When Sierra turns to Skye, I expect her to extend some small kindness. She doesn’t. Instead, she says coldly, “Lose it out there again and I’ll put you down myself.”
“Stone’s not dead, I told you,” Skye says unexpectedly, half to herself. “Blame me if you want, but I saw what I saw.”
Sierra’s glare silences her. “Go now,” she tells the others. “Stay alert. Do it like we planned, like last time.”
Ovid, Peyton, and Skye leave us behind. The other three slip away a moment later.
Sierra, Dakota, Luke, and I follow. Soon we are entering a building on the north side of 110th and working our way up and up. When I step out onto the roof, the orange ball of the sun is deep in the west, mostly hidden by dark clouds. Thankfully, during our run the rain lessened and all but disappeared.
Our vantage point, ten stories up, gives us a commanding view in all directions. Park is a street we used often when we left Central and ranged north. Once having been used by both cars and trains, Park itself has two avenues for cars running north and south with six train lines between them, making it wide enough for a sixty-four to walk shoulder to shoulder and still have room to drive lines of mechs on either side of them.
“They’ll come from the south,” Dakota says. He and Luke set up their heavy rifles near the southeast corner of the roof and start sighting into the distance.
Sierra holds back. “About before,” she says, “I’m not going to apologize. Not to you, to Skye, to anyone. You can think me unkind, hateful even. I don’t care.”
“I understand,” I say, “but you have to let me in. You have to let me help you. All this anger you’re holding in—”
“You don’t understand anything. This isn’t anger—it’s rage, and it’s the only thing that keeps us alive out here.” She unshoulders her heavy rifle and throws her pack at me. “Supplies... Extra rounds on the right, rations on the left, bandages up front. You don’t have a sighting rifle, so you make sure the rest of us get what we need when we need it and you watch the door behind us. Got it?”
I eye the door. Then I step toward her and appeal to her with my eyes. “Are you sure about this?”
She brings up her heavy rifle, wraps it around her shoulder. It comes a little too close and I jump back. “We get back to Refuge ten for ten and four, you can say whatever you want. Out here, you don’t get to question anything I say. Got it?”
I glance away and back. “Yes, got it,” I say coolly. I want desperately to see in her eyes the girl I knew. The girl who was my sister.
After that, there’s nothing to say. I walk away. She sets up in the southwest corner of the roof but is facing north. I think she does this so she can easily swing around to the west if needed. I don’t doubt she knows what she’s doing. I do doubt her reasons for going after a column of machines.
Watching as I wait, I mourn for the sister I knew. The Sierra who wanted to kiss butterflies. The Sierra who’s eyes lit up whenever I touched the words in the book. I wonder what has changed her so dramatically. I thought I knew most of what happened since I left in search of Luke. Obviously though, there’s so much more she hasn’t told me.
We don’t have long to wait. I can tell something’s happening in the distance because of the way Luke and Dakota are sighting and focusing.
I crawl forward at Dakota’s signal. “First quad coming,” he says. “Two mechs in the lead. Two trailing. No sign of the other quad or any wisps.”
Sierra’s watching our backs, so she’s not seeing this. I crawl to her. “It’s starting,” I say. “First quad, no wisps.”
I turn to crawl back to my position near the door. She grabs my hand, squeezes. “You’ll see. Soon,” she says, “then you’ll know.”
Chapter 11
Node: 101
Everything happens so quickly when the quad comes into view. I’m on my belly beside Luke. Somehow he’s opened his wound and I’m trying to apply another layer of bandages. He has his rifle at the ready, but he can’t sight very well with me fussing over him.
Dakota has his eye pressed into his rifle scope, his finger ready on the trigger. Sierra is scanning with her scope, watching the approach from the north.
Half a block to the south, on the west side of the street, I see Ovid, Peyton and Skye preparing themselves. Across from them, on the east side of the street, I see Cali, Vesta and Luka doing the same. Both groups are hunkered down, out of view from those coming but clear enough for me to see from above.
