The Elves of Cintra (Book 2 of The Genesis of Shannara)

THE DISTANCE FROM the fence to where the haulers were lined up like obedient pack animals was less than a hundred yards, but it felt much longer as Logan walked it. The buildings behind and to either side were low, squat, windowless structures with metal roofs and siding. Doors on rollers stood closed, but he could not see any locks. The apron was surprisingly empty of debris, a condition that was almost nonexistent anywhere else in the country. Even more troublesome was the clean, polished look of the haulers, which lacked any hint of rust or dirt and had the appearance of newly minted machines. Even though the complex seemed to be deserted, the pristine look of the haulers suggested that someone had been caring for them.

Logan looked around uneasily. “Hello!” he called out.

“Anyone here?”

No one appeared. Nothing moved.

He glanced back the way he had come. The Ghosts were out of the Lightning and crowded up against the fence, faces pressed into the mesh.

Bear was the only one not watching, his attention given over to widening the opening through which they had come. In the silence of the fading afternoon light, Logan could hear the dull snip-snip of the heavy cutters.

He was all the way up to the closest of the haulers when he caught sight of the sensors. Partially embedded in the surface of the apron, they were spaced strategically around the perimeter of the painted oval inside which the machines were parked. No lights flashed on their casings; no beeps sounded from within. He stopped Panther and Sparrow from advancing, pointed to the sensors, walked forward a few steps, and knelt down for a closer look. The sensors lacked any sort of recognizable features—no antennas, no scanners, no identifying protrusions of any sort. They ringed the haulers, but weren’t connected visibly to one another or to anything else. There was nothing to suggest they were even working.

Yet he had the unshakable feeling that they were.

What to do? His choices were limited. He could not deactivate the sensors without knowing something more about them. So he could either test whether or not they were active, knowing that if they were he might not be too happy with the results, or he could turn around and go back the way he had come and forget about going any farther with this. He could not help thinking that if he were alone, none of this would be happening. He was here, taking this chance, only because he had taken in a bunch of street kids who needed hauling.

He pushed the thought away. After all, they hadn’t asked for any of this, either.

He took another long look around the complex, searching for something that would tell him what to do, and didn’t find it. A quick glance over his shoulder revealed that Bear had finished cutting an opening in the fence, high and wide enough to permit them to pull a hauler through. Haulers were big, but easy enough to move by hand when they were unloaded. With Panther’s help, he should be able to pull one of these clear.

All he had to do was walk up to it. Through the sensors, past the alarms, and into whatever waited.

He tightened his grip on his staff of office, feeling the heat of the magic beginning to build. He wasn’t afraid, but he was cautious.

For himself and for the children with him. Street kids were still kids. The haulers sat in front of him, lined up and ready. Why would there be any serious protection set in place for haulers, anyway? They had no real value, nothing that warranted firepower of the sort that the compounds employed.

Yet no one had touched these.

He made up his mind. He turned around abruptly and motioned for Panther and Sparrow to back away. “I don’t like how this feels. We’re leaving.”

“Leaving?” Panther stared at him with dark, angry eyes. He gestured toward the sensors. “Because of those?”

“You heard!” snapped Sparrow, already walking away.

Panther was shaking his head in disgust and turning after her when something caught his eye—something that Logan had missed entirely or maybe didn’t even exist. But it was enough to trigger an immediate response in the boy, who wheeled back and fired a sustained burst from the Parkhan Spray that peppered the haulers and blew several of the sensors that sat closest into scrap.

No! Logan thought, eyes sweeping the concrete apron. Panels concealed in the flat surface were already sliding open, and the remaining sensors were dropping from sight. Huge doors set into the walls of the buildings to either side of the haulers, their weight balanced on huge steel rollers, opened like hungry mouths, and from the darkness within there was a whirring of motors and the soft, ominous click of gears engaging.

“Get out!” Logan shouted at his young companions.

But Panther couldn’t seem to move, frozen in place, perhaps stunned by his own reaction, perhaps simply caught up in the moment. Sparrow was shouting at him. From somewhere back behind the severed links of the fence, the other Ghosts were crying out in either dismay or support, it was impossible to tell which. But Panther didn’t seem to hear any of them, his eyes fixed on the black holes that had opened in the sides of the buildings.