Sky on Fire

He turned to me.

“Here’s what we’re going to do. I am going to throw you up and you’ll grab on to the edge and scramble out.”

“Okay.” I shrugged. I was crying.

Max was going to die.

Niko made that cradle with his hands and I put my foot in and he tried to heave me up. It took a couple tries to get the angle right.

I got up pretty far on the fifth or sixth try.

Grabbed some grass out over the edge, but it was so slick.

I wanted to keep trying, but a root scratched me in the face and I was bleeding.

Niko started to pray.

I didn’t want to see that.

“Oh God,” he said. “Please, God, please send us some help because I can’t do it alone!”

Sahalia leaned forward and hugged Niko, her body pressing down on his, and I went, too, and there were two groups then: Sahalia, Niko, and I; and Batiste, Ulysses, and Max.

And then … then came a tiny “Hey!”

An old voice. But mad.

“Who set off these flares? Hello?”

Then we were clamoring. I jumped up.

We all hollered and yelled but Niko yelled at us, “Be quiet! BE QUIET! IF YOU WANT TO LIVE, SHUT UP!”

Then, Niko shouted up. “We’ve fallen in a pit. Don’t come too close or you might fall in!”

“I won’t fall in! I’m not stupid,” came the voice.

Then a blinding light flashed down on us, going from one kid to the next.

“Jesus Christ,” the voice cursed. “You went and fell in the foundation?”

“This family made it into a trap!” Sahalia snarled. “They laid a cloth over it and trapped us!”

Niko shushed her.

“Please, if you could just help us out. We’re a bunch of kids and one of us is really hurt.”

“The Mandrys. That’s who set the trap. Looks like one of them got the tar beat out of him, too, by the look of it up here.”

“Yes, a girl named Josie did that,” Niko said.

“She’s O,” I shouted.

“Looks like Tad Mandry’s dead, here.”

“Please, mister, can you help us out?” Niko called.

“Well, I’m not a savage!” he shouted. “Of course I’ll help you. There’s a ladder right here, for heaven’s sake.”

There was a ladder up there? Right there?

“I’ll help you out. But that’s all. Now you all shut up and give me a moment,” the man said. “We don’t want to be attracting attention these days. Could be any number of nutballs out here.”

We huddled together, excited and relieved and still terrified of everything. The only sound was Max moaning and crying. And Ulysses and Batiste sniffling, I guess.

Then we heard a wet, sliding sound. It was the man sliding the ladder across the ground.

“That’s it,” Niko called softly.

“I know!” the man grouched.

Inch by inch, we watched the ladder poke farther into our air space.

“It’s taking so long because I’m old,” the man said. “I’m too old for this nonsense.”

The ladder started to tip.

“It’s going to fall, now. Watch out.”

“We’re clear,” Niko called.

The ladder wobbled for a moment and then came crashing down.

* * *

The man was tiny. He was maybe the same height as Ulysses.

I couldn’t see his face because he had a red-and-black-checkered scarf wrapped around it. By the way he moved, you could tell he was very old.

He helped Sahalia out first and then she turned and helped us one by one.

Niko came up last, carrying Max.

He slung Max onto the wet, muddy ground.

There was the body of the dad. He was lying on top of a rock. He’d fallen on it during his fight with Josie and he must have broken his neck, because his head was cocked to the side and he was looking up at the sky with an open mouth, like he was stargazing.

But, no, he was not looking at the sky. He was dead.

The earth was torn up in places, mishmashed with footprints and some dark brown-black slicks that were most likely blood.

“All right,” the man said. “Good luck to you then.”

And he started to shuffle away.

“Please,” Niko said. “We need to get somewhere safe so we can take care of our friend. And we need somewhere safe to rest.”

“Well, I can’t help you!” he spat.

“But we’re so thirsty,” whined Batiste.

“And Max is so sick,” Sahalia added. “Please, mister. Please.”

And we all started in, begging him. “Please, please, please.”

“I knew I shouldn’t have come over!” he growled. “I just came up to take out the trash, see? And then I saw the flares and I thought to myself, ‘Ignore it, Mario. You’re gonna get sucked into helping someone and it will be a strain on your resources.’ But here I am.”

