But every eye was on the town now.
“It’s spreading,” someone said.
“It’s jumping from house to house.”
“No,” Quinn said. “I don’t think it’s spreading. I think…I think someone is setting those fires.”
He felt his stomach churn. His muscles, warm from rowing felt suddenly stiff and cold.
“The town is burning,” a voice said.
They watched in silence as the orange flames spread and billowed up into the sky. The town was no longer dark.
“We’re fishermen, not fighters,” Quinn said.
Oars splashed. Oarlocks creaked. The boats pushed water aside with a soft shushing sound.
Sam and Edilio broke into a run. Across the highway onto the access road. Past the rusting hulks of cars that had crashed into one another or into storefronts or simply stalled in the middle of the highway on that fateful day when every driver disappeared.
They ran down Sheridan, passing the school on their right. At least it wasn’t on fire. Once they reached the cross-street at Golding the smoke was much thicker. It billowed toward them, impossible to avoid. Sam and Edilio choked and slowed down.
Sam pulled off his T-shirt and bunched it over his mouth, but it didn’t do much good. His eyes stung.
He crouched low, hoping the smoke would pass overhead. That didn’t work, either.
Sam grabbed Edilio’s arm and pulled him along. They crossed Golding and in the lee of houses on Sheridan they found the air was clearer but still reeking. The houses on the west side of Sheridan were black silhouettes cut out of the sheet of flame that soared and danced and curled toward heaven from Sherman Avenue.
They started running again, down the street and around the corner on Alameda, trying to stay on the sweet side of the very slight breeze. The smoke was still thick but no longer blowing toward them.
Fire was everywhere along Sherman. A roaring, ravenous, living thing. It was more intense north of Alameda, but it was moving fast south toward the water down the rest of Sherman.
“Why is the fire moving against the breeze?” Edilio asked.
“Because someone’s setting new fires,” Sam said grimly.
Sam glanced left. Right. At least six houses burning to their right. The rest of that block would go up, no stopping it, not a thing they could do.
“There are kids in some of these houses,” Edilio said, choking from emotion as much as smoke.
At least three fires burned to their left. As they watched Sam saw a twirling firework, a spinning Roman candle that soared and arced downward and crashed into the front of a house far down the block. He couldn’t hear the Molotov cocktail smash over the roar of fire around him.
“Come on!” Sam yelled, and ran toward the newest fire.
He wished he had Brianna with him, or Dekka. Where were they? Both could have helped save lives.
Sam barely missed plowing into a group of kids, some as young as three, all huddled together in the middle of the street, faces lit by fire, eyes wide with fear.
“It’s Sam!”
“Thank God, Sam is here! Sam is here!”
“Sam, our house is burning down!”
“I think my little brother is in there!”
Sam pushed past them, but one girl grabbed his arm. “You have to help us!”
“I’m trying,” he said grimly, and tore himself free. “Come on, Edilio!”
Zil’s mob was backlit by a sheet of orange that consumed the front of a colonial-style house. They danced and cavorted and ran with burning Molotov cocktails.
“Don’t waste them!” Hank shouted. “One Molotov, one house!”
Antoine screamed as he waved a lit bottle. “Aaaaarrrggh! Aaaaarrrgh!” Almost as if he were the one burning. He threw the bottle high and hard, and it soared straight through an upper floor window of an older wood house.
Immediately there were cries of terror from inside. And Antoine screamed back, an echo of their horror, twisted into savage glee.
Kids came pouring out of the door of the house as flames licked the curtains.
Sam did not hesitate. He raised his hand, palm out. A beam of brilliant green light drew a line to Antoine’s body.
Antoine’s berserk cries ended instantly. He clutched once at the three-inch-wide hole just above his belt. Then he sat down in the street.
“It’s Sam!” one of Zil’s thugs cried.
As one they turned and ran, dropping gas-filled bottles behind. The gasoline spread from the shattered bottles and caught fire instantly.
Sam tore after them in pursuit, racing to leap the patches of burning gasoline.
