by E. E. Giorgi
I stand up and pick up my plate. Athel stretches his arm across the table and grabs my hand. “Wait. You don’t get it.” He looks to the boys for support. “I’ll explain everything. I’m not joking. It’s really important.” He sighs, looks over his shoulder, and lowers his voice. “I know what the Gaijins want back, the thing the sniper droid was talking about. It’s that rocket you saw, Dottie. Yuri and Cal didn’t make it, the Gaijins did. We’ve got forty-eight hours to fix it and find a way to return it to them.”
“How do you know?” Wes asks.
The question seems to irritate Athel. “Look. You heard the woman a few minutes ago. She’s right. The next attack is going to be to the Tower, and we won’t even have the time to blink. The Gaijins can squash us with their pinkies. We don’t have a place to hide or run to. We’re at their mercy, and until we have not just good weapons, but a strategy to strike back, we’ll have to play by their rules. We can’t waste any time.”
Athel looks at each one of us and then adds, “So. Who’s game?”
I exhale and drop back into my chair.
Lukas says, “Midnight. We’ll be there.”
* * *
“How on earth—and where—did you find this?” I ask staring at the rocket Athel has hidden in the stable, behind several bales of hay.
His lips stretch into a wide grin. “I’m never gonna tell you, Sis.”
“Yes, you are!”
My shout awakes Taeh. She stirs and leans out of her stall, her eyes shiny with sleep.
“I’m so sorry, Taeh,” I whisper, walking over to hug her.
Athel settles on the floor with his legs crossed. “I’ll tell you everything in due time. First, we need a plan.”
Lukas slides his data feeder out of his satchel and takes pictures of the rocket.
The frame looks like it’s come out of a battlefield: kinked and scratched, blue paint peeling off, and a rim of rust all around its nosecone. One of the exhaust nozzles is dented but probably still functional, as I’ve seen this thing with my own eyes flying across the forest, burning leaves and chipping branches on its way.
“How do you know it’s from the Gaijins?” I ask, leaving Taeh and joining the boys back by the stack of bales.
“Didn’t you say you saw Cal and Yuri in the forest with it?” Wes says, echoing my thoughts.
“Not exactly with it,” I reply. “Still, I thought—”
“It is from the Gaijins,” Lukas says, brushing a finger along the broken fin. “The frame is clearly made of a nickel-titanium alloy. Only the Gaijins have the technology to produce it.” He takes another picture, his eyes sparkling with excitement. “This is epic, Athel!”
Athel doesn’t reciprocate the fanfare. “Can you fix it?”
The smile evaporates from Lukas’s face. “Is it broken?”
I snort. “It’s supposed to fly up, not zigzag across the forest.”
Lukas pinches his chin. “I see. Sounds like one of the engines isn’t functioning properly. I can take a look, but it depends on the extent of the damage.” He fishes a screwdriver out of his bag and taps it on the side panel. “Also, if it needs replacement parts, I may not be able to supply them.”
“It doesn’t matter how you fix it, as long as you do fix it,” Athel says.
Lukas finds one of the bolts and starts unscrewing it. “I’ll try to see what’s going on with this thing. But the Gaijins are wrong. We never stole it. I bet the how and why it got here in the first place would make for quite an interesting story.”
I chew my lower lip, not liking any of this. I don’t like that we’re hiding a rocket inside the barn, I don’t like that it was made by the Gaijins, and I don’t like that my brother’s still not telling us how he acquired it.
“What if it’s all a trap?” I say. “What if you think the droid wanted us to fix it, when in fact he really meant for us to bring it here so it could explode in the middle of the night?”
“You mean, like a Trojan horse or something,” Wes chimes in.
I nod. “Exactly.”
Lukas stiffens and lowers the screwdriver.
Athel seems thoughtful for a moment, as though the notion hadn’t even crossed his mind. His cheeks flush, or maybe it’s the naked bulb hanging from the ceiling that’s playing tricks on me.
“It’s not a trap,” he says, his voice firm.
