Valley of Fires: A Conquered Earth Novel (The Conquered Earth Series) (51 page)

“It should be you,” Holt said. He was studying the crowd too, could see the same thing: like this, they’d never make it.

“No,” she answered. “It should be both of us.”

He looked at her and for a brief moment she saw the old Holt, the tenderness and the emotion, and it was heartening to feel again.

Together, they climbed up onto the train, leaving Max on the ground. As they did, all the movement in the rail yard stopped. The army they’d built, the one they’d sacrificed so much for, stared up at them, waiting.

Mira wasn’t sure what to say. She was no speechmaker. In the end, she simply opted for how she felt.

“Each of us … is weak,” she began. “Each of us has doubts. Each is afraid. Some admit to it, others don’t. Either way, you have all taught me that strength is not an absence of fear. Strength … is going forward in spite of it.”

The groups at the far end of the yard moved closer, listening: Assembly and White Helix, Menagerie and Wind Trader. She tried to look as many of them in the eye as she could, so they could see her sincerity. None of them looked away.

“The Wind Traders speak of the Valley of Fires,” she said. “The point where we are all tested. There’s no doubt, we are at that place now. A place where we either plunge ahead into the flames … or burn where we stand. I choose to go
forward.
To fight. Because I believe everything we’ve ever wanted is on the other side of those fires. I believe that when the sun comes up tomorrow, this planet will be
ours
again.” The army before her listened, she could see the will beginning to burn within them. “We’ve been through so much together, changed in ways we never thought we could. Take this one last step with me, not because you have to, but because you believe. If I’m going to fall, then it will not be because I stopped and waited for the fires to claim me. It will be because I pushed on, into the inferno, in spite of fear. With
you.
”

“Seek!” Dasha yelled from below.

“
And find!
” the White Helix chanted together.

“Power,” Holt yelled. “And profit.”

“
Power and profit!
” the Menagerie shouted back as one.

Mira turned and looked to the Wind Traders, near their ships, the crews watching from the top decks, the colorful sails billowing in the breeze. “Winds guide us,” she said, and she never meant it more.

Dresden and Conner nodded to her.

A chant went up from the Helix, and it was picked up by Avril. When the Menagerie saw her join in, they followed, and the words overpowered even the sounds of the explosions nearby.

“
Strength! Strength! Strength! Strength!
” They chanted the words, over and over.

Mira felt Holt look at her, and turned to him. “Let’s go get our girl,” he said.

45.
DISPERSION

PAIN SEARED THROUGH ZOEY’S BODY
and the world threatened to fade out, but she held on. If she passed out, the end she had fought so hard to stop would come. There were four entities inside her now, and as unique as her biological structure was, she was literally being torn apart.

Her hands were still forced onto the rods at the end of the armrests. She could feel the Tone, could feel where it passed through the minds of every survivor on the planet.

She was dimly aware of other things too. The sadness of the Nexus at what its children were doing. The conflict growing in the Citadel and outside, the divisions forming between those who believed in her and those who did not. She felt the resistance of the Feelings, fighting against the other entities, but they were too strong.

The pain made concentrating on anything but staying conscious virtually impossible. All the while, she could feel her presence within the Tone speeding, mind to mind, person to person. In a moment, the entities would make her force their own kind into millions of human hosts.

She had to find a way to let go of the rods, but how? Rose had clamped her arms and legs to—

Rose!

Zoey forced her eyes open and found the woman staring at her in horror.

“I’m so sorry…” she said. Through her pain, Zoey could just make out the woman’s sense of guilt.

Zoey fought through the pain with what life she had left. She tried to recall everything she could about her Aunt Rose, about the time they’d spent together and all the feelings that went with it.

Rose and Zoey’s mother, holding her in between them on the beach. Eating ice cream while riding on Rose’s shoulders. Drive-in movies outside of town, Rose teaching her how to paint, Zoey crawling into bed with her aunt to nap.

All of it, the images, the feelings, Zoey thrust at her, forcing them into her mind like coal into a furnace.

