Orson realized, before the Shapers did, that the fog was thinning. His HUD informed him of the change, a clinical assessment of cloud-cover density. The grams-per-cubic-meter reading began to decrease in a green numerical readout at the bottom right of his vision.
For the first time since he’d drawn his sword, Orson had no idea what to do or how to proceed.
Enoa might be danger. Maybe the exertion of prolonged Shaping had exhausted her. That was the best possibility. He couldn’t let himself think about the alternatives. The final four Shapers were still lobbing jagged iron spikes at him.
Orson activated his comm. “Wayfarer One to Wayfarer Two.” No response. “Enoa, do you hear me?” Still nothing, but that didn’t surprise him. She was often unreachable while shaping. But if the fog was dissipating, was she still shaping?
He would have to reach her, in person.
But if he fled with the fog clearing, he could be followed. Even his infrared sensor was limited by the density of the cool moisture. He couldn’t be totally sure how many Liberty Corps fighters were still alive somewhere under the shroud.
Orson changed his comm channel. “We need to pull back the defenders, Aesir. I’m using the lantern. We need to end this now.”
He could barely hear himself speak. Could Eloise or Jaleel hear him? He had survived long minutes of battle without uttering a word. He had nothing more to say to the Liberty Corps. No mockery was more demoralizing than what he’d already done to them. He didn’t focus on the immense noise, the constant hail of bullets from the Littlefield defenders, the haphazard counterstrikes from the Liberty Corps. The Littlefield shield still cycled on and off, its overworked computer trying to repel the Corps projectiles, while allowing the defenders’ barrage to pass through. The generator’s electric whine was like one hundred taxed fluorescent lights.
All these noises and the inevitable shouts and cries of battle had passed into the back of Orson’s mind as he analyzed the Shaper attack and cut his way through their midst.
Fighting that way was all that kept him on his feet. It was all that kept him from focusing on the pain in his forehead and temples and eyes. He could not let himself concentrate on the migraine, not while fighting and strategizing.
“Hello?” Eloise yelled. Her voice was loud enough to send a fresh wave of pain through him, radiating down his spine and along his limbs. “Orson, what did you say?”
But Orson could not respond. The four remaining Shapers had formed two-meter-tall walls, all barbed with spikes. They surrounded Orson and ran at him, spikes aimed to crush him. A number of Rifle Corps troops filled the air above with bullets and small rockets.
Orson rerouted power into his repulsor and flew free of the walls. The Shapers realized too late and slammed their iron spikes together, in a grinding crash. The Shapers stumbled away, dazed.
Orson flew at top speed, in a single arc around the iron walls. The sword of fire met all four sets of white armor.
There were still three or four Shapers missing – if the warning telegram were accurate – but he’d dispatched all the others.
“I said.” Orson fixed his comm. “You need to pull back the defenders. I have to use the lantern and end this. The fog is clearing.”
“What?” Eloise said. “What are you talking about?”
“Do you think someone found her?” Jaleel yelled. “Orson, do you think someone found Enoa? Did you call her?”
“You know how she is when she’s shaping.” Orson didn’t need any loud panic. He was having enough trouble thinking. “It might be nothing.”
“You need to go there,” Jaleel said. “We need to go there now! Eloise! We need to go there!”
“I know!” Orson said. “Jaleel, you need to breathe. I’m working on this.” The fog was visibly thinner now. He could see the silhouettes of larger vehicles in the gloom. He couldn’t see motion, not yet, but it wouldn’t be long before the survivors were visible. “That’s why I need to use the lantern. There’s no time to let them decide to give up. They’ve all had their chance.”
“Can the Aesir’s microphone get loud enough for the survivors to hear us?” Eloise asked. “If you actually use that fire, you could hurt our people, Orson. Lemme try something else?”
“Whatever you’re doing…” Orson didn’t get to finish the sentence.
