The Sun Dwellers (37 page)

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http://davidestesbooks.blogspot.com

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http://www.goodreads.com/davidestesbooks

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https://twitter.com/#!/davidestesbooks

After growing up in
Pittsburgh
,
Pennsylvania
, David Estes moved to
Sydney
,
Australia
,
where he met his wife, Adele. Now they travel the world writing and reading and taking photographs.

Chapter One

The Moon Realm

T
he reports are coming so fast that General Rose is not even reading them anymore:

Sun dwellers troops were spotted in the tunnels around subchapter 9…

A platoon of red-uniformed men
was
seen just outside of subchapter 32…

The shot fired appears to have been a warning shot, but subchapter 14 citizens have been warned to stay indoors, as far underground as possible…

She stacks the unread reports in a neat pile on the corner of her stone desk, closes her eyes, wonders whether she’s made a horrible mistake in sending her daughter on such a low-odds mission.
You had no choice
, she reminds herself. Everything is as it was meant to be, as it was planned by two plotting and scheming mothers two years earlier.

She’d never heard from the First Lady after that day. Then came the reports from the Sun Realm that President Nailin’s wife had disappeared mysteriously. Although she was glad the hooded woman had not returned to her abusive husband, she was somewhat surprised that she’d left her two sons behind, in the care of a madman. For a moment she wonders where the First Lady is now.

A knock on her door snaps her out of her thoughts. “Come in,” Anna says firmly.

General Ross enters, his typically stolid face grim. His dark skin is like a shadow in the dim lighting. “Have you seen the latest reports?”

“I skimmed them,” she admits, waving at the pile on her desk. “But that’s all it took to get the picture. We’re screwed.”

“I’d consider tweaking that speech before you address your soldiers,” he says, his flat face hiding the joke.

She smiles, despite herself. Ever since the star dwellers generals were released from the President’s threat on the lives of their families they were growing on her. General Ross in particular.

“All we have to do is hold them off long enough for your daughter to come through for us. Without their leader, they’ll retreat. There’ll be chaos. We’ll be able to take advantage of it.”

She nods. “I know. Adele will come through. They all will.” But there may not be a Moon Realm left to fight for when they do.

Anna leaves that part out.

Chapter Two

T
he eve of the Sun Festival brings dark thoughts for her. Earlier, President Nailin made an announcement that the 500-year celebration would “go forward as planned, war or no war!” Anna Rose suspected this might happen, but instructed the other generals not to mention it to the mission team, to her daughter, choosing only to inform Trevor. She wonders now if that was a mistake.

Her theory: better not to complicate things. For all she knew, the Festival would be cancelled and it would have no bearing on the mission, and even if it weren’t cancelled, it might benefit them by way of a distraction. As they agreed, Trevor will tell them all of that. It’s the same thing she would have told them beforehand.

But she could have just told them, so they were fully prepared.

Better not to worry them.

Should’ve told them.

Don’t complicate things.

Either way, she reminds herself, you can’t change things now. You have to trust they’ll adapt on the fly. They will.

Another distant
Boom!
shakes her bed, where she lies not to sleep, but to think. Despite the barricades and tripwire, it took less than an hour for the sun dweller army to infiltrate subchapter 1 of the Moon Realm, allowing them to wheel in their launchers and begin the assault. The bombing’s been nonstop for more than two hours.

There will be no sleep tonight.

Not for the Resistance, not for the moon dweller troops, not for the thousands of elderly, children, and disabled innocents sitting huddled together, their knees to their chests, in the cellars and basements and safe houses strewn haphazardly across the city—and certainly not for General Rose.

She closes her eyes and says a silent prayer, for the Moon Realm and for Adele.

Chapter Three

T
he bombing stops at two in the morning. The silence is loud and thick and rings in General Rose’s ears. She waits ten minutes to confirm that it’s not just a normal lull before another round. The rough whispers of hundreds of soldiers paint through the stale bunker air like an artist’s brush. The messages are obvious: eagerness, worry, determination, fear.

“What do you think it means?” the young woman beside her asks.

Anna looks at her curiously. Maia. Far too young to be a member of the Resistance Council, and yet she is, nominated and voted in shortly after Anna and her husband were abducted. There’s no fear in her dark eyes, only curiosity. Something about her is as strong as steel.

“They wouldn’t stop unless they had other plans,” Anna says.

“You think they’re coming on foot?” Maia asks.

“I don’t want to speculate,” she says, picking up the phone that’s bolted to the brown bunker wall. “General Suzuki? What’s the status in subchapter twenty-four?”

The answer crackles through her headset:
The bombing has stopped.

“Do we have eyes on the borders?” she asks.

It’s too soon.

“Okay. I’ll call you if I have anything.”

Slipping the phone back into place, she says, “The bombing has stopped everywhere. We need a visual on the borders.”

“I’ll go,” Maia says without hesitation.

“No,” Anna says. “It’s my responsibility.”

“But you’re the general.”

“Exactly. Stay here.”

“I’m coming with you,” Maia says, her voice firm.

Anna considers pulling rank, but then settles for the compromise. “Okay. Let’s go. Sanderson—we’re going above to check things out. You’re in charge.”

As they make their way to the thick iron door that separates the bunker from the outside subchapter, Anna studies Maia with interest. Her gait is confident, a mirror image of her expression. Despite her mere twenty-five years of age, Anna knows this woman is experienced beyond her years, either by choice or by fate.

