Then it was dark again. John lost sight of them in the starless sky.
He stared, squinting against the raindrops that were dive-bombing his face.
And then, a flash of light, like a new sun being born. Bright enough to blind.
The boom hit two seconds later.
Down came a spectacular rain of brilliant, sizzling particles, filling the sky, landing in the floodwaters around them with a soft hiss.
It only took John a moment to put together what had happened, that Ted had known the creature would try to take off with him attached, that flight was its only advantage. Ted was a soldier, a good one, and a hell of a lot smarter than the beast had been. He had just needed the BATMANTIS??? to get high enough, away from the innocents below.
The last of the falling embers burned themselves out and it was dark once more. No remains of either man or beast fell from the sky.
For a moment it was just silence, and the rain.
Then, the rain stopped.
Amy
The rescue effort was an awkward disaster at first. The combined efforts of the three of them managed to get a whole two additional kids off the bus—the children were terrified of the rushing water and didn’t want to jump off onto the jagged ledge of partially submerged pavement for fear of slipping off and getting swept away. Amy couldn’t blame them.
But soon there was a rumble of motorcycle mufflers and a flock of headlights, the rest of the biker gang showing up late to the party. They formed a human chain from the street up to the wobbling bus, handing the children down to safety one at a time. Rather than get in the way, Amy, John, and David trudged back toward the RV.
Amy had been so overwhelmed by events that it didn’t occur to her until she stepped inside that she was bringing with her news that Loretta was now a widow and that Maggie was now fatherless. She made her way back to the lounge and sucked in a breath when she saw the blood. It covered mother and daughter, Marconi, the little sofa, and the floor. Loretta sat there, cradling Maggie’s head in her lap, and Amy wasn’t sure which one looked more exhausted.
Loretta said, “What blew up?”
Amy started to reply, but found she couldn’t.
John said, “Ted blew up the monster. It’s gone. But he died in the process. I’m, uh, sorry. He sacrificed himself, to save Maggie. And you, and all of us. Maybe the world. If anybody ever tries to say otherwise, you can tell them to come find me. Because I saw it myself.”
Loretta closed her eyes and leaned back against the window behind her—the corner was shattered where a pair of bullets had punched through at some point. She pressed her lips together and swallowed. Amy sensed the woman was cutting off the grief, like crimping a hose. Her daughter needed her, and there would be time to grieve for her husband later.
Amy said, “How is Maggie?”
From behind her, Marconi said, “From what I can ascertain, the four pellets perforated her small intestine. I have stopped the bleeding and given her something for the pain. But she needs a hospital.”
David said, “She … does?”
Amy glanced out at the huddle of kids standing on the pavement outside, being tended to by their parents. The bus driver was among them. Amy had written her off for dead, and she now imagined her at the bottom of the bus, down where it was filling with water, lifting up the children one at a time so they could breathe. A hero.
With a tortured squeal of scraping metal, the empty school bus was wrenched free from the shore and went rolling down the river, colliding with the wreckage of the bridge. Several of the kids cheered.
Marconi fixed his gaze on David and in a lowered voice, said, “What I observe, with my five senses, is a child that has a very survivable wound, but that needs medical attention or else loss of blood or sepsis will finish the job. That is what I observe.”
From the driver’s seat, Joy said, “Hang on!” They were already moving before she finished the second syllable. Taking them to the hospital. How did she even know where it was?
David said, “Guys, we can’t just leave. We have to … watch them, out there. Contain them. Figure out a way to, you know. Take care of them. The right way.”
Marconi said, “What do you propose?”
David started to answer, but the words never came.
Me
I sat there and stared out of the bullet-riddled rear window, watching the RV shit a stream of wet highway, the biker kids shrinking in the distance. The farther away we got, the less I cared. I was so tired, and so cold, and so wet. Above all else, I just wanted to be dry again. Then maybe to sit down with a beer and hug Amy while she watched some terrible Japanese cartoon about magical girls learning the power of friendship.
No. I wouldn’t do any of those things.
I would see this through. This, and whatever came after.
I turned my back on the window and watched the Maggie larva carefully. Then I blinked, and there was Maggie, the little girl. Bloody hair matted to her face, pale cheeks, a little gap in her front teeth. The Sauce was wearing off.
So small, so fragile, chest barely rising and falling as she clung to life.
Maggie opened her eyes with what seemed like a monumental effort. Looking right at me.
With all her strength, she raised one tiny hand, extended it toward me, and gave me the finger.
31. THE UNDISCLOSED HOSPITAL WAS RECENTLY RENOVATED AND IS NOW A PRETTY NICE FACILITY
After all that, we wound up spending the next few hours sitting quietly in a hospital waiting room, damp as dishrags, eating snacks and sodas out of their vending machine.
Why were we there? To see if “Maggie” recovered? To try to contain her if she erupted into a towering shadow of doom? Fuck if I knew. John eventually fell asleep, sprawled across five chairs and snoring loudly. Amy leaned on me and rested her wet head on my shoulder. Joy—who was completely dry—casually filed her nails. Marconi mostly stayed out on the sidewalk to smoke his pipe and talk on his cell—he apparently had people he could reach out to for advice in situations like this. That must be nice.
Eventually, Loretta came shuffling down the hall and I noted she looked whole again—no longer appearing to have been attacked by a great white. It wasn’t because she was whole, necessarily, but that the Soy Sauce was wearing off and I was now starting to see what everyone else saw. I no doubt could have seen through the illusion with some concentration, but I had no concentration juice left in my brain. Besides, I knew the truth.
Loretta said, “The doctor says she’s going to be okay.”
John blinked sleep from his eyes and raised himself up on one elbow. “That’s … good. She appears, uh, normal, and everything?”
“She’s been through a lot.”
Amy said, “I’m so sorry about Ted.”
Loretta sighed and sat in one of the chairs across from us.
“This is going to sound awful, but Ted … he never really came back home. From Iraq, I mean. We were high school sweethearts and … well, you don’t want to hear our life story. It just seemed like he never forgave himself for what happened over there. It’s like he felt like he owed a life, somehow, like it was an overdue bill he’d shirked. He kept moving us, from place to place, paranoid about the government, about everything, sure that someone was going to come and make him pay what he owed. When Maggie got taken, it was strange, because I swear it’s like that’s what he had been waiting for, all that time. I don’t want to say he wasn’t upset, don’t take it that way—but in those hours and days after, he was so alive. I hadn’t seen him like that since right before he shipped out. He finally had another damned war to fight.”
Loretta wiped her eyes.
Amy said, “I just hope that wherever he is, he’s at peace.”