“Attention Liberty Corps!” Eloise’s voice blasted out of the Aesir, a thunderous shout borne down from the sky, like the words of some mythic goddess. Orson almost placed his hands over his ears. If she’d given him a moment of warning, he would’ve retrieved his kazoo’s earplugs.
“The battle is over,” Eloise said. “We’re done fighting. You have one minute to leave the fog and throw down your arms. If you continue to fight, then you’ll all be incinerated.”
* * *
Kol almost fell into thought fatigue before Duncan could guide him back to his station wagon. Only the terror kept him awake through his agony and exhaustion. He had betrayed the Liberty Corps and Brielle knew it. If Duncan hadn’t intervened, he would be dead.
If Enoa Cloud hadn’t bested Brielle, she and Duncan would have come to violence.
How long had it been since he’d imagined a future with Brielle, a future after he’d triumphantly found the Dreamside Road for the Liberty Corps? Now, all those thoughts were impossible dreams.
Kol could no longer unravel the web of his hopes and wants. He finally gave up on the strange shield he’d summoned to protect them. For the second time, he’d shaped without understanding how. Even while he did it, he couldn’t pinpoint the muscle or place of strength that guided this ability. He couldn’t tell how he was wielding the power. He feared when he let it go, he would not find it again.
But he couldn’t hold on. He relaxed, and he knew, without any confirmation from his phyical senses, that the energy had faded away.
Kol almost collapsed. He was running on autopilot, swinging his legs purely from muscle memory, allowing Duncan to guide him wherever he would, without any thought or consideration.
“You hanging in there?” Duncan now carried the duffle bags from the rover. Kol rested his left arm over his friend’s shoulder – the arm without the wound.
Kol looked at his right shoulder for the first time since they’d fled. He saw only the torn fabric of the borrowed serape and his tunic beneath it. The spear was gone. He saw no blood.
Kol hadn’t noticed the spear’s removal. How was it gone? Why didn’t the wound bleed? Duncan couldn’t have removed it, could he? Even with his mind occupied by shaping, wouldn’t he still have felt the blade’s removal?
It had been in too deep to just fall out. He knew that. He could remember it entering his shoulder. He could still feel the depth of the wound. Why didn’t it bleed?
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“Spear?” he asked. “Spear gone?”
“Yeah, Tarzan, the spear is gone,” Duncan said. “It fell out when you saved us from getting skewered. The blade was melted by that energy you made. Are you alright, or are you in that weird Shaper hangover?”
Thought Fatigue – that’s what Brielle had called it. Yes, Kol knew that was coming. Soon he would have no choice but to rest. It wasn’t fair to Duncan. He had lost him so much.
“I’m sorry,” Kol said. “I don’t…”
“I should’ve listened to you. If I just left and gave up, we’d be long gone by now. But I knew if I did, we wouldn’t get another shot.”
“We won’t get another.” Kol tried to quip, but the words came out muddled.
Duncan nodded at the top of the incline. “You can rest soon. I’m parked just over there.”
Sure enough, when they crested the long rise of dusty ground, Kol saw the old station wagon, parked in clear view. Even with Duncan’s help, Kol staggered. Duncan half-dragged him to the back of the antique vehicle. Kol leaned against the rear door.
He had none of the medicine Brielle’s people had given him during his last Shaping-exhaustion – Neurzodone. Did he need it to recover? Even that fear was dim and distant. It lacked the adrenaline-fueled energy that drove the body’s fight-or-flight instinct. Without that, it was just a vague concern, like the sensation of forgetting some small task.
Duncan released him when he got a grip on the vehicle’s roof rack. Without the need to run, to force his body into motion, Kol focused on the distant wails and gunfire of the still-raging battle. He heard a humming sound, something in the sky, over the road. With the airships gone, it could only be the Aesir. Kol fought the urge to look for the flying transport. Who was piloting it with Gregory on the ground?
