Chapter 11
What do you say we start with Goliath?” Agent Rhane said.
O’Keefe nodded and entered a series of commands in his handheld device. The air shimmered, and moments later a thirty-foot robot appeared in the middle of the floor, its head nearly touching the top of the domed ceiling. Covered in thick iron plating that looked like scraps from old tanks, it had gun turrets on its shoulders, cannons welded to its forearms, and rocket boosters embedded in its heels.
“Now Goliath here is a Tracker, which for all intents and purposes is a walking tank with limited artificial intelligence,” Rhane said. “Any idea how you take one down?”
“Nukes,” Ethan said.
“Fair enough, but what about civilians within the blast radius?”
“Hit the knee joints with rocket-propelled grenades,” Colt said.
“Now we’re talking,” Rhane said. “You the squad leader, then?”
“Yes, sir,” Colt said.
Rhane stared at him with narrowed eyes, and again Colt felt the telltale hair on the back of his neck stand on end once more. “Then you’re the one . . . the Betrayer?”
Colt tried to hold Rhane’s gaze, but it was so intense that he had to look away.
“That ‘aw shucks’ humility won’t get you far, cadet. Not on the other side of the portal. Once you enter the jungles of Gathmara, you can bet that just about everything that moves will be looking to kill you—and I’m not just talking about the Thule. Understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then what do you say we visit Dresh and see if we can’t survive long enough to reach the facility where they’re storing the engine that will open the gateway?”
O’Keefe activated the hologram chamber, and the sterile room became a lush jungle where vines covered in bright red and yellow blooms coiled around trees that rose high overhead. Pools of stagnant water dotted the ground, and even though it was an artificial environment, the air was suddenly hot and humid.
“Believe it or not, this halogram used to be a suburb not far from the capital,” Rhane said. “Koenig found out that someone had been harboring the son of a rival warlord, so he destroyed the entire town—women, children, and all.”
Colt started to notice the broken remains of buildings that were buried under the vines. Trees grew from the windows, and crumbled streets were overrun by vegetation that sprouted from the cracks. There were rusted vehicles, including what looked like a military transport with eight wheels and something that looked like a car with wings, which Rhane explained was a hovercraft.
He led them through the jungle, pointing out a variety of plant life. Some were edible. Some poisonous. All were stunningly beautiful. “Whatever you do, don’t drink any water that you haven’t put through your purifier,” he explained. “The parasites will eat through the wall of your stomach and you’ll bleed to death.”
“Lovely,” Danielle said as she sidestepped a puddle.
Eventually they came to the outskirts of a massive city that rose before them like a forest of concrete and glass. “Welcome to Dresh, the city of wonder,” Rhane said with a healthy dose of sarcasm. “In case you weren’t yet convinced that Koenig is a monster, he wiped out half the population with a strain of virus that was created inside the halls of Trident Biotech.”
“Why?” Pierce asked.
“To scare the other warlords,” Rhane said. “After all, if he was willing to kill his own people, what would he do to those who opposed him?”
Agent O’Keefe called up a transport vehicle that materialized on the street not far from where they were standing. They all piled in, and Rhane drove them through abandoned city streets lined with propaganda posters that were weathered and torn, each showing Koenig in his human form.
“That’s it,” he said, pointing to a massive domed structure on the horizon. “The reactor core that will power the gateway is inside those walls. Now all you have to do is find a way to get inside and blow it up. But let’s save that adventure for another day. I’m thinking we should start with something easy . . . Agent O’Keefe?”
“Yes, Agent Rhane?” O’Keefe’s voice replied through a loudspeaker.
“You still have Goliath cued up?”
“That I do.”
“What would you say to activating him? I wonder if our young cadets could survive for at least ten minutes.”
“There’s only one way to find out,” O’Keefe said, and suddenly Goliath loomed before them in the street.
It was all over quickly. Phantom Squad didn’t last to the five-minute mark, and Agent O’Keefe gave them all a failing grade.
“Like it matters,” Pierce grumbled.
