United as One (Lorien Legacies #7)(19)

Arm the governments of the world for one big counterstrike.

Meanwhile, learn every Legacy I can wrap my mind around.

Kill Setrákus Ra.

Not necessarily in that order. Especially not the “learn every Legacy” one. Because if I’m going to sneak aboard a Mog warship the way I’m planning, there’s one Legacy in particular I’m going to need first.

I have to learn how to fly.

The meeting breaks up after I promise General Lawson we’ll have a plan in place to covertly attack a Mogadorian warship by the end of the day. Hopefully, Ella was right and Setrákus Ra will be out of action for at least that long. It’s barely even noon yet, and I feel like we’ve already burned too much of the day.

As everyone hurries through the hallways of Patience Creek to go about their tasks, I pull Adam aside. He looks pale as usual, with the addition of some dark circles around his eyes. Everyone at that meeting had a little bit of similar wear on them. Invasion fatigue is setting in.

“You all right?” I ask him. “What did they do to you?”

Adam stares at me, shaking his head. “I’m fine, John. It was nothing. I should be asking how you’re doing.”

I figured that was coming. Everyone who knew Sarah—from Sam to Walker—all of them keep looking at me like I might fall apart at any second. I hate that. I don’t want to be coddled. I want to fight. I was at least hoping that when it came to Adam, I’d get a pass on the sympathy. Never thought I’d be yearning for some cold Mogadorian logic.

“I’m dealing,” I tell him, and am surprised by how much edge is in my voice.

“All right,” Adam replies, obviously getting the hint. He holds up his hands to show me his wrists where the handcuffs are still attached to them. “You mind getting these the rest of the way off?”

“Yeah, sure. Forgot about those.”

“It was more about delivering a message to that Lawson guy than getting me out of chains,” Adam says. “I get it.”

“Well,” I reply with a small smile. “You did look uncomfortable.”

“So did all those soldiers.” Adam laughs. “It was a good move. You showed strength.”

I light up my Lumen again, this time focusing it so that it’s limited just to the tip of my index finger. Careful not to burn Adam, I melt through the lock mechanisms on the cuffs until they fall open.

“What kind of questions were they asking you?” I ask while Adam rubs some feeling back into his wrists.

“Like I said, it wasn’t so bad. They wanted to know weapon and ship schematics. They wanted to know about the structure of the Mogadorian government and military, which is easy because they’re basically the same thing. They wanted to know what will happen to Mog society if Setrákus Ra is killed.” Adam shrugs. “I would’ve told them all these things even if they hadn’t put me on lockdown and kept me up all night.”

“Huh,” I say, thinking for a moment. There was actually a question in there that I’d never thought to ask myself. “What will happen when we kill Setrákus Ra?”

Adam smiles at me, appreciating the certainty in my voice. Then he runs a hand through his stringy black hair, looking thoughtful.

“Well, I don’t remember a time when there wasn’t a . . . ‘Beloved Leader.’ I’ve got no concept of what our world was like before. Hell, I doubt my parents would even remember. Setrákus Ra rewrote our history books, so, according to them, we weren’t much more than animals before he came along and ‘raised us up.’”

“I guess it’s too much to ask that they’d just give up and go away,” I reply.

“Without strip-mining Earth like they did Lorien, the fleet doesn’t have enough fuel to go anywhere.” Adam pauses thoughtfully. “Over a long enough timeline, though, they might go away. . . .”

“What do you mean?”

“For all his bluster in that so-called Great Book of his, Setrákus Ra never actually fixed the fertility problems we trueborn experience. He can grow an endless number of vatborn soldiers. Doesn’t change the fact that the trueborn birth rate is totally stagnant.”

“So the trueborn will slowly die off,” I say, trying to keep my voice suitably grim considering the company, but really feeling nothing for the slow extinction of Mogadorians. “And the vatborn?”

“As far as I know, the secret to creating them would die with Setrákus Ra.” Adam sees my smile and holds up a cautioning hand. “You need to realize a few things about my people, John. First, the vast majority completely buy in to Setrákus Ra’s twisted idea of Mogadorian Progress, and all of them believe that Setrákus Ra is unkillable. That’s the only thing that’s kept them in line all these centuries. When you kill him, you’ll cut off the vatborn and maybe get a few of the Mogs like me to lay down their weapons—”

“You think there could be others like you?” I ask, interrupting. I always thought of Adam as unique and considered his seeing the light a side effect of his brush with Number One.

He looks away. “I . . . don’t know. I’ve met others who I thought . . . maybe . . . I’m not even sure they’re alive at this point.” Adam waves this off. “The point is, even without Setrákus Ra, you’ll still have a heavily armed race of zealots who believe might makes right. How I imagine it going down? First, the trueborn decide who’s strongest by blowing each other up with Earth as their battlefield. Then whoever survives tries to pick up where Setrákus Ra left off. There are a lot of generals, like my father, who would think they’re next in line.”