I take in a slow breath and run my fingers through my hair, turning it jet-black. “Tell him to drive around to the front door, that we’ll be there in a few minutes.” While Benson’s tapping away I add smudgy black eyeliner and several pieces of silver jewelry as well as shoes. I take stock of myself and quickly conjure up a purse just before a nurse pokes her head through the door.
“Oh, excuse me,” she says, and ducks out again only to return a few seconds later. “Are you Jane Simmons?”
“No,” I say honestly, though I imagine that’s the name Benson came up with for me.
“But . . .” Her eyes return to the chart open in her hands. “You shouldn’t be out of bed.”
“What?” I say, letting false indignation hang heavy in my tone. “But I was just released. My mom and dad are getting the car. This is my brother, Bud,” I add when the silence stretches out a little too long. I smack Benson on the shoulder in what I hope is a sisterly fashion. “He drove me here last night.”
“You just got out of surgery,” the nurse says, still befuddled.
“What? Whoa, no,” I say, holding both hands up in front of me. “I was in for food poisoning. And cramps,” I tack on, and I lift the bottom of my shirt enough to show my unmarked stomach and pat it gently. “Bad combination,” I say. “But I’m good now. The doctor said I could go.”
The woman stares at my stomach, then at the chart, then my stomach again. “I’ll be right back,” she says.
“We better get out of here,” I tell Benson, turning toward the door. “She’s going to call security or something stupid in a second, I’m sure.”
Benson nods and takes my hand in his. It feels right, our hands joined as we head out to fight a world that would prefer us dead.
We manage to skirt around the corner without seeing the nurse, and I hope she doesn’t get in trouble for the stunt we just pulled. Alanna and Thomas are waiting for us right at the front doors, and though they give my new look a double take, Alanna hurries around to help me into the sedan. It’s a very fancy-looking car and I don’t quite recognize the make, so I suspect it’s newly created rather than newly stolen.
“She sealed her skin on the outside,” Benson explains under his breath, “but she’s still sore.” He sits behind the driver’s seat, and I lay down carefully with my head on his lap, my hidden incision throbbing from the fast walk.
“Where are we going, Tave?” Thomas asks, pulling away from the hospital.
Anywhere but here, I think. But I have a plan. “Phoenix,” I say. “There’s a Mayo Clinic there.” I remember seeing it from the Greyhound two weeks ago. It’s perfect. Close, in a huge city, and no one would expect me to go back there after the attack on Logan’s family.
“Well, the news is just trickling in,” Thomas says over his shoulder. “The two people we saw in the secret hospital room must have managed to live maybe an hour after the Earthbound panic led to the collapse of the headquarters—which is what we saw as we drove away.”
Despite the flat tone of his words, I can’t help but believe that if the initial collapse didn’t kill those two—helpless and unconscious—maybe Logan survived too. They make earthquake-proof buildings; maybe the headquarters was designed to stand up to a collapse.
“But they’re definitely dead now. Death Valley is gone,” he finishes, almost in a whisper, and my hopes sink. “Leveled. More than leveled, actually. It’s a hole in the ground hundreds of miles across. There’s a lake at the bottom, but they still can’t tell how deep it is.” He pauses. “I expect it goes down to bedrock, but that’s only a guess.”
“Any sign of . . . of anyone?” I ask, hearing the desperate edge in my voice and not caring.
“No, but that’s not surprising. No Earthbound would let themselves get caught in the middle of this.” He pauses for a long time. “There’s just no way to know if Daniel or Logan are alive, I’m afraid. Not yet.”
I nod, and then tears are leaking down my face. The rough pads of Benson’s thumbs rub them away, and I smile painfully up at him.
“People are already fleeing the city,” Thomas continues. “The bad news is that means it’ll take us hours just to get over the bypass and into Arizona. But the good news is we have the perfect hiding place among hundreds of thousands of other terrified people. There’s no way in hell anyone is going to find us.”
“Good,” I say softly.
“What are we going to do?” Alanna asks me.
I turn my head so I can look at her, peering at me over her seat. “The gods can’t help us anymore,” I say, my voice firm and confident as the plan continues to gel in my head. “It’s time to go to the humans.”
Acknowledgments
Every time I sit down to write these, I know I’m going to forget about six people, so to begin with, thank you to the six people I’m about to forget.
Gillian Levinson is the absolute champion of this series, and half the good stuff in here is directly because of her. No, really. To my awesome Razorbill and Penguin team including but absolutely not limited to Ben Schrank, Marisa Russell, Tara Shanahan, Anna Jarzab, Erin Dempsey, Courtney Wood, Shanta Newlin, Lisa Kelly, Erin Gallagher, and all the other hard-working folks who have had their fingers in the proverbial Earthquake pot. You all rock!
No Earthbound series book is complete without a thank you to Scott and Ashley, who are always so supportive but also let me ask a million questions of Scott regarding his brain injury, which, coincidentally (no, it actually was!), mirrors Tavia’s. To Kali, whose volunteer babysitting days made the first draft of this book possible. Oh, Saundra, you make my continuing sanity possible . . . and some days I’m sure it’s at the expense of yours.
My husband, Kenny, was truly a knight in glittering, dazzling, shining armor on this book, which really didn’t want to be written. Thank you for making sure I got twice as many hours of writing time as I usually need. My amazing children, who are the joys of my life: Aud, Bren, Gid, and Gwen, I love you all! And to my masses of extended family who all help in various ways, thank you, thank you, thank you.
Aprilynne Pike, Earthquake
(Series: # )
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