Alight_ Book Two of the Generat - Scott Sigler Page 0,75

look down the trail, I see something off to my left—the barrel of a musket, sliding out from behind a tree. A Springer, blue and wrinkled, aiming at me.

“Don’t move,” I say quietly. “They found us.”

I slowly look to my right—and see a second Springer, purple-blue, less wrinkled, mostly hidden by a fallen log. It is also aiming a musket at me.

Up ahead of us, a third Springer steps onto the trail.

Bullets are going to rip through my body, blast my brains out like Visca. I’m going to die here. On the Xolotl I would have become dust, but here it’s hot and wet. My body will rot away, drip into the mud.

“The spear,” Spingate says.

“They can see the stupid white flag. They don’t care.”

“Not the flag,” she says. “The spear. It’s a weapon. We made a mistake, we shouldn’t have used a weapon. Set it down, slowly, show them you mean no harm.”

Set it down? Is she crazy? They could rush us, beat us to death with the flat part of their muskets and not even have to waste a bullet. If I strike first, if they miss like they did last time, I could quickly kill the one on the left.

(Attack, attack, when in doubt, always attack.)

My father’s voice—again—but this time, my own voice seems to answer.

(Dad, shut the hell up.)

I tilt the spear forward, then let it go. It drops, wet white flag fluttering behind it until spear and flag both smack into the trail’s mud.

From farther down the path, a fourth Springer steps out of the jungle, skin of pure purple. It stares at us with three green eyes, then hops our way. The other Springers start screaming, a nasty sound that calls up Matilda’s memories of monkeys in a zoo. So loud, so angry.

My fingers flex. Without my spear, I feel naked.

Spingate takes my hand in hers.

“Be still,” she says quietly.

The Springer comes closer. It holds a musket, hammer already cocked. The barrel points to the side, not aimed at anything. I see a knife with a white bone handle dangling from a belt sheath. A hatchet is stuffed through the belt as well, its surface black save for a sharp edge that glints in what little light peeks through the storm clouds.

I’m letting Spingate control this situation, but I shouldn’t—she’s never been shot, she’s never fought, she’s just a tooth-girl who hides behind a desk while the real work is done by circles, while the real danger is faced by circle-stars.

I yank my fingers free and reach for the spear.

Her hand latches down on my wrist, squeezing so tight the bones of my arm pinch together. The pain surprises me; she’s far stronger than I thought. I look into her hard eyes. She mouths words: Don’t…you…dare.

She slowly stands straight. Her grip on my wrist forces me to stand with her.

The Springer stops in front of us. Purple skin wrapped in jungle-colored rags. Angry green eyes.

The others of its kind are still shrieking. They have come out from their hiding places. Musket barrels waver, as if the Springers aren’t sure where they should aim. It hits me—they wanted the purple one to stay clear. Now they can’t fire for fear of hitting one of their own.

I realize that I can easily tell these four apart. Their strange faces…at first I thought they looked the same, but now…not even close. And none of them are the ones Bishop and I saw earlier.

The purple Springer’s three green eyes bore into me, blinking slightly against the pounding rain. Purple doesn’t even seem to notice Spingate. Wet skin gleams. That skin looks…healthy. I realize Purple is shorter than the others.

Shorter, because it’s not fully grown.

When we first saw Springers on this path, two of them were children. Red skin. The bigger ones, the ones with wrinkles, they were blue. Do the Springers change color as they age? If so, the one in front of us isn’t a child, but it isn’t an adult, either. It’s somewhere in the middle.

Like us.

The other three scream louder. Their tone has changed from alarm and aggression to something that sounds like pleading—I think they are begging Purple to get away from me.

It lets out a guttural bark, a single syllable that rings with aggressive command.

The Springers fall silent.

Rain pours down.

Purple leans close, examines me. It wears the same multicolored rags as the others, but also something they don’t—a shiny copper chain around its neck that connects to corners of a copper rectangle hanging