I narrow my eyes. “Why? Where were you all day, Athel? You weren’t at the riverbank, helping out like we all did. Will you once and for all tell us what you’ve been hiding from us?”
He meets the equally concerned stares of Lukas and Wes and sighs. “Fine. But you guys will have to trust me.”
“Your sister has a point,” Wes mutters, scratching his brow. “It’ll be easier to trust you if you tell us what’s going on.”
Athel opens his backpack and slides out a roll of rice paper. He unfolds it with care and flattens it on the floor between us.
Lukas opens his mouth and runs his hands through his hair. “A map of the five powers of Astraca! Wow, Athel, how did you—”
“Not the original,” Athel quickly interjects. “Tahari wouldn’t part with it. He said it took him and Aghad two years to find it.”
“To find the original?”
Athel nods, pressing down the edges of the map so it’ll stay flat. Thin strokes of sepia ink sketch an eclectic collection of streets and buildings that sprawl from the upper left corner of the map to the bottom right one. Round blobs of ink mark the trees, while thin, wiggly lines reproduce creeks and waterbeds. Some of the squares, possibly houses, are filled with ink, and I can’t help but wonder if that has a special meaning.
Wes blinks several times. “What are we staring at?”
“The city within the city,” Lukas replies, beaming. “There was a whole underground city built underneath Astraca, complete with tunnels, buildings and secret passages.”
“So it’s not the real Astraca?” I ask.
“It’s the underground Astraca,” Lukas clarifies. “The Underground City. Originally built as a series of emergency tunnels that led outside the city, over the years it expanded to almost a fourth of Astraca’s original size. Only a few knew about it, the consuls and the senators—people in power who were sworn to secrecy. As a result, any trace that it ever existed was lost in the fire.”
“Not all,” Athel corrects him. “One thing was left.”
“Engrams?” I venture.
Athel nods. “Precisely.”
Wes shoots his hands up. “Hold on and slow down. Why did Tahari give you a map of the Underground City if the whole thing was supposed to be kept secret?”
Athel sighs. “I went back to the forest at night, and he was there with the other man, Aghad, a rice farmer. They were looking for the chavis. They already have three, so they only need two more to complete the set.”
“Of course! I knew it!” Lukas yells, making Taeh snort in her stall. I elbow him in the arm and scowl. “Sorry,” he mumbles, “but this is so… epic!” He shifts and snaps picture after picture of the map.
Wes scratches his brow. “Isn’t the Underground City where the AIs are hidden?”
We all stare at him, the thought dawning on us for the first time.
Wes is right. At the time of its fall, Astraca had mastered the production and use of artificial intelligence on every level of its society, from cleaning the streets to running banks and bureaucratic tasks. Robots so sophisticated they had become part of the society and started making their own demands. When the consuls refused to listen, the bots turned into bloodthirsty machines that walked the streets killing, burning, and destroying.
Athel drums his fingers on the map. “Tahari didn’t mention the weapons. But I’m sure it’s part of the plan.”
“Why did Tahari talk to you in the first place?” I ask. “How come he suddenly likes you so much that he’s willing to share a map it took him two years to find?”
“Aghad found it, actually,” Athel replies. “He’s the
one who had the engram about the map’s location. He told Tahari about the weird dream he kept having, and Tahari immediately understood. It still took them two years to find it. They finally unearthed it the other night when Akaela and I saw them.”
“Why did Tahari spill all this to you?” I press on.
Athel stabs the map with his index finger. “Because he needs our help in finding not only the chavis, but the five doors they’re supposed to unlock. In case you haven’t noticed, the Gaijins are tightening their grip on us. They’re getting impatient and tired of our presence here. It’s our land, and they’re not shy about exploiting it, but it’d be much easier if they could get rid of us altogether. The Underground City is our only way out right now. The Tower is big and bulky and an easy target for the Gaijins’ missiles. Our only hope is to unlock the city and escape underground.”
“We’re going to send the Gaijins away and win this war,” Wes says, not a wrinkle of doubt on his face.
