The Guardians of Zoone

by Lee Edward Födi

  “Doo-do-do-doo!” she kazooed.

  “Did you just turn my blender into . . . a gun?!” Aunt Temperance cried.

  “Ooh! Try testing it on me,” Tug said.

  “You’re not a moto,” Scoot told the skyger.

  “Try it anyway,” Tug implored.

  Scoot obliged, firing a blast of nectar in Tug’s direction. The skyger opened his giant maw and gulped it down. “Delicious,” he purred, his fur turning a satisfied orange.

  Cho chuckled. “We might have a chance now. Come on, everyone.” He led them to the stairs, but he came to a halt before taking the first step. There were motos heading up from below.

  “Action time!” Scoot proclaimed. She gave her blender gun a theatrical twirl, then bumbled down the steps on her wheel, firing and squealing in delight the whole way down.

  Fidget rolled her eyes. “She’s enjoying using that blender way too much.”

  “Oh, and you didn’t?” Ozzie asked.

  “Whatever,” Fidget said. “Come on!”

  They raced down the stairs to see every moto in the vicinity coated in a thick layer of nectar, their eyes flickering in distress and their limbs twitching like dying insects.

  “A-lert! A-ler . . . ,” came their gargled speech—then they sputtered to a stop.

  “It worked!” Ozzie cheered.

  “Six motos sabotaged,” Scoot reported. “Ninety-nine thousand, three hundred and seventy-two remaining.”

  “Good work, Scoot,” Cho congratulated her as he used the tip of his sword to prod a sticky moto out of the way. “Now, let’s find that station.”

  The misfit moto gave a salute, then began zipping through the debris, Ozzie and the others hard on her trail. At first, motos attacked them from every direction, but Scoot never stopped firing.

  “Ninety-nine thousand, three hundred and forty-two motos remaining,” she called out. “Ninety-nine thousand, three hundred and forty-one! Ninety-nine thousand, three hundred and forty! Ninety-nine thousand, three hundred and thirty-nine . . .”

  “That canteen really better be bottomless,” Ozzie said between panting breaths.

  “Yeah, or we’re dead meat,” Fidget added.

  They were soon able to outpace the motos, leaving behind the scrapyard and returning to a functioning part of the city, where the factories still rumbled in ceaseless operation.

  Scoot braked in front of a large console. “I can connecty here!” she declared. She plugged a finger into a socket and her eyes started flickering rapidly, as if she was downloading information. “Oh! I found a shorty-short!”

  “Do you mean a shortcut?” Aunt Temperance asked, but the moto had already raced off.

  They bolted through the labyrinth of machines, Scoot taking every turn with purpose—until she rounded a silo and screeched to a halt.

  “Motos!” she shouted.

  Ozzie grimaced. The robots were attacking from everywhere. It was like Scoot had said; every single one of them had zeroed in on their location. But why? What had upset them so much? Not even entering their base had provoked this sort of response. Ozzie’s gaze wandered toward Scoot. The only thing that had changed was that they now had a moto on their side. A very particular moto.

  It’s you, he realized as he chased Scoot down a different aisle. Why are you so important to them?

  Every path, every attempted escape route, led to the same result: more motos. Scoot and the blender simply couldn’t keep up. Suddenly, there was nowhere else to run. They were cornered against a conveyor belt, a whole new set of motos closing in on them. Ozzie could tell they were new—they had strange attachments at the ends of their arms, like pipe barrels.

  “Wait a minute,” Ozzie said. “Are those—”

  “Duck!” Fidget screamed, grabbing Ozzie by the top of the head and forcing him down. An enormous bullet whistled overhead.

  “We’re in trouble,” Cho uttered, sliding beneath the conveyor belt as more bullets began to fly. “Everyone, under here!”

  But Ozzie didn’t follow him, despite the flying bullets. He had suddenly noticed something about the conveyor belt: It was carrying heavy crucibles full of rocks. Enormous metal pincers were reaching down to unload the casks of ore—then, once relieved of their burden, the empty crucibles were placed back on the conveyor, which then curved and headed in the opposite direction.

  “I think this is the same belt we followed into the city!” Ozzie said excitedly. “We can just climb aboard and ride it all the way to the station—too bad it isn’t quicker.”

