Last Chance--A Novel Read online

I stared longingly at the tram. If we rode it up, we’d alert the entire city. I looked back at the switchbacks and sighed. “Gonna be a long hike.”

  Patrick and Alex were looking at me but not replying.

  And then I realized why.

  In the reflection of their helmets, I saw the enormous Hatchling resolving from the alley wall to loom behind me.

  I wheeled around, nearly losing my balance. Which, I’m sure, seemed most un-Drone-like. For a moment I’d forgotten that I was disguised by the armor.

  The Hatchling leaned over me. I had to crane my neck to stare up at him.

  His nostril holes quivered. Could he smell me?

  I told myself not to move. Not that I could’ve done much anyway. When we’d hopped out to sneak a peek at the freeway, we’d stupidly left our weapons in the truck.

  He leaned closer, closer, the horrid orange face bulging at me in the face mask’s fish-eye view. His mouth spread. The fangs were smaller than I would have thought, two jagged rows of triangles.

  I steeled myself. The smallest flinch would give me away.

  His face knocked my mask. All I saw was a smear of orange dotted with two nostril holes. The stench was overpowering. I could practically feel it taking up residence in my lungs. I held my breath.

  I waited to feel a flurry of claws disemboweling me.

  But instead he pulled back, leaving a dribble of orange mucus across my face mask.

  The giant Hatchling swung next to Alex. He leaned over her, plastering his face to her mask as well.

  She stood motionless.

  He snuffled in an inhale and stepped back, seemingly appeased. He stepped to Patrick, his clawed feet tapping the pavement.

  Same thing. Lean in, big sniff.

  He started to back up. Then halted, his head cocking in that awful fashion. He lifted his hand, raising a single long finger. We stared at the point of the claw.

  Slowly, he lowered his arm and slid the finger into the belly-button hole on Patrick’s suit.

  Alex and I moved to tackle him.

  But it was too late.

  A quick jerk of his arm and he would impale Patrick.

  We watched the ropy muscles of the Hatchling’s back tighten as he drove his finger through Patrick.

  I cried out, the noise reverberating around my helmet.

  But no—the Hatchling hadn’t shoved his hand into Patrick.

  Patrick had shoved his hand into him.

  More precisely, my brother had punched an armor-reinforced fist straight through the Hatchling’s chest.

  For a moment they were frozen there, the Hatchling staring down at Patrick’s arm, sunk midway to the elbow through his rib cage.

  Then Patrick ripped his fist out.

  It was gripping the Hatchling’s heart.

  An organic confusion of torn pipes and ventricles dripping orange sludge.

  Patrick dropped the heart at the Hatchling’s feet.

  Then he palmed the Hatchling’s face and shoved him to the side.

  The Hatchling tilted over like a plank of wood.

  Patrick wiped his gloved hand on his suit, his voice issuing from behind that blank face mask.

  “Let’s go,” he said. “We got work to do.”

  ENTRY 51

  JoJo dozed off in the golden dusk light, curled in the crawl space against the outside vent. A shuddering in the bones of the building woke her.

  No—not in the building.

  In the world.

  The vibration turned to a rumble, so intense it seemed the building would tear itself apart. She looked over at Rocky, who clung to the metal grid as best he could, his body hovering above the ceiling panels. His wild eyes stared out from beneath the jumble of his curly black bangs.

  The noise grew to a roar, and then JoJo watched with amazement as a massive meteor rocketed into sight, crashing into the parking lot and plowing through the cars and asphalt. It mowed through the fence and came to a smoking halt in the middle of the front lawn of Creek’s Cause High.

  Chunks of turf spattered against the side of the building. Some even landed on the rooftops of the houses across the street.

  The meteor rotated open, cracked vertically from the middle. The cockpit housed three seats.

  A feminine form in shiny black armor uncurled from the podlike wrap that passed for a pilot seat. She kept uncurling until she stood, tall and forbidding in the day’s dying light. One arm, elongated like an octopus tentacle, tapered to a sharp point.

  A Queen.