“We’re clearly unprepared,” Athel retorts. “Yuri can take down one droid at a time, but the Gaijins are going to send a full army.” His eyes stray back to the rocket. “Which is why we need to let them win this one altercation about the rocket. We’ll return it and buy some time.”
Lukas looks languidly at the bulky contraption leaning against the hay bales. “We don’t get to keep even a little tiny chip for another microbot?”
Athel shakes his head. “It has to be back in working shape, Lukas.”
“Why did Tahari give you this map?” I prod, frustrated that my brother still hasn’t answered my question.
“When we met in the forest last night, he thought I had the engram too and was looking for the chavis. He likes the fact that I can search for them at night without needing a flashlight. The map is only the first step to finding the city. Here, let me show you.” He rotates the map and tells us to hold down one corner each. “These are the five doors.” Athel marks them on the map with his index finger: “Wisdom, Foresight, Knowledge, Prudence, and Ingenuity.”
“It’s like I told you,” Lukas says. “They’re distributed like the five stars in Cassiopeia.”
“They are,” Athel confirms. “But it’s hard to read the map because there are no cardinal points or other references since the city burned down. Tahari thinks that Beacon Rock sits right here.” He stabs the map with his index finger, pressing it somewhere in between the Ingenuity and Knowledge doors, the gamma and beta stars in the Cassiopeia constellation. “If he’s right, then we should be able to find the doors.”
“Which we can’t open because we’re missing the chavis,” I say, the thought stinging.
“You couldn’t know,” Athel says. “Tahari told me you need a special engram to know how to open those cylinders. If Yuri had the engram, then he did the right thing to open it.”
Athel’s answer shocks me. “But I’m the one who found it!” I protest.
Is he defending Metal Jaw now? After all he’s done to us?
“We’re all in this together, Dottie. We find the five chavis and open the five doors, then the entrance to the Underground City will unlock, revealing a safe haven to plan our war against the Gaijins and build our weapons. If we don’t, then we’re doomed. All of us. You, me, Yuri and Cal alike.”
I grind my teeth. “You know I hate them.”
“I hate them too,” he says. “But we’ll have to convince them to collaborate on this one.”
“You said Tahari already has three chavis?” Wes asks.
“Yes,” Athel replies. “And now Yuri and Cal have the fourth one.”
“Four chavis have been found but no door?” Wes insists.
Athel shakes his head. “It’s not that simple. Like I said, the map isn’t easy to read.”
“But why find all the chavis?” I retort. “All we need is to unlock one door to gain access to the Underground City.”
“No,” Lukas interjects. “It was all part of a careful plan. The city was to remain secret and inaccessible under normal circumstances. That’s why no door will open until all five are unlocked. So we really need to find the remaining chavis first.”
“And then all doors?” I ask. “That’s insane. We’ll never make it in time.”
“Two doors is all we need,” Lukas replies. “Once we have the location of those two, we can figure out how the map is oriented and find the rest. In fact, if Tahari is right about Beacon Rock, all we need is one.”
Lukas stares intently at the map and brushes a finger from Beacon Rock all the way down to where the Prudence door is marked. “This is where Akaela found the chavi,” he says. “I think the Prudence door is in the vicinity.”
“How do you know?” Athel asks.
“Because now that I understand all this better, I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it.”
Chapter Twelve
Athel
Day Number: 1,586
Event: Lukas claims the rocket’s not a rocket
Number of Mayakes left: 428
Goal for today: Fix the rocket (or whatever it is) and return it to the Gaijins.
Lukas works on the rocket late into the night. Around one in the morning, Wes and Dottie lean against the hay bales and doze off. I try to resist a little longer, taking occasional strolls out in the paddock to breathe in fresh air. But I’ve already gone without sleep for forty-eight hours and eventually I, too, fall victim to my own exhaustion and pass out on the floor.
