Page 26 of The Fall of Five (Lorien Legacies 4)

“Yeah,” she replies breathlessly. She holds up her gun. “I’m out. ”

I reach out with my telekinesis and reel in one of the discarded Mogadorian blasters. Sarah plucks it out of the air.

“Cover me,” I tell her. “We’re finishing this. ”

I stride out from behind the car, practically daring the Mogadorians to come at me. A pair hunkered down in front of the gas station fire at me. My shield deploys immediately, absorbing their shots. I think about hurling a fireball at them, but I don’t want to blow up the gas station. We’ve already damaged poor Fouke, Arkansas, enough.

I use my telekinesis to grab their blasters, smashing them to the ground. Then, I raise my hand to the Mogs and motion for them to come on. They grin, their tiny teeth gleaming in the moonlight, and unsheathe their swords. They sprint towards me.

As soon as they’re a safe distance from the gas station, I launch a fireball that engulfs them both. Idiots.

Another group of Mogs has regrouped enough to make a focused assault. They charge me all at once, trying to surround me. Before they can close in, I feel something rubbery wrap itself tightly around my waist and I’m yanked backwards, away from the incoming Mogs. Startled, I look down. An arm is coiled around me. A really long, stretched-out arm.

As soon as I’m clear, Sarah starts lighting up the group of Mogs with blaster fire.

I look back down in time to see Five’s arm coil back to its normal shape and return to his T-shirt. He looks at me sheepishly.

“Sorry if I interrupted,” he says, “thought you might get pinned down. ”

“What did you just do?” I ask, both curious and a little grossed out.

“My Cêpan called it Externa,” Five explains. He holds up the rubber ball that he’s been fondling since we showed up. “It’s one of my Legacies. I can take on the qualities of whatever I’m touching. ”

“Nice,” I reply. Maybe the new guy isn’t so useless after all.

One of the Mogadorians manages to skirt Sarah’s blaster fire and charge us. Five steps in front of me. His skin suddenly gleams in the moonlight, shiny and silver. I remember the other ball he was carrying—a steel ball bearing. The Mog swings his sword at Five in an arc that should cleave right into his forehead, but with a resounding clang, the sword bounces off Five’s head. The Mog is stunned as Five winds up, delivering a massive haymaker, his steel-coated hand crushing the Mog’s skull.

Five looks back at me. “Never, uh, actually tried that before. ” He starts laughing, relieved.

“Seriously?” I can’t help but laugh too, Five’s nervous energy contagious. “What if it hadn’t worked?”

Five just shrugs, rubbing the spot on his forehead where the Mog’s sword made contact.

We turn to watch a

pair of Mogadorians fleeing towards the woods, Bernie Kosar snarling at their heels. Before they reach the tree line, Six appears in front of them. She slashes through them both with her borrowed Mogadorian sword.

I look around. The area is clear. The Monster Mart and its surroundings are pock-marked from blaster fire, and there’s still a plume of smoke curling up from the woods. Besides the dark patches on the ground where the dead Mogadorians turned to ash, there is no sign of our attackers. We wiped them out.

Sarah walks over to us, the Mog blaster propped up on her shoulder. “Is that it?”

“I think so,” I say, keeping my voice level. I feel like fist-pumping and high-fiving, but want to keep it cool. “For once, I think we caught them by surprise. ”

“Is it always this easy?” Five asks.

“No,” I tell him. “Now that we’re all together, though . . . ” I trail off, not wanting to jinx it. That fight couldn’t have gone much better. Granted, it was only one ship worth of Mogadorians; they’ve got entire armies stationed in West Virginia and elsewhere, not to mention Setrákus Ra. Even so, we mowed them down in record time, and I don’t think any of us suffered an injury. Yesterday, when Nine was all gung-ho for storming West Virginia and seeking out a rematch with Setrákus Ra, I’d tried to get across that I didn’t think we were ready for that. Now, after this performance, maybe it’s time to reconsider our odds.

“Where’s Six?” I ask, glancing around. “Someone must’ve heard that ship crash. We need to get out of here before the cops show. ”

As if in answer, a low rumble comes from the tree line, from the direction where the Mogadorian ship fell. I shine my Lumen that way just in time to see Six sprinting towards us, waving her arms.

“Incoming!” she shouts.

“What’s incoming?” Five asks, swallowing.

“Sounds like Piken,” I reply.

There’s a sharp breaking noise—the sound of a tree being uprooted and snapped. Something huge is coming this way. I put my hand on Sarah’s shoulder.

“Get back,” I tell her. “You need to stay behind us. ”

She looks at me, her grip tight on the Mogadorian blaster. For a moment, I’m worried she’s going to argue, even though she knows fighting a Piken is way different than being in a firefight with Mogs. Shooting from behind cover is one thing. Going toe-to-toe with a monster that thinks blaster fire tickles—that’s something else entirely. Sarah touches my hand, lets her fingers linger for just a moment, and then breaks away, running for cover near the post office.

“What the hell is that?” asks Five, still standing next to me, now pointing towards the tree line.

We both see the monster at the same time as it bursts from the trees, bearing down on Six. But I don’t answer Five. I actually can’t answer because, whatever this thing is, I don’t have a name for it. It’s like a centipede the size of a tanker truck, its wormlike body covered in cracked and leathery skin. Hundreds of tiny gnarled arms extend from its body, churning up earth as it rumbles forward with surprising quickness. At the front is a face sort of reminiscent of a pit bull—flat, with a wet snout, and a slavering mouth that opens upon rows of jagged teeth. In the center of its face is a single unblinking eye, bloodshot and full of malice. I remember the horde of creatures the Mogs had caged in West Virginia; as nasty beasts go, this guy would be at the top of my list.

---