Alight

  “We’re in visual range,” Gaston says. “Three minutes from landing.”

  The front-wall view changes from a crystal-clear picture of endless yellow jungle flowing by to a slightly shaking image of the crescent-shaped clearing. It curves away from us, as if we are approaching the bottom point of a quarter moon that is surrounded by tall trees.

  On that clearing, I see lines of tiny, moving things, morning sunlight glinting off of metal. A long line of Springers, marching forward, muskets in hand.

  Then, from the trees on the opposite side of the wide clearing, four yellow machines scurry out.

  Spiders.

  We are too late. The battle is about to begin.

  “Gaston, get us there, now,” I say. “Go faster!”

  He nods. “Give me maximum thrust.”

  The shuttle lurches forward so violently that the floor beneath me can’t accommodate fast enough; I almost lose my grip on the handhold.

  Lahfah is chittering and chirping. I’m not sure if he’s scared of the ride, or dreading what he sees on the battlefield.

  Images on the pilothouse wall gain detail as we close in. I see my people at the edge of the jungle, hiding behind trees and cowering in shallow ditches. Most of them hold tools that should be used for farming, and most of them are circles—fodder for Aramovsky’s war.

  The Springer lines stop. A staccato flash of glinting metal as hundreds of muskets take aim. As one, they fire, and are obscured by a long grayish cloud of smoke.

  One of the advancing spiders slows to a stop.

  From the other three, beams of white light shoot out, sweeping across the Springers. Clouds of dirt and grass fly into the air, clouds that I know also contain meat and bone, blood and brains.

  Barkah cries out, a howl that rends my heart.

  The remaining Springers flee. What came forward as an organized line runs away as scattered individuals.

  But the spiders don’t stop. On they march, to the middle of the clearing, beams blazing new holes, turning living beings into explosions of fluid and char and vapor.

  I feel so helpless.

  “Dammit, Gaston, get us there!”

  “The poles you’re holding aren’t designed for aggressive flight,” he says. “There’s too much inertia to—”

  “Do it! We’ll hold on! Put us down between the Springers and the spiders. We have to push our people back.”

  Spingate looks away from the little images of light floating around her, locks eyes with me.

  “We’re in range for the shuttle’s missiles,” she says. “We can destroy the spiders.”

  The missiles…I’d forgotten that Gaston told me the shuttle has weapons.

  But if we destroy the spiders, will we kill whoever is riding them? If we had left a few minutes earlier, we might have stopped this. And now the only way to end it is if I order the death of my own people?

  The image before us now shows the battlefield in perfect detail. Torn earth. Burning vines. Smoldering corpses. Severed limbs. Springers, trying to crawl despite missing legs, or hopping around holding bloody stumps that used to be arms. In the motionless spider, I see two young circle-stars and a tooth-girl, unmoving behind the protective ridge, a pool of blood filling the deck beneath them.

  “Thirty seconds to landing,” Gaston says. “We’re coming in fast, so this is going to be rough—hold on tight.”

  “Em, I have missile-lock,” Spingate says. “Do you want me to fire on the spiders?”

  I open my mouth to say yes, but nothing comes out.

  Something rolls forth from the Springers’ side of the clearing—dozens of those strange wooden wagons Barkah showed me. Springers push them along at a fast clip, wheels bounding over uneven ground. The wagons aren’t empty anymore: each one carries a boulder bigger than the biggest Springer, a boulder wrapped in ropes. The long wooden tails no longer trail behind, but stick up at an angle like some kind of off-center teeter-totter.

  A spider-beam lashes out, catches one of the wagons dead-center. Springer bodies pop and burn; the wagon flames bright, becomes an instant inferno of wood and rope.

  The wagons halt. The wooden tails swing straight up, snapping tight the ropes around the boulders; the boulders swing backward, then up, then over—they streak through the air toward their targets.

  The heavy rocks hit the ground, bounce and roll at terrible speed. The first two whiz past the lead oncoming spider.

  The next one hits.

