Rex nodded slowly. “Yeah, frozen. And buried deep in the desert to escape the sun. But still…maybe.” He shrugged.

Jessica sighed. She didn’t know which was freakier, the complete rupture of time itself or Rex acting like he didn’t know everything.

The way he’d changed was hard to pin down. On the one hand, he moved with much more confidence, like he was stronger, no longer afraid of the daylight world. But at the same time he could seem sort of dislocated, as if Earth was a new planet to him and every passing car something astonishing to behold.

At times like this she missed the old Rex, who could be depended on to at least pretend like he knew what was happening.

What if they were stuck here? What if this really was the end of regular time, at least for the five of them? What were they supposed to do? Spend the rest of their lives scavenging for canned food and being hunted nonstop by the darklings?

The secret hour was magical, but it could also be a trap; Jessica had already experienced enough since moving to Bixby to understand that. If they really were stuck here, she would never see her parents or sister again, except as pale, waxen statues—stiffs. She would never talk to anyone again except the other four midnighters or feel the sun on her face.

And she would never…

“Oh, jeez, would you knock it off, Jessica!” Melissa cried. “You’re bumming me out, and I think something’s happening.”

Jessica felt a hot flush rising in her face. “Were you reading my mind?”

Melissa sighed. “It’s not like I have a choice. Just chill out for a second. The darklings are doing something….” Her eyes closed, her expression changing from concentration to puzzlement, then suddenly to alarm. “Flyboy! Get down!” she shouted.

Jessica spun around and saw Jonathan hovering eight feet or so in the air. He had been bouncing up and down with nervous energy, still thinking of this extra blue time as an invitation to fly to his heart’s content.

He waved his arms uselessly, still drifting softly upward, powerless to change his course. Falling that far wouldn’t be fatal, but the parking lot’s asphalt surface was hard enough to twist an ankle or break a leg.

Above him the dark moon was dropping, sweeping across the sky faster than a second hand. The sun peeked out from behind it, a cold and lifeless eye against darkness.

As she ran toward him, Jessica remembered her lessons from flying and from physics class. Jonathan’s midnight touch made things almost weightless, but the rest of the laws of motion still applied. If she could throw something heavy up to him, and he caught it while it was headed downward, its momentum would carry him quickly back toward earth.

But Jessica’s backpack was still in the gym, and she didn’t have anything heavier than loose change in her pockets.

All she could use was her own body.