United as One (22 page)

The Thin Mog makes a lifting motion with his hands, and the marines stand up as one. Black veins have spread beneath the skin on their faces. They move the same way Mark did, like puppets, their eyes completely terrified as their bodies act out the Thin Mog's commands.

Now, the squadron of marines leads the way for the Mogadorians.

Soon, we encounter another group of soldiers trying to lock down a hallway. They hesitate, seeing their friends walking towards them.

“Kill them,” whispers the Thin Mog.

Without hesitation, the mind-controlled marines let loose on their comrades, shooting indiscriminately. The vatborn Mogs watch with glee. The hallway fills with smoke from all the shooting. Phiri Dun-Ra laughs as I look away.

“Isn't this fun?” she asks.

Suddenly, every mind-controlled marine's assault rifle is ripped from his hand by an unseen force. The vatborn raise their blasters and are summarily disarmed as well.

Telekinesis.

It's just like Nine taught them. Disarm your opponents.

“Bloody hell,” I hear Nigel's voice. “Careful, Ran, those are friendlies!”

A moment later, when the hallway explodes, I know
the Japanese girl didn't listen.

Ran must have thrown one of her charged projectiles, because bodies fly everywhere. Some of them are the mind-controlled soldiers and some of them are vatborn, many of the latter disintegrating from the force. I'm tossed backwards as well, and I can feel the noose gouging my neck as a result, warm blood pouring down my shoulder. I'm only alive because the impact caused Phiri Dun-Ra to let go of the leash.

My ears ring. The hallway is even smokier than before. I catch sight of the Thin Mog and some disarmed vatborn taking cover in an empty room off the hallway. I try to crawl away, but Phiri's tentacles are still piercing me. She's nowhere in sight and I'm still stuck to her somehow.

At least I can get rid of this noose. I reach up to pull it off.

Wait.

I've lost sight of myself. I can't see my hands, my arms, my . . .

We're invisible.

Phiri Dun-Ra is using my Legacy. She's making us invisible.

We flicker back to visibility for a moment. Phiri's control is shaky. But she spots me messing with the noose, and immediately her tentacles twist inside me. My hands drop away from my neck and clutch at my midsection.

Then we're invisible again.

As the smoke begins to clear, I see Ran and Nigel inching their way down the hallway. Fleur and Bertrand are with them too. All of them are armed with assault rifles except for Ran; she's got an old paperback novel clutched in her hands, the thing glowing, charged with her explosive Legacy. They've already got plenty of scrapes and cuts, and all of them look pretty shaky.

They're walking right towards me, which means they're walking right towards Phiri Dun-Ra.

“Look out!” I scream. “Get back!”

As a group, they jump at the sound of my voice. But they can't see me.

And now it's too late.

Phiri Dun-Ra appears from thin air. So do I, and the sight of me—leashed, impaled, on all fours—is exactly the distraction the Mogs need. All four of the human Garde look at me in shock and terror. Even Ran lets the glow fade from her projectile.

“Jo—John?” Nigel stammers, wide-eyed.

“RUN!” I shout in response, even though I know it's too late.

Before the others can act, Phiri Dun-Ra unloads.

First, she extends her hand palm out towards Fleur. Six icicles, jagged and sharp, the frozen water not clear like when Marina or I use this Legacy but tinged an ugly rust color, rocket into Fleur's chest. The girl
crumples with a gasp that's wet with blood.

“No! Fleur!” Bertrand shouts. The kid tries to do something heroic. He reaches down and grabs Fleur around the shoulders, attempts to drag her out of harm's way.

Phiri Dun-Ra engulfs them both in a fireball, the flames tinged purple and smelling like burned tires.

These are bastardized versions of my Legacies she's using to kill the human Garde I was stupid enough to invite here. The ones I swore to train and protect. I want to close my eyes and stop watching.

“You bitch!” Nigel screams, his eyes filled with tears. He manages to raise his gun, but Phiri Dun-Ra twists the barrel down with telekinesis. When he pulls the trigger, the weapon backfires in his hands. Nigel cries out. I'm not sure where he's hit or how bad—it won't matter in a moment.

Except there's Ran. Luckily, Nigel stumbles backwards into her. She grabs him by the scruff of the neck and slings him down an adjoining hallway. With a parting glance at me, Ran does what I told her. She runs, pushing the injured Nigel along as she goes, just ahead of another one of Phiri Dun-Ra's fireballs.

