Chapter 13
Less than a mile outside of the city, the highway winding out of Detroit is a wasteland.
Broken-down, rusted cars litter the road as if abandoned all at once like a zombie apocalypse.
What they were fleeing? The Rift and the subsequent skirmishes for power?
Criminal punishment under Thorne or his predecessors?
Could be anything off a long list of terrible actions taken by the region leaders in this part of the country.
A zombie apocalypse might have been preferable.
Shantytowns pop up every couple hundred yards—families living in sheds built from rubble, cobbling together an existence from nothing.
In between these communities are prolonged stretches of emptiness with vacant barns and plots of land piled with trash in a dreary, never-ending watercolor of tragedy.
Our caravan consists of ten bloated black trucks packed with people, weapons, equipment, and the minuscule number of personal belongings each soldier was allotted. Mason leads the pack, eight trucks follow, and Delilah and I bring up the rear.
Delilah’s watch lights up and she peers out the back window. “It’s time.”
Following her gaze, I stare into the skyline.
A skyline we are about to change forever.
Delilah is forlorn and it isn’t hard to put myself in her shoes.
A city she’s lived in her whole life, a city she feels responsible for like a child, crumbling before her eyes.
If someone were to level my city with its proud, brilliantly lit island of buildings, it would put me in mourning.
Within about thirty seconds the ground begins to shake.
And the noise is ear-splittingly loud, like firecrackers and forty thousand snare drums going off at once.
A building falls out of sight, melting into the blackened horizon.
I try not to think about Taylor and concentrate on the road to look for any movement that might indicate we were followed.
So far there is nothing behind us but distance and destruction.
More explosions. I try not to think about Taylor again.
Suddenly it’s like the crescendo of Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture”—crashing, banging, explosions, like someone has cranked up the volume of the world.
Sirens and gunfire, the echoing boom of what could be bombs.
Delilah’s watch beeps uncontrollably. Her worried eyes snap down to the blue-lit display.
“Dunn is there.” Her dulcet voice is quaking and unsure.
Fear nestles into my heart and pierces it. Sharp, but I have to be sharper. “Should we go back?”
“Absolutely not. We go forward. I have to coordinate sending more troops in. I need to get in touch with Theia, with Eos, with the other leaders. Our priority is getting this caravan to safety.” There’s no way she believes that, but I’m sure she’s under pressure from the Order, from Theia, and probably from Taylor herself.
“We have to trust her, Luciana. We planned for this. Trust the plan.”
Oh, I trust the plan. I also trust Taylor to get herself killed for this. I trust her to stop to save a kitten stuck in a tree and get blown up in the process. “She said it wouldn’t take long.”
Delilah sighs, forehead pressed against the glass as she watches the destruction behind us. She’s made of the same steel stuff as Taylor, and under the same thumb. No compromise, no surrender. “She didn’t want you to worry about her.”
“Like that’s even a choice to make.” Suddenly I imagine myself shooting through throngs of Dusters, mowing them down in pursuit of her.
But I don’t have it in me. Maybe there’s nothing in me, like an empty vessel.
Maybe I’m exactly what everyone thought I should be—pretty and ornamental like a vase with no flowers. Useless. “What do we do?”
“We complete our part of this mission. We get to Lansing. We set up another headquarters. We provide support.” Her eyes flick over to me as another round of bombs go off in the distance. “She’s going to be fine. She will be fine.”
It’s not a promise. It’s a prayer.
In their previous incarnation, the buildings we take over were a quartet of apartment towers, unexceptional brown brick with white trim on the windows.
Trucks, vans, and cars surround the perimeter; dozens upon dozens of people file out and pour over the lawns and through the doors.
Equipment, weapons, and ambiguous bags and cartons go rushing in like a virus, infecting the old building with new life.
Order members already live and work here, so between them and the entourage we brought, our gear is unloaded and operating in under an hour.
Everyone is very efficient. I, however, stand on the courtyard grass like a misplaced and absurdly tall garden gnome.
Finding a chair in a tiled hallway, I plop myself down and bury my head in my hands.
My heart starts racing as panic settles in for the night, camping out inside my gut and chest. It feels like someone has me by the back of the shirt, thrusting me over the edge of a building.
