by Tara Sim
“The church,” Cassie shouted in his ear. She pointed to the right, where St. Margaret’s stood in the shadow of Westminster. “The square is overrun, but if we go around the church, we can avoid most of the fighting!”
Edmund studied the path and nodded. “It’ll connect us to Parliament Street. We can reach Big Ben from there.”
Danny wanted to cross the square to the Affairs building. The Lead would be there. His father, too. He wondered what the Lead had done after Danny had escaped from the Tower, if he’d remembered Danny’s warning about Big Ben and summoned all the mechanics he could to stand against the Builders.
But the others were already running, and he had to hurry to catch up. They raced across the façade of the Abbey, passing each arched window. Two of the windows were already blasted open, revealing glimpses of the columns inside.
Above their heads, a plane took a hit and wavered, listing to one side as its right wing was consumed by flames. The plane spiraled and slammed into one of the Abbey’s towers with a dull crash of stone and steel. The Prometheus crew jumped back as huge pieces of stone rained down, and Cassie grabbed Danny around his waist, pressing him into a nook just before a jagged piece fell right where they’d been standing.
“Damn!” Edmund yelled. “That was close!”
Gunshots rang in their ears and pinged off the building beside them; they had been spotted by Builders. Danny pulled Cassie down as Liddy and Edmund swung their guns around and fired back.
Prema beckoned to Danny and Cassie. “The church!”
Astrid took down a Builder and went to retrieve her knife from the corpse. Prema gestured for her to hurry and follow them.
But Astrid didn’t see the Indian rebel behind her. The man raised a machete-like weapon above his head—
“Astrid!” Prema screamed.
Cassie shrieked as the shot went off. Danny hadn’t even realized he’d been the one to fire. The rebel staggered back with a pained sound, clutching his side. Liddy threw her bladed boomerang, snagging the artery in his neck and ending him quickly.
Prema sobbed as she rushed forward, grabbing Astrid and holding her tight. Astrid gaped at Danny over her shoulder.
Cassie was wild-eyed. “Was that the first person you’ve shot?” she asked.
Danny swallowed. “No.”
She gripped his wrist, just as he had gripped hers moments earlier.
The plane that had crashed into the Abbey’s tower fell with a sickening screech of metal. The resulting explosion made them stagger back as fire consumed the rest of the plane. The pilot inside was already dead.
They darted around the skeleton of the plane toward St. Margaret’s. Several Builders turned and charged toward them. Edmund shot one down, but another grabbed Liddy just as she threw her bladed boomerang.
Felix took out one of his tin canisters and let it fly, cloaking the path in a thick miasma of smoke that sent their pursuers to their knees, clutching at their throats.
Liddy kicked back with her heel and hit her assailant between the legs. He buckled and she broke away from him as Edmund fired a bullet into the man’s head.
“Tetchy son of a bitch,” Edmund said as Liddy rubbed at her arm. “You’d think—”
He never got to finish the sentence. The bladed boomerang came back and sliced through half his neck.
“ED!” Liddy caught him as he fell. His face was frozen in shock as blood gurgled up through the gap in his throat. He tried to speak, but only coughed out more blood before falling still.
Cassie looked away, heaving. The others could only stare, horrified, as Liddy hovered over Edmund’s body.
“Oh, God,” she kept saying. “Oh God oh God. No. No.”
Felix put a hand on her shoulder. “We’ll come back for him. We have to keep moving.”
Three more Builders rounded the corner, trailed by rioters.
Liddy pushed herself to her feet, aggressively wiping at her eyes. “No. I’m staying here.” She took up Edmund’s rifle and looked straight at Danny, the rage of loss making her seem raw, stripped. “Go get Sally.”
Liddy started firing at the advancing Builders as the others headed around the church, toward the street.
Danny’s stomach contracted, his numbness turning brittle and hot.
Dae, Meena, Edmund, his mother. He wanted to turn around and kill as many of the Builders as he could—ten of them for every life they’d snuffed out.
