Cure for a Nation

Chapter Thirty-Five

Claire was looking over Alex's shoulder as he piloted the Kraken. They were at the city's limits now, stepping over burned out vehicles and craters. They were approaching a solid cement wall that stood almost as high as the Kraken and Alex had to stop. Daniel stepped into the cockpit and unfolded an old, faded map and pressed it to the glass. It was a map of Alexandria detailing the plan of attack for the invasion. There were two arrows curving through the sides of Alexandria straight to the center despite the lack of roads on the path laid out.
"The Valkyries cleared a way through the wall and the buildings at these two points," Daniel explained, handing the map to Alex, "but the path on the right is wider. I suggest we take that one."
"Why is that one wider?" Claire asked.
"It was the path of most resistance," Daniel answered.
"Valkyries," Alex said with a slow shake of his head, "they are so beautiful yet so destructive. It is shame they were bred for war. What a waste of potential." He began to turn the Walker to the right and followed the wall. Claire followed the view of the city until it was obscured by the hull of the Walker. She was eager to see the famed home of the Warriors of Technology. It was said to be beautiful even after the war and she was almost excited to see it. She found Hazel sitting in a row of seats on her own and slid into the window seat beside her. She raised the shield covering the porthole and stared intently at the wall. She could see the tops of buildings on the other side but they were still quite a ways from the skyscrapers. She saw vines growing all over the wall and on the tops of buildings.
"Are you nervous," Hazel asked.
"I'm excited," Claire answered quickly, her eyes glued to the window.
"My mother tells me I was born here but I can't remember that time very well. I hear it used to be gorgeous."
"I heard that the tops of the buildings touched the clouds!"
"You see that tower earlier?"
"Yeah. That's where we're going."
"Kind of spooky, don't you think? Like a gutted fish."
"I thought of it as a tree in the winter."
"Here comes Daniel. I heard he was here once. Maybe I'll ask him what it looked like."
"Hazel, I don't think-" But it was too late. She was waving at Daniel and gesturing for him to come to her. He leaned on the seat in front of the two women, nodding toward Claire. His visor was tinted but Claire liked to think he was smiling. She hoped so. He hadn't said much since his episode topside and she was worried about him.
"Daniel," Hazel said giddily, "weren't you at Alexandria a long time ago? How would you describe it?" Daniel was very still for a moment before sitting down on the seat across the aisle from Hazel. He rested his elbows on his knees to keep his carbine from pushing against his chest piece. Claire would have said something to stop Daniel but she couldn't. She too was curious about his last visit to the city.
"It was springtime," Daniel croaked through the microphone of his helmet, "and for once there wasn't a gust of wind. The sun was setting behind us, stretching our shadows for miles. They couldn't see us coming. Marianne was swift, we were the first ones to get here. Our pilot threw me over the wall to plant charges and I had no choice but to stop and look at the city of magic. It was beautiful. Winding spires and colossal buildings towered over me with vines climbing all the way to the top. Roses were abundant along the wall itself and the very streets below were lined with vibrant flowers and trees of various colors.  I remember the people below, carrying on as though the war was a myth. And then they saw me. It wasn't one by one, they turned in unison. At first, they wore expressions of shock. Fear, even. And then every single one of them surged towards me with their glowing hands. That's when I blew the wall and Marianne came through with the other Valkyries." Claire noticed the other Warriors were silent when Daniel spoke. They were listening intently to his story.
"The Valkyrie class Walker is built to do many things," Daniel continued, "all while keeping their speed and strength. Ours each carried a squadron of six robots in a compact crate upon their back. Add the three soldiers riding on each Walker. With twenty Walkers total with ten on each flank, that's thirty soldiers with sixty deployed robots to each route. We burned through the orchards and the gardens, we toppled the spires, and we  burrowed through their architecture to get to the tower in the center. It was only dark when we got there. It was where the Magisters were hiding. We could tell as that was where the most of the Warriors were making a stand. You should have seen their eyes..they were not their own. They were just puppets. We offered them asylum if they could break free but they couldn't listen. So the robots.." he paused to shake his head sadly, "and then the Valkyries took aim at the tower to shake the Warriors loose from it. Piece by beautiful piece fell down to the earth. It was as though the heavens were falling.  Gold, silver, even jewels came tumbling down. And then in went the soldiers. Ten of us went in. Only ten. It was enough."
"Daniel, you don't have to-"
"We found them. We found them and they cut us down. But we were stronger and with only four of us left we brought ten of their reigns to an end. The last two escaped me. Us four, we searched and searched but we had to leave. I turned and looked out of the hole in a wall at the city before me. It was a city of fire and misery. Years and years of work and magic turning to ash before my very eyes. As the magisters lost their hold on some of the city's occupants, they began to panic. Even from up there I could hear the wailing. And then Marianne picked up the signal to retreat on the radio and that headquarters was falling. We ran as fast as we could but the remaining Warriors stayed on our heels right until the bitter end." Claire looked hard at Daniel, staring into the darkness of his visor. She could feel him staring back. She wondered what he was feeling then. What he was experiencing. She wanted to reach out and touch his face but she knew that wasn't an option. Hazel was staring down at her boots. She knew the Warriors were being controlled by others but she never thought about what it would be like to want to help someone being led to believe killing you was the right thing to do. Claire could hear Joan crying a few seats up.
"I remember," she sobbed as she drew her knees to her chest, "I remember you..and what my father did." Daniel bowed his head shamefully. All Joan could see when she closed her eyes was the end of Daniel's barrel spouting smoke, fire, and death as he stormed the tower. She saw her father manipulate Warrior after warrior into leaping into harms way to save himself. Her memories were no longer just her own and what she once thought was a gift will forever be a curse to her.