  Stone smashes into metal. The full-speed spider not only stops, it’s thrown backward, metal shell now wrapped around the embedded boulder. A human body flies free, spinning limply. The spider flips and skids to a stop. Broken and twisted yellow legs stick up in the air. Two more riders stumble to their feet, disoriented, probably injured.

  Another boulder grazes the second spider, shearing off two legs as it rolls past. The spider crashes, spins wildly. Bodies fly, moving so fast and so violently that if the riders aren’t already dead, they will be when they hit the ground.

  The other boulders sail past, all misses. They tumble across the clearing, losing speed—except for one. It must have hit a hard patch, because it sails higher like a ball bouncing off a floor. The boulder smashes into our side of the clearing, pulverizing human bodies.

  In a span of seconds, the “outmatched” Springers have destroyed two spiders and killed the crew of a third. Now I understand why the Springers wanted the spiders in one place—with that many wagons, at least some of the two-dozen-odd boulders were bound to connect.

  The last attacking spider’s legs flash in a mad chopping motion as it slows, stops and retreats.

  From the edge of the clearing, a fresh wave of Springers pours forth. I can’t hear them, but I can see their open mouths and I know they’re bellowing a war cry.

  “Twenty seconds to landing,” Gaston says.

  The Springer line closes in on the two spider riders stranded in the middle of the clearing. The riders take cover behind their ruined machine. I silently urge them to run, but the smaller of the two clutches her arm to her chest, and the bigger one won’t leave. There is just enough detail for me to make out who they are—it’s Bawden and…Zubiri.

  The shuttle lurches left.

  “Fifteen seconds,” Gaston calls out.

  I look to our side of the clearing, to see what Aramovsky does next, and when I do, the trees themselves seem to move forward.

  It’s a giant—a walking giant covered in vines, leaves, even whole trees jammed into gaps and spaces. One arm ends in a huge scoop shovel, the other in a pincer. It’s the construction machine we saw in the spider nest. We’re flying, but I swear I can feel the ground shake with each step of the huge metal feet.

  Lahfah points at it, jabbers something fast and panicked, then re-grips his handhold as the shuttle shifts right.

  “The Springers can’t stop that thing,” Bishop says. “Muskets and rocks aren’t going to do anything to that.”

  “Missiles will take it out,” Spingate says. “Em, what do we do?”

  The giant’s long strides eat up the distance. The Springers fire muskets at it, which doesn’t slow it in the least. Everything is happening too fast. We can destroy it, but just like the spiders, I’ll be killing my own people. Unless…

  “Spin, hit the ground in front of the big machine, and also in front of the Springers, but try not to kill anyone. Do it now!”

  Her hands grab symbols made of light.

  “Launching,” she says, her voice calm and level.

  The shuttle vibrates. Our view is temporarily blinded by spots of moving fire, then by streaks of smoke snaking out and away from us—some toward the Springers, some toward the giant machine.

  The smoke lines touch the ground.

  Expanding half-spheres of dirt and grass rise up, driven by churning fireballs. The Springers are knocked away—hard—many of them lifted off their feet and thrown backward.

  A fireball rises up in front of the giant machine, splashin
g it with debris. Its lumbering ceases as the people inside it duck for cover.

  Rubble rains down onto the battlefield.

  Bawden covers Zubiri with her own body.

  I point to them. “Gaston, put us down there! By that ruined spider!”

  The shuttle banks to the right, throwing me hard against the handhold. The shuttle banks left, then up. Bishop loses his grip and tumbles away. He hits the door, bounces off it just as the shuttle levels out, trembles once, then stops.

  “We’re down,” Gaston says.

  Bishop is on his stomach, moving weakly.

  “Gaston,” I say, “tell Smith there are wounded on the field. Spingate, stay in the pilothouse and be ready with the missiles. If I raise my left fist, you take out the giant, understand?”

  “Understood.” Her gaze is steel. “You know that will kill whoever is inside it, right?”

  I nod. If I have to kill again to stop this, if I have to carry yet another haunting face around with me wherever I go, so be it.

  “Lahfah, Barkah, move,” I say. “Bishop, get up.”