Shock exploded from the woman as the memories came to life, one after the other, overriding her other thoughts, filling her with their resonance. She was terrified.

“Zoey!” She staggered back, holding her head, but Zoey just kept pumping the memories in.

The pain in Zoey’s body intensified, the entities burning her apart. The little girl fought through it, trying to hold on. If she didn’t, it was all for nothing. Holt and Mira and the Max were counting on her.

Zoey pushed harder, concentrating on every detail of every moment she could remember, and the horror Zoey felt from the woman slowly morphed into something else. Anger at what was happening, intense shame that she had helped bring it about, and a maternal, protective instinct that overrode everything else. The woman, more Rose than she had ever been, dashed forward.

“No!” she yelled, grabbing one of Zoey’s hands, prying the fingers loose from the rod. When it was off, Rose grabbed it herself … and then shrieked as she polarized with the machine and the Tone.

Like Zoey, Rose held on, adding her own strength to the fight against the entities burning out the little girl. It gave Zoey some relief, she felt the pain lessen, she could
think,
but the Ephemera inside her were strong, and she felt them double their efforts.

Dozens of transmitter panels in the ceiling exploded as the energy in the room intensified. The Citadel rumbled. Zoey saw more of the blue and white crystalline shapes push toward her, about to reinforce the ones already there.

She tried to pull her hand loose from the rod, to sever her connection from the Tone, but the entities kept her fingers clamped tight. All the while she could feel them using her innate power and the power of the Nexus to bind and merge with the Tone.

Zoey was running out of time.

Rose struggled to stay standing. The woman’s efforts had given Zoey her mind back, for however long. She put it to use, reached out through the Tone, scanning for Holt and Mira … but there were just too many human minds now.

The only entities she could detect with any specificity … were Assembly.

Zoey’s eyes widened. She reached out once more, searching for an old presence, one she felt fondly for. Zoey found its specific colors, called them forth, and, seconds later, she felt its response.

Scion …
Ambassador projected with dismay.

Over the pain and her fading consciousness, Zoey felt a slight twinge of hope.

46.
END RUN

MIRA GRIPPED THE WALL
of the cargo car as
Sorcerer
began to move. Holt and Max were next to her, and no one spoke. There wasn’t much to say. It was all about to begin … and end. Her artifact sat in the makeshift Grounder, shut down for the moment. Mira had no idea how much power it had left, so it was being saved for the “Endgame.”

Isaac said there were always three phases in anything strategic. Early Game, Mid-Game, and Endgame. Victory was achieved by the proper use of your pieces in each phase. In their case, victory was getting the train to the Citadel, though Mira still wasn’t sure what they would do when they did.

Sorcerer
would no doubt hit resistance right out of the gate. The Assembly would come down hard, but the arrangement of all their pieces was designed to counter it. The problem was balancing speed against force. Move the train too fast, and you’d leave behind defensive forces. Move it too slow, and you’d be overwhelmed by Assembly firepower. They had to get the pace just right.

Isaac was on the train, in a car near the middle, surrounded by what was left of the Regiment. He’d insisted on coming, even with his lack of mobility. Like everyone else, he knew this was it. Besides, too many of his men had died here. If he was going to follow them, it would be in the same light.

Sorcerer
barreled out of the rail yard as the skies darkened with clouds and the sun was almost down. In a few hours, the ruins would be dark, but it didn’t matter. This would all be over before then.

Almost immediately, a hailstorm of plasma bolts began flying. Walkers, mostly blue and white, were in the streets, and they erupted in explosions of their own as
Sorcerer
’s cannons returned fire.

White Helix and Menagerie were on the roof, and bullets, missiles, and Antimatter crystals launched outward. Flanking the tracks, Mira could see the Landships shadowing them, their colorful sails disappearing behind tall buildings as they raced along. Among them were the Menagerie vehicles, dune buggies and jeeps, and the gyrocopters buzzed by above, dropping bombs onto the Assembly.

