Getting into a Drone suit was harder than I thought. First I had to pry free the helmet, which took a crowbar from the gas station’s garage and a lot of exertion. Once it popped off, more problems presented themselves. How could I get into the suit itself when it was all a single airtight piece? I couldn’t exactly climb through the neckhole.
Alex and Patrick watched me work my way around the suit, searching for zippers, catches, hidden buttons—anything. But no, it was perfectly smooth.
I finally decided to put on the helmet.
It lit up at once, and I saw that I could control it like the Rebel helmet by issuing commands. Once I’d gotten the hang of it, I said, “How do I get into the suit?”
Nothing.
“Get the space suit on me.”
Still it lay there, inert.
I said, “Open armor.”
A seam opened down the midline of the armor. We watched in amazement as it peeled open from the neck to the chest to the stomach, as if being sliced with an invisible laser.
I sat on the floor and wiggled my way into the suit.
Then I said, “Armor close.”
It zippered shut around me, conforming to my body. It was incredibly comfortable—tough and flexible at the same time. It felt like a second skin, the technology knitting around my shape, seeming to anticipate my movements as I stood up.
I stared through the face mask at Patrick and Alex.
“Whoa,” Alex said. “This is so weird. I totally want to kill you right now.”
The air tasted like metal and oil. I found myself getting light-headed.
Then I remembered: It was airtight. Aside from the tiny hole I’d made with the stun gun.
I took off the helmet and aerated it with the stun gun, punching two holes beneath the chin where they’d be hidden but close to my mouth.
When I put the helmet back on, the air tasted a bit fresher.
Patrick and Alex set about armoring themselves next. They’d never worn a helmet before, and they staggered around more than I did, finding their balance. They kept knocking into the shelves.
“You need to practice walking outside,” I said. “More room.”
I walked to the door, reached for the handle, and tore it clear off.
“Oops.”
I dropped the handle on the floor and flexed my glove. It would take some work to acclimate myself to the strength contained in the armor.
We stepped out through the doors. Though I found the suit freakishly fluid, there was a half-second delay between my wanting to reach for something and my arm actually doing it.
Patrick practiced running around the pumps, his legs pistoning powerfully. Alex did deep knee bends and then jumped a few times, testing the suit’s weight.
We were so occupied with our new armor that we didn’t notice the two giant cattle trucks.
Not until they’d pulled in to the gas station.
We turned as they eased up to the pumps. Three Drones filed out of each cab. They took a few steps in our direction. Halted in a line.
I could see our reflections in their face masks. I glanced nervously over at Patrick and Alex. The hole in the thigh of my brother’s armor seemed obvious. The one in his stomach looked like a friggin’ belly button. They were too obvious. There was no way the Drones wouldn’t notice.
Bracing myself to fight, I looked at the Drones. Their unreadable face masks pointed at us.
My breath echoed around in my suit like crazy.
They stared at us.
We stared back.
Two of the Drones reached for gas nozzles and started filling up the trucks’ tanks.
The others walked around to the livestock holds. They were packed with kids. A few bulging eyes peered through the slats. A little kid’s fingers wiggled out the side near the bottom. Someone was shrieking, “Can’t breathe! Can’t breathe!”
The gas pumps clicked off, and the Drones filed back into the cabs. They looked out the windows, nodded at us again.
We nodded back.
They pulled out, driving for Stark Peak.
The cries of children lingered in their wake.
I thought about those small fingers I’d seen poking out of the hold. No bigger than JoJo’s. Something fired to life inside my chest. Anger. At Ben Braaten. At the pieces of our friends littering the halls of Creek’s Cause High. At saying good-bye to Eve. At the Hosts and the Drones and the Hatchlings. At a new world where little kids were packed into the backs of cattle trucks.
I was staring at the Ninja motorcycle leaning against the air pump.
Fire spread inside me, my temper igniting. Maybe I could have stopped it, but I didn’t want to. Yielding to the rage felt so much sweeter. I was already walking, my step charged.
“Chance,” Patrick said. “No.”
Rocketing out of the gas station on the neon-green Kawasaki, I thought, Too late.
I blasted toward the cattle trucks. As I zoomed up on them, it seemed like they were flying backward at me. I’d done plenty of off-road dirt-bike riding on the mounds behind Britney Durant’s house, but those beat-up little motorcycles were nothing compared to this. This was flying a rocket.
I steadied the motorcycle and steered close to the first cattle car. I reached out an armored hand, grabbed hold of the rear gate, and clenched.
My hand literally crumpled into the metal.
I tore the rear gate open.
As it swung wide, my front wheel wobbled. I grabbed the grips with both hands, the bike cutting sharply, almost hurling me off. I righted myself just in time.
