Chapter 10

CHAPTER 10 And then something stabbed him in the back. He thought he'd been hit by a piece of glass. But it was Nya. She had her front paws on Ben, and her back claws still anchored to the tree. Nya was trying to hold him in place! It felt as if ten curved nails were hooked into his skin. But Ben gritted his teeth, and forced his icy fingers to cling to the tree. He swung his legs, wrapping them tightly around the trunk. Bit by bit, he shimmied up, so his body was out of the water. He'd made it.

Nya unhooked from him, and climbed up the tree so that she was resting on Ben's shoulder. "Thank you, Nya," he gasped. Crazy kid, talking to a cat again. Ben clung to the tree as the water rushed back to the ocean. It was shocking how quickly the water went away, as if it was draining from a gigantic bathtub. It had to be more than twenty feet deep in places. But within minutes, it was all gone. In its place was a sea of mud — knee-deep, black, and oily. There was a terrible smell — a rotten, poisonous stench — that burned Ben's nose. Ben and Nya climbed down from the tree. Ben stared at the heaps of wreckage piled everywhere. There was so much wood and metal, crushed roof tiles, and bits of houses and buildings that had been chewed up by the wave. And there were things, clothes and books and magazines, an

armless doll and a crushed baseball cap, a smashed laptop computer. What about the people who had bought these things, who had worn the clothes and turned those pages, who had played with the doll and looked up basketball scores on that computer? Where were those people? Was Ben the only person left? A dark feeling came over him, blacker than the wave. Ben had never felt more tired, or more cold. His muddy clothes were frozen to his body. His bones had turned to icicles. His body was raked with gashes and cuts. His strength was gone. He was out of ideas. He wanted to curl up in the mud. Yes, that's what he needed to do. Close his eyes. Forget all this. But suddenly Dad flashed into his mind. He remembered what Dad had told him about his last night in the cave in afghanistan. I was in bad shape. Dad had said

He was freezing cold, starving, and exhausted. His ankle throbbed, and was swollen to the size of a melon. The cave was crawling with rats, and Dad had hardly slept. He'd eaten some leaves that made his lips swell and his throat burn. He had no water. His radio was out of battery power. He'd been trying to send a signal all week, and had heard some crackling voices on the other end. But he had no idea who those voices belonged to, whether help was on the way or not. "Things did not look good," Dad had said. "They did not look good at all. But here's one thing they don't teach you in training, that you just have to know in your heart. You have to know that no matter how scared you are, no matter how hopeless things seem, you simply cannot give up hope." And Dad didn't. He killed a rat and cooked it for dinner. He kept his mind clear by thinking of Mom and Ben, and the happy times ahead of them. He swung his

arms in circles to keep blood flowing through his fingers. On the morning of the seventh day, Dad woke up to the sound of a helicopter thundering overhead. He was too weak to walk. So he crawled out of the cave. He made it out just in time to see the helicopter overhead, just in time to fire his signal gun. Just in time to be saved. Ben closed his eyes and took deep breaths until his mind felt calmer. He scanned the wreckage for something — anything — that would be useful. He finally glimpsed a can of some kind. It was fruit juice. He cleaned off the top and guzzled down half of it. He poured the rest into one of his dirty hands so Nya could lap it up. He was still thirsty, but the juice gave him a flicker of strength. Ben lifted Nya. He held her up so he could look into her cloudy blue eyes.

For the first time he wondered how she had survived the wave, how she'd gotten herself onto that mattress, how she'd made sure someone found her. Harry had been right about Nya. She was as tough as a Jedi warrior. "We're going to find them, right?" he said to her, not caring anymore that it was crazy to talk to a cat. "Eee, eee," Nya said. Ben decided that meant yes. Ben carefully draped Nya around his neck. He turned away from the ocean, and pointed himself toward the mountains. And he walked.