“What’s what?” she said absently.
“There!” said Albert. “Did you hear it?”
“I didn’t hear . . . ” Hannahlily’s voice trailed off as she suddenly did hear something.
A faint pop. Then a few seconds later, another.
“What is that?”
“It’s coming from outside,” said the nun. She rose and crossed to the doorway. Other monks and nuns were rising too.
Pop!
Pop-pop!
Albert joined her as she stepped out into the lurid redness of the sunset.
Pop!
“I don’t see anything,” he said. But then he did, and in his total surprise he forgot his manners, his vows, and his decorum. “What the hell?”
He stared, goggle-eyed, at a sight that made absolutely no sense. It was weird, impossible. Surreal in a way that teetered on the thin edge between comedy and unpleasantness.
The sky was filled with balloons.
They bounced along the ground, skittering between the legs of the dead, riding puffs of air above them. The Children of Lazarus were drawn to the color and movement. Dead-white hands reached for them. Grabbed them. Jagged fingernails tore through the thin rubber. Broken teeth bit into the glistening toys.
Pop-pop-pop-pop . . .
69
JOE SHOVED HIS GUN INTO its holster and stepped toward Dr. McReady, but the scientist recoiled from him.
“Monica!” he cried. “Good God, Monica . . . it’s me—it’s Joe.”
“I know who you are,” she snapped in a voice that sounded rusty from disuse. “Of course it’s you. Who else would they send but their number one killer?”
That stopped Joe in his tracks.
Ouch, thought Benny.
All they could see of McReady was her eyes. They were filled with suspicion and more than a little wild.
Joe held his hands up in a no-threat gesture. “Monica . . . nobody sent me to hurt you. We’ve been looking for you for months.”
“Eighteen months, one week, six days,” corrected McReady. “And I’ve been here all that time, haven’t I? How hard have you been looking?” The bitterness in her voice was filled with jagged edges.
“We didn’t know where you were,” insisted Joe.
McReady’s laugh was short and harsh. “Oh, I’m quite sure. There was a planeload of people who knew where I was. I hand-wrote the coordinates and put them into Luis Ortega’s hand myself. Are you say he didn’t—”
“Dr. McReady,” said Benny, taking a half step forward, “you don’t understand.”
McReady’s head swiveled toward him. “And who are you? Is Jane Reid recruiting kids now?”
“Dr. McReady,” Benny said calmly, “my name is Benjamin Imura. These girls—Phoenix Riley and Lilah—are my friends. We found your plane.”
Her eyes narrowed with instant suspicion. “What do you mean, ‘found’?”