AARON The brakes slammed and the world pitched forward. I crashed into Seraphina. Her hand shot out, fingers catching the refrigerator door. The metal handle groaned but held. It kept us both from tumbling to the floor. A spike of pure panic. Our car was right behind us, Lucas in the back seat. Could Elena stop in time? The Mobile Hauler shuddered to a complete stop. Nothing hit us from behind. "Holy shit!" Nathan yelled. We untangled ourselves, turning toward the front. There it was. An army Siege Crawler sat directly on the road. Its hard, green angles filled our lane. The very front of it was parked on the shoulder. Its turret swung smooth and fast to the side. It happened in an eye blink. Then I was flying backward. The Crawler’s stubby barrel launched something. There was no flame, no smoke. But the thing left the armored beast so fast the air itself rippled. The wave rushed toward us. Adrenaline hit my brain. The scene unfolded in slow, terrible detail. The front windows of the Hauler bulged inward under the pressure. They shattered. A storm of glass blew into the cabin. Nathan’s body lifted off the floor. It was thrown back toward Seraphina and me. The windows along the side exploded. Lucas was bowled down the center aisle. Seraphina slammed into me, reversing our earlier fall.My feet left the floor. The rifle was torn from my hands. It clattered against the walls. My arms flailed, grabbing only air. My breath vanished as my back hit the bedroom door. The thin wood flexed. The door shifted on its hinges, absorbing the force. Pain exploded across my spine. It felt like being struck by a car. A deafening, high-pitched ring filled my head. I opened my eyes. Lucas lay crumpled by my knees. My heart seized. I reached for him, rolled his small body over. His eyes opened. They locked onto mine. An instant later he leapt up, his arms wrapping tight around my neck. His face buried against my skin. Hot tears flowed onto my collar. I could feel his whole body shaking. I pushed up to one knee, holding him close. Seraphina had grabbed the small countertop. She was pulling herself up. Nathan extended a bloody hand to Elena, helping her from the floor. Marcus, who had been thrown onto the couch, was now sitting up, dazed. My eyes went back to the Siege Crawler. Its turret gave a small twitch. Instinct took over. I spun Lucas and myself away from the front, toward the broken bedroom door. I felt both of us scream as the second shockwave hit. It threw me forward, but this time I was braced for it. One arm clamped around Lucas. The other shot out, my palm slamming flat against the wall. We stopped short of crashing into the door. A jolt of pain shot from my shoulder down to my wrist. I looked back over my shoulder. The others were moving again, but slower now. More hurt. Elena clawed her way across the glass-strewn floor toward us. The exhaustion was gone from her eyes, replaced by raw fear. She frantically reached out. I turned and grabbed her hand with my free one. Her fingers closed around my damaged wrist. Something popped in the joint. I ignored it and pulled her into the huddle with Lucas. We wrapped our arms around our son. The three of us were a tight knot on the floor at the very back of the cabin. For one heartbeat, I let myself believe it. This feeling of them against me, of my arms around them, was a wall. I could keep them safe right here. The feeling evaporated the moment it formed. My hearing was just a dim, faraway ring. But my eyes worked. Rapid flashes of light pulsed into the cabin, throwing sharp shadows on the walls. I looked past my family. Nathan was kneeling on the torn-up couch, looking out the shattered side. His body was covered in blood from a hundred small glass cuts. Shards glistened on the fabric around him. Marcus was pulling Seraphina to her feet. She was shouting, pointing at the floor. His face was a mask of confusion. Nathan’s rifle bucked against his shoulder again and again. He was firing out into the chaos. But the rifle wasn't making the flashing light. The device. The same spinning weapon I saw kill the man with the rocket at our house. It was mounted on the Crawler’s turret now. It spun with a deadly whine, so fast it was a blur. I pulled myself free from Elena and Lucas. Elena’s hand reached for mine as I stood. My legs were unsteady. I took two steps. Just enough to see out the ruined window. To see what Nathan and the Crawler were shooting at. I moved past the solid wall. I looked out through the empty frame where the glass had been. I immediately wished I had not.Hundreds of them. The robots were just yards away now. They moved through the shattered army position like a metal flood. Tearing through everything left. As I watched, a group of them, maybe two dozen, simply erupted. Orange flame swallowed them whole. The Crawler’s defense system was firing, sweeping through their ranks. But for every one that burned, three more kept coming. They were not being destroyed fast enough. They were getting closer.