Chapter Eighteen

 

 

The plaza had several unaware Grounders standing in it, most of them by the Great Council building. A few were already running inside the massive front doors of the HQ as soon as they spotted us and the cannon we had stolen. Their blue-gray uniforms vanished into the mountain. Behind us, the two tripods emerged from the smog, keeping pace, and ready to back us up. That probably had something to do with it, too.

It was strange being on the ground for once. I felt more vulnerable than ever, and I was sure that Matt did, too. We both ducked behind the pulse cannon as we pushed it forward, onto the open pavement and under the yellow-green sky. The Grounders were fleeing, and it gave me a feeling of satisfaction. They should.

And then they would not like what we had to tell them.

"It's a good sign that they're all running inside," Matt said. "I bet they thought that we were dead for sure."

"Agreed," I said, smiling at Matt. I felt alive more than ever. I wondered if Grandpa Luis had tried to launch a full-scale attack on the HQ or if he had sneaked inside with the Grounder Secret. But we had an advantage that he didn't have, and we had made a discovery that he had never suspected.

"We don't know where your parents are inside the building," Matt said.

"They won't be by the front doors," I said, pushing the cannon beside him. My arms quivered with the effort. That was my hope.

Matt and I reached the steps, while the two walkers entered the plaza behind us. The ground quaked with each step they took. It would have instilled terror in me if they weren't working with us. Now having such backup filled me with a sense of power. We owned this alien invader thing, all right.

The stairs towered overhead. Matt and I managed to grunt and roll the cannon forward with enough force to get it over the first three steps, but no further. The barrel now pointed right at the front doors of the Great Council, which I was ninety-nine percent sure had great locks and security installed. The Great Council might have even installed guns or invisible electric fences around the place.

That wouldn't matter much longer.

I pressed the button to charge the gun, which didn't work at first, but after cranking one of the random levers (I tried all of them, to be honest) the button worked. The gun began to whine inside as the red glow appeared on the steps before the barrel. The shadows of the two killing machines fell over us and then stopped. I knew that Blake and Lin would roast any Grounders who dared to come out and try to stop us. We had the advantage until we got inside.

When the weapon's whine reached the maximum intensity, and the FIRE button glowed in red, I didn't hesitate. Time was not on our side. I hit the button with my fist.

The world roared as the cannon fired its reddish beam at the doors of the Council.

The front doors imploded, leaving flying dust and a giant, gaping hole in its place. Particles drifted away and mixed with the rest of the air. I blinked, heart racing, waiting for the dust to settle. Any Grounders near the entrance were no more.

Now, the Great Council HQ had a ten meter wide, gaping hole in the front of it. It looked as if the front of the structure were screaming.

More of the dust settled, and everything got quiet. Dim light emanated from inside the building, and I caught a glimpse of a lavish chandelier. It swung, having missed oblivion.

Matt and I didn't hesitate. I didn't even turn to wave at my friends. There was no time. The two of us left the cannon and bolted up the stairs, through the particles that might be the remains of Grounders, and into the Headquarters.

"Whoa," Matt said, drawing his heat ray.

That was an understatement. We stood in the most massive, most lavish hallway that I had ever seen as if the world's biggest Roman palace had blown up by a hundred times. The corridor stood empty of Grounders--either they had died or fled--and massive chandeliers hung from the ceiling in intervals. The hall itself must be over thirty meters across--and I had to look for a minute to realize that it circled an even more expansive chamber, one almost the size of Woking Park, that sat below us.

The Great Council's meeting room, set under the mountain.

I bolted to the railing that separated the meeting room from the rest of the HQ. Vast and circular, it looked as if it were a bowl filled with rows upon rows of black-robed people, thousands of them, all facing a central holographic display that by itself stood taller than several houses put together. A sky-view of Landin played out on the screen, complete with three more tripods marching onto the coast of the city, each taking one slow, loping step from the water at a time. Huge words at the bottom of the display scrolled past. LIVE NOW. INVASION CONTINUES. GREAT COUNCIL WORKING ON DEFENSES. LANDIN EVACUATED.

It was the news feed--and a partial lie. But our backup was on its way.

"We've got to find where they broadcast from," Matt said. "Before they all freak out and realize that we're inside."

"I think they already have," I said, training my attention on the Great Council themselves.

All of them had risen from their seats and scrambled around each other like bugs which didn't know where to go. I drew my weapon and readied myself, but I also knew that there was no chance of us taking down so many Grounders. I could smell that same rank air in here that had filled the transport tunnels. It seeped through both of my masks. I was right that the virus existed in here in high concentrations, making it impossible for non-vaccinated people to get in here and survive long enough to do real damage. But we weren't non-vaccinated people. We had already beaten their best security.

"We can't go down there," Matt said.

