The Burning World (Warm Bodies #2)(27)

Grief. Rage. Both are reasonable responses to the winking cruelty of the universe.

I move toward her and try to embrace her again, but she is nowhere near ready to be consoled. She shoves me back so hard I almost fall over and runs past me toward the Armory.

“Julie, don’t,” Ella calls to her. “There’s nothing in there that will help.”

Julie stops at the edge of the rubble, staring into the dark hole and trembling, sucking in short, rapid breaths. These constrict into raspy wheezes and she fumbles in her pocket for her inhaler. She takes a shot but her breaths keep getting shorter. She clutches at her throat. “I can’t—I can’t—”

I rush to her side and try to lead her away from the wreckage, but she sags down onto the pavement, heaving hard against her bronchial tubes. I want to say something soothing, but what can I possibly say? My mouth is not accustomed to delivering comfort. The apparatus of my tongue and teeth has always been a weapon. How does one use it to heal?

In the silence of my uselessness, the medicine finally kicks in and her gasps begin to slow. She struggles to her feet and walks on rubbery legs to the stoop where Ella is sitting. She pulls in a deep breath, lets it out, then drops down next to Ella and buries her face in her hands, her small body shaking with quiet sobs.

I stay where I am, standing apart from them, waiting. I feel a cold sprinkle of rain and I look up. The sky is clear. The moon is bright. With the noise of twenty thousand people panicking, I didn’t even notice the helicopters overhead, spraying water onto the flames that surge from apartment rooftops.

I see it now. The pieces click.

We’re here to help.

High above, hovering like a book of divine wisdom, the Jumbotron blinks on. A handsome man in a yellow tie steps into view and sits in front of a microphone.

“Residents of Citi Stadium,” he says in a gentle baritone. “We invite you to feel calm. Careless storage of expired munitions has led to a terrible tragedy and loss of life from both enclaves, but as your new next-door neighbor, the Axiom Group is already working hard to minimize the damage.”

I notice men in unfamiliar uniforms—beige jackets over khaki pants—rushing through the streets with fire extinguishers and first aid kits.

“We will have the disaster contained momentarily, and in the days to come, we will work closely with your remaining leadership to help restore order. We invite you to feel calm, safe, and secure. Everything will be the way it was.”

Julie peeks through her fingers at the gigantic face grinning down on the city. The screen shows a brief flash of the logo I carved into the bar, plays a stock animation of a football player chugging a Bud Light, then goes black.

“What is happening?” she whispers into her palms.

The rumble of an approaching truck cuts through the noise of the stadium’s panic, which has in fact quieted noticeably following the Jumbotron’s announcement. It seems that an invitation to feel calm from a stranger on a screen is all these people needed to feel calm. Do they even care who’s in charge of their lives, or will any handsome face suffice? Any well-groomed head with a tie around its stump, any mouth that can lie with confidence?

Staring up at the helicopters, feeling the spray cool my flushed cheeks, I realize I’m still drunk. Or perhaps something even more debilitating. I have imbibed a terrible cocktail: whiskey, adrenaline, shock, and sorrow. I feel sick.

A beige Escalade pulls up next to us and six men in beige jackets emerge. It’s a nauseating color, not a warm, sandy tan but the neutral green-gray-taupe of old office computers, cheap hotels, suburban strip malls, and municipal carpet. The men carry three empty body bags between them. They move toward the Armory entrance and suddenly Julie is on her feet.

“What are you doing?” she snaps, wiping her red eyes and darting over to block their path. “Who are you and what are you doing?”

“Here to collect the bodies,” one of the men says without looking at her or stopping. He and the others move around her and begin to climb through the rubble, but she jumps in front of them again.

“I said who are you?”

The men slow their advance without quite stopping. “We’re with Axiom. We’re here to collect the bodies.”

“That’s my friend in there and I don’t know you people,” she says, glaring up at the much taller men. Her voice begins to tremble again. “You’re not taking him. Go away.”

“We have orders to collect all the bodies before they’re handled by enclave residents. Please step aside.” He pushes past her.

She grabs his jacket and yanks him backward and he falls, landing on jagged chunks of concrete.

“I said go away!” she shouts hoarsely, her eyes welling up again.

In my woozy perception, everything feels slow. I move toward Julie, but my feet are strapped with heavy weights. One of the men shoves her. She falls into the rubble. She gets up, wipes blood from a cut on her forehead, and lunges at him. Too short to reach his face, she punches him in the throat. He stumbles back, choking, and I hear Julie screaming.

“Get out of here! Get out!”

I’m almost there. The ground sucks at my feet like deep tar. I crawl up the rubble heap as four men converge on her. She takes a swing at the nearest one but he grabs her arm and twists her around, then kicks her hard between the shoulder blades. She flies clear of the mound and lands facedown on the asphalt.