“Get that house open so we can get inside!” she shouted, pushing him again, and after a moment he turned and sprinted toward the building, stumbling in the fallow field. Kira gritted her teeth, wondering how he could even see, and pulled the horses as hard as she could, using the leverage of one to keep the other in line, and hoping her shoulders would survive the strain. After a short struggle they seemed to realize that she was urging them to run, and in the open field they let loose, tucking their heads and galloping at top speed for the farmhouse, jerking Kira off her feet and dragging her forward. The slack in the reins pulled her toward Buddy’s pounding hooves, and she let go and tumbled to a stop in the churning poison mud. The horses raced toward the house, neck and neck, and Kira surged to her feet and followed, realizing as she ran that she was yelling, half pain and half war cry.

Kira reached the house just as Samm and Heron were catching the horses, and she stumbled through the door in agony. The front room held a couch and an easy chair, each with a skeleton still staring at an old TV on the wall. Every inch of Kira’s body seemed scalded by the acid, and she looked down to see that it had already eaten a hole in her shirt. She pulled the shirt off in a flurry, seeing half a dozen more holes in the back, and threw it across the room; Samm and Heron were inside now as well, slamming the door behind them to keep the horses from escaping back into the rain. The horses were terrified, still bucking and squealing and destroying everything in the room—the TV, the furniture, even the skeletons were trampled madly underfoot. Kira tried to reach Afa, still tied to Oddjob’s saddle, but she couldn’t get close. Heron crept around the perimeter of the room with Samm in tow, his face red and his eyes squeezed shut, dashing forward when the horses left an opening, and rearing back when they came too close. When she reached Kira, Kira too grabbed Samm and pulled him through the back door into the kitchen, away from the flying hooves. Kira could hear the sizzle of acid on their clothes and ripped Samm’s shirt away from his chest; it parted like wet paper, already half consumed by the acid, and she threw it aside. Heron was stripping as well, and the pile of clothes smoked in the corner as the acid consumed them. Their skin was mottled with throbbing red sores. Samm’s eyes were still shut tight, and he fumbled helplessly with his belt; Kira helped undo them, then pulled off her own. Soon all three of them stood in their underwear, gasping for breath, trying to think what to do next as the horses railed madly in the living room.