Chapter 30

It started as a whisper, a distant cry that multiplied as every species joined together one by one to give the call. Treetops shook as birds took flight, and Croc cawed to them, matching the ear-splitting clamor of the flock. Cranes, herons, cardinals, and crows all bled into one, building a twister. I gaped at the sky, then at him. He walked sideways, hand outstretched, closing the few feet between us without looking my direction. His attention remained skyward, on the birds, on himself as he cried out to the mother. To the brothers and sisters. His voice shifted in and out of character, one animal to the next, hammering out instructions on the frontline of a war. This was a war. He ducked as he hissed, drawing snakes from the water, the branches. They slithered across the yard, down the bank, past our feet. He croaked, and frogs hopped after them. He conjured a plague, like Moses against the Pharoah, performing miracles.

When he reached my side, his hand rested on my back, but he still didn't look at me.  "We're okay." He followed the words with a series of grunts, and monstrous, squealing rats sprinted out of hiding places.

"You sound just like them." I didn't sound like me. My voice was too small, as if I were a mere mortal speaking to a god. He was impossible, but impossible was our reality. One central government was impossible, until it wasn't. Mass killing citizens was impossible, until it wasn't. Things ever getting any better was impossible.

Until it wasn't.

Croc's fingers slid to my shoulder. "Watch this."

He roared at the sky, and the mass of birds darkened, thickened, dove. 

Screams erupted. Then gunfire. Bullets became fishhooks, yanking feathers from the sky. Hell had found a crack. Hell was on its way. I watched the formation struggle, migrating closer, knowing what that meant. The Greater Good was here, and they were coming for us. It was only a matter of time. An icy chill settled over me. They wouldn't bother with IVs, not now. They'd have bigger tests for us. Horrible tests. The thought of Croc strapped to one of those chairs, alone and suffering and surrounded by lies.

He cried out as if he already were, and the sound broke me like the world never could. His eyes, crazed eyes. Like the women in my group. Like the people at the store. Like the men who cleaned the trash-coated streets. Like Lita on the day this all began. They were killing his family, forcing him to watch.

I wanted to block his view. I wanted to pick him up and run. Croc wasn't like the rest of us. Croc was still human. The last human on Earth.

Croc gripped my forearm. "New plan!" He dragged me with him to the trees, threw me over his shoulder, then jumped. I squeaked, clinging on as he raced through the branches.

He deposited me behind a curtain of moss, then pulled one of the kitchen knives from my belt and slid the handle into my palm. My fingers curled around it; his curled around mine.  "If you stay here, those things can't get you."

Those things. He'd barely listened when I tried to prepare him, too caught up in offensive strategy. He squeezed my hand, and for a blessed final moment, I had his full attention. Croc studied my face. I memorized his. 

I couldn't lie to him. I wouldn't paint our fate. He needed to know, and better he hear it from me than learn the hard way. "They're too big, Croc. They can get us no matter where we hide, and I—"

He palmed the sides of my face, and his look said it all. Don't question. Don't doubt. He needed me to believe in him, and I couldn't take that away. I leaned in, brushing my nose against his, breathing him in for the last time. I'd give him everything I had. Everything that was left.

Croc took my mouth as if it belonged to him, making promises he couldn't keep. I let him. I melted into him. For a split second, I slipped away. This could be the last of our broken rules, and I wouldn't waste a single second on worry.

He leaned back, holding me still when I tried to follow. "Throw the knives, Willow. Like I showed you." He yanked one off his belt, then nodded for my agreement. "Don't let them see you."

I nodded, and he left me, moving three trees over to crow insistently at the sky.

I parted the moss and watched the din answer. Swirl up, dive. Swirl up, dive.

This was happening. My heart slammed against my ribcage, then stopped beating altogether as the first wave of clinical white scrambled from the trees. Bodies swung and bent as the ground swallowed them. Croc's traps were like hungry mouths that had never found a greater good. I stared, trying to get an idea of their numbers. They seemed endless. How long could we keep them back? How long before they inevitably made it closer. Already, they were regrouping. The pits were all uncovered. Too easily passed. Had we had more time, we could have dug a trench. We could have built a moat. Had we had more time, I could have convinced him to leave. I could have made a better plan.

We could have had a life.

Had we had more time.

Croc threw three knives, each hitting a target. A spine. A throat. A back. He straightened and drew in air, filled his chest like an iron hive, then heaved out a swarm. Insects burst from the trees, gathered like droplets, building a tsunami. Croc's volume built with them. His muscles strained as his arms lifted, and a wall of buzzing black rose between us and our deaths. It took my breath away, then gave it  back. For the first time since Croc said Danny was gone, I breathed. I hoped. I imagined.

Croc dropped his arms, and the wave crashed. Chaos exploded. Officials became ghosts, shadows scrambling for light, ducked bodies and flailing arms. It was working. Croc directed the bugs; the bugs directed the men, driving them closer to the water.

But Hell had smoke.

