Chapter 8
VI
My foot catches on something I don’t see in time.
I go down hard.
Fuck me.
The impact knocks the air out of me in a sharp, humiliating burst. My knee slams tile.
Pain flashes hot and immediate. I bite the inside of my cheek to keep quiet and roll, scrambling into the narrow gap between two shuttered storefronts.
My shoulder clips a metal gate and the rattle rings out, too loud in the corridor.
I go still. One breath. Two.
Nothing answers. The silence doesn’t mean safety. It means, I haven’t been heard yet.
I stay crouched, one hand braced on the floor, the other fist pounding to bleed off the initial pain. My lungs work like a bellows, too loud in my own ears. I force the sound down, pull air through my nose, slow and thin. My pulse doesn’t care. I roll back onto my ass and look down at my knee.
Blood seeps through torn denim, dark and fast. The cut isn’t too deep, but it’s open, and the Rot doesn’t do clean wounds. Everything here has been touched by mildew and rust and the kind of grime that never washes out.
“Just great,” I whisper.
I can’t keep bleeding like this.
I shift deeper into shadow. The space behind the gates is an old boutique, stripped bare. The floor is littered with ripped shopping bags and broken hangers and the sagging carcass of a mannequin arm. Something small skitters near the wall and disappears into a crack.
I ignore it.
There’s a trash bag in the corner, half torn open. I kneel beside it and dig through, hands moving fast. My fingers come up slick with something I don’t want to think about. I find a strip of cloth that might’ve once been a shirt. Gray. Thin. It smells like old sweat and damp.
It’s still better than nothing.
I press the cloth against the cut and hiss through my teeth. Pain pulses up my leg in waves. I wrap the fabric around my knee, tight enough to slow the blood. My hands shake. I force them steady and tie the knot hard.
The pressure helps. A little.
I lean my head back against the wall. Just for a second. I know I should elevate my leg, at least until it stops bleeding, but who has time for that shit?
Concrete presses cold against my skull as I try to relax. My eyes burn from sweat and dust. My throat tastes like metal. The back of my neck is soaked, hair sticking to skin. My legs tremble now that I’m not moving, like they’re trying to keep going. Reminding me that this is no time to slack off.
I want to slide down the wall. To close my eyes. To let my body go slack and disappear into a dream. But the Hunt doesn’t pause just because I’m tired. Just because I’d give almost anything for a peaceful little nap.
And neither can I. I just need a minute. Really.
Wait.
Words, old words from long ago, land in my head without sound. Not shouted. Never shouted.
My father’s voice, low and controlled, as if calm could hold the city together by itself. His hand on my shoulder, fingers digging in just enough to hurt. The pressure meant something then. It meant he was there, and I wasn’t alone, and that there was still a plan.
Wait here.
The memory isn’t warm. It’s sharp. It cuts straight through the noise in my skull, and the pain in my leg and drags up everything I’ve kept buried under motion.
I blink hard, and the boutique I’m hiding in snaps back into place with its dark corners, warped tile, the smell of damp and rot. My chest tightens, but not from the running.
I grind my teeth and shove the memory down. It refuses to go away. Refuses to give me a fucking break.
Another fragment from the past breaks loose.
The conference room, years ago, before the Rotter Hunt was a thing anyone said out loud.
Before the town of Rothwell admitted what it had become.
A folding chair under me. Cold metal against the back of my thighs.
The hum of fluorescent lights. People talking in clipped voices, too polite, too careful.
“Your father’s done a lot for this city.”
“Your father understands what’s necessary.”
“Your father will cooperate.”
Words that sound respectful until you realize what they really are.
Threats.
My father across the room, face still and tight. He looks smaller than he should. He keeps his hands flat on the table as if any movement will be used against him. He meets my eyes once. Just once.
Wait.
Then someone shuts a folder. Someone stands. Someone says, “That’s all.”
The rest of it fractures.
I don’t know what he says after that. I never have. My brain refuses to hand it over cleanly. All I’ve got is the weight of that moment and the way the room smells like cheap coffee and old paper and authority.
And betrayal. So much betrayal.
My knee throbs harder, yanking me back to the Rot. I press my palm against the wall and push myself upright, careful with my weight. The fabric bandage holds.
Barely.
I take two steps toward the gate and stop again, listening.
Footsteps. Not close. But moving. Not running. Not frantic. Measured. Designed to be terrifying. The sound drifts from the corridor outside the storefront, passing by, then fading. A sweep, not a chase. I count the beats between steps the way I did before. My breath steadies a fraction.
They’re not panicking. Which means they’re not losing.
I swallow and wipe my palm on my jeans. My hands smell like garbage and blood now. It disgusts me. I don’t have time to care.
The city didn’t fall all at once. It sagged.
First, there were the little failures. Streetlights out for days. Trash pickup skipped. Water pressure dropping in certain neighborhoods. People complaining online, then stopping because no one answered. Stores closing early. Then closing for good.
The lies came next, dressed up as reassurance. Temporary disruptions. Containment.
Please remain calm.
Help is on the way.
I believed that once. I believed if you did what you were told, if you stayed in line, if you kept your head down, everything would work out.
I stayed because my father stayed. I stayed because the people with badges and microphones said everything was under control. I stayed because leaving meant admitting the city didn’t care if we lived.
Then the evacuation orders came. Then they changed. Then they contradicted each other. Then the buses never showed. Then the sirens started arriving later and later until they stopped arriving at all.
The worst part wasn’t the noise. The worst part was the silence afterward. That’s what Rothwell became. A place where help used to come.
My throat tightens. I tilt my head back and take one controlled breath, then another.
I don’t get to spiral. Not here. I didn’t come here because I ran out of options.
I came here because waiting didn’t work.
I came here because the truth doesn’t volunteer itself.
It hides behind paperwork and committees and reports that all say the same thing: unfortunate outcome, unavoidable circumstances, no wrongdoing found.
I’ve read those disgusting words so many times, I can recite them.