  JoJo felt a gasp scrape its way out of her throat.

  The Queen started for the school’s entrance. Two Drones unloaded from the neighboring seats and marched behind her.

  JoJo scrambled through the crawl space and took up a position next to her brother, peering through the vent into the gym. Ben was weak on his feet, swaying slightly as if drunk. The Drones hadn’t let him sit this whole time.

  The Hatchlings had long finished their meal. Only dark stains were left where Mikey’s remains had been. They paced at a distance, eyeing Ben hungrily.

  The doors boomed open one floor beneath JoJo and Rocky.

  The Queen drifted into the gym and right up to Ben. Her Drones fanned out beside her.

  Ben drew in a breath and raised a trembling hand. “There’s … I have information you, um … If you’ll spare my—”

  The Queen’s face mask flickered with glowing blue amplitude bars. “Where are Chance and Patrick Rain?”

  “A TV … transmission … Alex, she used to check…”

  The Queen leaned in. Despite her menace, her movements were elegant, the seamless black suit bending gracefully around her. “Where?”

  “Stark Peak,” Ben said. “There’s … uh, some kind of haven or something somewhere on the edge of the city. I don’t know any more than that. I swear I don’t.”

  The Queen seemed to scan his face. “I believe you.” Her mask danced again with the blue light. “Thank you.”

  She drew back her squirming stinger of an arm and plunged it through Ben’s midsection.

  Rocky gave a tiny yelp, and JoJo grabbed his hand.

  The Queen lifted Ben up. His glazed eyes stared down at his impaled stomach. His legs churned, feet kicking listlessly.

  The Queen said, “We will tear the outskirts of the city apart.”

  Then she flung him to the floor in front of the Hatchlings as if slinging a steak to a pack of dogs.

  The Hatchlings fell on him.

  He did not last long.

  Next to JoJo, Rocky was hyperventilating. She looped an arm around his neck, pulled his head close, and whispered in his ear, “Ben didn’t say that they were at the northeastern edge of the city. And he doesn’t know they went to the university. Which means we still have a shot.”

  Rocky’s lips were parted, his head nodding with each breath. “Shot … at what?”

  “At warning them. We have to go.”

  “Go where?”

  JoJo cast a look down at the Queen, who continued to give orders to her Drones.

  “Follow me,” JoJo whispered.

  She straddle-scampered back through the crawl space atop the hall, away from the gym. Bunny’s head thumped along beside her, clenched in her fist. Then JoJo slid back a ceiling panel, stuck her head through, and scanned both directions.

  Clear.

  She swung down and dropped through. Then she peered up at Rocky.

  “What are you, crazy?” he whispered. “Where are you going?”

  “Come on already. Don’t land on your bad ankle.”

  She heard footsteps moving across the gym toward the doors to the hall. She stared at the closed doors, panic building.

  Her next whisper was strained through clenched teeth. “Now, Rocky.”

  He slid out, landing evenly. She grabbed his hand. They ran for the front exit and skidded through just as they heard the gym door clang open behind them.

  JoJo dragged her big brother toward the meteor.

 
Rocky halted as they approached it. “No,” he said. “No way.”

  They turned back to the school. Shadows became visible behind the inset windows of the front doors. No more time.

  JoJo dove into the meteor cockpit. Rocky jumped after her.

  They scrambled onto the row of podlike seating structures. Behind was a tiny cargo space.

  She could hear boots moving across the lawn, closing in.

  She and Rocky slid over the headrests, piling on top of each other in the cargo space. They shoved themselves as low as they could. A few bulky bags filled with hard equipment dug into their backs.

  Three shadows fell across the meteor opening. JoJo’s face filled the tiny gap between two of the chairs, a band of light falling across her eyes.

  The Queen and the Drones ducked to enter. They turned to sit.

  That’s when JoJo realized she didn’t have Bunny’s head.

  Her eyes strained to find it.

  On the curved base of the pilot’s seat pod.

  Right beneath the Queen’s lowering rear end.