Thick grey puffs rolled into existence, driving back the horde. As the view cleared, my vision blurred. Nose, throat, and lungs burned. Tear gas. I held my breath and squinted at Croc. "Cover your—"

Croc bellowed, and alligators darted from the canal, jaws clamping around legs, arms, and thighs before dragging their prey back into the murk. Officials wailed. Officials fell. An incessant crack of machine gunfire. Gators piled up like big-game trophies. So many. Too many. They were painting our world red: the ground, the dock, the bank. A basecoat of blood to start their new reality.

"No!" I wrenched my knives free, flinging them with little thought, desperate to reverse it. Fix it. Turn back time. But if Croc wasn't enough to stop them, what chance did I have? I was useless. Powerless. The same as I'd always been. The same as we all were. 

My new world was falling to the same ruin the last one had. Only, this one had been so much more. I had belonged. I was part of it, and I was crumbling.

Croc thundered, an explosive, booming growl. It lifted all the little hairs on the back of my neck. The gators slid back into the water, out of sight. The officials paused, slowed, looked around with lifted guns and skittish movements.

Croc crouched, breathing harsh, gripping the branch with a force that made me pity the tree. He pulled the last knife from his belt. "Willow," he said without looking in my direction. "They need me."

I swallowed hard, already shaking my head. "You'll be no good to them if you're dead."

"I'll be no good at all if I stay here."

Without him, what good was there? My vision swam, and not just from lingering fumes. It was too soon. "Then I'll go with you."

"No." It was instant and rough, and before the words could pass his lips, his gaze whipped to mine. "They need me. The babies need you."

The babies. His babies. Our babies. He knew the truth now. That this was over before it started. That we could never win. I swallowed convulsively, pursed my lips, demanding myself to keep it together. I couldn't fall apart. Not yet. Not when he needed me most. "They need you more than they've ever needed me."

I looked away from him and counted. Ten. Twenty. Twenty-five. Thirty. Fifty. Still too many. Force hadn't worked. It wouldn't. Not when they were all armed with semi-automatic weapons. All strapped down with bullets draped over their shoulders and chests. Their commander turned to give more orders, waving the rest toward the dock.

Then, I saw them, our babies, and what little hope I still possessed disintegrated.

Julia yanked her arms, fighting to free herself from the men pulling her forward. They had her. They had the children, and they seemed so much smaller. Crouched. Slumped. Scared. Little mice amongst the filth. Mud coated their skin, like it had the day we arrived, blocking their colors, dulling their joy.

An official holding a loudspeaker stepped over and took Eric's arm, yanking him forward. The speaker gave a high-pitched screech as the man turned it on. Then he swung it to his face as if it were a prop, nonchalant, boastful. "Didn't I tell you, Willow?"

Danny.

It was over. It was worse than I could have ever imagined. I couldn't watch. Not this. Not them. I gasped and choked, fighting for air, for calm, for the ability to think, but no option seemed plausible. No answer existed.

I emptied, collapsed, slumping onto my branch as I stared at that tiny, cherub face. His downy brown curls. His sorrowful eyes, too aware for his age.

"Croc?" I needed him. I needed him to hold me together because I didn't think I could anymore.

But Croc didn't answer.

Croc was gone.

I scrambled to my feet and raced after him. "Croc! No!" He was too far ahead, swinging through the trees, sprinting across limbs. I moved faster than I ever had, eyes frantically shifting whenever I'd lose sight of him. I couldn't lose sight of him. If I did, I may never find him again.

Croc leapt from the trees, sprinted across the yard, then collided with an unsuspecting Danny. The intercom chimed as it hit the dirt.

"Do not shoot the subjects!" Danny shouted. "You have your orders! Contain! Contain!"

Croc smashed Danny's head into the ground, silencing him once and for all.

Guns lifted, pointed, and I forgot how to think. All I did was move. Move faster. Move, move, move. The first dart hit his shoulder; the second his arm. Croc yanked them out and pushed to his feet. He spun a circle, roaring murder, daring them to come closer. "You should never have come here!"

Three darts hit his stomach. Two more in his chest. He grunted, stumbled.

"No, no, no, no, no." The words rattled out of me, and I missed my grip on the next branch. I slipped, fell, body smacking limbs on my way down. I landed back first, and my lungs deflated, locked.

I looked around, stunned, broken, done. Gaps in the trees offered a front row seat I didn't want. Croc was limp as they flipped him over. Men cuffed his wrists, then his ankles, tying it all together like a pig they would roast slowly. They'd hurt him. They'd kill him, then make him live with it. A corpse, already gone, forced to sit day after day and feel himself decay. It was a fate worse than death, and I couldn't do anything about it. Nobody could do anything to stop it.

I turned away from the sight, gasping like a fish left to die on the bank. We hadn't done it, but I'd known we wouldn't. I was tired. Tired of fighting, of suffering, of losing. I was tired of trying, of failing, myself, the people relying on me. I wanted to close my eyes to all of it, never wake up. It didn't matter where we went or if we went anywhere at all. How could I exist after this? How could I stay awake, watching, as the children fell to the same fate? The fate I'd barely managed to save them from the last time.   

