“It’s better to beg forgiveness than ask permission,” Asher shoots back.
“And screw anyone who happens to get hurt in the process, right? As long as Asher’s happy, no one else matters.”
“That’s not true and you know it!” Asher practically yells. “This? All this? We’re only here because I was thinking of Evie. Because she needs to be here. I didn’t do this for me. I did this to help her.”
“And this is helping her? We’re trapped. And we’re going to die! No matter what happens from this point out, that’s going be the end result because Mother is going to kill us. And Evie is going to get the worst of it because she betrayed Mother to help me.”
I stop twisting my hands together to gape at Gavin. “I did what?”
He winces. “You betrayed Mother. To get me home.” He rushes on, his sentences running together. “But it’s a good thing, because she was going to turn you into breeding stock, and there were those murders, and she was going to kill you eventually. I’m sure of it. You were much safer up there.” He goes back to glaring at Asher. “Until someone decided to bring you back.”
“I was trying to help her,” Asher starts.
“You weren’t planning on helping her! You were planning on using her. Like you do with everyone.”
I shake my head. “You don’t know that.”
“Yes I do! I know him more than you ever could. And I know for a fact that he’s just using you.”
Asher butts in, face flaming. “When are you going to realize what happened was an accident? A horrible mistake. My mistake. I trusted someone I shouldn’t have. He’s a liar and a cheat. He gets people to trust him, only to turn around and not only stab them in the back, but take away the people most important to them. I lost my best friend because of it. Because in trying to help him and his family, I ended up betraying them, and not a day goes by that I don’t regret it. And you want to know something else? The reason I was even helping you and Evie in the first place was because I was trying to make up for what I did to you.”
“That’s a lie,” Gavin says, but he doesn’t sound convinced. “You’ve said numerous times that you weren’t doing this for me.”
“For pity’s sake, Gavin! I couldn’t exactly admit I was doing this for you or you’d never have let me. You’re as stubborn as a damn mule and have never taken help from anyone. I knew that the only way I was going to be able to prove anything to you was to take care of your girl. You’d have to be blind not to see how much she means to you and I knew you’d do anything, including letting me help you, to help her.”
I gape at Asher, shocked. He’s standing with his fists clenched at his sides, his whole body shakes with indignation and anger. I want so badly to ask what exactly happened. It’s not hard to see it was bad—bad enough to split up two best friends—and my heart breaks for the both of them, but I don’t know what to say. I wouldn’t even know where to start.
Gavin doesn’t say anything either, but at least his anger has left him. Instead, he looks thunderstruck. He lowers himself to the ground, staring off into space. Asher watches him for a few minutes, but when Gavin doesn’t seem intent on saying anything to anyone, Asher turns back to me.
“So,” he says as if he hadn’t just been yelling at Gavin for the last few minutes, “what do you think that stuff is?” He points to the closest “body.”
I watch Gavin a second more before turning to Asher. “I don’t know. Maybe it was something they used to clean up the deceased Gavin said were here. They are in the shapes of bodies.”
“But why did it try to eat my foot?”
“Maybe it likes the taste of chicken,” Gavin mutters.
I have to stifle a laugh, but Asher ignores him completely.
“Hmm.” Asher tilts his head as he focuses his attention on the green sludge. Eventually, he stands and leans over it, then kneels next to it. He rubs his hand against the floor, picks up a handful of debris and starts throwing it into the puddle.
Even from here I can see it suck up the pieces like a sponge.
“Hmm,” he says again, then looks around.
“What are you looking for?” I ask.
“Something else to throw in it.”
“Why?”
“Got any other plans to keep busy?”
I shake my head.
“Well, then, this is as good as any.”
Since he’s got a point, I dig into my pockets to see if I have anything hiding in there. I come up with a pen, a couple scraps of very wet paper, and a paper clip.
Asher takes the items. One by one he throws them in, only to have them get sucked up. Which is odd, because the muck can’t be more than half a centimeter thick. The pen, at least, should be touching the floor and still visible. Instead the puddle looks completely unchanged. It seems to have eaten the items, just like the other mass ate Asher’s shoe.
“I guess they’re not coming,” Gavin says when we run out of things to throw. “It’s been a while. I’m sure if they were going to come, they’d have been here by now.”
“I don’t know whether to gloat, or be upset that I was right,” Asher says, worry clouding his face.
What was it the computer said about being arrested until surface police get here? Asher’s focused on me, but it’s Gavin who answers.
“I think it’s a holdover from when this was a resort. The journals Evie found made it really clear her dad had built this whole complex as a rich man’s playground. It was never meant to be a self-sufficient city. Not until Mother killed him and turned it into one.
“She killed her own dad?” Asher asks. “That’s sick.”
Gavin presses his lips together and nods, not saying anything.
I decide I don’t want to continue this conversation and step closer to the green stuff.
I step as close to the goo as I can without getting a foot full of whatever it is.
Just as I squat down to look closer at it, the whole puddle lurches toward me. Screaming, I fall back onto my butt at the same time Gavin and Asher shout, “Whoa!”
Asher, the closest to me, yanks me away, shoving me behind him. I peer around his shoulder.
“What was that?” Asher asks.
But Gavin doesn’t get a chance to respond before it moves again, its arm stretching toward Asher and me.
All three of us run to the other wall, as far away from it as possible, but it doesn’t do anything else.
“What the hell was that?” Gavin asks.
Asher shrugs. “I have no clue. I have never seen anything like that before.”
They both turn toward me. “Evie?” Gavin asks.
I shake my head rapidly. “How should I know? I don’t remember seeing anything like that. I don’t remember anything, remember?”
Gavin steps up to it again, but when he apparently gets too close, its arm lunges at him again and he jumps back with a yelp.
“Okay, I take it back,” Gavin says. “Mother isn’t going to kill us. That thing is.”
Asher and I both nod, our eyes wide as the arms of several of the piles slide slowly across the floor toward us. But before we can do more than think about reacting, the walls start to rise. The three of us exchange a terrified look. It appears Gavin was wrong again. Mother did come, and she is going to kill us.
Asher slides underneath the still rising walls and pulls me toward the stairwell with Gavin close on our heels, but before we can get there, a male voice yells, “Stop! Don’t move any further.”
We keep running, but the voice yells, “Evelyn! Gavin! Wait! Please.”