Page 75 of Ash Fall

It hits the back of my skull and drives straight through, and my legs are gone before I understand that I'm falling. The sidewalk takes my knees. Both hands clamp over my ears, which does nothing at all, because it isn't coming in through my ears.

go go go the air is wrong behind us behind us

not enough sky not enough sky follow follow

don't land don't stop don't land

There are thousands of them. The flock comes over the rock face above the visitor centre in a black sheet that keeps coming and coming. There's no shape to any of it, no argument, no small opinions about mice or snacks. There is one single driving message in all those voices and it repeats without stopping. Something is behind them. Something is wrong. Something is coming. They can't outrun it, but they are going to try anyway. The sound in my mind builds until my teeth ache with it and I'm pressing my forehead down toward the concrete.

Hands come down on me.

Luna drops beside me on the sidewalk, gets both arms around my head and pulls me in against her stomach, and the shrieking cuts out. All of it goes, every single voice.

The pressure behind my eyes drains away until what's left is a dull ache, the kind I get from a bad night of sleep and nothing worse. Her hands stay locked over my ears. I can smell lilacs and the cherry thing she puts on her lips. My fingers close on the back of her jacket, and I stay exactly where I am while the sky pours north over the top of us.

It takes a long time for the last of them to clear the ridge. When the sound of wings is finally gone, she loosens her arms. I lift my head to look up at her without a single word in me. Her hands come off my ears and cup my face instead, and then her eyes go huge.

"Reid," Her thumb moves once over my cheekbone. "Your eyes. Your eyes are glowing."

"What?"

"They're gold. I mean they're always gold, but right now they're lit." Her voice climbs. "What does that mean?"

Everybody is looking at us. I have no answer for her, not one, and I want that answer more than she does.

The visitor centre door bangs open before either of us can search for it. Anders comes out with the older man half a step behind him, and the relief all over his face tells me the answer before he opens his mouth.

"Everybody, this is Milton," he calls across the lot. "He's been kind enough to say yes, and better yet, he's staying on with us. The man knows every inch of this place."

Milton lifts a hand at forty strangers with the resigned look of somebody who has just agreed to something enormous and hasn’t had a chance to regret it yet.

"You'll want to get off this lot," he tells us. "There's a service road along the east side. Follow it around to the far end and you'll come to the equipment doors, big industrial rollups, they're how they used to bring the heavy machinery in and out. You can back your trailers right inside. I'll open them up for you from in here."

People start moving. Doors slam all over the lot, and Luna shifts to get her feet under her.

I don't let go of her hand as she stands.

She looks down at where I've got her fingers, then up at my face, and whatever she sees there makes her stop pulling. I get up off my knees and wordlessly I take her with me toward the Escalade. Julian is waiting with the back door open, concern etched all of his face for me, and I climb in after her. He drops into the driver's seat, pulls us into the line behind Torrin, and adjusts the rearview mirror until he can see the two of us back here.

I don’t fully understand what just happened but while I sit there with Luna tucked in beside me, holding her hand, I know that I need her more than ever. My eyes stay open the whole way around that service road, watching the northern sky where the birds went, scared of whatever they were running from.

Chapter 28 - Luna

The industrial doors come up in sections with a rattle that echoes off the rock, and Milton steps back out of the way to wave us through.

My jaw drops before the Escalade is all the way inside.

I missed whatever field trip the guys all took out here as kids because I was in a different school then. Every picture I've built in my head over the last two days has been wrong, this place is way more massive than I imagined. Vehicles roll in ahead of us and peel off left and right. When the last of them parks, we’ve only filled one small corner of this place.

I get out and stand there with my neck craned back.

Banks of industrial lighting run the length of the ceiling three storeys above me, throwing white light down onto a concrete floor painted a clean pale grey. Somebody was still maintaining this place right up until the world stopped. There isn't a stain on the floor or a burnt-out bulb anywhere I can see. Voices bounce around overhead and come back doubled, so forty people make the noise of a hundred.

Three pieces of mining equipment sit along the far wall behind a low rope barrier, scrubbed and repainted for the tours. One of them is a loader that looks like it was made to run inside of tunnels. Beside it sits something low and yellow with a chewing wheel of teeth on the front that I don't have a name for. Past that stands a little train engine on a short section of track going nowhere. Interpretive signs stand in front of each one. People used to pay money to come look at this and eat lunch upstairs.

"Don't start unloading yet," Anders calls out, his voice carrying easily. "Everybody take twenty minutes and walk around a bit. Use the restrooms over there if you need. Let’s just take a first look around and get our bearings."

Milton has gone halfway down the side wall to a set of double doors and is waving us over. Gigi appears at my elbow with Kara and Briar in tow, and the four of us start across the floor together. Briar turns a slow circle as she walks, shaking her head.