J. Mitchell - The Severed Tower

“Just… give it a second.”

The tripods burst around the corner, trumpeting angrily, led by the Royal, and Ravan ducked out of sight. “Well, okay then.” She motioned to one of her men, and he tossed her a shotgun. Holt had the same idea, switching out the Sig for his Ithaca. They both started loading shells.

“You know, I’ve killed these things before,” Holt informed her.

Ravan was unimpressed. “Me, too.” Behind them the Hunters trumpeted, searching. Explosions flared in the distance.

“I was being chased by, like, a thousand Forsaken at the time,” Holt retorted.

Ravan shrugged. “I was dodging a time-locked semitruck exploding through a wall.”

Holt kept loading shells. “Killed mine with shotgun blasts, close range.”

“That’s funny. So did I.”

Holt pumped the final shell into the chamber. “Guess we have a plan, then.” Ravan smiled back at him.

Holt whistled four short notes, and Max bolted right and out into the open. The tripods tracked the dog, opening fire, but Max dodged and weaved in his best White Helix imitation.

While the Hunters were distracted, Holt and Ravan rolled out from cover. Their shotguns thundered. Sparks exploded from two walkers, staggering them back, one blast after another, until flame exploded out their exhaust ports and the machines crumpled to the ground.

Holt and Ravan slid back into cover, just in time to see two Hunters land on top of the bus, staring down at the Menagerie.

“Maybe that wasn’t the smartest idea,” Holt said.

Plasma cannons opened up. Two of Ravan’s men fell, instantly dead.

“Run!” Ravan ordered, but more Hunters appeared on either side, blocking them. One was the Royal. Holt looked around for any escape as the thing’s cannons began to prime. There wasn’t any.

Then a stream of new plasma bolts slammed into the walker and flung it backward, clearing out the threatening tripods.

Everyone turned and looked. Two other machines stood a hundred yards away. One had five legs, a powerful blocky frame, and an energy shield crackling around it. The other one was a Mantis. Ten feet tall, raised off the ground by four legs, and heavily armored with twin mounted plasma cannons and a missile battery. Like the five-legged walker, its colors were gone, leaving only the bright silver of bare metal.

“Ambassador…” Holt breathed, feeling hope.

The street filled with bright, wavering flashes, and multiple bursts of distorted sound, as more five-legged walkers, half a dozen, teleported into the battle zone—each bringing reinforcements. More Mantises, and something else, too. Something that towered over the ruined buildings, something huge.

A Spider. The largest, most powerful walker in the Assembly arsenal. Thirty feet tall, almost as wide as the street, with eight large legs holding its huge fuselage. Spiders were the most feared sight on the planet, and this one, for the moment, was on their side.

A frightening sound bellowed from the huge machine, like electronic whale song, and it stepped forward, its footfalls shaking the ground. The Hunters trumpeted uncertainly, and then scrambled as plasma fire sizzled toward them. Two of them crashed to the ground, their armor disintegrating in flame.

The remainder, including the Royal, withdrew—and Holt caught a glimpse of a gray blur chasing after them, growling evilly.

“That dog’s even dumber than you are,” Ravan observed, “but I’m kinda starting to like him.”

Holt whistled and Max skidded to a stop and ran back, tongue lapping out of his mouth.

All three of them, with what was left of the Menagerie, ran toward the silver walkers. The gunships arced in the sky. Plasma bolts streaked everywhere, raining down into Ambassador’s small but imposing force. The shields flared to life around each of the five-legged walkers, and they charged forward.

It was total war, and Holt and Ravan ran through the middle of it.

* * *

AVRIL GROANED AS SHE burst through the cloud of fire that erupted from the fallen Hunter. She landed on the ground and recalled her missing spear point, catching it with a jerk back onto her Lancet.

Each of her Arc, one-on-one against these small Assembly walkers, were more than a match for them. She could see Gideon’s vision, even his strategy for individual encounters. Two Helix for a Mantis, six to take down a Spider, it was all so clear to her now. Gideon hadn’t lied. They were made for this.

The problem was, right now it wasn’t a one-on-one fight. There were only a little more than twenty White Helix facing hundreds of Hunters plus airships, and whatever those larger walkers did. The grim reality was clear. For all their skill and strength, they would be overtaken soon.

But it didn’t matter. They were never in this fight to win. They simply needed to hold off the Assembly long enough for the Prime to reach the Tower. Then, whatever was going to happen would happen.

In the distance, bright flashes of light sparked to life up and down the line of larger walkers. Seconds later, the popping sounds of ordnance being fired echoed through the air.

Avril’s eyes widened. She had a sense of what was coming. “Heads up!”

There were explosions in the air, and Avril saw streaks of light raining down, as if something large had burst into dozens of smaller pieces.

A second later she knew what they were.

The small buildings and old cars filling the streets rocked as hundreds of explosions blanketed the area, and Avril leaped up and away in a flash of yellow.

She saw two of her Arc, and one of Dane’s, consumed in the fireballs and disappear. Avril grimaced, but kept moving.

She knew what the larger walkers were now: artillery. She also noticed something else. The flurry of cluster bombs exploding all around never once struck one of the green-and-orange walkers. It couldn’t be a coincidence. It meant the ordnance had the ability to differentiate targets. It was brilliant, given the Hunters’ propensity for stealth and speed. It allowed them to lunge into a fight they might be outclassed in, with devastating support from behind.

Two more of Avril’s Arc fell, caught by plasma bolts, unable to avoid all the flying death in the air, even with their skills. They would be cut to pieces in this storm.

New plasma bolts suddenly flared around her, and she saw, back near the center of the ruins, something amazing. Mantis walkers and a giant Spider firing back at the Hunters near them. In front, charging forward, was a line of five-legged walkers, like the one that had befriended the Prime.

Each was silver, their bodies bereft of color.

“Pull back!” Avril yelled. “Pull back to the buildings!” She heard Dane shout the same order, saw the Helix dashing away as one, covered in purple or yellow light. If they could get back to the buildings and those silver walkers, they might actually have a chance.

Avril leaped into the air after her Arc. The onslaught of Hunters fired after them and gave chase, renewed by the Helix’s retreat.

* * *

MIRA’S VISION WENT BLACK as she slammed back to the ground, the Vortex tossing her like a rag doll, in a flurry of flashing particles. She had a feeling her leg was broken now, too, but the pain had yet to register. Somehow, she managed to hold onto the plutonium that kept the Anomaly at bay, and Zoey had avoided being hurt as well. It was Mira’s final wish to protect the child as long as she could.

She moaned and looked up. Above her, the Severed Tower loomed, a shadow that stood massive out amid the glowing haze of the Vortex, two giant shapes broken apart in the air.

There had been a time when she dreamed of seeing the Tower, the deepest part of the Strange Lands. She and Ben had talked late into the night about it, imagining what it looked like, what it might actually do.