She starts after them, but I put my weight down. Her tentacles dig deeper into my body, and I can taste blood in my mouth. I slow her down, though, and knowing that she needs to stay connected to me to maintain my
stolen Legacies, she doesn't give chase.

“You are only delaying the inevitable, John,” she says. Phiri looks down at the two bodies—Bertrand and Fleur, barely recognizable, their skin charred black—and a new tentacle juts out from her oily mass of an arm, probing around them. She sighs. “The spark in these two had barely even started, hmm?”

“You picked them before they were ripe,” says the Thin Mog as he and the other vatborn emerge from the room where they'd taken cover. The vatborn scramble around, grabbing their blasters.

Phiri Dun-Ra picks up my leash—I never got it over my head—and shrugs at the Thin Mog. She looks down at me. “I wonder, is this how you felt as you slaughtered your way through our warship?” She makes a sound that's close to purring. “Did you enjoy that as much as I am enjoying this?”

She gives my noose a tug, and we're moving again. As she drags me past Bertrand and Fleur, I reach towards them. I know it's futile—I'm cut off from my Legacies as long as Phiri Dun-Ra has control of me—but I harbor a desperate hope that I'll somehow be able to push some of my healing Legacy into them. My fingers barely manage to graze Fleur's shoulder; nothing happens, and then I'm forced onwards.

We turn down the hallway where Nigel and Ran fled, the vatborn once again leading the way. At this
point, the only thing I can do to help is slow the Mogs' pace. Ignoring the bite of the Voron collar, I follow Phiri's lead as slowly as I can.

It's not entirely a defensive strategy, I realize as my vision begins to swim. I'm losing a lot of blood. At one point, I fall down on my elbows and hear something in my shoulder crack. There's so much pain and I'm so disoriented, I'm not even sure where we are in Patience Creek anymore.

I can't believe this is how it ends.

The sound of fighting rings out from all around the base. Distantly, I'm aware of shooting and screaming. Echoes of losing battles nearby. We stick to the quiet halls, hunting stragglers.

“There!” the Thin Mog shouts.

I look up just in time, peering between Phiri Dun-Ra's legs, as a lone person skids into view. The vatborn immediately take aim and open fire.

“Shit!” Sam yelps as he dives for cover around a corner.

Oh no. Not Sam. Please not Sam. I don't want to see this.

He didn't run like I'd told him. He didn't escape. He's alone now. I don't know what happened to Malcolm and the other scientists, to the Chimærae that were with them, but I can't help but imagine the worst. Before he disappears from view, I notice that Sam's
not wearing that heavy backpack anymore. Maybe he stashed it somewhere, or maybe it got lost during the fighting.

The vatborn charge after Sam. They have to jump back when he uses a blaster to blind-fire around the corner.

“John?” he yells. “Is that you?”

“Sam . . . ,” I gasp weakly. “Sam, get out of here.”

“I'm going to save you, John!” he shouts back.

Phiri Dun-Ra giggles. “Oh, how touching. Get this one and bring him to me. I want to make it slow.”

As ordered, the warriors barrel heedlessly around the corner. Phiri, the Thin Mog, a handful of vatborn and I bring up the rear, safe from any stray blaster fire. I can hear Sam's footsteps pounding down the hallway, sprinting away from his attackers.

“Lights off!” he shouts breathlessly. “Lights off!”

The overhead halogens click off at Sam's command. Now only Mogadorian blaster fire lights the way. Phiri growls impatiently.

I get the sense that Sam is leading us somewhere. I turn my head from side to side, trying to figure out where we are. It's difficult in the dark, and, in the flashes of light from the blaster fire, all I can make out are a series of identical closed doors.

Over gleeful Mog shouts and blaster discharges, I hear a loud metallic noise, like a heavy bolt being
thrown open. Up ahead, a door creaks open. Did Sam just lock himself in somewhere? Did he make it to safety?

Suddenly, the dark hallway gets a lot quieter. The shooting stops. I hear a grunt of pain followed by a noise like a sharp breath being exhaled.

That's the sound a vatborn makes when it turns to ash.

Phiri Dun-Ra and the Thin Mog exchange a look. We halt as the group leading the way goes quiet.

From the darkness, I hear metal banging against metal. Rhythmic and echoing.

