Hunger

sort of prayer, one she knew her dead brother could hear. “As long as Caine dies first.”

TWENTY
    18 HOURS , 29 MINUTES
    BRIANNA HAD NOT found Sam on the road to the power plant as she raced back to town. He was not on any of the roads. The only vehicle she had seen had Quinn, Albert, Cookie, and Lana out for a ride in a giant pickup truck. She’d thought about stopping them, telling them to go to the power plant, but none of the four was much of a fighter. Quinn and Cookie were both supposed to be soldiers, but the person she needed to find was Sam, not his useless old surfing buddy.
    Sam wasn’t at the gas station. He wasn’t at town hall or in the plaza. He wasn’t anywhere she looked.
    And Brianna was burning out fast. The speed was exhausting. Not as tiring as it should have been, probably, given that she had just run something like fifteen miles or so, dodging back and forth, up and down streets and alleyways. But exhausting. And the hunger was like a lion inside her, tearing at her insides.
    Her sneakers were in tatters. Again. They didn’t buildNikes for going as fast as a race car.
    Then she heard a loud bang. It was hard to guess where it had come from. But then suddenly there were kids running. Slow. Very slow. But as fast as they could run, poor things.
    “What’s going on?” she demanded, screeching to a stop.
    No one answered. If anything, they seemed scared of her.
    It was clear, though, that they were running away from, and not toward something. So she zipped back up the street and in less time than it would have taken a normal heart to beat twice she was standing in Astrid’s open doorway.
    “Hey. Anybody home?”
    Astrid came out, followed by Edilio. It was obvious that neither was having a good night. Astrid had a red welt on the side of her face next to her eye. Edilio was rubbing his head gingerly and holding a massive shotgun.
    “Where is Sam?” Brianna demanded. “What happened to you guys?”
    “You missed the fun,” Edilio said sourly.
    “No. No, I didn’t. You did!” Brianna yelled. “Caine is attacking the power plant.”
    “What?”
    “He’s there. He and Drake and some other guys.”
    “What about our kids up there?” Edilio demanded.
    “I didn’t see any of them. Look, Caine threw a car through the front gate. He’s real serious about this.”
    “You know where Hunter lives?” Edilio asked.
    Brianna nodded. But too fast to be seen. So she said, “Yeah.”
    “Go there. Sam was there last I saw him. Tell him I’m getting my guys. It’ll take me half an hour to get everyone assembled again. Tell Sam I’ll meet him at the highway.”
    “Your shoes,” Astrid said, pointing down at Brianna’s feet. “What size do you wear?”
    “Six.”
    “I’ll get you a pair from my closet.” But before Astrid could move, Brianna was up the stairs and back, sitting on the porch and tying on a pair of New Balance.
    “Thanks,” she said to s startled Astrid.
    “Don’t forget to—,” Astrid said, but between “don’t” and “forget” Brianna had arrived at Hunter’s house.
    Dekka was just coming down the steps looking like a thundercloud. The girl barely flinched when Brianna appeared suddenly before her.
    “Hi, Breeze,” Dekka said. She almost smiled.
    “Sam in there?”
    “Yep.”
    Brianna appeared suddenly before Sam, who took it less calmly than Dekka had.
    “Sam. Caine. He’s at the plant. I already found Edilio, he’s getting his guys together. Give me a gun, I’ll go keep Caine busy.”
    Sam cursed loudly. It took a while before he was ready to stop. Then, “I knew it! I knew it, and I let myself get distracted.”
    “Sam. Give me a gun.”
    “What? No, Breeze, I need you. And not dead.”
    “I can get back there in, like, two minutes,” Brianna pleaded.
    Sam put a hand on her shoulder. “Breeze? You have a job. You’re the messenger. Right? We have other people for fighting. Go help Edilio get the troops together. Then go see if you can find Lana. I don’t know where she is and we’re going to need her.”
    “She’s driving around in a truck with Quinn and Albert,” Brianna reported.
    “What?”
    “They’re in a truck, heading out on the highway.”
    Sam threw up his hands. “Maybe they heard about Caine, somehow. Maybe they’re on the way there.”
    “Yeah, I don’t think so. Albert wouldn’t be with them. Also, someone smacked Astrid.”
    Sam’s face froze. “What?”
    “She’s fine, but there was some kind of