I don’t know what to expect because I’ve never attacked the machines in this way before. I feel useless and wish I’d taken the heavy rifle earlier. The others have tasks and objectives. I have only to wait for them to need me.
I pull the fabric back across Luke’s shoulder, patting softly to let him know I’m finished. “All done,” I say, leaning up to his ear. “Be more careful next time.”
Even before I zip him up, he’s waving me away, returning to his scope with renewed purpose. “I’ll see you later,” he says, “Stay strong. We’ll get through this. Then you and I need to talk.”
“We do,” I say, touching his arm. We’ve been so preoccupied we still haven’t talked through all that happened before we found each other. Knowing might explain his reaction to the news of John’s return.
I crawl back to the middle of the roof, losing much of my view of the street below. For the first time, it occurs to me that waiting was one of our options too. We didn’t have to do anything. We could have stayed in Central Park and let the machines sort everything out for themselves. We wouldn’t get the answers we wanted, but we’d be safe and together.
I think more about Luke. He’s been keenly interested in what I’m talking to Dakota and Sierra about, but has told me nothing of his talks with them or others. I know he wants to be out there searching and wonder if he’s planning something without me.
I want to be somewhere else too. But it’s more that I want to know what’s true and what isn’t. I am different. More different even than Luke, Sierra or Dakota I suspect. This broken city may be the only home I’ve ever known, I may know there’s no such thing as “safe” with the machines occupying it, and I may have other things on my mind than what I should. And so, apparently, do they.
Sierra’s hand signal draws me to her. “The second quad?”
I turn over on my back, and look up at her as I try to calm my breathing. “No sign as yet.”
She frowns. “Something’s not right. Get down below. Tell them to let the first quad pass, to wait for the second.”
I rush off. It seems an eternity before I reach the landing on the first floor. The side door exits on the west side of the building. I hustle around to the south side. Skye is on me before I turn the corner.
“It’s me, Cedes,” I say. My rifle is on the roof with the heavy pack. The only weapon I have is the pistol in my hand, which I holster to reassure her.
Her eyes widen, but she doesn’t lower her rifle. “Is there a problem?”
“Change of plans,” I say. “Let the first quad pass, wait for the second.”
She grabs my arm and pulls me down into the shadows. It’s a reaction to something I don’t see or hear.
I start to ask her what’s going on. She cuts me off with a hiss: “Follow.”
She rushes off, stooped over, and I do my best to keep a low profile while moving as fast as I can after her. She doesn’t look back at me as she works around and into the nest where Ovid and Peyton are set up. She just reaches back occasionally to determine whether I’m close. But the secluded spot is empty when we reach it.
Skye mumbles some kind of apology before racing away. I’m left asking the empty air, “What’s going on?”
From the nest, I watch in mute horror as Skye tries to catch up to Ovid and Peyton. I think Skye is going to wave them off, that’s not what she does.
While the trio stalks the west side of the street, Cali, Vesta and Luka shadow the east side, moving alongside the marching remnants. They’ve
left their rifles behind, and I have no idea what they plan to do when they catch up with the quad. With two mech trucks at the front of the line and two mech trucks at the rear, engine noise and the turning of mechanized wheels drowns out everything else.
I glance up to the roof. From here, there’s no hint that Dakota, Luke and Sierra are up there watching over us. I can’t help thinking that this shouldn’t be happening, that there has to be a way to stop this, even though I know there’s nothing that can be done.
Chapter 12
Node: 101
Skye, Peyton and the others make their move when they are lined up with the final row of the quad. It happens in a few blinkings of the eye. One moment the six are shadows, the next they are out in the street.
I expect weapons fire, rifles and pistols blasting in greeting. Instead, there is silence and nimble moves. Twelve hands reaching out, clasping mouths, gripping chests, and taking down the four remnants with the barest of struggles. Two are pulled to the west side of the street by Skye, Ovid and Peyton. Two are pulled to the east side by Luka, Vesta and Cali. It’s a perfect plan, executed flawlessly, but not an accomplishment without consequences. And what follows is mayhem.
