Meridian Divide

by Cassandra Rose Clarke

  Owen and Farhi emerged from the building. Owen jumped on the Warthog, turned to face the pockets of the militia that formed each team. A pale streak of sunlight shone out over the militia, highlighting their faces.

  “We’re doing this a little earlier than we planned,” he said. “But we’ve got a solid plan. We’re familiar with the area. And as soon as we’re done, we’ll be collected by ONI.” He tapped his helmet. “I’ve been in contact. Window’s clear and they are still on their way. Most of the fighting has pushed off from over Annecy. For now. We still need to act fast, though, now that we have the Covenant’s attention. Let’s get in, get the samples, get out.”

  This was greeted with a kind of contemplative quiet, a silence that matched the dim dawn light. Owen nodded at Farhi.

  “Firebugs, corallers, you know what to do,” Owen said. “Excavators, get in the Warthog. We’re going straight there.”

  The firebugs piled up on the fuel cart, started up the engine, and rumbled toward the city. Saskia crawled into the Warthog, pressed in with both Local Team as well as the corallers, which consisted of the three most vicious fighters in the militia. They sat up on the back of the Warthog, hanging on to the turret as it bounced through the city. Saskia watched the buildings materialize in the dim light and replayed the plan in her mind—the million and one things that could go wrong. The biggest was that they had to use the Brume-sur-Mer artifact—the very thing that they couldn’t let fall into Covenant hands—to access the site and get whatever ONI needed. Plus, while Owen had some experience with Forerunner structures, none of that experience was with this structure. No one, not even he, knew how it might respond now that they had activated it. The sculpture might not even be extractable, and even if it was unactivated, what if removing it triggered something just as bad? What if the structure was programmed to self-destruct upon removal of the sculpture, or upon being damaged—which was exactly what would happen if they removed a chunk of the wall? Even thinking about any of those possibilities sent a phantom pain winding through Saskia’s skull. Still, there were more mundane dangers. About a million of them, it seemed.

  The Warthog slowed to a stop about half a kilometer from the dig site. “Excavators,” Farhi said. “Here’s where we leave you.”

  Saskia glanced at Evie, who was sitting beside her, hoping for a bit of reassurance. But Evie looked as terrified as Saskia felt.

  “It’s going to be okay,” Saskia whispered, wishing she were telling the truth. “We’ve got this.”

  “I hope so,” Evie whispered back.

  They climbed out of the Warthog: Evie, Saskia, Dorian, Victor, and then finally Owen, who saluted with two fingers, signaling to Farhi that it was time for her to drive off, around to the western side of the site. To Local Team, Owen gestured to the left, and they moved forward through the strips of that white foam substance that was everywhere in this part of the ruins. Saskia swatted it away from her face, cursing every time it blocked her vision. She could hear the Covenant up ahead: the whine of vehicle engines, the chatter of their language.

  “Sounds like a party up there,” Dorian muttered. Victor hushed him. But he was right. And Saskia could tell that Owen knew it too.

  They stopped, right on the edge of the clearing. Owen motioned for them to fan out along the perimeter. Saskia squeezed Evie’s hand, gave her a little wave of support, and then took up her position. She squatted down behind a particularly large piece of steel rubble, took a deep breath, and looked out at the dig site.

  It was worse than it had been the day before. Elites were everywhere, barking orders at Grunts and Brutes, who were already moving out into the hills. The two Banshees from the day before were sitting on the ground, flanking the hole, which, thank god, still did not have a shield across its surface, but only because there was now some kind of structure built up over it instead. Not the Scarab that had been at the Brume-sur-Mer site, but some other kind of device designed in the Covenant’s strange, organic style. Large leglike pillars rose around the hole’s perimeter, jutting upward into a canopy-like chassis, which held a rounded pod that sent pulses of light down into the hole where the structure lay. A scanner, perhaps, trying to unlock the structure’s secrets.