  At the last second, JoJo snaked her hand through the gap, grabbed Bunny’s ears, and snatched the stuffed animal into the cargo space with her.

  It was so close that her knuckles brushed the smooth armor at the back of the Queen’s thigh.

  The seats rocked slightly as the Queen and Drones adjusted their positions.

  A grinding sound as the meteor zippered itself closed.

  A vibration rattled JoJo’s teeth in her skull. The roar grew to an earsplitting decibel level, and then the meteor rose up slowly, slowly. When it rocketed off toward Stark Peak, it left JoJo’s stomach behind.

  Her mouth, like Rocky’s, was open.

  She would have been screaming if she could’ve caught her breath.

  ENTRY 52

  By the time I hiked off the last switchback in the cliff face and tumbled onto level ground, my calves ached, my thighs screamed, and the sun was nothing but a seam of fuchsia at the horizon. Alex and Patrick were up top already beside the stalled aerial tram perched at the cliff’s edge. They sat side by side next to their packs, enjoying the sunset. Patrick was wearing his black cowboy hat again.

  It looked like I’d interrupted them on a picnic.

  After cresting the first hill past the freeway, we’d shed our armor. It was too heavy for the terrain. We’d followed the path of the aerial tramway overhead, hiking beneath the steel cables to the base of the cliff. We didn’t come across a single Drone or Hatchling the entire way. The Harvesters seemed to be concentrated in the city, remaking it to their liking.

  More and more the university seemed like a haven.

  At the top of the cliff, Patrick and Alex gave me a moment to recover, and then we readied our weapons and walked toward the grouping of buildings. The closest, a three-story rise that housed the departments of history and literature, was empty. We stepped inside, the click of the glass door sending an echo through the abandoned halls and up the stairwells. We walked through the lobby, across the atrium, and out the other side.

  The chemistry building was deserted. As were physics and biology. From a central quad, we peered down at the law and business schools below. Dark windows. No signs of movement.

  A ghost campus.

  We were losing light fast, and the winding paths were confusing. After a few more detours, we found ourselves back at the central quad. A big fountain sat stagnant. Dead leaves clustered around picnic tables. A mountain bike lay on its side in the middle of a wide lawn, the front wheel spinning lazily in the breeze.

  “This place is confusing,” Alex said. “We keep walking in circles.”

  “Maybe we’re too young to be at college,” I said, and she laughed.

  “I don’t see any Department of Virology,” Patrick said. “What if we came all the way here for nothing?”

  I turned in a circle, my eyes settling on a sign at the edge of the quad. It said STARK PEAK MEDICAL SCHOOL and had an arrow pointing to the far edge of the cliffs, around the bend where we’d climbed up. I walked over to the sign and peered up the dirt path.

  The sunset backlit the big white building of the medical school. Next to it was a low-lying concrete structure, almost a bunker, with slits for windows.

  Lining the edge of the roof like gutters were what appeared to be pipes. They pumped mist into the air all around the building. The surrounding parking lot had no cars, just a row of golf carts near the door. Odd.

  I signaled to Patrick and Alex, and we crept closer. We hid behind a groundskeeper shack and peered out at the building.

  Sure enough, a metal plaque bolted to the concrete read DEPARTMENT OF VIROLOGY AND IMMUNOLOGY. The pipes pushed out slow, steady bursts of mist.

  “What is that stuff?” Alex asked.

  The mist reached us now, flecking our cheeks.

  I stepped out from around the groundskeeper shack. Opened my mouth.

  Smiled.

  “Salt water,” I said.

  My pulse quickened with excitement. We ran across the parking lot to the door of the bunker.

  It was locked.

  But beside it was a keypad with an inset security camera. My trembling thumb jabbed at the red button.

  Nothing happened.

  I jabbed at it again.

  A moment later the front door clicked open.

  It slowly swung wide.

  As we stepped inside into a glass-walled box of a room, air blasted down at us, making our hair flutter. The door sealed behind us, trapping us in. In the ceiling, the noise of hidden fans revved to life. We spun around, staring up at various vents. A UV light came on, glaring through the Lucite walls, bleaching everything to A-bomb white. The air tingled around us.

