Last Chance--A Novel Read online

  Alex: “Riverdance.”

  Me: “Become a YouTube star.”

  She laughed, smacking my shoulder. “Overcome my fear of clowns.”

  Me: “Play Mozart on water glasses.”

  Alex: “Cure sleep apnea.”

  Me: “Take up competitive dog grooming.”

  Patrick lifted his shotgun. “Say good-bye.”

  We both turned to him, the smiles freezing on our faces.

  “What?” I said.

  He pointed up in the sky.

  A tiny flame, no bigger than a thumbnail. It grew to a silver dollar. Now we heard it, the rush of air. And then the boom of the sound barrier breaking, only carrying to us now.

  A meteor.

  Of course.

  It rocketed closer. We took a few nervous steps back. It didn’t slow. It was the size of a refrigerator. A VW Bug.

  It zoomed in, pushing a wave of heat before it.

  It was gonna pancake us right here on these to-the-thirteenth-decimal-place coordinates.

  The helmet slipped from my fingers and hit the dirt with a thud.

  “Um,” I said. “We might want to—”

  And then it was on us, the roar drowning out anything I might have said. We bolted to the side, Patrick jostling us in front of him. At the last minute, we dove and felt the heft of the massive object hurtling behind us.

  The earth shook. We landed in the dust, the ground vibrating beneath us so hard it jogged my vision. Turning, we saw the giant meteor plow through the barren plain, cleaving the unforgiving ground, shoving up furrows on either side. It missed the Mustang, but the swell of its wake pushed the car up into a thirty-degree tilt.

  The meteor traveled a good half mile, sinking to its midway point, throwing off black smoke.

  We were on our feet sprinting for it, waving our hands in front of us to clear the air.

  Patrick reached it first.

  A familiar popping sound drifted through the smoke and then the rumble of the meteor as it slowly hinged open, shoving earth aside.

  At last the dark fumes cleared enough for us to see.

  A hole the size of a trash-can lid was lasered straight through the meteor. A torpedo blast? Sunlight shone through it. The cockpit was as scorched as the inside of a chimney. A monitor showing our coordinates gave a dying fizzle and went blank. Charred screens, charred seatlike pods, charred control panels.

  And two corpses, as black as midnight, still belted in place. Their suits were heat-split, the helmets crushed inward.

  The last two Rebels.

  Shot down.

  It was impossible to tell which was the one we’d met at our house a few weeks back.

  The Rebel on the left had a vial the size of a tennis can clamped in his armored glove. Smoke poured out the top.

  Patrick skidded down the embankment toward the meteor, careful not to touch the sizzling exterior. He poked at the vial with the tip of his shotgun, and it crumbled into ash. Inside were two blackened test tubes, the glass cracked and singed. The contents had mostly evaporated. Whatever was left was reduced to useless black puddles.

  The serum shots for me and Patrick.

  The burned residue of the last hope of mankind.

  ENTRY 41

  JoJo stirred in her cot at the commotion across the basketball floor. It was still early in the night, not much past eight, but necessity had put most of the kids on an early schedule that mimicked the sun’s rise and fall.

  She sat up and cast a look at her brother on the neighboring cot. Rocky was in deep sleep, each raspy breath just short of a snore. Chance, Patrick, and Alex were still gone on their super-secret mission. Groggily, she sourced the noise. Across the gym Ben was talking to Dr. Chatterjee intently.

  JoJo slid off her cot and snuck across the floor toward them.

  “—got a problem outside,” Ben was saying.

  She crept closer, crawling beneath Marina Mendez’s bed.

  “I could not have been more explicit that you were not to be on lookout duty, Mr. Braaten.”

  “I was going to take a leak. I just happened to glance out the window and notice it.”

  “What?”

  “It’s something new.” Ben lowered his voice even more. “I don’t want to talk in front of the kids. It’ll freak them the hell out.”

  “Very well,” Dr Chatterjee said, adjusting his leg braces and standing up. “Then let’s go.”

