The Severed Tower (46 page)

“This belong to you?” one of them asked.

Through his blurred vision, Ravan crouched down next to him. “A prized possession.”

Holt stared up at her through the pain. “Hi.”

“What the hell happened to you?” she asked, studying not just the blood, but the dirt and grime all over him.

“Just … give it a second.”

The tripods burst around the corner, trumpeting angrily, led by the Royal, and Ravan ducked out of sight. “Well, okay then.” She motioned to one of her men, and he tossed her a shotgun. Holt had the same idea, switching out the Sig for his Ithaca. They both started loading shells.

“You know, I’ve killed these things before,” Holt informed her.

Ravan was unimpressed. “Me, too.” Behind them the Hunters trumpeted, searching. Explosions flared in the distance.

“I was being chased by, like, a thousand Forsaken at the time,” Holt retorted.

Ravan shrugged. “I was dodging a time-locked semitruck exploding through a wall.”

Holt kept loading shells. “Killed mine with shotgun blasts, close range.”

“That’s funny. So did I.”

Holt pumped the final shell into the chamber. “Guess we have a plan, then.” Ravan smiled back at him.

Holt whistled four short notes, and Max bolted right and out into the open. The tripods tracked the dog, opening fire, but Max dodged and weaved in his best White Helix imitation.

While the Hunters were distracted, Holt and Ravan rolled out from cover. Their shotguns thundered. Sparks exploded from two walkers, staggering them back, one blast after another, until flame exploded out their exhaust ports and the machines crumpled to the ground.

Holt and Ravan slid back into cover, just in time to see two Hunters land on top of the bus, staring down at the Menagerie.

“Maybe that wasn’t the smartest idea,” Holt said.

Plasma cannons opened up. Two of Ravan’s men fell, instantly dead.

“Run!” Ravan ordered, but more Hunters appeared on either side, blocking them. One was the Royal. Holt looked around for any escape as the thing’s cannons began to prime. There wasn’t any.

Then a stream of new plasma bolts slammed into the walker and flung it backward, clearing out the threatening tripods.

Everyone turned and looked. Two other machines stood a hundred yards away. One had five legs, a powerful blocky frame, and an energy shield crackling around it. The other one was a Mantis. Ten feet tall, raised off the ground by four legs, and heavily armored with twin mounted plasma cannons and a missile battery. Like the five-legged walker, its colors were gone, leaving only the bright silver of bare metal.

“Ambassador…” Holt breathed, feeling hope.

The street filled with bright, wavering flashes, and multiple bursts of distorted sound, as more five-legged walkers, half a dozen, teleported into the battle zone—each bringing reinforcements. More Mantises, and something else, too. Something that towered over the ruined buildings, something huge.

A Spider. The largest, most powerful walker in the Assembly arsenal. Thirty feet tall, almost as wide as the street, with eight large legs holding its huge fuselage. Spiders were the most feared sight on the planet, and this one, for the moment, was on
their
side.

A frightening sound bellowed from the huge machine, like electronic whale song, and it stepped forward, its footfalls shaking the ground. The Hunters trumpeted uncertainly, and then scrambled as plasma fire sizzled toward them. Two of them crashed to the ground, their armor disintegrating in flame.

The remainder, including the Royal, withdrew—and Holt caught a glimpse of a gray blur chasing after them, growling evilly.

“That dog’s even dumber than you are,” Ravan observed, “but I’m kinda starting to like him.”

Holt whistled and Max skidded to a stop and ran back, tongue lapping out of his mouth.

All three of them, with what was left of the Menagerie, ran toward the silver walkers. The gunships arced in the sky. Plasma bolts streaked everywhere, raining down into Ambassador’s small but imposing force. The shields flared to life around each of the five-legged walkers, and they charged forward.

It was total war, and Holt and Ravan ran through the middle of it.

*   *   *

AVRIL GROANED AS SHE
burst through the cloud of fire that erupted from the fallen Hunter. She landed on the ground and recalled her missing spear point, catching it with a jerk back onto her Lancet.