  “You want me to juice it up?!” Scoot asked, her eyes flashing excitedly. “No problem!”

  She reared to her full height, fired a stream of nectar at the approaching motos to provide cover, then zipped over to the control panel at the side of the conveyor. She brought the belt to a stop, then vaulted herself into the nearest crucible. She was close enough to the console that her long arms could still access it. “All aboard!” she directed. “We’ll be out of here in a whirly-whirl.”

  Ozzie and Fidget clambered into the crucible in front of Scoot, but there was no room left for Tug, so he bounded into the one ahead of them.

  Scoot wiggled her chunky fingers over the control panel like a magician preparing to perform. “I’ll program it not to stop until we reach Untaar—and plug in a little cheaty-cheat so the motos can’t turn it off.”

  “Are we sure this is a good idea?” Aunt Temperance asked, even as the next wave of motos began firing.

  Cho had already climbed into the crucible at the head of the line. “I don’t think we have a choice,” he told her, extending her a hand.

  Aunt Temperance slung her bag into the crucible and, ignoring his hand, leaped gracefully inside.

  “Start us up, Scoot!” Ozzie cried.

  “How fasty-fast?”

  “Moderate but expedient!” Aunt Temperance replied.

  “Unless there’s a setting for ‘get us out of here,’” Fidget quipped.

  More bullets soared, puncturing a tank overhead that began hissing hot yellow steam.

  “Just punch it!” Cho shouted.

  “Okeydokey!”

  The conveyor shot off like a roller coaster at top speed—except in roller coasters, Ozzie thought woozily, they buckled you in. His eyes teared up as the factory world whipped past them. They took a corner so quickly that the crucible he and Fidget were in tilted up on one edge, like a car on two wheels, then rocked to the opposite edge before slamming back down on the conveyor. Ozzie managed a glance at Fidget; her fingers were white at the knuckles as she held on for dear life. She leaned over the edge as if she was about to puke herself purple, but Ozzie threw his arms around her waist and reeled her back inside just as a giant mechanical arm zoomed past, narrowly missing taking her head off.

  They didn’t even have time for a sigh of relief—they were tossed against the far wall, and Ozzie realized the conveyor had started going upward, but without losing any speed. Once it flattened out, they were so far up that Ozzie couldn’t even see the factory floor beyond the haze and layers of machinery.

  More mechanical arms thrashed around them, as if purposely trying to snatch them. Then it occurred to Ozzie that was exactly what they were trying to do. Maybe the motos can’t shut down the conveyor, he thought, but they’ve mobilized the factory against us!

  Ozzie saw Tug’s crucible whip around a corner in front of them—but then he lost sight of him completely. It took a moment for Ozzie to register that the container he and Fidget were in had sailed right off the belt.

  “Hang on!” he screamed as they plummeted downward.

  They crashed onto another conveyor belt and continued trundling along. Ozzie exchanged a terrified glance with Fidget before looking up. Somewhere up there in the green smog was the conveyor that they were supposed to be on with Aunt Temperance and the others.

  How are we going to find them again? Ozzie worried.

  “Ozzie!” Fidget shrieked.

  A giant metal hammer w
as roaring toward them. It clobbered the side of their crucible, sending it spinning off the conveyor belt. Down they plunged, through the network of machinery. Ozzie squeezed his eyes shut, bracing for impact—but instead of hitting rock-solid ground, they landed with a soft plunk.

  “Huh?” Ozzie groaned. He was completely disoriented, flipped upside down in the crucible. Fidget pulled him to his feet, and he saw her face twist in an expression of disgust. “What is i—”

  The stench walloped him like a fist: a mixture of hard-boiled eggs, burnt hair, and gasoline. He peered over the edge of the container and saw that they had dropped into a gray channel of wastewater. Though, Ozzie considered, you really couldn’t call it water. It was so disgustingly thick that their heavy crucible hadn’t even sunk.

  Yet.

  “I think this is the same gunk that we crossed to reach Cho’s hideout,” Ozzie said.

  “Well,” Fidget said, “right now the only place we’re going is down.”

  Already, the crucible had started to tip, one side of its rim dipping below the surface and allowing a chunky burble of sludge to ooze inside. It continued to tilt, so precariously that they were forced to scramble over the edge and find safety on its exterior side, which had now become the top.

