“The way John told it, Sam only discovered he had Legacies when a piken was bearing down on them,” I say. “Maybe you just haven’t been in a situation where they’ve developed.”
“Yes,” Marina says, jumping in. “Speaking from experience, Legacies have a habit of manifesting when you really need them.”
“Oh, great,” Mark says. “So, if we hang around here to face certain death, maybe there’s a chance I’ll at least die with superpowers.”
“Yep. Maybe,” I reply to him.
“Or maybe the Entity didn’t choose anyone,” Adam says. “Maybe it’s all just random.”
“Says the Mogadorian with Legacies,” replies Mark.
“Whatever, it’s okay,” Sarah says, clearly trying to change the subject. “I’m not counting on it happening. So, whatever. That doesn’t mean we can’t help in other ways. I just got off the phone with John before we landed.”
“Is he on his way?” I ask. “He’s supposed to be bringing the big guns with him when he comes down here.”
“I don’t know if that’s going to happen,” Sarah replies, her face creased by a frown that I know means bad news is coming. “The government isn’t exactly cooperating. Like, they want to fight, but they don’t want to lose.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“They’re being little bitches,” Mark explains helpfully.
“They don’t want to throw themselves into a conflict against Setrákus Ra unless they know they can win. So, they’ll support us, but they won’t fight him directly. Not yet, anyway.”
“Pathetic,” I say.
Sarah looks at Adam. “John still wants you to get those cloaking devices out of the Skimmers.”
“So he can turn that technology over to the army that won’t help us?” Adam asks, an eyebrow raised.
“Pretty much.”
“Already taken care of. I took them out before we wired the ships to explode,” Adam replies, glancing at me. “Whether or not we turn them over? We can decide that later.”
“Why the hell would we if they aren’t going to help us fight?” I ask Sarah. This whole deal sounds an awful lot like what Agent Walker described to us back at Ashwood Estates. MogPro. Even now, with their biggest city practically a smoking crater, the government is still playing angles and trying to scam cool swag from the friendly aliens.
“Because diplomacy?” Sarah replies, shrugging like the situation is out of her control. Which it obviously is. As usual, we’re on our own. “John thinks they’ll be more inclined to help us once he can show them a way to beat the Mogs.”
“When’s he getting here?” Marina asks.
Sarah’s face falls. “More bad news there. Five has taken Nine hostage in New York.”
I hear a crackle of frost as Marina’s fists clench tight. “What?”
“Yeah, not good,” Sarah replies. “John and Sam are trying to track him down and stop him from doing—well, whatever the hell that psycho has planned.”
“I should’ve killed him,” Marina mutters. I shoot a quick look in her direction. She’s been peaceful while we’ve been at the Sanctuary, so much like the old Marina, all nonviolent and serene. One mention of Five, though, and the darkness comes rushing back.
Sarah continues, not hearing Marina. “Once they’ve got that sorted out, John will be on his way, but . . .”
I look towards the jungle’s tree line. The sun is already starting to get low.
“He won’t make it in time,” I say, feeling it in my stomach. “It’s just going to be us.”
“He’s going to try,” Sarah insists, and I can tell she’s hoping to see her boyfriend appear on the horizon like some conquering hero, he and Sam backed by the full might of the U.S. armed forces. I don’t hold on to any such delusions.
“We need to get back to it,” I say. “We need to get ready.”
“Or we could bail,” Mark says, raising his hand. When that earns him a dirty look from Marina, he backs down. “All right, all right. Show me where I need to dig.”
We get to work.
First, Adam moves Dust’s twisted body onto Lexa’s ship. The Chimæra seems a bit more alert now, like the tension is going out of his muscles, but he still can’t change forms and is nowhere near fighting shape. He’s just going to have to sit this one out.
Lexa wants to see the cloaking devices we stripped out of the Skimmers, so then Adam and I show her where we piled them in the ammunition tent. Each one is a solid black box about the size of a laptop.
“They were hooked in to the Skimmer consoles, behind the piloting controls,” Adam says, fingering the ports and cords on the back of one of the devices. “I tried to keep them as intact as possible.”
