he ceiling of the crawl space was inches above their heads, and it trembled with explosions. Phoebe wriggled after the others, wedging herself through the nest of plumbing and bundled wires. She could barely see anything, just a few patches of light poking up from below.

“Eighteen percent rise in heat ratio,” came Orei’s voice.

“The smelting factory is that way,” replied her father. “Too dangerous. Follow me.” He took the lead, and they crawled after him, squeezing between ducts and channels, finding a path through the chaotic knot of conduits.

Phoebe peered down through a gap in the stretches of pipe and saw some kind of shipping zone. Watchman workers in Multi-chain conveyors and Over-cranes were loading a fleet of bullet-shaped trains. The shipments zipped through a semicircular array of tunnels, hovering silently along cylindrical tracks that glowed purple. Magnetic rails, she realized.

Phoebe hurried to catch up with the others. There was barely enough room to crawl, and she knocked her head and got tangled as they slid under the skin of the Citadel.

“Here,” Jules called out. “Down here.”

Orei tore a gash in the metal duct, wrenched it open, and slipped through. The rest of them followed, dropping onto a rusty boxcar, then lowering themselves to the gritty ore.

This was a graveyard of trains. It was crowded with rows of obsolete engines and wood-paneled carriers. Crushed boxcars were piled like demolished Autos at a junkyard, and pulleys dangled from busted equipment. Cracked trestles and lumber lay in rotting mounds. A set of those magnetic rails cut right through the middle, but these were not glowing purple like the others. They swept to the left, winding out of sight.

Orei withdrew a white spike from the confines of her ticking disks and struck it on the side of a boxcar. It resonated like a tuning fork, and strips along its pointed end flared open. She plunged it into the ground, letting the device ring for several seconds in the ore before retrieving it.

“Move,” Orei pointed to the right, past the wreckage of the train yard. A tunnel led into the darkness, its mouth cordoned off with age-worn barricades.

“The E-Four line?” Jules asked. “No good, it’s collapsed.”

“There,” Orei insisted. “Immolation in five-point-four-seven ticks.”

“Wait,” Phoebe said. “What about Dollop?”

“Yeah! We ain’t leavin’ without him,” stated Micah.

Orei swept about to face them. “Seven Covenant left to rust. All for pathetic bleeders,” she snarled. “No delays.”

“We either get out now or not at all,” Jules said.

“Not without Dollop!” Phoebe shouted.

Orei froze, the sensors on her body ticking like mad.

With a sudden, vehement swing of her arms, she knocked the kids away.

A massive wooden beam smashed into the ground where they had been standing, exploding in a shower of moldy splinters. A long black shape leaped into view. A caged bulb mounted to a strut illuminated his cadaverous face.

“No escape,” Kaspar growled.

The air shook as her father fired. The soldier dodged with alarming quickness, but two rounds punched his chest, knocking him back. He kept his footing. White epoxy bled onto his bullet-proof flak jacket.

Kaspar sprang at them, farther and faster than was humanly possible.

Orei intercepted in a whistling blur. She snared his leg and redirected him in midair. Kaspar rebounded and swung at the mehkan. Her rings snapped and slid, parting so that he only managed to pound at the air. She cinched her blades closed to hack his hands, but he was too quick.

“Move!” Orei commanded as she kept Kaspar at bay.

Jules hurried the kids into a maze of stacked cargo transports, charging toward the collapsed tunnel in the distance.

A creaking groan behind them. They turned to see a tower of boxcars toppling in their direction.

Jules and Micah dove one way, Phoebe the other.

CRASH.

She looked back to see Kaspar leering at her.

Orei sprang at him again, and they tumbled out of sight. Phoebe was cut off from Micah and her father, separated by the fallen wreckage.

“Phoebe!” came their voices.

“Go! I’ll meet you up ahead!” she shouted.

The overturned pile of boxcars had spilled over the corroded trains lining the tracks. She raced alongside until she found a gap between two carriages.

“Come on!” Micah shouted. “Climb through!”

She grabbed the edge of the car and placed a foot on the coupling. There was a squeal as the train was propelled forward. The cars collided in a splintering crunch, and Phoebe fell back, cut off again.

Kaspar rocketed at her. She tried to scramble beneath the locomotive, but he snatched her ankle and flung her out into the open. She tumbled across the dusty ore, and he was on her in a flash. He grabbed her by the front of the coveralls and lifted her, a sadistic grin stretching his face. She screamed and tried to kick at him, but her attacks were futile. He carried Phoebe effortlessly, holding her at arm’s length.

