Midnight City: A Conquered Earth Novel (The Conquered Earth Series)

by J. Barton Mitchell

  “You okay?” Holt asked beside her. He’d followed them up, had his gear slung over his back. She looked at him softly, something passing between them. And then she nodded and touched his arm.

  “Wow!” Zoey exclaimed, taking Mira’s hand. The little girl was staring at the port outside the ship with amazement.

  Mira smiled down at her. “This is nothing—wait till we get into the city.”

  “What’s it like?” Zoey asked.

  “It’s … beautiful, actually. Dark and bright at the same time. Full of energy, more people than you’ve ever seen in one place. It’s not like anywhere else you’ll ever go.”

  Zoey gazed out over the port below them.

  Midnight City actually had two ports, one at the top where the Wind Shear was docked called Upper Berth, and one far below, where the Missouri River came out of the dam and continued south, called Lower Berth.

  Lower Berth was for River Rat crews who brought their ships up from the south for trade. Mira looked over the edge of the dam, all the way down to where dozens of river boats and barges were docked far below. The crews and kids moving down there looked like ants from this far up.

  Upper Berth was the land entrance to Midnight City, and traders moving on foot, as well as the occasional caravan or Landship from the Barren, docked and entered the city here. There were two other Landships tied off next to the Wind Shear, both a similar mix of different parts and pieces, all meticulously and artfully put together, and the crews of all three vessels had spun lines of cable between them, so that cargo or messages or even people could pass easily to and from them.

  On the ground, hundreds of survivors moved between the ships and Midnight City’s main entrance, a huge opening in the concrete structure at the far side of the port that probably once allowed vehicles down into the dam’s interior.

  “Would it be a waste of time to try to convince you to stay on?” a voice asked from behind. Mira turned and saw Dresden studying her. “It’s a long road west, and your expertise would come in handy. Not to mention … you bring a definite beauty and charm to the ship.”

  Mira blushed, even as she noticed Holt’s glare. The Captain was certainly cute, and he had a way with words, but he was also more kinds of trouble than she could probably name. “I’m sad to say the answer’s still no. But you have a nice way of reasking the same question, Captain.” Mira saw Holt roll his eyes and pretend to focus on the port below.

  “I see your friend found his legs,” Dresden said, looking at Holt. “That’s good. When you fell, I thought you were a goner. Hell, for a second, I thought we all were. Way those things chased after us … you’d think they were interested in you three personally.” Dresden smiled pleasantly, but it wasn’t completely disarming. He had his suspicions, it was clear.

  “They were probably just trying to take out the depot,” Holt offered. “Tempting target.”

  “Three different Assembly groups?” Dresden mused doubtfully. “I’ve never seen red or green ones before, and they just show up and start fighting each other? No. Something was wrong there, and whatever it was, I’ll be glad to put distance between it and myself. We’re full sail to the west tomorrow morning. Gangplank’s down, we’re tied off, you can disembark whenever you want.” Dresden reached out and took Mira’s hand. He lifted it to his lips and kissed it gently. “I feel we are destined to meet again, you and I.”

  Holt had apparently had enough. “I doubt we’ll be visiting the Barren anytime soon.” He took Mira’s hand from Dresden and started moving toward the gangplank to the port. Mira almost smiled. It surprised her how much she enjoyed seeing Holt jealous.

  “You never know,” Dresden said, walking next to them casually, seemingly unbothered. “The winds take us where they will, after all … not the other way around.” He looked down at Zoey, and she looked up at him. Dresden winked at her. “Remember that, little one. Be safe.”

  “You, too, Captain Dresden,” Zoey said.

  “Winds guide you,” Dresden said, giving the traditional Landship farewell as he bowed. Then he turned on his heel and disappeared back into the movements of his crew, giving orders.

  The gangplank stretched before them, an ornate ramp made of sealed aspen and sparkling metal that descended to the ground of the Upper Berth below. The four walked down it and stepped onto the grass.

