"On and off," I say. "We flew here, but then we crash-landed."
"Well, let's hope you're more on than off today. We have to get out of this place, like, now. It was nice living in a department store while it lasted," she says, looking around at the disheveled place the Freelanders had called home for so many months. Months that felt like an eternity.
Then Janine starts to clap her hands loudly and shout out orders. "We know from intelligence that the New Order is coming tonight, everyone. We have to get everyone out, and I mean everyone, even the sick and wounded. Let's move it, everybody! We have a plan for evacuating. Let's execute it perfectly."
She stops for a breath and makes eye contact with me. "It's good to see you, Whit. You look older. It suits you."
Janine seems older, too-and it suits her.
Chapter 84
Whit
Now that Garfunkel's has been seriously breached, we need to move to a new protected location, but no one's sure exactly where. Janine, Sasha, Emmet, Wisty, and I debate the options as we hike through the tunnel underneath the once-famous department store that used to sponsor football games and the holiday parade.
"Within hours Freeland is going to be blanketed with bombs or totally teeming with New Order patrols. Or both." I recount the details of what Byron had told me and Wisty at the factory. "We're going to have to go back across the border into New Order territory. Maybe just lie low and wait it out."
"But where?" Janine asks. "We've been living out of Garfunkel's for so long we don't really know what's going on out there. That's the problem with getting too comfortable."
"How about the Stockwood reservoir?" Sasha suggests.
"Too risky," I say. "The Bionics know about it, and we know they were working for The One." I glance at Wisty's pained face. "Most of them anyway."
"How about the abandoned Electio factory, Whit?" Janine says.
"Breached by the enemy," Sasha replies.
Wisty suggests the City of Progress. "They won't bomb there, and maybe Mrs. Highsmith can help with the sick and wounded."
After some discussion, we decide that's the best plan we have. We'll try to do a group transformation when we get closer-to disguise ourselves as a rally, or a parade of Sector Leader's Stars of Honor. The old tunnels don't run all the way there, though, so we're faced with having to do the last piece of the journey aboveground and without a vehicle.
"Maybe there's a portal that will get us there," I suggest.
"Right. Let's go hang out in the Shadowland," scoffs Wisty. "They're always rolling out the red carpet for us. Especially when they're hungry."
"We're all exhausted," Janine says. "We've been walking for hours, and a lot of us haven't slept in at least a day. Let's get a few hours' rest before we make our break into the open."
And that's right about when the bombing begins. And it's the worst ever.
With the tunnel shaking like a jackhammer, and without our knowing whether or not this tube is strong enough to withstand the blasts, no one is getting much rest-let alone sleep. Instead we huddle together quietly and tightly-not for warmth but for safety.
Janine and I, leaning our backs against the wall, rest together. Wisty has her head in Emmet's lap. Sasha is cradling his guitar. The rest of the kids are in a tangle around us.
We're just waiting here to die, aren't we?
Chapter 85
Wisty
Whit and I chance a peek outside. The sun is high in a perfectly blue sky by the time the N.O. artillery has quieted down. We can see the City of Progress skyline a few miles away, across bombed-out Freeland. Now what?
Since none of us got much sleep, and miles of trekking ahead of us meant we'd need as much energy as possible, Whit and I had worked hard to conjure up a breakfast buffet for the entire group-complete with bacon, eggs, and waffles. This was a feast way bigger than Whit's earlier soup-kitchen trick. Realizing that maybe we'd never have to survive solely on Garfunkel's Cashew Crunch again was a definite breakthrough for us and our powers.
Here's how we did it: taking a cue from what Whit and I learned at the BNW Center, we'd practiced doing our magic with the group, holding hands, and it worked like a dream. I'd even started taking stock in Byron's wild theories about our magic becoming greater when it passes through others. This could be the secret to our success…
Of course, waffles help a whole lot, too. We've been living in a tunnel for half a day, so sun plus breakfast equals a group of kids who are now officially sunny-side up.
And it's a good thing, because it's not that long before we spot a ponderous black V formation of at least fifty N.O. bombers creeping right toward us. This is the battle we've been waiting for, and we'd rehearsed our plan. To the extent that you can actually "rehearse" defeating a world-dominating enemy.
So that's how it came to pass that rather than hiding in rubble, we're now standing boldly in the barren landscape and staring hard at the planes speeding toward us.
"You ready?" Emmet shouts above the squadron roar. He flashes me a confident smile, and I nod.
"Okay, people, focus, focus, focus!" I shout out like I'm a gym teacher running a tough calisthenics regimen. "Wait until they're almost right overhead but not directly enough to bomb us. I'll tell you when!"
And, at what I hope is precisely the right moment, Whit and I begin to conduct a chorus of voices. "Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!… Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore! Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken! Leave my loneliness unbroken!"
And suddenly the breath's gone out of me, and some of the others actually collapse to the ground from the effort, or the power surge, or whatever it is that's happening…
Because, to be honest, we're not exactly sure what's going on.
The planes definitely start tipping, then spiraling downward. The wings seem to be… missing?
"They're going to crash!" someone cries out. "Into us!"
"Again!" I scream. "We need to say the words again! Everybody together!"
The bombers are careening sideways toward us, and we don't have the energy left to find cover-not that there's any cover in this flattened wasteland. A bunch of us manage to clasp our hands together and recite the spell all over again.
The bombers are now grotesquely distorted. They're, like, half machine, half creature. And they're still coming for us.
"Look straight at them!" I yell. "And let's chant one more time!"
One last time, that is, because if this doesn't work, right now, we're all roadkill.
There's a plane fewer than a hundred yards from flattening me, and I close my eyes as I say the last line.
When I open them, I'm ravenously hungry. I see nothing in the sky… except a whole bunch of wheeling ravens. Apparently we just turned their bombers into birds.
Chapter 86
Wisty
It's totally, totally mindblowing. That was a real military battle, wasn't it? We're unarmed. And we won? A bunch of kids beat the N.O.?
The thrill of victory is followed by another and yet another success. We've seriously upped the Freeland raven population, and our confidence is sky-high.
We're clearly running on adrenaline for a while as we triumph through several similar battles. Eventually, though, we're running on empty. The magic has consumed every calorie from that bacon-and-waffle breakfast. Everyone's basically curled up on the ground, trying to recoup some steam.
"Another squadron on the way!" Sasha suddenly shouts, pointing into the distance. I think that if I ask them to join hands one more time, everybody is going to start crying. Even bouncy Emmet has dark bags under his eyes. "Wisty," he says, "shouldn't we come up with another plan?"
My eyes follow the planes. "They're not coming our way. They're veering off toward -"