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Relax. Meyer thought of this. Just because someone is trying to get in doesn
’
t mean they
’
ll succeed
.
 

Piper thought of the manuals. How far did Meyer’s paranoia extend? If he’d procured assault rifles, gas masks, and God knew what else, had he built a perimeter defense system of some sort? That’s what smart guys always did in the movies. Maybe Piper could flip a switch and electrocute whoever was tap-tap-tapping at their door. Maybe she could release a poison gas topside. Maybe she could blow the surface to rubble, leaving only the impenetrable bunker in a smoking crater.
 

But those thoughts were ridiculous. Flights of fancy. Inventions that only delayed the inevitable.
 

You
’
re in charge here, Piper. It
’
s all you, girl. You didn
’
t ask for the crown, but Meyer left on the nightstand when he abandoned you
.
 

“Look,” said Piper, sitting, turning back to Heather as the drilling continued above. “The lights are on. So — ” She jabbed a button, and the screens coughed back to life. “There. See? It’s all fine.”
 

“So, whatever was wrong with the power is fixed?”
 

Piper could tell by the lights that nothing was fixed. Too few had come back on, and those that had were far too dim. The whole place was in power-saving mode because their mains were cut and they were on borrowed time.
 

“I doubt it.”
 

“The generator,” said Raj. “You said there was a generator.”

“Do you
hear
a generator?” Trevor said.

Raj looked back at Trevor, but Piper only saw the boys measuring their dicks from the corner of her eye. “I think we’re on battery power. Enough to run what we want, but … ” Piper trailed off. She wasn’t an engineer, but it didn’t take an engineer to know that the more power they used, the shorter their stores would last. She should tell Heather to run around and kill the lights and anything not strictly necessary, but her breath was stolen by the picture that had flickered to life in one corner of the main security monitor.
 

“But what?” Heather prompted, urging Piper to go on.

“
Shh!
”
 

Piper’s blood had gone cold. She’d guessed at what they’d find on the monitors, but seeing it was something else entirely. The camera displaying the image was in the kitchen, probably above the island at its center. The view showed the closet alcove near its right edge. Six people clustered around the bunker’s front door, a man with a large corded drill as their centerpiece.

She reached for the screen, pulled the image forward, spread her fingers to magnify it.
 

“They’ve got a generator.” Lila pointed at a cord running away from the drill. She knew from past nights that the cameras were able to see in absolute darkness, but right now they didn’t need to. There were several high-powered lanterns at the screen’s corner aimed into the alcove, plus what looked like a shop light clipped on a rack inside the huddle of men, pointing down.
 

“Oh, sure,” said Heather. “
They
have a generator.”
 

Lila ignored her. The group seemed so equipped and prepared. They didn’t strike her as mindless UFO nuts who’d decided to riot and storm the castle while waiting for their ride to the stars. They looked like professional burglars: the kind of people who pull bank heists and high-stakes capers. The kind of people who might have figured a way through Meyer’s defenses, or were in the process of doing so.
 

Piper peered at the screen and felt a shiver. She pinched the image back down to size, let it drift to where the software wanted to place it as a thumbnail in the gallery, then turned. Eight eyes watched her.
 

“What do you think?” said Heather.
 

“About what?”
 

“Can they get in?”
 

“I don’t know, Heather.”
 

“But you looked at the video. Is there another angle? Is there a camera in the closet?”
 

“I don’t know.”
 

“How thick is that door?” said Raj.
 

“I don’t know, Raj. Why would I know that?”
 

“Why are they drilling? Why aren’t they just bashing it in?”
 

“I don’t—”

“Do they know we’re in here?”
 

“Hell if I — ”

“Is it going to be okay? Can they get in?” Lila’s hands found Piper’s arm. She didn’t know whether to be more perturbed or touched. It didn’t matter. Lila’s terrified affection was useless information, same as the rest.
 

 
“Lila — ” she began.

“But there’s a computer on the door, right?” said Heather. “With a really hard code or a scanner or something?”
 

“Computers don’t stop drills,” Raj chided.
 

“Shut up, Princess,” Heather said.
 

“Oh,
that
’
s
helpful.
That
will protect us.”
 

Trevor turned to Raj. “My dad wouldn’t build a place like this and then just let people kick in the door.” Then, to Piper, he added, “Right?”
 

“I don’t know.”
 

“But the door. The door will hold.”
 

“She
said
it would,” Lila told her brother.
 

“No, she didn’t.”
 

“Earlier! You weren’t around, Trevor.”
 

“That doesn’t mean that — ”

Piper stood quickly enough to kick the wheeled chair back into Raj’s shins. He yelped. She held up a hand.
 

“Look,” she said, “either they’ll get in, or they won’t. But we — ”

Trevor lost a helpless little inhale, his bravado gone. Piper grabbed his shoulder.
 

“Dammit, Trevor! Don’t lose your shit on me! You’re the man of the house now, so act like it!” She shook him until his eyes cleared.
 

“Hey, I’m two years older than — ” Raj began.

“Shut up, Princess,” Heather repeated.
 

 
Piper began again, locking eyes with each of them. She didn’t have time to play nice or coddle them. They wanted a leader?
Fine.
They wanted to be helpless sheep and put all the burden on her shoulders?
Fine.
But she’d be damned if she’d tuck them in and sing them a lullaby.
 