I’m in no actual danger, so my brain buzzes and grows warm in the friction between reality and imagination.
If I could throw up or cool down, I might feel better.
Instead, I’m rooted to my seat by invisible fear.
Fear is the mind-killer. Well, fine. It’s not like my mind was doing me a lot of good, anyway.
Mason finds me an indeterminable amount of time later rocking in my chair, soaked in sweat.
“Luce,” he calls in his deep bass, crouching in front of me. My watery eyes catch his. “I’m going back to Detroit. I’m gonna help her.”
I don’t trust myself to speak. Shivers course through me, trying to calm my overactive systems. I nod.
He pats me on the knee and stands, bringing my attention up to his full soldier’s uniform.
It’s bulky and intimidating. Formidable, like someone who could rush in and save her.
Not like me, cowering on a thinly upholstered chair, convulsing like a child.
Was it only days ago I was giggling and dancing with him?
On a dance floor that soon became the deathbed for a young girl.
Everything turns to death sooner or later.
Death circles and circles overhead until it finds prey to pounce on.
And we’re easy pickings, arrogantly basking in the sun.
“I’ll see you soon. And hey.” His short tone brings a marginal amount of my attention to him. “She’s counting on you.”
She shouldn’t. I’m a disaster. Whatever she sees in me she’s imagined entirely. I’m torpefied by fear like I was with Thorne, with her at the ball, and like I always am when I’m overwhelmed.
Mason’s retreating shadow shrinks against the carpeting, an amorphous blob of darkness, which morphs into a smaller shape, unrecognizable.
Following the fuzzy blackness, my bleary eyes focus on Delilah.
She’s changed into casual attire—a loose T-shirt and jeans over a pair of heels.
Other than blatant exhaustion, she looks no worse for the wear.
Not physically, anyway. She’s still the living embodiment of fingernails trailing down your spine.
“Lucy, your room is ready. Let’s get up there, okay?” Her voice is gentle, like a mother coaxing a weary, refractory toddler to sleep.
My knuckles blanch as I grip the chair and shake my head. “I can’t. Delilah, I can’t. I can’t do this. I’m not—I’m not strong enough.”
“You are a lot of things, Luciana Piccolo, but I did not make you for a liar.” This time, her soft voice turns hard. “Get up. Come with me.”
Sniffling, I look up and find her unrelenting. “But I can’t.”
“I am not asking, Luciana.”
When I find the courage, I get up from the chair with her assistance and my limbs scream in protest. We take a short walk into what was a recreation room in the former life of this building.
In place of billiards and pinball, screens relay feeds or maps from beeping green televisions.
Order members man radios and other communicative equipment, tuning into various frequencies to try and catch the attention of their brethren out on the front lines.
“Look around.” At her request, I inspect everyone closer.
The bags under their eyes are heavy, but the look in them is resolute.
A few soldiers pal around in a corner, others are deep in serious conversation.
“Some of these people have seen battle, some have not. Some come from poverty, from near slavery, some are more fortunate. Some know people on the front lines, some are here alone with no family. Nevertheless, here they are.”
Lack of sleep and desperation thin my patience. “Okay?”
Delilah sits us down on a sofa near a television broadcasting electronic snow, and hands me a bottle of water from a stash beside us.
“They are prepared for this. Trained for it, maybe even wished for it. But you, Luciana, you did not. You were kidnapped, thrown at the feet of the leader of the rebellion, put at the mercy of her most esteemed soldier, robbed of your home and legacy. You fought a Lightbringer, assassinated a region leader, and somehow went from a prisoner of war to an indispensable deputy to the Order of Prometheus’s Lieutenant General.
No one here has gone through what you’ve gone through.
And you’re still here. So, you will never convince me you are not strong. ”
Gratefully, I take a long sip of the water. “I’m scared.”
“That doesn’t mean you are not also strong.
” Delilah gestures to the nearest feed. “We are connected to the pre-Rift traffic camera system. In addition, each squadron of soldiers has members equipped with cameras.” My wide eyes speak for me and Delilah nods.
“Yes, Taylor too. Her feed hasn’t come through yet.
She’s turned it off, presumably for security reasons. ”
“Does Theia know Taylor is out there?”