But when he saw Big Ben, he knew his mission lay ahead. The tower was bathed with the same red that stained the sky, the reflection of flames flickering over its plated iron exterior. A mass of people swarmed its base.
“We can’t get through there,” Astrid called. “Felix, we need a distraction.”
The man nodded, fumbling with his grenadier bag. Shots tore through the air overhead as a plane zoomed by, pounding the street with bullets. Felix went down with a shout as a bullet got him in the arm, the bomb in his hand rolling away.
Danny dashed forward and kicked the bomb as far as he could, shielding his face from the heat as it erupted down the street amid screams.
Prema dragged Felix to the shelter of the church’s wall.
“I’m all right.” Felix was panting as he clutched his arm in a white-knuckled grip, dark blood pooling on the ground below him. “Go on without me.”
Prema ripped away a piece of her shirt and made a quick tourniquet. “Don’t be ridiculous, I’m staying right here. Charlotte would never forgive me otherwise.” She picked up a fallen rifle and primed it, ready to fend off attackers. She met eyes with Astrid, who clenched her jaw and nodded. She knelt and pressed a quick kiss to Prema’s mouth.
“We can’t waste any more time,” Astrid said as she turned back to the others. “Come on.” She ran straight for the tower. Another bomb went off in the square. Bodies were blasted back, a couple of people running by with their clothes on fire. Danny peered through the smoke and saw a familiar figure at the base of Big Ben.
Archer.
White-hot electricity ran through his body. He started forward, but Cassie threw out an arm to block him.
“You can’t! There’s too many people!” Soot was smeared across her face, and a fleck of blood—he didn’t know from whom—had dried on her chin.
He gritted his teeth as Archer disappeared into the tower. Everything inside his body screamed. His blood called for hers.
“We can’t go through that way,” Astrid agreed. She looked Danny up and down. “If we give you a distraction, will you use it?”
At first he wasn’t sure what she meant. Then he touched the metal disc in his pocket. “Yes.”
That was all she needed. She shared a small nod with Anish before racing forward, firing into the mob, seeking out Builders and rebels. Cassie looked as though she were ready to join them, but Danny held her back.
“Spot me.”
They hurried toward Bridge Street, along the river-facing side of Big Ben. Time seemed to flicker before him, and he shivered. The clock tower was the source—there was a panic to its threads that offset his own.
Only a couple of Builders were stationed on Bridge Street, and they lifted their guns when they saw Danny and Cassie. Danny raised his own, but the Builders went down before he could even shoot.
Looking over his shoulder, he saw a group of clock mechanics around his father’s age, faces he recognized from the office.
“Christopher said you’d be out here,” one of them called; Danny thought her name might be Joan. “He sent us to protect the tower.”
“Where is he?” Danny called back.
“Helping the Lead back at the office. Come on, you lot,” she yelled to the others. They ran toward the mob teeming in front of the tower. “Be careful, Danny!”
He swallowed and approached the clock, trying not to look at the bodies scattered across the ground.
Cassie touched his back. “Are you sure this is safe?”
“No.” He laughed, the sound wild and uncertain. “But t
his is the only way I can get up there.”
Removing the disc from his pocket, he flung it up with all his strength, as he’d seen Zavier do in Prague. The rope extended far enough to snag on one of the spires of the Parliament Building right beside Big Ben. Danny yanked the line to be sure it was secure, then pulled Cassie close.
“I have to go alone,” he whispered in her ear. “Stay safe. Keep by the other mechanics.”
She wrapped her arms around him and hugged him tight, kissing him at the corner of his mouth before stepping back, eyes shimmering with tears.
Taking a deep breath, Danny began to climb. He knew it would be difficult, but he hadn’t expected just how difficult. He focused hand over hand, one foot before the other, though his shoulder ached and his body was already weak. He focused on Archer. On the image of his hands around her throat.
Reaching the top of the Parliament Building, he paused on the roof to catch his breath. Then he stood back up and flung the disc again and again until it caught the edge of the clock face’s dial.
