Climbing ladders and crawling through ducts with one arm was excruciating. There was no other word for it. Hwa smeared blood everywhere she went. The ducts were smaller and tighter than she’d expected, and the only thing that greased their way through the aluminum tunnels was anxious, frustrated sweat. It felt like being born, if your mother was an unfeeling machine with a pussy made of steel who didn’t really care if you lived or died.
That was a fairly accurate description of Sunny, actually. Hwa would have to remember that for later. If there was a “later.”
Finally, they made it to the light booth. The fan was still off. Hwa checked her watch. This was a long time for the cops not to enter the building. What were they waiting for?
“Let’s get through before it starts up again,” Joel said.
“Yeah.” Hwa wriggled around until her feet faced the fan. “Turn around so your back is to mine, okay? I need you to brace me, so my kicks have more force.”
“Okay.” He turned around. Through his shirt, she could feel how hot and damp he was. But he didn’t seem frightened. He was doing well with this whole thing. “You’re doing pretty well with this whole thing.”
“I have an antianxiety implant,” Joel said. “It’s perched right on my amygdala. It’s sort of like a pacemaker, for my emotions. I don’t feel high highs or low lows. I’m right in the middle, all the time. Dad had it put in right when my voice started to change.”
Hwa kicked twice. The fan squealed the second time, but didn’t budge. “No shit?”
“No shit.”
“That’s a long time to go without worrying.” Hwa tried not to sound as snide as she felt.
“I’m fifteen,” Joel said. “I only got it like three years ago.”
Hwa focused all her surprise into her legs and kicked again. “Fifteen? You’re a senior! You’re graduating this year!”
She felt him shrug against her shoulders. “Like I said: I’m a genius.”
“Wow.” She kicked right at the centre of the fan. It dented around her feet. Now they were getting somewhere. She could see a rim of light around the panel. “So, that means I’m, what, seven years older than you?”
“I don’t know how old you are,” Joel said. “Does it matter?”
Hwa kicked hard. The fan fell in, and a couple of little kicks at its edges with her heels popped it the rest of the way. “Nope,” Hwa said. And she pushed herself through.
The first thing they found was food. The light booth had an impressive array of snacks. All of it was the high-calorie contraband that the school had outlawed years ago: bright pouches and boxes of crisps and chocolate (a whole box of the cherry brandy kind), seaweed crackers, “cheddar” popcorn, “kettle” popcorn, and bottle after bottle of energy drinks. Hwa mainlined one like it was the blood of Christ.
Tossing the empty bottle into a bin, she took stock. The light booth’s equipment was still all tarped over; no one had come in to use it since the summer. She plunked herself into one of the chairs and pulled the other one out for Joel.
“What’s going on, out there?”
“Let’s see.”
Hwa opened the security tab again. More feeds had come online. Students in darkened rooms cowered under their desks. Teachers held fingers over their lips. The halls remained empty. It was standard protocol in an active shooter situation, one Hwa had drilled her self-defence students on: run, and if running is impossible, then hide.
The shooter was on the second floor, now. He was in the foreign language pod. He was standing outside Madame Clouzot’s class—Hwa recognized the French flag across the door—and trying to kick it down. Hanna Oleson was in there, Hwa realized. She’d figured out Hanna’s whole schedule when Jared took her. Was she as scared now as she’d been then? Had Hwa saved her just to watch her die here?
“Hwa?”
Just as she was about to explain, the bell sounded. First period was over. Christ, where were the cops? Maybe they knew something she didn’t. Like maybe this asshole had chemical weapons, or there was a bomb somewhere, or he’d rigged himself to blow up. Maybe he wasn’t the run-of-the-mill batshit shooter, after all.
Maybe he was the one trying to kill Joel.
Maybe he was going to kill everyone in his way until he found Joel.
“Fuck this,” Hwa whispered. She stood up and started digging in the supply racks. Most of it was just extra wire and batteries and folders of gels. There was an old red toolbox that looked promising, but it had a big fat padlock on it and Hwa had no time.
“What are you looking for?”
“The emergency ladder.”
Hwa fished a box cutter out of one bin. That could come in handy. She tried stuffing it down her skirt, but that didn’t work so well. She dug out a tool belt, cinched it over her waist, and stuck the cutter in there, along with a couple of flat-head screwdrivers and a heavy flashlight. There was a drill, but it was a small battery-powered job without much force. She needed something bigger. Like a nail gun.
Fortunately, she knew exactly where to get one of those.
“I think I know what you’re doing, and I think it’s really stupid,” Joel said.
“Probably is.”
“You’re wounded. You shouldn’t even be standing up.”
“Got us this far, didn’t I?”