“We can’t leave yet!” Gwen shouted at the backs of the cyborgs as they trotted through the gardens toward the main gate. “We have to wait for Rora—”
But even as she spoke, the sound of a dragon’s roar pierced the sky.
She did it. She fucking did it.
“Marzanna!” Gwen turned on a heel, heading for the palace. “Go to the stables. Find Rora. Make sure she’s okay.”
“Just what the hell do you think you’re doing?” Marzanna shouted after her.
“I have an idea,” she called back. “Head for the ship once you have Rora. I’ll meet you there.”
She hoped they could get through the city. But with the tolling of the bells, she wasn’t sure. If the city was even remotely organized—and she didn’t doubt the capital would be—there would be feds awaiting them at the main gate. They wouldn’t be able to make it to the docks.
Moving as quickly as she could, she leaned on her crutch as she hurried back to her room. It took what felt like an eternity before she got to her door. Hurrying inside, she found what she sought.
Grabbing her skimmer, she moved toward the door but hesitated. Turning, she snatched her pack, pushing the portable mainframe into it along with her tool kit. She didn’t trust Emmeline farther than she could throw her. And thanks to Gwen’s broken leg—courtesy of the woman in question—she wasn’t throwing anyone anytime soon.
Sparing a glance for her crutch, she dropped it and donned her magnetic boots. Stepping onto her skimmer, she groaned at the pain from the weight on her leg. There would be time to deal with that later.
Kicking the board on, she flew out of her room, through the palace, into the ballroom, and out into open air.
Flying high, she saw exactly what she’d been afraid of.
Hundreds of feds formed lines in front of the palace gates. Her friends stood on the other side, attempting to lower it, unaware of their impending doom.
Where is the dragon?
Spotting the creature where it perched on a rooftop, sunning like a housecat, Gwen flew over to it.
“Hey!” she shouted. “Remember me?”
As the scaled creature turned its feline gaze on her, she grabbed her pistol and aimed.
Sorry, little buddy.
Then she fired.
The dragon roared as the bullet pinged harmlessly off its scaly hide. Reloading, she shot a second time. That got its attention. Scraping its claws against the shingled rooftop, it pushed into the air, wings flapping furiously as it flew toward her.
Yanking on her board, she turned around and headed back toward the palace gates.
Gwen felt the fire before she saw it.
Shifting the gears on her skimmer, she dived down, narrowly avoiding a plume of flames. Behind her, the dragon snarled.
As she flew back toward the palace, she noted more soldiers pouring down the city streets, eager to hunt the cyborgs.
The soldiers would never let them leave this planet. They wouldn’t believe the cyborgs had nothing to do with the attack on their emperor or that one woman had turned them all into mindless zombies. To the prejudiced humans, all of the cyborgs would be guilty and either executed or used in experiments.
Seeing Gwen and her scaled companion, the soldiers and feds in front of the palace gates turned. Eyes wide, they aimed guns and crossbows skyward. She flew toward them, revving the engine, the ground flying by beneath her. Arrows thunked into the base of Gwen’s board, but none hit the engine. The dragon wasn’t so lucky. Countless bullets bounced off its underbelly. When a crossbow bolt wedged into one of its legs, the creature roared.
The dragon spewed fire over the city, cooking soldiers inside their metal armor. Men screamed, and the smell of roasting flesh filled the air. Those untouched by the dragon’s first bout of flames reloaded their guns and crossbows and fired again. Temporarily unconcerned with Gwen, the dragon turned its full attention toward the soldiers.
Quickly, she circled back to her friends.
They’d slipped out of the main gates while the soldiers had their backs turned and were running through the city streets. Rora had an arm slung over Marzanna’s shoulders, but they kept pace with the other cyborgs.
Gwen flew down to them, shouting over the screams of dying men and the crackling flames. “We need to get to the ship before the forcefield goes up!”
She knew as well as any tinkerer of safety protocols on important planets, such as Covenant. Those who could afford it installed massive forcefields over a city or location, which prevented ships from returning to space by erecting a massive, impenetrable forcefield in the shape of a dome over a location.
Her friends nodded, and she took to the air.
The dragon had made quick work of the soldiers. Most of them were dead or far too injured to raise a weapon toward the cyborgs running past them.
Once more, Gwen reached for her favorite pistol and reloaded it.
Sending a quiet apology into the ethos, she flew toward the scarlet dragon and fired. This time, the bullet didn’t just bounce off its hide; it pinged off its head.
“Oops.”
Turning, the dragon belched flame.
Revving her engine, Gwen flew toward the city where squadrons of feds stormed toward the smoking palace.
Civilians ducked inside buildings, slamming doors and pulling shutters closed. Seeing them, she tried to shove her guilt down.
These people would kill you, given a chance.