We gather them up in a duffel bag and bring them onto Lexa’s ship, ready to be delivered to our generous friends in the government, who, in trade, will be giving us a whole lot of nothing.
Of course, that’s all assuming we get out of Mexico alive.
“Will it work?” I ask her.
“I think so,” Lexa replies. She strips the rubber off a cable and then connects the exposed wire to the cloaking device’s power port. “I guess we won’t know for sure until we try flying through their warships’ shielding.”
Careening towards a massive warship while on board a refurbished Loric vessel that may or may not be able to pass through the impenetrable force field surrounding it. There’s a situation I’m not looking forward to.
“If it doesn’t work . . .”
“We’d explode,” she says, before I can even finish the question. “Let’s not rush trying it out, okay?”
While Adam and Lexa continue to patch the cloaking device into the Loric systems, the rest of us get to work on the pit in front of the Sanctuary’s entrance. Adam did manage to find a few shovels buried among the Mogadorian equipment—apparently, they gave up trying to dig their way under the force field pretty early on. Mark seems a little too happy to take off his shirt and start tossing shovelfuls of dirt over his shoulder. Bernie Kosar gleefully jumps in, too, the Chimæra morphing into a large mole-like creature. With his three-toed claws, Bernie Kosar sends funnels of dirt raining messily out of the pit. It seems like he’s having a blast. Mark, on the other hand, doesn’t last too long. The jungle heat quickly takes a toll. “This sucks,” I overhear him complain to Sarah, wiping sweat off his forehead.
“Wait until the Mogs show up and start shooting at us,” Sarah replies. “You’ll be wishing we had more manual labor.”
Pretty soon we reach a layer of earth that’s just too rocky to get through by hand. It’s easiest if Adam comes over and uses a quick seismic burst to break up the ground, and then Marina and I use our telekinesis to lift the big chunks free of the pit and hide the displaced dirt in the jungle.
Eventually we’ve got an honest-to-goodness pit dug. Now that we’re finished, Marina and I carefully use our telekinesis to lift our surgically removed dirt cube back into place. It’s suspended over the pit pretty precariously and it sags a little in the middle, but it looks natural enough if you don’t know the difference. I’m pretty sure it’ll cave in as soon as Setrákus Ra reaches the middle, and drop him down about thirty feet, so he won’t be able to jump right out. Hopefully, between this and our other traps, we distract him enough to get on board the Anubis.
Back in beagle form, Bernie Kosar sniffs around the pit’s now-hidden edge, wagging his tail. He seems to approve.
“What’s next?” Mark asks, dusting off his hands. “We going to set up some trip wires that trigger hidden crossbows or something?”
“I haven’t seen any crossbows lying around,” Adam replies, rubbing his chin. “However, we might be able to fashion some spears from the tree branches. How are you at whittling?”
Either Adam doesn’t quite get that Mark’s being sarcastic, or he really likes setting traps.
“Yeah, let’s table that for now,” Mark replies, inching away.
Sarah and company actually had the
foresight to pack some supplies. Everyone takes a break, passing around bottles of water and food. We all do a pretty good job of pretending not to be scared as hell of what’s coming.
I stand a little ways away from the rest of the gang, eating my sandwich and considering the Loric ship parked on the runway. Something’s nagging at me, but I can’t figure out what it is. It’s like there’s a little voice shouting a warning in the back of my mind and I can’t quite make out the words. Seeing me locked in a staring contest with her ship, Lexa approaches me.
“You think this will work?” she asks me, inclining her head towards our defenses.
“Are you asking me if we’re going to win the war today thanks to a big hole in the ground and some guns hidden in the jungle?” I shake my head solemnly. “No way. But maybe we can screw up Setrákus Ra’s plans somehow.”
“I know this probably doesn’t mean much coming from me,” Lexa begins hesitantly, clearly uncomfortable. “But you’re a good leader, Six. You’re holding it together. Your Cêpan would be proud. Hell, all of Lorien would be proud of the fight you guys are putting up.”
