“The specimen archive is set to self-destruct in less than four hours!” I blurt out, as I decide to risk telling him the truth in front of all the drones. “Did you know that? Meira told us. Before she committed suicide.”
“Then we have to get there right away! The travelers know a way to free everyone in the archive. They just didn’t want to do it until the drones were defeated, in case some of the frozen drones decided to join the new Monk!” David is looking around. “The battle is going to start soon! The travelers are going to kill everyone!”
“Why now?” I ask him, still covering the microphone. “Why fight after so many years!”
“They were waiting until their numbers were large enough—and for the perfect opportunity. Now they have it.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this stuff earlier?”
“I just couldn’t!”
“Why not? You’ve made it impossible to trust you!”
“I’ll explain when we’re safe!”
I grab hold of the microphone as fast as I can. “I have received news,” I begin saying into it. “You must put down your weapons right now. Onto the ground. Or toss them off the road.”
Without hesitation, the drones begin doing what I commanded. Many of them start laying their weapons down on the concrete. The drones near the edge of the highway simply drop their spears and bows to the underbrush below. I should have told them to do this sooner, but I feared they would resist it.
“It’s working!” I whisper to David as I watch in relief. More weapons tumble to the ground and fly off the highway.
But then, a second later, I see something shooting through the air near the edge of the highway. It’s a line of sharp grappling hooks on the end of ropes.
The travelers have arrived.
We were just a way for them to lure the Monk and the drones to them. Nothing more, and nothing less. Their talk of peace now seems like a ruse.
I see the travelers in their hoofer masks and skins burst up and over the edge of the road. There are thousands of them. Waves of arrows start raining in all directions.
Most of the drones have put down their weapons, but some still have them in their hands. They pause, confused.
An arrow plunges through the roof of my covered platform. I realize that the travelers think that I’m Meira, and they are coming after me.
I reach out for David, but he gets knocked backward by the surging crowd.
At the same moment, my platform is suddenly hoisted up even higher. The drones carrying me start racing forward.
“Surrender!” I yell at them, but the microphone has cut out—maybe because we’re moving so fast. They can’t hear me anymore, so they keep running. I lose sight of David.
Even though the drones are brainwashed, they’re astute enough to defend themselves when attacked. Or maybe this is a plan that was put into place long ago. A plan to always defend their Monk, no matter what else happens.
The drones are swarming around me. Rushing me sideways to the edge of the road. They climb on one another’s shoulders to provide a human shield. Arrows keep pelting us.
One of the boys carrying my platform is struck right through the chest. He topples backward. The platform lists sideways and almost falls. I cling to it until another drone takes his place and it stabilizes.
I need to get off this platform. There’s no way to let the travelers know who I really am. Or to stop them from fighting the drones. I see hordes of travelers clambering over the side of the road. Some of them have climbed up into the few trees higher than the road, and fire arrows down from above. The drones are not so silent now. I hear gasps of pain and screams as they get hit by arrows and sliced by spears.
The platform pauses for a moment as we run into a mass of drones, getting backed up by the travelers in the chaos of the battle. This is my chance!
I instantly leap off the platform and into the crowd. I land hard, crashing down on the concrete and tumbling into drones.
The drones try to help me up. I feel their urgent hands on me, trying to bring me to my feet. I brush them off, staggering upward. “Get away from me!” I yell.
They keep coming. Most of them are chattering crazy prayers that sound like evil incantations. They reach out, gently probing me with their fingers. They’re desperate to sacrifice their own lives for mine.
“Alenna!” a voice cries out.
I look up, staring through the mask’s eyeholes.
David is staggering toward me, followed by a group of travelers. I struggle toward him. The drones around me are engaged in battle now. Travelers with massive iron blades strike them down.
The travelers are already overwhelming the drones. Without a Monk to lead them, or many weapons, the drones are going to get brutally defeated. Or at least that’s what I hope.
“This way!” David screams. “Follow us!”
I need to rip my mask off now. If I don’t, the travelers might accidentally kill me. I reach my hands up and grapple with the straps affixing it to my head. Within seconds, I manage to tear it off.
I push strands of hair back and stare around, gripping the mask tightly in my hand. None of the drones even notice. They’re too busy fighting.
“Come with us, Alenna,” one of the travelers intones over the noise of the battle, as I reach him and David. Around me now is madness and destruction. The drones and the travelers are locked in combat.
I scramble forward, ducking arrows and blows. I keep the mask in my hand. I don’t want to discard it in case I need it later on.
“We have to get off this road!” I call out. It’s just a writhing sea of people. All fighting and screaming and scrambling over one another.
I stare up, trying to find the feeler in the sky. I don’t see it anywhere. I hope that Liam and Gadya are okay in the forest. Maybe they’ve already been found by the travelers and rescued. I keep moving toward the side of the road.
If I can survive this battle, then—together with the travelers—we can conquer the drones once and for all. But we still need to reach the specimen archive before it self-destructs. If we don’t, then this day will be a victory for the UNA after all. I run faster, determined that this time we are going to win.
