He rubs his chin and then grips the back of his neck. “I think I know where your friend is,” he counters.

I narrow my eyes at him, not sure whether I can or should trust him. “How do you know? Why are you out here?” I ask, trying to figure out who he is.

He studies me and I see a brief flash of something cross over his face. Fear? Regret? Or maybe just the moon hiding behind a cloud before bursting through. “I’m looking for someone as well,” he says. His voice is quiet and even.

“Who?” I ask, wondering if everyone in the world is lost, all of us searching.

He stares at me a little longer, and then finally shakes his head. “Never mind,” he mumbles.

“Who?” I press.

He pauses before saying, “I just saved you from the Unconsecrated, which, I might add, are still after us. Who I’m looking for isn’t important. I’d think just the fact that I am here would be something you might want to be thankful for.”

I look at him closely, unsure if I heard him right. “You call them Unconsecrated.” I pause. “Why?”

He’s silent for a long moment. Waiting, I think, for me to say something. Then he shrugs. “Every town has its own word for them, passed down from the Return. It’s the one I like best.”

I’ve only heard my mother use that term. But then again, I’ve rarely met someone from outside Vista except the traders and Recruiters. “You said you’d seen my friend?” I ask.

“I think I know where he is.”

His eyes are so intense that I have a hard time looking away. “Will you take me to him?”

Once again he looks past me and then rubs a hand over his head as if forgetting he has no hair to tug at. “Are you sure, Gabry?” He says my nickname carefully, as if testing it out.

I start to say yes but the word won’t come. I have to force my lips to move, remind my chest to squeeze out air. “Yes,” I finally manage. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

He shifts his feet. “Your friend is infected,” he says.

I close my eyes, feeling the pain come back. Seeing the bite wounds on Catcher’s shoulder again.

“You have to trust me,” he says, almost tenderly, when I’m silent. “I know what infection looks like.” He seems to laugh a little then. Like a nervous sigh, just a puff of air. “He’s infected. He’s got a few days, maybe. But …” His voice trails off, slipping away to the sound of the moans behind him.

I nod. “I know.” And it feels as if it takes everything I am to say those words. Of course, I suddenly realize everything I am doesn’t exist anymore. For a brief moment under the shadows of the coaster with Catcher I thought I knew for the first time who I was and wanted to be. Since then all of that has been shaken.

The air around me seems too thick, too heavy. “I just have to see him,” I tell Elias. “I just have to see him again.”

When I open my eyes he’s looking at me, pain etched in the lines around his mouth. I wonder, then, if he’s lost someone to the Mudo. He said he knows infection, has seen it. I wonder if he’s watched someone he loved get bitten. If he’s watched the infection sear through the body, fester the wound, take control.

Elias turns and looks at the fence. The Mudo have multiplied, the moans echoing off the half-fallen walls around us. They pull at the metal links, which look too thin, too delicate to stop their onslaught. Elias reaches to the scabbard on his back and pulls out a long sharp dagger.

I see the flash of a pattern etched into the blade before he lunges at the gate, the tip of the knife slipping through the links and piercing the skull of one of the Mudo. The movement is so abrupt, so unexpected, I gasp. Elias grunts as he yanks the weapon free and lunges at another. I watch the Mudo man stay standing just a moment longer before slumping to the ground. The ones around him don’t notice. Don’t care. Don’t stop. They don’t move away, just keep thrashing against the fence, which bows under their weight.

My entire life I’ve watched my mother behead the Mudo that wash up on the beach after storms and during strong high tides. I’ve seen her turn them over, examine their faces, before pushing her shovel-shaped blade into their necks.

It always seemed as if she was looking for someone. As if she was waiting, fearing, that someone she knew would wash upon her beach. As if she regretted her job—regretted what the former people at her feet had become.

