Monsters of Men

by Patrick Ness

  The Sky and 1017 are watching, too, and you can hear their surprise that the missiles didn’t kill everyone.

  Are those the only weapons on the ship? Ben asks.

  I look back up and the scout ship is already turning in the air–

  “The hoopers,” I say, remembering–

  [TODD]

  “What the HELL?” the Mayor growls–

  But I’m watching the screens that show the hilltop–

  Where the missiles ain’t exploded–

  They just crashed and that was that, causing no more damage than throwing a really big rock–

  “Todd!” the Mayor shouts into the camera. “What do you know of this?”

  “You fired at VIOLA!” I shout back. “Yer life ain’t worth nothing, you hear me? NOTHING!”

  He makes another growling sound and I run to the door of the healing room but of course it’s locked and then the whole floor lurches back as he powers the ship forward. I fall into the beds, slipping on Ivan’s blood, trying to keep my eyes on the screens, trying to see her anywhere on the hilltop–

  And with one hand I’m patting my pockets down for the comm but of course he took that–

  But then I start looking round the room cuz Simone used to talk to us from the ship, didn’t she? And if the comm system comes down here from the cockpit, maybe it can go outta here as well–

  I hear two more whooshing sounds–

  In the screens, two more missiles are headed for the hilltop, at closer range this time, and they both slam hard into the crowds of Spackle fleeing down the riverbed–

  But still no proper explozhuns–

  “Very well, then,” I hear the Mayor say in that measured way that means he’s really angry.

  And we’re flying right over the top of the Spackle–

  And goddam if there ain’t a lot of ’em–

  How in the living hell did we ever think we could fight an army that big?

  “I do believe there’s another class of weapon on this ship,” the Mayor says–

  And the screens show a view from above as the cluster bombs drop onto the fleeing Spackle–

  Drop and fall and not explode neither–

  “DAMMIT!” I hear the Mayor yell–

  I lurch over to the comm panel where the Mayor’s voice is coming out. I touch the screen beside it and a whole list of words pops up–

  “So be it,” seethes the Mayor on the screen behind me. “We’ll just have to do things the old-fashioned way.”

  And I’m looking at the words on the screen and I’m forcing my concentrayshun on ’em, forcing everything the Mayor taught me–

  And slowly, slowly, slowly, they start to make sense–

  {VIOLA}

  “We wanted peace!” Bradley shouts at the Sky, as we watch the hoopers fall with almost no effect except for the poor Spackle just beneath them. “This is the action of one man!”

  But the Sky’s Noise has no words, just anger, anger that he’s been duped, anger that his position is weak because he’s proposed peace, anger that we’ve betrayed him.

  “We haven’t!” I shout. “He’s trying to kill us, too!”

  And my heart’s beating out of my chest worrying what the Mayor’s done to Todd–

  “Can you help us?” Bradley says to the Sky. “Can you help us stop him?”

  The Sky looks over to him, surprised. The Spackle behind him still run but the trees on the riverbanks are starting to disguise their numbers as they flee the scout ship, which has stopped dropping the disarmed hoopers and is hovering ominously in the still-falling snow.

  “Your burning fire bolt things,” I say. “Those things you shoot from the bows.”

  Would they work against an armoured vessel? The Sky asks.

  “In large enough numbers, maybe,” Bradley says. “While the ship’s still low enough to be hit.”

  The ship is turning now, still hovering at the same height, and we hear a change to the pitch of its engines.

  Bradley looks up sharply.

  “What is it?” I say.

  Bradley shakes his head. “He’s changing the fuel mixture,” he says and his Noise cranks up, confused but alarmed, as if it’s remembering something just a little out of reach–

  “He’s the last obstacle to peace here,” I say to the Sky. “If we can stop him–”

  Then someone else will pop up in his place, says the Sky. That has always been the evil of the Clearing.

  “Then we’ll just have to work that much harder!” I say. “If we managed to get this far against the man in that ship, don’t you think that at least shows how much it means to some of us?”

  The Sky looks back up and I can see the rumblings of agreement there, rumblings that what I say is true against the other truth of the ship hanging in the air–

  And of the ships to come–

  The Sky turns to 1017. Send a message along the Pathways, he says. Order the weapons to be prepared.

  (THE RETURN)

  Me? I show.

  The Land will need to learn to listen to you, the Sky shows. They can begin right now.

  And he opens his voice to me and I am sending out his orders in the language of the Land almost before I know I am doing it–

  I let it flow through me, as if I am merely a channel–

  Flow through me and out into the Pathways, into the soldiers and the Land waiting around us, and it is not my voice, not even the Sky’s voice nearby speaking through me, but a voice of the bigger Sky, the Sky that exists apart from whatever individual goes by the name, the Sky which is the agreement of the Land, the accumulated voice of all of us, the voice of the Land speaking to itself, the voice that keeps it alive and safe and ready to face the future, it is that which speaks through me–

  That is the voice of the Sky–

  And it urges the soldiers to battle, urges the rest of the Land to fight as well, to gather the spinning fire and the weapons on the backs of the battlemores in our hour of need–

  It’s working, the Source shows to the people from the Clearing. Help is coming–

  And then there is a hissing sound from above and we all look up–

  To see a waterfall of fire pouring out of the engines of the vessel–

  Pouring down like blood from a wound, smoke and steam billowing around it in the cold air, pouring down onto the Land and setting it ablaze and as the vessel starts to fly a wide circle around us, the fire roars up from the ground in walls, burning everything that can burn, trees, secreted huts, the Land, the world–

  “Rocketfuel,” the man from the Clearing says.

