Page 33 of Five Survive

“Well, put it this way,” Oliver said. “The RV is not going anywhere. We can’t call for help. So, the only way we’re getting out of here is by leaving the RV. And Reyna has a point; it’s been a while since his last shot. Maybe he’s gone.”

“Why would he shoot out all the tires and the gas tank to trap us here if he was just gonna leave right after?” Maddy said.

It seemed no one knew how to answer that. No one said anything for a moment, eyes shifting around the group, Red fiddling in her pocket, Simon staring up at the ceiling. Until a voice dared to break the silence.

“Hello.”

Red looked up, at Simon, then at Arthur. Had one of themspoken? The voice had sounded strange: metallic and muted. But, no, it couldn’t have been them because they too were looking around, searching for the speaker. Arthur caught her eye and Red shook her head. It wasn’t her.

“Did someone just—” Reyna began.

Oliver shushed her, holding up his finger.

“But I—” Simon now.

“Shut up!” Oliver shouted him down, holding up both hands to control the silence.

But it wasn’t silent; there was that empty, fizzing sound again.

It clicked off and—

“—Hello,” the voice spoke again, deep and disembodied.

Maddy gasped, and Oliver tapped her on the arm to keep her quiet, brandishing his finger at the rest of them.

“Hello?”

A voice, but no one to claim it. Red scanned over her shoulder. The voice was coming from the front of the RV, and so was that fizzing sound she hadn’t imagined.

“Hello,” it said. “Come here.”

“Nobody move!”

Oliver’s eyes were frantic, spinning in his head as he studied the front of the RV, and the darkness of the uncovered windshield. He backed up, feeling for the knife on the table.

“He said, ‘Come here,’ ” Maddy whispered, fear spiking in her voice, hands moving instinctively to protect her head. “Is he right outside? Oh my god he’s going to kill us all.”

“Hello.”

The voice clicked off, replaced by that fizzing hiss, but this time Red knew exactly what it was, the sound passing through her, gathering snapshots of memory. Ones she normally pushed away, the good and the bad. Running around her house, back when it had been warm, a walkie-talkie in her hand as she played Cops and Cops with her mom. They’d invented it, you see, because neither wanted to be a robber. Tiny Red yelling made-up police codes into the radio, sometimes too excited to remember to press the push-to-talk button, but always remembering to finish with “Over!” Running into separate rooms, demanding status reports on theBad Guys.TheBad Guyswere invisible, but somehow she and her mom always managed tosave the day and save the city. Together. They were heroes, if only in the game.

It was static, that sound, the fuzz between her voice and her mom’s as they ran to each other, laughing, taking cover. But that was all ruined now, because it was the exact same sound as the one at the funeral, the static between the final call on the police radio.Central to Officer 819.Static.Officer 819, no response.Static.Officer 819, Captain Grace Kenny, is End of Watch. Gone but never forgotten.Static.

Gone, that was right. And Red tried to forget most of the time.

“Hello?” The voice came from Oliver that time, crouching low on the floor, eyes trained on the front of the RV, knife up.

“He’s not there,” Red said. “It’s a two-way radio.” Oliver narrowed his eyes at her. “A walkie-talkie.”

Oliver straightened up, his grip loosening on the knife. “Where isit?”

“Somewhere over there.” Simon pointed toward the driver’s seat, the one-eyed bullet hole glaring back at them.

“Inside or outside?” Reyna asked, taking one tentative step forward.

“How would he have gotten it inside?” Oliver snapped. “We are right here and the RV is secure.”

Maybe if he said it enough times, it would become true.