24THE PATH TO FREEDOM
WE REACH THE EDGE of the road, and I slam into the low concrete wall. I stare down over the side, peering into the forest to look for Liam and Gadya. Rough hands yank me back from the edge.
“Careful,” one of the travelers cautions. But there’s no time to be careful.
David is right there next to me. “I should have known you’d do that with the mask,” he says, shaking his head. “I passed out again, right after the feeler took Meira. But you could have been killed!”
“Hurry up!” one of the travelers calls out urgently, before I can ask David more questions.
I stare around for Cass and Emma as we race along the side of the highway with the travelers. We can’t leave them here on the road. But there’s no way to find them in the battle. “Have you seen Cass?” I ask David. He shakes his head.
We keep running. A traveler helps David along; he’s weak from his injuries. I keep looking for Cass and Emma, but I don’t have any luck. The travelers are now herding the drones toward the center of the highway as they continue their relentless assault. I duck my head and keep moving.
Occasional arrows hit concrete nearby and splinter. Spears and blades slam against one another in a clash of metal. I constantly duck.
“Here!” David yells.
We stop moving. I nearly fall into the traveler in front of me. I glance down over the side of the road and see fresh ropes hanging there. I also notice that these ropes have metal loops to hold on to. Loops that grip the rope and control the speed of descent.
Everyone starts grabbing the ropes and getting ready to slide down them. I grab one of the metal links firmly. Then I loop my foot around the rope twice. And I begin sliding down it as fast as I can. David is nearby, hanging on to the back of a traveler.
I hit the bottom thirty seconds later with a crash that knocks the air out of my lungs. I stumble backward and regain my balance. David and the traveler land a few seconds later, slightly more gracefully.
I stand there for a moment, listening to the battle raging above us as I search for Liam and Gadya. The travelers rush around us everywhere in the forest. David and I get caught up in their wake, and we start moving too. Heading toward the trees.
“So what happens now?” I ask as we run. I still don’t know if I can fully trust him, or if there are more surprises along the way.
“The travelers conquer the drones,” David replies, struggling to keep up.
“Did you always know it was Meira? Behind that mask?”
“Yeah.”
“How?”
“The scientists told me they thought she and Veidman were high-level spies, trained for years. It didn’t take me long to figure out who was already on the island who could have stepped into Minister Harka’s place so quickly. So I went to her and pretended to be on her side. I offered her information so it seemed like I was spying for her.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I was afraid you and Liam would have tried to reason with her.”
“That’s doubtful.”
“I couldn’t take the risk.”
We keep running.
“I need to get back to Liam,” I say. “He’s hurt. Gadya’s with him. She’s hurt too.” I look up at the sky. There’s no sign of the feeler that transported me onto the road. Maybe it crashed.
“We’ve done it,” David says, pausing for a moment as he struggles for breath. “This battle will be the final major one on the wheel. I mean, there will be skirmishes and stuff, but without the Monk around, the travelers will be able to control the drones and defeat them. Of course we have to get to the archive in time. But we’re not that far from the gray zone.”
“You sure about that?” I ask.
I startle when there’s a thud behind us. I glance and see that the body of a drone, peppered with arrows, has landed a hundred feet away from us. Someone has thrown him off the highway.
We start running again.
“I just don’t want to underestimate the UNA,” I tell him. “Meira said that the UNA valued the drones. That they wanted to build a new army to invade Australia.”
A group of travelers suddenly bursts out of the trees in front of us. David signals to them. They’re heading toward the ropes behind us. Probably planning on joining the battle.
Then I see Liam and Gadya in their midst.
“Liam!” I yell, racing straight toward him.
Liam sees me and instantly breaks away from the group.
He runs over to me as fast as he can. I fall into his arms. He grabs me and hugs me tight. I hug him back, pressing him against me.
Then I worry that I’m hurting him. But I see that his wound has already been covered by a bandage, and the arrow has been removed. The travelers have taken good care of him. I hug him tightly again.
We don’t say anything. We don’t need to. We both know how close we came to never seeing each other again.
“C’mon. I knew you’d be okay,” a voice says behind me. I turn and see Gadya standing there, leaning on a stick, feigning nonchalance. “Liam was worried, but I told him you were a fighter. After all, I trained you. How could you not be?”
I smile. She leans in and we hug as well.
“You did it,” she whispers.
“For all the good it did,” I say. “I didn’t know the travelers had their own plan!”
“Me neither. How could we? But if it weren’t for you, Meira would have been up there on the road. She definitely would have commanded the drones to massacre everyone. But because you told them to put their weapons down, the travelers got the upper hand, and we’re safe. Think about the lives you saved.”
When I pull back from Gadya, I see David standing there watching us. “It’s time to go,” he says.
I glance at Liam. “What’s the plan?” I ask.
“Most of us are heading forward into the gray zone,” he replies. “It’s nearby. But some of the travelers are headed back to make sure everyone gets free from the cathedral. They’re going to look for my dad as well.”
