Scott Westerfeld - Blue Noon

Melissa rolled back and forth, spreading out her dress as far as she could. She smelled its singed cotton, felt the muffled hiss of a bottle rocket trapped under her, its detonation like a quick jab to her ribs.

When she opened her eyes a moment later, they stung with smoke, but she saw that the fire was mostly smothered. The last flaming tendrils of oil spread across the wet gravel, sputtering out.

Melissa sighed with relief. Her hands and face were blistered, her hair felt like a total disaster, and she smelled like a wet dog that had been set on fire. But she’d saved the cache of fireworks. Jenks wouldn’t die because of her mistake.

A second later she frowned, realizing her new problem.

The hurricane lamp was destroyed, her only fire extinguished, and Jessica was off chasing her little sister. Until the flame-bringer returned, Melissa was defenseless.

She sent out her mind and soon found a coppery taste on the midnight landscape—the familiar, metallic flavor of flame-bringer. Jessica was still moving, thrashing through the rain-heavy trees on her way to the cave. She hadn’t reached her little sister yet.

Off to the east Jonathan was just now closing in on Rex, climbing toward the last-stand building in leaps and bounds.

And from the deep desert darklings were coming, old ones.

Lots of them.

“Come on, Jessica and Jonathan,” Melissa said, rising to her feet. “Hurry the hell up!”

“Where are they!” Rex shouted.

“Who?”

“Jessica! Melissa!”

Jonathan spread his hands. “They’re still back in Jenks.”

Rex let out a half-animal howl, his hands twisting into claws. Dess looked up from where she knelt inside her thirteen-sided arrangement of fireworks and shrugged. “He wanted you to bring Jessica,” she said.

“Yeah, I’m getting that.”

Jonathan was soaked. Barreling through the suspended rain at seventy miles an hour had been like swimming in his clothes. If the secret hour wasn’t so warm, he probably would have died of exposure by now.

And some thanks I get.

“Why didn’t you bring them?” Rex cried.

“Listen, Melissa didn’t know exactly what you wanted, so she said I should come and see.” He coughed into a fist; he’d inhaled a lot of water on the way here. “Plus Jessica had to sort of look for her, um, sister.”

“Look for her what? ” Dess said.

“We need her here!” Rex hissed.

“Okay. Should I go back and get her?”

“Yes. But I’ll come with you.” Rex made his way across the roof toward Jonathan, limping, his teeth clenched with pain.

“Are you okay?” Rex didn’t answer, and Jonathan held out his hand. “Are you sure you can fly?”

Rex shot him a look, and for a moment Jonathan thought he was going to get all scary-faced.

“Don’t worry about me.”

“Hey, Rex,” Dess called. “Sorry to do the math, but if there’s four of you out there, how are you all going to get back?”

Jonathan nodded. As far as he knew, he could only fly with two midnighters in tow—one holding each hand. With four of them out in Jenks, someone would have to stay behind.

“If we can get Jessica back here in time, it won’t matter.”

“What won’t matter?” Jonathan asked.

Rex took his hand in a deathlike grip. “I’ll explain on the way.”

He looked into Rex’s eyes; the exhaustion and madness had only gotten worse in the last week. What if the guy had snapped, and this was all a wild-goose chase? What if Rex decided he was a winged darkling in mid-flight and let go of Jonathan’s hand?

What if he really was a darkling?

Jonathan paused, but then remembered his promise to Jessica and decided to follow the seer’s orders, no matter how crazy he seemed.

“Fly,” Rex said, his voice cold.

“Okay. But I have to warn you, you’re going to get really wet.”

They jumped from the building’s edge, cutting two tunnels through the suspended rain, building speed as they fell. Water spattered against Jonathan’s face, forcing his eyes closed to slits. Flying through frozen rain was like standing under a shower and staring straight up into the faucet.

Before the other buildings rose up around them, Jonathan caught a glimmer of red in the distance—the rip was moving faster now.

“Can we make it?” Rex shouted, covering his mouth with his free hand to keep the water out. “All the way to Jenks and back before the rip gets here?”

“I don’t know. Normally it would only take ten minutes or so. But this damn rain—” He broke off, coughing up water from his lungs.

Rex grunted as they hit the next roof over, and as they pushed off again, his fingernails dug into Jonathan’s flesh, his face twisting with pain.

“Ow, Rex!” The pressure eased. “Why do you need her back here anyway?”

“It’s complicated.”

Jonathan shot Rex a sidelong glance. He should have known that the promised explanation wouldn’t be forthcoming.

He sighed. No point in arguing now. How did Dess always put it? Seer knows best.

“Ten minutes? That’s cutting it close.” Rex winced as they hit the next roof, taking two long strides across its rain-slick surface, then leaping into the air again. “Dess says the rip will reach downtown in less than twenty.”

“Yeah, and that’s assuming we find Jessica right away,” Jonathan said. “I mean, she might still be out looking for her sister.”

“Don’t worry, I can find her,” Rex said.

“Huh?”

The seer didn’t answer as the outskirts of downtown rose up around them. They had landed at street level finally and angled onto the highway. Jonathan imagined the cars around them springing to life again in twenty minutes, all weaving to a stop, people struggling to control them with brute strength, their power steering and brakes suddenly heavy as lead.

Rex made a strangled noise with every bound.

When they reached a light patch in the frozen storm, Jonathan spoke up again. “Listen, Rex. Why don’t you let me go on alone? You could still make it back there in time. You’re killing yourself on that sprained ankle.”

“It’s broken, actually.”

“What the hell?” Jonathan looked down at Rex’s right cowboy boot. It was turned wrong somehow. The next time they landed, he watched Rex hold the foot up off the ground, taking all his weight on his other side.

“You have to stop, Rex. I’ll take you back to Dess first. You’re going to tear your foot apart!”

“No. You need me to track Jessica.”

“ Track her ?”

“She smells like prey to me now. You all do.”

Their next bound took them over a frozen pickup truck piled high with sharp, deadly scrap metal, giving Jonathan a moment to think before he answered.

Rex had really lost it; he was certain now. For once his plan had actually made sense, yet the seer seemed determined to screw everything up.

Except for the parts that Beth has already managed to screw up.

He let out a sigh through clenched teeth, wishing he hadn’t promised Jessica that he’d do what Rex said. Of course, following orders didn’t mean he couldn’t try to make sense of them. “So, wait. Why do you need Jess downtown?”

“Lightning,” Rex said in a strangled voice, then cried out as the ground rose up and struck them again.

He refused to say another word the rest of the way.

“Beth!” Jessica shouted for the hundredth time. “Where are you?”

The cave had to be around here somewhere, she was positive. But three weeks ago Jessica and Jonathan had flown here, not walked. Somehow the path had disappeared right under her feet, fading out into scrub and tree roots. Everything looked weird and unfamiliar here in the rip, the edges of the leaves glinting with purple and crimson fire.