by Kim Curran
I sensed the divide between us start to fade, like words in sand. There wasn’t him and me anymore. I was one person, with a clear job ahead of me and the people behind me I needed to get it done. Today, this would end.
“We have been given our power for a reason,” I said, my voice taking on a tone and strength new to me. “To protect this country. And today, that is what we will do. Even if we have to lay down our bodies so that those left can crawl over us to reach our goal. We will do our duty. We will prove to those who doubt us that we are stronger than they can imagine. We will prove to those up on the surface who want to make our home our grave that our power is a gift, not a curse. We will be braver than they can comprehend. More powerful than a thousand tanks or missiles. If you follow me today, I can’t promise that I will lead you to safety, but I will lead you to victory.”
The men and women in the room saluted in unison. I returned the gesture. “Towards the true way,” I said.
The motto of ARES was taken up by everyone in the room, repeated over and over.
“Well, that was impressive,” Zac said when the echo had died down. “Have you been practising it long?”
“For weeks,” I said, smiling at him.
He returned it, bigger and brighter, and looked up at the cracked ceiling. “So, one way or another, this is it. A life free of ARES, can you imagine it? I wonder what I would do with myself.”
“Become star striker for Chelsea Football Club?”
Zac looked pleased at the idea. “You know, that might just work.”
“Just stay alive, OK?”
“I’ll do my best.”
I reached my hand out to him to shake it. Zac pushed it out of the way and pulled me into a big hug.
I’d never found making friends easy in my old reality. And here I was with a friend. A real friend who was willing to follow me into death. Whatever happened today, that was something I was grateful to this reality for.
Zac let me go and saluted, the first genuine salute he’d given me.
I felt Aubrey’s fingers entwine with mine. “Hello, you.”
I didn’t understand what she meant. “Er, hello yourself?”
She laughed. “There’s a change in you. Not as scary as when that coldness takes over you. Something else. It’s like you’re finally here.”
“And I’m not going anywhere till this is over.” I reached out and tucked a lock of her blonde hair behind her ear.
“In position.” I heard Williamson’s voice over the radio.
“Do it.”
Four soft thuds shook the floor under our feet.
“Yes!’ I heard Carl’s voice being picked up by Williamson’s mic.
“Report,” I said.
“He seems happy, sir. He’s doing a sort of dance.”
I imagined him playing air guitar. “Tell him to knock it off and get us up there.”
A moment later, I heard the whirring of machinery.
“Form a circle!” I shouted, remembering what I’d read about battle formations in my military strategy books.
My command was repeated over and over, till the whole of S3 were standing facing the walls as a crack ran in a perfect circle around the whole of the Hub, and slowly the floor began to rise. I looked at Aubrey on my right and Zac on my left. The two people I trusted most in the world, more even than I trusted myself. They believed in me. Them and the whole of S3. It was about time I did the same.
We got closer and closer to the ceiling, till it was just feet above our heads. For a moment, I worried that we would be crushed against it, when it split down the middle and slid across. The sound of the gunfire and the plasma cannons was almost deafening.
“Bring the rain!” I shouted, and all hell broke loose.
Grenades were thrown. Machine guns fired through the gap in the ceiling. Bodies of Red Hand soldiers fell through the breach and tumbled down onto the platform. If they weren’t dead when they fell, they were a few moments later as they were picked off by the S3.
The platform rose, bringing us up inside the hangar, and I came face to face with our enemy for the first time. I set my gun against my shoulder and fired into the front row of the Red Hand.
It was a hail of bullets on all sides as both sides tore into each other. Men and women next to me went down, holes opening in their chests, limbs being blown off. But a blink later and they were back on their feet, firing – this time having dodged the bullet. This was what it meant to go up against a Shifting army. Bullets didn’t work.
All around me was that weird, jerking, blurring of movement you saw when Shifters fought. It had never looked more beautiful.
I slapped in a new magazine and started to walk forward in line with the rest of my squad. I took a bullet in the side, but the pain didn’t even have time to register before I Shifted clear of its path. I saw Aubrey next to me take one in the chest, the bullet passing clear through her heart. The image of her dying in my arms came back so raw, and a scream of rage formed on my lips. But before it had a chance to escape, she simply closed her eyes and was whole once more. The man who had shot her, however, was missing his head.
The Red Hand were clearly panicking, not understanding why they didn’t seem to be able to kill us.
Then one of them worked it out. “Headshots!” they cried.
That was the sure way to kill a Shifter. I watched as a man next to me fell, a neat hole in his helmet. His eyes stared straight ahead. The Red Hand must be using armour-piercing rounds. Another solider went down behind me. They were picking us off one by one and there was nowhere for us to run. No chance of retreat. We were trapped inside the hangar. What have I done? I thought. I’ve led my men into a massacre.
A third soldier went down next to me, blood pooling out of the hole in his head. I had to do something.
Then I heard a peal of gunfire coming from ahead of us, from behind the line of the Red Hand. They were being attacked from behind.
“The army is here,” I heard Cain shout in delight.
But it wasn’t the army.
