I’m about to ask why an analyst is treating Struz like he’s the big boss, when I figure it out myself. He
is
the big boss. My dad is gone, and the Bureau hasn’t had the time to transfer anyone else in yet. And they’re not going to have the resources or the manpower to do it now.
“Coronado,” Deirdre says. “The whole base is underwater. It’s as if the island just sank.”
“Fuck,” Struz says, shaking his head.
“That’s not the worst of it,” Deirdre adds. “Rady Children’s Hospital still doesn’t have power back up, and they’re over capacity. They’re treating people in the parking lot, but a big aftershock could take out the left wing, since the foundation is already shot.”
I look at Struz, who’s running a hand through his already messed-up blond hair—and I have to push the emotions back. If someone has to replace my dad, it should be Struz. I’m proud of him.
“That would be a disaster,” he says. “Can you coordinate with San Diego PD and see if they can get anyone who’s not critical evacuated and sent to Petco Park?”
“Petco’s already full,” Deirdre says.
Struz touches his chin and then says, “What about the Lakeside Rodeo grounds? We could set up a new evac site with medical there. It’ll be out of the way for some people, but—”
“I’ll talk to Red Cross and see what I can do,” Deirdre says, and then she’s turning around.
“Dee,” Struz adds. “I need an APB out on Barclay. In fact, I need everything we know about him, and not just what’s in his file. Everything.”
I watch Deirdre’s face. Her eyes widen slightly with surprise, and she frowns. “I haven’t seen Barclay in a few days, I don’t even know if—”
“I do,” Struz says. “Call a meeting with everyone in fifteen minutes.”
“Of course,” Deirdre says, then Struz’s hand is on my back and he’s guiding Ben and me down the hallway again.
When I open the door to the room Jared is sharing with four other people, he’s the first person I see. He’s lying in the hospital bed, a bored look on his face, his left leg in a cast from toes to calf. I’m so relieved, I burst out laughing.
“Oh my God, you look like half a mummy,” I say as I move to his bed.
He smiles for a second and opens his mouth, but apparently he changes his mind about being happy to see me. Instead he folds his arms across his chest and says, “Where have you been? Struz looked everywhere for you, and no one knew where you were.”
I sit down on the edge of his bed. “I know, I’m sorry. I was with Ben. We’ve been looking for you.”
Jared leans around me to look at Ben, who’s standing behind me. He waves awkwardly, because I know he’s been itching to get away since Struz first picked us up—we’re wasting time.
I can’t believe the world might still end in less than a day, and I’m having
this
moment. The one where my little brother is appraising the guy I’m in love with. It makes me want to get away too.
I run a hand through Jared’s hair, but he ducks away.
“How’s your leg?” I ask, because I know he isn’t about to admit he was afraid in front of some other guy. “What happened to it?”
“I was in the locker room, getting ready for ENS, and the lockers came down.” Jared glances at Ben. “They just got me at a bad angle.”
“How long did they say you’ll have to wear the cast?”
“Six weeks.” And by the way he says it, I can tell it’s the last thing he wanted to hear.
“Six weeks will pass in no time.” Hopefully.
“Do you remember at Disney, when we rode the new Pirates of the Caribbean ride and you got soaking wet?” Jared asks.
“It was just a few days ago, dude.” I smile. “Of course I remember.”
Jared yawns and leans back against his pillow. “Good. Because I want to do that again, as soon as my leg is better.”
I don’t know if Disneyland is even remotely still standing—somehow I doubt it. But I don’t tell Jared that. Instead I just say, “Deal.” Hopefully I’ll have time to figure that all out later.
“S
lipping that leash was harder than I expected,” Ben says when we’re finally on our way to Qualcomm.
I can’t help but smile at him despite everything going on right now.
Struz wouldn’t let us out of his sight. He drove us to Scripps to look for my mother—and for Elijah. But my mother was gone, like Struz had said, and Elijah had been discharged. When we got back to the Federal Building, Ben and I needed to get out of there. We were keeping track of the countdown, and we had less than twenty-four hours.
