And when we saw exactly what we wanted to see, what we expected to see—the big flatbed loaded with soldiers, the Humvees bristling with machine gun turrets and surface-to-air launchers—we still held back.

Then the school buses pulled into view.

Three of them, bumper to bumper.

Packed with kids.

Nobody expected that. Like I said, it was so weirdly normal, so shockingly surreal. Some of us actually laughed. A yellow freaking school bus! Where the hell is the school?

After a few tense minutes, where all we could hear was the throaty snarl of engines and the faint laughter and calls of the children on the buses, Dad left Hutchfield talking to the commander and came over to me and Sammy. A knot of people gathered around us to listen in.

“They’re from Wright-Patterson,” Dad said. He sounded out of breath. “And apparently a lot more of our military has survived than we thought.”

“Why are they wearing gas masks?” I asked.

“It’s precautionary,” he answered. “They’ve been in lockdown since the plague hit. We’ve all been exposed; we could be carriers.”

He looked down at Sammy, who was pressed up against me, his arms wrapped around my leg.

“They’ve come for the children,” Dad said.

“Why?” I asked.

“What about us?” Mother Teresa demanded. “Aren’t they going to take us, too?”

“He says they’re coming back for us. Right now there’s only room for the children.”

Looking at Sammy.

“They’re not splitting us up,” I said to Dad.

“Of course not.” He turned away and abruptly marched into the barracks. Came out again, carrying my backpack and Sammy’s bear. “You’re going with him.”

He didn’t get it.

“I’m not going without you,” I said. What was it about guys like my father? Somebody in charge shows up and they check their brains at the door.

“You heard what he said!” Mother Teresa cried shrilly, shaking her beads. “Just the children! If anyone else goes, it should be me…women. That’s how it’s done. Women and children first! Women and children.”

Dad ignored her. There went the hand on my shoulder. I shrugged his hand away.

“Cassie, they have to get the most vulnerable to safety first. I’ll be just a few hours behind you—”

“No!” I shouted. “We all stay or we all go, Dad. Tell them we’ll be fine here until they get back. I can take care of him. I’ve been taking care of him.”

“And you will take care of him, Cassie, because you’re going, too.”

“Not without you. I won’t leave you here, Dad.”

He smiled like I had said something kiddy-cute.

“I can take care of myself.”

I couldn’t put it into words, this feeling like a hot coal in my gut, that splitting up what was left of our family would be the end of our family. That if I left him behind I would never see him again. Maybe it wasn’t rational, but the world I lived in wasn’t rational anymore.

Dad pried Sammy from my leg, slung him onto his hip, grabbed my elbow with his free hand, and marched us toward the buses. You couldn’t see the soldiers’ faces through the buggy-looking gas masks. But you could read the names stitched onto their green camouflage.

GREENE.

WALTERS.

PARKER.

Good, solid, all-American names. And the American flags on their sleeves.

And the way they held themselves, erect but loose, alert but relaxed. Coiled springs.

The way you expect soldiers to look.

We reached the last bus in the line. The children inside shouted and waved at us. It was all one big adventure.

The burly soldier at the door raised his hand. His name patch said BRANCH.

“Children only,” he said, his voice muffled by the mask.

“I understand, Corporal,” Dad said.

“Cassie, why are you crying?” Sammy said. His little hand reached for my face.

Daddy lowered him to the ground. Knelt to bring his face close to Sammy’s.

“You’re going on a trip, Sam,” Dad said. “These nice army men are taking you to a place where you’ll be safe.”

“Aren’t you coming, Daddy?” Tugging on Dad’s shirt with his tiny hands.

“Yes. Yes, Daddy’s coming, just not yet. Soon, though. Very soon.”

He pulled Sammy into his arms. Last hug. “You be good now. You do what the nice army men tell you. Okay?”

Sammy nodded. Slipped his hand into mine.

“Come’n, Cassie. We’re going to ride a bus!”

The black mask whipped around. A gloved hand went up.

“Just the boy.”

I started to tell him to stuff it. I wasn’t happy about leaving Dad behind, but Sammy wasn’t going anywhere without me.

The corporal cut me off. “Only the boy.”

“She’s his sister,” Dad tried. He was being reasonable. “And she’s a child, too. She’s only sixteen.”

“She’ll have to stay here,” the corporal said.

“Then he’s not getting on,” I said, wrapping both arms around Sammy’s chest. He’d have to pull my damn arms off to take my little brother.

There was this awful moment when the corporal didn’t say anything. I had the urge to rip the mask off his head and spit in his face. The sun glinted off the visor, a hateful ball of light.

“You want him to stay?”

“I want him to stay with me,” I corrected him. “On the bus. Off the bus. Whatever. With me.”

“No, Cassie,” Dad said.

Sammy started to cry. He got it: It was Daddy and the soldier against me and him, and there was no winning that battle. He got it before I did.

“He can stay,” the soldier said. “But we can’t guarantee his safety.”

“Oh, really?” I shouted into his bug-face. “You think? Whose safety can you guarantee?”

“Cassie…,” Dad started.

“You can’t guarantee shit,” I yelled.

The corporal ignored me. “It’s your call, sir,” he said to Dad.

“Dad,” I said. “You heard him. He can stay with us.”

Dad chewed on his bottom lip. He lifted his head and scratched under his chin, and his eyes regarded the empty sky. He was thinking about the drones, about what he knew and what he didn’t know. He was remembering what he’d learned. He was weighing odds and calculating probabilities and ignoring the little voice piping up from the deepest part of him: Don’t let him go.

So of course he did the most reasonable thing. He was a responsible adult, and that’s what responsible adults do.

The reasonable thing.

“You’re right, Cassie,” he said finally. “They can’t guarantee our safety—no one can. But some places are safer than others.” He grabbed Sammy’s hand. “Come on, sport.”

“No!” Sammy screamed, tears streaming down bright red cheeks. “Not without Cassie!”

“Cassie’s going,” Dad said. “We’re both going. We’ll be right behind you.”

“I’ll protect him, I’ll watch him, I won’t let anything happen to him,” I pleaded. “They’re coming back for the rest of us, right? We’ll just wait for them to come back.” I pulled on his shirt and put on my best pleading face. The one that usually got me what I wanted. “Please, Daddy, don’t do this. It isn’t right. We have to stay together, we have to.”

It wasn’t going to work. He had that hard look in his eyes again: cold, clamped down, remorseless.

“Cassie,” he said. “Tell your brother it’s okay.”

And I did. After I told myself it was okay. I told myself to trust Dad, trust the People in Charge, trust the Others not to incinerate the school buses full of children, trust that trust itself hadn’t gone the way of computers and microwavable popcorn and the Hollywood movie where the slimeballs from Planet Xercon are defeated in the final ten minutes.

I knelt on the dusty ground in front of my little brother.

“You need to go, Sams,” I said. His fat lower lip bobbed up and down. Clutching the bear to his chest.

“But, Cassie, who’s going to hold you when you’re scared?” He was being totally serious. He looked so much like Dad with that concerned little frown that I almost laughed.

“I’m not scared anymore. And you shouldn’t be scared, either. The soldiers are here now, and they’re going to make us safe.”