She doesn’t pull away when I wrap my fingers around her wrist. She doesn’t unleash her enhancement upon me and tear my head off my shoulders. She offers hardly any resistance when I force her hand down.
“I’m lost, Zombie.”
“I’ll find you.”
“I can’t move.”
“I’ll carry you.”
She topples sideways into me. I wrap my arms around her. I cup her face; I run my fingers through her hair.
The
darkness slips; it cannot hold.
53
WE’RE HEADING BACK to the hole when Cassie and the kids emerge from the basement of the demolished safe house, loaded down with blankets.
“Zombie,” Nugget calls out. He races over, the stack of blankets in his arms bopping up and down as he runs. He pulls up when he gets a close look at Ringer’s face. Right away he knows something’s wrong; only dogs read faces better than little kids.
“What is it, Private?” I ask.
“Cassie won’t let me have a gun.”
“I’m working on that.”
His face screws up. He’s dubious.
I poke him in the arm with a loose fist and add, “Lemme bury Ringer first. Then we’ll talk about weapons.”
Cassie comes up, half leading, half dragging Megan by the wrist. I hope she hangs on tight. I have a feeling if she lets go, that girl’s taking off. Ringer jerks her head toward the garage, in there, and says, “Ten minutes till the chopper.”
“How do you know?” Sullivan asks.
“I can hear it.”
Cassie shoots me a look accompanied by a raised eyebrow. Get that? She says she can hear it. While all anyone else can hear is the wind driving over the barren fields.
“What’s the hose for?” she asks me.
“So I don’t black out or suffocate,” Ringer answers.
“I thought you were—what did you call it?—enhanced.”
“I am. But I still need oxygen.”
“Like a shark,” Cassie says.
Ringer nods. “Like that.”
Sullivan leads the kids into the garage. Ringer drops into the hole and lies flat on her back in the dirt. I pick up the rifle where she dropped it and lower it toward her. She shakes her head. “Leave it up there.”
“You sure?”
She nods. Her face is bathed in starlight. I catch my breath.
“What?” she asks.