“Get her,” he called out.
But Diamond already had his sister in his hands. She was no bigger than that first time when he knowingly saw her—a bug-like creature clinging to the window of that tiny awful cabin—and she seemed weak in every way. But the jointed legs clung to his forearm, while bright crystalline eyes captured his face, and he stared down at her, and the faint beginnings of a voice said nothing that made sense, but the sounds seemed hopeful nonetheless.
Prima hesitated, looking lost when she glanced at the boy who had ruined her world. But she needed him enough to ask, “Where’s shelter? Where can we go?”
With his free hand, Diamond gave her a push.
The ancient corona was waiting. One hole led inside, and even though the scales and muscles were weak in life and very dead now, the body’s bulk would supply protection against almost every attack. King turned to walk backwards, letting the room see the man strapped to his chest, that fragile head surrounded by teeth. And between more big breaths, he said, “Diamond. First.”
Diamond climbed into the gouge, running a few steps before stopping. Nothing about the gut felt familiar. He didn’t know this room. But to his sister, he said, “Home again,” and heard a weak laugh.
His mother was next, and she took a moment looking about, probably wondering what Merit would have made of this remarkable place.
The others were coming, Karlan at the back.
King remained outside.
From a deep pocket came a long torch, and Karlan turned it on and handed it to List. Then to Nissim, he said, “Help me drop the ceiling.”
Two timbers were kicked out, and soft old meat shut out the outside world.
Within the gloom, two lights shone.
Quest was glowing weakly.
Diamond kneeled on the gooey floor, and speaking in a whisper, carefully but quickly, he said, “I asked you once early on. ‘How big can you grow?’
“Well, show me how big, sister.
“Show everyone.”
EIGHT
A dead neck provided the way.
Despite living among tree-walkers, King had never walked along any branch, but running up the corona’s neck had to be similar. Legs reached, feet planted. Sprinting was work, but balance was the greater trick. The first few steps taught him how the mind could grow peculiarly fond of any branch or neck, learning its curves and textures, anticipating what would happen next. Then the object to which he had pinned his hopes decided to vanish under its brothers, which was a small treachery, and King had to leap twice, finding a better neck that carried both of them to the top of the giant carcass.
Meeker’s face was pressed against King’s neck, and whenever his head twisted, teeth sliced into his scalp.
King tasted human iron and human salt. Running across the flesh, he told his prisoner, “Shout. Offer some final orders.”
“You want them . . . to hold their fire,” the general guessed.
“Not that, no,” said King. “Reasonable. Tell them to be reasonable. The world’s dying, and this is everybody’s last chance to be sensible.”
Meeker cursed.
King ran and then the corona’s body fell away under them, and he half-jumped and half-slid back to the floor. By then, the other generals had to be realizing where he was going, if not why. But there was no time to react. The gangway to the Girl remained intact and unguarded. The only soldier in view was a recruit only a few days out of training, ordered to reinforce the soldiers who were being killed by living coronas. The boy was trotting towards the battlefield. Thinking like a soldier, he sensed that a slow, steady pace might save his life.
Then he saw King and the general dangling from the alien’s mouth, and dumbfounded, the boy stopped, doing nothing but staring at the day’s latest astonishment.
King sprinted past.
In the edge of an eye, Meeker saw the familiar green uniform. “Do what you have to,” he screamed. “Shoot shoot shoot.”
Nobody fired.
The gangway had a steep pitch, almost like a ladder. King needed both hands to climb. Speed counted, but he didn’t hold any one pace. Snipers would have to work for their clean shots, and that’s why he was better than halfway to the fletch before a signal was given, a dozen bullets launched at the same moment and battering his skull on three sides.
The humans wanted one sharp stunning blow.
The idea was respectable. But King’s hands were locked on the heavy rope railing, and one foot never lost purchase. He dangled but didn’t fall and a moment of empty blackness passed, and then he was conscious again, climbing again, and only when he was standing inside the fletch did he taste what was inside his eating mouth, understanding what happened when his head jerked.
King spat out the slivers of bone and the juicy remnants of brain. Then he unwrapped the skin around his chest, dropping the corpse to the distant floor.
Next he broke the heavy ropes, dropping the gangway.
One guard and three capable monkeys had been left on duty. The monkeys needed no excuse to jump away, limbs extended to slow their descent. But the human guard had the duty of firing at the invader while donning a drop-suit, and then he flung himself free of the abandoned ship.
Karlan’s instructions led to the belly turret.
King was far too large to squeeze inside that bubble of glass, but he could lay on the floor above and grab the cannon’s tiny handles, one thumb on the trigger.
A hundred soldiers were running below him, shouting and taking positions and then abandoning those positions for better ones.
Most of the civilians were retreating into the hallways.
The towing balloons that helped carry the corona up from its home were gathered nearby, rubbing each other and the highest portions of the ceiling. They should have been drained immediately, but people had been too busy and too excited to remember routines. And because all of the vents in the abattoir had been closed, making ready for the papio attack, every breath of leaked hydrogen was now puddling in easy view.
Three bursts of cannon fire shredded the bladders, unleashing fierce blue flames.
For the next recitations, the only duty below was survival. Fire triggered alarms, and pressurized carbon dioxide exploded from tanks waiting above the ceiling. People scattering, fighting for gas masks or simple distance. The heavy gas caused some people to pass out and drop. Scaffolding burned and rope rigging burned, flames draped across the giant corona, and the shredded bladders fell like dead leaves. But then the fires were suddenly finished, and the generals ordered their soldiers to approach the great black corona, carrying cutting tools as well as weapons, plainly ready to slice a fresh hole into its side.
King fired one explosive round and then ten more, and some of the soldiers ran.
Others lay still.
The coronas at the ruined door were wounded and weak, but no human was left to fight them. They squirmed and crawled inside, and they screamed mournfully while their dying flesh flashed gold and purple
Once again, desperate troops made a run for the dead giant. Snipers supplied covering fire, shooting at the turret, ignoring King while trying to kill the cannon. But the weapon was a tough proven design. Shells ricocheted, hitting King in the face and hands and across his shoulders. One eye was blinded briefly, but he became a quick expert with the cannon. That attack faltered, and he held tight to the handles, and because a relentless mind needs to be busy, he began to count the dead soldiers.
He stopped at fifty, well short of the answer.
And King was thinking this: generals were idiots at quite a lot, but not war. If they couldn’t get inside the corona, they would try next to drop boarding parties from the overhead vents. To meet the attackers, he ran into the battered machine shop, claiming a long cylinder of steel to use as a battering club. But his enemies didn’t even try to win back the Girl. Returning to the turret, he saw tubes in the doorways below, and out from the tubes, riding on columns of roaring smoke, were at least a dozen rockets.