Lana felt an overwhelming feeling of sadness. A sob that filled the world. It was as if that outstretched hand was all she could see, all she could feel.

She wanted so badly to reach for it.

“Come on, Lana,” Edilio urged.

Tears filled Lana’s eyes. Her head moved slowly, side to side. “I don’t want to,” her voice said.

Lana lifted the gun.

“I don’t . . . ,” Lana whispered.

She took aim. Inside her head a scream a scream a scream.

“Lana, no!” Dekka cried.

Lana didn’t hear the shot. But she felt the gun buck in her hand. She saw the jet of flame.

And she saw Edilio fall straight back.

She saw him land on his back.

His head bounced as he hit.

Lana shifted her aim. Sights lined up on Dekka who seemed paralyzed in shock.

Lana squeezed the trigger.

Click.

Click.

Dekka raised her hands. Her expression was furious, determined. But she did not use her power. Her eyes flickered. She lowered her hands and rushed to Edilio.

Dekka knelt over Edilio. She gasped. Pressed her hand against the wound in his chest. Trying to hold the blood in.

“Lana. Lana,” Dekka pleaded with tears running down her cheeks. “Help him.”

Lana stood confused. The gun wasn’t working. Why wasn’t it working? The question was not hers, the thought not her thought.

The gaiaphage was confused. Why did the weapon not kill? It did not understand. So much it knew. But not everything.

The gun slipped from Lana’s fingers. She heard it clatter on stone.

“Lana, you can save him,” Dekka pleaded.

I can save no one, Lana thought. Least of all myself.

Lana took two steps back.

The last thing she saw was Dekka rushing to Edilio.

Lana returned to her master.

FORTY

38 MINUTES

THE SUN WAS sinking into the sea. Shadows were lengthening in Perdido Beach. The plaza was full of kids, far more kids than Zil could possibly feed with one deer.

It worried him at first. But then he realized the simple solution: Those who would take part in the sacrificing of Hunter would eat. Those who would only watch, would not.

Those who laid hands on Hunter would be a part of Zil’s group. They would have demonstrated their loyalty beyond all doubt. Their bridges would be burned. He would own them, body and soul after that.

They would be lifetime members of the Human Crew.

A big fire had been built in the dried-out fountain. Someone clever had raided the hardware store and had rigged a spit onto which big hunks of the deer, chopped into slabs with an ax, were roasting.

The smell was amazing.

Turk had grabbed spray cans and tagged the fountain and some of the sidewalks with Lisa’s stylized “HC” logo.

“How we doing this, man?” Antoine asked.

“Doing what?” Zil answered.

“Hunter. How we doing it?”

Hunter had recovered a little from the hit to the head. He had tried to free his hands, but Hank had smacked him good. Cheers had risen from some of the crowd. Others had looked queasy.

“Yank,” Turk said, and made a comic hanging motion.

“Where? Is what I mean, man,” Antoine said. He was slurring badly, almost to the point of not being intelligible. Drunk.

“There.” Lance pointed to the tumbled-down church.

“Where the door used to be? It makes an arch. You can pass a rope up through that hole. One end around Hunter’s neck, right? The other end can be really long. You can extend it all the way down through the square, so you could have, like, a hundred kids pulling on it.”

He frowned and glanced back and forth. “Pull him up, then you can tie the rope off to one of the trees, around the base.”

Zil considered Lance curiously. It seemed strange to find this popular kid getting involved, actually coming up with a plan for an execution. Weird. Lance had none of Hank’s seething, crazy rage. None of Turk’s desperate toadying. He wasn’t a pathetic burn-out like Antoine.

“That’s a good plan, Lance,” Zil said.

Hank’s eyes glittered dangerously.

“If we’re going to do this, we better get on with it,” Turk said. “Astrid’s a freak-lover. And that Brianna. She could be bringing Sam.”

“Sam’s busy. Besides, I’m not afraid of Sam. We have all these kids with us,” Zil said, sounding far more confident than he felt. “But yeah, let’s get this thing going. Hank. Lance. Start stringing the rope.”

Zil climbed up onto the trunk of the convertible. “Everybody! Everybody!”

He had everyone’s attention almost instantly. The crowd was hungry, desperate, and very impatient. Several kids had tried to rush at the meat and grab some right from the flames. They’d had to be beaten back by Hank and a group of kids he’d enlisted as bodyguards.

“The food is ready,” Zil announced to loud cheers.

“But we have something more important to do, first, before we can eat.”

Groans.

“We have to carry out some justice.”

That earned a silent stare until Turk and Hank started raising their hands and yelling, showing the crowd how to act.

“This mutant, this nonhuman scum here, this freak Hunter . . .” Zil pointed, arm stretched out, at his captive. “This chud deliberately murdered my best friend, Harry.”

“Na troo,” Hunter said. His mouth still didn’t work right. Brain damage, Zil supposed, from the little knock on his head. Half of Hunter’s face drooped like it wasn’t quite attached right. It made it easier for the crowd of kids to sneer at him, and Hunter, yelling in his drooling retard voice, wasn’t helping his case.