Alex, exhausted, could hardly process the horrible statement. On the floor? The hospital ward full? Alex’s face was stained with sweat and dirt and blood. His clothes were ripped, and his body was covered in bruises and cuts. He looked down at the quickly deteriorating mansion, and at the masses of pirates tearing up Artimé and his people, and at all the dead and injured that littered the grounds, and at all the ships that surrounded the island with even more enemies still hiding aboard. He looked around for familiar faces of his friends, his team leaders, and he didn’t see any of them. Not one. Were they dead? All of them? Where was Aaron? What if Ishibashi was wrong about the seaweed? He couldn’t bear to consider it. How could he stand the grief of losing another friend? And then he choked on a ragged sob, and all the hope he’d ever held in his heart drained out in that moment.
That hope was replaced by the somber truth. Artimé was destroyed. There would be no prevailing this time. Soon there would be no more people for the pirates to kill, because they would all be dead, except maybe Aaron—and the pirates would just torture him until he finally outlived them all.
“Florence,” Alex said, his voice anguished.
Florence turned again to face the mage. “What is it, Alex?”
“I think we need to surrender.”
One More Try
Florence looked at Alex. And without blinking, without reacting, without arguing, she shouted in her loudest, most booming voice, “SIIIMBERRR!”
Alex looked at her, aghast. “What are you doing?”
Florence shook her head in disgust. “I want to see you make that suggestion to Simber. I could use a good laugh right now. SIIIMBERRR!” she called again.
“Stop!” said Alex. “Don’t do that. He’s busy.”
Florence opened her mouth to call again, but Alex skittered down the slant of the roof.
“No!” he cried, and jumped on her, fists flailing. She caught him and held him up with one hand. “Really, Alex? You want to break your fists punching me?” Quickly she stuck out her other arm and clotheslined a pirate who was running by. He hit the dirt, and Florence grabbed his sword. She stabbed it through his chest, barely taking the time to look at what she was doing.
Alex deflated. He’d lost his mind. He stopped punching the air and hung limply in Florence’s grip until finally she set him down on the ground. She pulled the sword out from the pirate’s chest, wiped it clean, and gave it to Alex.
“Moment of insanity,” Alex mumbled, taking it. “Can we just pretend that didn’t happen?”
“I’d certainly like to,” said Florence. She saw Simber flying at full speed toward them.
“You’re not going to tell him?” asked Alex anxiously.
“Not today.”
“Good. Thank you. And sorry. I’m out of here.” Alex ran off to start swinging his sword at pirates.
“What’s wrrrong?” Simber asked Florence.
“Nothing,” said Florence. “Only I see Claire and Sky at the edge of the lawn by the jungle. Do you see them?”
Simber turned to look. “I do now. And the rrrest of the teams arrre hiding on the otherrr side of the mansion, including Samheed and Lani, whose teams took some of the worrrst action. They just arrrived afterrr a skirrrmish with a group of pirrrates coming frrrom the lighthouse, and found the otherrrs setting up forrr an ambush.” Simber snarled at a pirate, clamped her in his jaws, tossed her into the air, and batted her out to sea.
“Well then, let’s go assist,” said Florence.
“Wherrre’s Alex?”
“Oh, he’s around. Fighting hard.”
“Does he know about this plan?”
“I don’t think so, Sim. Let’s surprise him. He could use it right about now.”
Just then, a shrill whistle went up from the lawn where Claire and her team were standing. Automatically at least half of the pirates turned to see what was happening. With their backs turned, Carina and her team of forty rushed in and fired deadly spells at them, dropping a whole section on the lawn at once. They fired again and took down another group.
When the pirates realized what was happening, they all turned toward Carina’s team. With a roar, the pirates rushed at them, giving Claire’s team open targets on their backs. Claire’s team fired, once, twice, three times, until all their components were gone, and another thirty pirates went down. Then the team went in with swords drawn and continued the attack, with Sky leading the way.
Florence and Simber rushed in to clobber any pirates who had been struck dumbfounded by the attack.
At the sight of Carina, Aaron, Kaylee, Lani and Samheed, and Claire and Sky, Alex felt his heart refire. His friends weren’t dead! Sky was alive! And Aaron! All of them! They were alive and fighting and not in any way looking like they wanted to give up. Maybe the tide was swinging just the least bit.
“We fight until we win!” Alex cried to the returning teams, who were equally glad to see him alive. But the returning teams were less glad to hear that there were still pirates and Warblerans on the ships, and no one quite knew what was coming next. They all dug in and kept going.
But the twenty-four-hour battle had taken its toll on their bodies, and slowly their euphoria at the momentary victory began to slip away.
They fought valiantly, but the pirates on land still outnumbered them four to one. It was only a matter of time before the Artiméans would collapse from exhaustion.