  After a while the lights dimmed. The fans quieted. A second door clicked open ahead of us. We squinted at it, trying to blink our eyesight back to life.

  Patrick stepped through the doorway first.

  A man’s form emerged slowly from the glare. A heavy guy with a bushy beard—the guy from the TV transmission. Several other scientists were arrayed in the background, wearing scrubs or sweats and white coats. The room looked like some kind of control center, with monitors and servers and consoles. A few slender windows provided scant light. Pipes twisted from giant tanks of water and disappeared into the concrete walls. I guessed they fed the outdoor misters.

  The door whistled shut behind us.

  The man with the beard spread his arms. “Welcome! I’m Dr. Brewer.”

  Patrick said, “Are you in charge?”

  “No.” A skinny woman with horn-rimmed glasses stepped out from behind him. “I am.”

  Alex smacked Patrick on the arm with the back of her hand. “Sexist!”

  Patrick shrugged. “She was hidden.”

  The scientists eyed us with delight, whispering in wonderment, as if they were laying eyes on some never-before-discovered Amazonian tribe.

  I caught only snatches of what they were saying.

  “—can’t believe anyone actually made it—”

  “—older one looks eighteen already—”

  “—reach of the television signal—”

  “Uh,” I said, “we’re right here.”

  “I’m sorry,” the skinny woman said. “Our social skills have atrophied. I’m Dr. Messing. But please call me Laura.” She offered a slender hand.

  We stared at it.

  The bearded man said, “I think it’s safe for you to lower your weapons now.”

  We hadn’t even noticed that we were in fighting posture. Alex relaxed first, her hockey stick clanking to the floor. Patrick let the shotgun swing down by his side. I released the baling hooks so they dangled from their nylon loops.

  Alex shook Laura’s hand.

  “You’re safe now,” Laura said.

  One of the scientists in the back started crying but stopped when everyone looked at him.

  Laura gestured to a steel staircase at the rear of the lab. We stepped through another sealed
Lucite door to see that it twisted down to a huge underground facility.

  “I’m sure your journey’s been trying,” she said. “What do you say we get you cleaned up?”

  ENTRY 53

  The meteor smashed down in the city center, churning up the sidewalk in front of City Hall like butter. The cockpit split open, and the Queen and her Drones exited, storming toward the high-rise of the bank building.

  As soon as they cleared from sight, JoJo and Rocky poked their heads up from the cargo hold and peered out.

  Drones and Hatchlings everywhere.

  “Great plan, JoJo,” Rocky said. “I don’t know why I listened to an eight-year-old. I’m two years older, which means…”

  He kept on, but JoJo wasn’t paying attention anymore.

  She watched the Queen disappear into the bank. The outer wall of the building had been removed, so you could see right inside, like a cross-section diagram in science class. Drones were hooked up to virtual monitors on all the floors.

  The Queen strode regally across the lobby and plugged herself into a massive screen.

  A moment later the movement in the city stopped. The Drones halted all at once—on the sidewalks, in their vehicles, in the surrounding buildings. The Hatchlings, cuing to them, halted as well.

  A paralyzed moment.

  And then, at the same time, every last one of them started moving again, heading for the city outskirts.

  They’d received the Queen’s order and were bolting to the fringes of the city in search of Chance and Patrick. The numbers were awe-inspiring.

  But JoJo and Rocky had one thing going for them. They knew not only which part of the city outskirts to search—they knew that their friends were at Stark Peak University.

  Rocky hadn’t even noticed that the city had cleared out. His face was covered in a panic sheen of sweat, and he was still looking at JoJo, rattling nervously, “… survive all this time to become Hatchling snacks because my dumb younger sister wouldn’t—”

  JoJo reached over, gripped the back of his neck, and turned his head.

  Empty streets. Empty buildings. A newspaper blew through the desolate City Hall courtyard.

  Rocky finally shut his trap.

  JoJo squirmed out of the cargo space, climbing from the meteor. She took in the deserted city.