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It went beyond the loss of his mom and dad, too, a loss that encompassed everything he had known, everything he had been. He’d been cool, once. The memory brought a sad smile to his lips. Quinn was cool. One of a kind. Everyone knew him. They didn’t all like him, they didn’t all get his act, but Quinn had carried an aura of specialness with him.
And now…now he was an afterthought in the FAYZ. Kids knew he had betrayed Sam to Caine. They knew that Sam had taken him back. They knew that he had gone a little crazy on the day of the big battle. Maybe more than a little crazy.
The memories of his mom and dad, his old life, they were far away. Like photos in an old album. Not quite real. Someone else’s memories, his pain; someone else’s life, his loss.
The memories of the battle—those couldn’t even be called memories because weren’t memories something from the past? That day might have happened three months ago, but it wasn’t the past to Quinn, it was right here, right now, always. Like a parallel life happening simultaneously with this life. He was driving through the night and feeling the gun buck buck buck in his hands and seeing the coyotes and the kids, all mixed up together, all crisscrossing, weaving through the arcs of the bullets.
Finger off the trigger. Too close to shoot. He’d hit the kid. He couldn’t do it, couldn’t take that chance, and so the coyote had leaped, jaws open, and—
And that wasn’t long ago and far away to Quinn. It was right now. Right here.
“Okay,” Lana said, bringing him back to reality. “Slow down, we’re almost there.”
The headlights lit scruffy bushes and dirt and scatterings of rock. Then a wooden beam, badly charred. Quinn swerved to avoid it.
He stamped on the brakes. Then, much more slowly crept forward again.
The headlights illuminated a section of wall, just a few feet. Charred wood was everywhere. Two blackened cans of fruit or beans or whatever lay on their sides in the dirt.
Despite himself Quinn wondered if there was anything edible left. He remembered that terrifying night spent cowering in the cabin, waiting for the coyotes to drag them out and kill them.
That was when Sam had finally revealed the extent of his powers. For the first time he had been able to control the devastating light that shot from his hands.
Quinn stopped the vehicle. He put it into park.
“It was here,” Quinn said softly.
“What happened here?” Albert asked.
Quinn killed the lights, and the four of them climbed from the SUV. It was silent. So much quieter than the last time Quinn had been there.
Quinn slung his machine pistol over his shoulder and fished a flashlight from under the seat. Albert had a flashlight of his own. The two beams stabbed here and there, highlighting this jagged beam, that singed bit of rug, a kitchen utensil, a twisted metal chair.
“This is where we met Lana for the first time,” Quinn said. “We’d escaped from Caine. Run away into the woods up north. Decided to go back to town and make a fight of it. Anyway, Sam decided.”
He bent down to pick up a hefty number-ten can. The label was charred. It might be pudding, though. Roasted pudding, maybe, but the can looked intact. He walked it back to the SUV and tossed it into the back.
“How was it destroyed?” Albert pressed.
“Partly it was Sam. First time he ever used his power deliberately. Not out of panic, or whatever, just cold-blooded, knowing what he was doing. You should have seen that, man.” Quinn recalled the moment perfectly. It was the moment when his old friend was clearly revealed as something far, far beyond Quinn. “Partly the coyotes had set the place on fire.”
“Where’s the gold?” Albert asked, not really caring about the story.
Quinn waited for Lana to show the way, but she seemed rooted to where she stood. Looking down at the brown, dead remains of Hermit Jim’s quirky attempt to keep a lawn in the midst of this dry, empty land. Cookie stood just behind her, big pistol stuck in his belt, ready, scowling at the threatening night, ready to lay down his life for the girl who had saved him from agony beyond enduring.
Patrick was busily running around to anything remotely vertical, smelling carefully. He didn’t mark anything himself, just smelled. He seemed subdued, tail down almost between his legs. The scent of Pack Leader must still be strong.
“This way,” Quinn said when it was clear that Lana wasn’t going to respond.
He threaded his way through the wreckage. There wasn’t much, really; most of it had burned down to ash. But the surviving bits of shattered lumber were stuck with nails, so Quinn moved cautiously.
He bent down when he reached what seemed like the right place and began pushing two-by-fours and shingles aside. He was surprised to find the plank floor mostly intact. It had been singed but not consumed by the fire. He found the hatch.
“Let me see if I can get it open.” He tried, but the fire had warped the hinges. It took both of them, him and Albert, to raise the hatch. One hinge broke, and the hatch flopped awkwardly to one side.
Albert aimed his flashlight down into the hole.
“Gold,” Albert said.
