The City of Mirrors
Page 181

Suddenly the cab was at a right angle to the causeway; the tanker was jackknifing. The whole thing began to swing crosswise. As its back wheels touched the water, the rear of the truck abruptly decelerated, swinging the cab in the opposite direction like a weight on a string. The truck was less than a hundred yards away now. Peter could see Greer fighting the wheel for control, but his efforts were now pointless; the vehicle’s angular momentum had assumed command.
It flopped onto its side. The cab separated from its cargo, which rammed it from behind in a second crunch of glass and metal. A long, screeching skid, and the whole thing came to rest, lying driver side up at a forty-five-degree angle to the roadway.
Peter dashed toward it, Chase and Amy close behind. Fuel was gushing everywhere; black smoke billowed from the undercarriage. The virals were funneling onto the isthmus; they would arrive within seconds. Patch was dead, his head crushed from behind; what was left of him was spread-eagled over the dashboard. Greer was lying on top of him, soaked in blood. Was it Patch’s or his own? He was staring upward.
“Lucius, cover your eyes.”
Peter and Chase began to kick what was left of the windshield. Three hard blows and the glass caved inward. Amy climbed inside and took the man by the shoulders while Peter took his legs. “I’m okay,” Greer muttered, as if to apologize. As they hauled him out, the first fingers of flame appeared.
Chase and Peter each took a side. They ran.
—
Passengers had massed at the narrow gangway, attempting to shove their way through the bottleneck. Cries of panic stabbed the air. Men were scrambling over the deck of the ship to free the chains that held it in place. Many of the children seemed dazed and uncertain, drifting on the dock like a herd of sheep in the rain.
Pim and the girls were already on the ship. At the top of the gangway, Sara was lifting the smallest children aboard, pulling others by the hand to hasten them; Hollis and Caleb were shepherding the children from the rear. A man charged from behind, nearly knocking Hollis over. Caleb grabbed him, threw him to the pavement, and shoved a finger into his face.
“You wait your goddamn turn!”
They weren’t going to make it, Caleb thought. People had resorted to using the chains, attempting to drag themselves hand over hand to the ship. A woman lost her grip; with a cry, she plunged into the water. She came up, her face visible for only a moment, arms waving over her head: she didn’t know how to swim. She sank back down.
Where were his father and the others? Why hadn’t they come?
From the causeway, an explosion; all faces turned. A ball of fire was rising in the sky.
—
Wedged under the charger, Michael was trying to trace the faint hiss of leaking gas. Keep cool, he told himself. Do this by the numbers, joint by joint.
“Anything?” Rand was standing at the base of the charger.
“You’re not helping.”
It was no use. The leak was too small; it must have bled for hours.
“Get me some soapy water,” he called. “I need a paintbrush, too.”
“Where the hell am I going to get that?”
“I don’t care! Figure it out!”
Rand darted away.
—
The blast hit them like a slap, hurling them forward, off their feet. Debris whizzed past: tires, engine parts, shards of metal sharp as knives. As a wall of heat soared over him, Peter heard a scream and a great crunch of metal and splintering glass.
He was lying facedown in the mud. His thoughts were disordered; none seemed related to any of the others. A raglike bundle lay to his left. It was Chase. The man’s clothes and hair were smoking. Peter crawled to him; his friend’s eyes stared sightlessly. Cradling the back of the man’s head, he felt something soft and damp. He turned Chase onto his side.
The back of the man’s skull was gone.
The Humvee was totaled, crushed and burning. Greasy smoke clotted the air. It coated the insides of Peter’s mouth and nose with its rancid taste. With every breath it drilled into his lungs, deeper and deeper.
“Amy, where are you?” He staggered toward the Humvee. “Amy, answer me!”
“I’m here!”
She was pulling Greer clear of the water. The two of them emerged covered in gooey mud and collapsed to the ground.
“Where’s Chase?” She had pink burns on her face and hands.
“Dead.” Crouched, he asked Greer, “Can you walk?”
The man was holding his head in his hands. Then, glancing up: “Where’s Patch?”
The burning truck would hold the virals at bay, but once the fires died, the horde would come streaming down the isthmus. The three of them had nothing to fight with except Amy’s sword, which still lay in its scabbard over her back.
A harsh white light raked their faces; a pickup was racing down the roadway toward them. Peter hooded his eyes against the glare. The driver skidded to a stop.
“Get in,” Caleb said.
—
Alicia saw only the sky. The sky and the back of a man’s head. She sensed the presence of a crowd. Her stretcher jostled beneath her, there were voices, people crying, everything rushing around her.
Don’t take me. Her body was broken; she lay loose as a doll. I’m one of them. I don’t belong.
Clanging footsteps: they were crossing the gangway. “Put her over there,” someone said. The stretcher-bearers lowered her to the deck and hurried away. A woman was sitting beside her, her body curled around a blanketed bundle. She was murmuring into the bundle, some kind of repeated phrase that Alicia could not make out, though it possessed the rote rhythm of prayer.