There could be other Mudo out here. I know I should climb back over the wall and run home. Even though I want nothing more than to hide in the night shadows here. To be absorbed into this nightmare and disappear.
The world’s shrunk too fast. What was only hours before a new horizon of possibility opening in front of me has collapsed in on itself. I was right to fear the other side of the Barrier. I was stupid to allow myself to be lulled into believing it could be any better outside Vista. That there could be any place for me away from my mother and the lighthouse and the safety of town.
I climb the thick wall and don’t pause at the top before dropping to the other side. Shadows move through the town, the dull moonlight swimming around them. I melt into the chaos of it all, keeping my head down to stay invisible to the panicking people scattering about.
Men flow from the houses with their weapons, shouting to one another. Women barricade windows and doors. But their sense of urgency doesn’t touch me. I’m hollow and numb—nothing but a ghost.
A few times I stop and stand in the street, the town streaming past. I wonder if I should go back. I wonder how I was able to just leave Catcher like that. Leave Cira and the rest of them to face the wrath of the Militia and the Council. How I could think only of myself and abandon them.
But I don’t go back. I just keep wandering, weaving through the houses in the narrow streets, my fingers loose around my weapon. Tears still burning my eyes.
Nothing tonight makes sense. The kiss after so much longing. My first time past the Barrier and the sense of freedom and desire.
But most of all the Breaker. Her speed. Her ferocity. They taught us about them by comparing them to certain animals, which can sense the gender balance of their environment: If the population in any given area has too many females, most of the next ones born will be males. It’s the only way to ensure they survive.
Same with Mudo: If there aren’t enough Mudo in the area, anyone infected will turn into a Breaker. Otherwise it would be too easy to kill them off. Mudo are only difficult to kill in large populations because one on one they’re too slow. The Breakers, on the other hand, don’t last as long but are much harder to kill in small numbers and can spread the infection rapidly.
Seeing it in person is different from hearing stories about it in school. Seeing someone you know die. Seeing her Return. Seeing her sprint and knowing you’ll never outrun her.
I press my fingers against my eyes, wanting to push hard enough to erase the sight forever.
No one notices me in the chaos and I follow the path past the edge of town and through the trees to the lighthouse, my home with my mother. It sits on the edge of Vista, perched on the tip of the peninsula, away from the other houses and shops of the town. Its bowed wall is flush with the fence that follows the curve of the ocean. I stand and stare at the sweep of its light as it traces through the night, glinting in rhythm with my heartbeat.
Years ago—generations—Vista used to be a more important city, a port for trading. After the Return, as the roads became too dangerous for travel because of the Mudo, more and more people turned to boats and ships. With the lighthouse and small harbor, Vista was connected to the rest of the world. It was a center for news, goods, everything. It was a prize of the Protectorate. Until the pirates began raiding the ships. Until even the ocean became too dangerous.
And now we’re nothing but a light on the shore, spinning for no one.
The windows are dark and hollow and I can feel the emptiness of the house from here. My mother must still be at the weekly Council meeting. I know I should go inside and close myself up in my room. She’d be worried thinking I’m outside while the alarm bells ring but there’s no danger here. It’s in the ruins, in the amusement park that feels so far away.
I skirt around the house and through the fence down to the ocean, not ready yet to go inside. The tide is creeping in, a dangerous time to be around the waves that may wash Mudo against the beach. But still I stand there and stare out into the blackness. I sense more than see the shudder of the light sweep high above me, illuminating nothingness.
Growing up, I used to stand here with my mother. She would stare at the horizon as if it were an impossible forever. As if it called to her, always needing her. But she would never go. She had a little sailboat she would tempt the waves with every now and again. I’d overheard whispers in the town about my mother—how they thought she was crazy for bothering to leave the shore.
Their words would cause my cheeks to burn. I was fiercely proud of her when I was a child, how she would do things no one else dared. Regardless of what people said, she’d bob out past the waves in her little boat, me on the bow and her at the rudder. There were times when I wondered if she would unfurl the sail and just keep going past the horizon. But she always turned back.
And as I got older and learned the risks she was taking, my face would heat with embarrassment that my mother was so different. That she didn’t fit into the town. They didn’t understand why she acted so recklessly. I refused to go with her anymore—it was stupid to tempt danger and leave the protection of shore.
Eventually she stopped sailing. She seemed to forget about the old boat on its shelf by the lighthouse, where it still sits. And just like everything else in our world, it’s slowly and inevitably fallen apart: its sail tattered, its hull slightly warped. I wonder if I have the strength to drag it to the water. To hoist the mast, hold the sail and whip out into the night. Let the void swallow me.
Instead I let my feet sink into the sand, the waves tugging around my ankles. I think about the crescent wound on Catcher’s shoulder and wonder at how everything can change so fast.
I imagine that’s what it must have been like to ride the roller coaster back in the before time. One moment teetering at the top, the world laid out before you and the rush of life filling your lungs … and then the plummet. The lack of control. That’s what I’ve started to learn about this world. It might give, but it always takes away.
That night I lie in bed so aware of the sheets against my body. It’s the first time I’ve thought about the feel of Catcher’s skin skimming my own. The air is hot, close, heavy. It pushes me into the bed until I can’t breathe and suddenly I panic. I throw off the covers, pressing my hand to my chest and gulping air. I can’t believe I left them. I can’t believe I ran away.
I stumble from my room and run up the stairs to the gallery, shoving my hips against the railing and waiting for the light to roll across the darkness and hit the curves of the coaster in the distance.
My body still vibrates. I’m safe, I remind myself. I’m safe. But it doesn’t help. Because I don’t know if anyone else is.
And I’m terrified that it won’t last.