  Saskia wished she could talk to the others, but they had no comms and now they were too spread out. She didn’t dare move, not when there was no way to synchronize all of the militia’s actions. And so instead she considered what now appeared to be a major alteration to their plan: this machine, whatever it was, crouching above the hole. This was why they needed those extra days. They knew the situation at the site wouldn’t be identical. They needed to scout, to gather information. Then act.

  Not that there was anything she could do about it now. So she took a deep breath and waited.

  It didn’t take long. A shout rose up from the other side of the clearing, zips of plasma fire.

  Followed by the deep, thunderous roar of an explosion—the fuel cart.

  The fireball billowed up, illuminating everything in angry red light. The Elites guarding the structure began screaming wildly at one another, while a pair of floating, tentacled creatures drifting near the scanning device swirled together, moving for cover. Saskia could hear the corallers in the distance, pinning down the Covenant, buying her time. But where were the others with the fire suppressant?

  The fire spread across the clearing quickly. The white debris ignited easily, the scraps bursting into flames before the fire had even touched them. “Oh, that’s not good,” she muttered, fear sliding up her spine. That debris was all over the place. She was sitting on top of it. There was no way the firebugs were going to be able to control the fire—

  Saskia scrambled to her feet and ran along the perimeter of the clearing. The thick smoke billowed over her, choking her, making her eyes water. She crouched down, trying to avoid it.

  “Saskia!”

  She turned; she could barely see Victor through the smoke. He was a silhouette, gliding toward her. Saskia coughed, pressing herself against a nearby stone.

  “What are you doing?” Victor put his hand on her elbow, peered down into her face. “Are you okay? Why did you leave your position?”

  “Did you see that fire?” she hissed, pulling him down to the ground, out of the path of the smoke. “It’s moving too fast.”

  Even with her watery vision, she could see in Victor’s expression that he had noticed it too. “Caird is capable,” he said. “She’ll handle it.”

  “Of course she’s capable,” Saskia said. “But she wouldn’t have expected the fire to move this fast. There’s no way she’s able to clear the path for us—”

  Gunfire exploded nearby. Saskia and Victor both hit the ground—which was covered in that white flammable material. Saskia shrieked, pushed it away, clawing for the dirt underneath.

  “Owen!” shouted Blanc, one of the firebugs. “We’ve got a major problem!”

  Saskia looked over at Victor, her hands still full of the white debris. “I told you.”

  “Owen! Local Team! Do you copy?” Blanc’s voice bounced around through the smoke. Saskia spun around in place, kicking up debris and dirt.

  “Do you see her?” she cried to Victor. “Blanc! We’re here! Where are you?”

  A dark shape wavered in the smoke. Saskia stood up, ducking to try to avoid the smoke, and ran toward it. “Blanc!” she screamed, the smoke searing her lungs. The shape turned toward her, the glint of a rifle muzzle flashing in the firelight.

  “Nazari!” Blanc bolted forward, emerging out of the smoke. Her face was streaked with black soot and her hair was soaked with sweat. “Thank god,” she gasped. “Where’s Owen?”

  “We spread out,” Saskia said. “He’s half a kilometer west of here.”

  “We’ve got to get to him.” Blanc’s eyes were wild with fear. “We’ve got to call off the mission.”

  “What?” Victor was at Saskia’s side. “We can’t! You have no idea—”

  “You have no idea!” Blanc
shouted. “The fire is out of control. Caird is dead.”

  “What?” Saskia whispered, the news hitting her like a punch.

  “It’s this damn—” Blanc kicked out the ground, the debris fluttering up around her. “It must be some sort of polymer foam; it’s the most flammable material I’ve ever seen. There was probably a plant nearby—they put this stuff in furniture. The fire got out of hand immediately.” She pulled a slim metal canister from where it had been strapped to her back. “This is the last of the fire suppressant.”

  “Are you serious?” Victor lunged forward, but Blanc jerked the canister away from his grasp.

  “We had to,” she said. “The fire just—” She shook her head, and Saskia realized she was crying, the tears bleeding into the droplets of sweat running down her face. “We’ve got to get out of here now.”

  “We can’t,” Saskia said, and she felt her own tears on the edges of her eyes. “Victor’s right. You don’t understand what this structure is capable of. We’ve got to get these samples back to ONI.”

