I picture Devon’s campus sketch in my mind, with the now torn up road and added splashes of red near the Foreign Language House. Again, on Old Campus. Again, right where I’d been. Hours earlier.
This is clearly more of the same.
But if this was meant to be an attack on someone I care about, to scare me or motivate me to surrender, how isDaanone of the only survivors? Obviously, I don’t want anyone on campus dead, but to come so close and not follow through? I’m not understanding the strategy here.
Also, why keep hiding? Why not just come at me directly, like JT did?
Maybe several spawn are colluding. But why? Power isn’t an issue, obviously. Whoever is doing this is plenty strong enough. So it’s not like these sneak attacks are necessary.
Sharp-edged panic swells in me.Make it make sense!
“I met that detective,” Carter adds, startling me out of my thoughts.
“Morales?” As if there would be another one.
He nods. “She came by not long after I got here. I guess she heard about the explosion and came to check on the survivors. She seemed extremely interested in where you were. I guess someone saw you at that sorority house when…” He pauses. “A girl jumped from the roof yesterday. She… she didn’t survive.”
Izzy. Fuck, fuck, fuck!I was so hoping…
Lennie, Izzy, Daan’s residents, Daan himself. Who will be next?
A weight settles on my chest. It now seems more inevitable than ever that there will be a “next.” This isn’t going to stop unlessIstop it.
But I don’t know how.
A wave of helplessness washes over me. I’ve done everything I know to do. All the other spawn found me without issue, even if they didn’t approach right away. Why is this one different? Even Devon doesn’t seem to understand what’s happening. And in the time it takes us to figure it out, more people are going to die.
Aadesh at Theta Iota, my friend Carly who has classes in the old art building on Old Campus, random students who happen by at the wrong time… Carter. Chessa.
The pressure in my chest increases until it feels like a fist is clenching around my heart, digging its nails in.Fuck my father for doing this. For doing this and then not even bothering to contact me or show up.
I step away from Carter, shaking my head. “I need to go back to campus,” I say, more to myself than anyone else. I can’t stand around here and wait. I have todosomething.
Plus, the fact that the incidents are all limited to Old Campus, that has to mean something. Right? Maybe if I look at everythingagain, visit all the locations on Devon’s sketch, I’ll see something I missed before.
Assuming I don’t get arrested by Morales the second I set foot there.
Right.
“Aren’t you going to see Daan first?” Chessa asks.
I turn, startled. I hadn’t even seen her return. She’s waiting at the far edge of the lounge, arms still folded tightly across her middle. Her eyes, red and swollen, are narrowed in suspicion.
“I feel like that’s the least you could do before disappearing again to ‘do stuff,’” she says. “He would visit you. Hell, he would probably stay until the nurses kicked him out.”
My throat tightens. “Of course,” I say hoarsely. “Of course I’m going to see him.”
She nods, but it’s clear she doesn’t believe me.
The worst part is, she’s right—Idon’twant to see Daan like this. I just want to take action, fix everything, and get back to normal. I guess Chessa and I aren’t that different in that regard.
But I don’t know if there’s a “normal” to get back to anymore. And I owe Daan this, if nothing else.
I pull my phone from my pocket and set it on the nearest table, obeying the rules posted on the wall. Then I head for the double doors in the corner, my stomach leaden with dread.
It’s time to face up to the consequences of my decisions.
19