I can tell Lexa doesn’t mean just today, she means all our time on Earth, surviving against the Mogadorians. I watch her out of the corner of my eye. I recognize in Lexa a similar quality to one I’ve always strived for myself. She’s a survivor. I wonder if she’s what I’ll become if this war goes on for long; a person who avoids making connections because she’s already experienced too much pain. Maybe I’m already a little too much like that.
“Yeah,” I reply awkwardly. “Thanks.”
Lexa seems satisfied with this short exchange. She probably gets me in the same way I get her and understands I don’t want some big mushy moment. With one hand, she gestures towards the western expanse of jungle.
“When we were landing, I spotted a small clearing about a mile off. I’m going to move our ship over there, away from the Sanctuary. I’ll drive it under the canopy, so they won’t be able to see it.”
“Good thinking,” I reply. “Don’t want to give away to Setrákus Ra that we’re here.”
“Yeah. There’s a good chance he’ll think you retreated.”
“Element of surprise is pretty much the only thing we’ve got going for us.”
“Sometimes that’s all it takes,” Lexa replies, and then leaves me, striding off towards her ship. Our ship, she called it.
I watch her go. There’s still that little voice shouting in the back of my mind, louder now, but still unintelligible. I don’t know what it’s trying to tell me.
“Six? Do you hear that?”
It’s Marina, walking up next to me with one hand pressed to her temple like something is giving her a migraine.
“Hear what?” I ask her.
“It’s like—it’s like a voice.” She swallows. “Oh God, maybe I’m losing my mind.”
And that’s when I realize what’s nagging at me isn’t the voice of my conscience or some other mental warning system gone haywire. It’s literally a voice in my head. One that doesn’t belong there and is desperately trying to be heard.
“You’re not crazy. I hear it, too.”
I focus on the shrill buzzing and, at that moment, it becomes perfectly clear, if still distant, like it’s coming through a tunnel.
Six! Marina! Six! Marina! Can you hear me?
Marina and I lock eyes. That little telepathic voice belongs to Ella. John mentioned that her Legacies had gotten stronger, but her telepathy must be seriously juiced up if she’s able to broadcast to both me and Marina like this. With every second that passes, her voice becomes clearer in my head.
That can only mean she’s getting closer.
“Ella!” I say these words out loud, not really used to communicating telepathically. “Where are you? What’s happ—?”
She cuts me off with a telepathic shout. What are you guys doing there? I told John! He was supposed to warn you.
“He did warn us,” Marina says. “We’re here to try to help you. And to protect the Sanctuary.”
NO! No no no. Ella sounds a little deranged and definitely panicked. He was supposed to warn you.
“Warn us about what?” I ask.
Warn you to run! Ella screams. You have to run!
RUN OR YOU DIE!
CHAPTER
FIFTEEN
MARINA AND I STARE AT EACH OTHER, BOTH OF us frozen.
That’s the thing about death prophecies delivered over telepathic group chat. It’s not exactly clear who they apply to. Is Ella talking about me? Marina? Both of us? Everyone here?
Hell, I don’t believe the future is set in stone. I don’t believe in fate. We’re not running now. Not without first trying to execute our plan. After a moment of uncertainty, I see a flare of determination light in Marina’s eyes.
“I’m not running,” she says.
“Me neither,” I reply, already regretting these last few seconds we spent standing still. “Go! Get the others into position!”
Marina runs towards Sarah and the others. I bolt in the opposite direction, across the landing strip, trying to chase down Lexa. She hears the commotion and turns around at the top of the ramp, an eyebrow raised at me.
“He’s early,” I tell her.
“Shit.”
“Fly low so they won’t see you. I’m not sure how close they are.”
CLOSE! Ella screams in my brain. I flinch at the loudness.
“You know I’ve got some weapons on this thing, right?” Lexa asks, pointing her thumb towards her ship. “I can help fight them off.”
“No. It’s our only escape plan. We can’t risk the ship getting damaged.”
