At the top of the drive now, and the house was right there. Wood and glass, enormous, lit from within. Eddie went to the door and rang the bell, and it was so incongruously normal, Zane nearly laughed. A woman at the door, then a man behind her. Kids. Eddie explaining, the door opening.
Twenty-five meters up here at least. Twenty-five meters in shallow water, which meant they should be safe. And just as he’d thought it, there was the other thought again, crowding out everything else in his mind.
My kids. Where are my kids?
28
LIMBO
Eventually, everybody was just sitting on the hard, cold floor of the museum. A generator provided emergency lighting, and that was all, so they sat, surrounded by the darkness outside and the fear of what that darkness hid. All of them shattered. Stunned.
Stunned because of what had happened over the past hour. Two more waves had come in, more terrifying because they hadn’t been visible in the darkness. Just that horrible roar, then the wave crashing into the huge building with a shuddering jolt as the people within held each other, cried, called out, or just stood and waited, blank and frozen and silent. A hard aftershock that shook the building for ten more terrifying seconds, then two more. And after a long while, a fourth wave. Smaller. Weaker. Another aftershock, and nothing since.
All those people on the walkway, before. All those people she hadn’t saved. She tried not to see them caught, swept out to sea. A little girl in a pink jacket, with her mum and dad. She couldn’t bear to think of that little girl.
Stop it. Focus on now.If only she had something to do,though. Some way to help. Some way to escape that vision. She couldn’t even text, because the network was either too busy or down, she didn’t know which.
Museum staff were handing around food now, sandwiches and pastries and bottles of water, so that was activity, at least. “Take one food item only,” they were saying. “One item only.” From the café on Level 4, Skylar guessed. The main café would have had more food, but it was on Level 1. Nobody was going down there, not now, and anyway, it had to have been flooded.
The kids had long since lapsed into silence, huddled together on the floor. Forrest was still with them, because his sister, Fiona, had never turned up. Gone to meet friends—or more likely a boy—and been caught outside? Oh, how Skylar hoped not. She’d been gone “for a while” before Forrest had headed into the Quake House, the boy had said.
Please, no,Skylar thought, and knew it wouldn’t matter. That it wouldn’t help.
Worse, Forrest didn’t know his parents’ mobile numbers. He knew his address, but that wasn’t much help to her now. She thought about how worried his parents would be, and then she couldn’t think about it anymore, because it wasn’t helping.
When you know more, you’ll do more. Right now, you have him safe, and you’ll keep him safe.
Her watch said seven-twenty. Long since full dark outside, and made darker because there were no streetlights. No lights in buildings. No light at all.
“I wish I knew where my dad was,” Scarlett said. It was the first time anybody had spoken in a while.
“I know,” Skylar said.
“I’m hungry,” George said.
“There’s nothing to eat,” Scarlett said. “We’ll get food soon,though. We’ll get our tea. Here, come sit with me.” Reassuring them. Comforting them. Stepping up.
Skylar left her to it and checked her phone again. She had bars! Her heart leapt. She didn’t want to tell the kids, though, not until she got through.
A text to her Granddad’s number.We’re safe. Stuck in Te Papa. How about you and Maureen?
Text failed to send.
The network still too busy, maybe? She hoped that was it. Granddad and Maureen were far above the tsunami danger, so it would just be the earthquake.
Justthe earthquake. Things falling from high shelves. Heavy furniture tipping. A building slipping off its foundation.
Fire.
Don’t think about that. Not now.
A similar text to Zane’s number. Surreptitious, so Scarlett wouldn’t see.
Text failed to send.
A cold squeezing at her heart, but she didn’t know anything, did she? And if any man could get out of a tough spot, it was Zane. The tsunami had hit a good fifteen minutes after the quake, and that was enough time. Zane was no fool, the coaches probably weren’t either, and everybody in New Zealand knew about tsunami danger. They’d have climbed. Surely they’d have climbed.
A stirring, now, amidst the sprawled and huddled bodies. An older woman—senior staff, probably—arriving at the edge of the crowd and saying, her voice resolutely calm, “We’ve just heard the news via GeoNet, on the emergency radio. The tsunami danger appears to be past.”