“Sam, no!” Edilio shouted. Edilio tripped over the body of Antoine, who lay now on his back, gasping like a fish, eyes staring up in horror.
Sam had not noticed Edilio fall. But he heard Edilio’s single shouted warning. “Ambush!”
Sam heard the word, knew it was true, and without thinking dropped and rolled. He stopped just inches away from rolling into burning gasoline.
At least three guns were firing. But Zil’s thugs had had no practice with weapons. They were firing wild, bullets flying in every direction.
Sam hugged the pavement, shaking from the close call.
Where were Dekka and Brianna?
Another weapon was firing now. Edilio’s rapid bam-bam-bam, short bursts from his machine gun. There was a big difference between Edilio with a gun and some punk like Turk with a gun. Edilio practiced. Edilio trained.
There was a loud shriek of pain, and the ambush was over.
Sam pried himself up a few inches, enough to see one of Zil’s gunmen. The kid was running away, a wraith in the smoke.
Too late, Sam thought. He aimed, straight for the boy’s back. The beam of burning light caught the gunman in the back of his calf. He screamed. The gun flew from his hand and clattered on the sidewalk.
Hank ran back to grab it. Sam fired and missed. Hank snarled at him, a face like a wild animal. Hank raced away as Edilio’s bullets chased him, plowing a furrow in the hot blacktop.
Sam jumped to his feet. Edilio ran up, panting.
“They’re running for it,” Edilio said.
“I’m not letting them get away,” Sam said. “I’m tired of having to fight the same people again and again. It’s time to finish it.”
“What are you saying, man?”
“I’m killing Zil. Clear enough? I’m putting him down.”
“Whoa, man,” Edilio said. “That’s not what we do. We’re the good guys, right?”
“There has to be an end to it, Edilio.” He wiped soot from his face with the back of his hand, but smoke had filled his eyes with tears. “I can’t keep doing it and never reaching the end.”
“It’s not your call anymore,” Edilio said.
Sam turned a steely glare on him. “You too? Now you’re siding with Astrid?”
“Man, there have to be limits,” Edilio said.
Sam stood staring down the street. The fire was out of control. All of Sherman was burning, from one end to the other. If they were lucky it wouldn’t jump to another street. But one way or the other, Sherman was lost.
“We should be looking to save any kids that are trapped,” Edilio said.
Sam didn’t answer.
“Sam,” Edilio pleaded.
“I begged Him to let me die, Edilio. I prayed to the God who Astrid likes so much and I said, God, if You’re there, kill me. Don’t let me feel this pain anymore.”
Edilio said nothing.
“You don’t understand, Edilio,” Sam said so softly, he doubted Edilio could hear him over the roar and crackle of the fire raging all around them. “You can’t do anything else with people like this. You have to kill them all. Zil. Caine. Drake. You just have to kill them. So right now, I’m starting with Zil and his crew,” Sam said. “You can come with me or not.”
He started walking in the direction of the fleeing Hank.
Edilio did not move.
TWENTY-FOUR
14 HOURS, 5 MINUTES
DEKKA COULDN’T JUST lie there. She couldn’t. Not when there was a fight. Not when Sam might be walking into danger.
Half the girls in the FAYZ had a crush on Sam, but it wasn’t like that for Dekka. What she felt for Sam was different. They were soldiers, the two of them. Sam, Edilio, and Dekka-more than anyone else in Perdido Beach, they were the tip of the spear. When there was trouble, it was the three of them in the middle of it.
Well, the three of them plus Brianna.
Best not to think about Brianna too much. That way lay sadness and misery and loneliness. Brianna was what she was. Wanted what she wanted. Which was not what Dekka wanted.
Almost surely not what Dekka wanted. Although, Dekka had never asked, never said anything.
She doubled over with a fit of coughing as she rose from her bed.
She should probably get dressed at least. Put on some clothes, not stagger out into the street wearing flannel pajama bottoms and a purple hoodie. But another round of strangled coughing left her feeling weak. She had to save her strength.
