“Don’t hit the other window—” her father added.
But his words were lost in the sound of the gun firing. The bullet hit the floor in front of the man, throwing sparks up into the air before disappearing with a whizzing sound. Before anyone could say another word, Ms. Parks took the second shot, sending a bullet into the man’s brain. His head bucked up, spraying a cloud of red behind him, and then dropped down.
Ms. Parks’ shoulders slumped, and she lowered the gun, sighing. A grim satisfaction stole the concentrated expression on her face. Emily wondered if the man had already died before the bullet ever touched him. And though the dead don’t bleed, she saw that the rain water continued to feed on the man, eating away at his skin, melting him until she thought nothing would remain except a puddle of gore.
“Okay,” Jeter said.
Everything suddenly became quiet as if the horror of what had just happened somehow stopped time. Emily listened to her father breathing, and then passed a glance to Peter, and felt grateful that they were both going to be fine.
“You have to go!” Peter yelled, ending the quiet. He’d covered his arm, tending to his burns, but puffed out his chest, intent on being heard. “You’re the outsiders. Understand me!”
“Now hold on a min—” Jeter’s brother began, but then stopped and raised his arms.
“No! You hold on,” Ms. Parks answered. She held the gun—steady, strong—as if she’d been handling guns for years. “You beat this man and hit this child. There’s no room for you here!”
Emily’s mind roared, cringing at the ache they left on her. She wanted to yell at them too, but held her words. Her father moaned and pushed up onto his knees. She’d expected him to say something, but he only looked at Ms. Parks and the gun, and stayed quiet.
The gun is like the talking stick
, she thought, remembering the summer camp where they could only speak when they had the talking stick.
“No more!” Ms. Parks continued. “I don’t care where you go, as long as you’re far from here.”
“The service tunnels,” her father said. His voice sounded mumbly as he tried to talk. His lips bounced with his words, pouching out in a painful droop. “We all need to go!”
Jeter flicked a glance toward them, stabbing her father with his eyes.
“We’ll go,” Jeter said, keeping his eyes on her father. “We’ll take the service tunnel you all found. The mall ain’t the only place. But mind me when I say that someone’s gotta pay. Ain’t free what he’s done. Gotta pay the fine.”
A large crash came then—the first of many, Emily was sure.
“Can you walk?” Emily asked, pulling up on her father’s arm. He stood with her, rising slowly, pushing his weight onto her shoulder.
“I can walk,” he answered, coughing up a mouthful of blood. Seeing her father’s beaten face, Emily suddenly broke down and cried. “Em, I’ll be fine. Just a few bruises and broken stuff.”
“I know, but scared me is all,” she said, tucking her face into his shirt, and folding her arms around him. She felt him flinch, and she relaxed her hands, apologizing.
“The rain?” she mumbled. “It’s going to pull the mall apart. Isn’t it?”
A second crash, heavier and denser, shaking the floor, reminding her of their garage the moments before it was destroyed. The memory was fresh—the sounds, the smell—yet it felt like a lifetime ago when it happened. She pulled back from their hug, searching for an answer.
But before he could say anything, the sound of metal bending, popping and shearing away from its welds spilled down from the second level.
Her father’s eyes got round. “It’s just a matter of time. But I think I can stop it—even save the mall, maybe.”
“Stop the rain?” Mr. Halcomb asked, standing next to them, offering a hand. “The fog too?”
“I don’t know,” her father answered, shaking his head. “But the rain… has to do with the cloud density, which we can control.” Mr. Halcomb straightened himself, peering over to where Jeter and the others had stood. Emily saw that they were gone. He looked to the puddled remains of Tree-trunk and then back to her father.
“Then what they said was
true
?” Mr. Halcomb asked, giving him a look of disappointment. “How much of it is true?”
“Some,” her father said. Peter and Ms. Parks joined them, dismay in their expressions.
“We defended you!” Peter blurted. “We thought Jeter was just some random old coot who didn’t know what he was talking about.” And while she picked up the tone of disappointment in Peter’s voice, it was the look in his eyes that hurt.
“Wait,” Emily interrupted. “Just wait and hear what my dad has to say.” But the shame filled her, leaving her to wonder whose side was the right side, or if there should be one side to take at all.
“It’s true that I worked there… at the machine,” her father answered. “But what I did there isn’t relevant to the current circumstance.”
“I pulled a gun on them to defend you,” Mr. Halcomb said. His words were soft as though he were speaking more to himself than to her father. “I broke the window, killing that man.” Mr. Halcomb’s eyes emptied, and his face went slack and then his whole body seemed to sag from the weight of what had happened.
“Nonsense!” Ms. Parks spoke up. “You stop that guilt-feeding right now Charlie Halcomb.” She swung her arm, stinging his cheek with a slap from her open hand. Mr. Halcomb’s eyes came alive, and he shook his head at her.
“Why’d you do that?” he asked, rubbing his cheek.
“Wanted to turn your attention… to take you off that path you were headed. It doesn’t matter where Mr. Stark worked. In fact, we should be thankful to have someone here who knows anything about the machine.”
“That’s right,” Peter added. “If Emily’s father hadn’t said something, we’d have gone outside, gone out into the rain.” One by one, they each peered over to the remains of Tree-trunk as if to confirm what could have happened.
Relief welled inside her. She’d never considered the perspective Ms. Parks shared.
“What do you want us to do?” Mr. Halcomb asked.
“First thing is to get everyone into the service tunnel,” her father started.
“We can move down there, and even move our supplies too,” Peter added.
“The scuba suits?” her father asked.
“Why?” she demanded.
“I’m sure that the other tunnel reaches the beach,” he answered. “But I can’t be sure how far. I think the machine is a quarter mile north, to the right.”
“But the scuba suits that I found won’t fit you, Mr. Stark,” Peter exclaimed.