“The travelers said there’s another path into the gray zone from this sector,” Gadya adds. “A way to get into a master control tower and free everyone at once. While there’s still time. The travelers are going to come with us.”
I nod. But something in my gut makes me feel that it can’t be this easy.
“We should keep our guard up,” I say, gazing around at the group. “Meira gave her life to protect something. There’s probably more going on here than we think.”
“There always is,” Liam agrees.
“So how do we get into the gray zone?” I ask. “I mean, without nearly freezing to death like last time.”
“Secret tunnels,” David says. His brow furrows a bit. “Or at least that’s what the travelers believe. No one’s ever been through these exact tunnels before. But apparently they exist, as part of an old subway line that was constructed by the UNA to transport materials when they were building everything on Island Alpha. But we’re going to have to go by foot. The subway cars got destroyed a long time ago.”
I nod.
“What are we waiting for?” Liam asks, staring around. “We need to go there right now. Let the travelers finish up this battle while we get to the archive. We can thaw out the villagers first.”
“I don’t know if the travelers will let us do things that way,” David says. “I’m not sure if—”
His words are interrupted by a loud rumbling noise nearby. I see a look of surprise flit across his eyes.
“Feelers!” Gadya says, voicing my thoughts. And I know exactly where they’re coming from: the chasm where the road is broken. I’d nearly forgotten about them in the fear and excitement of the battle.
I stare up at the sky as feelers begin rising into the air, one after another like a swarm of angry bees. They keep coming. I’ve never seen so many on the move at once.
I keep looking up, horrified. The feelers are headed straight toward the heart of the battle.
“Who’s controlling them?” I yell as travelers around us rush toward the ropes leading up to the road. Prepared to fight and help their fellow warriors.
A couple of them pause and toss us spare knives. The blades are long and sharp. I take one in my hand and grip it firmly. I discard the Monk’s mask. “Whose side are the feelers on?” I ask again.
“I don’t know!” David yells back.
Liam has taken the black box out. He and David are trying to get it to work, but there are too many feelers in the sky. It’s useless right now.
The sky is getting dark with the shadows of these machines. The feelers are ignoring us down here in the trees. They are only focused on the highway. I’m worried about Cass and Emma—not to mention the travelers who are fighting for our freedom.
I see the first few feelers dart down from the sky and pluck kids into their metal embraces. I see drones getting taken, but also travelers as well. The feelers don’t seem to be discriminating between the tribes. Is this some sort of automatic response? I can’t tell.
“The tunnels!” voices are yelling. “To the control tower!” A small contingent of travelers is heading in the opposite direction, away from the road.
I feel Liam take hold of my hand. “We have to go now, into the tunnels before the archive self-destructs.”
We both start running along with Gadya and David and a group of travelers. I don’t know exactly where we’re headed in the forest.
Above us come the sounds of the feelers zooming down to snatch up even more kids from the road. I also hear more drones jumping off the highway, landing in the shrubs. Some of them scream in pain as their bones snap from the impact. Some make no sound at all, and I know they might not have survived the fall.
“This way! Fas
ter!” one of the travelers yells at me. He’s guiding us, still wearing his hoofer-skin mask.
We race after him as best we can. The feelers are directly overhead now. I’m afraid they’re going to start plunging down into the trees and coming after us.
“There! Straight ahead!” Liam calls out to me. “I bet that’s it!”
I see what he’s staring at. It’s a large stone archway built into the side of a low grassy hill. We race toward it, following the travelers. I wonder how many of these tunnels there are. I remember that before the drones blew it up, Liam used to use a tunnel in the blue sector to access the gray zone. But none of us have ever seen this one before, because the purple sector has been controlled by drones for many years.
Soon, we’re inside the entryway. It’s surprisingly spacious here, like the opening to a large cave. Travelers flood past us. We pause to catch our breath. It’s dark, with stone steps that descend downward into musty darkness.
“This must be the old access tunnel to the gray zone, right?” David asks a passing traveler. “I’ve seen it on maps. The gray zone’s not far—”
“Quiet!” the traveler snarls at him. “Maps aren’t always made to scale.” He stares at us. More of his men surround us. “It’s a five-mile hike through these tunnels. At least. And we don’t know what’s waiting for us inside them. Or at the end. But this is the fastest way into the gray zone and to the control tower.”
“What are we waiting for, then?” Liam asks.
We descend the steps rapidly, heading down into the tunnel. The noises of the battle and the feelers grow softer behind us.
“Where does the tunnel open up?” I ask.
One of the travelers glances at me. It’s hard to tell them apart because of their hoofer skins and long hair. “Exactly where we need to be,” he replies obliquely. Then he turns back and keeps heading down the stairs.
Clearly, the travelers don’t trust us. We should be angry at them for lying to us and using us as bait. But I’m just glad to be alive.
“When we hit the bottom of the stairs, we start running,” another traveler says.
The Uprising: The Forsaken Trilogy Page 30