  He looks hurt, more damage on an already brutalized body. Later I will feel sympathy for him. I’m not giving him the choice of staying down.

  He’s struggling to his hands and knees. “I’m coming, just get out there and stop this!”

  I run from the pilothouse to find the shuttle doors already opening. I step onto the platform and am assaulted by the odors of battle—metal, scorched wood, wet charcoal, burning mint and a sickening stench of cooking meat.

  I slide my silver bracelet off my arm. I don’t want to get blasted to bits if one of the kids mistakenly thinks I’m going to shoot Aramovsky. I hold the bracelet by the long point, raise it up high so all my people can see it. Then, I throw it, as hard as I can. It spins through the air, gleaming in the morning sun. The point plunges into a bloody patch of fresh dirt. There it stands, open circle sticking up, almost like a gravestone marking the deaths of today’s fallen.

  This is my chance—my one chance—to stop the slaughter. I push away my pain, my heartbreak, my fear. I square my shoulders, and I stride down the ramp like I own this world.

  Like an empress.

  War’s crumbs dot the clearing’s ravaged ground. Twists of burned vines and clumps of soil. A torn Springer head and shoulder, smoke drifting up from the half-open toad-mouth. A severed human hand—dark-skinned.

  Lahfah limps down the ramp behind me. Barkah hops out, confident and regal despite his wounds and ravaged eye. Like me, he has pushed his pain down below, prepared himself for this one moment that will make all the difference. At the bottom of the ramp, the pair turn and hop toward the Springer lines, screaming as loud as they can—I can only hope they are telling their kind to stay back, to give me time to do what must be done.

  Three spiders stand not ten strides away. They are battered and rusted, even more than the ones we first saw in the jungle. Their cannons, though, gleam and shine.

  The spiders on the left and right are each crewed by three kids—a gear, who must be the driver, and two black-clad circle-stars armed with silver bracelets pointed directly at me. I know that if I make any sudden movement, they will fire.

  Standing on the middle spider: Aramovsky, the man who makes children go to war. He holds the spear.

  My spear.

  His red robes blaze in the morning sun. A long-pointed bracelet adorns his right arm. Standing atop the spider’s back, staring down with fury and excitement, he looks like an angry god of war.

  “You told me to wipe out the vermin,” he says. “Now you’ve brought two of them with you? If you want to help me finish this, use those rockets to destroy their trebuchets!”

  Like Bello, he thinks I’m Matilda. Of course he does. When he left the Observatory, I was locked in a coffin. It could not possibly be a worse time to do it, but I can’t stop myself—I start laughing.

  “You know something, Aramovsky? You always thought you were smarter than me.”

  It takes him a second to understand. His eyes flick to the Springers. He snarls at me.

  “Where is Matilda?”

  As if in answer, the sky fills with a broken sound that quickly grows to a roar. I’ve heard that sound before, when Bello’s ship came down. But this time, the ship is going up.

  I point to a line of smoke streaking into the sky. “Matilda is there. Probably with Old Gaston. They left you, Aramovsky. And don’t bother looking for Coyotl, O’Malley or Beckett, because they’re all dead.”

  His eyes narrow. So much hate in them. His hand squeezes on my spear, so tight the blade trembles.

  “Knights,” he says, “kill this traitor!”

  From the shuttle platform behind me, Bishop’s voice booms out, echoing across the clearing.

  “Hold your fire!”

  No one moves. Aramovsky thinks he speaks for the gods, but Bishop truly has the voice of one.

  “The Grownups are gone, Aramovsky,” Bishop says. “And your time as leader is over.”

  Aramovsky’s mouth opens. He looks rattled, but recovers quickly. He raises the spear over his head and shouts his answer.

  “The vermin want to murder you in your sleep, take away what the gods have given you! If Em and Bishop aren’t with us, then they are against us. Do not listen to their blasphemous lies. The time has come to take this planet for ourselves.”

  He points the spear to his right, up at the towering metal monster covered in vines and trees.

  “Lead the assault! Crush the Springers!”

