The sheriff dropped his chin. “And you didn’t think to tell me when you found the debris?”

Remy frowned. “No?”

His father sighed. “But you see the debris on this video?”

“Not exactly,” Levi answered, handing over the flash drive he’d put the copy onto. “It’s really bad quality, and it cuts him off right here.” He poked the center of his chest. “But you can see his creepy overalls and that he’s carrying something. Probably. And the stuff was gone after that!”

“Well, the problem here is we’ve got no proof that the materials ever were there.”

“I’ll testify,” Sofía said.

“Look, you all,” he said. “Even if we had solid proof Wayne took that stuff out of some cave, that doesn’t mean he stole it.”

“Search his house,” I said. “It’s there. It’s got to be.”

“I can’t do that without grounds,” he said. “And even if Wayne Hastings did steal a bunch of twisted metal crap from them—which, as I said, I have a hard time believing—I doubt Crane Energy wants to press charges at this point. They’ve got bigger fish to fry.”

My heart started to race as the possibility of resolving this shrank before my eyes. “He’s dangerous,” I said. “You don’t know what he’s using the parts for—you don’t know what he’s capable of.”

The sheriff’s expression softened. “I know you kids have every reason in the world to hate Wayne Hastings,” he said gently. “But I want you to leave him alone. He gets enough harassment. The man’s harmless.”

“You don’t know that!” I screamed, smacking his desk and surprising myself as much as anyone else.

The sheriff’s stunned expression held for a beat before it resolved into something stern. “Frances, I know—”

“You’re not even going to listen to us?” Remy cut across him.

“Remy, of course I’m listening. I’ll always listen, but—”

“But you won’t actually do anything,” Remy said. “You’ll run into a burning building for Joe Ass Shmo from two streets over, but when I need something from you, I’m just on my own.”

“Remy.” The sheriff reached for Remy’s arm, but he shook him off, and Sheriff Nakamura’s face twisted. “You’re not on your own. You’ll never be on your own.”

Remy laughed. “Really? Because my mom’s dead, and you’re a police officer who’s not following up on a dangerous person.”

Right then, he was the secret Remy who’d whispered his fears to me and then pretended they vanished on the breeze, and the way his father was staring at him made me think the sheriff had never seen this Remy at all.

Didn’t he know what his son’s nightmares were about?

Didn’t he know his son hated that he was a cop?

“I’ll go to Wayne’s house tomorrow,” the sheriff said. He gave a tiny shake of his head. “I’ll ask him if knows anything about the wreckage or the power surges, but I can’t barge into his house without a warrant, and I can’t get one of those without evidence.”

For a prolonged moment, Remy and his dad faced off. “Do you understand?” the sheriff finally asked, quiet, gentle.

“Yeah,” Remy said, and jerked the office door open. “Got it loud and clear.”

He was already out the door when his father’s face crumpled.

After a few seconds, the rest of us awkwardly shuffled toward the door, and Levi cleared his throat. “Good to see you, Uncle Reo.”

The sheriff’s dark eyes shifted over each of us. “You kids be careful, okay?”

By the time we made it to the parking lot, Remy was in the Metro, idling at the curb.

“What now?” Nick asked as we piled in. “We try the FBI? Do they have an alien hotline?”

“We get better evidence,” Remy said. “We find whatever Wayne is building and get pictures.”

“Exactly,” Arthur said, confident and optimistic once more. “The alien wants us to destroy what Wayne’s building, to prevent global catastrophe. That’s why Levi sleepwalked to his house. That’s what our purpose is—to save the world!”

I wanted to scream at him to stop. I didn’t know how, after everything, he could believe in purpose, in great commissions that fell from the sky.

If people had purposes, then why was Mark comatose in a hospital bed? Who decided to cut Nick’s dad down in the prime of his life, to give Nick’s mom a grief so big and terrifying she couldn’t get herself to leave the house ever since? To put her in a situation where she could no longer work, and her nineteen-year-old son was responsible for keeping a roof over their heads and fancy-ass stolen sneakers on their feet?

Who or what took Remy’s mom from him, robbed his dad of his health and comfort? Stole Sofía’s aunt and grandfather, and with them, Sofía’s perfect future?

Maybe there were people who had purposes, but we weren’t them.

Not people in Splendor. At least not the Ordinary.

It wasn’t our purpose to save the world, but I wanted to anyway. Or at least to save the five people smashed into the car with me, who’d already lost too much.