Elias takes no such care as he goes about his task. And I find myself looking into the faces of the Mudo, wondering who they used to be. The Mudo washed ashore always seemed so lifeless to me. So dead and distant. I never had to get near them. Not like those beyond the fences in front of us, who push and moan and are too close. Who in a dark night could be mistaken as human. They all had mothers somewhere, sometime in the past. Some of them had lovers. Children. Dreams.

All they ever had is gone. Nothing more than a senseless hunger that will never be satisfied.

I wonder, then, if one of the women could have been my real mother. One of the boys my brother. And soon one of them could be Catcher. The thought hits me hard, reminding me why I’m here beyond the Barrier.

Chapter 11

“S top,” I whisper. Elias doesn’t hear me. His breath is ragged now with the effort of his kills as he shoves the blade through the fence again and again and again, grunting and almost screaming with a barely concealed rage every time another Mudo falls.

“Stop,” I say louder. I lunge toward him, pulling his arm back before he can thrust his knife through the fence again. I’m almost sobbing, the tears clogging my throat. He looks at me and I notice the anger on his face. I see horror and terror before he lets a passive mask fall over everything.

He lowers his arm but I keep my fingers pressed against his skin. It’s still damp, a combination of sweat and the ocean. Life flows from him, in the warmth of him.

He stares at where I touch him and then into my eyes.

I pull my hand away. His gaze is steady against mine and I step back.

“It’s the only thing we can do,” he says, and for a moment I think he means us. Think he means my touch. “We have to kill them. They’ll cave the gate in otherwise. It’s too dangerous.” I realize then that he means the Mudo, he means killing them.

“I just …” I don’t know how to explain to him how it all felt, suddenly wondering who the Mudo once were. Knowing there could be a connection between us. The thought makes me feel uneven, uncertain. “Never mind,” I mumble.

“It’s the only humane thing to do, Gabry.” He waves his hands at the Mudo but I can’t bear to look. Can’t bear to imagine what it would be like to see the people I love on the other side of that fence—of what it will be like when Catcher is one of them.

It’s disorienting—I’m not used to thinking of the Mudo as anything but monsters. They’ve never been anything else to me and I wonder now if this is how my mother has always felt. If this is why she treats them with such respect before killing them on the beach.

“This isn’t fair to them,” Elias adds. And I want to ask him what is fair about any of our lives. But instead I just nod as he tentatively raises his knife and I don’t stop him as he resumes his task. I want to walk away but I don’t. I want to cover my ears against the moans, against the blade scraping skulls and the sound of the chain-link fence, but I can’t.

I stand by Elias’s side as he kills them all and I continue to stand there as he pants after the last one slumps to the ground.

I remember my mother telling me earlier that we are nothing more than our stories. I look at the masses of dead flesh, at all the stories that are now forever silenced.

“I’m sorry,” I murmur. For feeling weak.

“So am I,” he says. He turns to me, his eyes bright and intense. “Are you sure you want to see your friend?” He holds his body frozen, waiting for my answer.

I want to tell him no. I want to beg him to carry me home. To erase my memories. I want to give up and not have to bear any of this.

But I promised Cira. And I promised myself. And it isn’t fair for Catcher to go through this alone.

“I’m sure,” I say, taking a step forward.

Elias shakes his head and then reaches his arm around to his back and pulls out another dagger identical to the first. He shrugs out of the scabbard and then hands it and the knife to me before he walks past into the darkness.

I buckle it to my side and then pause, looking at the corpses on the other side of the fence. They appear almost human in death, more human than they seemed just moments ago. And I wonder again what we lose when we die and if we retain anything of what we used to be when we Return.

While the amusement park has stayed mostly as it was before the Return, the rest of what used to be Vista didn’t. For generations, scavengers have picked it clean. Elias walks through the ruins with confidence, not questioning where he’s going, and I stumble behind in the darkness, skirting the shadows cast by the fat moon.

“How do you know this place so well?” I gasp, trying to catch my breath.

“I’ve been looking for someone,” he says again, but he doesn’t elaborate.

