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the slightest noise, plodding our way through muck.
    It was Five who led us into the swampland. He knew the way, of course. It was his ambush. We didn’t have an easy time finding our way out. It’s not like we could’ve gone back to the car we drove down here, anyway. The Mogs would definitely be watching that.
    A few steps ahead, Nine slaps the back of his neck, squashing a mosquito. At the noise, Marina flinches, and the field of cold she’s been giving off since the fight with Five momentarily intensifies. I’m not sure if Marina’s having trouble getting control of her new Legacy or if she’s intentionally cooling the air around us. Considering how humid the Florida swamps have been, I guess it hasn’tbeen so bad trekking around with a portable air conditioner.
    ‘You all right?’ I ask her quietly, not wanting Nine to overhear and yet knowing that’s impossible with his heightened hearing. She hasn’t spoken to Nine since Eight was killed, has barely said anything to me.
    Marina looks over at me, but in the dark I can’t get a read on her. ‘What do you think, Six?’ she asks.
    I squeeze her arm and find her skin cool to the touch.
    ‘We’ll get them,’ I tell her. I’m not much for these leader-style speeches – that’s what John does – so I keep it blunt. ‘We’ll kill them all. He won’t have died in vain.’
    ‘He shouldn’t have died at all,’ she replies. ‘We shouldn’t have left him out there. Now they have him, doing Lord knows what to his body.’
    ‘We didn’t have a choice,’ I counter, knowing it’s true. After the beating we endured at the hands of Five, we were in no shape to fight off a battalion of Mogadorians backed up by one of their ships.
    Marina shakes her head and falls silent.
    ‘You know, I used to always want Sandor to take me camping,’ Nine butts in out of nowhere, looking at us over his shoulder. ‘I hated living in that cushy-ass penthouse. But man, after this? I sort of miss it.’
    Marina and I don’t respond. That’s the way Nine’s been talking since our battle with Five – these forcedanecdotes about nothing, weirdly upbeat, like nothing serious happened out here. When he wasn’t rambling, Nine made it a habit to hike ahead of us, using his speed to put some distance between us. When we caught up, he’d have already caught some animal, usually snake, and be cooking it over a small fire he built on a rare dry patch of land. It’s like he wanted to pretend we were just on some fun camping trip. I’m not squeamish; I’d eat whatever Nine caught. Marina never did, though. I don’t think the roasted swamp creatures bothered her so much as the fact it was Nine doing the hunting. She must be running on empty by now, even more so than me and Nine.
    After another mile, I notice the road getting a little more packed down and well traveled. I can see light up ahead. Soon, the nonstop buzzing of the local insect life gives way to something equally annoying.
    Country music.
    I wouldn’t exactly call this place a town. I’m sure it doesn’t show up on even the most detailed map. It looks more like a campground that people forgot to leave. Or maybe this is just a place where the local hunters come to bro around and escape their wives, I think, noticing an overpopulation of pickup trucks in the nearby gravel parking lot.
    There are a couple dozen crude huts scattered throughout this cleared stretch of swamp coast, all of them pretty much indistinguishable from an old-school outhouse. The huts basically consist ofsome pieces of plywood hastily nailed together, and they look like a strong breeze could knock them over. I guess when you’re building at the edge of a Florida swamp, there’s no point in putting too much effort in. Hung between the huts, lighting this grim little vista, are strings of blinking Christmas lights and a few gas-powered lanterns. Beyond the huts, where the solid ground sinks back into the swamp, there’s a rickety dock with a