  “It’s going to be like drowning in cement pudding,” Ozzie said as they shuffled about, trying to balance their weight and slow their descent.

  “Toxic cement pudding,” Fidget added. “Look on the bright side. We might die from the smell before we drown.”

  Ozzie desperately surveyed the banks of the channel, which were smooth slopes of asphalt. “Maybe we can try to swim for—”

  He saw the mechanical arm at the very last minute. It swung down and plucked him from the top of the crucible like he was a toy in a machine at an arcade.

  “Hey! Don’t leave me!” Fidget shouted.

  The robot claw dropped Ozzie and he landed on his back, so hard that it knocked the breath out of him. When he groggily lifted his head, it was to find himself on a conveyor belt running parallel to the river. This one was made of grooved metal, like the stairs of an escalator, and it was carrying heaps of rock rubble. Ozzie pulled himself to his elbows and saw Fidget in the distance, still standing on the crucible—though there was hardly anything left of it. She was dancing on her tiptoes, trying to avoid the ravenous sludge.

  Have to help her! Ozzie thought. He tried scrambling to his feet, only to be tugged back down with a jerk—his shoelace had gotten snagged in the toothy metal slats beneath him and now he was being reeled along like a fish on a hook. As he frantically tried to kick himself free, he managed a desperate glance toward Fidget, but she was even farther away now—and up to her ankles in gunk. What was worse, he wondered: Having your feet devoured by a conveyor belt or by acid?

  Then something sharp slammed into his shoulder from behind, causing him to spasm in pain. He twisted around.

  And screamed.

  He was staring straight into a set of metal jaws, grinding everything into oblivion. Pebbles and grit—the spit-back from the rocks being pulverized—were pelting him. He yanked even harder on his foot and threw one last look at the river—only to see that Fidget’s crucible had sunk.

  She’s gone, Ozzie thought. And so am I.

  17

  Crossing the Wild Lands

  Suddenly, Ozzie’s shoelace snapped. He toppled backward into the toothy throat of the grinder and—felt himself flying through the air.

  Something had him by his shirt collar, but only for a moment before it hurled him forward and he landed atop a gigantic pipe. He nearly slid right off its rounded surface, but then, somehow, Aunt Temperance was right beside him, steadying him with a firm hand. Her other hand clutched the frayed end of an electrical cable, which stretched into the mechanical clutter above.

  Ozzie gaped at her. “Did you just save me? Fidget’s—”

  “Safe, too. Get on my back—now!”

  That was the last thing Ozzie wanted to do. It was embarrassing enough to have been rescued by an aunt who, up until recently, had been known mostly for her ability to dispatch a cup of tea, but now she expected him to ride piggyback like a three-year-old?

  “I said NOW!” Aunt Temperance commanded.

  Ozzie looked up to see an enormous mechanical blade slicing toward them, and every self-conscious thought evacuated his mind like water down a drain. He leaped onto Aunt Temperance’s back and she launched into the air, barely avoiding the ax. She swung them to a nearby catwalk, snatched another cable, then vaulted onward, like an orangutan through an industrial jungle.

  Before long, they were dangling over the original conveyor. Ozzie could see the empty crucibles zooming along below them, but the conveyor was moving so fast, the casks were spaced much farther apart.

  “Get ready!” Aunt Temperance warned—and then, after taking a moment to gauge the timing, she dropped them into one of the empty vessels.

  Ozzie stared at her in bewilderment. He had spent his life thinking Aunt Temperance was the type of person who was hanging by a thread. But it turned out she had actually been hanging by a trapeze swing, ready to perform death-defying stunts with perfect timing. “How . . . how can you do that?” he asked.

  “More practice than you can imagine,” Aunt Temperance told him. Her hair was wild, sticking out in every direction.

  “Fidget—”

  “Tug snatched her from the sludge, and I snatched you,” Aunt Temperance told him.

  “You flew through the air,” Ozzie said. “Like a superhero.”

  Aunt Temperance coughed. “I don’t think that’s what makes you a hero.”