In the distance I see flickers of light where there should be none—the Militia at the amusement park. I wonder if Cira or one of the others is telling them about how I was there. About how I ran away. I’m just as guilty as any of them, only I ran before they found me. I stretch up on my toes and look down at the path that snakes from Vista to the lighthouse, waiting to see the light of torches. Waiting for them to come and take me away.
But they don’t. Wind and light gather on the horizon and the lights in the amusement park fade to nothing and still I stand waiting.
I feel traitorous for being safe when my friends aren’t. For being alive when they could be infected.
But most of all I feel traitorous because, even as I hate myself for it, I want more than anything to remember the feel of Catcher’s lips against my own. Feel his fingers on my wrist. Just one memory from the night that isn’t pain and fear and regret.
But I can’t. I can only see the blood.And I realize that I’ll never see him again. I’ll never feel him again. All the possibility and freedom I’d felt is gone forever.
Chapter 5
The early-morning sun seeps around the edges of the window blind and highlights the creases in my mother’s face as she sits on the side of my bed and pushes tangles of hair from my cheeks, even her lightest touch pulling me from the depth of my dreams.
Something tugs at my body, a memory that I’m supposed to be sad and upset, and it takes me too long to remember. Catcher’s infected. The Breaker. Mellie and the others and me running away. Leaving Cira behind.
The emotions of the night before hit me, overwhelm me. I want to crumble in on myself but instead I hold my breath, swallowing back the sting of tears. I press the ridges of my nails into my palms, the sharp pain a focus.
“Mom,” I whisper, letting her believe it’s the weight of sleep that dulls my voice.
She tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. For most of my life this has been our morning ritual. Her coming into my room, sitting on my bed, gently waking me up to face the day. Sometimes she sings a soft song; sometimes she tells me news of the village. Sometimes we just exist in silence.
More and more this summer I’ve shrugged her off, feeling acutely how very different she is from the others in Vista. I want to be more like the other teenagers, even like Catcher and Cira, who don’t have any parents.
But this morning I let her twist my hair. I close my eyes and let her comfort me.
“I have to go meet with the Council, Gabrielle,” she says before pausing. “Something happened last night. Something you need to know about.”
I try to keep my breathing even, not wanting her to realize that I know what she’s going to say. Even so I feel it catch, feel my chest tightening with the panic from the night before. I shouldn’t have run. I should confess what happened.
But I don’t.
I mumble a “What?” hoping she thinks my throat is tight from sleep rather than pain.
“Some of your friends were caught outside the Barrier,” she says.
I feel the bed shift. “The Militia were notified. They found them in the amusement park by the ruins.” I hear her swallow. “Apparently there were Unconsecrated nearby.” I cringe as she uses the word Unconsecrated, a throwback to her old life and the way she was raised. Her refusal to call them Mudo like everyone else is just another reminder of how different she is.
“Some of them were infected and Returned,” she says with a tight voice. She pauses again. “I’m so sorry,” she whispers, clutching my hand.
I turn my head into the pillow, squeeze my eyes as tight as I can to keep the agony inside.
“They’re voting on a punishment this morning,” she continues, “and then they’re having a full town gathering to announce it.”
I should ask her who was hurt. She would expect me to. I should ask her if Cira and Catcher were there, if they’re okay, but I already know the answer and can’t bring myself to pretend otherwise. She waits for me to say something and when I don’t she walks to the window and opens the shutters so that she can stare out at the ocean.
The light’s bright and harsh and I wince against it. I can only see the outline of her body as she turns back to face me but her shadow looks older than I’ve noticed before.
“I need to know if you were out there with them,” she says. I want to see her face and read her expression but I can’t. I push myself up on my elbows, the sweat-soaked sheets falling away. I open my mouth but nothing comes out.
“I need to know what to say if the Council asks me,” she pushes. “I won’t have a vote in what they do with the others. But I need to know about you.”
I have never—not once—lied to my mother. And for a moment I think about telling her the truth. But I can’t. I can’t put her in the position of choosing me over her duty to the Council.
I can’t bear her disappointment.
“No,” I whisper, my voice cracking. “I was too afraid.”
She drums her fingers against the windowsill and I hold my breath, waiting to see if she believes me. If the truth of my fear is enough to cover the lie that preceded it. And then, because I can’t stand the silence any longer, I add, “I’ll never cross the Barrier.” I draw my knees up to my chest and wrap my arms around them. “I’ll never leave Vista.”
She looks back out the window and as the light slides along her profile I think I see sadness. And I wonder if she’s sad that I’m so weak and so afraid when she’s always been so strong.
I feel like everyone’s watching me as I make my way alone through town to the square with the rest of the crowd gathering for the Council announcement. News of the night before is swift and I hear people murmuring. They must know I was there. They must know that I ran away and abandoned my friends.
Or they know that I wasn’t there and they feel sorry for me. The only one not invited. The outcast. The one who was too afraid.
My hands shake as I walk past the old crumbling concrete boxes that house shops and homes. Rough-cut logs replace what time and age have dissolved, so that the buildings look like patched dolls with too many mismatched parts. Old women stare out the windows, kids’ shouts echo up the narrow streets.
I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to face what happened. I want to run back home and crawl into bed. But I push myself forward anyway, swallowing back the acrid taste of regret. I have to see Cira. I have to make sure she’s okay.
I finally make it to the center square of the town, the other residents of Vista pressing in around me. It feels too tight, the bodies near me slick with sweat and heat and a stench of hard work and long days. Even my own skin doesn’t feel right and I try to stretch my arms and neck but can’t move in the crush of people.
On a platform against the Council House are two large cages. In one are two boys and a girl. They sit limply on benches, their eyes cast down, staring at their feet. The girl has bandages wrapped around her arm, the boys both have bandages covering their legs. Blood dots the gray-white of the fabric and I shudder.