Each of her Arc, one-on-one against these small Assembly walkers, were more than a match for them. She could see Gideon’s vision, even his strategy for individual encounters. Two Helix for a Mantis, six to take down a Spider, it was all so clear to her now. Gideon hadn’t lied. They
were
made for this.

The problem was, right now it
wasn’t
a one-on-one fight. There were only a little more than twenty White Helix facing hundreds of Hunters plus airships, and whatever those larger walkers did. The grim reality was clear. For all their skill and strength, they would be overtaken soon.

But it didn’t matter. They were never in this fight to win. They simply needed to hold off the Assembly long enough for the Prime to reach the Tower. Then, whatever was going to happen would happen.

In the distance, bright flashes of light sparked to life up and down the line of larger walkers. Seconds later, the popping sounds of ordnance being fired echoed through the air.

Avril’s eyes widened. She had a sense of what was coming. “Heads up!”

There were explosions in the air, and Avril saw streaks of light raining down, as if something large had burst into dozens of smaller pieces.

A second later she knew what they were.

The small buildings and old cars filling the streets rocked as hundreds of explosions blanketed the area, and Avril leaped up and away in a flash of yellow.

She saw two of her Arc, and one of Dane’s, consumed in the fireballs and disappear. Avril grimaced, but kept moving.

She knew what the larger walkers were now: artillery. She also noticed something else. The flurry of cluster bombs exploding all around never once struck one of the green-and-orange walkers. It couldn’t be a coincidence. It meant the ordnance had the ability to differentiate targets. It was brilliant, given the Hunters’ propensity for stealth and speed. It allowed them to lunge into a fight they might be outclassed in, with devastating support from behind.

Two more of Avril’s Arc fell, caught by plasma bolts, unable to avoid all the flying death in the air, even with their skills. They would be cut to pieces in this storm.

New plasma bolts suddenly flared around her, and she saw, back near the center of the ruins, something amazing. Mantis walkers and a giant Spider firing
back
at the Hunters near them. In front, charging forward, was a line of five-legged walkers, like the one that had befriended the Prime.

Each was silver, their bodies bereft of color.

“Pull back!” Avril yelled. “Pull back to the buildings!” She heard Dane shout the same order, saw the Helix dashing away as one, covered in purple or yellow light. If they could get back to the buildings and those silver walkers, they might actually have a chance.

Avril leaped into the air after her Arc. The onslaught of Hunters fired after them and gave chase, renewed by the Helix’s retreat.

*   *   *

MIRA’S VISION WENT BLACK
as she slammed back to the ground, the Vortex tossing her like a rag doll, in a flurry of flashing particles. She had a feeling her leg was broken now, too, but the pain had yet to register. Somehow, she managed to hold onto the plutonium that kept the Anomaly at bay, and Zoey had avoided being hurt as well. It was Mira’s final wish to protect the child as long as she could.

She moaned and looked up. Above her, the Severed Tower loomed, a shadow that stood massive out amid the glowing haze of the Vortex, two giant shapes broken apart in the air.

There had been a time when she dreamed of seeing the Tower, the deepest part of the Strange Lands. She and Ben had talked late into the night about it, imagining what it looked like, what it might actually do.

Now she felt nothing for it but revulsion. This thing that, if what Gideon and Ben believed was true, had arranged every little detail of her life to bring her to this point. And for what? To die? To be beaten and in pain? What was the point of that? She hated the thing now, whatever it was.

As the Vortex roared around her, she thought of Gideon’s idea, of the paper dragon, the pain that came from opening it, the image it had seared in her mind. She saw the mirror, her own reflection, but it hadn’t been her. It had been everything she wasn’t—strong, confident, and assured.

She remembered what Gideon told her, that maybe the mirror was the important thing. Not the reflection. But what did that mean? She was supposed to find something that reflected a true image. Something—or maybe, the idea occurred to her—
someone.

Holt’s last words rang in her head.
I believe in you.

They had stirred something. It wasn’t just the words, it was how he had said them. Forceful and pointed. He wasn’t just telling her what she needed to hear. He was telling her something he
felt,
and it had moved her. She wanted it to be true.

