How did I not prepare myself for this? How did I not think of a lie, think of some way to break this to her? But in my silence she understands, her face slipping into despair. “No,” she whispers. “No.”
“I found him.” I lean in close so that those around us can’t hear. “He’s in the ruins past the amusement park.”
Hope flashes through her and I shake my head. “He’s infected, Cira.”
She stumbles back. A few of the others crowd around her. Blane takes her hand and Cira leans in to her. They glare at me.
I realize then that she’s not mine anymore. That we’ve taken two separate paths and they’ll never join again. She’s with them, she’s with the others bound for the Recruiters. And I’m left behind. The one who ran away.
Just two days ago she was the one I would have told about my mother’s revelation about where I came from. The one I’d have gone to after my mother left for the Forest. Together we would have figured out what to do, how to move on. Two days ago she was my best friend and not a stranger.
I want the feeling back again. That feeling that there’s someone in the world who knows me as well as I know myself. Someone who won’t let me go through all this alone.
“I’m going back to see him,” I tell her, stepping forward, needing her to hope. “I promised him I’d be there.”
Her eyes are red-rimmed. Everything about her is limp, as if she’s already given up and those around her have to keep her standing.
She looks thinner than before, even in only two days, and her skin is gray from being locked inside. “Cira, are you eating? Are they bringing you food and water?”
She doesn’t respond. Just stares through me as if I’ve disappeared. I wait for her to say something. I look toward Blane, pleading with my eyes. “Is she okay?” I ask her.
Her hatred is palpable. “What do you care? You’re the one who left Cira behind,” she says. “You’re the one who doesn’t know what it is to be a friend.”
I press my lips together and focus on the floor where cracks spider-web through the concrete. I try to take a deep breath but I’m too shaky. I want to tell Blane that I tried to get Cira to come with me, I tried to get her to run away as well. But the words taste bitter in my mouth because I know I could have tried harder.
I blink rapidly, praying that I don’t cry in front of this girl. “Please make sure she’s okay,” I finally say. She nods before turning away, leading Cira toward a bench against the far wall.
I stand there a little longer, a small part of me hoping that Cira will look up at me. That she’ll see my pain and come and take my hand and tell me what’s wrong. But she just folds in on herself, taking a cup of water from Blane with shaking fingers but not drinking.
Finally I slink back through the door and up the stairs, leaving my best friend behind.
Everything seems muffled as I walk back home to the lighthouse. The sounds of the town, of people constructing platforms and erecting decorations for the arrival of the Recruiters. Even the feel of the late setting sun is dull against my skin.
At the beach the waves are sluggish, unable to budge the carcass of a large decapitated Mudo on the sand. But when I step into the house it’s as though everything sharpens into focus and the air is alive with the sound of emptiness.
And then it hits me with full force: My mother is gone. She’s left me. Our conversations from last night and this morning spin around me in the silence, piercing against my skin and boring into my skull. I’m the one who convinced her to remember. I’m the one who told her that forgetting is useless.
I’m the reason she’s gone. She could be hurt out in the Forest. She could be Infected and it would all be my fault. Because I made her go alone, too scared to go with her.
I press the palms of my hands into my eyes and bend over, a wave of nausea rising in my throat. I’m so tired of feeling useless and weak and alone. I’m tired of messing up and putting the people I love in danger.
I’m tired of being afraid, of allowing fear to hold me back. I clench my fingers into fists. I have to find Catcher. I have to talk to him, explain what’s happened and ask for his help.
Elias’s face flashes in my mind, the memory of him holding me this morning prickling along my arms and legs. But I force those feelings away and try to remind myself that he’s a stranger. That he turned me down when I needed him. He doesn’t know anything about me and never will.
Strapping the knife Elias gave me around my hip and slamming the door to the lighthouse behind me, I stride to the beach. I don’t care what the risks are: I promised Catcher I would be there, and I need him as much as he needs me.
But when I look at the rack where we stored the boat last night, I realize that it’s empty.
Elias must have taken it when he left, and with it the only way for me to get back to the ruins safely. I want to scream out my frustration at how everything seems to be falling apart so quickly and there’s nothing I can do to keep up.
I kick at the sand but the wind throws it back against me, biting at my skin. I race to the waves and am up to my thighs in the water, my heart pounding, when I realize where I am and what I’m doing. There’s still a whiff of daylight, sunset blinking on the horizon.
I gasp when I think about it. Can I really do this? Can I really swim my way to the ruins, to Catcher?
The idea tantalizes me, makes me believe I can be strong and invincible. But I know that if I spend any time thinking about it or reasoning through I’ll never do it. I’ll find a thousand reasons why this is stupid, why I should turn back.
I push deeper into the ocean. I promised Catcher I’d come back. I promised him I’d be there. He wouldn’t be infected if I’d been able to kill Mellie. If somehow we’d been able to stop the Breaker earlier none of this would have happened.
I slice my arms through the water, my feet lifting away from the bottom. I try not to think about the darkness creeping in, about the dead that could be in the depths. I try not to think about what I’m doing.