  Throngs of people, hundreds of them, flocked everywhere, all headed to and from either the docked Landships and other vehicles or the city’s main entrance. Mira looked up at Holt and found his eyes were already on her. Zoey’s head turned back and forth, studying both of them.

  “So…,” Mira said. Here it was, another crossroads.

  “So…,” Holt said back.

  They stayed like that, considering each other, both unsure what to say. Mira saw Zoey roll her eyes in frustration beneath them.

  “Are you—?” Mira started.

  “I was thinking—,” Holt began at the same time.

  They both cut off, looking at each other awkwardly.

  “Go ahead,” Mira said.

  “No, I cut you off, you go first.”

  Mira sighed. Why was this so hard? She’d had plenty of good-byes in her life. It was the way the world worked, after all. Why did the possibility of this being one of them leave such a dull ache?

  “Hard to believe we made it,” she finally said. “After everything.”

  “We definitely beat the odds, I’ll give us that,” Holt said soberly. “We make a good team.”

  They stared at each other again, questions and thoughts hanging in the air. Mira heard a slight “ahem” from below, and she looked down. Zoey was giving her a firm get it over with, already look. Mira frowned and looked back at Holt.

  She forced herself to ask, “Are you … heading east now? For the Low Marshes, I mean?”

  “Is that what you think I should do?” Holt asked back.

  “I think … you should do what you want to do,” she said back, completely sidestepping what she wanted to say. What was wrong with her? “Is that … what you want to do?”

  “Is that what you want me to—?”

  “Mira,” Zoey interrupted in agitation. They looked down at her, and she was giving them both a severe look. “Holt wants to ask if he can stay and help you do what you have to do here.” Holt’s eyes widened, but Zoey kept going before he could protest. “Holt, Mira wants to ask if you’ll stay with us and not head east, at least not yet.” She gave each of them a look in turn. “Was that so hard?”

  Holt and Mira smiled and looked up at each other. “I guess not, kiddo,” Holt replied.

  “Are you sure? It’s not going to be easy, Holt,” Mira said. “In fact, it could be really dangerous.”

  He looked around warily at the droves of people entering the city. “Why would I expect anything else?” he said. “Besides … Max would miss Zoey.” Holt gave her a pointed look as he said the words.

  The smile on her face spread. “He would, huh?”

  “Can I ride the Max just until we get to the front gate? Please?” Zoey pleaded.

  Holt and Mira sighed, shook their heads, mouthed the word no, and started moving. Zoey pouted, but followed after them.

  They blended in with the churning crowd headed for the main entrance, and as they moved, Mira put the hood of her top up over her face, concealing herself as best she could.

  “Just … how recognizable are you here?” Holt asked.

  “Very,” Mira answered.

  “What happens if I get caught with you?”

  She looked at him mischievously.

  “Forget I asked,” Holt said.

  They kept moving toward the gate amid the line of people pushing forward. As they moved, more detail of the old dam was revealed. Cannons of all kinds lined the top of the structure, makeshift ones like the boats at the trading depot had used, refurbished artillery guns from armories and old military bases, and even a few repurposed Assembly plasma guns that had been rigged to work again.
r />   Besides the cannons, the denizens of the city had crafted gun ports all through the exterior, where they could shoot while staying behind cover. All of it was defensive, in case of an Assembly attack, but as far as Mira knew, that had never happened. They were at the edge of the Minneapolis Presidium’s territory, and the aliens didn’t seem to care one way or another about the city’s existence. Why should they? All they had to do was wait, after all, and the Tone would deliver the rest of the survivors right to their doorstep.

  The main entrance to Midnight City loomed ahead of them, two huge steel doors that had been swung open to allow entry into a concrete tunnel on the other side.

  Painted above the giant doors was a symbol. A clock face, with both hands pointing straight up, and the numbers 1 through 12, arranged in a ring around it. It was the symbol for Midnight City, and under it, a group of older kids stood guard by the entrance, checking the people as they entered.

