The Rains (Untitled #1)(54)

“Sorry, Chet.” Ben glanced at the clock. “You’re down to a few minutes. We have to do this.”

“Just … just let me go. Please. I’ll go out there.”

“You want to turn into one of them?” Alex asked.

“What if there’s a cure someday?”

“There are holes bored straight through their skulls,” Ben said, stepping forward again with the stun gun. “There ain’t gonna be no cure.”

Chet held up his hands defensively.

Patrick grabbed Ben from behind. “It’s his choice,” Patrick said.

Ben shoved him off, whirling around.

“If he wants to turn instead of die, it’s up to him.” Patrick looked across at Dr. Chatterjee. “Right?”

Chatterjee nodded.

Ben’s jaw shifted left, then right, redness creeping along the lines of his scar. “You got a minute and a half to get him off school grounds,” he said.

Patrick took Chet’s arm, and they bolted. Alex and I ran after them. We made it to the front and crouched behind a row of bushes as a Chaser flashed by in the street, sprinting after something. She vanished around the corner. For a moment the coast looked clear. We sprang out from cover, running for the gate. Patrick’s hands fumbled at the combination lock.

Moans escaped Chet’s mouth. “I’m scared,” he said. “I’m so scared.”

The chain fell away, and the gate creaked open. “I’m sorry,” Patrick said. “But you have to go.”

Chet took a shaky step forward, then another. He was moving too slowly, and Patrick had to give him a little push. The gate closed behind him. Patrick looped the lock through the chain.

“Wait.” Chet’s chest was heaving, each breath coming with a rasp. “Please can you just … just wait?”

Alex’s eyes were wet. “I’m sorry,” she said. “We have to go before you turn and see us here. We have to hide from who you’re gonna be.”

“I don’t want to be out here alone. I don’t want it to happen to me.”

I couldn’t make my legs move. Patrick grabbed me. “We have to go, Chance. We have to leave him.”

“Wait, please,” Chet said. “I’m just a kid. I’m a kid like you.”

I stumbled after Patrick and Alex. We ran through the open doors, Chet’s cries carrying behind us.

When we got back to the gym, a lot of the kids were crammed on top of the bleachers at the windows. They parted as we climbed up and took our place at the sill.

Twining his fingers in the chain-link, Chet looked up at us, his face lit with terror.

I pressed my palm to the window. I would’ve done anything for him not to feel so alone. Next to me Alex wiped her cheeks and said, “Damn it. Damn it.”

Chet’s face suddenly went blank, as if something had washed through his features beneath the skin. His hands dropped to his sides.

Then he shuddered.

A current of emotion passed through the kids around us. Many turned from the window; some leaned closer.

Chet’s eyes blackened, and then the ash blew away. We ducked further beneath the sill, barely peering over.

He turned and began walking a straight line, his head lowered to the ground. Then he turned again, walking past JoJo’s Frisbee. As he continued his pattern, the kids drifted away from the casement windows, one by one, until only me, Patrick, and Alex remained.

Chet’s legs carried him across a front lawn and into an alley between houses. We watched until he disappeared from view.

*

Late that night I was awakened by a wet slurping on the side of my face. I turned my head into a gust of dog breath. Wrinkling my nose, I sat up as Cassius whined.

“Okay, okay,” I said. “I’ll take you out.”

I crept from the gym and down the dark corridor, nodding at the lookouts. Cassius hustled along with me. We veered toward the humanities wing, stepping out into the sheltered picnic area, which I’d designated as his bathroom spot. Since the wings of the building folded around the benches, it was the outside zone most hidden from the surrounding streets.

As Cassius did his business in the flower bed, I leaned against one of the trees, blinking sleepily.

That’s when I sensed movement beyond.

My hands clutched instinctively at my sides, but my baling hooks were back at the supply station. I was defenseless. And yet Cassius wasn’t growling.

I leaned around the trunk, Alex and Patrick coming slowly into view. She was sitting up on one of the picnic tables and he was standing, leaning into her, holding her face.

His voice carried to me. “—not sure exactly when, but Dr. Chatterjee said it was one A.M. Or a little after. He didn’t deliver me, but he was there with my dad.”

It took me a moment to understand that he was talking about when he’d been born.

Alex’s voice came sharp and angry. “So we only have one hour of the last day. It’s not a day at all.”

“Hey,” he said softly. He tried to tilt her chin up so she’d look at him, but she fought it, blinking back tears. “Hey,” he said again.

She shook her head. “There has to be something. There has to be some way to … to…”

“I could stop breathing,” he said, “but that probably wouldn’t help me much either.”