We must have looked a pitiful sight to him. All of us wearing filthy, matted layers of grimy sweatsuits. Me, Sahalia, and Batiste with our faces uncovered, coated with mud, the only clean parts being the trails made by crying. Niko standing with his head hung. Max lying, moaning, on the ground, wearing a bloody air mask. Ulysses clutching Max in the mud.

“I’ll give you a day and a night. That’s it!” he snarled. “Some basic medical to fix you up the best I can. 3 meals and 1 night’s sleep. But that’s it. You have to swear you’ll go after that.”

Niko stuck out his hand and said, “We swear.” They shook.

Everyone started thanking him and Sahalia hugged him.

“Follow me then, and keep quiet about it,” he grouched.

He led us across the street, toward a smaller development we had already passed.

“What’s he got now? Burns?” the man asked Niko, who was carrying Max.

Max was whimpering with Niko’s every jostle.

“Blisters,” Niko answered.

The old man was hurrying as fast as he could. But old people walk slow. He led us toward a house. It was that pretend-English style, with the wooden beams. Trying to look like a Shakespearean house.

I thought we were going inside, but instead, he kept on going.

He went across his back lawn to a little building. It looked like a garden shed. A little too big for a garden shed, but that’s what it looked like.

We went in and there were tools hanging all along the walls.

“Come in,” he crabbed at us. “Shut the door behind you, for God’s sake. This is a secret place.”

I couldn’t read Niko’s expression through his air mask, but I was worried. Did the old guy think we would be safe in a garden shed?

Then Mario bent over and picked at the edge of a rubber mat on the floor. It looked like a welcome mat, sort of, but old and scuffed up.

He lifted it and there, underneath it, was a metal handle sunk into the floor and a seam.

He pulled up on it but he was winded.

Sahalia and I stepped in to help.

“Hold on, hold on a minute,” he said. He addressed us. “When the door opens, go right on down the stairs. They’re steep, so mind you don’t fall. Keep going so you’re out of the way for the next person. All right. Go,” he told Sahalia and me.

We pulled up on the handle.

It was really heavy for the first moment, then a hydraulic lift kicked in and it rose up by itself. Up above, everything was grimy and dirty and dark, but pure white poured up from below that door.

It was blinding, so used to the dark were our eyes.

“Go on now!” Mario ordered. “Get below.”

We did not worry for a second that he might be tricking us or trapping us. He had so clearly not wanted to help us. Why would he be tricking us now?

As crabby and crotchety as he was, I trusted him right away. Everyone did.

And we were right to.

He saved our lives and his name was Mario Scietto.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

DEAN

DAY 14

“I got a pharmacy full of Robitussin,” Jake bragged to Payton. “We had some whiskey, but I drank it.”

“I like you more and more, Jake. I am glad you’re considering entering the academy. You should do it,” Payton asked. “I’ll get you in my squadron. Would you like that?”

“Sir, yes, sir!” Jake responded.

Payton turned to the cadets, who were still awaiting his orders.

“Well, you heard me. Fan out! Use your lights and be thorough.”

So how much respect did I have for Jake? Before this … meh. Not very much. I liked him. You had to like Jake, because he was an affable, charming guy. Everyone liked Jake. Even when I hated his guts and wanted to kill him, I liked him.

But with the drugs and the way he just got so lost and depressed and the fact that he’d left us? Well, he’d fallen really far in my eyes.

Now, seeing him play this game with Payton and watching him carefully bluff and negotiate his way through this nightmare—he was kind of my hero.

My shoulder was out. Every step was agony for me. I wasn’t going to be able to fight these guys. If we were going to make it through this alive, Jake would be the one saving us.

“Too bad you have no lights,” Payton said. “Kind of grim in here, all dark like this.”

“Yeah,” Jake said. “But we got a lot of flashlights. And, hey, you should see our campfire!”

Jake led Payton to the Kitchen.

I got his strategy. With the fire going, it looked right. It looked cozy and cheerful. You could believe that it was our campsite. As long as they didn’t look for our beds.

The cadets started coming back, listing what they’d found. Greasy found the chainsaws and the patched hole in the wall. A thin, twitchy guy they called “Jimmy Doll Hands” reported in on the water and remaining drinks near the Food aisle (and, yeah, his hands were weirdly small). They were fairly thorough. Zarember even found and reported on the oil stain on the linoleum and the tire marks from where the bus had stood before it left.