Julius's Arc

Chapter 3 of 5

They crossed the bridge one at a time and climbed until the ridge broke open. Below them, the ground flattened into a shallow bowl. In the middle of the bowl sat a glass dome, ribbed with metal and traced with blue light. Inside stood a small wooden building and a cluster of satellite dishes. No Vael in sight. Julius crouched behind a rock and stared. He unclipped his dead dish and held it up next to the ones inside the dome. Same shape. Bigger. "Could be him," he said. "Could be nothing. No Vael down there. That's something." "Something," Elina said. Her wings caught the sun. She pointed. "Not nothing between us and it." Julius looked where she pointed. The dome was ringed with maws. Not a hundred like the basin. Maybe twenty. Pink and orange heads on thorned stalks, mouths already turning toward the ridge. "We clear them," Harlen said. His rig glowed red. Riley checked her makeshift gun. "Loud work." "Then quick," Elina said. They came down in a spread line. Elina lifted off and swept in from the side, her sharp wing edge slicing the first stalk clean. The head dropped and kept snapping at the dirt. Harlen scorched the next two before they could lunge. Riley fired once. The round tore through a stalk and dropped it. She fired again. Julius broke left with a length of pipe, cracked a mouth shut mid-strike, then jammed the pipe through its throat. One got Tevin's leg. Thorns bit through his shorts. He went down. Elina dropped from above and split the stalk with her wing. Tevin crawled back, bleeding but moving. It was over in under two minutes. The last mouth twitched and went still. Julius stood in the middle of the ring, breathing hard, pipe wet. A voice came out of the dome. Loud. A speaker somewhere in the frame. "Where did you get that cube." Julius froze. He looked down at his belt. The dead dish. He held it up so whoever was inside could see it. "A man gave it to me," he said. He spoke toward the dome. "Out in the flats. He said there was somebody up here who had a better one. His ran out. He didn't make it." Silence. Long enough that Julius thought the speaker had cut. Then a seam in the glass split. A door slid open at the base of the dome. Warm light spilled onto the dust. Harlen lowered his rig. Riley kept her gun up. Elina landed beside Julius, folded her wings tight, and said nothing. Julius clipped the dead dish back to his belt. He walked toward the open door. Behind him, Tevin limped, shackles glowing faint blue in the fading light. Whoever was inside had been watching them the whole time. He stepped through.