“NO!” her father cried, crawling from under the train car with Micah. Orei, too, was sprinting for her, but she was unsteady, a cracked ring hanging loose from her body. They weren’t going to make it to her in time.

Kaspar hauled her over to a rusty orange hook dangling from a chain.

She screamed again.

“Three!” came the collective cry in the throne room.

On the giant screen, another beast was shredded by Foundry fire.

A Watchman distributed chilled champagne among the staff. Bodies were already being recovered from the detainment block, but a handful of stalwart intruders still held out near the Armory. The entire control room watched the monitors, counting down as each target was dispatched.

The directors, however, were not impressed. They stood like a firing squad before the Chairman. But Goodwin stood tall, shoulders squared and hands clasped behind his back.

“This is a dark day.” Director Malcolm’s leathery face folded into a frown.

“An unacceptable oversight,” berated Director Obwilé.

“Agreed.” Goodwin nodded. “We must be more diligent.”

“We?” Director Layton scoffed. “This is unforgivable. What happened to the Citadel’s so-called impervious security?”

“Jules happened. And I have dealt with him accordingly,” Goodwin said, motioning to the video feeds.

“Your coddling of Plumm caused this,” she retorted.

“No,” the Chairman corrected coolly. “He leaked the relevant intelligence weeks ago, which means this little scuffle was unavoidable. However, my coddling,” he emphasized, “enabled us to extract a full confession so that we may properly manage this threat in the future.”

“Two!” the staff cried in unison as a Titan vaporized another intruder.

“How could you allow this?” Director Obwilé scolded.

“I am”—Goodwin took a step toward him—“the sole reason it is over. Imagine what would have happened had I not personally deciphered their intent and thwarted their attempts to infiltrate the Armory.”

“This was on your watch!” Director Layton blasted.

“To my knowledge, no one foresaw this. And had I somehow managed to divine that the Covenant would surface, you would have dismissed it as a ridiculous fairy tale.”

Director Malcolm paused to touch his earpiece. “The Board understands your position,” he explained with a smile. “But we require some assurances.”

“A sweep of every sector is currently under way, along with a thorough investigation of the incursion,” Goodwin explained. “Ladies and gentlemen of the Board, this was a desperate attack and far from successful. We have incurred only minor damage, limited entirely to non-vital sectors. And thanks to preparedness and decisive action, it is being mitigated as we speak.”

“It remains an unconscionable breach and—” Director Obwilé started.

“It is over,” Goodwin declared, “because I stopped it.”

As if in response to his words, a hundred darkened screens around the control room flickered on simultaneously as power was restored to the disabled Omnicams. There was another cheer from the staff.

“Selkirk,” Goodwin called across the room, not breaking eye contact with Director Obwilé. “Turrets.”

“Yes, sir!” shouted the technician.

A handful of screens flashed as Dervish turrets leveled the remaining creatures from behind, demolishing them in a white hailstorm of bullets.

“ONE! ZERO!”

The control room rang with the joyous popping of champagne corks. The directors did not celebrate, but the severity in their demeanor eased. Only Director Obwilé seemed dissatisfied. He stepped away from the group, adjusting his glasses to scrutinize the wall of Watchmen feeds.

Goodwin savored the triumph.

“Thank you all for your questions,” the Chairman concluded, spreading his hands and guiding them to the exit. “Now let’s leave our team to wrap things up here. We have important matters to discuss.”

“Such as?” Director Layton inquired.

Goodwin looked at the directors with his icy, shining eyes.

“Retribution.”

Phoebe shrieked.

She kept trying to kick free, but Kaspar clamped her legs and tensed, rearing back to impale her on the rusty hook.

A silver blur whipped down from above and wrapped around his head. Stumbling back, he dropped Phoebe and clawed at the thing over his face. As she scurried clear, Jules let loose with his rifle, blasting away at the soldier. The white rounds pinged off the crane hook, and Kaspar leaped away.

He tried to seize the thing locked around his head, but it kept changing shape, transforming to evade his grasp. Phoebe stared at it in wonder.

Orei attacked once more, spinning at Kaspar with renewed ferocity. He tore the silvery form from his face, then engaged the wounded commander.

Dollop reassembled himself and took Phoebe’s hand to flee.

“I f-f-found you!” the little mehkan cried.

“You saved me!” she heaved.

“Here!” Micah called out, cutting between two boxcars to make a getaway. Jules covered them with his rifle while they escaped. Phoebe looked back to see Kaspar grab Orei by her wounded appendage and hurl her at a metal strut. He struck at her, but she twirled away, and his blow bent the massive beam as if it were rubber. She staggered to her feet.