Then the intercom sounded again, and a small, mechanical voice announced, "I think I can."

My head whipped over, finding Eric bent with his mouth pressed against the device. He was too small to lift it, forced to rest it on the ground. He pulled the trigger, and his voice crackled again, "I think I can."

"I think I can!" Eve's voice rang up. "I think I can!"

"I know I goddamn can!" Julia stomped the foot of one of her captors. He jolted enough to lose his grip, and she elbowed him in the face before another man could restrain her. That strange chaotic harmony we'd created that night returned, magnified. "I think I can. I think I can." It grew, croaking, crowing, hissing, bellowed, "I think I can." It rose all around us, building momentum like the happy train chugging up its hill. 

"I think I can," I rasped, pushing past the pain and to my feet. "I—" I heaved a breath "—think I can." I stumbled, then stepped, then ran. "I think I can."

"I think I can! I think I can!" A battle cry. Our battle cry.

Screaming officials and snarling beasts fought to intercept me. A man covered in cottonmouths fell backward in my path. Another landed as if thrown, legs missing and face ash. I skirted around and over, moving with the obstacles how I moved with the canal. I'd grown. I wasn't a coward making dark deals in the shadows of society. I was a protector. I'd been chosen by the Earth herself, made strong by her hands, and I would fight until the last breath left my lungs.

My lips curled around a snarl as I pushed my muscles to the limit, racing toward my family. Devils sprouted as I went. Tranquilizer and stun guns lifted, but I was too fast. Too powerful. Too awake.

I threw the men who stood in my way and snapped the necks of those trying to stop me. Tranquilizer darts hit my skin, but they were nothing compared to the chemicals I'd endured. In the back of my mind, I awaited my death. I waited for the moment my vision would fade. When they'd get me down. But the thoughts couldn't make it past my subconscious. I couldn't hear them over the menacing roar of our army. "I think I can! I think I can!"

The longer I remained on my feet, the louder I became. The more I believed I could. We could. The swamp moved with me; the wildlife aided me. I gathered Eric. I freed Eve, then Julia. I got them inside the house. Gators kept guard as I went for Croc. The so-called Greater Good wasn't looking so great. With each second that passed, we made them fall. Fifteen. Ten. Maybe we would win. Maybe it was possible.

But no sooner had the words entered my mind, the world arrived to laugh at them.

A boat drifted into view, loaded down with fully armed men.

A new wave, worse than the last. The man at the wheel took one look at the sight and called up a sharp, "We've got suits! Take 'em down, boys!"

I sprinted, throwing myself over Croc just before the guns went off. Crack, crack, crack, crack, crack. I covered my head, muscles tensed, and aching in anticipation of a hit. I focused on the steady rise and fall of Croc's lungs, telling him goodbye inside my mind, thankful to have had him for a little while.

Gators circled us, forming a wall of protection. Then, all at once, the world fell silent. No pain. No pinch. No darkness come to swallow me. I lifted my head.

The remaining officials were full of holes, covered in blood, scattered with arms and legs bent at awkward angles. I peeked up at the boat. It'd stopped, and the men on board stood still, waiting for a new command. That's when I noticed their clothes. Worn jeans and T-shirts, leather jackets and tattooed skin. Not officials. They weren't officials. This army of giants was on our side.

"That's a lot of gators you've got there," the same man at the wheel called with a grin. "I don't suppose you can stop them from eating us."

I ignored him and checked Croc's face, felt his pulse, patted his cheek and shook his shoulder. He coughed, groaned, before his eyelids opened the smallest of cracks..

"Are you okay?" I ran a hand over his forehead, then quickly broke his bindings.

He nodded and tried to sit up, only to flop back down and clutch his head. "The world is spinning," he said. "But I'm okay." He looked around, taking in the gators around us, then seeming to remember our situation, pulled me against his chest.

"It's alright," I said. "We won." My voice broke and lifted, "We won, Croc! We did it!"

His eyes opened fully, and, this time, he finally managed to pull himself into a sitting position. I kissed his lips, reassured with the fact that he was alright, then stood and stared in horror at the devastation surrounding us. So many dead. Too many gone. A part of myself, a part of us, lay lifeless upon the ground. I swallowed the lump building inside my throat and blinked hard to clear the moisture clouding my vision. "Gator!" I cried out, voice high and shaking. "Where's Gator?"

"I'm right here," he said. He'd been right beside me, the first one to curl around to shield us.

I dropped down and hugged him, my cheek against his back, my grip tight. "I thought you were dead."

He laughed low. "I already told you. I'm fast. Real fast."

Croc reached over and laid his hand on Gator's head, his body bowing in obvious relief as his other arm circled my shoulders. I choked on a laugh that sounded more like a sob and burrowed deeper against the scales, ignoring the men still waiting for a response, or gratitude, or some acknowledgement. I didn't know who they were, but they'd helped us.

"Little Bit?"