  As they padded across the court to the double doors, JoJo squirmed out from beneath Marina’s cot and snuck after them.

  * * *

  Ben and Chatterjee walked quietly across the school’s front lawn, heading for the teacher’s parking lot. They reached the gate, and Ben withdrew a giant key ring from his pocket, picking out the right key for the padlock.

  Dr. Chatterjee whispered, “You’re not supposed to have that anymore. You’ll turn it over as soon as—”

  Ben whispered, “Sshhh.”

  He released the lock and held the gate open. Chatterjee stared into the inky darkness for a moment and then walked forward in his unsteady gait.

  Ben kept at his side, moving along the lawn that framed the side parking lot. There was an odd taste on the breeze. Something foul.

  Ben crouched. “Here.”

  Chatterjee whispered, “What?”

  Ben pointed. The lawn was marked with brown dead spots.

  Chatterjee blinked down at them.

  Footsteps.

  It took some doing given his condition, but Chatterjee squatted and touched a trembling finger to the dead grass. Then he shook his hand as if something had stung his skin. He wiped his finger on his pants.

  As he moved to rise, Ben stepped into him, brushing him with the edge of his leg. Unable to react quickly with his orthotics, Chatterjee toppled over off the curb. He landed on the asphalt at the edge of the parking lot, skinning his hands. His glasses flew off.

  Flat on his stomach, Chatterjee groped for them.

  “Oops,” Ben whispered. “Sorry. Let me help you.”

  His wide boot crunched down on Chatterjee’s spectacles, smashing them.

  Ben leaned over the fallen teacher. “It’s dangerous out here,” he whispered. “We’d better get back.”

  He started walking away.

  Chatterjee managed to shove himself up onto his legs. “Mr. Braaten, you get back here.”

  “You might want to be quiet,” Ben said, breezing toward the gate.

  “I can’t keep up,” Chatterjee said, waving his hands blindly in front of him. “Please … Ben…”

  He tripped over the curb and spilled onto the grass. Grabbing his shoulder, he struggled back up to his knees. He blinked rapidly at the fuzzy night.

  There was no sound save the faint whistle of the wind and a stillness claiming the air. The slightest crunch of earth compressing drew his attention to the wall of the school by the shrubs. A foot setting down?

  The brick rise was motionless, and then it wasn’t.

  It seemed to wobble for a moment, squirming like something living. And then a shape manifested right out of the bricks.

  It stood over him, an orange smear against the darkness.

  A rancid odor filled the air.

  Over toward the school, the gate clinked open and then shut.

  The blurry form swiveled to note the sound and then seemed to orient back toward Chatterjee.

  Chatterjee’s shirt hung about his thin frame, now little more than a sweaty rag. His shoulders bowed with defeat.

  And then they straightened.

  Biting his lower lip, he forced himself up onto one leg and then the other.

  He glared at whatever was before him. “This way, then,” he said to it. “Follow me.”

  He turned.

  And ran away from the school.

  He banged off the bumper of a Volvo, the force of the impact knocking him into another parked car.

  Whump!

  The Hatchling leapt onto the Volvo’s roof, which crumpled under
the weight.

  Chatterjee ran for the street, putting as much distance as possible between the Hatchling and the children hidden inside the gym. The Hatchling bounded after him.

  Whump!

  Another car roof divoted beyond recognition.

  Chatterjee made it through the last row of parked cars.

  Whump!

  The last car in the row.

  There was nowhere else for Chatterjee to hide. And no time to run for cover.

  He turned to face the blurry form. Drew himself erect.

  “All right, then,” he said again.

  It jumped.

  * * *

  From her hiding place inside the hedge against the wall of the school, JoJo pressed her hands over her mouth to keep from whimpering. Ben stood only about ten yards away, his hand gripping the chain-link of the gate, watching.

  The sounds of moist thrashing lessened.

  JoJo watched Ben reach for the padlock. He swung the base around, aligning it with the shackle. And then he closed it.

  It gave off the faintest click.