As a path cleared in the enemy lines, I saw small figures dressed in black, with too-large helmets bouncing on their heads. They were firing rifles, the front row kneeling down so the row behind could get a clear shot. Just like we’d been taught in training.
The cadets were here.
“Fire!” I saw Morgan at the head of the troop, dressed in his ARES uniform, gold brocade glinting in the light. And the cadets fired.
It was clear that the Red Hand didn’t want to return fire, not at a bunch of kids. They spun in confusion, not knowing whether to run or to fight back. The cadets were focused, trained and composed. And the men and women of the Red Hand fell under the shots of the children they believed to be an abomination.
I saw the Rhino roll forward. The front line of the Red Hand scattered in front of it. Those who didn’t make it in time were ground into the dirt under its tracks. They were being attacked from the front and the back. A perfect pincer manoeuvre. We pushed them back, out of the hangar and into the open. We had them. I turned to Zac and we smiled. The day was ours.
I heard the thump of blades and looked up to see a helicopter hovering overhead. It spun till the nose was pointed at us, and I saw Ladoux behind the controls. She was grinning, a look beyond mania contorting her face. I should have killed her when I had the chance.
I aimed for the glass covering the cockpit and opened fire. Zac and Aubrey did the same, but our bullets pinged off.
“Bring it down!” I shouted, directing all fire towards the gunship as its rocket launchers slotted into place. She was going to finish us off.
All the weapons around me pointed at Ladoux’s helicopter. A shot found its home, tearing a hole in the tail. It began to circle wildly. But she let a rocket loose before spiralling away and crashing into the side of the Hub in a ball of fire. Ladoux was dead. I didn’t even have time to feel happy about that.
“Get clear,” Zac shouted. He tried to hold me back,
but I broke free of his grip and ran towards the Rhino, shouting my sister’s name as Ladoux’s rocket soared towards its target.
Everything moved as if in molasses. The people around me fighting and dying all faded away. All I could see was the missile cutting through the blue sky like a paper aeroplane thrown by a child.
I raced through the options, looking for something to Shift before I had to watch it collide. But in my panic, nothing came to me. My mind had gone totally blank.
I raised my hand, as if I could reach out and grab the missile out of its trajectory. Then the world exploded in heat and fire.
I was thrown off my feet by the explosion. Time returned to normal as I hit the ground. Fragments of concrete and dirt rained down on me, filling my mouth and eyes. I sat up, spluttering, trying to clear my vision. The Rhino was upside down, tracks still whirring, like a turtle on its back. Exposed and vulnerable.
I tried to pull myself to my feet but collapsed as white-hot pain cut through me. I looked down to see a shard of metal protruding from my right calf. My right arm, too, was a bloody mess.
There was a groaning from next to me. Unwin covered his face with his hands. Blood poured down what was left of his face. I could see the white of bone jutting through the ragged flesh, teeth exposed from where his cheek had been. He was dead. He just didn’t know it yet.
I struggled to my feet again, yanked out the shard of metal, and stumbled towards the Rhino. There was still a chance. And that was the only thing that was stopping me from lying down and joining Unwin.
I could hear screams from inside the Rhino. I couldn’t tell if it was Katie or CP crying out for help. I scrambled through the smoke towards the tank, dipping and dodging the few bullets that were still being fired. I clambered up onto the belly of the tank and tore at the hole left by the missile, trying desperately to widen it enough to get inside. I shredded the skin on my hands, but I didn’t care. I could still hear a girl’s voice crying out for help. Whoever it was, why didn’t they Shift?
“Stand back.” Zac was up on the tank next to me, an axe in his hands. He swung it and buried the head into the metal of the tank. Again and again he hacked till a hole appeared. White smoke billowed out, and then a small hand reached through. I grabbed it. I knew it was Katie’s hand as soon as my fingers closed around it. I pulled her free of the hole and into my arms. I held her so tight, I might have crushed her. “Why didn’t you Shift?” I said. “Why didn’t you Shift?”
She was coughing, struggling to say something. I let her go enough so she could speak. “CP!”
I let her down and pushed my head through the hole and looked into the dark interior of the tank.
CP was still at the controls, hanging upside down by the straps, a shard of shrapnel sticking out of her head.
“No.”
Rage poured into me, filling the hole that had torn through my soul, like it had the night I’d watched Aubrey die. Bringing with it a power stronger than I had ever known. I let it storm through me. I made myself remember Jake, Cooper, Unwin, Ward. Everyone I had ever lost. I let all of the grief and anger that I had been holding back break free.
“No!”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
My command passed over the battle like a tidal wave, touching every person here. Guns clattered to the floor. Soldiers on both sides fell to their knees. Their will was mine now. And I wanted the fighting to end.
Faces that had snarled in rage softened and went still. Every man, woman and child froze exactly where they were, unable to so much as lift a finger. I looked around at the blood-splattered faces of the Red Hand. I was filled with so much hatred that I considered Forcing them all to die. To pick their guns back up and put them in their mouths. I saw the image in my mind and knew with utter certainty that I could make it happen. But then I saw the body of a cadet lying in the dust, and the hot anger faded into grief. And I let them all go.