I duck down as the quad reforms into defensive wedges. Soon after, octets of golds with rifles and pistols are fanning out in all directions, blasting away at every shadow. Despite the chaos, Skye, Ovid and Peyton manage to reach me, their illicit cargo intact and unconscious.
I count those who don’t give chase: 20. They stand guardedly within the defensive perimeter formed by the four mech trucks. Most have no weapons. Some of them are wearing black. Others, orange or yellow. A few, copper. The coppers seem to be acting as sentries.
“Why did you do that?” I whisper. “Sierra’s orders were to wait.”
Ovid and Peyton don’t say anything. Their eyes are on our surroundings. At any moment, I expect them to make a break for it. They don’t.
Skye flashes a mischievous smile. “And you didn’t reach us in time, did you?”
“No, I guess I didn’t,” I say, then I settle in for whatever’s coming while I try to figure out a few things that don’t make sense. Why weren’t the machines better prepared for an attack? How come so many members of the quad don’t have weapons? Why does the quad have golds and coppers?
Skye collects metal discs the size of my palm from Ovid and Peyton. Attached to the bottom of the discs are rows of needles. The needles are short, about the length of the fingernail on my little finger. I can tell at once the discs are used to give some sort of injection. If the discs were used on the captives that would explain how quickly they went down and why they remain unconscious.
Kneeling down, I reach out to touch one of the discs in Skye’s open pack. She grabs my wrist and shakes her head. “Don’t,” she says. “Maybe you should be readying to move out.”
I put my hands on my waist. “Doesn’t look like we’re going anywhere soon.”
I notice a slight curl in her lip. She turns around and points to where Ovid and Peyton are lifting a heavy metal cover from the ground. “We’re going now.”
In the dark hole revealed by removing the cover is a ladder. Skye clambers down it and into the gloom. Ovid and Peyton lower one of the unconscious remnants into the hole. He’s dressed in black and his head and arms hang limply.
It’s as I watch the second, dressed in orange, being lowered into the hole that I realize the significance of the colors I’m seeing: gold, copper, black, orange, yellow. Golds are soldiers; coppers are security; the others are workers.
My first week with the machines my octet was two orange, four black, and two orange and we performed construction and industrial work. My second week we were two yellow, four black and two yellow and we worked with electrical circuitry and communications components. They didn’t go after a combat patrol; they went after some sort of work detail. And immediately, I want to know what’s inside the trucks.
“You next,” Peyton says to me. “Careful, it’s slippery and wet down there.”
It takes me a moment to return from my thoughts. Then I descend the ladder where I’m greeted by damp air and a foul stench. The deeper I descend the more pungent the odor that stings my nose grows.
Skye is waiting for me. Her hand on my back is reassuring as I step off the final rung into a thin layer of muck and water. The tunnel I find myself in seems to stretch out endlessly. A short distance ahead, I can see other tunnels leading off of it, going north and south.
Ovid and Peyton climb in together. Halfway down the ladder, they reach up and pull the metal cover into place atop the hole, plunging the tunnel into what seems like total darkness.
Skye’s grip at my elbow keeps me still. “It’ll be okay,” she says. “Don’t try to move just yet. Let your eyes adjust.”
Ovid and Peyton step around me. I can’t see what they’re doing, but the scrapes on the ground and the movements I hear tell me they’ve lifted the captives and perhaps put them over their shoulders.
We start walking, not west like I expect, but east. Skye stays close, her eyes searching and her weapon ready. I ready my pistol as well.
As my eyes adjust, I start to make out shapes around me. The tunnel we’re in is round and straight, big enough so that I can’t reach out and touch the walls on either side or above us, but not so considerable that I forget for a moment where I am.