What could Kol do if the pilot saw him and decided to kill him? He had no hope of escape, and they had no idea what he’d done, what he’d lost to save Littlefield. If it was his fate to be killed by the very people he’d given everything to save, he didn’t want to know it.
Duncan unlocked the station wagon and returned to guide him. Kol pressed his entire left side against the vehicle and slid toward the front passenger’s seat. Duncan kept him upright and helped his limp feet find purchase on the soil.
Kol struggled to get into the seat. Duncan had to crouch down, shove him inside, and lift his legs into the vehicle.
Kol tried to buckle his own seatbelt, but his wound made its presence known. The sensation of the gaping opening was worse than the pain – the wrongness of it. Kol shuddered.
“The battle is over!” A woman’s voice boomed out of the sky, from the Aesir. “We’re done fighting. You have one minute to leave the fog and throw down your arms. If you continue to fight, then you’ll all be incinerated.”
“Shit,” Duncan said. “That’s Corwin’s daughter. We need to be long gone when her minute is up.”
“Eloise Corwin?” Kol asked.
“She was in the original Aesir crew.” Duncan buckled him in place. Then he rounded the driver’s side.
Kol tried to look over his shoulder, down the incline, toward whatever remained of the War Force and the battle, toward Littlefield and the corpses of Nine-flails and Governor Sloan.
Was Brielle lying dead there? Had Enoa killed her? Kol might never know.
“You should’ve left me.” Kol managed the full sentence when Duncan climbed inside.
“Don’t start with that.” Duncan put his key in the ignition. “Don’t. I meant what I said to Brielle. I was happy to save your ass, but if you whine about me leaving you behind then I really will turn you in, do you hear me?”
Kol had nothing to say to that. With the weight of his recent decisions, with his mind on the brink of collapse, there were no words.
“Did you fall asleep?” Duncan asked. “You can’t sleep until I know where I’m going.”
“Get Max,” Kol said.
“And where do you have Max?” Duncan asked. “Oh Christ, you don’t have him back at Sloan’s camp, do you? Please tell me you didn’t commit treason and leave your brother in the camp?”
“Inn,” Kol said. “Inn off Sixty-six. Card.” He tried to motion backward, toward the duffles. “In bag.”
“Right.” Duncan started the engine. “We’ll go far away from here and then I’ll dig it out, okay?” He chuckled. “You know, maybe I like you not being my superior officer. I get to be mean to you again.”
Kol couldn’t joke. They were leaving. They were leaving everything behind. They’d been barely eighteen when they’d joined the Liberty Corps. They’d spent their entire adult lives serving, and it had ended in one of the worst ways possible.
His body managed a surge of adrenaline. The fear and the enormity of the road ahead was too much even for the thought fatigue.
Duncan pointed the station wagon away from Littlefield and the road of corpses. “Hang on. This won’t be a comfortable drive.”
* * *
Dozens of Liberty Corps troops poured from the rear of the fog. Most threw down their weapons and ran back along the road, away from Littlefield and its defenders. Only a handful presented themselves for capture, willingly surrendering to the people they’d come to exterminate.
By then, the fog cleared enough to give Orson’s HUD an infrared scan of the roadway. He saw only forty-odd heat signatures, much too few to overwhelm the Aesir or the defenders.
Orson flew to Enoa.
He launched himself directly over the southern line of defenders. They’d ceased fire for the surrender and glanced up at him, as he passed over. He crested a high arc above the point of the incline where they’d situated Enoa and the water tankers.
Enoa was gone.
Orson saw no one – no one alive – only two Shaper corpses. Two of his missing Shapers were dead – still one or two missing.
He found the water trucks alone and damaged, their tanks punctured full of holes. The ground around them was littered with metal shards and pieces, most melted.
A Liberty Corps hover-cart, of the kind used by Nine-flails’s caddy, floated only feet from one of the water trucks.
A strange burn marked the ground and rose out of sight, up the incline. It was too level, too consistent for fire, and flame was unlikely to spread along bald dirt.