I eyed the hologram, which displayed a live news feed to the world. I shifted my attention to the area above it, praying that dust particles would betray the location of the projector. Blasting the door down had helped with that. I caught a glimpse of the beam, forming a line that angled up to the right. We would have to run a quarter of the way around the room.

"Come on." I grabbed Matt's hand and led him along.

He didn't argue. Straight ahead, two Great Council members, two women with blank expressions, scrambled up the stairs and into the hallway from the chamber below. I almost fired but decided they weren't enough of a threat. The Grounders already knew we were here. It didn't matter.

"They are not sick," one of them said to the other as we passed.

"They should be sick," said the other.

After eyeing the projector a couple more times, I found something promising ahead: double doors labeled PROJECTOR ROOM. The Grounders hadn't expected anyone to make it this far. Why hide this?

"There!" Matt shouted.

But when I pulled the doors and pushed, they refused to budge.

Locked.

The Grounders had used the oldest form of security after all.

Matt kicked at the door. "Well, this is nice."

The two women approached, and now more Great Council folks were pouring up the stairs, eyeing us with blank expressions. It must be the Grounder equivalent of confusion. We were quickly becoming outnumbered.

Once that wore off, they would figure out what to do with us.

Matt and I had come in on a suicide mission. If the Grounders were capable of any emotion, this wouldn't work. It would all depend on whether their urge to survive could override their cold logic.

We turned and stood against the door. We were so close, and yet so far away from our goal.

"You are not dead," the first woman said, approaching us as we stood against the projector room door, facing the two dozen Great Council people. More came up the stairs. "Are you Grounders?"

"They cannot be," a man said. "They are green, like the invaders."

I resisted the urge to recheck my hands. It was getting noticeable, then.

"They must be."

"No human can survive the virus."

"We do not attach to humans before they are fully grown."

"Perhaps they had no other choice."

Monotone voices filled the hall in an eerie concert. I shuddered. More Grounders poured up the other sets of stairs. The corridor was filling, and they left a semicircle around us. I remained pressed against the door, hiding the back of my neck, and Matt did the same. The fact that we weren't sick had confused the heck out of them.

It might be the only way we would get into the projector room.

I had to turn the monotone on and take the most monumental risk of my life. I had the long hair. Matt didn't. The back of my neck remained hidden. It fell on me. I hoped that Matt understood he had to stay against the wall.

"Yes," I said, trying to mimic Henry and all the other Grounders. "We lost our bodies, and we had to use these. We had no other choice." I spoke carefully, not using any contractions or figures of speech that would give me away. Flavorless and dull was what would save my life.

Matt got the drift. "We have important information regarding the invasion," Matt said. "We have found incriminating evidence related to the Earther Movement. We must broadcast it now."

With any luck, the Grounders would think I was one of them long enough for me to reach the projector and hook up the tablet. After that, all bets were off. Matt and I wouldn't live long enough to escape the building.

We might as well do the best we could to save the others. I gave Winnie and Lin and Blake a silent wish that they'd turn away now and live the rest of their lives. I hoped that Mom and Dad had found a way to escape. I knew my loss would devastate them, but I had no choice but to continue.

"Incriminating evidence," the Grounder woman said. She took one step closer. "Tell us the evidence."

I had been afraid of this. "We must broadcast it," I said. "We must show all the people that the Earther Movement is bad. It will make them trust us again." This whole charade rode on the hope that the Grounders were still trying to keep the citizens of the world calm so that they'd march right into the processing plants. The air stank more as if they were pumping more of the virus into it from deep underground. I struggled not to gag. None of the Great Council seemed to mind. This stench must smell good to Grounders. It was worse than the pollution outside.

"They need to trust us again," a Grounder man echoed.

A monotone chorus of "yes" in various forms rose from the assembled government officials in front of us, some of them more skeletal than others. Hope rose that we might be able to show this to the world after all. I might get to see the looks on the Grounders' faces before they dragged us off to get killed in some other horrific way. By having our blood sucked out bit by bit, perhaps. Or they would dispense with that and convert us to Grounders for real, though that wouldn't do them much good. I'd place my bets on the blood sucking part.

"I will unlock the door," the female Grounder said. The Great Council member stepped forward, and Matt and I stood aside to allow her to pass. She drew a card and slid it into the front lock panel on the door. It paused and clicked, allowing her to pull the double doors open to a semi-dark room filled with broadcasting equipment and holographic screens. Another Grounder, a Task Force man in a blue-gray uniform, stood before the biggest one in the center, which was still playing the broadcast of the tripods marching into Landin from the coast. They lumbered over the factories, swinging their long, snakelike legs, and I watched as a heat ray flashed across the facilities below. The Great Council must have sent out reinforcements of their own--and this meant that they were getting more desperate. More willing to kill. Better able to tolerate blowing their cover.

The Task Force man turned. "They are advancing."

Matt remained pinned to the wall, afraid to turn and blow his cover. It was up to me. They would discover him first.