Mira realized something then. Looking back, she knew why Holt was different from Ben. He gave her strength. Since her father had disappeared, he was maybe the only one who ever had. Not Lenore, not even the Librarian—and definitely not Ben. Ben took her strength, intentionally or unintentionally made her rely on him. Holt made her feel like she could do anything all by herself.

If he made her feel that way … maybe it was because it was true.

It was him, she suddenly knew. It was Holt.
Holt
was her mirror. It had been there the whole time, but she had never seen it.

The realization filled her with renewed strength. The world snapped back into focus; and with it came pain. Horrible, lancing pain in her broken arm and leg. The pain helped focus her as much as the thoughts of Holt.

She stared with anger back up at the Tower looming over her. “Let’s see what you know,” Mira said in a cracked voice.
“Let’s just see!”
She couldn’t walk, not with her leg, but maybe that was for the best. Every time she stood up the Vortex ripped her off her feet.

Instead, this time, Mira rolled onto her back, keeping her arm around Zoey and the plutonium, and pushed back with her good leg across the empty ground, toward the Tower. One leg length at a time—and each push was agony.

Mira’s vision blackened, but she kept at it. Kept pushing, over and over, through the raging Vortex. She was doing it somehow, and she kept pushing until she hit something and stopped.

She opened her eyes. A figure stood over her, wrapped in a similar cocoon of blankness that repelled the Vortex, holding a brightly flaring glass cylinder.

“Mira?”

It was Ben.

*   *   *

HOLT WATCHED TWO OF
the Menagerie in front of him spin and fall as he ran. Ravan cursed next to him, but kept moving. Holt had a feeling she was going to lose a lot more men before this was over.

There was no way to tell how many Hunters the Menagerie and White Helix had killed, but there didn’t seem to be any end to them. They kept dashing into the streets from the south, and Holt knew the bulk of their force was still to come.

Ahead of them were two Mantises, their colors stripped bare, firing at the tripods chasing after Holt and Ravan.

“Get behind the silvers!” Ravan shouted to her men.

She didn’t have to answer Holt twice. He and Max lunged behind them as more plasma screamed by. Giant footfalls came from a few blocks away, and Holt saw the hulking form of the lone silver Spider, its huge cannons flashing and booming, sending bolts screaming toward the green-and-oranges.

Any other time, being relieved at the sight of an Assembly Spider walker would have seemed ludicrous, but Holt didn’t have time to ponder the irony.

The rapid-fire pops of automatic gunfire echoed down from above. Ravan’s men were still at the top of one building, holding their position, and they’d even managed to drop one of the gunships, sending it spiraling to the ground and exploding.

“Get those guys out of—” Ravan started.

The top of the building exploded, as four gunships targeted the shooters inside, blasting it with plasma until it was just a burning skeleton. Ravan glared up at the building with silent fury.

“I’m sorry,” Holt said, shouldering the Ithaca and pulling loose his Sig, ramming in another clip of ammo.

Ravan did the same thing with her own rifle, peeking back out behind the Mantis. “Don’t be. We got bigger problems.”

Holt followed her gaze. Several blocks away the White Helix reappeared, jumping toward them and flipping in flashes of color between the rooftops. There weren’t as many as they had started with, but that wasn’t what bothered Holt. If
they
were falling back, it wasn’t a good sign.

Seconds later it was confirmed. A swarming mass of movement appeared. Hunters, hundreds of them, pouring into the city, plasma cannons firing up at the Helix. Holt watched one of the warriors take a hit and slam into a wall, tumbling downward a hundred feet and out of sight.

Holt and Ravan looked at each other somberly. They could both do the math. They weren’t getting out of this one. None of them were. Even so, it didn’t mean they were about to give up. They would make as many Assembly pay as possible.

“We need a choke point,” she said.

Holt nodded, looking around. He saw something that might work a block away, and darted out from cover, whistling for Max. He felt Ravan, and what was left of her men, on his heels.

He led them to where two semitrucks had jackknifed into each other years ago, their trailers arcing out in a V shape. Dark Matter Tornadoes had warped and blended the vehicles together in a strange, disturbing mix of melted metal. If they got in between the trailers, any Hunters that followed would have to bunch up. They could take them one at a time.