“Dad, you can’t go unprotected.”
“What about an umbrella.” Ms. Parks suggested. “We can use the wetsuits we found and fashion an umbrella.” Emily’s father nodded, and she could see him working the numbers in his head.
“The neoprene won’t hold up to the rain, but it will buy me the time I need.”
As they continued to make plans, they made their way back to the center of the mall. Emily kept an eye on the darker corners, searching the shadows for Jeter. But the men had gone, and she hoped that it was the last they’d ever see of them.
Beyond the food court, Emily saw that dozens of people were milling around, still preparing for a meeting that never happened. Mr. Halcomb saw the group too, and waved his hands over his head to get their attention. A few gasped when they saw what had happened to her father and Peter. Mr. Halcomb hushed the questions and did what he did best, deliver and direct. And though a hundred questions sprouted like weeds—creepers and redroot, and even some dandelions that turned into good ideas—Mr. Halcomb and her father hurried the questions along. But nothing motivated the group more than the sounds of the roof beginning to collapse. The Food-Mart was a simple shack by comparison. There was no outrunning the mall if it came down on top of them.
XVI
GRAY RAINBOWS
Shallow daylight crept into the
service tunnel, telling Emily that her father was right: that there
was
something at the end of the tunnel. Anxiety knotted in her gut, and she could only hope that it was the beach they’d find.
End of the rainbow
, she thought nervously. But unlike the childhood cartoons she’d grown up watching, Emily didn’t expect to find a pot of gold. She didn’t know what they were going to find. She tried to listen for a breaking wave, but didn’t hear anything.
Too far?
she wondered.
Or maybe the tide is out
. She felt the knot in her gut tighten.
They’d helped move everyone into the service tunnel—she listened as they settled in, waiting out the storm while the mall heaved and sighed. The walk in the service tunnel passed in a murmur of voices, and Emily found an odd comfort in listening to their soft chatter. The sound kept her connected to them, connected to Justin.
But much of the walk was in a dark silence. She stayed in her thoughts and expected that the same was true for her father, and for Peter. Occasionally, her father grunted and yelled a sharp word, yanking her from her thoughts. Still weak, he struggled to keep pace. Peter helped him for much of the walk while she carried some of the supplies he had asked for.
Emily jumped with the sudden echo of a crash. The sound carried along the tunnel walls, bouncing between her ears like a drum. Screams from the survivors interrupted the noise, racing along the walls just as fast.
That is what they are now
, Emily thought.
Survivors… we all are
. And even the screams began to quiet after a while. But the crushing sounds of the mall being consumed by the rain continued. She imagined the mall tumbling in on itself, becoming a grave to those she had helped put in the back: out of sight, and out of mind, so to speak.
She supposed that they would never find any answers about the man with no burns. Emily suspected her father knew something though. She figured that the man had followed this very same path—from the machine, along the beach, and then back up through the service tunnel.
Emily flicked a quick look at the concrete in front of her, moisture reflecting the gray daylight, holding onto the secrets of those that had traveled the path before them. And if the man with no burns was from the machine, was he looking for her father?
The chatter grew louder, and Emily’s chest tightened. At once, she thought of Jeter and the others. They’d become the outsiders, and then had disappeared. At one point, Mr. Halcomb shined his flashlight toward the Food-Mart, searching. Emily expected to see the three men, their figures blackened against the remaining sliver of light. The service tunnel was empty. She could see the Food-Mart hatch, throwing light onto the ladder. The final crash that they’d heard earlier must have shifted enough of the fallen structure. Peter’s scuba gear might come in handy after all, letting a few of them venture outside and collect whatever canned-goods were still available.
“Are we there yet?” Peter asked. Emily stopped. She was exhausted and before she could stop it, a laugh spilled from her as easily as her breathing. His voice sounded odd, almost childlike, and she knew that he was exhausted too, but still she had to laugh. When she heard her father chuckle and saw a smile on Peter’s face, she laughed some more.
“He sounds like Justin,” her father said, turning briefly. “And yes, I think we’re nearly there. Tunnel’s getting brighter. Can you see it?” Her father’s words came out clunky, sounding wispy, the air in his voice passing over broken teeth. She watched him flinch, and dart his tongue over his ragged lips.
“I do. I do see it,” Peter answered. “I thought I was seeing things at first… you know, like my eyes were playing tricks on me.”
“No tricks. We’re at the opening to the beach.”
“No rats either,” Emily added, her tone grateful, but running on the end of laughter. “Glad those little buggers are gone.” Her father slowed, and straightened himself, taking his weight off Peter’s arm.
“But where did they go?” he asked, stealing a glance behind them. “If they’re not here, and they’re not between the Food-Mart and the mall, then they’ve got to be somewhere else.”
“Dad, you’re the only other person who’s been in the other tunnels. What do you think?”
Her father picked at a cut beneath his eye while considering her question. Shrugging his shoulders, he answered, “Maybe the office buildings? Tall, big, and most of them probably have some food?”
“Well, I guess I really don’t care where they went, as long as they’re gone.”
A gritty sound rose from their footsteps. Emily squished her heel against the ground, sliding it to emphasize that she was stepping on sand that had blown into the tunnel. Ahead of her, she saw emptiness. The world remained hidden from them.
“We’re at the opening,” her father said. “Just a few more steps, but be careful. I can still hear the rain falling.”
“What are you talking about?” Peter asked. “There’s nothing here.”
“Give it a moment,” her father answered, patiently. “Let your eyes adjust, and listen.”
And after a minute, she could see it. Dark patchy fog covered the service tunnel’s opening like a blanket. It was the same veil she’d seen in their garage. The fog rolled, cycling around and around, but never coming in. Only this fog was too dark, almost indistinguishable from the service tunnel walls.