She still couldn’t quite believe what had happened, but there was no denying the horror of the events on Earth. The refugees all had the same look of shock from those first few days of the Coalition revolution that had taken Paris in a wave of violence.
Chloe had come here to flee war, but war, it seemed, had followed her.
Gripping the rails, she searched the fatigued and frightened faces of refugees. There were so many, a sea of bodies surging as Lunar Defense soldiers tried to guide them into the concourses for scanning.
Chloe blinked to zoom in on faces that might have been Cyrus’s. Months had passed since they were together, and when she finally spotted him, she almost didn’t recognize him.
“Cyrus!” she shouted, waving.
He kept walking, carrying a single bag.
“Cyrus!” she yelled again. She ran to the stairs. After jumping the final three, Chloe pushed through the crowd.
“Sorry,” she said. “Excuse me… sorry.”
People grunted and cursed as she wedged her way through. She stood on her tiptoes and finally spotted Cyrus leaving the concourse, heading toward the security line.
“Cyrus!” she shouted.
He turned and found her with his eyes, a smile forming under his mustache. He rushed over to Chloe and wrapped her up in a hug.
“You made it!” she cried.
“Chloe!” He kissed her on the lips and then pulled back. She saw a streak of blood on his ear and another on his chin. But it wasn’t the blood that told her what Cyrus had been through. She could see it in his normally bright brown eyes.
“I love you,” she said. “I love you, and we’re alive, and everything is going to be okay now.”
Cyrus hugged her again, and for the first time since she had met him, she felt him relax against her body. Today, he was the one who needed the support.
“Keep moving!” shouted a soldier.
Chloe pulled away and followed Cyrus to the checkpoint. She would now have to go back through, she realized.
Oh no.
She halted.
“What’s wrong?” Cyrus asked.
“I have Radar in my bag.”
“So?”
“So all droids have been banned,” she whispered.
“Turn him off.”
“I did.”
“Then maybe they won’t notice.” Cyrus jerked his chin. “We’re drawing attention. We should just go and hope they don’t find him or maybe they’ll let you keep him.”
Chloe saw they had no option. The line inched forward. They were ten people away from the guards. She gripped Cyrus’s hand.
“Hey, where are you taking him!” shouted a woman not much older than Chloe.
Cyrus squeezed her hand tighter as two soldiers pulled an older man away from the security checkpoint. He resisted, and they pulled him to the ground, dragging him away, while the woman who must have been his daughter screamed for them to stop.
She too was escorted away.
“Maybe a Coalition soldier or something,” Cyrus whispered.
They kept moving forward.
A few minutes later another person was ripped from the line, this time a woman.
“Where are you taking me?” she said.
The soldier who had her by the arm didn’t respond.
“What are you doing with them?” someone ahead of Chloe and Cyrus asked.
“Keep moving,” replied a guard.
When it was Chloe’s turn, Cyrus took the bag from her.
“I’ll handle this,” he said.
“Next,” said the soldier ahead.
He motioned for Chloe to enter a narrow tunnel, stepping up behind her as she entered. At the other end, another soldier waited.
As soon as she set foot inside, a red light flashed and an alarm chirped.
Turning, she looked toward Cyrus.
“Come with me, ma’am,” said the soldier.
“She’s with me,” Cyrus said.
“Step back, sir.”
“No, I’m coming with her.”
The soldier sighed, clearly frustrated. “Look, all chipped persons are being quarantined,” he said. “This is for precautions only, now please step back.”
Chloe realized this had nothing to do with Radar. She was the threat.
“Cyrus,” she said as the two guards grabbed her by the arms.
“Hey!” Cyrus shouted. “Let her go!”
“Back up, sir,” said the largest guard, a towering man with a beak of a nose.
Cyrus tried to get past, but the man grabbed him. Three more guards surrounded him as Chloe was pulled away. “Cyrus!” she shouted.
“I’ll find you!” Cyrus called out, squirming in the grip of the guard. “I’ll come find you!”
The soldiers took Chloe down a hallway, into an elevator, and underground. A truck brought her to a warehouse that had once stored Hummer Droid worker units. They were all gone now, their power racks empty.
In the center of the room was a massive cage, and inside were hundreds of people. Chloe was herded into it, like the Hummer Droids she had seen on the streets.
“Are they going to kill us?” asked a boy no older than eight.
“No,” Chloe replied. “They’re just keeping us here for a short time.”
But as she walked forward, she couldn’t help but feel the same fear that she had felt during her worst days on Earth. The Moon was supposed to be safe, a new home where she could start over with Cyrus.
And once again, she was a prisoner.
— Epilogue —
Five hundred people waited in line for food at Zone 20 in Halo Colony at the Shackleton Crater. Ronin, Elan, and Lise were among them.
Almost two weeks ago, over one million people had escaped Earth on E-Day. “The Lucky Million,” they were being called. They had arrived at Kepler Station only to be shipped off to the capital colony of Mesopotamia, the new cradle of civilization at the bottom of the cold, dark Shackleton Crater. Halo Colony was one of ten colonies connected to Mesopotamia, and it was the new home of Ronin and one hundred thousand other lucky colonists.