“Either they’ll get in, or they won’t,” she repeated, speaking slowly. “But
if
they get in, we need to be prepared.”
 

“The guns.” Lila looked at her mother, vindicated.
 

“You’re not touching a gun, Lila.”
 

“What did
you
do, with Dad’s gun, Mom? You never did tell us how you got out of Las Vegas.”
 

“I said enough.”
 

“
Guns,
” said Lila, nodding to herself. “Okay.” She seemed to force a breath. The idea of holding cold steel was apparently comforting.
 

“I’m not letting you use a gun, Delilah Dempsey.”
 

“I’m taking one, Mom!”
 

“No, you’re not!”
 

There was a clanking sound from above. The drill stopped as something heavy struck the floor in the home’s kitchen. Then the drill resumed.
 

Lila stared at Heather, her features firm. “
They
have guns, Mom.”
 

“You don’t know that.”
 

“Then I guess they just came to say hi? And all they have with them are gift baskets?”

“You don’t have any goddamned idea what’s really going on, Lila! Shooting first and asking questions later is the kind of thing that — ”

“ — that saves your ass in Las Vegas?” She pointed a finger toward Piper, and Piper felt the jab as if it had struck an open wound. “That saves all of our asses, as long as
someone
is willing to step up and not be a pussy?”

“Watch your mouth, Delilah,” Heather said.
 

“This from the Obscene Queen? How’s that mouth that made you famous, Mom?”
 

“
Look,
” Raj said, interrupting.

Lila stopped. Turned. Looked where Raj was pointing. Piper followed the same finger. Raj had pulled up some sort of diagnostic panel while Lila had been sparring with her mother. Piper saw a readout of some sort: white text on a black screen.

“It says, ‘secondary locks engaged,’” Lila read.
 

“We can read,” said Heather, eyeing her daughter before turning to the screen.
 

A rocket went off in Piper’s mind. It felt like salvation.
 

“Yes!” she said. “
I remember!
If someone tries to force the door, it locks with these giant deadbolts! There’s no way to get at them from the outside! There’s no way in! There’s no way to — ”

The drill ceased, surprising Piper into quiet. A new noise grew in the silence. Faint. Like the dragging of metal on metal.
 

Trevor’s head cocked. He stood and left the control room.
 

Lila threw a final glance at her mother and followed. Piper brought up the rear, leaving Raj behind. In the corner of Piper’s eye as she turned, Raj returned to the camera screens, flicking idly, wasting power.
 

Trevor crossed the large living room, his head still cocked, following the sound toward an interior door opposite the control room, mostly hidden from all but the kitchen side. Now that the drill had either finished or surrendered, the room seemed strangely quiet. The new dragging noise was comparatively loud.
 

“What
is
that?” Lila asked.
 

“
Shh,
” Trevor answered, cocking his head, triangulating.
 

The noise had become brisk, in an on-off-on pattern, over and over. It wasn’t constant. It had the rhythm of someone sweeping a floor or moving a broom back and forth. Leaving a pause at the end of each stroke.
 

Trevor reached the door. It looked like any interior door, but it had subtle rubber seals along all of its edges. It was heavier and thicker, the hinges larger, the kind of door intended to keep something out. The kind of door that means serious business.

“It’s the generator,” said Heather.
 

“It’s not the generator,” Trevor answered.
 

Raj’s voice came from the control room. “Guys?”
 

Trevor ignored him. He put his hand on the doorknob and pushed. The generator was in the utility room’s center, squatting on the bare concrete floor. Behind it to one side was the backup array: shelf after shelf of what looked like ordinary car batteries strung together with wires.
 

The metallic dragging stopped. There was a pinging sound, then more rattling, this time less metallic. A gurgling sound followed, echoing in the space.

Raj again: “
Guys!
”

Lila turned suddenly white. She grabbed her brother’s wrist.

“Close the door, Trevor.”
 

“Is something dripping?” Trevor was looking at a small pool of liquid beneath the exhaust pipe’s ninety-degree bend. He leaned forward, sniffing. A harsh smell assaulted Piper’s nostrils.
 

“Close it, Trevor. Close the door.”

Piper looked at Lila, then at the puddle. Her mind found a match for the earlier sounds — the ones that had come after the drill’s riot had ceased.
 

A back-and-forth metallic dragging, like a saw.
 

The gurgling, and now a forming puddle of gasoline.
 

All at once, Piper understood.
 

She shouldered Trevor aside. Slammed the door. Raj came sprinting from the control room, his dark skin blushed and eyes wide.

“There’s another guy by the side of the house!” he stammered. “In a little hole they dug by the foundation! And I think he’s — ”

Raj’s report was severed by the soft
fwump
of fire, followed by an explosion.

CHAPTER SIX

Heather, behind her children, shouldered her way forward, obeying an impulse she didn’t entirely understand. But a place deep within her
did
. Something was about to happen.
 

She’d seen it in a dream.
 

She
’
s walking with Meyer. Somewhere ancient, somewhere uniquely shamanistic. It
’
s a thing Heather has no interest in, and Meyer normally wouldn
’
t either. But she
’
s with him, even now, after he
’
s vanished, because this place
—
this place of dream walking
—
is timeless. And Meyer says
…