The Passage - By Justin Cronin Page 0,296

scratch you?”

His insides were still churning. He shook his head: no.

“What happened?” Michael cried. “Where’s my sister!”

Peter found his voice. “It took her.”

Michael had grabbed Amy roughly by the arms. She was still clutching the globe, which had somehow remained unbroken. “Where is she? Where is she?”

“Stop it, Michael!” Peter yelled. “You’re frightening her!”

The globe fell to the floor with a crash as Alicia yanked Michael away, sending him spilling onto the sofa. Amy stumbled backward, her eyes wide with fear.

“Circuit,” Alicia said, “you have to calm down!”

His eyes were brimming with furious tears. “Don’t fucking call me that!”

A booming voice: “Everyone shut the hell up!”

They turned to where Hollis stood by the open window, his rifle at his hip.

“Just. Shut. Up.” He looked them all over. “I’ll get your sister, Michael.”

Hollis dropped to one knee and began rifling through his pack for extra clips, filling the pockets of his vest. “I saw which way they took her. Three of them.”

“Hollis—” Peter began.

“I’m not asking.” He met Peter’s eyes. “You of all people know I have to go.”

Michael stepped forward. “I’m coming with you.”

“I’m going too,” said Caleb. He raised his eyes to the group, his face suddenly uncertain. “I mean, because we’re all going. Right?”

Peter looked at Amy. She was sitting on the sofa, her knees pressed protectively to her chest. He asked Alicia for her pistol.

“What for?”

“If we’re going out there, Amy needs a weapon.”

She drew it from her waistband. Peter released the clip to check the load, then pushed the clip back into the handle and cocked the slide to put a round in the chamber. He turned it around in his hand and held it out to Amy.

“One shot,” he said. He tapped his breastbone. “That’s all you get. Through here. You know how to do this?”

Amy lifted her eyes from the gun in her hand, nodding.

They were gathering their gear when Alicia pulled Peter aside. “Not that I’m objecting,” she said quietly, “but it could be a trap.”

“I know it’s a trap.” Peter took up his rifle and pack. “I think I’ve known it since we got to this place. All those blocked streets, they led us right here. But Hollis is right. I never should have left Theo behind, and I’m not leaving Sara.”

They cracked their light sticks and stepped into the hall. At the top of the stairwell, Alicia moved to the rail and looked down, sweeping the area with the barrel of her rifle. She gave them the all clear, waving them forward.

They descended in this manner, flight by flight, Alicia and Peter trading the point, Mausami and Hollis guarding the rear. When they reached the third floor they exited the stairwell and moved down the hall, toward the elevators.

The middle elevator stood open, as they’d left it. Peering over the edge, Peter could see the car with its roof hatch standing open below. He swung out onto the cable, his rifle slung across his back, and shimmied to the roof of the car, then dropped inside. The elevator opened on another lobby, two stories tall, with a glass ceiling. The wall facing the open door was mirrored, giving him an angled view of the space beyond. He inched the barrel of his rifle out, holding his breath. But the moonlit space was empty. He whistled up through the hatch to the others.

The rest of the group followed, passing their rifles through the hatch and dropping down. The last was Mausami. She was wearing two packs, Peter saw, one slung from each shoulder.

“Sara’s,” she explained. “I thought she’d want it.”

The casino was to their left, to their right the darkened hall of empty stores. Beyond that lay the main entrance and the Humvees. Hollis had seen the pod taking Sara across the street, to the tower. The plan was to get across the open ground in front of the hotel using the vehicles, with their heavy guns, for cover. Beyond that, Peter didn’t know.

They reached the lobby, with its silent piano. All was quiet, unchanged. In the glow of their light sticks, the painted figures on the ceiling seemed to float freely, suspended over their heads without attachment to any physical plane. When Peter had seen them the first time, they had seemed somehow menacing, but as he looked at them now, this feeling was gone. Those dewy eyes and soft, round faces—Peter realized they were Littles.

They reached the entrance and crouched by the open window. “I’ll go first,” Alicia said. She