Alex paused before a crumbled section of the wall. It was wide enough to accommodate the Kraken, just as Daniel had said. Four Warriors marched past Claire clad in the armor of Imperium pilots. It was all the armor Daniel could pack for the Warriors that they could use. It was slimmer and protected their fronts while their backs were more exposed. Only a slim steel plate covered the back of the armor pieces apart from the chest piece. A piece of armor covered their shoulders and raised up into a collar along with the shoulder pads. They paused in front of the ladder while Bear was going through a silent checklist for the Warriors to follow. She made a great show of pulling the straps of her armor and slapping pieces into place while the Warriors struggled to understand the silent Peacekeeper.
"Two of you will mount the carbines in the front," Lawrence shouted as he hefted a pack clinking with ammunition, "and the other two will mount the carbines in the back." Daniel shouldered his way through the line and stood on the opposite side of the ladder from Bear.
"Bear will take position with the rear gunners," he explained as he put one foot and one hand on the ladder, "Lawrence will take the front, and I will take the mid deck." Alex started up the Walker again and the Warriors stumbled and staggered in their armor while the Peacekeepers were stock still. The Walker tilted upwards as it scaled the pile of rubble that was once a wall and shook as a leg slipped on the loose rocks. Claire could feel herself getting nervous. Her stomach was steadily sinking and she began to tap on the armrest of her chair.
"Are we expecting trouble?" Asked an armored warrior.
"Always," was Daniel's simple response, "now let's get up there." He threw the hatch open and waved Bear up first. He handed her her equipment and began to wave the Warriors up onto the deck. He looked at Claire and she froze. He reached up and cleared the tint from his visor, locking eyes with Claire. Lawrence went clinking by and threw the ammunition onto the deck before leaping up the ladder with a grunt. Daniel nodded before tinting his visor and following Lawrence up. Claire realized she was holding her breath and let it all out in a quiet sigh.
"What was that?" Hazel whispered.
"A message," Claire answered.

Daniel closed the hatch with the toe of his boot and swung his carbine down into his hand. The sun was shining bright and Daniel reckoned there to be another four hours until sunset. He coughed suddenly, hacking and spluttering for a brief moment. He pulled at the collar of his armor for a moment and stooped slightly until it passed. He choked back the blood that had risen in his mouth and regained his composure. He saw Bear watching him from over her shoulder and he held his hand beside his thigh and waved to dismiss her. She slowly turned back to her watch. Daniel rolled his shoulders and strolled to the railing. What he saw made him stagger away from it the moment he touched it. The city is dead, he thought. The once beautiful streets were now scorched and ruined. The blackened husks that remained of the trees creaked and snapped in the wind. A branch fell from one and landed in a flurry of ashes. All around the Walker were incinerated plants and the shells of buildings. The city was silent. The Walker stepped on a spent casing from an old Valkyrie's cannon and sent it spinning down an alley. Daniel watched it fly, heard it bang and crash against buildings and finally into a solid wall. The bangs echoed throughout the great monoliths that used to be buildings throughout the city. They passed an old skyscraper and Daniel looked up, half expecting an ambush or a trap to be sprung but found none. Just the shade of what was once a beautiful piece of art and used to be a home. He shivered. He remembered Marianne crashing through the side of the building, making it fall over and smash into another on the opposite side of the street where it rested now. Daniel looked straight up at his reflection looking down at him. He shook himself free of his trance and looked to the tower in the distance. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, using an old trick he used to find Magisters. He broadcasted a wave of his own energy in a way that hid his and revealed others to him the same way a bat might use echolocation. He "listened" closely. He could feel a faint pulse and he focused on it. Suddenly, a wave of terror washed over him and suddenly the energy was gone. Daniel chased it but a second wave hit him suddenly, this one burning with sorrow. He realized suddenly what they were. They were echoes, traces left behind by the Warriors that died there. So many died so suddenly that their energy gathered in one mass and lingered even after their deaths. Daniel closed himself off again and opened his eyes. He found he was facing the tower and red spots danced before his eyes. He could swear he could see the energies swirling around the tower for a moment before he blinked hard, dispelling the spots in his vision. There, he thought, there is where the dead still speak. And that is where we must go.