threads. Many of the trees were burdened with what appeared to be giant fruits.
“Do you see all the pupae, Colonel?” I shouted, pointing down through the mist.
“I do! I do! What! What! I hope they’ll not be damaged! Harrumph!”
Led by Artellokas, the flock continued on, passed over the beach, and headed out to sea. Meanwhile, Clarissa, Colonel Spearjab, Gallokomas, and I, having veered to the left, landed on one of the foothills at the northernmost tip of the Mountains That Gaze Upon Phenadoor. It gave an unrestricted view over the entire forest.
Clarissa pointed to the northeast. “I see the rupture. It looks different. Unstable—like a quivering tube extending into the heavens.” She pulled her goggles down over her eyes, then pushed them back up again. “We may have a problem. The light of dawn is becoming too bright for me. I shall have to wear my protection soon, and I can’t see the rupture through the glass.”
“Hold out for as long as you can,” I said, “but not so long that you damage your eyes.” I raised my arm to show the tattoo on my wrist. “And give me frequent reports.”
She dipped her head in acknowledgment before turning to Gallokomas. They looked at each other and communicated silently. The Zull then said to me, “Miss Stark Thing will also speak to me through her tattoo, and I shall use my mind to pass her directions on to the flock. We—” He stopped as a jagged line of energy suddenly sizzled over the forest. “We will avoid that!”
“Or, to be more accurate,” Clarissa said, “the mouth of the rupture. The storm might spread across the whole valley, but the mouth itself appears to be a fairly small phenomenon that moves about within the disturbance.”
I watched the atmosphere flicker and flash for a few moments, then said, “Let’s join our fellows.”
Clarissa stepped over to me. “Be careful, Aiden.” She leaned forward and kissed my lips.
Gallokomas made a sound of surprise. “Miss Stark Thing! What was that you did?”
“Something a possessor of mandibles shouldn’t try,” she responded.
“Humph!” Colonel Spearjab added.
The Zull, Mi’aata, and I floated into the air and raced seaward, shooting over the wide beach and across the water until the land had receded so far behind us that only the jagged peaks of the mountains were visible. Ahead, the flock, spread thinly, was wheeling back and forth over a wide expanse of ocean, every Zull’s eyes looking down. We joined the patrol.
Hours passed before anything happened. The sky continued to darken on one side and brighten on the other. The calm surface of the water sparkled purple, red, and orange.
I considered the threat that faced us—a mad creature capable of controlling minds and armed with war machines, hungry for power and intent on invading the Earth. The odds were not in our favour. How could the peaceable Zull possibly oppose Yissil Froon?
Gallokomas suddenly pointed to one side and cried out, “Over there, Thing! A Zull has noticed something moving beneath the water!” He looked behind us. “And there!”
A large squarish object, submerged and only vaguely visible, passed below me. I saw more of them to the right and the left, obscured shapes sliding rapidly over the seabed, speeding toward the shore.
A quarter of a mile to our rear, a sudden explosion sent water bulging upward. Oval lights shimmered under the slowly rolling swells—flashes, indistinct activity, a second detonation.
“What is happening?” Gallokomas called.
Colonel Spearjab swooped in close to us. “Underconveyances! The Quintessence must be pursuing Yissil Froon’s army! Pursuing, I say!”
A loud sequence of discharges shattered the surface, sending water so high that it splashed over us.
“Back!” I yelled. “To the shoreline! We’ll strike as the machines leave the water!”
Zull engulfed me as, like a single entity, the cloud folded in upon itself, condensed, and streamed eastward. After a moment of confusion, I regained my bearings and rescued the colonel, who was spinning wildly in mid-air, his tentacles flailing. We joined the race, slapping at our gears’ control units until we’d caught up with Gallokomas, hurtling along near the front of the throng. I reached his side and called, “Order the flock to keep moving back and forth along the beach. Let’s not make easy targets of ourselves!”
Lightning flickered on the horizon ahead of us. I pressed the tattoo on my wrist. “Clarissa Stark. We’re on our way back with the invasion force hot on our heels. I can see the storm.”
“It’s expanding rapidly, Aiden—spreading over the central expanse of the forest,