Chapter 5
FIVE
The aircraft came at us so fast that my brain froze in panic, my eyes glued to the monster as it loomed closer.
For several terrifying seconds, I couldn’t move my feet, couldn’t move anything, could barely even think.
And then, as if a switch had been flicked, the life returned to my limbs and adrenaline sent me hurtling down the ladder.
My friends had traveled back over to my post when I reached the bottom, and they stared at me, their eyes wide with alarm.
“Tani, what the—” Jessie began, but I didn’t let her finish.
“An aircraft,” I croaked, barely able to get the words out. “It’s coming our way. We have to—”
I cut off, realizing I had no idea what we had to do. What we could do. This little cluster of tree houses was our world. Where could we run to? Where could we hide?
There was nowhere, except for the treacherous jungle floor, and how could we take our young ones down there? How long would the adults survive, much less the children?
I cursed, breathing so hard I felt close to hyperventilating.
We thought we were oh-so-smart, living out here in the wild.
We thought we were prepared. And while that was true, to a large extent, we had not paid enough attention to what would happen if there ever came a day when outsiders threatened us.
We had relied on our remoteness, being buried in the heart of the jungle, to keep us safe for so long.
To be fair, nobody had intruded on us since the commune’s birth.
Why is it happening now?
“What aircraft?” Robert demanded.
As if in answer to his question, the aircraft’s low growl thundered in the distance, much closer this time.
“We need to warn everyone!” I shouted. “Get everyone together in one place—head to the hall.”
I still had no semblance of a plan, but that seemed like the logical first step.
Get everyone together. It didn’t feel safe for everybody to be scattered about; flocks are stronger together.
For all I knew, the intruders were not here to harm us—maybe I was just fearing the worst. But after what we had seen back near Zina’s colony, I doubted it, and I didn’t want anyone stuck in isolation for whatever happened next.
“Okay,” Jessie said shakily.
We each took a separate zip line, leading to different parts of the commune.
I took the line that led directly to my home.
At least, I realized as I soared, my father, aunt, and uncle were already in the process of calling a meeting.
It wouldn’t involve everyone in the community, but it would involve some, so that would be a bit of a head start.
My heart twisted as I neared my tree house and saw my mother standing outside on the porch, wearing a frown on her face and holding Bea in her arms as she looked up at the clear sky in confusion.
Her expression lifted when she spotted me hurtling toward her. “Tani! Are you okay?”
“Hurry and get in!” Bea shouted. “Another storm’s comin’.”
“That wasn’t thunder,” I panted as I hit the deck.
“Listen, Mom, I’m guessing Dad stopped by to tell you things went wrong during our trip, but everything’s just gotten much worse.
You gotta take Bea and get to the community hall, now!
” I grabbed the two harnesses resting against the wall outside the door and helped my sister into hers, while my mother took the other.
“What do you mean?” she breathed.
I glanced at Bea, who gazed up at me with fear and confusion, and set my jaw, looking back at my mother. “A large aircraft is heading our way, and I don’t know why. Just get to the hall, and yell to everyone you come across to do the same.”
“What’s an aircraft?” Bea murmured as my mother nodded nervously and launched onto the line with her. I followed, hearing the sound of panicked shouting all around me as I glided.
Robert and Jessie were doing their jobs, and others would take on the responsibility of doing the same. But the thundering of the machine was growing too loud, and I knew we wouldn’t all get to the hall in time. It was simply approaching too fast.
A thought struck me then, and when we hit the next deck, instead of taking the line that would lead me after my mother, I pivoted toward where Robert and Jessie had convened, on the porch of a house six trees along.
“Tani, what are you doing?” my mother cried when she realized I had stopped following her.
“I’ll catch up with you!” I shouted back. “Just look after Bea.”
She was already in momentum along a line, so there was nothing she could do but continue gliding. I just hoped she wouldn’t come back looking for me once she got Bea to safety.
“I’m heading to the museum to get those masks,” I informed my friends as I landed in front of them. “Follow me if you want to help.”
