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Who is she? Why does she have powers? How many more like her are out there?
Meanwhile, Daniela is staring at me with that star-struck look again. “So, um, can I ask why you picked me?”
“Picked you?”
“Yeah, to turn into a mutant,” Daniela explains. “I couldn’t do this shit until today when you and the pale guys—”
“Mogadorians,” Sam clarifies.
“I couldn’t move stuff with my mind until you and the Moga-dork-ians showed up,” Daniela finishes. “What’s the deal, man? None of the other people I’ve seen out here have powers.”
Sam clears his throat and raises his hand, but Daniela ignores him. She’s on a roll now.
“Am I radioactive? What else can I do? You got those flashlight hands going on. Am I gonna be able to do that? Why me? Answer the last one first.”
“I—” I rub the back of my neck, overwhelmed. “I have no idea why you.”
“Oh.” Daniela frowns, looking down at the ground.
“John, shouldn’t we get moving?”
I nod when Sam reminds me of the impending Mogadorian reinforcements. We’ve already stood here talking for way too long. Standing in front of me—and next to me, for that matter—are . . . what exactly? New members of the Garde? Humans. It’s like nothing I’ve ever contemplated. I need to wrap my head around the new status quo quickly, because if there are more human Garde out there, they’re going to be looking for guidance. And with all the Cêpan dead . . .
Well, that leaves us. The Loric.
First things first, I need to make sure Daniela stays with us. I need time to talk with her, to try figuring out what exactly triggered her Legacies.
“It’s not safe here, you should come with us,” I tell her.
Daniela looks around at the destruction that surrounds us. “Is it gonna be safe wherever you’re going?”
“No. Obviously not.”
“What John means is that this particular block is going to be crawling with Mogs any minute now,” Sam explains. He starts walking away from the bank, trying to lead by example. Daniela doesn’t follow and so I don’t either.
“Your sidekick’s nervous,” Daniela observes.
“My name’s Sam.”
“You’re a nervous guy, Sam,” Daniela replies, one hand on her cocked hip. She’s staring at me again, sizing me up. “If more of those aliens come, won’t you just blow their asses away?”
“I . . .” I find myself having to recycle the pick-your-battles logic that made me bristle so much when Sam used it on me. “There are too many to keep fighting. It might not feel like it now because you’ve just started using them, but our Legacies aren’t a limitless resource. We can push too hard, get tired, and then we’re no good to anyone.”
“Good advice,” Daniela says. She remains rooted in place. “Too bad you couldn’t answer any of my other questions.”
“Look, I don’t know why you have Legacies, but it’s an amazing thing. A good thing. It’s destiny, maybe. You can help us win this war.”
Daniela snorts. “Seriously? I’m not fighting any war, John Smith from Mars. I’m trying to survive out here. This is America, yo. The army will take care of these weak-ass dust aliens. They got the drop on us, that’s all.”
I shake my head in disbelief. There’s seriously no time to explain to Daniela everything she needs to know about the Mogadorians—their superior technology, their infiltration of Earth’s governments, their endless amounts of disposable vatborn warriors and monsters. I never had to explain those things to the other members of the Garde. We always knew the stakes, we were raised understanding our mission on Earth. But Daniela and the other newly minted Garde who might be wandering around . . . what if they aren’t ready to fight? Or don’t want to?
An explosion shakes the ground under our feet. It emanates from a few blocks away, but is still powerful enough to set off car alarms and rattle my teeth. Thick smoke darker than the night sky floats into view from the north. It sounds like a building just collapsed.
“Seriously,” Sam says. “Something’s headed our way.”
Another explosion, closer, confirms Sam’s suspicion. I turn desperately to Daniela.
“We can help each other. We have to, or we won’t survive,” I say, thinking not just of the three of us, but of humans and Loric. “We’re looking for our friend. Once we find him, we’re going to get out of Manhattan. We heard the government’s established a safe zone around the Brooklyn Bridge. We’ll go there and—”
Daniela waves off my whole plan, stepping towards me. Her voice is raised, and I feel her telekinesis buffet my chest, like a jabbing index finger.
“My stepdad got roasted by those pale scumbags and now I’m out here looking for my mom, alien guy. She worked down here. You saying I should drop all that and join your army of two, running around my city that you played a part in getting blown up? You saying the friend you’re looking for is more important than my mom?”
Another explosion. Closer, still. I have no idea what to say to Daniela. That yes, saving Earth is more important than saving her mom? Is that my recruitment speech? Would I have listened to that if someone said it about Henri or Sarah?
“Oh my God,” Sam says, exasperated. “Could we at least agree to all run in the same direction?”
And that’s when the reinforcements come into view. It isn’t a squadron of Skimmers or warriors come to kill us.
It’s the Anubis.
CHAPTER
FOUR
THE MASSIVE WARSHIP, BIGGER THAN AN AIRCRAFT carrier, becomes visible in the night sky when it’s still five or so blocks away. It pushes slowly through the acrid smoke its recent bombings kicked up. Sam and I had been able to stay ahead of the Anubis earlier that afternoon, fighting our way south as it slowly prowled the skyline to the east. But now, here it is, looming up the avenue, right in the direction of Union Square.
I c
lench my fists. Setrákus Ra and Ella are on board the Anubis. If I could just get on there, maybe I could fight my way to the Mogadorian leader. Maybe I could kill him this time.
Sam stands at my side. “Whatever you’re thinking, it’s a bad idea. We need to run, John.”
And as if to punctuate Sam’s declaration, a sizzling ball of electric energy gathers in the barrel of the Anubis’s huge hull-mounted cannon. It’s like a miniature sun building up within the barrel, and for a moment it lights the surrounding blocks in a ghostly blue. Then, with a sound like a thousand Mog blasters going off at once, the energy erupts forth from the cannon, shearing through the façade of a nearby office building, the twenty-story structure almost immediately collapsing inwards.
A wave of dust rolls down the street towards us. Coughing, the three of us have to shield our eyes. The dust might give us some cover, but that doesn’t really matter when the warship has a gun that can demolish whole buildings. The Anubis lumbers closer, already prepping for another shot. I’m not sure if Setrákus Ra is aiming at heat signatures in the buildings or if he’s just destroying things at random, hoping to hit us. It doesn’t matter. The Anubis is like a force of nature and it’s headed in our direction.
“Hell with this,” I hear Daniela say, and then she takes off.
Sam follows her and so do I, the three of us retreating the way Sam and I just came from. We’ll have to find another way to track down Nine. If he’s still in the area, I hope he manages to ride out this bombing.
“Do you know where you’re going?” Sam yells to Daniela.
“What? You guys are following me now?”
“You know the city, don’t you?”
Another building explodes behind us. The dust is thicker this time, choking, and my back gets pelted by small chunks of plaster and cement. The explosions are too close. We might not be able to outrun the next one.
“We need to get off the street!” I shout.
“This way!” Daniela yells, hooking a sharp left that momentarily takes us out of the deluge of building debris that funnels down the avenue.
