“That’s not what I was told at the precinct!”
“Things are evolving, Leonard. You can’t go in!”
My father looks pained. “Be safe!”
“I will.” I hope it’s a promise I can keep.
“I’ll keep her out of trouble, Big Guy,” Bex says. She grabs my hand and then Shadow’s, and the three of us sprint through the barricades, past the ugly faces and their ugly signs.
Once we hit the top step, Bachman leaps in front of us. She grabs my arm and turns my hands over to study my palms and the skin between my fingers, then my neck. She’s putting on a show for the crowd, and I’m too stunned to protest.
“She’s one of us,” Bachman cheers. “You don’t have to go in there with them, honey.”
And then I hear the thrum. The governor hears it too, and she whips her head around, scanning for its source, but it’s everywhere, a buzzing that grows and grows, and all we can do is watch and wait. Bachman stammers, but words fail her. Like us, she’s trapped inside a pregnant pause in history.
When the noise is on top of us, I see a group of soldiers, cops, and FBI agents rushing toward us. They push the crowd aside to make room for another group that marches behind them—the Alpha. It’s impossible to call them men. Men are not hulking, copper-skinned towers of muscle. Men do not charge down a street with spears raised and ready. They do not wear armor made from enormous shells and bones, monstrous lobster claws, and teeth. They do not use oysters the size of truck tires as shields. They do not chant in an ancient language in which every word sounds aggressive and hostile. They do not stretch their mouths as far as they can and bellow to the clouds, growl and threaten the sky like they are challenging the sun itself. These are not men.
The protestors have never seen anything like this. They fall back, tumbling to the ground, and shriek when the next group emerges. The newest additions to Hylan High’s student body have arrived.
Many have scales.
Others have jagged rows of teeth, and mouths like open wounds.
One of them is a teenaged mountain of power, a slightly smaller version of one of the giant warriors who led the way. He has sunken eyes and tiny spikes on his neck, shoulders, and forearms.
A girl with ghostly, gelatinous skin and eyes as big and black as plums steps serenely forward. If you look closely enough, you can see the blood coursing through her deep purple veins. Even closer and you can see the hint of bones.
Another boy is no taller than an eight-year-old and has a head like a gourd planted atop a thin, tottering body. He’s a skeleton shrink-wrapped in gray skin, with long fingers and black nails. His eyes are enormous chunks of coal, and his nose is nothing more than two wet slits.
The last three look almost human. One is a delicate beauty, slender and tall with tight red curls that cascade over her shoulders and bounce lightly at the base of her spine. Pink and blue scales freckle her throat, her shoulders, and the inside of her arms. She looks terrified.
The other two look as if they’ve never been afraid of anything in their lives. They’re golden gods, tall and strong with sculpted limbs. The female is close to my height and age, with cropped hair and a body that clearly skipped the awkward phase. Her face is a case study in symmetry, favored by dizzying cheekbones and bright, full lips, but it’s also unsettling, sharp, and serious. It’s not so much a face as it is a weapon, as deadly as the spears of the titans who guard her. The boy—well, he’s beautiful and troubling all at the same time. His face is strong and fierce but marred with bruises. Murky green highlights border a purple contusion on his right cheek. Yet who can focus on it when his eyes are so hypnotic? They’re violent whirlpools of green and blue, but just when I think I could get pulled into them, I notice his damaged forearms. They’re criss-crossed with scars like a Jackson Pollock painting, yet they pale in comparison to something way more gruesome. Starting at his wrists and going all the way up to his elbow is a jagged red gash in which sharp black blades sink in and out in an agitated rhythm. Their edges are serrated, like an old lumberjack’s saw, and each time they pop out, there is a sickening sucking sound, a Shhhtttiiikkkk! I’m unsure if he’s an angel or a monster.