Jessie looked nervous as the rumbling grew ever louder over our heads, but she and Robert nodded, and we headed off.
I knew it wasn’t much, but if these intruders were somehow connected to that toxic fog, at least some of us could be prepared. And there were also other potentially useful artifacts in the museum that I wanted to check.
We recruited more people to help us along the way, and by the time we had reached the large storage building, there were eight of us.
I barreled inside—aware that we probably had only a few precious seconds before the aircraft was upon us—to find my father already there, along with my uncle and fifteen other men, all frantically gathering equipment.
“You heard the shouting?” I breathed, locking eyes with my father. The pallid complexion of their faces made it obvious that they had.
My father thrust a mask into my hands. “Put it on,” he instructed.
As I navigated the cold metal of the mask’s helmet-frame and slipped it over my head, I felt guilty. “How many masks do we have?” I asked. We couldn’t have more than fifty.
“Just keep it on,” he grunted as he continued pulling equipment off the shelves.
My eyes scanned the rows of boxes on the floor.
Closest to me were the guns, twenty of them.
I wasn’t sure how much use those would be, though, when we had so few bullets.
We’d used up the bulk of our initial stock over the centuries, on defense against aggressive animals.
Sixty years ago, an agreement was made to preserve the rest, but there were probably less than a hundred in total.
Still, it was something, at least.
My eyes traveled deeper into the room and spotted the boxes of flares.
Those were also from the early days, but we had many more of those.
I’d always thought our founders had gone a bit overboard on the flares, but now I couldn’t have been more thankful.
Flares, I could see as being a significant advantage.
They were the closest we could get to actual bombs.
Robert, Jessie, and the rest of our helpers were also given masks, and then my father dipped into a case of flares and pressed five into my hands, along with a box of matches.
“You know how to use these,” he said sternly.
I nodded, swallowing.
“Take them and hurry to the hall with your friends. Use them if necessary.”
A shiver of fear ran through me at the dark look in his eyes.
“What about you?” I asked, glancing at my uncle and the other men in the room, who were equipping the rest of my group with flares and matches, along with six bulky bags of masks.
I spotted Jessie’s father among them, as she held him in a tight hug.
I realized then that the men were all among the toughest members of our community.
My father must have been in the process of gathering them for the meeting, planning to talk to them about an excursion back to Zina’s colony.
Now they had pivoted roles and were preparing to fight.
“We’re going to try to head off the ship,” he said, strapping a belt around his waist. “And do all we can to keep it away from the hall.”
He then pulled me into his arms, his eyes infused with such worry that my heart ached. I had no idea what might happen to him out there, and neither did he. I hugged him back tighter, not wanting to let go. For all I knew, I might never see him again.
“Now go,” he said gruffly, loosening my hold on him.
I opened my mouth to resist, but he pushed me firmly toward the door, along with Robert and the others we had gathered, the glare he shot me brooking no argument.
Jessie joined us, having been sent off by her father, too.
Her fearful eyes brimmed with tears, her expression exactly mirroring my inner state.
I tucked the flares and match box into an outside pocket of the backpack I still carried over my shoulders, and retreated outside, gazing around the jungle through the thick visor of my mask.
The rest of my companions were already lining up.
I let them launch off first, taking the most direct line to the hall, and sent a reluctant Jessie after them, while I hung back to cast one last glance back into the museum.
Stay safe, Dad. Please, stay safe.
I turned and launched off, and at almost the exact second my weight left the deck, the shouting around us intensified to panicked screams, and I realized with sinking finality that time was up. The intruders had arrived.
I caught a glimpse of the aircraft’s round, dark underbelly through the leaves above me, its hulking form blocking out the sun. It was now directly over the settlement, but thankfully, still some distance from the hall. Though there were still people out there who hadn’t made it to the building.
As I passed a stretch of thinner foliage, I got a full view of the vessel.
The closeness of its vast, glinting black exterior made my heart skip a beat.
It truly was a monster. A beast of a machine, with eight wide, outward-pointing cylinders lining the base of it—cylinders that looked terrifyingly similar to gun barrels.