Free Legacies Reborn by Pittacus Lore Page A

the initial shock of waking up in a strange place. My eyes burn from lack of sleep, and the pounding in my head is back. For some reason I think of school when we had to read The Iliad and learned about Greek gods and stuff. I remember that one of the goddesses broke out of her dad’s skull. Aphrodite, maybe? Or Athena? Whoever it was, that’s how my head feels: like someone’s taking a bat to the inside of it, trying to get out.
    It’s weird the thoughts that cross your mind when you wake up on a stalled train with an alien and his super-powered human sidekick.
    The subway car is pitch-black except for the faint glow of a cell phone in Sam’s hands. He’s sitting straightup in one of the seats, passed the eff out. A handful of comic books have slid onto the floor in front of him. So much for keeping watch or waking me up.
    I get up and stretch and walk over to him. There’s drool coming out of one corner of his mouth. I wonder how he can sleep so soundly with everything that’s going on, but I guess he’s had more time to process the idea of aliens being real than I have. I slip the phone out of his hand, which doesn’t get any kind of reaction from him at all. I probably couldn’t wake him up if I tried.
    The cell phone tells me it’s just after 5 a.m. I don’t know if the sun would be up aboveground yet. Don’t even know if there is a sun still, actually. I turn the phone’s flashlight on and wave it around our car. John hasn’t moved. I keep the light on him long enough to make sure his chest is still moving up and down before turning my attention to the big duffel bag of cash sitting under the bench I slept on. I haven’t actually looked through the bag, so I unzip it, in case there are weapons or something inside we can use. I find myself looking down at more money than I’d ever know what to do with. I pick up a wad of hundreds and think about what this money would have meant just twenty-four hours ago. Everything. And now . . . who knows? The future seems so uncertain.
    The money’s the only thing in the bag.
    I stand, spreading a fat stack of cash out into a half circle and then fanning myself with it as I try to figure out how far away I am from Canal Street or whatever the next subway station is. But I don’t know where I’m at. Not for certain. My light falls on the closed train doors. I could just leave now. Take my bag and go. These guys would be fine without me. It’s not like when the tunnel was falling in around us. They’d wake up and move on. Keep fighting.
    Keep fighting .
    Sam’s words. Maybe it’s because I only got a few hours of sleep, or maybe it’s because evil aliens attacked our city —whatever it is, I suddenly feel so lost and alone. So much so that I almost shake Sam to try to wake him. I could just pretend to be ragging on him because he fell asleep.
    But he needs his rest. They both do.
    Regardless of whether I go out on my own or stay with them, I’m going to need some supplies. Even if I have a dozen phones on me, if I get lost in the tunnels I don’t want to risk being stuck with a bunch of dead batteries. So I pocket the cash and start down the other half of the train that Sam and I didn’t get to. It’s pretty much the same scene as the cars we explored last night. A lot of trash on the floors. A couple of purses and grocery sacks every now and then with usable supplies. I find a few more phones and two giant Whole Foods bags fullof groceries—probably a hundred bucks’ worth. My stomach growls. I dig out a jar of almonds and eat them by the handful as I continue.
    Three cars into my search, I find a small blue book bag on one of the seats. There’s a baggie of baby carrots and an applesauce pouch in the front pocket. The big zipper compartment holds a stuffed animal and some picture books. This is some elementary school kid’s bag. Maybe even a