We are flying across the flats, JoJo doing the best he can to keep us away from the deep ruts and cracks in the hardpan that can slow us down, his face intense. Everything is happening so quickly, but it feels just the opposite; time is all but stopped and we are frozen in place. I check the spitfire, unsure of its load, then cast it aside and take up the other one. A moment to take a deep breath, and I prepare to lift myself back through the hatch for another go at the last pursuer.
But suddenly JoJo looks in the side mirror and grunts in fury. “Something happening back there! Hold on!”
I poke my head and shoulders out of the hatch for a quick look, spitfire extended. Our pursuer is almost on top of us, a fiery charge exploding out of a port above its heavy front bumper. The charge slams into our carrier’s rear end and everything goes up in fire and smoke and screams. The entire back shield disappears, and I am thrown halfway out of the hatch and onto the roof.
An instant later the Goblins hit us with a second charge, and our vehicle shudders, lurches, hits a crevice or rut or rough patch, and takes flight. When it comes down again, it is listing heavily and I am flying through the air. Somehow I manage to hold on to the spitfire when the carrier and I part ways—when I am separated from the others entirely—clutching it as if it might give me wings so I can fly to safety. I pinwheel through the air, everything a jumble, then land with a shock so severe I am sure I have broken every bone in my body.
I slide into blackness and everything disappears.
When I regain consciousness, the sun is shining down on me.
Okay, I’m alive. I’ve at least got that much working for me. But the memory of last night’s events is sharp-edged and raw, and being alive doesn’t begin to ease the pain.
I lie where I am for a moment, reliving it all. Commandeering an armored vehicle and trying to outrun the Goblins who came after us. Tommy dying instantaneously, a fluke, killed by an errant charge from a spitfire. Taking out two of three vehicles closing in on us, then being struck by cannon fire from the third at close range. Two out of three wasn’t enough. JoJo losing control. The carrier veering away and launching skyward amid shouts and screams—amid chaos. And then becoming separated from the others, thrown out of the hatch and into the air. Coming down hard. And then nothing.
I cannot understand why I am alive. I cannot begin to understand why every bone in my body isn’t broken. But however I fell, it clearly wasn’t enough to damage me seriously. I ache everywhere, but a quick exploration of my torso and limbs reveals no evidence of lasting damage. Bumps, scrapes, and bruises—nothing more. Everything seems intact.
Still, why aren’t I dead? Wouldn’t the Goblins have come back to find and finish me? Or did they crash, too?
I lever myself into a sitting position and look around. I am lying in a swale with scrub brush growing all around me. I wonder how far I was thrown. From where I sit, I cannot see anything but the sides of the swale and the blue of the sky. At night I might have been entirely hidden. At a guess, I imagine the last vehicle’s occupants were less than eager to do much more than a cursory search before returning home. No one could have survived being flung away like I was. Surely the impact would have killed me outright.
Yet here I am.
I don’t want to, but I have to go look for the others. For our crashed vehicle and their lifeless bodies. Better I find them than don’t, I think. If I don’t, I’ll know they have been taken back to be disposed of—piece by piece, before an audience. No one should have to face that.
Slowly, I climb to my feet and stand looking around. I cannot see anything from where I stand. I force my angry, aching body to perform basic movements it would just as soon avoid. My joints and muscles scream angrily in protest as I climb out of the swale and look around. My vision is suspect, the glare of the sun working hard to make me blind, but the wastelands seem a vast unchanging expanse of scrub, hardpan, and sand. My clothes are ripped and torn, bloodied and stained. My boots are still on my feet, but I have no hat or gloves or pack; all were left inside the vehicle.
Then I see what is left of it, crumpled hood buried in the earth, two tires shot out, the rear end in the air, the whole vehicle resting nose-down at a forty-five-degree angle. A body lies close by. Tommy, I decide, recognizing his clothes. I don’t see anyone else, so I have to go closer. I do so reluctantly, wishing it wasn’t necessary—not wanting to see what I know is waiting there.
Coming up on the crumpled vehicle, I see that the entire rear end has been blown out by that last charge—the one that sent it careening off wildly and me flying. Torn, jagged pieces of metal look like the teeth of some terrible animal. Vast splotches of blood, dried in the sun, coat what remains of the shell. I see body parts, detached from the body, caught in those metal teeth. I walk around and take a quick look. Can’t tell who they belong to, but from their size and shape I can tell they are female. Barris and Breck were sitting in back.
I walk to the front and stoop to be sure the body on the ground belongs to Tommy. It does. I look through the driver’s-side window. JoJo lies slumped over the controls. The force of the crash has shattered his face and left him pinned on the steering column. I turn away quickly, trying not to retch and failing. I complete a circuit of the wreck and then make another. No sign of the other three—Malik, Khoury, or Wince.
I can’t leave it at that; can’t stand the thought. I have to widen my search and make sure they were taken. I start a fresh round of circling that takes me in a widening spiral away from the vehicle and into the surrounding wastelands. I take time enough to be sure I miss nothing—all the while wanting to just walk away and accept the inevitable. They are dead—all my friends, all those I escaped with—hunted down and destroyed. How I escaped cannot be explained, save by declaring it a miracle.
Then, abruptly, I find Wince. He is lying behind a patch of scrub well off to one side, farther away from the vehicle than I was. There is blood all over his midsection and on the ground around him, and at once I think him dead. But when I kneel to make certain, I find a pulse and then his eyes open and he stares at me. “Wince,” I whisper.
He smiles faintly and nods. “Auris. I…”
He coughs and cannot continue. I bend close to check his wounds, which are many. But the worst is where the blood leaks from a mass of torn flesh in his stomach. “Easy, Wince,” I caution. I know he is dying. He cannot survive this wound, even if he could survive the others.
“Stay with…me?” he whispers.
“Yes. Are all the others…?”
“I think. I…crawled away…after crash. Goblins didn’t bother looking. There was…”
He coughs blood and grimaces. “We never…had…”
He goes still. He is dead. That he managed to survive the night in this condition is nothing short of astonishing. His wounds were fatal, yet he hung on. I close his eyes, hating everything, wishing I could have done something. Knowing I couldn’t. The Goblins must have taken Malik and Khoury back with them to be executed. I close my eyes against the picture this conjures and climb to my feet, leaving Wince where he lies.