Genesis. Volume 1.

September 10, 1985. Tuesday. 6:00 p.m. The Walker house. Arthur sat in the kitchen, watching his mother chop salad. The knife tapped against the cutting board—steadily, rhythmically, like a metronome. It smelled of cucumbers, dill, and something else domestic that he was afraid of forgetting. "You're quiet today," Sofia said without turning around. "Tired." "From school?" "Yeah." She didn't believe him—he could tell from her back, from the way she paused for a second before picking up the knife again. But she didn't ask. Upstairs, Lisa was moving around—gathering drawings, stacking them in a folder. Tonight they were supposed to meet at the garage for the last time. Arthur knew it. She knew it. Everyone knew it. He finished his cold tea, set the mug in the sink. Went upstairs, put on his jacket. Checked his pockets: money, keys, the red thread on his wrist, the old circus ticket with the number 7—the one they'd drawn together. Lisa knocked on the door. "I'm ready." She was in jeans, a sweater, her notebook tucked under her arm. Her hair was loose—lately she'd stopped pulling it back. "Let's go." They stepped outside. The evening was warm, but the air was heavy—like before a thunderstorm that couldn't quite decide. To the west, the sky was already turning pink; to the east, blue clouds were gathering. It smelled of leaves and gasoline. Max was waiting at the corner, by the old oak. He crouched, poking the ground with a stick. "Took you long enough," he said, getting up. "Are Jenny and Emma already at the garage?" "Yeah. I left them the key." They walked toward Third Street—past the old pharmacy, past the barbershop, past Rose's Diner, where the neon had already been switched on. The city was living its own life, lights coming on in the windows. September 10, 1985. Tuesday. 8:00 p.m. Abandoned garage on Third Street. The garage was dark. Max turned on his flashlight—small, aluminum. A yellow beam picked out the walls, the crates, the old sofa. And a new map. It hung where the old one with the six red dots used to be. Lisa had spent three days drawing it—carefully, with a ruler, with city names and dates. Fifteen dots. Fifteen places where Devourers had woken or might wake. Lisa stood by the map, holding her notebook against her chest. "This is just America," she said, stepping back so everyone could see. "I haven't drawn the other countries yet." "Enough for now," Arthur replied. He sat on an upturned crate—the very one he'd sat on two months ago when they'd first gathered here to decide how to stop the clown. Beside him—Lisa, Max, Jenny, Emma. The same five. Two months. A lifetime. "Claire called this morning," Emma said, settling on the windowsill. "She found another guy in Chicago. He saw a strange man in the park—tall, in a long coat, with black eyes. Agreed to meet." "That makes four in Chicago," Max noted. "In Chicago or total?" Jenny asked. "In Chicago." "So there are several of them in Chicago," Arthur said. "Or one Devourer for all of them." "Or several," Lisa countered. "The map shows one dot. But that doesn't mean there's only one monster there." "We need to learn more. But not now." Arthur swept his gaze across all of them. "Right now we need to breathe." "Breathe?" Max repeated. "You're telling us to rest?" "I'm telling us not to burn out. We can't be everywhere. We can't save everyone at once. If we keep pushing forward without stopping—we'll break." "He's right," Jenny said. "We already broke. We just didn't notice." "I didn't break," Max said. "You slept with a knife for three weeks," Emma said without malice, simply stating a fact. Max fell silent, gripping the edge of the crate until his knuckles went white. "None of us are normal," Arthur said. "And we never will be. But we can at least try to keep living." "How?" Lisa asked. "Go to school. Talk to our parents. Sleep at night." "I can't sleep at night," Max said. "Neither can I," Jenny said. "We'll try. For ourselves. For Jack. He wouldn't want us to turn into shadows." "How do you know what he'd want?" Emma's voice faltered—for the first time that evening. "Because he sacrificed himself so we could live. Not so we could just exist." Silence. Only the wind humming through the cracks in the garage, only a mouse scratching somewhere behind the wall, only the watch on Max's wrist ticking, reminding them that time was passing. "I want to say something," Lisa said without looking up. The pencil in her hand had stopped. "To everyone." "Go ahead," Arthur said. "I'm afraid. Not that we won't make it. But that we will, and we'll become different." "Different?" Jenny repeated. "Hard. Cold. Like him. Like Crowley. We've already started. I can feel it. I used to cry when I saw blood. Now I don't. I just draw." She lifted her head. Her eyes were dry, but something had frozen in them—something Arthur hadn't seen before. Not fear, not pain. Emptiness. "I don't want to become a monster. Even if we defeat them all." Emma stood up, walked over to her, put a hand on her shoulder. "You won't. Because you draw. And monsters don't draw." "How do you know?" "Because I don't draw. And I'm already turning. Sometimes I look in the mirror and don't see myself. I see someone else. Someone who doesn't smoke, doesn't cry, isn't afraid. But that's not me." "Then who is it?" Max asked. "I don't know. Maybe who I'll become if I don't stop." Arthur stood up. "We won't become them. Because we remember. We remember Jack. We remember Amber. We remember what we fought for." "What if we forget?" Jenny asked. "Then remind each other. That's why we're together." He walked over to the map, ran his finger over Brookfield. The paper was warm from the lamp. "Here we are. Here Jack is. Here Crowley is." "And here's the beginning," Lisa said. "Of everything?" Max asked. "Of everything," Arthur replied. He took the map off the wall—carefully, so as not to tear it—and rolled it into a tube. "Leave a copy here?" Max asked. "Burn the copy. The original stays with me. If someone finds the garage—let them not know where we're going." "What if we lose each other?" Jenny asked. "Then we meet here. The first Sunday of every month. If