The Fate of Ten (lorien Legacies, #6)

The Fate of Ten, the sixth installment in the Lorien Legacies series, picks up in the immediate aftermath of the Mogadorian invasion of Earth. The Mogadorians are an alien race that destroyed the planet Lorien and now seek to conquer Earth. A small group of surviving young Loric warriors called the Garde, each identified by a number, possess supernatural abilities called Legacies. They are humanity's best hope against the Mogadorian leader, Setrákus Ra, who commands a massive warship called the Anubis and has issued an ultimatum: Earth's governments must surrender within forty-eight hours or face total destruction.

The novel opens with a fifteen-year-old girl in Harlem watching the invasion on television with her stepfather. Mogadorians break into their building and kill him. When three soldiers corner her outside, she throws up her hands and their weapons are torn away by an invisible force: She has developed telekinesis, a power that should be impossible for a human.

Two parallel storylines drive the novel. In New York, John Smith (Number Four), the series' central protagonist, and his human companion Sam Goode fight through a devastated Manhattan. John is exhausted from overusing his healing ability and his Lumen, a fire-generating Legacy. Sam has unexpectedly developed telekinesis and uses it to prop John upright in front of survivors so he still appears capable of fighting. John insists on staying in Manhattan to find Nine, a fellow Garde last seen battling Five, a traitorous Garde.

In Mexico, Six (Number Six) narrates the second storyline. She, Marina (Number Seven), and Adam, a Mogadorian defector with Loric powers, have emerged from the Sanctuary, a hidden Loric site beneath a Mayan temple. Inside, they deposited personal Loric heirlooms into an ancient well, awakening the Entity, a living embodiment of Lorien's energy, which released its power before retreating. Outside, a surviving Mogadorian named Phiri Dun-Ra has sabotaged every ship on the landing strip, stranding the group.

John and Sam encounter Daniela, the girl from the opening, suggesting the Entity may be granting Legacies to some humans. When the Anubis bombards the area, the three flee into a collapsing subway tunnel and combine their telekinesis to hold up the ceiling. John loses consciousness from the effort.

While unconscious, John is pulled into a dreamscape by Ella, the youngest Garde, who is imprisoned aboard the Anubis. Setrákus Ra is pumping a black substance into Ella's body to control her, but she has hidden her telepathic abilities from him. A Mogadorian charm binds Ella's life to Setrákus Ra's, making him invulnerable as long as she lives. Ella shows John a vision of the Anubis heading for the Sanctuary and warns him to alert Six. She reveals she has foreseen a future where Setrákus Ra dies, but it requires her own death.

Six's group hunts Phiri Dun-Ra through the jungle to recover stolen ship parts. They capture her, but the recovered bag is booby-trapped. The explosion nearly kills Adam and destroys the parts entirely. Marina heals Adam's devastating injuries, though parts of his tissue briefly turn to ash, the substance Mogadorians leave behind when they die, before her healing reverses the effect. The group is completely stranded.

John, Sam, and Daniela reach a military encampment at the Brooklyn Bridge. Agent Walker, a federal agent serving as John's government liaison, briefs him: Twenty-five warships hover over major cities worldwide, protected by impenetrable electromagnetic shields. John calls Sarah Hart, his girlfriend, who steadies him through a near-breakdown. He contacts Adam, who reveals that Mogadorian Skimmers, small aircraft assigned to each warship, carry cloaking devices that can pass through the shields. John instructs Six to remain at the Sanctuary, reasoning that knowing Setrákus Ra's destination while the Mogadorian leader remains unaware of their knowledge gives them a rare advantage.

Sarah, Mark James (Sarah's ex-boyfriend and ally), and Lexa, a Loric engineer revealed as the mysterious hacker GUARD, arrive at the Sanctuary aboard the original Loric ship that brought the Garde to Earth. The group prepares defenses: wiring Skimmers with explosives, hiding blasters for Marina to fire telekinetically, and digging a camouflaged pit. In New York, Five demands John meet him at the Statue of Liberty, holding Nine hostage. Five is dying from a chest wound; John heals him, confiscates his weapons, and declares Five will face justice but not execution.

The Anubis arrives at the Sanctuary ahead of schedule. Setrákus Ra fires the warship's cannon into the temple, obliterating it, though the Loric well at the crater's center survives. He descends with Ella, who appears gaunt and pale with black veins beneath her skin, and lowers a pipeline device to harvest the Entity's energy. Six's group detonates their explosives and attacks from multiple positions.

Ella, shuffling in a trance toward the well, tells Setrákus Ra he does not get to win, then falls backward into the torrent of Loric energy. Her body overloads the pipeline, destroying it. She is flung aside, apparently dead. Six strikes Setrákus Ra in the head with a rock and draws blood, confirming the charm binding him to Ella is broken. Beams of Loric energy shoot from Ella's body, pulling everyone present into unconsciousness.

Ella's consciousness merges with the Entity, which she names Legacy. It augments her telepathy to reach every Legacy-touched being on Earth. In a shared vision, all witness Lorien's ancient past: Setrákus Ra's obsessive experiments to create artificial Legacies by mining Loric energy, and Pittacus Lore's failure to execute his former friend when given the chance. In a recreation of the Elders' Chamber, the ceremonial hall of Lorien's ruling council, John addresses hundreds of new human Garde from across the globe and asks them to join the fight. Legacy reveals that Loralite stones, Loric minerals linked by planetary energy, can now teleport anyone with Legacies between locations.

Back at Liberty Island, a colossal creature called a Mogasaur emerges from the river. Sam frees the captive Five to help fight, and Five flies through one of the creature's eyes, extracting a Loric pendant powering it. Daniela manifests a new Legacy: beams of energy from her eyes that turn matter to stone. John discovers he possesses Ximic, Pittacus Lore's ability to copy any observed Legacy. He replicates Daniela's power, and together they petrify the Mogasaur. The president, whose daughter experienced the telepathic vision, signals a willingness to support the Loric.

At the Sanctuary, Six wakes and attacks Setrákus Ra with a sword before he can regain his bearings. Marina and Adam rejoin the fight once beyond his Legacy-canceling radius. Setrákus Ra grows to twenty feet tall, catches Marina in his telekinesis, and slams her into the ground repeatedly. Phiri Dun-Ra, having freed herself, leads a Mogadorian counterattack from behind. Six unleashes a combined assault of weather and telekinesis, impaling Setrákus Ra with a serrated piece of his destroyed pipeline. The surviving Mogadorians drag him aboard the Anubis.

Sarah, who stayed at Six's side providing cover fire, is struck by debris that tears through her midsection. Aboard Lexa's ship as the group flees, Sarah calls John to say she loved him from the moment she saw him, has no regrets, and asks him to keep fighting. Sarah dies. John, still at Liberty Island, hears her fading voice through the phone as the novel ends, setting up the final volume, United as One.