Shoes. Definitely needed shoes. That was the minimum. She shuffled out of her slippers and searched around under the bed for her sneakers. Found them after more hacking and almost lost the will at that point. Sam didn’t need her. Whatever was going on…
Then she noticed the orange glow from the window. She pushed back the curtains. The sky was orange. She saw sparks, like fireflies. She pushed the window open and almost gagged on the smoke.
The town was on fire.
Dekka got her shoes on. She found a scarf and her bucket of fresh water. She drank deeply of the water. It was going to be a thirsty night. Then she plunged the scarf into the rest of the water, soaked it, and tied the soggy mess over her mouth and nose. She looked like a pajama-wearing bandit.
Out onto the street. An amazing, awful, unreal scene. Kids were coming past, alone or in small groups, glancing back over their shoulders. Carrying a few pitiful possessions in their arms.
A girl loaded down with a big bundle of dresses staggered past. “Hey! What’s going on?” Dekka rasped.
“Everything’s burning up,” the girl said, and kept moving.
Dekka let her go because now she spotted a boy she knew. “Jonas! What is this?”
Jonas shook his head, scared. Scared and something else.
“Hey, don’t walk off, I’m talking to you!” Dekka snapped.
“I’m not talking to you, freak. I’m done with all of you. It’s because of you this is happening.”
“What are you talking about?” But she’d already guessed. “Is it Zil did all this?”
Jonas snarled at her, his face transformed by rage. “Death to freaks!”
“Hey, fool, you’re a soldier.”
“Not anymore,” Jonas said, and took off at a run.
Dekka wobbled. She was so weak. So unlike her usual self. But there was no doubt about what she had to do. If kids were running away in one direction she had to head in the other. Into the smoke. Toward the bright orange glow that sent up sudden flares of fire, like fingers reaching for the heavens.
Diana stumbled as she raced to keep up. Caine was pushing the pace. The haggard band of Coates kids trotted along, terrified of being left behind.
She had enough strength to keep up, but barely. And she hated herself for having that strength. And hated Caine for giving it to her. For what he had done. For where he had led them to.
But like the others she raced to keep up the punishing pace.
Across the highway. Smooth concrete under foot. Across the access road, and pelting across the school yard. So bizarre, Diana thought. The school yard where the town kids used to play soccer and try out for cheerleader, and now they were running like no one before had ever run on this overgrown field.
The fire was in the east, a wall of flame down Sherman. Their path lay down Brace Road, just two blocks from the fire. It was a straight shot down Brace to the marina.
“What about Sam?” someone asked. “What if we run into him?”
“Idiot,” Caine muttered. “You think this fire is a coincidence? It’s all part of my plan. Sherman cuts off the western end of town. Kids will run toward the plaza, on the other side of Sherman, or down to the beach. Either way, it’s away from us. And Sam will be there with them.”
“Who’s that?” Diana said. She stopped. Caine and the rest stopped as well. Someone walked straight down the middle of Brace. It was impossible to tell at first whether he was walking toward them or away. But Caine knew the silhouette instantly.
The hair on the back of his neck stood on end. No one else looked like that.
No one.
“No,” he whispered.
“Do we keep going?” Penny asked.
Caine ignored her. He turned to Diana. “Am I…am I crazy?”
Diana said nothing. Her horrified expression gave Caine his answer.
“He’s moving away,” Caine whispered.
Smoke swirled and the apparition was gone.
“Optical illusion,” Caine said.
“So we keep going straight?”
Caine shook his head. “No. Change of plans. We’ll cut through town. Head for the beach, then make our way back.”
Diana pointed a shaking finger at the burning street beyond. “Go through the fire? Or go down streets that are going to be filled with Sam’s people?”
“I have another way,” Caine said. He crossed quickly to a fence around the backyard of the closest house. “We’ll make our own street.”
He raised a hand and the fence bulged inward. With a rending, tearing sound the fence gave way.
“Backyard to backyard,” he said. “Let’s move.”
“We did it, Leader! We did it!” Hank said. He had to shout to be heard over the roar of the flames.
