"You mean she's a prisoner?"
He shrugs. "Could be. She didn't give me much info before she tossed me out of the Echo."
"She told you the Brain can't work properly on its own, right? She might be expecting you to take over that role now."
"Then why banish me to Earth? And why bring you here? None of this makes any sense."
Well, I can't argue with that. Lightning has tried to fry me several times. I have nothing to offer in terms of healing the Echo's Brain. Maybe Aldith didn't do this after all. At least we have our backpacks. That gives us some water and snacks, weapons too.
"What should we do now?" I ask. "You've traveled this whole world, so I'll defer to your knowledge of the Echo."
"Do you think I memorized the geography of this entire planet? I don't have a photographic memory."
He's getting grumpy again. Perfect.
A metallic grinding noise erupts behind us, but when we turn around to look, we can't see anything. The ground trembles with everywhumpof what sounds like gigantic feet. Then a white flash behind us makes me spin around and shout, "Gabriel! The lightning is back."
In the distance, bolts pound into the ground one after another after another, sweeping closer every moment.
"Run," Gabriel says, almost whispering the word.
We take off, having no clue where we're going or how to escape from the dual forces coming after us. More metallic grinding. More thunderous lightning. And we keep running, running, running. The ground shudders so violently that we stumble and hit the ground.
A lightning bolt strikes too close.
Gabriel hoists me onto my feet, but just as we turn to run, another bolt erupts from the sky.
A massive metal hand reaches out from behind us, raising its open palm, and the lightning bounces off it. The being that hand belongs to remains shrouded in darkness as the thing deflects bolt after bolt, using both palms as shields. Then the being scoops up both me and Gabriel. Cradled in the monstrosity's palm, we both stare up at the creature.
"Jarek," Gabriel says. "Thanks, buddy. We needed a hand."
The gigantic being seems to be made of metal and flesh, like a cyborg in a sci-fi movie. Gabriel knows this creature, and he doesn't seem angry or afraid of the thing. He called it Jarek.
"Did Aldith send you to bring us into the Echo?" Gabriel asks. When the cyborg shakes its head, Gabriel says, "No, ofcourse you didn't. You would've scooped us up straight off Earth, and whoever brought us here needed an Echo creature to abduct us."
With one hand, Jarek continues deflecting the lightning bolts, but I swear he winces a little every time.
I whisper to Gabriel, "Your friend is getting tired."
"Yeah, he is." Gabriel shouts to Jarek, "Big buddy, can you take us to the castle?"
Jarek shakes his head.
"What about the stronghold?"
The cyborg nods.
"Good. Take us there, please."
Jarek cups his other palm over us, forming a protective shell. Then he lopes away, presumably ferrying us to the stronghold, whatever that is. I can't see Gabriel, but I feel his hand holding mine.
"What is this creature?" I ask. "Everyone says Echo beasts are the size of normal humans, but this guy is like Godzilla."
"He's nicer than that monster. Jarek is good, and he helped me scale the sheer cliff that has Sefton's castle at the top of it."
"But what is Jarek?"
"He's a golem. That's a creature created by magic to serve its master's bidding. But Erin and Grant managed to free him, and he does what he wants now."