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slans were again using this ancient base, though he feared the war was over and lost, for all

intents and purposes. Cross described the treasure-trove of forgotten discoveries he had found

here upon reopening the underground redoubt, including a series of Samuel Lann’s

investigations about “original memory transference” and “baseline life-recording technology.”

Then Peter Cross looked directly into the imager. His blue eyes seemed to stare right out at

her, and Anthea felt his words tug at her heart. “I will never stop my work,” he vowed. “Not

until I succeed in making a better world so that my wife and baby son no longer have to live in

fear.”

When the recording ended, Anthea nodded silently and solemnly to herself. “That’s

something we can all wish for.”

«
^
»

Inside the sleek spacecraft, Jommy recovered, sleeping as if in a coma, then feeling weak and

disoriented when he woke. Counting on Joanna’s help, he tried to think of a way they could

save Earth and prevent the extinction of both humans and slans. Both of them felt a sense of

urgency, knowing that Jem Lorry would be meeting with President Gray soon. Worse, Joanna

told him the ominous main occupation fleet from Mars would arrive within days.

As she checked her systems, Joanna glanced up to see a flash of fire as an explosive

projectile came flying toward her ship. “Jommy! Someone’s shooting at—” She didn’t have

time to complete her warning before the explosion struck the side hull. The metal plates

buckled inward, and fire tore open the wall.

Jommy staggered to his feet, feeling angry and helpless. He saw the ragged scavengers

outside, coming closer. “They didn’t take long to creep out of their hiding holes.” The looters

had scavenged firearms from civil defense armories and from the cold, dead hands of civilians

who had tried to defend themselves. Now they closed in on the landed tendrilless craft.

Joanna ran to her cockpit systems, struggling to power up and fire her small battery of

defensive guns. Three brief shots rang out, and the bright bursts scattered the attackers

outside, giving them a brief respite. Joanna got her engines activated, and the damaged ship

shuddered. With a blast of rockets, the scout heaved itself a few feet off the ground.

The angry scavengers shot whatever weapons they had managed to cobble together. Before

she could lift the ship out of reach, a thrown grenade took out her rear engine, causing the ship

to spin. The spacecraft’s rear smashed into the wall of a nearby building, bending one of her

guidance fins.

Jommy gripped the back of Joanna’s pilot seat for balance as the ship collapsed back to the

ground, raking the street with a flare of screeching sparks. Oily black smoke poured in from

the engine compartment. Joanna looked at him, stricken. “Looks like we’re not taking this ship

anywhere.”

Though broad spiderweb cracks obscured the cockpit window, he could see

tattered-looking people closing in from all sides. He recognized some of them, saw their scrapes

and bruises, the angry expressions on their faces—in particular one man with sharply squared

shoulders and a fresh cut on one cheek.
Deacon
. He must have recognized the scout ship that

had attacked them before he and his people could finish with Jommy…

Jommy reacted with instinctive loathing, and a red undertone of anger suffused his face.

“That’s the man who cut off my tendrils.”

Deacon’s gang seemed to realize that they had snared themselves big prey. Jommy

imagined how the scarred gang lord would use the captured enemy craft to consolidate his

power, swooping along the streets and assassinating rivals. At the front of the advancing crowd,

Deacon waved his dagger in the air as he ran forward. He seemed to think nothing could harm

him.

The spacecraft’s remaining engine groaned and whirred. Smoke polluted the air in the

compartment. “If that man wants to capture my vessel intact, he’s not showing much

restraint.” Joanna flashed a grin as smooth as broken glass. “And I plan to show even less

restraint.” She opened fire with the ship’s energy weapons.

The dazzling beams struck Deacon squarely in the chest, turning his entire body into a

cloud of reddish mist, shattered bone, and greasy smoke. He disappeared in mid-shout.

The other scavengers scrambled to a halt. Four of them dropped their makeshift weapons

and ran away in a panic. Another hurled an empty pistol at the side of the tendrilless ship; it

struck the hull with a harmless clang. Then the whole mob vanished into the shadowy streets

like cockroaches fleeing a bright light.

“They won’t cause us any more trouble.” A faint undertone of disappointment rode on the

tendrilless woman’s words.

Jommy lurched back to the engine compartment and used flame extinguishers to smother

the crackling fire. Joining him to inspect the damage, Joanna shook her head. “The energy cells

are cracked. The ship’s ruined, completely ruined.”

His brow furrowed with concern. “We can’t stay here. Exposure to those cracked cells can

be more hazardous than facing a desperate gang.” He pulled on Joanna’s arm. “I hope you

didn’t intend on going back to Mars any time soon.”

The woman’s face showed a mixture of conflicting emotions. “I’m not returning there until

we’ve got a viable resolution to this unnecessary war. I’m staying at your side, Jommy.”

Earlier, when she had helped him escape from Cimmerium and grudgingly admitted the

possibilities of his idealism, he hadn’t been sure how to read her. Like many of her race, Joanna

had developed tight mental blocks that kept him from sensing her innermost thoughts. But he

suspected that she was more than intrigued by him, more than perplexed by his strange

optimism. Even though she was aware of his bond with Kathleen, Joanna actually seemed to be

in love with him…

“Jommy, what were you doing at the palace? What were you searching for when that gang

found you, when they cut—?” She stopped herself.

