Hunger (Gone, #2)

by Michael Grant

“Right,” Sam agreed. “When they bother to show up. The thing is, we need more people working. We need people bringing in that food.” “We’re just kids,” a fifth grader said, and giggled at his own joke. “You’re going to be hungry kids,” Sam snapped. “You’re going to be starving kids. Listen to me: people are going to starve. To death.

“What? Why did she hit him with a bowling ball?” “She says Tom killed her cat,” Taylor said. “And then he was cooking it on the barbecue in his backyard.”

Now, Lana thought, now he wants his old name back. The bully who reveled in a monster’s name was now a monster in fact, and wanted to be called Charles.

He had come to realize a basic truth that day: You can’t be trapped by other people, you can only be trapped by your own fear. Defy and win.

Sure enough, the first words out of the kids’ mouths were, “I’m hungry.” “Well, there’s your lunch,” Edilio said, sweeping his hand toward the field and feeling great personal satisfaction at being able to rub their noses in it. “Those round things?” “They’re called cantaloupes,” Edilio said. “And they’re very tasty, actually.” “What about zekes?” one of the girls asked. Edilio sighed. “That’s the cabbage field, not here. That’s, like, a mile from here.” But no one moved. They all lined up obediently but kept close to the bus and far from the edge of the field. Edilio sighed. “Okay. Let the wetback show you how.” He sauntered out into the field, bent over, gave a twist to one of the melons, and held it up high so they could see. It was luck that saved him. The fact that he dropped the melon. He looked down at the cantaloupe and saw the dirt move. Edilio leaped, a wild reaction that almost tripped him, but he caught his footing and ran. He ran faster than he had ever run before, boots slamming down on the seething worms and faster, faster, faster until he sprawled, facedown, in the dust. The dust beyond the field. He yanked his feet toward him and frantically examined his boots. There were chew marks on the sides, on the heels. But no holes. The worms had not penetrated. Edilio looked at the shocked faces of the kids around him. He had been seconds away from impatiently ordering them into the field. Most wearing sneakers. None with experience seeing what the zekes looked li...

In the process he’d used the promise of beer to turn an alcoholic kid into human bait.

“I hate him,” she said. “I mean, I hate what he did. Hate the sin, not the sinner. And I’m going to shoot him so he won’t hurt anyone else.”

Orsay had smelled them cooking and had been driven nearly crazy by the smell. One of the boys had attacked Allison, beaten her, and stolen the mushrooms as Allison wept and cursed. Within a few minutes the boy was vomiting. Then he began raving, crying, shouting at things that weren’t there. He’d fallen silent after a while. No one had entered his room since to see if he was dead or alive.

Caine chewed at his thumb. Jack had the unsettling thought that he might be hungry enough to eat his own finger.

Well, Duck thought, I guess I did want to be a hero. And then Duck stopped thinking anything at all.

😭😭😭