Pulling himself higher, the air warped downward over his body in a shudder. He had to hurry. Danny fought the fire in his arms, the shaking of his upper body. His shoulder started bleeding. Tears stung his eyes as cold wind made him sway on the rope, and smoke invaded his lungs.
Just a little more. Just a little farther. Danny bit back a scream of pain, trying not to look down. Trying not to loosen his grip. Trying not to let Colton in to see.
Groaning through his teeth, he reached the bottom dial, searching for the door the mechanics used to hang the scaffolding. It was just above, and he reached desperately for it with one hand.
The clock face shattered.
As Zavier’s blood dribbled into the prison, a guttural groan emerged from the earth itself. It didn’t sound human. It was the sound of the impossible.
Daphne hugged herself, shaking. Time drifted in curious tendrils, snaking through her hair, winding around her legs. The small cog in her pocket began to vibrate.
Zavier didn’t seem to notice any of it. He stood at the lip of the prison, staring into its bottomless depth, watching his blood feed the power that was growing all around them.
“How much does he need?” she asked.
“I don’t know.”
She looked up. The clouds were darker than when they’d first arrived, the ocean more restless. Lightning flickered in the distance.
Oceana’s serene face was now marred slightly with a frown, like the thinnest crack in a bowl.
He knows, she said.
“Who?” Daphne asked. “Aetas?”
No, Chronos.
If Zavier had heard, he didn’t react. Daphne shook his shoulder. “Didn’t you hear her? If Chronos knows what we’re doing, he might try to stop it.” It sounded implausible when she said it out loud, but here was a Gaian god before her, another beneath her, and another about to descend from the heavens.
Zavier’s brow furrowed, but he kept concentrating on the prison. Just as Daphne was about to shake him again, one of the bars began to crack, then crumble. His face lifted in triumph.
“It’s working!”
His words were nearly drowned by a clap of thunder that echoed around them. Daphne whirled around, finding that Oceana had disappeared. In her place stood another being.
Chronos was blazing with a molten light. His eyes gleamed crimson, his hair redder than blood. He stood taller than Oceana, his stance wide, his large hands folded into fists. His glimmering tunic was woven with dark blues and silver streaked with winking reds and oranges, as if he’d wrapped himself in the cosmos.
STEP AWAY.
The booming voice made Daphne stagger back, clamping her hands over her ears. But the voice was all around them, inside them. There was no escaping it.
“Aetas has done you wrong!” Zavier shouted above the crashing waves and the thunder that cracked above them. “He merely went against your wishes in giving humans power to manipulate time!”
Chronos didn’t move, and yet he seemed to do nothing but move. As Oceana’s movements had been constant and flowing like water, Chronos’s body blazed and faded, both opaque and transparent.
IF YOU KNOW OF HIS WRONGDOING, the terrifying voice boomed, KEEP HIM IN HIS CELL.
Zavier shook his head. Daphne was impressed that he had the courage to face down a Gaian god, but as she looked closer, she saw his body trembling, his nostrils flaring in panic.
“I cannot, in good conscience, do as you say,” Zavier shouted back. “Aetas has served his sentence, and I believe he is ready to be freed. My people face terror even as we speak because Aetas cannot guide us. Release him, and we will be eternally grateful to you, Lord Chronos.”
Chronos’s light waxed and waned, but his eyes harbored the fire of a dying star. There was a horrible pounding in her ears, and Daphne realized Chronos was laughing.
MORTALS NO LONGER TRUST IN OUR POWER. THEY NO LONGER PRAY OR FOLLOW THE OLD WAYS. IF I KILLED ALL MY CREATIONS, WHAT WOULD YOU MORTALS DO, I WONDER?
In all of the tales, Chronos was the creator of time, the reason why humanity advanced. To hear him speak in such a way, that he could disregard the people he had once protected, rattled Daphne to her core.
Oceana appeared again. She looked so small compared to her creator. Please, Chronos. Allow my brother to be freed. I will see to it that he will never disturb your rest.
Chronos made that grating laugh again. MY REST HAS ALREADY BEEN DISTURBED, AND FOR THE LAST TIME.