Kaspar was going to kill Orei. There was no question about it. And then he would kill the rest of them.

Phoebe had to do something.

She sprinted after her father, Micah, and Dollop, racing toward the collapsed tunnel. Rotten wooden railroad ties had been ripped up and tossed aside in craggy mounds of debris. Beyond those, affixed to the side of a pillar, she spied a battered metal control box.

It came to her in a flash, crystal clear and complete.

She skidded to a halt. “Wait!”

“What?” Micah blurted.

“I need your help. To get Kaspar.”

Micah’s eyes nearly popped out. “Don’t be psycho.”

Her father and Dollop stopped up ahead.

“Come on!” Jules shouted urgently.

Phoebe looked at Micah, galvanized.

“No guts, no glory,” she smirked.

She quickly explained her plan to them and grabbed a couple of rivets off the ground. Then she raced back toward the clanging sound of combat.

Kaspar appeared atop a boxcar, holding Orei overhead. Slashes across his face leaked dark blood. He hurled her body down in a clattering heap, and then pounced, swinging both fists in an arc. She rolled sluggishly away as Kaspar slammed a crater into the ground. His flesh bulged and quivered beneath his tattered gloves, sinewy folds swelling, veiny pistons pumping.

A rusty bolt cracked into the side of his head.

Phoebe didn’t get the chance to throw another.

He charged her in a fog of bloodlust.

She ran, faster than she had ever run before, faster than she ever thought she could. She scrambled over the mound of torn-up rails, spikes stabbing and splinters scratching her face. Kaspar ripped the rubble aside.

Ahead of her was the polished new train track.

He was close behind. Phoebe hurdled past the rails.

His shadow consumed her.

WHOOMF!

The tracks ignited in a bright purple glow.

Kaspar stumbled, howling in fury. She turned to look.

He strained to grab her, but one of his boots was stuck securely to the track. With a sucking sound, his other leg swept against the rail, connecting with a clunk. He was locked firmly in place. Her breath was ragged. She was shaking. Gathering her nerve, Phoebe leaned in close.

“Gotcha.”

Kaspar swiped a gear-gnarled hand at her.

She left him snarling like a rabid dog against its leash and rushed to join her companions. They were gathered at the metal control box, which had been shot open by her father. Micah had worked his grease monkey magic on the circuits, splicing lines with his teeth and hot-wiring the magnetic train tracks just as he had done to the Lodestar.

“Minus two ticks,” snapped Orei’s warbling voice. Several disks on her chest and arm were bent or cracked. She hobbled toward the abandoned tunnel, and they raced to catch up.

With a roar, Kaspar pounded his fists down on the rail to flatten it. There was another clang as they too locked in place.

Phoebe had never heard a more gratifying sound.

As the Chairman crossed the throne room, he glanced up at the eighty-foot-high statue and had a vision of what it must have looked like in its prime, resplendent in all of its barbaric glory. Supplicants would have come to grovel at its feet, to marvel at its saw-blade wings flared in a fiery array of beams.

Goodwin, too, knew what it was to feel like a god. Two worlds were his to command, revolving around him like planets around the sun. But unlike the dead despot, Goodwin persevered. He could have given Kallorax a few pointers.

“We are concerned this attack will have widespread impact,” Director Layton pontificated. “Rebellion is contagious.”

“But it is not incurable,” the Chairman assured her. “Our response must be swift and resolute. Let us look to Fuselage as our example.”

“WAIT! Enlarge that window!” shouted Director Obwilé. He stood behind one of the Watchman coordinators, staring at the screens. “Go back. Go back!”

Surprised by the outburst, the directors returned to the control center. Goodwin clenched his jaw and wondered what the troublesome man was up to.

A slow-motion video was on the display. It was a deactivated Watchman feed from Level Three, captured during the battle near the Armory. A blurry creature had struck the soldier down and cracked the lens. As the optical sensor began to short out, distorted by bars of static, its malfunctioning focus shifted to the wide-open atrium in the distance.

“There!” Director Obwilé cried.

Goodwin saw it too. Just before the feed blinked off, there was movement beyond the glass—shadowy and indistinct.

The Chairman of the Foundry stopped breathing.

He had missed something.

The Armory was not their target. All that chaos, all of those lives were a diversion. Jules had played him like a fool.

Goodwin felt the phantom of Kallorax. Heard his laughter. The fate of the damned megalarch was to be his, too.