One thought pushes me forward: Catcher. I must get to him before he turns. I can’t let him die alone and turn into a Mudo. I can’t stand the idea of him becoming a monster. With the world spinning and unraveling around me, being there with him is the only thing I can control, the only thought that can ground me. I have to prove to myself I have the strength to follow through on this one thing.
What’s the worst that can happen? I ask myself. There could be Mudo in the water that aren’t downed. I could get bitten, infected and pulled into the deepest parts of the ocean, turning Breaker almost instantly. I sputter and press myself forward, tamping down fear that crawls up my throat, squeezing my lungs harder the farther away from shore I get. With my eyes closed the sea feels like an endless pit.
I pull back above the surface and start to swim, angling out to where I know the tip of the jetty should be, at the line of boulders that separates the town from the amusement park and ruins. I’m almost there when I feel something brush against my foot and I scream, choking on water.
Something like hair tangles in my hands and I rear above the surface. I try to rip my fingers free as I kick out at everything I can’t see. My mind shrieks with thoughts of arms grabbing me, teeth sinking into my flesh.
I flail, beating at the water and pulling myself to the jetty, slipping on the slick rocks. I crawl over the jetty as fast as possible, gulping air. I look down at my hands, my arms shaking and heart screaming. Wrapped around my fingers are lengths of seaweed, glistening under the moon.
I glance down the jetty to where it meets the Barrier wall, tiny lights of the Militiamen flickering in the night. It won’t be long until the patrol moves closer, until they’ll be able to see my shadow hulking among the boulders.
Before I jump back into the water on the other side of the jetty I look behind me at the lighthouse etched in the darkness. I feel as if I’m leaving something behind. Something that I’ll never be able to come back to. And then I realize that I’ve forg
otten to light the lantern. I curse my stupidity and for a moment I consider going back. I think about my mother in the Forest; what if she looks to the horizon for the light? What if it’s all she has to hold on to?
But Catcher’s waiting. I promised him. And if I go back I know I’ll never leave again and he’ll be left to face his fate alone.
My chest tightens and I stop to take a calming breath. Then I slip back into the water, pushing myself toward the shore stretching in front of the ruins.
The beach is empty when I pull myself slowly from the waves, water trailing down my bare legs. A strong wind gusts behind me. I hover at the edge of the surf, waiting for the moon to shift from behind the cloud cover for better light and cocking my ear to try to hear any moans over the rush of water.
The Mudo from last night are gone, the beach quiet, and I slowly make my way toward the dunes, my feet sinking into the warm sand as I pull Elias’s knife from my belt. Still no Mudo.
I reach the seawall and climb the boards, which are worn smooth from the highest tides crashing against them. Once I’m on the other side the streets of the ruins stretch ahead of me like a labyrinth and suddenly the confidence and drive I felt earlier disappear entirely.
The night air glides over my arms, brushing against the water droplets and causing my skin to prickle. Doubts crowd around me and I can’t force my feet forward. I stand unmoving and stare down the cracked road, a fine coating of sand brushed over it.
“You can do this,” I say aloud, my voice sounding hollow and out of place among the decayed buildings. I think about Catcher. I think about what Cira would do if she were here and I reach under my shirt and grasp the plastic superhero figurine she gave me. She’d never be afraid—she’d charge ahead in search of her brother.
And so that’s what I do.
I take a few wrong turns searching for Catcher’s building, the streets and rubble beginning to blur together. In my head the route through the ruins is so clear that I felt certain I’d remember how to get back to him.
And yet at every intersection and every turn I find myself second-guessing and I’m fairly sure I’ve gone in more than one circle. My damp clothes feel heavy on my body, the drying salt causing me to itch and my skin to feel tight.
I’m standing in the hollow between two crumbled buildings, trying to figure out which way to go next and wanting to kick the nearest wall in anger, when I hear a soft sound on the breeze, a hint of something mingling with the crickets and my own heartbeat.
I hold my breath, straining to hear, wondering if maybe it’s Catcher, as the sound resolves into a song, the voice bright and clear and definitely a woman’s.
Tilting my head, I try to figure out the words of the song and even start walking toward it before I stop myself. By then I make out an underlying beat to the music and at first I think it’s a drum, that maybe it’s the Recruiters making their way down the long road to Vista. Then I realize that it’s not a drum, it’s feet walking, and it’s not coming from the main road but from much much closer.
My body tenses in worry, wondering who else could be out in the ruins. A part of me wants to run to them, seeking safety in numbers, but a larger part urges caution.
The thrum of people walking grows louder and I realize that they’re very nearby. Quickly I cast my gaze around, looking for a place to hide. There’s a small cave created by a halffallen wall and I scramble toward it.
I pause at the entrance. The moon is high tonight, its light almost as bright as that cast by the lighthouse, but the little nook is dark and I have no idea what else could be hiding inside.
Then I sense movement and I whip my head around to see someone turning the corner up the street. I slip into the darkness, clutching my knife tight, and squeeze back as far as I can, trying not to scream as I feel something small scuttle over my ankle.
