Monster (Gone 7)

CHAPTER 24

There’s Always Something Worse

SHADE DARBY DE-MORPHED to escape the pain. It was unlike anything she had ever endured before. Her morphed hands and knees were burned deep, burned to the bones, and it was agony that all but obliterated thought.

But as she resumed her normal form, she felt the pain disappear and sighed in momentary relief. It was an important fact: she could change shapes, and each time the shape—herself or the morphed herself—was renewed, fresh and unmarked.

She ran at human-normal speed back to Cruz and Malik. Malik put his arms around her and she shook as if she was freezing.

Cruz hugged her from behind, and to her amazement Cruz felt Shade sobbing.

In the near distance Drake could be seen staggering around almost comically. His entire back, the backs of his calves, his buttocks, were all melted. He looked as if he was made of Play-Doh. His burned muscles could not walk properly. But he did not seem to be in pain, just unable to move very well as he lurched after Napalm like a poorly made robot.

Moving was not a problem for the creature calling itself Napalm. It was at the Okeanos.

Shade freed herself from Malik, but gently, and wiped her eyes. “That was bad,” she said. She needed no embellishments—they had seen. Napalm was unstoppable. Shade had tried and nearly died. Two others with morphs and powers had joined the fight and been similarly brushed aside.

“Let’s get out of here,” Malik said. “We’re not winning this fight.”

Shade’s eyes were bleak, like nothing Cruz had ever seen. She seemed empty. She did not argue with Malik, but she didn’t get in the car, either, instead stood staring hollow-eyed after the mighty monster.

“If we all worked together . . .” Cruz hadn’t even meant to say it out loud.

“Together against that?” Malik pointed, incredulous. “That girl with the dreads is badass, but her partner is basically just a big, pissed-off bear.” And Shade had done enough, more than enough. He put a protective arm around Shade, and again she let him.

“There’s me,” Cruz said.

Malik stared at her. Shade raised her eyes.

“No,” Shade said. “No, no, no. You’ll die. You’ll die, Cruz, and it will be my fault. Again.”

“Don’t, Shade,” Malik said tenderly, leaning his forehead against hers, looking her in the eyes. “It was not your fault then—it never was.”

Not Shade’s fault then, Cruz thought, but Malik wasn’t denying that what was happening here and now was Shade’s fault. And wasn’t it? It wasn’t Malik—or for that matter Cruz—who had become twisted by guilt and obsessed with finding a way to reverse her earlier weakness. It wasn’t Malik or Cruz who had laid plans to steal the rock. It was Shade’s fault. It was.

But whose fault will it be if more people die while I do nothing? Cruz asked herself.

Cruz felt herself moving without meaning to move, walking without quite intending to. It was as if her body had made a decision her brain was not yet ready to endorse. But she did not stop. Not even when Malik yelled, “Get back here, you idiot!”

The stocky black girl with ripped and burned clothing stood now beside a very tall white boy, both with their backs to her, both staring at the scene unfolding.

“Hey. I’m Cruz. My speedy friend back there is Shade Darby. I think maybe we’re all on the same side.”

Dekka and Armo spun toward her, tensed for a fight. But on seeing Cruz with her hands up as if surrendering, they relaxed.

“Do you have powers?” Dekka snapped.

“A little. I can . . . um . . . I can look like other people.” Cruz demonstrated by turning briefly into Katy Perry, then back. She half expected this formidable pair to laugh. But they exchanged a look, Dekka and Armo.

“Have to stay behind him,” Armo said to Dekka. “That’s his only weak spot, and it isn’t real weak. But head-to-head he just spews, and everything burns.”

“How’s your friend?” Dekka asked.

“Not great,” Cruz admitted.

Dekka nodded. “Yeah. Been there.”

“You know what you do with a fire?” Armo said. “You put it out, right?”