Clang. Clang. Clang. Clang. Clang.

It sounds like clapping.

With Phiri Dun-Ra distracted, I manage to get onto my knees. I realize now where we are. Those identical rooms on either side of me are cells. Sam wasn't locking a door.

He was unlocking a cell.

“You seem pretty good at killing, lady,” a familiar voice growls from the darkness.

Phiri Dun-Ra holds her hand in front of her and creates a ball of fire that illuminates the entire hallway. Then she takes an involuntary step back.

Five stands in the middle of the hallway about twenty yards away. He wears nothing but his cotton boxers and an open bathrobe. In one hand he holds a
Mogadorian blaster, which he bangs against the side of his head, creating the metallic ringing sound. Every inch of his fleshy frame has taken on the same sheen as the blaster's gunmetal-gray alloy. In his other hand he holds a Mog warrior by the throat. With a squeeze, Five snaps his neck, the Mog turning to dust in his hand, which Five then smears across his bare chest. The flame from Phiri Dun-Ra's fireball reflects in his remaining eye, wide and locked in. When he speaks, it's through an insanely wide smile.

“Let's see which one of us is better.”

MY HANDS GRIP THE BACK OF LEXA'S SEAT AS
I lean over her shoulder. Through the ship's windshield, I see treetops flying by, the roads below a blur. Even in here, the rush of wind across the ship's hull is loud, a constant shriek.

“Can't this thing go any faster?” I ask her through my clenched teeth.

Lexa half turns from her controls to give me a look, like,
Are you really asking me that?

There's a little red triangle flashing on Lexa's console. Her speed is too high. She's going to burn out the engine if she keeps this up.

It doesn't matter. We need to make it back to Patience Creek. We need to make it there
now
.

In the copilot seat, BK stands with his front paws on the dashboard. His furry body is pointed straight ahead, back straight, teeth bared. He's like an arrow aimed at Patience
Creek. He knows our friends are in trouble; maybe he's got some kind of animal sense about the direness of the situation.

We lost our connection with Sam shortly after he told us Patience Creek was under attack. Before the connection was severed, I could hear shooting and screaming, all of it human.

Mogs don't really scream, I guess.

Once we lost our connection with Sam, we couldn't get him back on the phone. Worse still, we couldn't get any of the numbers for Patience Creek to work. Neither could the Canadians when we asked them for help.

And that brings us here. Flying in this goddamn ship towards yet another tragedy.

I glance behind me into the passenger compartment. Nine paces back and forth. He keeps raising his fists like he's going to punch something, then angrily thrusting them back to his sides. He hasn't stopped moving since we all climbed on board. I'd yell at him to keep still if I wasn't feeling the exact same way. Completely useless.

Marina and Ella sit opposite each other. Ella's eyes are closed, the girl trying to work some telepathic magic. There's strain on her face and a spot of blood under her nose. Marina catches my eye and gently shakes her head.

“She's not as strong as she was,” Marina says quietly.

I've noticed that the glow of Loric energy that surrounded Ella after she took her header into the Entity's
energy fountain has been fading gradually over the last few days. It looked especially dim after she reactivated the Loralite stone at Niagara Falls. In that meeting with Lawson, she was able to spy on Setrákus Ra telepathically from miles away. Now, trying to reach Patience Creek with her mind looks like a strain.

“What perfect timing,” I say.

Marina reaches out and squeezes my hand. “Sam is going to be fine,” she says.

I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Yeah. You don't know that.”

“Destiny, Six. Lorien would not have given him those Legacies—him or any of the other humans who have joined our fight—if they were not meant to play an important role in the final battle.”

“You've got a lot more faith than me,” I say to Marina bitterly. “It's all just random, if you ask me. I mean, if Legacies equal destiny, how do you explain a piece of shit like Five? Or Setrákus Ra?”

“I . . .” Marina shakes her head, not knowing how to respond.

Ella opens her eyes, takes a deep breath and snuffs away the blood in her nose. She looks up at me and shakes her head.

“We're still too far away,” she says. “I can't reach anyone. I don't know what's going on.”

“What about John?” I ask. “Could you track him down?”

“I tried,” she replies. “He's out of range too.”

I bite my lip to keep from yelling out in frustration. What a terrible time for John to go running off on his own. Not like he could've known that the Mogs were somehow going to track us to Patience Creek, but damn it, we need him with us now.