Two burly guards unlock the barrier and pull it open before them, exposing a short tunnel that leads to a flight of stairs that ascend to the surface. A heavy dust-filled mist hangs in the air, swirling eerily before the soft lantern glow. Covering her mouth and nose with her tunic neckline, Anna moves forward quickly, Maia a step behind. The dust haze gets deeper as they climb the steps, and the smell of gunpowder and molten lead remind Anna of the Uprising.

They reach the surface, where the fog is settling on the debris from the bombing, coating the world in a thin layer of gray powder. Anna gasps as she surveys the extent of the damage.

“My God,” she says.

“They’ve destroyed it all,” Maia says.

Anna nods because she’s right. The subchapter, once beautiful in its elegant design, with symmetrical city blocks and narrow canals, is in shambles, its buildings toppled, its waterways filled to the brim with chunks of large stone blocks. The Dome, the large half-sphere at the center of the city, is ripped in half, mangled beyond recognition, the subchapter’s symbol of solidity and order reduced to ash and debris. And the strange thing: they can see it all from where they’re standing.

“The lights are back on,” Anna realizes, gazing at the cavern roof, where the rectangular panel lights are shining brighter than she’s ever seen them.

“And they’re brighter,” Maia says, reading her mind.

“This can mean only one thing,” Anna says, dread filling her. “The sun dwellers are coming.”

At that moment, a horn blares, drawing Anna’s attention to the eastern corner of the city, where an inter-Realm tunnel leads to the Sun Realm.

Hundreds of red-clad sun dweller soldiers pour from the maw of the tunnel, letting loose a thunderous war cry, climbing over half-crushed stone blocks and cracked gray columns.

“Move!” Anna shouts, just as a flash of flame erupts in the distance. Her words are unnecessary, as Maia is already on the run, seeking shelter behind one of the few upright stone walls.

BOOM!

An eruption of rock and fire and pain—from the splinters of stone shrapnel on her face and arms—announces the arrival of incendiaries preceding the ground troops. Covering her head with her hands, Anna races after Maia, diving for cover just as another blast shatters the abnormally bright night.

“We’ve got to get back to the bunker…warn the others,” Anna says, breathing heavily.

“I’ll go,” Maia says, moving out from the wall before Anna has a chance to argue. She begins to pursue the young warrior, but is stopped when another bomb explodes, throwing Maia back and into her arms, knocking them both flat on the ground. Her ribs are on fire and her lungs full of dirt, but she manages to wheeze, “Maia—are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” the girl says, rolling off of her. “You?”

“I’ll survive.”

“We’ve got a problem, General,” Maia says, looking back toward the bunker. Following her gaze, she watches as a massive stone block settles over the mouth of the entrance.

“Dammit,” Anna says. “We’ll have to get to the other entrance.”

“Follow me,” Maia says, once more surprising Anna with her courage and strength. Moving out from the cover once more, Anna chases Maia across the broken terrain, staying low to avoid detection by the enemy. The war cries have stopped, but she knows they’re still coming, and it’s only a matter of time before the sun dweller soldiers manage to navigate the maze of fallen buildings and clogged canals.

As Maia hurdles a low wall, there’s another explosion, this time just to her right, and she’s thrown harshly to the side, tumbling down a small rise and into the blackness of a cellar. Just before she disappears, she cries out.

Her head on a swivel, Anna climbs over the wall and creeps down the hill toward the opening, hissing, “Maia!”

No response.

Thumbing her flashlight back on, she steps through the opening, descends a dozen stone steps, and flashes the light on Maia, who’s against the wall grimacing, clutching her ankle and breathing sharply through her teeth.

“Did you hit your head?” Anna asks.

“No. My ankle. I sprained it,” Maia says.

“It’s too hot out there at the moment,” Anna says. “I don’t think I can carry you to safety without getting us both killed. I’ll go get help.”

Maia nods, her eyes a steel-gray. “I’ll be here,” she says, forcing a laugh through her locked teeth.

Turning, Anna moves to climb from the cellar when the ground shakes from another blast.

CRACK!

A terrible sound of destruction rends the night. A huge stone block looms over the cellar entrance, rocking slightly, as if trying to decide which way to fall.

CRASH!

It topples, blocking the exit and thrusting the cellar into complete darkness, save for the thin beam of Anna’s flashlight.

Her heart sinks as she realizes: the cellar is now their tomb.

Chapter Four

T
he first ten minutes were the worst. Breathing in plumes of dust-ridden air from the explosion, coughing and coughing, but never managing to expel the choking fumes; hearing the deafening blasts of bombs going off all around them, the ground shaking, the roof threatening to cave in; wondering when the first sun dweller soldiers would arrive, whether they would break through the barricaded cellar opening, hot metal death flying from their automatic weapons: it was ten minutes of expectation. Expectation of pain—expectation of death.

General Rose huddles next to Maia, not embarrassed by the physical contact between leader and warrior, desperately needing the comfort of having a friend nearby.

I’m going to die without seeing either of my daughters again
, Anna thinks to herself pitifully. Her husband’s face pops into her mind, giving her strength.

No!
I will not go quietly into the night. This fight I’ve fought for so many years will not be lost, not while I’m still breathing, while my heart’s still beating, while blood continues to pump through my veins.