  The fire was leaping across the excavation site, roaring like a monster. Banshees circled overhead, dropping down into the flames, lifting back up. A rescue operation, Saskia thought. Even the Covenant were getting the hell out.

  “Give me the suppressant,” she said.

  “What?” shouted Victor, just as Blanc shrieked, “No!”

  “I’ll clear a path,” Saskia said. “You go get the others. I’ll lay the suppressant down thick. We only have a short way to run. Owen said the structure itself most likely can’t be damaged by fire, so once we’re in, we’ll probably be fine.”

  “Are you insane?” Blanc screamed.

  “There’s a super-weapon under there,” Saskia said, pointing her finger at the Covenant device rising up before the fast-encroaching wall of fire. “Or at least something that the Covenant will use as one. If we don’t get to it first, the Covenant will. And if they do, the war is over. Humanity is over. ONI needs those samples so that we can fight back.”

  Blanc blinked. The firelight flashed over her wet skin.

  “We saw what it was capable of,” Saskia said. “If we wait until the fire clears, the Covenant will just move back in. We have to use the fire as cover to finish the mission.”

  Blanc stared at Saskia, clutching the fire suppressant to her chest. Saskia held out one hand. “Please,” she rasped, and she didn’t say the rest of what she was thinking: that this was the chance for her to prove once and for all that she could be trusted in a way her parents never could.

  Slowly, Blanc held out the suppressant. Saskia took a deep breath. “Thank you.”

  And then Victor dove forward, grabbing the suppressant.

  “Victor!” Saskia called.

  “Let me do it,” he said. “I can run faster than you. Go get the others. I’ll lay the path.”

  “Victor, I can do it—”

  “If you’re going to do this,” Blanc shouted, shoving herself in between them, “we have to do it now. That fire is almost to the structure.”

  Saskia looked out at the site. Covenant soldiers were drifting upward weightless out of the flames, their bodies climbing upward in a large beam of light. It was a Covenant craft, pulling them up with its gravity lift.

  “Fine,” she said. “But please just—be careful.”

  “I always am,” Victor said. “Now go! I’ll meet you at the rendezvous.”

  And then he was gone, vanishing into the flare of the fire.

  Blanc looked at Saskia. “Tell me where to go,” she said. “I’ll help.”

  “That way,” Saskia said, pointing to the left. “Evie and Dorian are that way. I’ll get Owen.”

  And then she was running too.

  The heat almost reminded him of Brume-sur-Mer during the dry season, the same intense, baking swelter, an overpowering shimmer that soaked through his skin and seemed to roast the inside of his bones. When they didn’t have school, he and Evie would wake up early and go down to the beach to shoot footage for his holo-films, the heat already settling in as they set up the models and tested the camera settings. By lunch, it would be too hot to stay outside, even with the salt breeze whipping off the ocean, and they would drive into town and escape into the coffee shop, where they would order frozen drinks and sit in the back corner, away from the blazing sun pouring through the windows.

  He thought he had known heat then. He had chewed on ice and slept in the cool dark of his bedroom during the hottest part of the day, mid-afternoon, the cloudless sky bleached the color of bones. Nighttime wasn’t much better, even with the sun down; the heat lingered, as if it were baked into the soil. But he could still remember running errands with his mother, taking the ferry into Port Moyne to visit the supply warehouse there in the hour before it closed for the day. The night’s sticky swelter. The bustle of the city slowed down, as if it were trapped in molasses. A heat so endless it was like the rainy season couldn’t come.

  But he hadn’t known heat. Not like this.

  He made his way across the clearing, kicking aside that flammable white debris, trying to keep as low to the ground as he could. The smoke was thick as water, but if he got down, he could almost breathe normally. And so he crawled, the suppressant strapped to his back. He wanted to start at the entrance and work his way back. Try to beat the fire as best he could.