My control over them had only lasted for a matter of seconds. But it was enough. It was over.
The understanding that the battle had ended and they were still alive came as a relief to some. A weight to others. They had lived, whereas others had not.
I didn’t know how I felt about it. All I knew was that I had lost a friend. I looked down at CP’s tiny body, her eyes wide open and staring at the sky as if she was looking for shapes in the clouds.
I could Shift. I could find a way for this not to have been. I could bring CP back to life.
I felt a hand on my arm. Katie was standing next to me.
“It’s done,” she said.
She was right. I could Shift. But the question was, should I? I looked around at the forces picking their way through the burning rubble. The fighting was over. CP’s death had given me the strength to Force my will on them all. If I saved CP, I wasn’t sure I’d find that strength again.
Sacrifice.
He understood it, and maybe I did now.
I didn’t know what that said about me, that I was willing to sacrifice CP in a way I wasn’t willing to let go of Katie or Aubrey. How had I become the kind of person who ranked the value of people’s lives?
I moved CP in my arms so she was lying over my shoulder, and allowed Katie to lead me off the tank and back onto the ground. Frankie ran forward, her white coat covered in blood. She tried to take CP off me, to see if there was anything that could be done. I pushed her away. There was nothing.
“Let her,” Katie said.
Reluctantly, I handed CP to Frankie. She laid her on the ground and called for a stretcher while taking her pulse. Checking her for signs of life. It was a waste of energy. The stretcher arrived and CP was carried away.
“Let me see to your leg,” Frankie said, softly. She cleaned and bandaged it quickly and then stood up. “You’ll live.”
I nodded my thanks as Frankie moved on to tend to the wounded.
Katie took my hand and we moved through the crowds. S3 soldiers were gathering up what remained of the Red Hand forces and corralling them inside the hangar. They didn’t even need to bother marching them at gunpoint or cuffing them. The Red Hand walked seemingly of their own volition. Holy warriors whose God had abandoned them.
“Scott!”
I turned to see Aubrey running toward me. She leapt off the ground, throwing her arms around my neck. She was shaking and kept saying my name over and over.
“It’s OK,” I said. “I’m here.”
“I thought you were dead. I saw the explosion,” she said into my neck.
We pulled away from each other. Her face was covered in what looked like freckles. I looked closer; they were speckles of blood. I stroked her cheek with my thumb, smudging the blood and leaving a dark trail.
“What happened?” she said, looking around. “One second, everyone was fighting and then…”
“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “All that matters is that it’s over.”
I wrapped my left arm around her and took Katie’s hand again with my right. The men and women of S3 swarmed around me. Some called out my name, others saluted. Others still reached out and touched me, as if that would bring them luck or protection. Like they were touching a statue.
Scott Tyler, saint of the S3. It sickened me.
They laid hands on Katie too, as if she was also some mascot for the unit. I shoved away the first couple of people who did it, but she shook her head, telling me it was OK.
“I have to get out of here,” I said to Aubrey.
She understood. She led me to a sleek black limo. It had been one of the Emperor’s cars and looked relatively undamaged.
I opened the back door for Katie, then got into the passenger’s seat. I slammed the door on the sound of my name being passed through the troops like a chant.
“Tyler. Tyler. Tyler.”
Aubrey hotwired the ignition, fired up the engine, and slowly pulled away. I watched the smoking ruins of the Hub grow smaller in my rear-view mirror.
Katie was curled up in the back. Her shoulders qui
vered, and I was sure that she was crying. I wished I could do the same. I wished that I could feel something. Anything.
I watched Aubrey. She stared straight ahead at the road.
“Where are we going?” I said.
“Somewhere that nobody can find us.”
I let out a long breath, feeling the tightness in my chest lighten a little. “That sounds good. Just for a while.”
“Just for a while.”
She drove across the river, pausing only to talk to some guards at a roadblock.
Yes, she told them, the treaty had been signed. No, she said, she didn’t know what was going to happen next.
Katie’s sobs had quietened, and when I looked back, she was asleep.
I reached my hand out and wrapped it around the back of Aubrey’s neck. She settled her head against it. “What are you going to do?” I said.
“What do you mean?”
“Now the war is over.”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I never really bothered thinking beyond tomorrow. The future always seemed so far out of reach. What will you do?”
“Go and see my parents, I guess. Spend some time with Katie. Get to know you.”
I watched her smile. “I thought you already knew me,” she said.
“I know the other you. The one from the other reality. I know your favourite book is The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.”
“Same! My father gave me that book!” she said, sounding delighted. “He used to read it to me whenever he was home. What else do you know about me?
“I know you had your first cigarette with Adam Jackson.”
“Never heard of him. Different! What else?”
“I know you like your coffee with vanilla sprinkles.”
“Vanilla sprinkles?” she said, laughing. It was like the sound of rain in the desert.
“Yeah, you always said a coffee wasn’t complete without vanilla sprinkles. I mean the other you did.”