The emitter is broken in two.
It takes a few seconds for the fear to hit me, but when it does I can’t move.
“That doesn’t look so good,” Brenna whispers, looking around. “You think it still works?”
I stare at the broken emitter, my legs heavy. I’ve relied on it so much these past few months. Now it’s gone. We’re sitting ducks.
I will my limbs to work and quickly sling the pack over my shoulder and, ignoring the pain that shoots through my ribs, spin in place with my gun. “We need to find shelter, now,” I hiss. Two loud gunshots had gone off. Maybe there weren’t any Floraes around to hear them. Maybe we’re still okay.
Yet out of the corner of my eye, I catch a flash of green streaking across the parking lot.
The world seems to slow. And now I see it—a Florae. It rises slowly over a car. Its eyes are milky and unseeing, but its ears—or earholes—are a hundred times sharper than our own. I know it’s heard us. And if one has, there will soon be many more.
Brenna and I look at each other. Our instinct, of course, is to run. But that would only make things worse. We’d go in different directions, and the Florae, with all its inhuman speed, would hunt us down in seconds. Our only hope is to stick together.
The two of us stand there as if time has stopped. I wish I could sign to her, like I did so many times to Baby. I hold up a hand to try and convey we should be still. She shows me she understands with a small, stiff nod.
And then everything happens at once.
I raise my arm and shoot the creature with my silenced Guardian gun before it can figure out exactly where we are. It falls, but there’s no time for relief. Another appears to our left from another car, attracted by the minimal noise. I turn to Brenna and put my fingers to my lips. She again nods her understanding.
We can make our stand here; there are plenty of abandoned cars to hide behind. But I don’t know how many are coming, and they could attack us from any direction. It would be pointless to use the rifle, as the sound of the shots would just bring more. They are only a few now, and far enough away for us to find someplace where we can be quiet and wait for Them to disperse.
I point behind us, to the shelter of the strip mall. We need someplace secure that we can hide.
Another creature appears a few hundred feet behind Brenna, listening. I take aim and silently mouth one word at her.
Run.
Chapter Twenty-four
We sprint past rows of cars toward the strip mall. I run silently, like I used to years ago, in New Hope, my mouth gaping. Brenna, on the other hand, makes a lot of noise, loping heavily along. She’s fast and strong but not light on her feet. Her loud shoes banging on the pavement will only bring more Floraes. I shoot three before we make it to the auto shop.
The door is already wrecked, the wood shattered by Florae claws. Whoever tried to hide in here before didn’t last long. The floor is covered in rust-colored bloodstains. Auto parts are scattered everywhere inside. A car is perched high up on a lift—a great place to hide, but I have no idea how to get us up there.
“Can you shoot?” I ask Brenna.
She gives me a hard look. “I am from Texas.” I hand her the gun, and she aims it at the open doorway. There’s about twenty bullets left in the clip, and I hope Brenna doesn’t waste them. A Florae appears and she gets off two shots before bringing it down. She grins. “See, no problem.”
I pull a knife and search the shop for a ladder or anything of use to fight the Floraes or help us hide. At the back is an office separated from the shop by a counter used to transact business with customers. Useless. I look wildly around for another advantage, and then it hits me.
Whoever used to own this place would want to lock up their money at night. There’s got to be a way to barricade this office. Then, looking up, I spot it—a metal gate that can be pulled down from above.
I hop up onto the counter and slide into the office. The actual office door is solid, made of steel, not wood. The outside windows are high up; a Florae couldn’t get through those. Leaping back on the counter, I stretch for the handle at the bottom of the sliding door. I jump and miss it, landing with a blinding shockwave of pain.
Chest throbbing, I check on Brenna. She’s holding a shooter’s stance, gun trained on the doorway. Two more Floraes lie dead on the threshold. She’s no taller than I am, but she’s more athletic. Maybe she can jump higher.
“Brenna, I need you here,” I whisper-yell, my voice echoing through the shop.
She backs toward me, gun still on the doorway, as I hop down from the counter. I take the gun from her and motion with my head at the gate. “Pull that down. It’s too high for me, but if we don’t get it, we’re dead.”
Brenna swings herself up onto the counter, eyes the handle, and leaps, grabbing it on her first try. The door comes crashing down, metal runners shrieking, but it jams to a stop halfway.
I run to help her, only to spot a trio of Floraes drawn by the screeching of the metal. I drop them each in turn with a headshot, but the closest one made it to within ten feet of us—and two more are jostling with each other in the doorway.
“Get that thing down,” I say, growling.
“I’m trying.” She slams it with the bottom of her fist in frustration, and it falls another few feet. I duck down to continue to shoot Floraes through the opening. It’s a bad angle, though, and one makes it all the way to us, slamming into the counter and wedging its head and neck between it and the bottom of the rolling gate. Its black-blue tongue flicks out of its mouth and it thrashes its head, razor-sharp teeth bared. It’s so close, it can almost taste us.
I shoot it and it slides back off the counter as another creature rams the gate. I pull the trigger but nothing happens.
I’m out of ammo.
There’s no time to retrieve another clip from my pack. I draw my knife and am just about to stab it in the eye when Brenna pushes the Florae away and jams the door down the last few inches. She closes the mechanism on the counter and locks it in place, grinning.
I slump against the wall. The Floraes scratch and scramble wildly against the rolling door and the other, regular door, but it looks as if, for the moment, both will hold.
“Amy—” Brenna starts to speak, but I shush her. We just have to stay silent until nightfall. They’ll wander away by then.
“But, Amy.” She’s panting loudly and I look at her closely. She holds up her left hand, its flesh ripped and bloodied. Her ever-present grin has disappeared. “I think one of them got me.” Her voice is surprisingly calm, but the look on her face betrays her horror.
“Was that from a Florae or from the gate?”
She turns her hand sideways. Gashes run across her middle and ring finger. The gate would have cut her palm, not the outside of her fingers. It wouldn’t have made such a deep wound. It looks like she was cut with a knife.
Brenna has been bitten by a Florae.
“What are we going to do?” she asks, eyes wide. “I don’t want to turn—”
“You won’t,” I tell her, stepping toward her and pinning the wrist of her wounded hand to the counter so that she can’t move. She twists her head to look at me, her eyes filled with terror.
“Amy, please. Don’t,” she whispers.
“I have to make sure you don’t change.” I look at her shredded, useless fingers.
“Don’t do it.” Her voice is unlike that of the Brenna I’ve come to know. The fear is taking over.
“My knife is sharp,” I say, willing the tremors out of my voice. “You’ll barely feel it.”