The singing grows louder, bouncing between the walls of the old street, the pounding of footsteps closer and closer and closer. Sweat and salt water drip down my neck. And then I see the feet passing by, the hems of white tunics falling to their knees over dark pants.
Just like what Elias wears. Absently I wipe at my lips with my hand as I try to figure out what’s going on—who these people are and what they’re doing out here. Wondering if Elias is with them. I hold my breath, hoping they won’t notice the dark puddle of water where I was standing earlier or the trail of damp ground leading to my hiding place.
They shuffle past, the song still twining among them, and growing muffled with distance. The concrete digs into my knees; my legs are sore from being so scrunched up in this little hole. Carefully I ease my head out into the moonlight and gaze down the street. They’re gone, the ruins now empty of everything but echoes.
I look the other way, the calm neglect of the ruins settling back over everything. I wonder if Catcher heard them, if he’s standing at his window watching the strange group weave through the streets.
Slowly I crawl out of my hiding place, keeping to the shadows. I sneak around the next corner, the sound of the singing always ahead of me. I look around, trying to find something familiar to lead me to Catcher’s, but I know I’m lost.
It would be easy to find the ocean again—just retrace my route through the streets with the rise of the coaster to my right. But I’m not ready to face the waves again. I took a risk coming here to see Catcher and I’m not willing to give up so fast.
I stop in the hollow of a broken doorway. In front of me is a huge empty expanse of concrete dotted with bushes and small trees growing from cracks. At the far end of the expanse is a large wall carved with thick stacked-stone arches. In the glare of the moonlight I can make out a large rusty sign hanging at an angle. Letters have worn out, leaving the words CHARLESBURG AMPHITHEATER barely readable.
Disappearing under the center arch is the trailing line of the singers, all in white tunics with shaved heads, just like Elias. I squint, straining to pick out details, but it’s difficult to tell any of them apart at this distance with so little light. I’m surprised to see this many people out here in the ruins, surprised they could be so close to Vista and I wouldn’t know anything about them.
But I realize that if I can find Elias among them, he can lead me to Catcher.
I wait several moments after they disappear into the amphitheater, until the night settles back into normalcy: cicadas buzzing and tree frogs humming. I clench and relax my grip on the knife, nervous. A few drops of water slide from my wet hair down my back and along my legs.
All I have to do is make it across the concrete expanse and into one of the arches, I tell myself. Just take the next step and then another. I force one foot forward, trying to crouch against the branches of trees and hulking mass of bushes.
I feel keenly every heartbeat, every thundering throb of warning, but I keep going. Slowly, as I get closer, I can hear the singing again. Hear the chant of deep voices.
I touch my fingers to the stones of the arch—not the one they walked through but another one off to the side. I slide underneath it, pressing into its shadows.
Beyond the arch is something I’ve never seen before: a long sloping depression, as if someone scooped out the ground a long time ago. Cut into the slope are terraces scattered with broken benches tangled in weeds. In the center of the bowl is a stage capped by a dome with no walls.
I shrink against the side of the arch, feeling the warmth of the stones through my shirt. The tunic-wearers still sing but then another noise reverberates around the grassy edges of the bowl: moans.
I jump to my feet, knife clutched tightly in my hand, and am ready to run when I realize that no one else is reacting. The people continue to chant and sing as they make their way down a crumbling set of steps.
Fear twists my stomach. Why aren’t they running? Why aren’t they grabbing weapons?
The line of people splits as it hits the bottom of the hill, climbing onto the stage, and that’s when I see the Mudo swarming in the shadow of the dome.
I j
erk my head back, slamming it into the wall of the arch with a thick thud. I grunt at the pain and then slap a hand over my mouth. My breathing is ragged but I’m terrified to move. Afraid someone will see me, that someone might already have noticed me. I shrink as deep into the shadows as I can, keeping myself frozen.
My eyes bounce around the scene. None of the people seem to care about the Mudo as they walk toward them. And then I realize that the Mudo aren’t moving—they’re reaching into the night, their fingers swiping at the air, but they’re all stuck in place.
There’s something terribly different about them. About the way they look and the pitch of their moans.
My stomach drops when I realize what it is. The Mudo aren’t moving because they all have collars around their throats, chains and leashes keeping them stationary. And the people in the white tunics aren’t worried about them because the Mudo are missing their teeth and the bottom of their jaws: They can’t bite.
Which means they can’t infect. Their faces are twisted, looking less human and more animal, but despite my disgust I find myself leaning forward to see them closer. The living walk among them as if they aren’t even there, as if they’re harmless—not the definition of death.
Suddenly the singing stops and silence pervades everything, tempered only by the hollow moans. I’m afraid that any movement will give me away and so I stand stuck in the curve of the arch, staring. I scan their faces, trying to find Elias, wondering if the man who saved me could be here—be a part of this.
Last night in my dream his face was so vivid, so unique. But now with so many men and women and boys and girls wearing white tunics with their heads shaved, they start to blend together. They all blur in the light of the moon.
The Mudo squirm against their restraints, pushing to get closer to the living flesh. There must be more than a dozen of them, their moans raspy and reedy. And yet the people leading them look unconcerned at the way death lunges for them.