“What do you mean by that, Cadet Pierce Bowen?” Glyph asked.
“We can’t beat the Thule no matter what we do.”
The words haunted Colt for the rest of the day.
Pierce wasn’t the first person to think that things were hopeless, and he wasn’t going to be the last. People were flocking to remote locations by the tens of thousands. It was impossible for grocery stores to keep canned goods and bottled water on the shelves. Churches, synagogues, and mosques were filled to capacity around the clock. A few days earlier Colt and the other squad leaders had even been briefed about a group that was starting to worship the Thule in hopes that they would be shown mercy once Earth was conquered.
But this was different. Pierce was brash. Arrogant. Overbearing. He had never—not once—shown any kind of weakness or vulnerability. So why now? Had his dad told him that the next attack was going to happen any day? Did he find out the president was actually a shape-shifting Thule? Or was he just mentally and emotionally exhausted, like everyone else?
Colt looked up at the clock tower. It wasn’t quite three in the afternoon, which meant he had an hour before he was to report to the training facility for more hand-to-hand combat lessons with Lieutenant Lohr, the Tharik from a wooded planet called Nemus who looked like Bigfoot fused with a robot. Instead of going back to his dorm, he found an empty study room in the library that had a warm fire blazing in the hearth.
The tension left his body as he sat in an overstuffed leather chair and kicked his boots up onto the coffee table. Between the warm air and soft throw pillows, it didn’t take long for his eyes to grow heavy. He blinked once and then twice, fighting to stay awake, but his head fell against his shoulder and he could feel the drool sliding down the corner of his mouth.
“Colt?”
Startled, he sat up, and for a moment he wasn’t sure where he was. He shook his head and turned around, and saw Miranda Patel standing beside the fireplace.
“I thought that was you,” she said. “What are you doing here? Aren’t you supposed to be training for your new job?”
Colt swiped the drool from his chin and forced a smile. “Oh . . . um, yeah,” he said, trying to kick-start his brain so he could form a clear thought. “I, ah . . . well, we had practice this morning.” He tried to stand up but slipped on his backpack and fell back into his chair. “You’re talking about the Phantom Flyer thing, right?”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, fine,” he said, kicking his backpack out of the way so he could stand without making a fool of himself. “So what have you been up to?” He leaned against the chair, then stood up straight when he realized how lame he must look.
“I got stood up for lunch the other day,” Miranda said.
“Really? By who?”
“You.”
“Wait, you were serious?” Colt said, still finding it hard to believe that Miranda Patel actually wanted to have lunch with him.
“Of course. What about—”
“Attention, all cadets,” a synthesized voice said through the speakers in the ceiling. “Jackal, Blizzard, Lightning, Phantom, and Anvil Squadrons need to report to Helipad Delta immediately. I repeat, Jackal, Blizzard, Lightning, Phantom, and Anvil Squadrons, please report to Helipad Delta. This is not a drill.”
“Phantom,” Colt said. “That’s me. I’ve got to go.”
Miranda’s eyes went wide and her dark skin grew pale. “Do you think we’re under attack?” she asked as a group of cadets ran past the study room, their boots echoing down through the hall.
“I doubt it; they would have made all the squads report.”
“Then what is it?”
Colt shrugged. “I guess I’m about to find out.” He started to walk past her, but she placed her hand against his chest.
When he looked down, their faces were mere inches apart. He was intoxicated by the scent of her hair. Her skin. Her breath. It felt warm against his neck, and he just stood there, unable to move as he looked into her eyes.
He swallowed. It felt like ten thousand fireflies were alight in his stomach at the same time, their tiny wings beating. Tickling. He wondered if he was going to faint.
She leaned closer, lips slightly parted. Her hand reached up and flames lit where her fingers caressed his cheek. She reached behind his head and drew him close. He thought about Lily and started to resist, but he was short of breath. As her lips touched his, there was an explosion of sensation.
“Come back,” she said, the words little more than a whisper in his ear.
He nodded, unable to form a coherent thought, much less a complete sentence.