  He peered up at the large machine the Covenant had placed above the Forerunner structure. Most of the remaining soldiers were using it as a fire shelter. What looked like a Phantom dropship was hovering overhead, Covenant soldiers rising up to its gravity beam and then into the craft’s belly. Victor kept crawling. He couldn’t watch this drama play out. He had to get to the dig entrance.

  And it was right dead ahead.

  He was pouring sweat, the dirt beneath his palms turning to mud with his touch, then caking and drying and flaking away just as fast. Sparks flew off the fire and dusted across his back, sharp stings of intense pain that he brushed aside. But he didn’t regret taking Saskia’s place. This was the sort of thing he had learned in his time in training, his time with Owen. Use your strengths. Saskia was smart, resourceful, and fearless: He knew that she would be of more use to ONI than himself. She didn’t need to risk her life crawling through the fire.

  So no, he didn’t regret it. Not one bit.

  He came to a base of the Covenant machine, looming over the hole. Up close he confirmed the suspicions he had when he first saw it: This machine was some kind of a scanning device, the Covenant’s way of prying open the secrets of Forerunner technology without having direct access. The entrance to the structure yawned open, a dark, inviting hole, free from smoke and heat. Victor pulled the suppressant canister around and yelped when he touched the metal; he pulled his hand away and saw the dark angry burn on his palm. Good thing he could do this one-handed.

  He activated the suppressant, tilted the canister down. The foam gushed out, hardening almost instantly in the sweltering air. He cursed, thumped the side of the canister. The suppressant stuck out from the spout like a piece of coral.

  Victor heard a deep, thunderous groan. It was the Covenant’s scanner, sinking down on its melting stand. Damn it, they would have to move fast. He reached down with his burned hand and broke off the solidified suppressant, screaming in pain. Smoke poured into his mouth, down his throat, into his lungs. He tossed the suppressant down and then got low, spraying practically into the dirt, crawling backward over the open space. He kept his gaze on the suppressant, building a path along the ground. His vision blurred. He shook his head. Focus. He was almost to the edge.

  The smoke was falling around him, dark as a storm cloud. All he could smell was fire, all he could smell was heat, a scent like the strike of a match, burned flesh, like swooning beneath the glare of the sun. The fire roared with laughter, mocking him. His lungs felt tight. The world flickered.

  He was almost there. Almost done.

  The smoke was everywhere.

  The canister
dropped out of his hands, rolled over the white path of the suppressant. He watched it tumble toward the structure. As if it wanted to help.

  He wasn’t crawling backward anymore. He couldn’t. It was as if the smoke had bound him to this place.

  He couldn’t breathe.

  He couldn’t feel anything but the Brume-sur-Mer sun. The heat of the beach. Home.

  He knew if he closed his eyes it would be over.

  He closed his eyes.

  Don’t stop to think!” Owen roared, somehow louder than the fire raging around them. “It’ll be better inside the structure, but we’ve got to act fast!”

  Owen wasn’t lying; the large, looming Covenant scanner was tilting precariously, threatening to collapse all over the entrance to the structure. There was a part of Dorian that wanted to turn around and run to the rendezvous point, where he would at least be able to breathe. But then he saw Evie and Saskia pounding their way to the shelter entrance and he knew he couldn’t. Not the girls, and not Victor, who had laid a path and then vanished into the smoke. Dorian hoped he was lying in wait at the rendezvous, his role in the mission done.

  So Dorian kept moving, trying to follow Blanc’s instructions for running headlong into the fire: keep low, try not to breathe too much. He pushed forward into the smoke and heat, his feet pounding against the path of fire suppressant leading them straight into the structure.

  “Go! Go! Go!” They were at the entrance of the hole, the Covenant scanner tilting precariously above them. Dorian could hear the internal groaning of its crumbling structure. Not good.

  Dorian half boosted, half tossed Evie into the dig, then Saskia. Dorian took a deep breath as Owen grabbed him around the waist and then let go. He landed hard on the packed dirt below. The air was clearer down here, but just as hot. Dorian wiped away the sweat dripping into his eyes.

  A loud and thunderous thump as Owen landed beside him. “You okay?” Owen asked. “Breathing fine?”