  “He’s trapping us here,” the Knife’s one in particular says, spinning round on her beast, which calls out in alarm at the flames that face us on all sides.

  The vessel rises higher in the air, its circle arcing wider, the fire still pouring out of it–

  He’s destroying everything, the Source says. He’s setting the whole valley ablaze.

  [TODD]

  The ship pitches this way and that and I can hardly stand up straight in front of the comm panel.

  And on the screens, there’s fire everywhere–

  “What’re you DOING?” I shout, trying not to panic as I sweat thru the words on the panel–

  “Old pilot’s trick that Bradley forgot his grandfather taught him,” the Mayor says. “You change the mixture of the fuel, oxygenate it, and it just burns and burns and burns.”

  I look up and see us higher in the sky, swooping across the rim of the upper valley, circling round and pouring the rain of fire down onto the trees below, and the fire is sticky and super-hot, kinda like the Spackle firebolts, and even tho there’s snow coming down, the trees are just exploding in the heat, catching other trees, the fire just zooming thru ’em, faster than the Spackle can run, and the screens show a massively expanding band of flames following us as we fly, circling the valley, trapping ’em inside–

  He’s setting the whole world on fire.

  I look back a
t the comm screen. There’s a bunch of boxes I could press but I’m still trying to read the top one. Rekent, I think it says. Rekent Comms. I breathe in, close my eyes, try to lighten my Noise, try to feel it like when the Mayor was in there–

  “Watch as the world burns, Todd,” the Mayor says. “Watch as the last war begins.”

  Recent Comms. That’s what it says, Recent.

  I press it.

  “Todd?” the Mayor says. “Are you watching?”

  I look up at his face on the screen. I realize he can’t see me. I look back to the comm box. There’s a red circle on the bottom right saying Visuals Off.

  Which I read first time thru.

  “You don’t care who wins, do you?” I say. He’s flying a wide circle round New Prentisstown now, soaking the forests to the south and the north in a fire that can’t help but eventually reach the city. I can already see an arm of it shooting thru a row of outlying houses.

  “You know, Todd?” he says. “I find that I really don’t care, no. Isn’t that something? Just so it’s over. Just so that it’s all finally over.”

  “It coulda been over,” I say. “It coulda been peace.’

  The comm screen is now a list of the Recent Comms I guess and I’m working my way down it–

  “We could have made peace together, Todd,” the Mayor says. “But you decided that wasn’t for you.”

  Comm, I read, comm, commoony, communicay–

  “For which I must thank you,” he says. “For returning me to my true purpose.”

  Communicaytor 1. Communicator 1. That’s what it says, Communicator 1. The whole thing’s a list of communicators. Going down from 1 to 6, tho not in order. 1’s at the top, then 3 (I think it’s 3), then 2 maybe, then whatever the others are–

  “You said you were transformed,” I say, sweating as I look at the panel. “You said you were a different man.”

  “I was wrong. Men can’t be transformed. I will always be who I am. And you’ll always be Todd Hewitt, the boy who can’t kill.”

  “Yeah, well,” I say, with feeling. “People change.”

  The Mayor laughs. “Have you not been listening? They don’t change, Todd. They do not change.”

  The ship lurches again as he makes another pass, torching the world below us. I’m still sweating over the comm panel. I don’t know which number is Viola’s but if these are recent and in order then she must be 1 or 3 cuz–

  “What are you up to in there, Todd?” the Mayor says.

  And the comm panel goes blank.

  {VIOLA}

  The scout ship’s hardly visible now through the smoke that’s rising everywhere. We’re safe so far in the middle of the rocky riverbed, but there’s no way to get out with fires all around. The Mayor’s flown around the whole valley, which is burning so bright it’s difficult to look at directly–

  How can there be so much of it? Ben asks as we watch the fire rage through the forests, spreading almost impossibly fast.

  “A few drops of it was enough to blow up a bridge,” I say. “Imagine what a whole shipful can do.”

  Can you not contact the vessel? the Sky asks me.

  I hold up my comm. “No answer,” I say. “I keep trying.’

  Then as the vessel is out of reach of our weapons, the Sky says, his Noise resolving into a decision, there is only one course of action.

  We all stare at him for a moment as we realize what he means.

  “The river,” I say.

  And there’s a roar in the air that makes us turn–

  “He’s coming back round!” Bradley yells–

  And we see, in a parting of the smoke, the scout ship flying up over the lip of the hill, screaming out of the sky like judgement–

  Coming straight for us–

  [TODD]

  The screens are nothing but fire now, fire everywhere, ringing the valley, ringing New Prentisstown, blazing on the hilltop where Viola still is, somewhere in all that burning–

  “I’ll kill you!” I shout. “You hear me? I’ll KILL YOU!”