She weaved between the buildings, dragon fire at her heels. It didn’t catch at first since most of the buildings were made of stone with slate roofs, rather than the wood common in rural areas. But when she ducked around an automated carriage, the dragon’s hot breath behind her, wood, wheels, and other debris flew into the air as the flames met the fuel tank, and the carriage exploded.
Flying off her skimmer, she skidded across the ground. The cobblestone streets bit into her skin, slicing through her clothes. She tumbled beneath an alcove. As her skimmer skidded down the street, the soldiers’ arrows on the base of the board snapped off.
Another roar split the sky, which was quickly followed by gunfire and the zipping of arrows.
Ignoring the pain from countless cuts and her broken leg in its torn cast, she clambered to her feet and hobbled toward her skimmer. As she emerged from beneath the alcove, a plume of flames erupted down a nearby street. She rolled forward, grabbing her board and landing feetfirst. Then she took to the sky.
The dragon was once again thoroughly occupied by the dozens of soldiers in the streets below and on rooftops. Its cyborg talons ripped through slate roofs as it clawed at balconies where soldiers aimed massive crossbows, trying to bring the scarlet dragon down.
As she’d hoped, with a dragon on the loose, the city should be less inclined to host execution parties for the escaping cyborgs.
Silently praying the dragon would survive the day and apologizing for antagonizing it, she turned, looking for her friends. It took her a few minutes to find them, but they were nearing the docks. She flew down to them.
“How much farther?” Rora asked, gasping.
“Two blocks.” Sweat poured down Gwen’s face, and she ignored the throbbing pain in her leg.
At the docks, people scurried to their ships, land-bound or ready for space travel. Men and women pushed each other aside in their haste, and some even shoved people into the waters far below. Gwen hovered low on her skimmer, her empty pistol in one hand.
When one man tried to push their group aside, she held her pistol to his head. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” He didn’t need to know the damned thing was empty.
Eyes wide, he scurried around them.
When they neared Obedient, watchmen guarded the gangway and were stationed across the ship’s main deck.
“You aren’t supposed to have returned yet,” the watchman at the base of the gangway said.
“We got back early,” Gwen said from where she hovered on her skimmer. “Step aside. There’s been a change of plans.” When the guard didn’t move, she looked around. “Where the hell is Emmeline?”
Rora ambled forward. “I know that voice.” Raising her hands slowly, she removed the watchman’s mask. The woman didn’t move at her touch.
The mask and helmet clattered onto the dock as Rora gasped. “Philippa? I thought you were dead.”
Philippa had a fair complexion, and she might have once been blond. But like every watchman Gwen had seen today without their mask, her head was shaved. She had large brown eyes and a soft jaw that suggested she had once been beautiful.
“There isn’t time for this.” Without warning, Gwen struck Philippa over the side of the head with her pistol. Rora managed to catch her before she fell to the ground. “Bring her on board. We’ll tinker with her chip later if we’re still alive by the end of this.”
Emmeline appeared before the gangway.
“Timely as always,” Gwen muttered. “Have the cyborgs prepare the ship for takeoff. We leave yesterday.”
“Who put you in charge?” Emmeline bit back, but she had already pulled out the strange device she’d used earlier to control the cyborgs.
“I did when you tried to get us all killed.”
The watchmen and performers hurried onto the ship in a strange silence before standing utterly still on the main deck.
After a minute of working on her device, Emmeline pocketed the machine once more. “Done.”
All at once, everyone started moving. The watchmen who’d remained with the ship as well as all the remaining watchmen and performers who’d come from the city readied the engines and lowered the sails.
To Gwen’s annoyance, Abrecan had somehow been one of the few to survive.
With the deaths of the watchmen and performers, there were fewer than one hundred cyborgs now.
“Marzanna!” Gwen shouted, uncertain where she’d gone off to. “Get Bastian’s chip back into his head. He has some experience flying, so we need him up and running.”
Unlike the rest of the cyborgs, Bastian’s chip hadn’t been tampered with by uploading malicious coding. Instead, he’d been given a completely new one. Therefore, they should be able to bring him back to help in their escape without the need to update his coding in a portable mainframe.
From the little Bastian had told her of his past, he’d overseen some of the trading vessels for his family’s business. She prayed Emmeline hadn’t done anything to his original chip.
Come back to me. I need you.
Marzanna appeared before her, and Gwen passed Bastian’s chip to her.
The forcefield still hadn’t been put up, and Gwen breathed a sigh of relief. They were going to make it. They were—
Suddenly, a rippling boom shook the city. Waves tossed the docked vessels, and they all clung to the sides of the ship.
A shimmering wave of air rose from the edges of the city and surrounding land and water. Several ships were already skyborne, hoping to flee the burning city and its dragon. They throttled the engines to get out of the range of the forcefield. But it caught one ship, slicing the back clean off. Without its engines, it fell, splashing into the lake below. The second ship bounced off the forcefield, careening backward, but it managed to remain airborne.
Too soon, the forcefield closed, forming a massive shimmering dome around the city.
They were trapped.