  The different factions in Midnight City alternated various responsibilities throughout the city, the entry guard being one of them. With relief, Mira saw that the kids weren’t wearing shades of gray; they were wearing green.

  It meant they were part of a faction called the Cavaliers. If they’d been wearing gray, it would have meant they were from the Gray Devils, Midnight City’s most powerful faction, and the faction Mira herself had once belonged to.

  The odds of Gray Devils members recognizing her would have been much greater.

  They kept moving until they reached the city gate. The line broke into three separate paths here, each passing through a different guard purview. They were searching each person, looking for contraband or anything dangerous before allowing anyone to pass. Mira tensed at the sight. What had she been thinking? Just walk right through the main gate—had that really been her plan? Her face was well known here, and the chance of these guards recognizing her, Gray Devils or not, were pretty high.

  Next to her, Holt undid his pack and dug through it, looking for something specific. He pulled out a small red cylinder with Chinese symbols written across it, and a piece of string hanging from one end.

  Mira looked at him questioningly.

  “When it’s time,” he said without looking back. “Just keep moving.”

  Before she could ask, Holt pulled the string on the cylinder … but there was no pop or bang. There was nothing. He casually slipped it into the pack of the boy in front of him. No one noticed.

  The line kept moving. Holt and Max joined one line, Mira and Zoey another, but she nervously kept watching the boy in front of Holt.

  Right as the kid reached the green-clad guard … smoke began funneling up and out from his pack, wafting into the air.

  Shouts rang up from all three guards, and they automatically moved for the boy with the smoking pack. As they did, the line in front of Mira was suddenly devoid of guards.

  She saw what Holt had planned, grabbed Zoey’s hand, and walked quickly forward, past the distracted guards and into the tunnel ahead of her.

  Behind her, Holt and Max did the same thing, moving fast for—

  “Hey! You!” one of the guards shouted. Mira shut her eyes tight … and then realized the guards weren’t yelling at her at all. They were moving instead toward Holt.

  “You just gonna walk through the main hall carrying those guns?” the guard asked him in annoyance.

  Holt looked back, unsure.

  “Your guns, nimrod,” the guard said. “Gotta check ’em before you go in, no firearms allowed. No slings or crossbows either. Unless they’re for trade, then you need a trader’s permit to carry, and they have to be empty. You trading?”

  “Uh … no,” Holt managed. “No, these are mine.”

  “Check them over here, then,” the guard said impatiently, moving toward a group of lockers set into the wall near the entrance. Mira moved farther inside and watched as Holt hesitantly handed over his weapons to the Cavalier guard. He sealed them in a locker, handed the key to Holt, and he and Max started walking toward her and Zoey again.

  Behind him, the other guards were roughly searching the kid Holt had planted the smoke bomb on, and he loudly complained that it wasn’t his. The green-clad boys didn’t seem to be buying it.

  When Holt and Max reached Mira and Zoey, they all started down the tunnel again.

  “So far, so good, I guess,” Mira said, pulling her hood tighter around her head.

  “Yeah,” Holt replied. “But I don’t like not having my guns.”

  They kept moving amid the mass of survivors trailing down the tunnel, which gradually descended into an ever-thickening darkness, toward whatever awaited them at the other end.

  30. CITY OF MIDNIGHT

  THE TUNNEL GREW GRADUALLY DARKER as they moved down it, so much so that eventually Holt had to reach out for Mira in front of him to keep from falling. In what was left of the light, Holt saw Max scamper ahead of them, darting playfully through the people.

  “Max!” he yelled, trying to stop him, but he was gone, and Holt shook his head.

  They passed through more of the heavy steel gates, all yawning open where they stood. They were formidable, with multiple gun ports. Further defenses, he figured. In case of an attack.