  Please don’t move…please don’t listen to him…

  The massive machine lifts a foot, extends it, sets it down with a thump that shakes the entire clearing.

  Barkah must have stopped the Springers from attacking, but if the giant presses forward, then they will fight back.

  I have no choice.

  “Aramovsky, who is driving that thing?”

  The monstrosity takes another thundering step. I hear the Springer horns sound all through the jungle.

  “Abrantes and Aeschelman,” he says, “both young halves, and two brave young knights—Cody and Cadotte. You wouldn’t know them, because you never talked to them like I did.”

  Kids. Would it be any better if it was people my age? No, not really.

  “Why, Em?” Aramovsky spreads his hands, turning in place and speaking to everyone, like he always does when he’s trying to make me look bad. “Do you think you’re going to talk them out of it? Maybe shout to the sky and the stars and the sun, hope that they hear you?”

  I shake my head. “No. I just want to know who I killed.”

  The monster machine takes another step.

  I raise my left fist.

  Spingate does not fail me.

  A hiss, a roar of flame—two smoke trails shoot out from the top of the shuttle, covering the distance almost instantly. The missiles hit at the same time, one near the head, the other sliding into the chest. Fireballs erupt, billowing up to the sky and down to the machine’s knees. A cloud of angry orange rises, driven higher by the column of flame beneath it. The vines catch fire, as do the full-size trees jammed into the nooks and crannies. Every inch of the machine bubbles and burns. The fireball dissipates, replaced by a column of greasy black smoke.

  The machine moves no more.

  From inside it, I hear screams.

  The Springer horns fade out.

  On either side of the clearing, no one moves.

  With one gesture, I have demonstrated not only the ultimate power on this battlefield, but the willingness to use it. The Springers have no choice but to understand—if I’m willing to kill my own kind, I’m willing to kill them, too.

  I am the wind…I am death.

  We all stand there, motionless. We listen to the screams fade, then die out.

  The fire roars on. The machine that was made to build cities, then converted to kill, is now a colossus of flame and smoke.

  Aramovsky stares at it blankly. He prepared well for
this battle, far better than I expected. He had his people salvage spiders. He acquired weapons that gave him the advantage. He had children repair a machine that looked like it was rusted and long since worthless. He was led into a trap, but in the end, he might have won anyway.

  Three of the six spiders at his disposal are out of the fight. The Springers have probably reloaded their carts by now, and will assuredly take out at least one more spider if not all three. Aramovsky is vastly outnumbered. And his weapon of awe—the one thing the Springers could not possibly bring down with flying boulders—burns like the biggest bonfire ever created, the crew of four people inside it turning into ash.

  People that I killed. What have I done? I make choices, and people die.

  Bishop brushes past me. He’s trying hard to hide a limp. Bleeding, his face swollen and cut, his coveralls ripped and torn, he squares his shoulders and stands in front of Aramovsky’s spider.

  “Knights, hear me,” he shouts. “You voted for Aramovsky, but he is false. Everyone he left behind was to be sacrificed to the Grownups, so they could be overwritten. You are here only because there is no Grownup waiting to erase your mind. You are expendable.”

  He spits that last word with a power I didn’t know he possessed, with so much venom it makes my hair stand on end. But he’s not done talking.

  “No one else has to die. The Springers showed Em how to kill the red mold. We will have food, all we can eat. Em did that, not Aramovsky. She killed my creator. She saved my life. I have fought beside Em. I have bled with Em. She is honorable. She is brave. She is willing to sacrifice for the greater good. She is not a knight, but she is everything we knights aspire to be. If you want to fight the Springers, you’ll have to go through her. And to get to her, you’ll have to go through me.”

  Bishop can barely stand, yet his words carry thunder. Where is the spoiled boy who bullied anyone who disagreed with him? That person was a child in a grown man’s body, but—like me—that child is gone.

  And more than that…he’s bluffing. His legs tremble. He couldn’t fight one young circle-star, let alone all of them. This time, though, it isn’t about Bishop’s physical presence. The person who doesn’t like to talk is ending this with his words.