At times, the muck beneath my feet is so thick it feels like I’m stepping in glue. Other times, there’s nothing but a thin layer that sloshes beneath my boots.
I can’t stop thinking about the mech trucks and what’s inside them. If we knew what they were carrying, we’d know what the machines were building. Something Sierra told me when we saw the blades comes to mind. She said she’d never seen machines this far north before. That she’d never seen any machine in this part of the city before.
I hear footsteps other than ours in the dark. “Skye?” I say quietly, aiming my pistol.
Skye’s hand returns to my arm. “It’s just Cali and the others.”
A tall, long-legged figure emerging from the darkness confirms this. It’s Vesta, behind her I see two others. A girl with long black hair and a broad-shouldered boy with bright eyes: Cali and Luka. Vesta has the feet of one of the captives, Cali the torso. Luka has the other up over his shoulder.
Skye greets them with a squeal of delight. Then we turn south into the cross-tunnel I saw earlier. Here, the darkness is pierced occasionally by shafts of light from overhead which help us avoid dross and detritus we might otherwise trip over.
“I keep expecting to see Luke and the others at any moment,” I say quietly to Skye as we walk.
She does an about face, walking backward for a few steps. I know she’s studying the way we’ve come, making sure we’re not being followed. “Getting off the roof won’t be easy. They’ll likely need to stay put until nightfall.”
The story continues with:
After the Machines
Episode Six: Deception
The Secret of Us
About the Author
Robert Stanek is author of the #1 bestselling ELVES OF THE REACHES, an epic fantasy series, currently comprising eight books, which has been translated into twelve languages; the #1 bestselling MAGIC LANDS, a young adult series comprising two books and counting, which has been translated into seven languages; and the #1 bestselling POCKET CONSULTANTS, a computer technology series comprising 35 books and counting, which have been translated into 21 languages.
Robert is also author of the #1 bestselling BUGVILLE CRITTERS, a children’s series comprising 28 books and counting; #1 bestselling BUGVILLE LEARNING, an educational series comprising 31 books and counting; the #1 bestselling BUGVILLE JR, a children’s series comprising 26 books and counting; and the #1 bestselling THE PIECES OF THE PUZZLE, a mystery thriller novel for adults.
In his fiction writing, Robert transports readers to many imagined worlds. Robert’s early fiction work has many influences, including JRR T
olkien, C S Lewis, Anne McCaffrey, H G Wells, and Ray Bradbury.
In his long, distinguished writing career, Robert’s books have been distributed and/or published by Simon & Schuster, Random House, Macmillan, Pearson, Microsoft, O’Reilly, and others. In 2007, Robert founded Go Indie, an organization dedicated to supporting independent publishers, authors, and booksellers, and over the past few years Go Indie has helped hundreds of independents.
Dubbed ‘A Face Behind the Future’ in the 1990’s by The Olympian, Robert’s been helping to shape the future of the written word for over two decades. Robert’s 150th book was published in 2013.
Select Acclaim for Robert Stanek…
“Robert Stanek is one of our most featured and respected Kids & Young Adults, K-12 Educators and Kids authors.”
--The Audio Book Store
“Stanek [has] a penchant for clear and simple prose. He also prefers swift, action-oriented scenes. Solidly built. Stanek moves among his main characters with ease, always switching at a climactic moment to maintain suspense. The accessible, brisk language keeps things moving.”
--Foreword Magazine
“Sure to attract fans of graphic novels and classic Tolkien alike. Stanek will likely draw a cult following. This guarantees fans, and those fans will be ready to wield their swords against the Dark Lord in Stanek’s next installment.”
-- VOYA, the leading magazine for YA librarians
“Word of mouth turned it into a bestseller. Very satisfying.”
-- The Fantasy Guide
Select Achievements for Robert Stanek and his Ruin Mist books…
#1 Fiction, Audible (12 weeks, 2005)
Top 50 Sci-fi/Fantasy, Amazon (26 weeks, 2002)
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