Sprinklers rained down from the ceiling of the underground mall, and in seconds Brandon was soaked through to the skin.
He squinted, trying to see in the rain and the darkness. There were burn marks around the blown-out elevator doors by the stairs, as though giant balls of flame had blasted down all the way from above. There was no fire that Brandon could see, but the sprinklers still ran. The water on the floor was ankle deep.
Port Authority and New York City police guided people toward the exit to Church Street on the other side of the mall. Brandon didn’t need directions. He knew this mall like he knew his own neighborhood. There was the familiar coffee shop to his left and the Banana Republic just ahead on the right. Beyond that would be the Gap, and the Speedo store where Brandon liked to laugh at the male mannequins
in their skimpy bathing suits. Farther along, he knew, was the Duane Reade where he and his father bought cough medicine and snacks, and a Sbarro where they sometimes grabbed a quick slice of pizza before heading home.
“Keep moving!” a policeman called through a bullhorn.
The mall looked very different than it had that morning. The main hallway was like a gushing aqueduct during a storm, but the electricity was still on in the stores. TVs ran, music played, and lights glowed. But there was no one there. No clerks, no salespeople, no cooks, no customers.
For the first time in Brandon’s life, the mall felt incredibly garish. The lights were too bright, the music too happy. And the things for sale: Designer jeans. LEGO sets and plastic dinosaurs. Sunglasses and necklaces and greeting cards and remote-controlled cars. How could anybody care about all that stuff? How could any of that matter when there were people flying planes into buildings? When there were people trapped and burned and broken and jumping and dying?
How could any of this ever matter again after what Brandon had seen?
A woman near them stopped and cried, and Richard put an arm around her shoulder.
“Come on. We gotta go,” he told her. “It’s going to be okay.”
They came to an intersection. To the right were more shops. To the left, past the Borders bookstore, were stairs down to the subway and the escalator up to Church Street. Straight ahead of them was the Warner Bros. Store, with its Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck statues outside the entrance.
How many afternoons had Brandon and his dad spent watching Batman and Superman and Looney Tunes cartoons? They were both big fans, and they loved going in the Warner Bros. Store and looking at all the superhero T- shirts and stuffed cartoon animals and movie posters.
All of it was drowning in sprinklers now.
As the water poured down, Brandon pictured his dad trapped up in Windows on the World. Smoke pouring in, and no water to put out the fire climbing up from below.
“Brandon, we have to go,” Richard told him. “We’re almost out.”
“They have phones in the store,” Brandon said, wiping his eyes. “We could try my dad again.”
“Not exactly the best place to stop,” Richard said, squinting up into the water coming down from the sprinklers. “Come on. We’ll call from a pay phone out on the street.”
The ground underneath Brandon’s feet suddenly began to vibrate, and Brandon threw his arms out to steady himself. It felt like a subway car rattling by beneath them.
But this was no subway car. The rumbling grew and grew, and Brandon and Richard just had time to look at each other in horror before something exploded above and behind them. It was like the whole mall collapsed in on them at once, and with a roar like a garbage truck, a blast of smoke and dust lifted Brandon off his feet and hurled him into darkness.