“I came to the city to find something—something vital.” He reminded her of his father’s

disintegrator weapon, which she had previously seen him use to great effect. “I know exactly

where it is. I found it. I had my hands on it—then those scavengers came.” He lowered his

head, then drew strength from his resolve. “Come on. We’ve got to retrieve it. I’m not going

back to the ranch empty-handed—especially if Jem Lorry’s going to pull one of his tricks.”

Before abandoning the wrecked scout ship, he and Joanna stuffed supplies into a pack,

though they found it difficult to see and breathe in the thickening smoke. Since he had already

activated the locking mechanism on the door to the vault that held his disintegrator, he knew

exactly what sort of equipment he would need. Joanna also packed two small hand weapons.

Though they had once been on different sides of this conflict, he was glad to have the

tendrilless woman at his side.

“Joanna, if we don’t get out of this, if we can’t end the tendrilless war, then I am at your

mercy. You can claim me as your prize and take whatever reward or promotion that’s your

due. At that point, it won’t matter anymore.”

“It’ll always matter, Jommy. You said it yourself.” He answered with a faint smile. Perhaps

he truly had gotten through to her after all.

They exited the smoldering wreck and trudged away, never looking back. The scavengers

could have the broken hulk with its poisonous smoke and radiation that leaked from the

destroyed engines.

As sunset threw long shadows across the streets, bonfires began to blaze in cul-de-sacs and

alleys. A few candles and kerosene lanterns shone behind broken windows, where people

huddled around the light and warmth. It would be another dangerous and harrowing night for

the survivors in Centropolis.

He and Joanna stalked toward the site of the palace, both of them sensing that unseen eyes

were watching them. They clambered over stones, dodged girders and broken glass.

In twilight, they finally reached the battered vault that lay like an egg in a nest of shattered

debris. When he saw dark bloodstains spattering the stones, Jommy wondered how much of it

was his own.

Joanna found the discarded bottom half of the man Thompkins, who had been severed in

two by the slamming vault door. Untroubled, she kicked the loose legs, knocking them aside

with a wet ripping sound so she could reach the vault door controls. “I wish people would pick

up after themselves,” she muttered.

Jommy was pleased to see that his dismantled tracking device still dangled to the controls

by a few loose wires. “We better open the vault door, retrieve the disintegrator, and get out of

here as fast as we can. It’ll be dangerous negotiating our way out of this crater in the dark.”

“Especially if we have company again.” She peered warily into the shadows.

Struggling to function without his tendrils, realizing now how much he had relied on them,

Jommy removed the necessary equipment from his pack and installed a new power source to

run the vault’s pistons. His fingers felt thick and clumsy, but he managed to rig the mechanism

and charge up the weary motors of the security door. Once again, the pistons hummed, and

the tilted door groaned partway open until the hinges jammed.

From inside, they heard a sliding, wet thump, and Jommy realized it was the top half of

Thompkins dropping the rest of the way into the vault.

Suddenly, all around them in the dimness, hundreds of bright torches appeared,

surrounding the crater. In the thrown firelight, the people looked like scarecrowish trolls, a

wild tribe closing in on two victims. Without saying a word, Joanna dug in her pack and

withdrew her hand weapons. Gunshots rang out from the scavengers, and bullets ricocheted

off the rocks next to Jommy and Joanna. One pinged off the partly opened vault door.

“This isn’t going to be as easy as I thought,” she said.

Painfully aware of his lost tendrils, Jommy said, “Those are either Deacon’s men, or a new

gang’s already moved into town.”

“It seems I created a job opportunity for a potential new leader.” Joanna slowly turned

around, took aim at one of the capering figures, and shot him dead. Her moment of triumph

was short-lived as a volley of responding shots peppered the rubble around them. She ducked

behind a large chunk of concrete. “Maybe we should come back at a better time.”

“Never. Not while we’re this close.”

A rocket-launched explosive detonated nearby, sending a spray of rock splinters and

clattering pipes and broken glass. Jommy hunched behind the tilted wall of the displaced vault

chamber.

Joanna looked for another target and coolly took a second shot, which sent one of the torch

bearers scrambling away, his bobbing light like a drunken firefly in the darkness. She snapped

at Jommy, “Get inside the vault, find what you need to find, and then climb back out. I’ll hold

them off as long as I can.”

“Not good enough. There’s no time.” With his shoulder, he knocked Joanna backward

through the partly opened door. She fell into the vault, and he heard her clatter among the

broken shelves and scattered debris.

“What are you doing? It’s dark in here!” He heard her trip and let out a gasp. “Hey, how

many bodies did you leave lying around?”

Another grenade hit, exploding against the back of the vault. He heard shouting and

screaming, more gunfire. A swarm of angry scavengers boiled over the rubble, coming closer.

He could see their snarling faces in the torchlight.

Jommy scrambled in through the gap, hoping the door’s pistons would hold just a few

more seconds. Before he dropped inside, he seized the blinking device attached to the locking

mechanism, then yanked it free. As he dropped down, the immensely heavy door slammed

shut with a hissing groan, sealing them inside the impregnable vault in total blackness.

Next to him, he heard Joanna breathing hard. From outside, the scavengers’ banging and

pummeling sounded oddly distant through the thick walls.

“Well, we’re safe now. We can spend the night here.” His voice seemed disembodied in the

rich darkness. “There’s just one problem. We can’t open the door from the inside.”