Rot & Ruin (Rot & Ruin, #1)(66)

insensate as scar tissue and as violently earned.

He turned away from the house and stood on the top step of the porch with Tom. Without speaking they adjusted the straps of their packs, patted their pockets for the necessary things they

would need out in the Ruin, and made sure of their weapons. Benny had his wooden sword, and he had a sturdy hunting knife that Tom had told him to hang from his belt.

The last thing he’d packed was Nix’s small leather notebook. He hadn’t opened it yet. Nothing in there would be a clue to finding her, but having it felt like a talisman. He slipped it

into his back pocket.

“Tom?” he asked.

“Yes?”

“Are you sure it’s them? Charlie and the Hammer?”

“Yes.”

“Not the Mekong brothers?”

“If they’re involved at all, it’s because Charlie’s paying them. Or maybe Charlie planted that coin there to frame them. Maybe he thinks he can come back to Mountainside after he—”

“After he kills the Lost Girl?”

“Yes.”

“He’d know that he couldn’t come back as long as you’re here,” Benny said. “And me, I guess. We know about the Lost Girl, and we know about what he’s done. Even if we can’t prove

anything to Captain Strunk and the others, we’d be able to cast suspicion on them, right?”

“Right.”

“So … even if we didn’t go out there, we’d always be in danger.”

The moon was down, and Tom’s face was almost invisible in the darkness. The street lamp torches were too far away for Benny to read his expression, but he could feel Tom searching his face,

trying to read him.

“That’s right, Benny.”

“Then no matter what else happens, we have to face them.”

“Yes.”

“Can we … I mean, can you take them?”

“We’ll see.” Tom paused. “You don’t think too much of me, do you?” Before Benny could answer, Tom pressed on. “Little brother, you may never have said it in so many words, but I know

that you think I’m a coward. You think I ran away and left Mom to die back on First Night.”

Benny didn’t dare say a word.

“I did run, Benny. I ran like hell. I left Mom and I took you and I ran. Is that what you want me to say? Does it help that I said it?”

“I—”

“The world is bigger and harder to understand than you think, Benny. It was before First Night and it still is now. You have to keep your mind as wide-open as your eyes, because almost

nothing is what it seems.”

“What does that mean?”

Tom sighed. “It would take too long to explain it now, and we don’t have the time. It’ll be light in forty minutes, and I want to be outside the fence the moment it’s bright enough to

see. Are you ready?” Tom asked.

“Yes.”

“Are you sure? I’ll give you one chance, Ben. You can stay here, with the Kirsches or Chong’s family . … Or you can go with me into the Ruin.”

“I have to go.”

Tom nodded. “I hope that means the same thing for you as it does for me. I’m not going to baby you. We’re going to have to move light and fast, and we’re not going out there for fun.

This is going to be ugly work. Can you deal with that?”

“I was at the Rileys’ too,” said Benny, and that was enough answer for both of them.

“Okay.”

“There are two of them now.”

“Two?”

“Lost girls. Nix and Lilah. We have to save them both.”

Tom put his hand on Benny’s shoulder and gave it a single, solid squeeze. “Then let’s go.”

They started out walking toward the fence, but after a block they were running.





30


A TALL, SLIM FIGURE STOOD IN THEIR PATH, AND AS THE BROTHERS JOGGED past, he turned and fell into step between them. They ran down the length of Main Street and then cut over toward the Red

Zone, the wide, flat area that lay between the town proper and the fence line.

“I heard,” said Chong as he ran, and the shared awareness of what those two words meant carried them for a dozen yards. “I just came from the hospital. Morgie’s in bad shape, but Doc

Gurijala says he’ll make it.”

“Thank God,” said Benny as he exhaled a knot of hot tension that had hung burning in his chest. “When you see him again, tell him we’re going to get Nix back.”

“I will. He’s going to need to know that.”

Despite the early hour—or perhaps because of everything that had happened—the streets were filled with people. The closer the brothers got to the Red Zone, the thicker the crowds.

Eventually they had to slow to a walk. A lot of people stepped forward to offer condolences to Tom, and some school friends of Benny’s asked about Morgie. Tom said very little and kept

moving, his face set and grim. Those people with common sense stepped back and gave him room when they saw the look in his eyes.

The crowd thinned abruptly once they crossed over into the Red Zone, and for the first time in his life, Benny realized this: On some level he’d always known that people avoided the Red