  “What, being able to fly?” Ozzie countered. That was exactly what made someone a superhero. He felt the sudden need to apologize to her, to tell her he was sorry for underestimating her. Even though he had seen her swing over the river to Cho’s hideout, even though he knew she had rescued Fidget in the cosmic storm, he hadn’t quite believed it until now.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked.

  “About what?”

  “Anything!” Ozzie blurted. “About the circus. About Mercurio. Why didn’t you guys get married?”

  Aunt Temperance swallowed. The conveyor had finally exited the city and now she turned her gaze to the vast landscape of rusted metal plates whipping past them. “My parents were against it,” she said at last. “We planned to elope, but . . .”

  “What?” Ozzie prodded.

  “My father came and stole me away. Mercurio and I were supposed to meet at a prearranged place, but by the time I managed to escape through a window and get there, I . . . I . . . I was too late. Mercurio was gone.” Aunt Temperance released a long sigh. “He must have thought I changed my mind.”

  “Didn’t you ever try to find him?” Ozzie asked.

  “He vanished,” Aunt Temperance said simply. “And I had . . . other things to deal with. Life.”

  Ozzie pondered her explanation, but it didn’t make much sense to him. Why had she given up? Or, at the very least, why hadn’t she gone back to her job in the circus? It would have been way better than her tedious office job. He had so many questions, he didn’t know which one to ask first. He settled on, “What do you mean, Mercurio vanished? Why didn’t he come looking for you?”

  “I don’t know,” Aunt Temperance admitted. “I spent a long time asking myself that very question. Then a longer time trying to ignore it. But . . .”

  “But what?”

  Aunt Temperance was still staring out at the metal landscape. “What if pain is important?” she asked.

  That made zero sense to Ozzie. “Aunt T, maybe—”

  The conveyor abruptly sputtered to a halt. Ozzie and Aunt Temperance looked at each other in surprise.

  “I guess the motos figured out how to stop this thing after all,” Ozzie said.

  The conveyor juddered and started rumbling backward.

  “Get out!” Aunt Temperance exclaimed, heaving Ozzie over the side of the crucib
le. “Hurry!”

  Ozzie landed roughly on the metal ground, followed by Aunt Temperance, who arrived with considerably more grace. Ozzie stared at her, so many questions still percolating inside of him. “Aunt T,” he began, “why didn’t you—”

  “Come on,” she cut him off. “I guess we’ll have to walk the rest of the way.”

  Ozzie knew that tone. It meant she didn’t want to talk about her past anymore—and he knew better than to push it. She had already turned and set off across the desolate landscape, so he squared his shoulders and followed her.

  When it comes to Aunt T, every answer just leads to more questions, he pondered.

  Only fifteen minutes later, the station came into sight, and there were the others, waiting on the steps.

  “Creator!” Scoot squealed, wheeling up to Ozzie. “I thought I lost you again.”

  “Are you okay?” Tug wondered, after licking Ozzie’s cheek with his sandpaper tongue.

  Ozzie nodded as Fidget came over and punched him in the shoulder. “Ow! What was that for?”

  “Why didn’t you take your shoe off?” she demanded.

  Ozzie glanced down at his shoe and its frayed shoelace. She made a good point, but he wasn’t about to tell her that. “I didn’t want to lose it?” he replied somewhat lamely.

  “You nearly lost a lot more,” she retorted. Then she hugged him—which, Ozzie thought, kind of defeated the purpose of the punch.

  “Hey, what happened to your shoes?” he asked, staring down at Fidget’s feet. They were bare and blistered.

  “That gunk ate right through them,” she said.

  “I have a spare pair of flats in my bag,” Aunt Temperance told the princess as she began digging through her things. “Our feet are close to the same size, so they should fit you. And let’s get some salve on those sores.”

  “Thanks, Aunt T,” Fidget said, sitting down on the steps.

  As soon as Aunt Temperance’s ministrations were complete, they climbed the stairs and entered the abandoned station. It had been less than a day since they had arrived here, Ozzie realized, but it sure felt longer than that. They followed the path of the conveyors through the open doorway and into the tunnel beyond. Unlike most of the portals Ozzie had seen during his time at Zoone Station, this one was somber and quiet; the only sound came from the conveyor belts. The track itself wasn’t moving at all, and the skyscape was a swirl of unusually dull colors.