At the front of everything were the silver rebels. A group of them broke off and barreled down a side street, their cannons engaging a group of Mantises directly—more of Isaac’s strategy: dividing the Assembly into “battle groups,” each consisting of a Spider, two Mantises, four Hunters, and two Brutes. When the front of the train encountered resistance, a battle group could break off and engage, stopping the Assembly from impeding the train. Even though the groups would be outnumbered, they would still make their impact. It was the ultimate utilization of Rock, Paper, Scissors, and Mira watched the groups wade into larger Assembly forces and shred them. Mira allowed herself to smile, for one brief moment.

Then the gunships appeared, swarms of them. They weren’t blue and white, and they weren’t Raptors. They were pure
brown,
shaped like crescents, with the pointed tips facing forward, and they soared up the streets, cannons blazing, strafing everything in sight.

Barrier artifacts flared to life around the train, absorbing the hits. The same thing happened on the Landships, but the Menagerie vehicles near them weren’t as fortunate.

Half a dozen gyros went down in flames. Dune buggies skittered out of control, cartwheeling and disintegrating to pieces.

“Look at
that
thing!” Holt yelled, peering out the observation slit in the armor.

A few miles away, hovering in the air, was the source of the gunships. A massive brown craft and they could see the fighters launching off it. It was some kind of carrier, and far larger than the yellow and black drone mothership they’d faced before. It could launch enough fighters to decimate everything they had.

Mira tapped the radio button on her belt, spoke into her headset. “Olive, Dresden, you read?”

A burst of static, then Olive responded. “Go, Mira.” There were explosions in her ear over the radio. She looked and found the
Wind Rift,
a block away, rocking as plasma bolts flared into her Barriers.

“These gunships are gonna rip us up,” she said. “Hate to do this, but maybe you can pull them away. Isaac, you agree?”

“Agreed,” Isaac’s voice said. “Target that carrier if you can, you’re bound to get their attention that way.”

“That sounds like a great idea,” Dresden replied testily.

Antimatter crystals streaked upward from the Landships, aimed at the carrier in the distance. They hit with colorful explosions, rocking the craft, but not dropping it. It was just too huge. Almost immediately, the gunships broke off and turned toward the Landships, chasing after them as the big vessels rumbled through the streets. Half of the Menagerie vehicles followed, the other half stayed to defend the train.

Sorcerer
shook, Mira heard the crackling sound of activating Barriers. She and Holt both peered out and saw the source.

New walkers, but different from any they’d ever seen. Solid gray, smaller than even a Hunter, maybe five feet tall, but with four legs like a Brute, lined with strange, mechanical claws almost like octopus tentacles.

The walkers, a hundred or more, dashed toward the train … then leapt straight off the ground, propelled upward by jetpacks that flashed fire behind them. They landed on
Sorcerer,
the claws on their legs clamping down, holding them in place. Plasma bolts ripped into the train from the grays, they were inside the fields of the Barriers. There was nothing to stop them.

Max whined and Holt tapped his radio. “Avril!”

“We’re on it!” the girl shouted back, and White Helix on the roof dashed toward the new threat, flipping and dodging through the plasma. Some didn’t make it, they fell and disappeared as the train rumbled on.

Holt looked at Mira. “Are we having fun yet?”

*   *   *

TWO MAS’ERINHAH ALLIES FELL
in flames. Their Ephemera did not rise, their colors would fade, as would many today.

The shield of the one the Scion named Ambassador flared around it as it charged, absorbing the ordnance as it drove the first Mas’Shinra through the wall of a building, crushing it into the ground in a shower of flame.

Another fell in a torrent of cannon fire from the huge Mas’Phara that reinforced their group. Seconds later, the rest of their enemies were obliterated, proving that more Electives trumped a single, even with greater numbers.

Rock. Paper. Scissors.

But there were many more to take their place, and the silvers turned and barreled back toward the long human construct the Guardian had named
Sorcerer.

Ambassador could see the humans fighting valiantly, watched them flip through the air, firing their strange-colored crystals, or shooting their primitive weapons. If it was still connected to the Whole, it was sure it would feel a sense of apprehension. These humans were resisting, and they were strong, but that would not prove enough in the end.