“We need to split up,” Paul said. “Run around, level to level, look at every sign. It’ll be easy to find the right one. Just keep saying ‘the words inside’ over and over in your head.”

“What do we do if we find it?” Tick asked.

“Scream like bloody murder. We’ll come to you.”

The metaspides had formed a semicircle, still moving slowly, closing their trap. Every few seconds, on each creature, a spinning saw would pop out, or twin blades would scissor shut with a snap. They were like gang members taunting their opponent.

“Are you in?” Paul asked Sally.

“Ain’t got much choice, I reckon. Fine friends you chirrun turned out to be.”

Sofia spoke, her voice steady. “We need to go. Now.”

Paul quickly pointed out directions of who should go where. “Okay . . . ready . . . Go!”

Paul shot down a pathway to the left, having to run in between two of the robots. They snapped at him, but he slipped through easily. Sprinting, he made it thirty or forty feet before something became very obvious. He turned, baffled.

None of the metaspides were behind him.

They’d all gone after Tick. Every single one of them.

Chapter

13

Flying Metal

Tick looked over his shoulder when he got to the end of the bridge, shocked to see all of the creatures following him. He caught a quick glance of Paul standing in the distance, staring.

“I’ll keep them busy—you just find the place!” Tick yelled. “Find it!”

He turned and set off running again, winding his way down another cobbled path and then down an alleyway, then back onto a wider, main road. The clicking sounds of his pursuers’ metallic feet sounded like a typist overdosed on caffeine. Tick looked up at the signs of the various establishments as he passed by.

Tanaka’s Feet Barn . . . The Hapless Butcher . . . Ted’s Cups and Bowls . . . The Shack Shop . . . Mister Johnny’s Store . . .

None of them came close to matching an anagram for “the words inside.”

He came to an intersection and hesitated too long deciding which way to go. One of the spider robots caught up with him and jumped on his back, some kind of clamping device shooting out and gripping his neck. Tick shouted out in pain and fell down. He twisted to see his attacker, but could barely move. Two more spiders grabbed his arms, another two grabbed his legs, pinching him viciously.

Tick squirmed and kicked. The rising panic thumped his heart, blurred his vision. He heard metallic snaps and whirring, like the sounds of a futuristic torture device. Something sharp sliced across the length of his back; something pointy stabbed into his left calf. Tick could do nothing but scream as the heat of rage filled him.

A new sound filled the air—something like sizzling bacon or bubbling acid, but a hundred times louder. This was followed by a booming warp, the sound of crumpling, twisting metal. Something knocked the spiders off Tick

with a ringing clank. Their sharp legs ripped new wounds where they’d been clutching him. Pain lanced through him and all over his body. Groaning in agony, he flipped onto his back.

Above him, the indoor world had gone berserk.

Sofia found it near the very spot from which they’d entered the underground complex.

The Sordid Swine.

The rickety sign swung crookedly on a single chain above the entrance to a squat, brick building. Sofia thought it looked like a seedy gambling hall. Etched into the wood, the three words grabbed her attention; her eyes locked in.

It wasn’t obvious on first glance, but the phrase had no letters that immediately ruled it out. In a matter of seconds, she’d worked through it. The Sordid Swine was definitely an anagram for “the words inside,” letter for letter, rearranged.

She turned to face the way she’d come, ready to yell out that she’d found it, but faltered. In the distance, in the direction Tick had run, she saw something impossible. After all, they were indoors.

But there, a couple hundred yards away, countless pieces of debris swirled and flew through the air.

It looked like a tornado.

Paul heard it before he saw it. Crumpling metal, banging, clanking, a roaring wind—it all sounded like the world was coming to an end. He rounded a corner shop and saw a spinning mass of debris up ahead, mostly made up of chunks of metal and wood, some large and some small. As he watched, a long, steel beam hit the rail of an upper balcony then windmilled, smashing through a barber shop window.

“Paul!”

He turned to see Sofia just a couple of paths over, running toward him.

“Tick’s over there!” he yelled. Without waiting, he took off, crossing a cobbled path, heading for the same bridge he’d seen Tick cross a short time ago.

“Wait!” she called out, but he ignored her. He knew Tick might be caught in the middle of the weird tornado—of course, he didn’t know how he could help if that were the case, but he ran on anyway, making it halfway across the bridge before he stumbled to a stop.

Tick lay on the ground up ahead, bruised and bloody, staring up into the twister that spun right above him, railings and pipes and poles and sheets of metal flying through the air in a circle. He looked to be in the exact center of the steel storm, the buildings and walls around him ripped to shreds as they provided fuel for the impossible tornado. Nearby, several crumpled metaspides twitched and sparked; one of them had most of its body torn off and another had partially melted, two limbs and a chunk of its torso reduced to a pile of silvery goop.

“What the heck?” Paul said, just as Sofia caught up with him, almost knocking him forward.

“We’ve gotta grab him!” she said.

“I know, but how?” He turned toward her. “You got some body armor I don’t know about?”

“Look!” she said, pointing at Tick.

Their friend was crawling toward them.

Tick didn’t understand how this could be happening. Above him, solid metal objects ripped in half, dissolved, and reformed. Everything around him had gone nuts, breaking apart and spinning in the air above him, only to melt together into new shapes. The clank of stuff crashing into each other mixed with the roaring wind, sounding like freight trains were playing bumper cars.

And he’d had enough.

He crawled toward Paul and Sofia, thankful that the raging twister was several feet above him. Worried it might drop at any moment, or that one of the hundreds of pieces of debris would fly at him and skewer him, he scrambled on his hands and knees as fast as possible. When he reached what seemed to be the edge of the twister, he pushed himself to his feet and sprinted across the bridge to his friends.