But it wasn’t that easy to just leave. Despite how busy he was, Struz made sure he didn’t leave us alone. Until reports of wildfires came in, and Struz called another meeting. Agents and analysts were all too busy to babysit, and we managed to grab his TrailBlazer from the parking lot. Of course I feel guilty about leaving, but we have to move fast. We can’t wait for bureaucracy to catch up.
“What’s our plan?” I ask. Because I’m annoyed at how many of my decisions seem to be based on my reactions to things as they happen rather than on planning. I feel underprepared for everything.
“First we find Alex,” Ben says, and I’m glad he doesn’t seem offended by my abruptness. “We need to see if he knows anything about where Eli could be.”
“You think he could be at home?” For a minute, I wonder how he could open portals in the hospital, but then I remember he can open them anywhere. He just has that ability.
Ben shakes his head. “No way. Even if it’s still around, he got along with his foster family even worse than I did with mine.”
“Your foster mom didn’t seem bad when I met her,” I say, hoping he won’t take that the wrong way.
“No, she’s not, it’s… Janelle, I have a family. They’re just not here, and it’s hard not to resent people trying to jump in and be your parents, especially when you can’t tell them who you really are. There’s always a wall between me and them. Plus, I have Elijah and Reid. We’re each other’s family.”
Neither of us mentions that it’s an even bigger betrayal if one of them has gone behind Ben’s back and been opening the portals despite the danger.
“There are a couple places Eli might go if he was well enough to be released from the hospital,” Ben adds. “We’ll find him.”
I look out the window. The sidewalks and even full lanes of the highway have cracked and turned into small trenches.
It’s not just Qualcomm that’s an evac shelter, I realize as we pull up to the south entrance. The whole parking lot is an evac shelter as well. Cars are lined up on the side of the road haphazardly, as if people ditched their vehicles and ran for the stadium—and maybe they did. Even with the FBI vehicle, the security guard at the entrance won’t let us drive into the entrance. Ben double-parks nearby, and I say a silent prayer that the TrailBlazer is still there when we come back. I’d like to return it to Struz, if we can.
The parking lot is full of makeshift tents and families with their pets, and I walk close to Ben with my head down. It’s cruel and selfish, but I just can’t afford the distraction of more heartache. These people might not know it, but this isn’t over. We’re down to our last day, and the end of the world is still coming if we can’t stop it.
Inside, I look up and the first person I recognize is Kate. She’s standing with both of her parents, surrounded by a ridiculous amount of designer luggage.
Three years ago it looked like we might get evacuated for a wildfire, so my dad made us pack up the car with things we wanted to save. But our car was filled with things like my mom’s meds, blankets, photo albums, and a change of clothes for each of us. In other words, necessities and irreplaceables. Somehow I doubt Kate’s Louis Vuitton luggage is full of anything other than clothes or her shoe collection. And how useful are those stilettos going to be ever again?
I look away before Kate has a chance to spot me, because as much as I hate her I’m still glad she’s not dead.
“Here, let’s go this way,” Ben says as he pulls me toward one of the check-in points.
There are people everywhere, waiting in line with presumably whatever’s left of their lives, and unless I can find Alex by aimlessly wandering—which would take forever—we need to stand in line like everyone else.
“I’ll get in line if you want to look around for a second,” Ben says. “Just don’t go far.”
I nod, though I don’t want to go too far anyway. There’s an irrational comfort in maintaining close proximity. But I also know he’s not just asking about Alex at the check-in. He’s going to ask about Reid and Elijah. And the more I think about it, the more I’m getting used to the idea that Elijah is the one opening portals. After all, the whole reason he was interested in Eric Brandt, back when we were calling him Suspect Zero, was because he wanted to know if Brandt could help him get home.
I keep the thought to myself, because even if Ben has acknowledged it might be Elijah—even if he knows it deep down—he doesn’t want it to be true. And he still cares about him. They’ve been through something together I can’t even fathom.
But someone is opening portals, and we have to stop them. Barclay wasn’t wrong about that.
Someone’s already set up a wall where people can post pictures and notes about people who are missing, and I find myself standing in front of it. My eyes wander over the smiling faces in the photographs: young, old, black, white, Asian. These people are all loved—and missed—by someone. My throat constricts as I wonder what percentage of them are dead.