  But formidable or not, if the Assembly wanted inside Midnight City, Holt had a feeling they would get in, gates or no gates.

  Holt had been here only twice before, and both times he’d come in through the Lower Berth entrance, and he hadn’t stayed long. Which was fine with Holt. There was just something about the city, all the people, more people than he would normally see in a whole year, crammed together in these caverns.

  It was unsettling. He preferred open spaces where you could see the horizon. And he preferred a lot fewer people, too. People were untrustworthy, and the more of them you got in one place, the more fuel there was for something bad to happen.

  Lights appeared ahead, dim blue and red ones along the concrete tunnel’s ceiling that marked where the tunnel ended. Well, the part of it they were moving through, anyway. The man-made, concrete tunnel continued to the right, where it met a large sealed metal door. But where it forked, a hole had been punched into the wall.

  Beyond it was another tunnel, but this one was natural, made of jagged rock walls, and it continued downward. The line of people moved into it, and disappeared beyond.

  As Holt and the others followed after them, he finally felt the floor level out and stop its descent. There was a chill in the air, and a wetness, like fog almost, and he could taste it whenever he breathed.

  And then they stepped out into somewhere amazing.

  In spite of Holt’s misgivings about the place, it never failed to impress him, and coming into it like this, through the darkened tunnel, only made the reveal that much more dramatic.

  They stood in an enormous underground cavern system that had formed behind the dam who knew how many millions of years ago. The walls in this chamber stretched out of sight in every direction, and the ceiling soared several hundred feet above them.

  All throughout the cavern, a city had been constructed. There was no other word for it. Holt twisted the bracelet on his left wrist as he took it all in. Structures made out of wood and metal and plastic, repurposed buildings from other parts of the world hammered and welded together, and refurbished components from all kinds of devices and objects climbed up the cavern walls, sometimes as high as six or seven stories off the rock floor.

  Lights of all shapes and colors were strung up along the ceiling far above, in huge numbers. Because there were so many of them, and because they were so high up, they looked at first glance like stars in a night sky, bathing everything below them in flickering light. It was no mystery where the place got its name. Midnight City was a city in perpetual night.

  The buildings and natural flow of the cavern created large streetlike pathways outlined with lanterns on top of poles that glowed in different colors and intensities, stretching away into the distance toward other parts of the cavern city.
r />   The black rock made everything feel shadowy and mysterious, and the bright, colored lights seemed even more striking contrasted against it. It was as Mira had told Zoey: The city was both dark and bright at the same time.

  Zoey stared in awe, her mouth hanging open. Holt watched Mira smile and kneel down to her.

  “This is where you live?” Zoey asked.

  Holt saw a note of sadness play on Mira’s face, before she replied. “Yes,” she said. “This is the main hall—it’s where everyone lives, except for the larger factions. They have their own caverns.”

  Mira examined the city with a melancholy look. Holt had never really felt he had a “home,” as he was always on the move. Even when he’d been with the Menagerie, he didn’t spend all that much time in Faust. But if he had a home, someplace he felt he belonged, and it were taken from him, he thought he could imagine how that would feel.

  Hundreds of survivors moved in and out of the city’s buildings, going about their business, walking in a crowd through the lantern-lit streets.

  “Where do the lights come from?” Zoey asked.

  Good question, now that Holt thought about it. “Electrical?” he asked. “Do they have the dam’s generators working?”

  Mira shook her head. “No, the dam hasn’t worked in years, and no one knows how to fix it. The lights are artifact combinations, simple ones called Illuminators. Depending on the components, you never know what color you’ll get. That’s why they’re all different.”

  “I like the colors,” Zoey said, craning her neck to stare straight up at the cavern ceiling.

  They started walking again, through the glittering city, and as they did, Max reappeared, dodging through the crowd on his way back, tongue hanging out of his mouth. “The Max!” Zoey yelled, grabbing one of the dog’s ears and walking with it like it was someone’s hand.