A small sphere of energy shoots from just below the cockpit. It sticks to the side of the rising Mogadorian vessel. Nothing happens.
Shit.
I can see the Mog cannon powering up, energy gathering around it. I tap on the weapons screen again.
“Don’t tell me you’re a dud, you son of a—”
The sphere explodes in a wave of energy that knocks back my own ship. The autopilot levels me off, and then I take over the controls and hit the accelerator, flying high into the sky, far, far above New Mexico, shouting at the top of my lungs as I dart through the air. I check my radar, but there’s no one following me. I swing the vessel around, surveying the damage from hundreds of feet above in the clear sky. The Mog ships don’t exist anymore. There’s nothing left to follow me—only blazing hunks of twisted metal.
Energy courses through me, filling my head with fuzzy warmth.
“We did it,” I say before I realize the words are even coming out of my mouth. “We have the ship.”
I’m not sure who I’m talking to, who the “we” is—if I’m addressing Zophie, or the other Garde spread across the planet, or even Mark, my unwitting partner in this Dulce operation.
On the way back I stop over at Yellowhammer Ranch, setting the ship down in the backyard by the dilapidated barn. The place looks untouched since the last time I saw it—if not a bit overgrown. I find one of the keys hidden in a sliding panel on the side of the house and go inside, pulling off some of the drop cloths that are still on the furniture. I reprogram the door to the secret office to open to Mark’s fingerprint, which I have on file thanks to the fingerprint ID system in the laptop I sent him charging into Dulce with.
Inside the office I take stock of the weapons organized on shelves against one wall, and then boot up the security system, checking to make sure all my cameras are still in operation. A few electronic trip wires and traps are still live around the ranch, but I disable them so that Mark isn’t met with an automated weapon upon his arrival. I can always teach him to reset them later, when he’s settled in.
I keep the bomb beneath the office primed, ready to be set off in the event that the safe house falls into enemy hands. Just in case.
This will make a nice home for Mark. At least for the time being. Until I can figure out what to do with him, or until he finally manages to get in contact with Sarah and the rest of the Garde.
I wonder if I should just wait here for him, to reveal myself to him in person. I have the ship, after all. Things are going well.
But I recognize this feeling. The thought that things are finally going my way and that everything’s falling into place. Every time I’ve allowed myself to be comforted by such hope, things have gone terribly wrong. People have died. My world shattered, needing to be rebuilt.
I just need a little more time. To patch up the ship and figure out my next move. And he needs to recoup too. I’m not ready to lead my protégé into battle. Not yet.
In the morning I’ll take the motorbike stored in the old barn into town and bring back a few fresh supplies for Mark: food, water, extra ammunition. A small gesture of thanks for being my first set of eyes on Dulce Base. For now, though, I scrawl a note in thick black marker on the back of a folder and set it beside a shotgun for him to find later.
I hope you’re ready for war.
-G
CHAPTER TEN
THE SHIP BARELY MAKES IT BACK TO MY ORCHARD base in Georgia. I fly beneath radar and try to stay in cloud cover as much as possible along the way. By this point, the acceleration is hardly faster than that of a car or motorcycle—the battery is almost dead. The crystals are fading.
I manage to get the ship parked in the big old pecan-processing plant in the back. I guess it’s technically now a hangar.
Most of my energy and resources are immediately focused on figuring out how to get—and keep—the ship up and running for good. I start installing various adapters and fuel lines I’ve created over the years, hoping that all my work hasn’t been for nothing. I go over the research I’ve swiped from the Dulce computers to see what the scientists have been doing to try and repower the drives. I manage to connect the crystal housings to an electrical output just like they’d done in Dulce. If nothing else, that should buy me a few days’ worth of power.
The only reason the ship doesn’t have my full attention is because one of my sensors picks up some strange activity on Mark James’s old burner cell phone. I’ve been monitoring his communications since I got involved with him on the website, just to keep tabs on him. It’s something I’ve done with everyone I’ve worked with from the blog—though Mark is definitely the person I’ve gotten closest to. It looks as though someone has sent him messages from “GUARD” telling him to meet up with them. Communications that definitely didn’t come from me.
Somewhere, Mark slipped up. The enemy has found him.
I try to warn Mark, but I’m too late. Fortunately, he manages to escape from a team of FBI agents still loyal to the Mogs, but at the cost of his gear, his truck and, from what I can tell, a bit of his mental stability. And he was shot in his arm as he fled the ambush, though he swears it’s just a flesh wound. He’s stressed out, lost and feeling hopeless. When I talk to him on the chat client I built for “They Walk Among Us,” he sounds depressed. I’m suddenly worried that he might give up, even after all he’s been through. And I can’t have that. Not now that I’ve gotten so used to him always being in touch. I realize that he’s the only person I talk to on a regular basis. He’s the closest thing I’ve had to a friend since Zophie died. So I do my best to try and remedy these things with a new vehicle and directions to Yellowhammer Ranch. That all seems to perk him up a bit.