He seems so confident out beyond the protection of the town and the Barrier, so sure of himself and his steps. I envy him for it. With every crumble of rock I jump, afraid it’s more Mudo rising.

I jog until I’m closer to him, feeling safer when I can reach out and touch him. “Who are you looking for?” I prod. I try to see into the darkness, try to remember every turn and twist we make through the streets, but I’m already lost. It makes me feel even more uneasy.

He stops abruptly and I stumble a little before finding my footing.

The street here is wide. Gaping windows look down on either side of us from buildings nothing more than caves. In the far distance I can barely see the moon shining on the curve of the tall coaster and beyond that the cut of the lighthouse beam spinning through the night.

“Your friend’s in there,” he says, pointing down another street to a tall narrow building. “Third floor, left side,” he adds.

I squint into the darkness. “How do you know?”

He raises a shoulder. “I keep track of these things. When you leave just keep the coaster to your right and go straight. You’ll hit the beach and your boat.”

I study him, trying to figure out who he is and where he’s from. “You’re not coming with me down there?” I ask. My throat suddenly feels dry, my palms sweaty.

He shakes his head. “None of my business,” he says.

I hold out the knife he gave me but he pushes it back. “It’s not smart to be without a weapon,” he says.

I try to swallow. “Are there Mudo down there?” I ask.

“Not that I’m aware of,” he says. “Other than your friend.”

My stomach clenches and I grab at the sleeve of his tunic. “But I thought you said he hadn’t turned, that he’s just infected.”

“I said he hadn’t turned yet. He’s still dangerous.” I look in the direction of Catcher’s building and rub my palms on the hem of my shirt. I grit my teeth. “Fine, I’ll just take care of myself,” I tell him, knowing how stupid that sounds after his rescue on the beach.

He doesn’t say anything, doesn’t laugh. Just nods. “Good luck, Gabry.” And then he turns and walks out into the darkness, leaving me standing alone on the empty street.

“Wait,” I call after him, not ready to see him go. Not ready to be alone or to face Catcher.

He pauses and turns until I see his profile. His chest stills as if he’s holding his breath, as if he’s waiting for me to say something important. He takes a step toward me.

“Thank you,” I finally say. He stares at me a moment and then shrugs before walking away. Every sound becomes amplified: the sound of his footsteps fading, the groan of buildings settling from the heat of the day. Cicadas buzzing, rising and falling. My mouth tastes bitter, my throat raw from screaming for help earlier on the beach. The ocean salt has dried, making my skin itch and clothes chafe under my arms.

I want to run, either after Elias or toward Catcher, but I know that running will only feed my panic and then I’ll do something stupid. Mentally bracing myself, I take a deep breath and walk toward the building where Catcher might be.

I clench my fist around the handle of the knife, my shoulders tight and feet ready to sprint. There’s nothing to indicate that Catcher’s here, has ever been here. I glance behind me at the street, wondering if Elias is watching me walk into a trap.

But what else can I do? Run back to the beach where my boat is still surrounded by Mudo? Run toward the amusement park hoping that there aren’t any Mudo out there, knowing that the Militia will find me and turn me over to the Council and ultimately the Recruiters?

I pause on the threshold to the building, its walls rising above me to the stars. I place a shaking hand against the doorjamb and stare into the blackness. There’s no way I can do it. No way I can force myself inside.

But a hand grabs me and pulls me inside anyway.

I choke and freeze as arms wrap around me. And then my body catches fire and I fight.

“Gabry.” The voice is broken, ragged.

I stop struggling and fall against him. It’s Catcher and he’s here and he’s alive and I’m finally safe.

He seems comfortable in the darkness as he leads me up two flights of stairs and into an empty room flooded with moonlight. He walks to the gap of an old window and stands there, nothing more than a shadow.

I hesitate, watching him. Afraid that touching him would ruin this moment. Would make all of my fears and pain come rushing back. But still, I can’t help it and I finally step forward and reach my arms around him, pressing my face into his back.