Page 7 of Into the Mist

“And there!” Amelia pointed southwest to a similar contrail.

“Oh my God, they’re everywhere!” Jenny cried.

Mercury’s gaze scanned the sky as she turned in a stationary circle. Jenny was right. In the distance all around them tails of cloudy white shot down from the sky, so many that she couldn’t count them all. The humming intensified as a huge mass of birds that had been perched in the trees surrounding them took wing in unison—each screeching horrible, soul-shaking cries that echoed eerily around the clearing. From the tree line the two men dashed out to stand a few yards from them as everyone studied the sky.

Stella grabbed Mercury’s hand as the contrail over Portland disappeared into the city. She leaned into her best friend and spoke forher ears alone. “I think this is bad. Really bad. We need to get out of here.”

Mercury opened her mouth to respond just as the first blast hit Portland. It created an enormous rising burst of fire that was almost perfectly round, like a gigantic crystal ball filled with flame.

“There too! In Salem!” Coach Davis shouted as another fire circle lifted from the southwest. From all around them, the outlook allowed a front-row seat to watch brilliant balls of fire explode everywhere, with such force they seemed to eclipse the sun.

Then a wall of sound echoed from the many balls of flame, followed immediately by bizarre flashes of green that jetted from the center of each fireball. Mercury was looking directly at the Portland ball when the explosion of sound met the green geyser—it changed shape, expanded, and became a wall of emerald that catapulted out, out, out. Like an impossibly swift tsunami of color, the glow rushed from the core of fire to cover the city and the surrounding land, and raced toward them.

Mercury stared at the green tide and was filled with the strangest feeling of panic mixed with fascination. There was something about the green—something that evoked the Wizard of Oz and concealed mysteries—something as intriguing as it was terrifying.

“Get the fuck down!” Stella screamed and pulled Mercury to the grassy ground with her. Jenny and Amelia did the same, but she could see that Coach Davis, Mr. Hale, and Mrs. Gay were frozen as they stared at the advancing wall of roiling green.

The emerald cloud hit them with sonic boom intensity. Had Mercury not already dropped to the ground, she would have been knocked off her feet. She clung to Stella with one hand and covered her head with the other as sound, debris, and a wave of green mist engulfed them. Around them thick pines snapped, filling the air with the sounds of gunshots. She could hear someone screaming, though she couldn’t even see Stella through the soupy jade air.

Mercury panted with fear and shock—and inhaled the moist shamrock-colored air. It felt like breathing in the forest: the scent of growing things filled her nose with the sharp tang of cut grass, the rich, loamy aroma of tilled earth, and the unique sweetness of wildflowers. Her battered body was overwhelmed with an agonizing pinprick sensation, like she’d sat on her foot too long and it was tingling awake, only this sensation was a flood of pain that broke against herskin from the inside. It felt like hot razorblades filled her blood, her lungs, her skin with agony.

Mercury knew she screamed and screamed, but the blast of sound that was the harbinger of the green wave still reverberated around her, drowning everything but the internal thunder of her heartbeat echoing in her ears. She and Stella pressed themselves against the earth as their bodies writhed in pain. Mercury felt Jenny shaking beside her as the young teacher sobbed in terror.

Mercury tried to turn her head, to reach out for Jenny, but the earth suddenly mirrored Mercury’s tremors. The ground beneath her cheek shuddered and shook. Forest debris rained shards of bark and pine against her body while another emerald tsunami pummeled them from Salem in the southwest.

Mercury tried to hold her breath, but it was impossible. She gasped with pain and panic, and the green surrounded her and filled her completely. Something struck the side of her head and her face, already wet with tears, became warm with blood.

Then the world went from green to black and she knew no more.

CHAPTER

3

CONSCIOUSNESS RETURNED LIKEthe flip of a light switch, though Mercury’s thoughts didn’t catch up with her body for several breaths. She lay on the ground with her face in the grass.What the hell? Why am I on the ground?Her mind was sluggish, like she’d washed down a Xanax with a glass of wine. Something slid across her temple and cheek and down her nose. She wiped at it and then stared at the splash of scarlet on her hand—and memory rushed back, chasing away her confusion.

She sat up and then gasped and held her head in her hands while pain spiked through her temples. Her body felt strange—tingly—and bruised. Her joints ached like the last time she’d had the flu, and blood seeped from a cut over her left temple, down her face. Mercury brushed it away with her sleeve and crawled the short distance to Stella. Her friend was curled on her side in a fetal position, facing away from her. Something had torn through the faux fur of her car coat and turned the sleeve of her ripped sweater red.

“Stella! Oh Goddess! Stella!” Mercury touched her. Stella’s skin felt cool—unnaturally cool—but her eyelids fluttered and then opened.

“Mercury? Wha—” She tried to sit up, but Mercury gently held her in place.

“No! Don’t move. We have to make sure you’re not broken anywhere.”

“Mercury!” On her right Jenny sobbed her name.

“Stay still, ’kay?” Mercury said quickly. “Gotta check on Jenny.” Her focus was tight. It included Stella and Jenny, though from her periphery she could see that mounds of debris were scattered around them, but her brain couldn’t seem to process more. Still on her hands and knees, she crawled to the younger teacher. Jenny sat up. She rubbed her wrist as she stared at Mercury, who asked, “Are you okay? Is anything bleeding or broken?”

“You’re bleeding.” Jenny’s voice sounded bizarrely normal, like she’d just commented on a new haircut or outfit.

“Yeah.” Mercury wiped at her face again. “I think I’m okay, though.” She felt Jenny’s shoulders, arms, legs—as she checked for breaks and tears.

“My wrist is sprained, but not too bad. I—I don’t understand. What could have—”

A moan sounded from the other side of Jenny, and Mercury felt a terrible foreboding. “Amelia!” She and Jenny crawled to their pregnant friend, who was bent over at the waist, on her knees with her forehead pressed into the grass and her arms wrapped around her bulging belly.

“He’s coming!” Amelia’s tear-soaked face looked up at them. Her skin was almost colorless except for her cheeks, which were bright spots of flushed pink—drops of blood in a pail of milk. “It’s wrong. Something’s wrong.”

She panted between words and then another contraction took control of her and she made an inhuman growling noise deep in her throat.