At Yellowhammer, Mark connects Purdy’s stolen laptop to some computer equipment I left behind, allowing me to copy the entire contents of its hard drive to cloud storage. I isolate Purdy’s files and begin a full-fledged attack on their firewalls and security—cut off from the rest of the Mogadorian and FBI networks, I have no fear of being caught as I break into every hidden corner of his hard drive. What I discover is a wealth of information about MogPro and the specifics of the Mogadorian involvement with the US government. As I work, Mark finally manages to get in contact with Sarah. As Mark thought, she’d been traveling with the Garde. She’s an invaluable source of information, and the link to my people here on Earth that I’ve been searching for.
Things seems to be going smoothly.
Which is why I shouldn’t be surprised when everything falls apart.
I’m installing a new power line in the ship that will use the primitive fuel sources on this planet when I get a message from Mark saying that he’s screwed up and thinks the Mogs might have a lead on Yellowhammer. He asks if he should abandon it completely or go back for his notes and files. I tell him it’s his call.
He heads back to the ranch with Sarah to pack up. I’m left to wait for word from him. I pull up the cameras at Yellowhammer just in time to see him and Sarah rush inside and start packing.
Then everything goes black. I can’t reestablish a connection. All I’ve got are monitors full of static.
My heart falls into my stomach.
Every second that passes makes me more impatient, more worried that I should have told him to leave everything and run from Alabama. As I wait, I pull up a program on one of my monitors: the controls to the bomb planted underneath Yellowhammer Ranch. At what point should I assume the worst and detonate the fail-safe, keeping the Mogadorians from getting any of Mark’s notes? What if I set off the bomb too early and end up killing Mark and Sarah in the process? In that moment, alone in my safe house, all I want in the universe is to see Mark’s name appear on my cell phone. He’s been my eyes and ears for the past few months. We’ve been in constant contact.
I can’t lose him.
Nor can I believe that JOLLYROGER182, the “Aliens Anonymous” user who referred to Mogs as “janky-looking assholes from another planet” in his first message to GUARD,
has become a valuable asset not only to the Loric cause, but to me personally.
The clock ticks. I stare at the button that will destroy Yellowhammer. I wonder if I have it in me to press it after all this time. Would I risk sacrificing Mark and Sarah to keep information from falling into Mog hands?
Relief bursts through my skull when my phone dings. It’s a text from Mark, saying they were attacked but are all right.
I call him back on one of my burners that has a voice modulator built in. My voice comes out electronic, distorted on his end of the line.
“How far are you and Sarah from the house?” I ask when he answers.
“I don’t know. Maybe a mile? I can still see it in—”
I click the button. There’s static on the line as Mark’s microphone picks up the sound of Yellowhammer Ranch exploding.
“That should take care of any Mogs remaining on the property and thoroughly wipe our tracks,” I say.
Mark doesn’t sound too thrilled about the fact that he’d been sitting on top of a bomb all this time, but I’m too focused on typing to pay much attention to his concern. Instead, I tap into his truck’s built-in GPS and input the coordinates to the Georgia safe house.
It’s time to move forward in the fight against the Mogs. To join my fellow Loric.
The first step is to finally reveal myself to Mark and Sarah.
When Mark and Sarah show up, they look stunned—likely due to a combination of seeing me, the ship and the automated weapons that target them when they trip my security system. The incredulous silence doesn’t last, though, as they begin to ask a million questions. I assess the situation and prioritize; Mark is feverish, and the bullet wound in his arm is completely infected. The first thing I do is give him a shot of the antibiotics I’ve got stashed away with other medical supplies. He’s fine with that. The next part, less so.
“Motherffffff—” He holds out the “f” as I splash the injury with rubbing alcohol.
“Is he okay?” Sarah asks. She stands a few feet away from me, and I can see the concern in her eyes, not just for Mark’s condition, but for the fact that someone she doesn’t know is treating it.
“He’ll be fine,” I say. “The antibiotics will do most of the work. He should be back to normal in a few days.”
“But I’ve got a big game tomorrow, Coach,” Mark says flatly.
“I’m confused,” Sarah says. She turns to Mark. “You didn’t know she was a woman? Or Loric?”
“I just thought that since GUARD was so good with computers . . . ,” Mark starts.
She narrows her eyes a little.
“What?” Mark asks. “Okay, yes, I just assumed she was a dude. My bad. I guess ‘GUARD’ is technically gender neutral.”
“You’re from Lorien.” Sarah says this more than asks.
I nod.
“And being older . . . you must have been there when the planet was attacked.”
I nod again, slower this time. Sarah’s face seems to soften.
“I was on a different ship than the chosen Garde,” I say. “There were only a few of us.”
“Ella . . . ,” she murmurs, and the name stops my heart.
“What do you know about her?” I ask, taking two long steps until I’m towering over Sarah. “Have you met her? Is she with Number Four?”
She shakes her head.
“The Mogs took her,” she says slowly.
I swallow hard. “And Crayton? Did they take him too?”
“Crayton,” Sarah whispers. It takes a few seconds for her to place the name. “No. I’m sorry. . . . He was killed a while ago. In Spain, right before Ella joined the others.”
