Instinctively, she leaped away from the sound, skidded on her jean-clad knees curling into a ball and covering her head with her arms.
The blades shredded the wooden billboard sending splintered projectiles barreling toward the metahuman.
A burst of fire tore through the air, lighting the night sky just in time to see the chopper careen nose-first toward the dunes just past Farrow. The dying machine's tail blade motor was billowing smoke, blackening the stars from view as it aimed itself to exact revenge on its killer.
Everybody watched helplessly through their car windows as Farrow disappeared in a thick explosion of sand.
“Oh dear God, no!” Margo breathed her prayer, worn hands covering her mouth and nose.
The family hadn’t driven far before the sedan turned back, skidding in a wide turn. Theo followed seconds later. No one was willing to leave anyone behind—never again.
Everybody grimaced in stunned horror at the space where Farrow had been moments before.
Dust began to settle mournfully.
Sloan had donned gloves and crouched on the floorboard of the sedan's back seat. Even with all the commotion going on outside, and the jostling they were experiencing inside the vehicle, her steady hands kept working to flush Alik's eyes. She had been carefully but hurriedly drenching Alik’s face, trying to remove as much as the burning oil as possible without spreading it. She had only used one water bottle on him when he woke with a gasp. His eyes so swollen he was nearly blinded.
“Farrow!” he screamed against the ominous silence. His voice sounding like shreds of vocal cords strummed with sandpaper.
Sloan watched in awe as he clambered to unfasten his seat belt and felt around in a painful fog for the door handle.
“Alik, I need to keep working on you—”
“I need Farrow!” His raspy voice cut through the menacing quiet that followed the chopper crash. His swollen fingers grabbed the handle and yanked it open, spilling him onto the sandy ground.
Margo watched her son with tears in her eyes through the windshield of her van. He stumbled on his weak legs desperately trying to stand, blinded and in pain.
“Farrow!” His voice cracked with anguish. He reached blindly and began taking heart-wrenching steps in the dark, looking for the girl he somehow knew was out there and needed him.
“Margo, what do we do?” Theo whispered.
Margo shook her head sadly. “Maybe she—”
“There’s no way she survived that,” Theo finished her thought.
Everybody watched in horrified sadness as Alik stumbled on wobbly legs, hands outstretched searching for the girl who captured his heart in her sparrow’s wings.
After a dozen yards, Alik sunk to his knees in the sand, shoulders hunched over and sobbed.
“How does he know she was out there?” Evan asked no one in particular.
“The heart knows.” Sloan choked back a sympathetic moan as she watched.
“Give him some light, Evan,” Creed nodded toward the scene.
Feeling the weight of his brother’s sadness, Evan stepped out of the car, reached for the lighter in his front pocket and instantly created a ball of glowing firelight, illuminating a large radius in the sea of sand.
Time hung limp in a hangman’s noose and no one moved.
“Alik!” a small voice called.
Raising his head, Alik used his hearing to track what could have just been an echo of her voice carried on a cruel breeze.
“Farrow?” he coughed through tears.
Running footsteps approached.
Alik struggled to get to his feet and once upright, swayed as though standing on the bow of a small boat rocking in the sandy waves.
Everybody watching from the cars only saw Alik raise his hands to touch black night air until a pale, feminine face dusted in sand stepped out of the darkness and into the glow of Evan’s firelight.
“I dreamed—” Alik’s swollen eyes began to spill fresh tears of relief.
“I’m here,” Farrow managed softly, though she had breathed in the desert. She reached out and laid her hands on Alik’s shoulders.
“Are you hurt?” He desperately wanted to see for himself, or at least touch her face, but he knew better than to spread the painful oils to the girl he loved more than his own heartbeat.
“I’m okay, but we need to go, baby,” Farrow ignored common sense and took Alik by the oily hand to lead him back to the cars.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he tried to pull away.
“Not touching you would hurt me more.” Farrow continued to pull him along.
“You’re amazing, little sparrow.”
“We need to move, Ally—” she coughed, desperate for a clear airway, “—those guys in the chopper must have radioed our position back to Williams. They’ll be coming for us.”
“I’ll follow you anywhere,” Alik gripped her hand.