I stepped into the room. "This may stop the advance," I said, pulling the tablet out of my backpack. It was a struggle not to move my hair in the process. I kept the same blank look, certain that everyone in the area could hear my heart racing. Sweat marks appeared on the tablet as I grasped it. Keeping a straight face was the most difficult part of my life. "This was in possession of the granddaughter of Luis Volker before I took use of her body. There is information about the invasion."

If Grounders could drool, this Task Force man would have done it. He reached out and took the tablet with speed that didn't match the Grounders' speech. I had left the Secret folder open and the video ready to go, the one that Luis had instructed my mother to play at the Great Council. He had tried this before but hadn't gotten this far.

"Thank you," the Task Force man said, turning away and facing the control deck of the broadcast room. He swiped his finger over the tablet and opened the correct file before inserting the tablet into the control deck, which came to life with flashing lights.

"This is helpful," the female Great Council Grounder said from behind me. "Now that we have this intelligence, we may now be able to dispose of the Earther couple in our custody." Her robe flowed as she turned to speak to someone. "Remove their oxygen masks, and process them."

My heart about stopped.

They were talking about Mom and Dad.

I did what I was not supposed to do in that situation.

I lost my cool, whirled around, and punched the Great Council woman on the side of the face. Knocking her to the floor, I raised another fist and struck her as hard as I could. She gasped and gritted her teeth, and I caught the sight of blood leaking out of her nose. Blind rage had overtaken me, and the world turned to shifting black robes and sheer anger. A faint buzz filled the air as the broadcast of the invasion died, and Grandpa Luis began to speak. His voice echoed over the speakers of the entire Great Council, fierce and projected. He had planned his life for this moment.

"Greetings, Great Council," he said. "I am Luis Volker, founder of the Earther Movement. I do hope my words are reaching you, and the rest of the world."

"What is this broadcast?" the Task Force man asked.

The Grounder woman tried to speak, but I swung at her face once more, and she let out a breath as her eyes became unfocused. She was stunned. I got up and realized that two of the other Great Council people had taken Matt's arms, and they were dragging him away from the door and into the black-robed crowd.

Two thoughts raced through my mind.

Mom and Dad were alive, hooked up to oxygen to keep the virus out of their lungs, and that they wouldn't be for more than a few more minutes.

They were taking Matt away, too.

I drew the heat ray and fired.

The beam came to life, sweeping over all the Great Council members in the front. A wall of grimaces followed along with falling bodies. Matt wrenched himself free from his collapsing captors and ran into the projector room to join me.

All this happened in the space of two seconds.

As if waiting for me to finish, Grandpa Luis gave pause. He continued to speak in the main chamber as his image broadcast across the entire world.

"I hope that by the time you all see this image, it is not too late," he continued. "The government is being run by a race known as Grounders, who have emerged from deep within the Earth in the last century. They plan to--"

The Task Force man turned, ready to pull out the tablet.

We had to keep the Great Council out of here long enough for Luis to finish.

"Stop him!" Matt shouted, drawing his heat ray again.

The Great Council already tried to trample their fallen as they surged forward towards the doorway, but Matt fired another shimmering beam that engulfed the mass as I turned and elbowed the Great Council guy as hard as I could. He grunted and stumbled back, but I raised my knee and hit him on the spot that would stop all human men. It worked on Grounders, too, because he crumpled into a ball of pain and grimaced. The human nervous system still hooked into the Grounder one enough for that trick.

More Grounders fell as Grandpa Luis boomed from the center of the Main Chamber. The pile of bodies grew higher, and the disgusting burning smell overtook the one from deep below.

"--and then to use the rest of us as food," he continued. "I believe that the Mars colonies are a backup in case we cannot survive the changing planet. A planet which, despite the Grounders' claims, we have the right to live on, along with every other life form we have come to know and love."

Feet shuffled on the other side of the bodies, and more hands tried to grasp and pull the fallen Grounders out of the way. The projector guy continued to whimper on the floor. I stood in front of the control panel, which continued to blink as the new clip played. I had to live long enough for Grandpa Luis to deliver the blow. I wished he would hurry.

"Our weapons won't recharge in time," Matt said, standing next to me. I kept mine out, just in case.

Another body rolled out of the way, and another Great Council guy climbed over the others. Two dozen more Grounders stood behind him as if they were cult members, all blank and worse than dead. They had us beat on numbers alone.

"--The Grounders' claim that all familiar life, including us, originated on Mars is, in fact, correct," Luis continued. "But we cannot be held responsible for what happened four billion years in the past. And yet, the Grounders expect us to do this, despite their secret."

I pressed the button to fire my gun at the incoming Great Council, but nothing happened. It still had to recharge for a few more minutes. The man stepped over the bodies, gaining his balance as his comrade whimpered on the floor.

"The Grounders believe that they are the original form of life on this planet," Luis said. "What they do not understand is that their kind originally came from Venus."