“Can't you like”—I wave my hand at Ella—“juice up your power? Pull him into a dream like you did before?”

“It doesn't . . .” Ella frowns and looks away from me. “My brush with Legacy, the power I gained, I guess it was only temporary. I'm returning to normal, and the energy is going back where it belongs.”

I push my fingers through my hair and squeeze my scalp. “So that's a no.”

A shrill beep from the cockpit gets my attention.

“That's our warship,” Lexa calls back to me. “They're trying to open a communication channel.”

We left Adam, Dust and Rex back in Niagara Falls, manning the warship as best they can with a two-person crew. They're following after us, but in terms of speed, that mammoth ship isn't able to keep up with Lexa's little craft.

I hop back into the cockpit as Lexa hits a button that calls up a holographic projection of Adam in one corner of the windshield. He's standing on the elevated commander's platform of the warship, and, with nothing but emptiness behind him, he looks small and out of place. I expect him to ask if we've gotten any word from Patience Creek.
However, as soon as Adam sees me, he starts pressing a button on a console in front of him.

“Guys, I'm going to patch a broadcast through to you,” Adam says gravely, in a rush. “This is going out live right now.”

“What are you talking about?” I ask, confused. The idea that there could be something more urgent than what we're rushing towards just doesn't register with me.

“Every warship in the fleet is receiving this,” Adam says. “And from what I can tell, he's hijacked every still-active satellite to broadcast to the remaining news channels as well.”

“Who—?”

Before I can finish my question, Adam goes to split screen. The new feed causes a hitch in my breathing, and I have to sit down on the arm of Lexa's chair.

It's Setrákus Ra. Alive and well.

“Have I not been patient?” he asks, his dark eyes staring directly into the camera.

The shot of Setrákus Ra is from the chest up. He sits in an ornate chair that's best described as a throne. Behind him, I can see the stone walls of a cavern. He wears a bloodred silk shirt with the buttons undone halfway down his sternum. It's a ridiculous look, but it's also a message. A message for me.

There's no scar on his chest. No mark. Nothing.

“My warships hold your world's most important cities.
It should be clear by now that your planet is finished. And yet, you still resist. . . .”

Setrákus Ra's tone is even and condescending. Marina, Ella and Nine crowd in behind me as he drones on.

“Did he get plastic surgery or something?” Nine asks. “What's with his face?”

I take a closer look. Setrákus Ra's features are as sharp as ever, his head still shaved, the purple scar on his neck still puffy. He's pale, dark eyed, and yet . . . he looks less haggard than when I last saw him. He doesn't look so old or nearly so monstrous. He looks much closer to the young version of Setrákus Ra that we all saw in Ella's vision.

“He can shape shift, can't he?” Marina asks.

“No,” Ella says. “The staff he used for that was destroyed in New York City. This . . . this is something else.”

“Lorien,” I say. “It's got to be from the Loric energy he stole.”

“I gave humanity an ultimatum,” Setrákus Ra continues. “Surrender unconditionally and turn over to me those humans infected with Legacies. Only the wise leaders of Russia saw the wisdom in my words. Only they understood that these Legacies now afflicting humanity are a disease, something passed on from an alien species driven extinct by their own hubris. They are a sickness that only I can cure.”

“I am not fucking extinct,” growls Nine.

Setrákus Ra puts a hand on his chest, like he's feeling an emotion. “I understand how paradigm shifts can be difficult. I understand that acknowledging humanity's subservience is troubling for the unenlightened. I am not a monster. I do not wish to see your cities razed, to shed blood needlessly, and so I allowed the deadline I set to lapse. I gave humanity time to come to its senses. I showed mercy.”

Setrákus Ra leans towards the camera, and I instinctually lean away from the screen.

“No more,” he says, his tone suddenly icy. “This transmission is being broadcast simultaneously to the captains of my fleet. My loyal followers, humanity has refused to embrace Mogadorian Progress. They must be shown the way. We will lead them towards enlightenment with fire and blood.”

Marina covers her mouth with her hand. Ella stares daggers at the screen. Lexa focuses on flying, pushing the ship's engine beyond its breaking point. Nine's fists clench, his knuckles cracking. I stare at the spot on Setrákus Ra's chest where I struck, where I almost killed him. Not good enough. None of it was good enough.

Setrákus Ra takes a deep breath and bellows.

“All warships! Open fire!”