Happy Valley was in deep shit. We’d started out thinking we were going to be able to help. Now it seemed as if all we’d be able to do was maybe bury the dead.

— 44 —: HAPPY VALLEY

— 44 —

HAPPY VALLEY

“Down!” screamed Dahlia as she dove for cover. John and Neeko and the others scrambled away, tripping and falling. People flung themselves from the walls, landing hard on the ground ten feet below.

There was a sharp, rising sound like steam escaping from a boiling kettle and then the whole top part of the wall seemed to lift itself from the structure of reality and fly through the air. A massive red flower of superheated gas bloomed, spreading burning petals arching into the town. Trees caught fire and people screamed as fiery debris landed on them, igniting clothes and hair.

For Dahlia the world went red and then black as she lost herself for a moment. Seconds? Longer? When she opened her eyes, she was still on the wall, but she was alone. Her ears rang with a sound like an electronic wail and her hair was burning. She panicked, swatting at it, slapping her scalp, her face.

“Ne—Neeko . . . ?” she croaked, but if there was an answer she could not hear it. The noise in her ears was too loud. It took her a thousand years to climb to her feet. Hot smoke scorched her lungs and every breath rubbed her throat raw. “Neeko,” she screamed.

A figure moved in the smoke. Blackened and unreal. Staggering as it moved toward her. Shambling. It was Neeko sized and Neeko shaped, and it moved with artless clumsiness like one of the dead things. It reached for her with gray hands.

Dahlia backed away. Of all the horrors in her world, she could not bear this. Not Neeko. Not him.

She saw his lips move but there were no words.

“No . . . ” she begged.

Dahlia drew her kukri knife and tried to brace against a kind of pain that could not be endured. Neeko stumbled toward her.

She raised the knife.

A voice rang out. Harsh, and loud enough to punch through the incessant ringing in her ears.

“No!” roared Mr. Church.

Dahlia turned to see him come striding toward her, a pistol in one hand, his tinted glasses gone, dark eyes filled with pain and concern. Neeko turned toward him and reached for him instead.

And Old Man Church wrapped his free arm around the little scout’s shoulders and pulled him close.

“You’re okay, son,” said the old man. “You’re okay.”

Neeko clung to him, and Dahlia saw that he was alive. She had not been able to hear him speak because of the ringing. His skin was gray because he was covered with dust. She staggered over and nearly tore him away from Church and kissed him and then crushed the boy to her chest. Then she looked around. Others were not so lucky.