So here's the fourth chapter at long last! In Caitlin's perspective again.

sigh I'm such a procrastinator! I realize I do exactly what I get mad at my favorite authors for doing… and so whistlebird apologizes profusely for the long wait…again…hope it's worth the wait!

And I promise the next one will be much more exciting and not so long in the coming… hopefully

I do not own surface or any of its characters.

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No one had a watch but I guessed it had been about an hour now since the tsunami. Maybe it had been longer, I didn't know. But it seemed like the sun had sunk quite a bit toward the horizon. Just a hint of orange stained the clouds. Where debris didn't litter our hometown ocean, the water caught it and threw the colored light at my eyes, as if determined to blind me from the mysteries it hid beneath the surface. As if it was laughing at us and how easily it had swallowed up the cars, the streets, the houses, the furniture inside them, even my own yard, and now Miles…though I refused now to think of him. Or I was trying not to.

My tears were just about dry by now and my brain felt numb. What about Miles I was thinking about, I wasn't even sure. Just mixed up memories, wishes, confusion. My thoughts collided with each other, meshed together and clogged up my mind. None of it made sense. I'd been standing so long at the edge, chin resting on my arms, eyes searching the water for so long my legs ached but I hardly noticed.

I told myself I was looking for signs of man eating monsters, or Nim, who hadn't made an appearance since that last time he jumped off after Miles. I knew he was fine—he was practically invincible—but what was he doing?

Where was Miles? How could he be dead, really? Just like that, like that reporter we saw on TV…

Crack

The sound of a cell phone hitting concrete was the first sound I had heard in a while that was interesting enough to pull my eyes from my drowned hometown. So feeling a little lethargic, I turned my head only to see the man named Rich sitting against the wall pressing random buttons on his cell phone, muttering to himself. "Busted…just like that," I heard him say and then there was another crack and a crunch as he again smashed the thing against the ground.

Huh? My head cleared a little. Even Laura broke from her reverie leaning against the roof and looked with surprise in his direction. "Rich?" she called uncertainly. "Are you alright? What are you doing?"

Rich glanced up for a second then went back to pushing buttons. He frowned when the cell phone refused to respond. No lights, no sounds. It was obviously done for. He could see that, couldn't he?

"Can't figure out what happened to it," he answered simply. "It's like it melted from the inside or something. Can static do that? Just look at it. Buttons are stuck, nothing inside moves—I can't even break it open. As if it's all been fused together." He paused. "Where did that green electricity come from anyway? Green… that kid—" He stopped again suddenly, shot a fleeting look at me. "Well anyway, it doesn't work."

"And… how is smashing it to pieces going to help us get off this tower?" Laura stared as Rich examined the cell phone, picking plastic splinters from its casing.

"What else is there to do? You want me to start yelling and hope someone from hundreds of miles away will hear us? Okay, here goes. HEY!! HEEEEEEEY!!" I jumped at the sudden sound, startled at the sudden noise that came from his lungs. I couldn't do anything but stare. "HEEEY!" He cupped his hands over his mouth and bellowed. "Anyone out there still crazy enough to be out there??"

"Rich—stop it! What are you doing?" Laura grabbed his wrist and tugged him away from the edge. "What are you going to do if they hear us? The ones that aren't human?"

For some strange reason, Rich was laughing. "You wanted me to do something and I'm doing something. You have any better ideas?" He sat back down again, still chuckling.

"I don't know. What do we have to work with here? We need to think of some way to escape. Helicopters don't just appear in time of need. And what if those creatures attack? Why haven't they attacked already?"

"Maybe Nim's keeping them away," I ventured, and they turned to me. "Miles said—I mean I think they communicate by thoughts. Maybe Nim's telling them not to come near."

"Thoughts? You mean they can speak to each other through some sort of telepathy?" Laura asked interestedly.

"How would you know how they communicate?"

Rich's question knocked my mind off track for a panicked second before I realized he wasn't accusing me. Now that Miles was—there was no reason to tell them anything. Not anything about Miles' connection to Nim and the others anyway. I still didn't know who they were. I didn't believe they were bad people, but just the same…

"Miles raised Nim from an egg," I explained hesitantly. "We've… learned some things about him because he's always around."

Rich's attention went back to the cell phone. Frustrated, he scratched the back of his head. "Even if that Nim creature is keeping his friends at bay, that still doesn't help us get off this cathedral. Is anyone else starving?"

Why did he have to say that? Now I did feel hungry. I had barely eaten anything for breakfast in the rush my family and I were in, getting ready to escape the tsunami. Now I felt nearly sick with hunger and I wondered how I'd failed to notice. Adrenaline?

I sagged against the wall again, exhausted. My head still spun with thoughts I

didn't want to think. And now hunger added to it all.

And so it took me a few seconds to register what I heard.

A disturbance in the water. I jumped, a delayed reaction. Monsters? Fear wrapped itself around my throat and I didn't even look down before I thrust myself away from the edge, accidentally hitting Rich with my out-flung arm. He took one look at my face and stood up abruptly. "Laura," he grunted.

The air was suddenly intense, a choking throb. "What is it?" Laura asked, instinctively knowing the answer.

Rich twisted around, scanning our surroundings, our few belongings, which amounted to just about nothing. He flexed his hands, clenching and unclenching his fists. "No weapons," he breathed. "Let's hope we're too high up for them."

We stood frozen, waiting with our breath held captive in our lungs. I looked at Rich, and so did Laura. We expected the man in our group to go look over the edge for us and assess the danger. And so he did.

Rich stepped to the wall and looked back at the two of us huddled in the center of our sanctuary. A brief forced smile, meant to be reassuring, lit his face for a second and then he turned away to peer at what was below.

He was silent for a few seconds, as if in disbelief. Was he shocked at how many waited for us below? Were there that many? I braced myself for his next words and wished I could see his face.

But the words I heard next didn't come from the man in front of us. They came from below. A stranger's voice.

"Hey hey! What have we here? Is that you, Rich?"

Laura's mouth dropped open in surprise. "It can't be…" she muttered in disbelief and rushed to the edge. I followed reluctantly.

What I saw below was not what I expected at all. Not a monster, but a submarine, surfaced and with the hatch wide open. An unfamiliar man was out, waving away at us and smiling.

"Well what do you know? Laura? What in the world are you doing all the way up there all the way out here??"