I handed him some more water, which he drank readily. Then I wondered, “Are you hungry, by any chance?”

“Hm,” he said. “You know… I think I am.”

That was certainly an improvement. “Come with me and I’ll cook something for you.”

I waited for a second to see if his arms moved to his chair’s wheels, to gauge whether he wanted to move himself, but since he didn’t, I moved behind him and pushed him to the kitchen.

“Is there anything in particular you want to eat?” I asked. “Do you have any idea what you like?”

He shrugged. “Just… whatever you’ve got, I’ll try it.”

“I think you should try eating something solid for a change. If you throw up, then, well, you throw up.”

“All right…”

I wasn’t great at cooking. Really not great. Usually when my parents were away, I visited my grandmother for main meals. My mom also packed up meals for me and put them in the freezer so I could take them out and heat them up when I wanted to stay at home to eat. But now that I had a guest, I was feeling a little more adventurous. Unwisely so.

I looked in the fridge and saw that we had all the ingredients needed for omelets. And so began my endeavor. Unfortunately, I ended up burning the first two, but the third one came out all right. At least, it came out looking all right.

I flopped it onto a plate and put it in front of him before reaching for a bottle of ketchup and a tube of brown sauce. I set them down on the table. He picked up the ketchup and squirted a bit on his plate before cutting up a piece of omelet and dunking it in the sauce. He put it into his mouth and chewed slowly, tentatively, as if afraid of what he might taste.

Then, to my dismay, his face took on an expression of quiet disgust. He didn’t mean to be rude to me, I was sure. But I’d cooked bad meals enough times for enough people to detect when somebody wasn’t enjoying what I had put in front of them.

“You don’t like it, do you?” I said. “You can be honest with me. I promise I won’t get offended.”

He stopped chewing and furrowed his brows, looking down at his plate. “I, uh, don’t think it’s the omelet. There is nothing much to dislike about it—it’s rather bland. What’s really pretty unpleasant… it’s this stuff.” He poked his fork at the tomato sauce and curled his nose. “Ketchup.”

Aha. That I had cooked food that was merely bland was actually a compliment by my standards. “Why don’t you try this brown sauce instead?”

He poured a few drops onto his plate and tried it. But he didn’t like that any better. Not a ketchup or condiment fan in general, it seems. I was the total opposite. I loved ketchup. When I was a kid, my mother used to joke that I ate more ketchup than fries. I had a sweet tooth in general.

After a few more bites of pure, “bland” omelet, Josh seemed to change his mind about it. He set aside his fork, admitting defeat.

“Do you want something else?” I asked. “How about cheese on toast?” That’s British, isn’t it? “Or I can see what’s left of the frozen food my mom left…”

“I’ll try your cheese on toast,” he replied.

“Okay,” I said, half chuckling. I took away his plate and fixed him some good old cheese on toast, after adding a bit of dried oregano to it to make it a bit more flavorsome. He had a better time eating that. My main concern was not so much how much he enjoyed the food, but the fact that he was able to hold it down at all. He finished two whole pieces of toast, and after ten minutes, he was still showing no sign of vomiting.

Taking away his empty plate, I was about to suggest that he try a small piece of strawberry pie that we had in the refrigerator when a deafening explosion rocked through the apartment. I dropped the plate, my heart shooting to my throat.

It sounded like… a bomb. Josh’s eyes were wide with shock and confusion.

And then came another explosion, even more deafening than the last. “Oh, my God!” I gasped, clutching my ears and wincing.

What is going on?

I rushed to the window. In the distance, hovering somewhere above the Port, were swarms of black, wasp-like helicopters. The sky above The Shade’s boundary was choked with smoke, and as yet another deafening boom thundered down on the island’s protective barrier, blinding light flashed. Bombs. They were dropping bombs onto our barrier. What the heck?

I raced back to Josh and clutched his shoulders, hoping to reassure him. “Everything’s going to be okay, all right?” I said hurriedly.

“What is that?” he breathed.

“The IBSI. The same bastards who took you captive. They are raining down explosives, but don’t worry. Try as they might, there’s no way they can penetrate our island… You just wait here. I’m going to go and see what’s happening, and I’ll come right back to you.”

I didn’t even give him a chance to respond before hurtling out of the apartment and down to the forest ground.

I raced to the Port with all the speed my legs could carry me to find a whole gathering of residents already in the clearing before the jetty. I caught sight of Shayla near the front, her head panned up toward the sky. I rushed over to her, gripping her arms and drawing her attention to me.

“What is this?” I panted.

Shayla looked just as confused as I felt. “I’m not sure. I’m certain that they know they can’t make a dent in our island. I don’t understand why they’re even bothering…”