  Over in the street, the Hatchling paused from his feasting. His head whipped around. He straightened up onto his legs over Dr. Chatterjee’s remains. A beard of scarlet froth dangled from his chin.

  His large pupils pierced the night. Staring—it seemed—directly at Ben. But there was no way he could spot Ben. Not at this distance in the darkness.

  There was a moment of perfect stillness, broken only by the crickets.

  Ben’s head bobbed a bit as he started breathing heavily. Then it seemed that something gave way inside him.

  He turned and ran for the school’s front door.

  That the Hatchling saw.

  The Hatchling sprang off Chatterjee. A few mighty leaps carried him across the parking lot to the fence. And then he vaulted clear over the gate, landing right in front of the bush in which JoJo was hiding.

  His legs were close enough that she could have reached out of the hedge and poked his calf. The stink was overwhelming.

  The front door of the school creaked open. JoJo could hear Ben plowing his way up the corridor inside, screaming at Mikey to split with him out the back.

  JoJo expected the Hatchling to charge after him.

  But instead it stayed there.

  Perhaps it sensed her?

  She mashed her hands even tighter over her mouth.

  The Hatchling leaned forward and emitted a high-pitched whistle, steam misting all around his neck. The noise went on and on.

  JoJo thought her eardrums might burst.

  When at last the screech ended, even the crickets had been stunned into silence.

  There was nothing except for the reek of the Hatchling and a ringing in JoJo’s ears.

  And then, in the distance, a faint ruckus.

  A trash can knocked over. A car alarm sounded. The scrabble of claws on roof shingles.

  They came pouring into sight from all directions. Up the streets, over bushes, streaming across rooftops.

  Dozens and dozens of Hatchlings.

  They bounded for the high school, not even slowing at the fence line. Instead they sprang over it like a plague of frogs.

  The wall of the school vibrated behind JoJo. She heard smashing windows. Doors banging open.

  And then the screams of the kids as the massacre began.

  ENTRY 42

  Patrick, Alex, and I had barely spoken for the entire drive back to the high school. We left the Mustang at the outskirts of town past the Piggly Wiggly. We entered the back fields through a gate over by the football stadium; Patrick had replaced the combination lock on it himself before we’d left. We edged around the outside of the stadium and slanted toward the school. The math-and-science wing lay ahead, a dark block in the night.

  No Rebels were coming to save us. The helmet—the last lifeline we’d had—was buried beneath the dirt in Stone Spread. Nobody was left to help us.

  “Look at the bright side,” Alex said. “Now you don’t have to blow yourselves up.”

  Neither Patrick nor I laughed. It wasn’t just that humanity’s last chance at survival had been yanked away from us. It was that all hope had been destroyed, too.

  Patrick and I had immunity from the spores, sure. That would let us scrape by for a few more months, maybe a few years if we were lucky. But at some point a Hatchling would catch up to us, sink his claws into our flesh, and then we’d be meat the same as everyone else. And in the meantime we had nothing to look forward to except watching all our friends grow older, each day bringing them closer to an eighteenth birthday that would snatch the life away from them. As for Alex—what would the world be like when we lost her?

  My head was down, so I didn’t even notice that Alex and Patrick had stopped walking until Alex called out to me.

  “Chance? Chance?”

  Something sounded very wrong with her voice.

  I halted and looked up.

  We were close enough now to see the school.

  Every window in the math-and-science wing was shattered. The rear classroom doors flapped in the breeze.

  My breath left me until there was nothing but a dull ache in my chest. The damage was immeasurable. I don’t know how I knew that everyone was gone, but the building emanated lifelessness.

  We moved closer. I neared a shattered window in Chatterjee’s classroom. A dab of orange mucus clung to the tip of a shard.

  I peered inside through the classroom doorway into the hall beyond.

  There were parts on the floor. Of what I wasn’t sure.

  Shotgun barrel snugged to his cheek, Patrick drifted inside. Alex and I followed.

  The hall looked like something from a horror movie. Streaks on the walls—some vibrant red, some deep crimson.

  A discarded baseball cap. A partially filled pant leg. In a puddle of blood, a snapped-off claw lay shimmering, a dagger of amber.