He sure didn’t feel all that lucky. His older brother and father were dead, and his uncle was likely dead, too. Soon, Ronin, his twin brother, and his mother would be as well, if the Lunar Council didn’t figure out a way to start producing more food. They would die of starvation.
That is, if the machines didn’t come and finish the job first.
The people around him already looked weak and exhausted. Most had only showered a few times over the past four weeks and were still wearing the same clothes they had arrived in.
“Don’t push. There’s enough for everyone,” grumbled a Lunar Defense soldier.
The man wore the armor of a Piston, but in white. He monitored the crowd that stretched through the vast, dimly lit underground chamber. A faint aroma of soup drifted through the stale air, drawing the hungry colonists along like sharks to blood.
Elan and Lise didn’t say anything. They kept their heads down, like most everyone.
Holo-screens lit up the walls framing the long passage, replaying the message from War Commander Andrew Thacker, the new commander of the Lunar Defense Corps: “Conscription is in effect immediately. Anyone aged eighteen to thirty is required to report to their Sector Lunar Defense Corps Zone Station for assignment. For people aged over thirty, The Lunar Natural Resources Department is recruiting miners to expand our home under the lunar surface.”
There was no talk of Earth. No hopeful message about those left behind. No discussion of what was left. Ronin could only assume there wasn’t much at all.
While Hros-1 had missed Earth, the cannons built to destroy it had done more damage than a hundred asteroids like it. In the end, it wasn’t man who had destroyed the Earth.
It was AI.
Technology that had gotten out of control.
Yet, Ronin realized that technology kept
them alive here too. Providing warmth in the freezing temperatures and light in the inky darkness. Cleaning the air of regolith and pollutants. Producing gravity and growing crops.
If it weren’t for technology, humanity would be extinct.
At least on the Moon, it was only AI and droids that were now extinct.
After an hour of waiting, Ronin finally reached the kitchen. He grabbed a bowl and held it out as a woman slopped in a white mush of lentils and rice. He took a hunk of bread and kept walking.
A long, open room of tables was just ahead. He sat at an empty one. His brother slid next to him, and their mother sat across. She had tried to be strong for them since they arrived, but Ronin could see she was starting to fall into the darkness. Everyone around them looked the same, their eyes swollen from crying, their sleep lost to nightmares.
Lise had stopped crying weeks ago, and neither she nor Ronin had slept a full night here.
“Mom,” Ronin said. “You need to eat.”
She pushed her bowl to Ronin and Elan. “Go ahead. I’m not hungry.”
“Please, eat,” Ronin begged.
Lise looked back down at her bowl like it was poison, then sighed. “There’s something I need to tell you. Something that I want you to hear from me, that I should have told you a very long time ago.”
She signed to Elan, and he put his spoon down.
Zachary, she signed, Zachary wasn’t your…
Wasn’t what? Elan signed back.
He wasn’t your brother, Lise signed. He was your cousin, the son of your Uncle Akira.
“Why are you saying this?” Ronin asked. “That can’t be.”
You are lying, Elan signed.
Lise shook her head.
When your aunt was killed, Akira was recruited to the Engine program, and he asked your father to look after Zachary. His birth name was Takeshi. We agreed to raise him as our own son.
Ronin didn’t want to believe it, but as he considered what she was saying, he knew it was true. Zachary had always been different than Ronin and Elan. Faster and stronger, and skilled in ways that Ronin wasn’t.
He had even looked more like Akira.
I’m sorry, Lise signed. I’m so sorry for not telling you before, but you deserve to know now.
Ronin looked down at his bowl. Now he wasn’t hungry either.
They sat in silence, listening to the hushed voices around them.
Ronin didn’t bring up the future. He wasn’t sure his mother could handle it right now. After losing Kai and Zachary, she was still grieving, and Ronin didn’t want to upset her with talk of what would happen when he and Elan turned eighteen in a few months and reported to the Lunar Defense Corps station to begin their service.
Ronin forced himself to finish his food and waited until Lise had eaten some of hers. They got up to head back to the community shelter they were assigned to with ten thousand other colonists. A tunnel took them out of the mess hall to the main part of Halo Colony, where an artificial sunset spread over the buildings framing the streets.
Trees grew along the walkways, their canopies warmed by the grow lights built into the ceilings. The lights also supported the parks on each block that helped the filters clean the air. Not a single detail had been spared when building this place. Mesopotamia and the connected colonies had been built by the Lunar Defense Corp in response to the war on Earth. But none of them had envisioned what would happen on E-Day, or how many people would flee here.
According to rumors, the colonies were only designed to support up to one hundred thousand people. Ronin wasn’t sure if that was true, but he knew supplies were already strained.