“You got it, Six,” Lexa replies. “I’ll get it hidden and be right back.”
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “Don’t come back. We can’t risk our pilot getting clipped either. Get the ship parked and hidden, then wait. If things go bad here, I want you to be ready to get us the hell out. We might need to run.”
“All right,” Lexa says, keeping her cool. She points into the jungle to the south, where broken stone pieces of an ancient causeway are still visible. “I’ll be a mile in that way, Six. A straight line from here. Mark’s got a radio for the cockpit if you need to get in touch.”
“Got it.”
“Good luck,” Lexa replies. What she really means is survive.
Lexa gets our ship in the air and flies it low enough that the tops of the trees brush against its underbelly. As soon as she’s out of sight, I glance first towards the horizon—no Anubis yet—and then run towards the jungle on the eastern side of the Sanctuary. It’s where the others have gathered, a good place to hide out—there’s plenty of dense foliage and an overturned log we can use for cover. From there, we can see both the front of the temple and the side door. It’s the perfect place to trigger our traps. We’ll also be able to see the Anubis coming in when it does, which can’t be long now.
“Ella?” It feels weird to be speaking her name out loud, but I can’t get down this whole talking-inside-my-head thing. I wonder if Marina is still looped into the telepathic conversation. “What the hell? You told John sunset!”
Setrákus Ra didn’t stop for reinforcements. He’s too . . . excited to get here.
Well, that’s good news at least. Setrákus Ra didn’t replenish his troops after leaving New York. That means we won’t have to deal with so many. Even so, I’m still more than a little freaked out by Ella’s first dire announcement.
“What did you mean before? Who’s going to die?”
I . . . I don’t know. It was a vision. Not entirely clear. But I saw blood. So much blood. And I’m not worth it, Six! You could leave now, escape and . . .
I sense that Ella is holding something back, not being totally honest about what she knows. John told me that her Legacies were amped up, but that her clairvoyance wasn’t foolproof. I’m not about to change our plan based on her vision of a future that we might still be able to change.
“We??
?re staying,” I say firmly, hoping she can detect the resoluteness in my mind. “We’re getting you off that ship. Do you hear me?”
Yes.
“We could use your help. How close are you? What do you see?”
Five minutes, Six. We’re five minutes out.
Five minutes. Holy shit.
“What’s he sending against us?”
He’s coming down personally. One hundred warriors, ready to go. And I’ll be there. I won’t be able to help you, Six. I can’t . . . my body doesn’t work anymore.
One hundred. That’s a lot. We can handle them, though. At least if we catch a good chunk of them when we blow up the Skimmers.
“There’s gotta be something we can do, Ella. Just tell me how to help you.”
You can’t, her voice comes back, sad and resigned. Don’t worry about me. Do what you need to do.
Adam joins me as I run towards the edge of the jungle where the others have already hidden. Instead of immediately running to our hiding spot, he took a detour into the Skimmer we flew down here and collected the vicious Mogadorian sword that once belonged to his father. The sword looks heavy strapped across Adam’s back, but he keeps up with me.
“Almost forgot it,” he says, catching me looking at the sword.
“Isn’t there an expression about bringing a knife to a gunfight?” I ask.
He shrugs. “You never know when a big sharp thing might come in handy.”
We skid to a stop at the edge of the jungle, where the rest of our group is already hunkered down behind a fallen tree. Adam turns around and watches the sky, his mouth a tight line, arms crossed. Mark is holding the detonator control for our bombs that Adam showed him how to use earlier. With Mark acting as our demolitions expert, Marina is freed up to focus on telekinetically firing the blasters we’ve hidden throughout the jungle. Sarah stands next to them, a blaster held in one hand, her other hand pressed to her temple, pale and frowning.
“I don’t accept that,” Marina says as I slide in next to her. I realize that she’s having a conversation with Ella, too.
“Accept what?” Mark asks, confused. Sarah shushes him. Taking another look at her, I realize that Sarah is also tuned in to Ella’s telepathic channel. She knows death might be coming.