When Lukas rouses me from sleep, pins of light poke through the shutters in the stable. I blink, rub my eyes, and roll over, the smell of hay and horse manure tickling my nostrils. Wes and Akaela are nowhere to be seen, and Lukas is yelling in my face, “You’ve got to see this! You’ve got to see this!”
“Where are the others?” I drawl, slowly sitting up.
“Went back to the Tower before the moms would wake up to empty beds and freak out.” He pulls my sleeve and points to the rocket, which now lies on the floor with its belly—the frame—flipped open. “Come see this thing. I tell you, it’s no ordinary rocket.”
Taeh peeks at me from her stall and bobs her head, her way of saying good morning.
I rub my eyes with the heels of my hands. “Did you figure out what’s wrong with it?”
Lukas frowns as though disappointed I’d even ask. “Of course I figured it out. There’s a huge dent in the tank that reduces the fuel area, causing the burn rate to be too slow for it to reach high altitude. It’s fixable, but I need a special wrench to do it. Akari has one.”
I stifle a yawn and give him a blank stare. “What are you waiting for? Go get it, then. Will it launch once you fix the issue?”
Lukas shrugs. “I didn’t see anything else that could potentially cause problems. We’ll have to test it, although it doesn’t have much fuel left. Not that it needs a lot.” His eyes shine again, despite being tired from the sleepless night. “Check it out. The oxygen ratio makes this engine the most efficient ever—”
“Save it for later,” I interject. I get up and stretch. The time stamp on the bottom corner of my retina reads 6:29 a.m. “We don’t have much time. Once the rocket is fixed, we’ll haul it back to the mouth of the gorge. I’m pretty sure the droids will find it there and bring it back home to the Gaijins.”
Lukas sits with his legs crossed and flashes a devious smile. “Sounds good, except for one thing.”
I blink. “What thing?”
“This,” he says, patting the metal frame, “is no rocket.”
“Huh? What is it, then?”
“A rocket booster.” He leans over the thing, dips a hand inside one of the chambers and pulls out what looks like a set of straps with buckles. “This puppy is the propelling engine of some kind of capsule. It didn’t get here on its own.”
I blink at that. Several times. Then I run a hand through my hair and sit back down on the floor. “You sure about that?”
Lukas nods emphatically, the straight hair at the back of his head bobbing back and forth. “One hundred percent
positive. Not a big capsule. Given the size of the nozzles, I’d say it has enough thrust to carry about two hundred pounds, no more.”
“What would you put in a two-hundred-pound capsule?” I ask, although my mind is starting to form a clear picture of what happened.
Lukas shrugs. “I’d have to be a Gaijin to know the answer. I dunno. A trap? A spybot? Some kind of robotic machine, for sure, because we know the Gaijins will never set foot in our land for fear of getting the Plague again.”
Right. Except someone did. Why risk it, though?
And the rocket… booster, according to Lukas… That’s why she wanted it fixed, not to return it to the droids. But then, if not the rocket… what is it that the droids want?
A trickle of sweat runs down my cheek. If it’s not the rocket the droids want back, then we’re in deep trouble. The Gaijins will attack in twenty-four hours and we haven’t unlocked any of the doors. I wipe the sweat off my face and clamber back to my feet. Taeh whinnies impatiently in her stall. “I know, girl. Time to get you outside,” I say, while the memory of a girl with blue eyes and long braids flashes before my eyes.
All I wanted to do was save her life, I think, opening the gate to Taeh’s stall.
What if I gave her the Plague and signed her death sentence instead?
I walk Taeh to the prepping corner and groom her mechanically, my thoughts reeling. Taeh keeps stomping her hooves and moving away from me.
“Athel?” Lukas calls.
“What?”
“You seem… um. Preoccupied.”
“What makes you think so?”
“The fact that you’re brushing your horse with a horseshoe.”
Taeh’s finally had enough of me and walks to the door one second before it swings open. Akaela pokes her head inside and finds herself face to face with the horse.
“Good morning Taeh,” Dottie says, hugging her. “You guys still here?” she adds, her gaze straying from me to Lukas. She carries a basket that smells incredibly delicious.