  “I should finally hope so, Todd,” the Mayor says, a weird smile on his face in the screen he’s left up of himself. “You’ve waited long enough.”

  But I’m already looking round for some other way to contact Viola (please please please). The comm panel won’t come back on but I swear I saw Mistress Lawson doing something on one of the screens by the healing beds. I go over and press one.

  It lights up at my touch with a whirl of words.

  And one of ’em begins with Comm.

  “I should probably tell you what’ll happen next, Todd,” the Mayor says. “It’s important that you know.”

  “Shut up!” I say, pressing the Comm box on the screen. Up pops another set of boxes and a whole lot of ’em begin with comm this time. I take a deep breath and try to make my Noise into its reading shape. If the Mayor can steal learning, then so bloody well can I.

  “I’ve ordered Captain O’Hare to lead a small force into battle with the Spackle that will inevitably attack the city,” the Mayor continues. “A suicide mission obviously, but then Captain O’Hare always was expendable.”

  Communicayteeons Hoob, I read. I squint and breathe again. Please please please. Communicayteeons Hoob. I ain’t got no idea what it means so I breathe deep a third time and close my eyes (I am the Circle and the Circle is me). I open ’em again. Communications Hub. There it is, that’s what it says. I press it.

  “Captain Tate will already be leading the rest of the army to the Answer on the hilltop,” the Mayor rattles on, “to dispose of the remnants of the rebellion–”

  I look up. “What?”

  “Well, we can’t go around risking me being blown up by terrorists, can we?” he says.

  “You effing monster!”

  “And then Captain Tate will be leading the army to the ocean.”

  I really look up at this. “The ocean?”

  “Where we will make our last stand, Todd,” the Mayor says and I can see him grinning. “The ocean at our backs, the enemy at our fronts. What better war could you ask for? Nothing to do but fight and die.”

  I look back at the comm screen.

  And there it is. Recent Comms. I press it. More boxes pop up.

  “But it has to start with the death of the leader of the Spackle,” the Mayor’s saying. “And I’m sorry to say that means all who are near him.”

  I look up again. We’re right near the lip of the hill, flying up over it and down the dry riverbed towards the fleeing Spackle–

  Towards Viola–

  Who I can see on the screens now–

  See that she’s still riding Acorn, Bradley and Ben next to her, the Spackle leader behind ’em, urging ’em all to run–

  “NO!” I scream. “NO!”

  “I’ll be sorry to lose her,” the Mayor says, as we bear down on ’em, fire trailing out behind us. “Less sorry to lose Ben, if I’m honest.”

  I press the top button on the comm screen, the one that says Communicator 1, and I scream “VIOLA!” into it, my voice breaking with the volume, “VIOLA!”

  But in the screens, we’re already over the top of ’em–

  (THE RETURN)

  The Sky turns his battlemore hard, corralling the beasts of the Clearing to the side, pushing them out of the path of the vessel, towards trees that are burning on the riverbank–

  But the beasts of the Clearing are resisting–

  Fire, I can hear them call wildly, Fire!

  The vessel is coming! I show, not just at the Sky but at the Land around me, radiating the warning in all directions and I am pulling my own beast back towards the burning trees, where there is a small space we might use as cover–

  GO! I hear from the Sky, and my battlemore responds, whirling round towards the fire as the beasts of the Clearing do the same, and here come the Source, the man from the Clearing, and the Knife’s one in particular–

  Ben and Bradley and Viola–

  Their beasts racing tow
ards me now, towards the small space in the burning trees, where we will not be able to stay for long but which might just avoid the vessel still screaming down–

  And all around us the Land’s fear courses through me, their terror, their deaths, and I feel more than just the ones I can see, the ones running by my charging battlemore, I can feel them all, I feel the soldiers remaining to the north of the valley and the soldiers to the south, trying to save themselves in a forest where every tree blazes, where the fire keeps leaping from branch to branch, even in the falling ice, leaping faster than many of them can run and I feel the Land up the river, too, away from this inferno, watching it roar up the valley towards them, overtaking some of those who flee, and I see it all, too, see through the eyes of every Land–

  I see the eyes of this planet, watching itself burn–

  And I burn, too–

  “HURRY!” I hear the Knife’s one in particular shout and I turn again and I see she is screaming for the Sky, whose battlemore has fallen a step or two behind as the Sky sends out orders to the Land to save themselves–

  The vessel flies directly overhead–

  Raining fire down the riverbed–

  And the Sky’s eyes meet mine–

  They meet mine across the smoke and fire and falling ice–

  No, I show–

  No!

  And he disappears in a wall of flame–

  {VIOLA}

  The horses leap forward as the wall of flame WHOOSHES up the riverbed behind us–

  And there’s hardly anywhere to get away from it, the trees in front of us are ablaze and the rocks on the hillside above are somehow burning, too, even the snowflakes are evaporating in mid-air, leaving little wisps of steam where they were hanging, and we’re away from the first attack but if he comes back, there’s nowhere to go, there’s nowhere at all to go–

  “Viola!” Bradley yells, bumping Angharrad into Acorn and they greet each other with terrified whinnies–