  We moved on numb legs down the corridor toward the gym. The double doors were laid wide, a scarlet handprint spotting one in the dead center. My chest heaved. Oxygen was hard to find.

  As we drew close to the doorway, the inside of the gym crept slowly into view. Half of the cots were knocked over. Mattresses flung aside. Sheets puddled on the slick floorboards. The freestanding dry-erase board we used to keep track of everyone was split in half, the columns of names smudged. A doll missing an arm. A shattered flashlight. Someone’s asthma inhaler. A few feathers from torn pillows still circled the air lazily—it hadn’t ended that long ago.

  Alex made a noise deep in her throat, backing away from the door. We flanked her in the hallway, Alex still facing the gym, Patrick and I aiming the other direction. Patrick kept the shotgun butt pressed to his shoulder, but the baling hooks swung limply at my sides. I couldn’t seem to muster the strength to lift my arms.

  We heard a creak above us.

  We halted.

  Tilted our heads up.

  A panel in the drop ceiling slid back.

  Bunny’s head fell through the gap, plopping down onto the floor in front of my boots.

  Another creak, accompanied by some rustling. Then JoJo stuck her head through the space in the ceiling.

  When I let out my breath, it made a choking noise.

  I held up my arms.

  She slid out and fell into them.

  She clamped onto me so tightly that my ribs hurt. I held her, her hair sticky against my cheek.

  “Junebug,” I said. “Did anyone else make it?”

  She pointed at the ceiling.

  A pair of skinny legs shot over the edge, dangling down. And then Rocky scooted into sight, swinging from his hands. He dropped onto the floor, landing on one leg, favoring a badly swollen ankle.

  Eve crawled into sight next.

  I had my hands full with JoJo so Patrick helped her down. Her sweater was torn right in half in the back, a cut bleeding through the fabric. Grease smudged her face. She came over to me and JoJo and put her arms around us both.

 
; We stayed like that for a moment, breathing.

  Rocky said, “Ben and Mikey got away, I think.”

  “Anyone else?” Alex asked.

  Rocky shook his head.

  “Small and sneaky beats big and strong,” JoJo said. “I was in the hedge out front.”

  “I was at the supply store,” Eve said. “Rocky was keeping me company. When they … invaded, I yanked him with me back into the closet and slammed the door. A bunch of stuff fell on us. That’s probably what saved our lives when they checked.” Her next breath came as a shudder. “The noises…”

  I thought she was going to say more, but she didn’t. Her eyes had a faraway look that I hardly recognized.

  My back was starting to ache, so I set JoJo down. We stood there in a ring, unsure of where to go or what to do next. I saw us all there in the hall as if I were outside myself.

  A ragged little circle of six.

  The last children of Creek’s Cause.

  ENTRY 43

  We sat spread out across the bleachers because we didn’t know where else to go. The sight before us was horrid. Every time you looked, you saw something new. A trail of dark splotches dribbling off into one corner. A wide smudge across the free-throw line where someone had been dragged. Maria Mendez’s beanie cap along with a hank of her shiny black hair.

  Alex had fetched a bag of ice from the cafeteria for Rocky, and he pressed it to his foot, which he kept elevated on the bench beside him. The swelling was colorful and bad—the bulge above the ankle was as big as a softball.

  After a time Eve got up and walked over to the storage room. She dug a mop and bucket from the mess. Somehow the rolling bucket had stayed upright.

  She wheeled it over to the edge of the basketball court. Slapped the wet mop onto the floorboards. Started scrubbing. We watched her. After a while it was clear that she was just smearing blood around.

  It was no use.

  But she kept on, her motions growing more and more furious.

  I got off the bleachers and walked over to her. I touched her arm, and she swung away from me angrily and kept scrubbing.

  Her breaths came fast and hard. She slopped the mop around so fiercely that it was like she was trying to dig through the floorboards.

  I stepped around in front of her. I took her arm more gently. This time she let me. I pried the mop handle from her grip.