The plasma poles clicked on as the sunset turned the color of a black eye. Lise stopped at the next block to look at the job advertisements on the community holo-screens. A single Lunar Defense Corps soldier guarded the three-story building, watching the colonists who came to look for work. There was a long line tonight. Most of the posted jobs were mining positions off-colony. The teaching job Lise wanted had already been taken down. She tried not to show her disappointment, but Ronin could see it in her defeated posture.
They didn’t stop until they got to their assigned shelter, another sprawling underground space with thousands of beds set up in neat rows. New white blankets with the lion and star logo of the Lunar Defense Corps covered the beds.
Lise unfolded hers and sat down, draping it over her legs. Ronin took a seat on his bed and did the same. It wasn’t just food they were short on. The industrial equipment that operated the colonies was working overtime to warm the massive space, and the air-purifying units were already falling behind.
Ronin took a deep breath of cold air. He was mad. Mad that he couldn’t save his brother and father. Mad that he was living in the freezing darkness under a crater on the Moon. Mad that the LDC seemed to be giving up Earth to the machines.
Lowering his head into his hands, Ronin leaned forward over his bed and felt tears that he could no longer hold back. They fell over his lap and on his legs, hitting the spine of the book sticking out of his bag, still stained with blood from his brother.
It was odd thinking of Zachary—or Takeshi—as his cousin, but he decided he would remember him as his brother, always, no matter what.
Ronin pulled out the book and gripped the leather binding, finding strength in the worn leather and the weight of the spine. Inside the pages was the wisdom of his ancestors, and the stories of warriors defeating enemies and protecting their lands.
It was all he had left of his uncle and his father. Zachary, too. But this was more than a historical book of their past, he realized.
This book was a guide to the future, a map that would teach him how to avenge them and his brother, to take back Earth from the machines.
Ronin tucked the book away and laid down, pulling the blanket up to his chin. The overhead lights were already dim, but it was almost impossible to sleep with the voices, the crying, and the coughing of thousands of colonists. He closed his eyes, trying to silence the noises.
Ronin finally drifted off into a dream of Edo Castle in Megacity Tokyo. The cherry blossom trees were in full bloom, and their sweet scent carried on the breeze as he strolled through a garden with his family. His Uncle Akira was mounted on Kichiro, riding toward them. The gardens suddenly burst into flames, everything consumed in a brilliant flash of fire.
Ronin jerked awake to voices inside the dark barracks.
Elan was reading the Warrior Codex. Lise was standing. Other colonists were too, all looking toward the eastern entrance.
Ronin swung his legs over the bed and got up. “What’s going on?”
Lise shook her head.
“I’m looking for the Hayashis!” called a booming voice.
It belonged to a man who was a foot taller than anyone else in the room. Long, curly brown hair hung to his shoulders, and bulging muscles defined his figure.
“Over there,” someone said, pointing.
Elan put down the codex and joined Ronin and Lise as the hulking man drew closer with a slight limp.
“Tadhg,” Ronin whispered.
The man stopped in front of them, wearing a Lunar Defense Corps uniform that fit his muscular body snugly. Fresh scars crossed his cheek and forehead.
“Lise Hayashi?” he asked in a gruff voice.
“Yes,” Lise replied.
“And you must be Ronin and Elan,” Tadhg said. His tone lightened, and he cracked a half smile.
Ronin nodded.
“I have a message for you,” Tadhg said. He stiffened and gestured to the beds. “I’m sorry I didn’t deliver it earlier, but I’ve been in cryostasis since the battle.”
Lise slowly sat down with Ronin and Elan.
Tadhg crouched in front of them, still so tall he met their eyes. “I was with your Uncle Akira on E-Day. I fought with him till the end of Megacity Tokyo. If it weren’t for him, I would be dead.”
“Did you
see my husband Kai?” Lise asked.
Tadhg nodded solemnly. “I’m sorry, he didn’t make it. We buried him with Zachary.”
Lise lowered her head, and Ronin put an arm around her. They had both known in their hearts that Kai was gone but hearing that his uncle had buried them together brought Ronin some relief from the pain. He pulled his arm off his mom to translate for his twin brother.
Elan teared up and laced his fingers together.
“I’m sorry about Kai, and Zachary,” Tadhg said.
“Thank you,” Lise said.
Other colonists had gathered around to see the renowned Engine Sergeant from Shadow Squad. Tadhg got up and motioned for them to get back.
“Come on, people, how about some respect?” he grumbled.
That did the trick. The crowd parted quickly.
When Tadhg turned back to them, Ronin got up.
“Do you think Uncle Akira survived?” he asked.
The scars on Tadhg’s face tightened as he smiled, revealing large, broken teeth.
“I’m sure of it,” he said. “And I’m sure he’s fighting right now. That man will continue fighting with every breath left in his lungs.”
“When is the Lunar Defense Corps going to go and help?”
The smile melted back into the Engine warrior’s stone-faced features. That was all Ronin needed to know, his suspicions were correct.
Earth was gone, and the new War Commander was giving up on the survivors.
“Don’t worry, kid,” Tadhg said. “Stay strong, stay alive, and someday you might just see your uncle again. I sure as hell plan to.”
End of Book 1
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