Daphne didn’t see him move, but suddenly Chronos was standing before Zavier. With a sweep of his great hand, the god knocked Zavier away from the prison and sent him flying.
“Zavier!” She made to run to where he’d landed, but Chronos blocked her path. Daphne stepped back, her eyes fixed on the burning holes of the god’s eyes.
Shots rang out, hitting Chronos in the chest yet doing no damage. The god turned his head, and so did Daphne. Akash was racing down the slope, slipping and sliding over the wet sand, firing at the Gaian god.
“Get away from her!”
“Akash, no!” Daphne screamed, but Chronos had already disappeared, rematerializing in front of Akash. The pilot tried to skid to a halt, but Chronos lifted him by his throat. The gun fell to the sand.
“Akash!”
Oceana lifted her hands and water arced out of the walls on either side of them, pounding Chronos’s back. He lifted a hand and bonds of shimmering black rock pinned her to the ocean’s floor, locking her into her own aquatic prison.
All the while he maintained his grip on Akash’s throat. Akash kicked out, gasping for breath.
Daphne couldn’t move, couldn’t think of what to do. A god who had always been little more than myth to her was going to kill her, kill Akash, kill Zavier. Aetas would remain trapped. Colton might survive, but Danny and the others …
“Daphne.”
She glanced over her shoulder at the prison. Zavier had dragged himself back to the edge, half of his face newly bruised, his lip split and bleeding.
“Distract him,” he wheezed.
Distract a god? How? Her heart was the roar of the water all around her, drowning her.
Then she felt the cog in her pocket as a small pinpoint of heat. Daphne drew it out, and it lay buzzing against her hand. Big Ben’s cog. She gripped it tight in her fist, tighter, tighter, grunting as it punctured her palm.
And felt it: London. Steam, smoke, smog. No matter how it changed, she would recognize it anywhere.
Home.
A bright starburst of power flared up around her. Her body felt light, hollow, filled with heat.
The bloodstained cog secure in her fist, she advanced on Chronos.
“Put him down,” she ordered.
Chronos turned to her, but the power pulsing from the cog made him shy back. A groan rumbled from the earth. Lightning and thunder battled high overhead.
HOW DARE YOU USE THIS POWER. MY POWER.
“Let—him—go!” she screamed.<
br />
She strode forward, the power moving with her. Chronos backed away and dropped Akash, who fell to the ground in a spray of sand, coughing and sucking in air.
Daphne knelt beside him, keeping her bloody hand extended and her eyes on Chronos. “Are you all right?”
He nodded, his breathing harsh but evening out.
The god’s light was flaring again, the heat from his body evaporating the water closest to him. Desperate, Daphne spared a glance back toward the prison.
Zavier had reclaimed his knife. He met Daphne’s gaze, the golden power of Aetas flickering in his gray eyes.
“If you want to help the world,” he said, “there must be sacrifice.”
Daphne watched in horror as he dragged the knife across his arm. Blood sprayed and poured into the prison. The cog in her palm went still as the light grew blinding, shooting up into the sky like a beacon under the sound of crumbling stone.
NO, Chronos yelled, the anger in his voice rattling Daphne’s bones.
She clung to Akash and shut her eyes against the light. As it began to fade, she turned again and gasped.
The figure of a man knelt beside the broken bars of the prison. He was tall and otherworldly, with golden skin. Everything about him was golden: his hair, his eyes, his tunic. The air swirled and spun around him, caressing him with beams of sunlight. It hurt to look at him.
And there were time threads connected to his body. Dozens, perhaps hundreds of them, all thin and gleaming with potential. With power.
Now, said Aetas, standing to his full height, we may finish what we started.
And with that, he launched himself at Chronos.
Something flickered in the distance. Colton looked up, though he couldn’t see beyond Enfield’s barrier except when he concentrated on the occasional flashes he got from Danny.
But this new feeling, this crawling sensation across his body, was a warning. It was already happening—Aetas was escaping.
He stared at his central cog, still glowing like a furnace. If he installed it now, time in Enfield would return. His tower would crumble, and he along with it.