The Toll (Arc of a Scythe) - Neal Shusterman Page 0,178
keeping the scythedom secure, and the Thunderhead, secretly conspiring with the likes of Anastasia and the Toll, had built these ships in defiance of him. If they launched, Goddard knew it would signal to the world his undoing.
No! This could not be tolerated! Wherever these ships were bound, they must never be allowed to leave.
“Attention! If you’re not aboard a ship or on the gantry of one, you must clear the launch zones immediately or you will be incinerated. Repeat you WILL be incinerated. Do not return to your homes! Seek refuge to the west at the resort on Ebadon, or get on a boat and head out to sea!”
Faraday and Munira remained in the bunker, where they would wait out the launch. There was no way to know what was going on outside now. They heard the alarm; they heard Loriana’s announcements, then Sykora’s. Citra and Rowan had hurried off to learn the severity of the situation and hadn’t come back. Faraday hadn’t even said a proper goodbye to them. He supposed no amount of goodbyes would be enough. Then, as the ships began to shut their hatches, Faraday sealed the bunker, closed the inner steel door, and sat down with Munira, waiting for the telltale rumble up above as the ships launched.
“It will be fine,” Munira told him. “The ships will launch, and the world will be reminded of what still could be.”
But Faraday shook his head. “It will never be. Even if these ships escape, they will be the only ones that ever do. Goddard will make sure of that.”
“He’ll be taken down,” Munira insisted. “You will take him down. I’ll help you.”
“But don’t you see? There will always be another Goddard.”
Faraday looked at Scythe Da Vinci’s brittle pages. Da Vinci had torn them out of his journal and hidden them here so no one would know the truth. That the founding scythes – the shining paragons of all Faraday held true – had murdered one another.
“What is it about us, Munira?” Faraday said. “What is it that drives us to seek such lofty goals, yet tear out the foundations? Why must we always sabotage the pursuit of our own dreams?”
“We are imperfect beings,” Munira said. “How could we ever fit in a perfect world?”
“Are those spacecraft?” asked Mendoza.
Goddard ignored him. “Take us closer,” Goddard told the pilot, then tried to raise the four other planes on the radio, but could not. For the past half hour, static had been whining over the speaker, and the plane’s telemetry was fluctuating wildly. The BladeGuard pilot, who was only there as a dunsel accessory, actually had to take over manual control.
Scythe Rand moved in behind Goddard. “Keep your eye on the prize, Robert,” she said. “You’re here for Anastasia.”
Then he spun on her, furious. “Don’t presume to tell me my purpose here! I will do what needs to be done without your pointless counsel!”
“Pointless?” she said, her voice low, like a wolverine growl. “I’m the only thing that stands between you and your enemies. But really, you only have one. That angry boy – what was his name? Carson Lusk.”
He could have lashed out then. He could have struck her down for that, but he held back with his last ounce of restraint. “Never speak that name again,” he warned her. She opened her mouth as if to have the last word, but closed it again. Wisely.
And then, as if the vista before them wasn’t offensive enough, the pilot offered Goddard more bad news.
“Your Excellency, High Blade Pickford’s plane has broken formation. So Has High Blade Hammerstein’s.”
“What do you mean ‘broken formation’?” Goddard demanded.
The pilot hesitated, afraid to draw Goddard’s wrath. “They’ve … turned around,” he said. “They’re retreating.”
And in a moment, Underscythes Franklin’s and Nietzsche’s planes had left them as well – turning tail and running away, frightened off by the prospect of taking on these spacecraft and the Thunderhead.
“Let them go,” Rand said. “Let all of them go. Let these damn ships launch, and they won’t be our problem anymore.”
“I heartily agree,” Mendoza said, as if anything the Tonist said mattered.
Goddard ignored them both. East- and WestMerica were abandoning him? Two of his own underscythes as well? Fine. They would be dealt with later. But right now there were bigger fish to fry.
Until now, the bulbous weapons hanging beneath the wings were merely for show. A warning for those who might run afoul of his intentions. Now, more than ever, he was glad they were there.