someone doesn't show—it means they're in trouble. And we go looking for them." "How will we find them?" Max asked. "By the map," Lisa said. "They'll be in one of these cities. Or on the way to them." "What if they can't leave a sign?" "Then we search blindly. Like we searched for Jack." "We found Jack," Emma said. "But we didn't save him." "We did. He's alive. He's there. He's holding Crowley inside. If that's not saving, then what is?" Emma wanted to answer, but didn't. She pulled out a cigarette—the last from a crumpled pack—and lit it. The smoke lingered in the garage. "I thought you quit," Max said. "I quit every day. But not today. Today we're saying goodbye to this place." "Goodbye?" Jenny repeated. "For a while. We can't stay here forever. The cops might find it. Parents. Anyone." "She's right," Arthur said. "We'll meet other places. Cafés, parks, libraries. But this garage... it was our headquarters. Our sanctuary." "Our first headquarters," Lisa corrected. "There'll be others." "There will be." He looked at the walls—the peeling paint, the rusted cans, the old sofa that remembered their first meetings, the crates they'd sat on when they were still children. "What do we do with the stuff?" Max asked. "Leave it here. As a memory." "What if someone finds it?" "Then they'll see that teenagers hung out here. Nothing more." Lisa walked to the wall where the map had hung—now bare—and ran her finger over the nail that had held it. "Brookfield was here. Now it's gone." "It's still there. Just not on this map." Arthur pulled the old circus ticket from his pocket—yellow, faded, with the number 7 they'd drawn themselves. "I'll keep this. As a souvenir." "I've got mine," Max pulled a matching one from his pocket. "Me too," Jenny said. "Me too," Emma stubbed out her cigarette on her sneaker sole and tossed the butt into the trash bag. "Me too," Lisa said. They stood in the garage, clutching the red tickets with the number 7, and were silent. The wind beyond the walls had died down. Silence fell—so deep they could hear a dog barking somewhere in the distance. "Time to go," Arthur finally said. He stepped outside. The others followed. September 10, 1985. Tuesday. 9:00 p.m. Street in front of the garage. The night was dark, but the sky was clear. The stars burned brightly, as they hadn't in weeks, as if someone had washed the dust off them. Somewhere on the hill, the Genesis mansion stood black and silent. "Did you see it?" Max asked. "I saw it. I always see it." Arthur raised his hand. In the second-floor window—in that very room that hadn't been there before—a gray light flickered on. For a second. And went out. "He saw us," Lisa said. "He always sees us." They walked away. No one looked back. Arthur in front, Lisa behind him, then Max, then Jenny, Emma bringing up the rear. Each of them was thinking their own thoughts. Arthur—about the map in his backpack, about the fifteen dots, about the hundreds more yet to be drawn. Lisa—about her drawings, about never drawing a clown again. Max—about the knife still under his pillow. Jenny—about the photograph where all six of them were smiling. Emma—about cigarettes, about quitting tomorrow. For good. They reached the intersection by the old pharmacy, where the streetlight always worked. "This is where our roads part," Arthur said. "Not for long," Lisa corrected. "Forever," Max said. "But we'll meet again." "On the first Sunday," Jenny said. "On the first Sunday," Emma repeated. They hugged—silently, tightly. Five people in the twilight, pressed together as if for the last time. Then they split up. Arthur and Lisa—to the Walkers'. Max—toward his house, where a light was already on in the window. Jenny and Emma—together, as always. At the corner, Arthur stopped and looked back. The garage was behind them. Dark, abandoned, as before. But now it was empty. "Do you regret it?" Lisa asked. "What?" "That we started this." "No. I regret not starting sooner." "Earlier there was no point. Crowley hadn't woken yet." "Now others have woken." "So now there's a point." They went inside. Their parents were already asleep—a nightlight glowed in the living room, the steady breathing of their father came from the bedroom. Their mother had left dinner on the stove, covered with a plate. Arthur didn't eat. He went upstairs, pulled the map from his backpack, spread it on the table. Fifteen dots. Fifteen cities. Fifteen unknowns. He ran his finger over Brookfield. "We'll come back, Jack. I promise." He folded the map, hid it in his desk drawer—where the Crowley family photograph and the old ticket with the number 7 also lay. He lay down on the bed, closed his eyes. Outside the window, the wind rustled. Somewhere in Chicago, Claire sat on her windowsill, watching the city lights, clutching the yellow ticket with the number 4. Somewhere in Detroit, a guy named Marcus was rereading the letter from Brookfield for the hundredth time. On the wall of his room hung a map with red dots—just like Arthur's. Somewhere in Seattle, a woman who had lost her daughter stroked an old circus ticket with the number 7. She didn't know who had sent it. But she knew it was a sign. The network was growing. The Devourers were waking. But the hunters weren't sleeping either. Arthur opened his eyes. The room was dark, only the moon shining through the window, casting shadows on the floor. He sat up in bed and looked at his hands. The red thread was still on his wrist. It hadn't disappeared. It never would. "This is our connection. Our memory. Our promise." He lay back down, closed his eyes. In the darkness beneath his lids, he saw the mansion—not the one of daytime, gray and peeling. Another. Walls black, windows glowing gray. On the roof stood a man with a red eye. "Come to me." "I'll come. Not now. But I will." He opened his eyes. The room was empty. Only the map lay in the desk drawer, only fifteen dots waiting for their time. Somewhere on the hill, the Genesis mansion stood black and silent. No light burned in its windows—no gray, no yellow, no red. But Arthur knew: Jack was there. Watching. Waiting. "We'll come back." The wind outside the window died down. Silence fell.