The Continent (The Continent #1)(22)

I close my eyes, forcing myself to take long, steady breaths. When I open my eyes, one thing becomes painfully clear: the situation in the aft cabin has devolved into chaos.

My father is shouting at a red-faced Mr. Shaw, who is shouting back and jabbing a finger into my father’s chest. Mrs. Shaw is hovering over Aaden and dabbing at his bloody face with a handkerchief. The steward is moving back and forth, tucking the loose baggage into the storage bins, trying to keep his balance as the aircraft jerks and shifts. My mother stands in front of the escape pod like a sentinel, one hand on the glass door, the other balled into a fist at her side.

And then there’s me. What am I doing but watching from behind the glass as everyone turns on each other? I don’t even want to be here; I want to get out, I want to be with my parents.

My mother pounds her palm against the glass and I see the warning in her eyes. Don’t even think about it, Vaela.

She knows me too well. But I can’t stay in this pod any longer. I’m fumbling with the lock when a sudden silence overwhelms the heli-plane. The quiet—or rather, the lack of vibration—is so unexpected, so out of place, that I forget momentarily what I was trying to do. I look up in confusion, my fingers frozen on the handle.

It’s not just me; everyone has become still. Mr. Shaw is standing with his mouth open and his finger pointed in the air; the steward is bent in mid-crouch, a look of bewilderment on his face. And then I realize what has happened.

The engines have stopped.

Fifteen thousand feet above the Continent, the heli-plane’s engines have gone silent. And as suddenly as the calm and stillness overtook us all, so quickly does panic set in as the aircraft tilts sharply to one side and begins to glide toward the earth.

My father doesn’t hesitate; he lurches toward the pod, climbing over Mrs. Shaw’s endless bags and totes, and places his palm atop my mother’s hand on the glass door.

Vaela, I see him say, and I wish beyond anything that I could hear his voice. Be safe.

My mother’s face is tears and anguish. We love you. We love you.

Too late, I see my father’s other hand moving toward the control panel. And before I can stop him—before I can open the door and escape this hateful glass prison—he is gone, and all I see before me is the gray-blue sky, peppered with wispy clouds.

He has jettisoned the pod, and I am sent soaring upward as its parachute extends. The tiny craft swings languorously from side to side; the height is dizzying. At first, I can’t make out anything but trees and a vast icy lake dotted with shadowy patches of snow. The pod continues to sway back and forth, rocking madly, and it seems an eternity before it settles into steadiness. I put both hands on the glass door, craning forward to search for the heli-plane.

And finally, I see it.

Spiraling away from me, aflame on one side, the heli-plane is plunging toward the ground. Bits of metal, cloth, and debris are planing away as it falls—as it falls, twisting and burning and carrying my family.

I want to look away, but I can’t. I have the absurd notion that I can stop it somehow—if only I keep watching, the heli-plane will float aimlessly, harmlessly through the air and never reach the earth.

But, of course, I have no such power. And in the deafening silence, I watch as it crashes into the frozen tundra below and explodes in a burst of flame.





CHAPTER 7





THE POD SETS DOWN IN A THICK BANK OF SNOW. The yellow parachute follows a moment later, obscuring my view of the sky. I lie still, staring up at the bright silken fabric, my muscles convulsing, my mind blank. A tiny red light at the top of the pod begins to blink. I watch it flash three times. Four. I close my eyes.

I would be content to lie here forever—locked within the pod, isolated from the truth of what has just happened—but my body has other plans. Nausea, like a swell upon a restless sea, begins to roll over me in sickening waves. I seize the door handle, release the lock, and push the glass away from me. As it springs free, I clamber over the side and fall face first into the snow. Then I vomit, my body heaving with a violence borne of shock, revulsion, pain, grief.

When there is nothing left, I curl up in the snow next to the pod. I don’t feel cold or sad—merely conscious in a way that echoes something like being alive, but only in the vaguest sense of the word.

I close my eyes, but I do not sleep.

*

After what might be five minutes or five hours, I sit up and look around. I’m in a small clearing surrounded by evergreens. There is no sound at all—no birds, no wind, no water. There is only me, and the pod, and the snow, and the trees, and the sky.

The sky. Bright and blue, except for a plume of black smoke reaching high above the distant peaks. The thought of what is burning makes me sick again, and this time I fear it might never stop.

Sometime later, I’m on my feet. I have the dim realization that I am cold, that my teeth are chattering. I look down at my garments: a long-sleeved dress of fine red silk buttoned to my waist, with layered skirts flowing behind, open at the front to reveal slim white trousers. My fingertips, in contrast, are a pale bluish-white.

Shivering, I climb into the pod and pull the door closed. I watch the red light flash, wondering if this might be nothing more than a terrible dream. Perhaps I am asleep, safe in my bed, and any moment now I will awaken to the sound of my mother’s voice.

I want to cry, but I am empty. The yellow parachute is clear of the door now, and I have a plain view of the hideous column of smoke stretching up into the sky. I put my hand on the glass.