the two soldiers who were approaching the tan SUV with their weapons drawn. Cole took one step forward as I jumped down from the truck, and, with no other warning than his right hand tightening into a fist at his side, the Humvee burst into a ball of fire.

  The wave of pressure that came off the small explosion sent me stumbling back against the truck. It blew out the windows of nearby buildings and the back windshield of our pickup. The two soldiers were thrown onto the street, tackled from behind by the force of it. Cole moved toward them, unnervingly calm. His pistol was drawn out of the holster at his side, aimed with his usual precision. One shot, delivered to the face of the young soldier closest to the SUV. The other found himself hauled up, his helmet ripped away, and Cole’s fist slammed again and again into his face.

  I couldn’t watch, wouldn’t—my heart was banging against my ribcage as I ran for the SUV. Shards of tinted glass from the windows crunched underfoot. The driver’s-side doors had taken the brunt of the impact, but there was movement—Liam’s wide eyes met mine through what was left of the windshield.

  “Are you okay?” I called, wincing at the sound of one last gunshot piercing the air.

  Liam was sitting straight up, his hands clenched in a deathlike grip on the steering wheel. His face was drained of all color, save for the red mark stamped across the left side of his face, and the rapidly purpling bridge of his swelling nose. The deflated airbags hung limp in his lap.

  “Oh my God,” I gasped. “You guys—”

  Chubs had already crawled into the back with Vida, and was squinting as he examined a gash across her temple. His dark skin had taken on an ashy quality.

  The burning vehicle was eating up the fresh air around us, sending wave after wave of shimmering heat against my back. The roar of it consuming the metal and glass forced me to shout around the smoke I was already half-choking on.

  “Okay?” I called back to them. Vida gave me a thumbs-up, swallowing hard, as if she didn’t trust herself to speak just yet. “Liam?”

  My hands shook like crazy as I tried to work the handle on the front door, the enormous metal indentation popping and protesting. There was so much adrenaline running through me, it was amazing I didn’t rip the whole thing off its hinges. “Liam? Liam, can you hear me?”

  He turned toward me slowly, coming out of his stupor. “I told him it would roll.”

  I almost sobbed in relief as I reached through the window and kissed him. “You did.”

  “I told him.”

  “You did, I know you did,” I said, low and soothing as I reached in to unbuckle his seat belt. “Are you hurt? Anything feel broken?”

  “Shoulder. Hurts.” He squeezed his eyes shut, bracing himself against the pain. “Chubs? Everyone...”

  “We’re okay,” Chubs called, his voice surprisingly steady despite the congested tone it had taken on. When he turned toward us, I saw blood running down from his nostrils over his lips. “I think his shoulder is dislocated. Ruby, do you see my glasses? I lost them when the airbags inflated.”

  “What happened?” Vida asked, pointing at the fire. “How did—”

  “Bullet to the gas tank—lucky shot,” came Cole’s voice behind me. They were either too muddled or too terrified to really think the improbability of it through.

  Cole shouldered me out of the way to get to the door’s handle himself. After a moment of hesitation, I ducked around to the passenger side, forced the stubborn door open, and knelt down. I felt along the carpet until my fingers brushed his glasses. Or what was left of them.

  “Did you find them?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”

  I held the mangled frames and cracked-but-whole lenses up for Vida to see. In a rare moment of sympathy, she gave him a pat on the shoulder and said, “Yeah, she’s got them, Gran.”

  The driver’s-side door finally came open with a scream of metal against metal. Liam rolled, trying to get his left foot out from where it was pinned under the mangled dashboard. All the while, he clutched his left arm against his side, trying to keep it from being jostled.

  “Dammit, you stupid kid,” Cole said, emotions simmering just beneath the surface. His right hand twitched and jerked as he reached inside to help his brother. “Damn you—how hard is it to not get yourself killed on my watch?”

  “Trying,” Liam said, between gritted teeth. “Christ, that hurts.”

  “Give me your arm,” Cole said, “this is going to suck, but—”

  “Are you doing it?” Chubs was asking, “make sure you’re in the proper position—”

  I don’t know what was worse: the sound of Liam’s shoulder socket realigning, or his howl of pain that followed.

  “We need to move,” Vida said, kicking the SUV’s back door open. “This piece of shit is totaled—we’ll have to get into the bed of the truck, but standing around here crying over each other is going to get us shot, and fast.”

  “Glasses?” Chubs called, holding out his hand in what he must have thought was my direction. Vida took that hand and looped it through her arm, accepting the twisted wire frames from me. I stopped her, just for a second, to make sure that she really was okay. Banged-up, bruised, but not bleeding. What a goddamn miracle this was—

  Clancy. I spun back around to face the truck, heart paralyzed for the instant it took to spot his dark outline through the truck’s back window. Shit. This is how we’d lose him. Chaos. Carelessness. I’d panicked—my mind had just blanked out with terror and I’d run. I hadn’t even thought to take the keys out of the ignition. If Cole hadn’t bound his legs, he’d be in the wind by now.

  Be better than this, I thought, my nails digging into the palms of my hands. You have to be better than this. The adrenaline was slow to leave my system; I couldn’t keep from shaking, not entirely.

  “You know, Grannie,” Vida’s voice drew my attention back toward them, “you have actually not sucked in this crisis.”

  “I can’t see your face so I can’t tell how sincere that was...
.” Chubs said.

  I slid the backpack fully onto my back, jogging around to where Cole was helping a limping Liam around the bodies of the downed soldiers, toward the truck. I couldn’t bring myself to look at them or assess what Cole had done in his moment of rage. Liam braced his bad arm against his chest. I slid my hand around the small of his back to help steady him—but, really, to reassure myself he was fine. Alive.

  Liam tilted his head toward me and said, “Kiss me again.”

  I did, soft and quick, right at the corner of his lips where there was a small white scar. Seeing my expression he added, “Saw my life flash before my eyes. Not enough kissing.”

  Cole snorted, but his whole body was still tense with anger he couldn’t release. “Wow, kid. Unusually smooth for you.”

  We lifted Liam onto the flatbed, laying him out next to Chubs, who was clutching the broken remains of his glasses over his heart.

  “Oh, damn,” Liam said, seeing them. “I’m sorry, buddy.”

  “Prescription,” he said in a low, mournful voice. “They were prescription lenses.”

  Cole yanked the sheet of electric-blue tarp out from under his brother and spread it over them.

  “What are you doing?” Vida demanded, already trying to sit up.

  “Stay down and stay covered. We’re going to get as far as we can away from here and switch cars. Chances are they radioed this one in.”

  “I would like to register the fact that this fucking sucks,” she said.

  “Noted,” he said, shutting the gate.

  I climbed back up behind the wheel again, soaking in the vibrations from the running engine. Clancy had finally gotten his hood up and off him, and even though I didn’t look over, I saw him watching me out of the corner of my eye. For the first time in weeks, the sullen irritation that had coated his every mood was gone, and he was...smiling. His gaze shifted away, over to Cole, who slammed his door shut hard enough to rock the whole vehicle. In his lap was what looked like a leather pouch, and a pistol that he must have taken off one of the soldiers. They both slid around as his hand continued to jerk, spasm, until he finally tucked it beneath his leg. The sight made my brain think Mason. Red. Fire. It plucked at loose threads at the back of my mind until I saw the pattern of how they were woven together.