The shock of all this must register on my face, because suddenly Sarah isn’t looking at me like she’s afraid I’m going pull a blaster on her. Instead, she’s got a hand on my back and a chair under me before I even realize that I’m sitting down.
“Of course,” she says. “I should’ve realized you didn’t know. You were on the other ship with them. Oh God, I’m sorry.”
My hands shake. I wonder how Crayton died—protecting Ella, no doubt. Where could she be now? What might they be doing to her? My hands shake as I try to figure out what to do next.
The Chimæra they call Bernie Kosar rubs against my legs in the form of a dog, staring up at me with a long tongue hanging out. His tail drums against the floor.
“I think he likes you,” Sarah says.
I crouch down, looking into his dark eyes.
“I knew many of your kind once,” I say, thinking back to those days that seem so long ago, when Zophie and Crayton and tiny baby Ella and I were all cooped up in our ship with a dozen Chimærae. “I hope to see more of you again one day.”
He lets out a little whine and licks a salty tear from the side of my face.
“Uh, if it’s any consolation,” Mark says, “it sounds like Ella turned out to be a total badass? Like, apparently she was at Dulce and caused some damage.”
She was at Dulce. When? How close was I to her?
I wipe my cheek with my sleeve and look over at Mark. He’s shifting on his feet, his forehead wrinkled with concern. I think he’s trying to make me feel better.
“Yeah, so, anyway,” he continues, nodding to the back of the hangar. “Maybe you could show us the inside of this thing? I’ve never been in a spaceship before.”
I smile a little. “Keep your eyes open, Jolly Roger, and maybe you’ll fly it one day.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“HOLY SHIT,” MARK SAYS AS WE STEP UP THE metal ramp and into the ship. “I mean . . . holy shit.”
“Wait until you see her at top speed,” I say. “If I can get her to run on Earth fuels.”
“Fingers crossed,” Sarah murmurs. Her eyes are wide as she looks around.
“Superstition won’t get this beauty up and running. I was just putting the finishing touches on the new fuel line when you two arrived. Let’s see if I was successful.”
“You mean we’re going to take off right now?” Mark asks.
“No. I’m just going to start up the engines, with any luck.”
He looks a little nervous.
I tap on the instrument panels when we get to the cockpit. They slowly flicker on. The ship hums to life around us.
“That seems like a good sign,” Sarah says.
“Here comes the real test,” I say.
I touch a few more of the controls. The ship slowly begins to lift off the ground. Beside me Mark clutches the back of one of the mounted chairs in front of the controls and whispers a dozen curses.
We’re a few feet off the floor and hovering inside the hangar when the entire craft starts to shake, then suddenly drops a few inches, causing my two human companions to cry out in alarm. But the ship recovers. It levels itself off until all systems look normal.
“By Lorien,” I murmur. “I think it’s going to work. The ship’s running off the fuel line I’ve installed, plus we have a few days of backup from the charged crystals.”
“That’s . . . good?” Sarah asks.
“It’s very good,” I say.
I set the ship back down and power off. Mark looks a little shaky on his feet. There’s a sheen of sweat on his forehead.
“I think I should probably sit down,” he says.
Sarah touches his forehead. “His fever’s breaking.”
I take them back down and into what used to be the foreman’s office when the hangar was still a processing plant. Now it’s filled with computer equipment and monitors.
We start to trade information. We learn about each other.
I give Mark and Sarah an abbreviated rundown of my history, leaving out the parts about me using Mark or tracking all of his communications—though, by the look on his face, I’m guessing he’s figured that out by now. Sarah gets me up to date on the latest with the Garde, who they are and what Legacies they’ve manifested. She tells me everything she knows about the Mogs. It’s easier to get information now that I don’t have to
use Mark as the middleman between us or avoid talking about my identity. I learn that not only has Malcolm Goode been found, but his son, Sam, has joined the fight. I can’t help but smile at this, to know that Malcolm has been reunited with that little boy from outside his office. I can’t say that they’re safe in the middle of all this, but at least they’re together.
I ask a lot of questions about the girl Ella has become and find out that she is a strong, sensitive young Garde. Just the kind of person I imagine Crayton would have wanted her to be. Sarah has spent a significant amount of time with her, and I can tell that she’s worried about Ella as she speaks. That she cares for her.
“Everything happened so fast in Chicago,” Sarah says, her eyes looking off into the middle distance. “Ella was having some kind of vision and then suddenly the Mogs were there. We were overpowered.”
“Mogadorian scum,” I mutter.
“We’ll get her back.” Mark grins a little. “And we’ll waste a bunch of those pale freaks along the way. Ashes to ashes. Dust to—”
“Really, Mark?” Sarah asks.
“What?” His eyebrows draw together for a second. Then he relaxes a little. “You’re right. I should have saved that for after we’d killed What’s-His-Ra or something.”
Sarah doesn’t say anything, just smirks a little and rolls her eyes.
She turns to one of the monitors at her side, one that’s tuned to a twenty-four-hour news station. Her eyes get wide, and several small sounds come from her mouth, but no actual words form.
“Oh, come on,” Mark says quietly, concerned. “It wasn’t that bad. Sarah?”
“Oh God,” she manages.