“All units,” he boomed. “Intruder in the CHAR Lab!”

“I—I did it, Phoebe! M-Micah! I found my f-f-function!”

They looked at Dollop proudly, and she opened her mouth to congratulate him.

“Silence!” interrupted Orei. The commander withdrew her spike device, struck it against the wall, and flung it into the ore as it resonated. “She comes.”

Phoebe felt a tremor, but at first she thought it was just the blood pounding in the veins of her legs. Then the ground shook vigorously and loosened beneath them. Cracks snaked underfoot, and her father pulled her safely out of the way.

An enormous white drill exploded from the ground like a submarine through a glacier. It hurled clouds of smoke and particles, forcing them to cough and cover their eyes.

Not a drill—a giant mehkan. It was a leviathan so pale it was translucent, with a massive flanged head slotted by grooves and spinning, knurled teeth. Striated tentacles followed, dozens of them, thick as columns. Gliding like a giant squid, the mehkan doubled back and dove into the burrow headfirst. Held in its tentacles was a battered black vessel that eased to a stop as the creature submerged into the ore once again.

“S-s-s-salathyl!” Dollop chimed. “Sweet Mother of Ore! You-you’re the C-C-Covenant, aren’t you? See? I-I-I knew it was true! I knew y-you would—”

“In,” Orei ordered, opening the vessel’s rear hatch.

They climbed into the hollowed-out compartment and found a few carved niches to hold on to and a sloshing bag that cast pale blue light. Orei slammed the hatch closed, and the salathyl bellowed in response.

“Point four two ticks remaining.”

They descended, leaving no trace of their presence in the tunnel other than a circular scar in the ore, a distinctive pattern like the spokes of a wheel. The hull rattled and groaned as they picked up speed. Phoebe held on tight to the notched black wall, feeling the vibrations of the enveloping ore. She steadied herself and took a look around.

Orei, cracked and damaged.

Dollop, scarred and shaken.

Micah, bruised and worn.

And her father. He caught her stare, and a smile crossed his sunken face. She remembered what he had told her back in that awful prison cell: We’re going to make it through this.

He winked his unbandaged eye, and Phoebe giggled.

The others looked up at her.

Micah chuckled too. Even Dollop, who was unsure what was so funny, smiled wide. Orei measured them silently, betraying no emotion whatsoever.

Phoebe and her companions shared a moment of solace.

CLANG.

Something smashed into the back of the vessel, rocking it.

The rest happened in slow motion, a scene from one of Phoebe’s nightmares. The hatch tore away with a screech. The roar of tumbling, pulverized ore filled the air.

Kaspar.

He clung to the outside of the hull, drenched in blood. Jagged debris bombarded him from all sides. His dead eyes were trained on her father. He dove inside and hurled a fist.

There was a nauseating wet crunch and Jules crumpled, his rifle clattering aside. He clutched his chest, gurgling, blood foaming to his lips.

Phoebe screamed, and Kaspar lunged for her.

The vessel flashed as if full of lightning, and he was flung back. A cascade of white rounds pounded into him.

Now Micah screamed, firing the rifle. He stormed at Kaspar. Blasting, unrelenting. Kaspar pinwheeled his arms, trying to stop his fall. He toppled backward into the crushing surge. The burrow collapsed in their wake and buried him, howling, fighting the inexorable current of ore.

Micah stood wild-eyed, his finger mashing the trigger. The four barrels of his rifle continued to whistle and spin long after the bullets ran dry.

Captain Eldridge stormed the lab with a team of Watchmen.

His orders were clear. Use magnetic pulse weapons to incapacitate intruders and draw them safely away, and then execute with low-velocity rounds. The risks of a full-on assault in here were simply too great.

The laboratory was huge, a marvel of glass, porcelain, and wood—all materials impervious to CHAR. Blinking Computators and other complex equipment sat encased in clear vitric shells, along with pine racks of test tubes, stoneware scales, and glass partitions that left nowhere to hide.

They did a rapid sweep of the primary workroom and declared it clear. Eldridge crept to the storage vault and entered the code. There was a beep and a series of clicks as the lock disengaged.

The doors slid open with a hiss.

In the glass chamber were rows of giant vats, their contents swirling black, half liquid and half gas. Some contraption he couldn’t make out had been attached to their polished surfaces. Hair-thin wires curled away from the tanks, winding to a shadow hunched against the back wall.

Eldridge never got a chance to discharge his weapon. He could only watch as the figure touched a red shape on its chest and muttered a few words.

Then the world exploded in black fire.