More heartbreaking, though, are the hastily scribbled Post-it notes or the drawings on ripped spiral notebook paper. There’s a certain desperation to those.
“Did you need paper and a pen to write something?” a weary but familiar voice asks the woman scanning the board next to me. A sense of relief that is becoming ever more familiar washes over me.
I wait until she and the woman are finished before saying her name. “Cecily.”
She looks up at the sound of my voice, and her red-rimmed eyes widen when she recognizes me. Then she launches herself in my direction, her arms latching onto me.
“Oh my God, J, everyone thought you were dead! Your house … and you weren’t in school … and no one knew where you were!” she says, and she keeps talking, but as she starts to cry it’s clear I’m not going to be able to understand much more.
“Cecily,” I say with a smile as I push her away from me and try to force her to look at me. “Take a breath.”
She nods and tries—to no avail—to get control of herself. But at least I know she heard me.
I think she says something again about how she thought I was dead.
“Cecily, have you seen Alex at all? Ben and I—”
“Oh my God, Alex!” Cecily says with wide eyes. “He doesn’t know? Oh, you have to go see him. Come on!”
She starts pulling me toward the stadium ramp, and I’m genuinely caught off guard by how strong she is. “Ben!” I shout, pulling back and digging in my heels. “Hold up, Cee.”
And then through a wall of people I see Ben burst out, scanning for me. I wave, and I can see his body relax when he realizes I’m with Cecily.
I hold my hand out for him and then he’s there, his fingers curling around mine. Cecily looks from me to Ben and back to me again, wide-eyed and mouthing the word “oh” before her whole face morphs into the happy girl I know with the infectious smile. She even giggles as we run after her up the ramp.
I’m at least glad something hasn’t changed.
We find Alex in the nosebleed section, eating a hot dog and reading
Outliers
.
“Seriously?” I ask, ready to tease him—and a little relieved I still can. “You’re still doing homework?” But as I get closer, I realize he’s not reading
Outliers
. His eyes are red, and the tracks of his tears are visible on his face through the dust and sweat caked to his skin. The book is just sitting open on his lap, like he doesn’t know what else to do, and that hot dog has probably sat untouched for a while.
When I put my hand on his shoulder, he looks up, and for a second, it’s like he doesn’t even recognize me. He just stares.
And then something clears in his eyes, and he grabs my arm and pulls me into him for a hug. It’s awkward and uncomfortable the way I’m leaning over him, but I don’t care. I feel the way his body shakes, and I know he’s crying.
As I hold him, Cecily chatters on about how she found us and how Alex has been helping her all day with getting people situated. Her uncle apparently works for Qualcomm and is in charge of turning it into an evac shelter. When her walkie-talkie summons her and she has to head back downstairs, I glance toward Ben, who smiles and says, “Cecily, I’ll help you for a second.” Then he turns to me. “I’ll get the car and pull it around front. See you down there.”
When they’re gone, I pull back. “Where’s your family?” I ask Alex, because really there’s no way to tiptoe around it.
“I don’t know,” he says. “They’re both officially listed as missing. My mom wasn’t at the house during the quake, which is a blessing since she definitely would have died, but I’m not sure where she was. If she’s around, though, we can count on her finding me.”
I don’t doubt it. “And your dad?”
He just shakes his head. “His office building came down, and the department was on the thirtieth floor. But they don’t know if he was there.”
“I’m so sorry, Alex,” I whisper, giving him another hug. “And I’m so sorry about the things I said to you. I didn’t mean them.”
He squeezes me tight enough it hurts. “I should have believed you.”
“It’s crazy. Of course you didn’t believe me.” I shake my head and smile.
Alex wipes his eyes with the heel of his hand. “You saw Jared and Struz?”
“They’re fine.” I’m still a little disconcerted about the book and the hot dog. “What about you? Are you okay?”
“I’ll be okay,” Alex says, even though he’s not convincing at all. “I was worried your faces were melting off somewhere.”
“Thanks for that image,” I say, and like a girl, I burst into tears.
“Stop,” Alex says. “I’ll start crying too.”
I roll my eyes. “Please, I think all of us have cried more in the past week than probably ever in our lives. Let’s own that.”