An area of the city a fifth of a mile wide and a mile long was pulverized. Buildings were driven into ground, and broke into chunks no larger than a human head. The wavelength of the beam let those chunks lift up for a fraction of a second before the next wave of the beam thrust them down again with the same force as before.

The Simurgh was almost, almost out of the path of the beam. He clipped her, and she reoriented, pulling out of the way even as she was hurled back and down.

Much of the lower body she had been building broke away from the force of the impact. A wing shattered. The remainder was lost in the plume of smoke that rose from the tract of land he had blasted.

Dauntless, too, was in the path of the beam. He had his shield, and he was rooted into the ground in a way that resisted being thrust away with the kind of power that could push a moon out of orbit, but the grazing hit still demolished one of his arms, tore out a chunk of the Titan’s side.

For long moments, Dauntless didn’t move. Defiant fought to reorient, switching systems around so he wasn’t so vulnerable, and so Dragon could do what he needed.

Was that what she put in your head? Defiant thought. When the Simurgh roosted on you, was she thinking of this moment, reminding you of the times I exerted authority to take away your time with your son?

Are you aware enough to realize I didn’t mean to do that to you? Or is resentment building? Are you reaching a point where you serve her instead?

Defiant’s thoughts were interrupted as he was struck again. The Machine Army this time. The first blow had come from Fortuna’s group. There was no logic with these opponents they were fighting. Each acted according to self-interests. The Machine Army had decided it wanted what he had, half of the machines that had reached this particular battlefield scuttling over to the tract of devastated land, pausing as if staring at it.

Gathering data.

G-driver charging. 1:59:03

Borrowed tech. Dragon had taken it and revived the project. He had integrated it into this model of the Marduk. He’d fired it five times today alone, primarily in waging war against Titans. Then Titan Fortuna had started countering him, had used opportunities to absorb Oberon into her network.

What are you doing? What’s your move?

He wasn’t even sure who ‘you’ was. He was buying time, fighting the most imminent threat so they could dive headlong into the embrace of the next threat.

The Machine Army was entering the trench, scurrying into the trench, into the dust, where his sensors struggled to read things with the ten kinds of background radiation and—