Antoine lay on the ground, crying loudly. He had pulled off his shirt to see the wound in his side. He lay there, fat and jiggly, as he cried about the pain.
“Man up,” Hank said harshly.
“Are you crazy?” Antoine cried. “I have a hole in me! I have a hole in me! Oh, God. It hurts so bad!”
Perdido Beach was burning. At least a big part of it was. Zil climbed atop a Winnebago in the beach parking lot. He could see much of the town from there.
Sherman was ablaze. It looked like a volcano had erupted in the middle of town. And now the flames were advancing toward the center of town along Alameda.
His doing, all of this. His creation. And now they would all know that he was serious. Now they would all know that you didn’t mess with Zil Sperry.
“Take me to Lana,” Antoine moaned. “You guys have to take me to Lana!”
The sun wasn’t up yet, so it wasn’t possible to see the smoke plume, but Zil sensed that it was huge. There was not a star to be seen in the sky.
“Think we got Sam?” Lance asked.
No one answered.
“Should we go back and get more gas?” Turk asked. He, like everyone else, was ignoring Antoine.
Zil couldn’t answer. A part of him wanted to burn it all down. Every last house. Every vacant, useless store. Burn it all down and dance up here atop the Winnebago while it burned.
The plan was to create chaos. And to help the freak Caine to escape.
“Leader, we need to know what to do,” Turk urged.
“Help me,” Antoine moaned. “We gotta stick together, don’t we? Don’t we?”
Hank said, “Antoine, shut up or I’ll shut you up.”
“He burned a hole in me. Look at it! Look at it!”
Hank glanced up at Zil. Zil turned away. He didn’t have an answer to the problem of Antoine.
The truth was, Zil hated seeing wounds of any kind. He’d always been squeamish about blood. And the one quick glance he’d stolen at Antoine’s injury had made him sick to his stomach.
Which probably didn’t help Antoine much.
Hank said, “Come on, Antoine. Come wit
h me.”
“What? What are you…I’ll be good, it’s just that it hurts, man, it hurts so much.”
“Dude, come on,” Hank said. “I’ll get you to Lana. Come on.”
Hank bent low and propped Antoine up as he struggled onto his feet. Antoine shrieked in pain.
Zil climbed down the ladder that was bolted to the back of the Winnebago.
“What do you think, Lance?” Handsome Lance. Tall, cool, smart Lance. If only, Zil thought for not the first time, all Human Crew could look like Lance. Lance reflected well on Zil. Whereas fat, drunken Antoine, Turk with his dragging foot, and Hank with his nasty ferret’s face made it seem that he was surrounded by losers.
Lance looked thoughtful. “Kids are spread all over the place. All confused. What do we do if they decide we were responsible for burning the town and decide to come after us?”
Turk laughed derisively. “Like the Leader hasn’t thought of that? We tell people it was Sam.”
Zil was surprised by the suggestion. He’d given it no thought, but obviously Turk had.
“Not Sam,” Zil corrected, thinking on the fly. “We blame Caine. Kids won’t believe it was Sam. We say it was Caine and everyone will believe us.”
“Kids saw us throwing Molotov cocktails,” Lance argued.
Turk snorted. “Man, don’t you know? People believe all kinds of stuff if you tell them it’s true. People will believe in flying saucers and stuff.”
“It was Caine,” Zil said, making it up as he went along and liking it more with each word he spoke. “Caine can make people do what he wants, right? So he used his powers to force some of us to do it.”
“Yeah,” Turk said. His eyes lit up. “Yeah, because he wanted to make us look bad. He wanted it to be on us because he’s a freak and we fight the freaks.”
Hank reappeared. He took a position behind Lance. The contrast between the two was all the more clear when they were close together.
“Where’s ’Toine?” Turk asked.
“Dumped him down the beach,” Hank said. “He’s not going to make it. Not with that hole in him. He’d just slow us down.”
“Then he’ll be the first to give his life for the Human Crew,” Turk said solemnly. “That’s major. That’s hard-core. Murdered by Sam.”
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