Kids were shouting and clamoring in the back. Two of the bigger kids released the ramp, which slid down and started sparking along the asphalt. The cattle truck veered and slowed some. But not much.
As I zipped ahead, one of the Drones reached out of the passenger seat and tried to knock me off the bike. I grabbed his arm and gave a little tug.
He hit the highway, black smoke bursting from his joints. The armor rattled off in various directions.
I revved ahead to the second cattle car. It was already slowing down.
I had no baling hooks, no gun, no real plan. But I had one advantage over the Drones—I wouldn’t disintegrate if my armor got punctured.
I went to free the back gate, but the driver yanked the truck to the side, almost hitting me. I slowed down, cut across the back, and rode up along the passenger side. The Drone was just opening the door, his boot inching out toward the runner.
I made a fist with the armored glove and swung it into the door as hard as I could without toppling the bike.
The door slammed shut where his ankle would be. A blast of black smoke shot through the fractured suit down at the asphalt zipping by beneath us. The Drone blasted across the bench seat, flying over the Drone next to him and smashing into the driver. Both of them hammered through the driver’s door, taking it right off the hinges.
The remaining Drone sat there in the middle, bolt upright and apparently stunned, as the truck barreled forward. Then he seemed to come to his senses. He slid across to take the wheel.
I eased over, figuring he was going to swerve into me.
The other truck was right there in the next lane, catching me by surprise.
I jerked the handlebars back, barely dodging the grille as it swept past.
I was in the tight space between both trucks.
There was nowhere to go.
I hit the brakes, hoping to let them fly ahead of me, but both of the drivers steered sharply in at me. There wouldn’t be time.
I watched the walls close in.
There was no doubt about it. I was gonna get pancaked.
The sides of the trucks hit the outsides of the Ninja’s grips, pinning the motorcycle in place.
I let go of the handlebars and hopped up onto the seat. The ground flew by below. One slip and I’d be spread across the highway. I tried to grab the trucks’ slats, but there were no handholds. Through the metal bars, kids’ faces appeared, cheering me on.
I reached for the top of the slats, but they were too high.
The handlebars bent and gave way. The bike started to crumple beneath me, dragged forward. The sides of the trucks crushed in on my shoulders. I bladed my body, riding the disintegrating bike like a skateboard.
The Drones kept steering into each other, smashing me between the walls.
I had one foot on the seat. One of the bike’s wheels broke free and whipped away as if sucked into a black hole.
The trucks were side to side, zooming forward, closing even more.
The slats clinked against my helmet on either side, crushing in on it.
Blue electricity fizzled across my face mask.
I felt the helmet bulge around my head.
It was going to pop. And then my head would, too.
I knew that the Drone helmet was strong. I didn’t want to bet my brain on how strong.
What was left of the Ninja dragged forward beneath me, a sled forging through a fountain of sparks. I was on the tiptoes of one foot, trying to keep some weight off my helmet, which was still held in a vise grip between the sides of the two trucks.
I was pretty much flying along the freeway suspended by my head.
The helmet cracked under the pressure, a fissure opening up around my neck. I could feel air rushing through the seam.
The helmet bulged even more, distorting my view through the face mask.
This was it.
I heard a boom.
My head blowing up?
Another boom.
The trucks didn’t veer apart, but they started to decelerate. The asphalt treadmill beneath me slowed, slowed, and finally stopped.
The motorcycle gave a metal groan and collapsed.
For an instant I swung from my head.
“Hello?” I said, my voice strained and wheezy. “Anyone wanna help me out?”
The weight of my body tugged my head from the helmet with an audible pop, and I collapsed on top of the jagged, smoking Kawasaki.
I reached up and worked the helmet loose. Then, turning my body sideways, I squeezed my way up the narrow gap between the trucks. At last I squirmed out the front.
Through the cracked windshields, I saw black smoke and pieces of armor. A Drone stood on top of one of the cabs, shotgun in his hands, pointed down.
Patrick.
He had fired through the roof of the cab.
Then he’d jumped across to the neighboring cab and done the same.
A commandeered Ford F-150 pickup coasted into view from around the side of the wrecked vehicles, another Drone at the wheel. Alex yanked off the helmet and shook out her spiky hair. She must’ve driven up alongside the first cattle truck so Patrick could jump up onto it. She had one elbow out the rolled-down window and looked like something from a beer commercial.
She smiled that wide smile. “Whoa there, Little Rain. Next time wait for the cavalry.”
I grinned.
Already the kids were streaming out of the cattle holds, running around us, whooping and clapping.
We threw high fives, bumped knuckles, and wished one another well. They took off quickly, heading every which way.
Every which way—except toward Stark Peak.
We were the only ones stupid enough for that.