What appeared to be an astronaut helmet lay on the ground, beside the burn. The plastic, imitation helmet looked familiar to Orson, but he couldn’t place it.
“Is she okay?” Jaleel asked through the comm. “Orson, what’s happening?”
Orson peered under both water tankers. He found one of them had burst a tire, but still no sign of Enoa. Even his HUD’s footprint-distinguishing capabilities gave him nothing. The ground was too disturbed by footsteps and the acts of Shaping.
The ground around the tankers was all mud, as if the trucks had exploded. It was Shaping too, Anemos, not one of the Liberty Corps iron techniques. Enoa Cloud, wherever she was, had displayed a new level of skill.
“I think she’s taking her post-showdown nap.” Orson’s HUD infrared sensor finally caught a glimpse of red, the barest hint. Even his souvenir strider-head worked only so well through truck’s doors. “Or she’s sleeping on the job.”
“Do you mean that thing where she passes out?” Jaleel asked. He said something to Eloise, away from the comm.
“I’ll keep you posted.” Orson nudged the cab’s door handle. Locked. “I don’t have the key to the tanker trucks. I think she’s in there. Damn, I hate picking locks. Eloise, do you remember that skeleton key Ophion lent me?”
“How long until we can go there?” Jaleel asked. Eloise spoke, again out of earshot.
“Listen, I can get it open.” Orson rifled through the items in his pockets. Had he brought any of his investigatory set? “Well, maybe…”
The infrared shape in the cab moved, rising into a sitting position. Enoa’s face came into view through the window. She opened the driver’s side door.
Enoa slumped against the driver’s seat, her cloak shredded, heavy bags under her eyes. She looked otherwise unharmed, but Orson could see the weakness in her limbs, the physical exhaustion from her spiritual exertion.
“Orson,” she said. “I’m so sorry. I couldn’t keep the Midnight Sight and fight Maros’s girlfriend at the same time. I tried.”
“Don’t worry about any of that,” Orson said. “We won. How are you?”
“The astronaut came after me,” she said. “The astronaut from Nimauk. I just realized who he was! Do you remember the astronaut? He works for Maros. The astronaut wanted my key to the Dreamside Road but Maros didn’t want it and then Maros’s girlfriend got here and she almost killed all of us.”
“Man Bun was here?” Orson usually had a policy of not questioning the delirious, drunk, or extremely ill, but he couldn’t restrain himself. “Man Bun was in the War Force?” Maros had hunted them across the continent? Chasing him around the east coast was one thing, but had Orson underestimated the tenacity of the young captain?
“Is Maros one of the people dead out here?” Orson asked.
“No.” She shook her head. “They were killed by the astronaut, by Racz.”
Orson ran out of time for questioning. The Aesir had completed its work with the Liberty Corps surrender. It hurtled from the sky, landing beside the tanker. Its door swung open, and Jaleel and Eloise ran out.
“Are you okay?” Jaleel squeezed around Orson and lifted Enoa from the cab. She looked smaller in his arms, like she’d lost some of herself in whatever battle she’d seen. He looked about to carry her back into the Aesir. “Did you fight those men over there?”
“I’m okay, thanks,” she said. He turned sideways to carry her back into the Aesir. “I, uh, I really appreciate it, Jaleel, but I think it would be easier if you help me walk.” Jaleel set her back on her feet. She almost toppled over, until he caught her again. He looked frightened but her expression stayed mostly dazed.
“What happened here?” Orson asked.
“Oh, uh, right,” Enoa said. “The astronaut, he killed those men. He shot them. But I almost forgot. None of you know yet.”
“Whatever it is,” Jaleel said. “If you’re okay, it can wait.”
“No, it can’t wait,” she said. “Captain Maros sent the telegram. It was him. He warned Littlefield about the attack. We need to find him and the astronaut. If the Liberty Corps gets them, they’ll kill them both.”