Kalma’s shield extended out until it covered Wren and Zavier.
“Why do you always have all the fun?” Zavier said to Traven on a private line.
“Because I’m a better shot than you.”
Traven stifled a laugh at the look of annoyance on Zavier’s face. He watched as the other three men began walking nonchalantly away from the gazebo into the open.
Peering over the deck, he looked to the second-floor apartment above the yellow diner. Sure enough, the shooting was emanating from an open window to the right of a swinging sign that read “Joe’s.”
There’s only one. Traven moved to the far side of the gazebo, staying low to the ground as the shooter was distracted by the other three Guard parading across the open square. Using the sleek black transport for cover, he ran to the back of the ship.
With a thought, the multiband triggered his armor’s helmet. His shoulder and back plates shifted, allowing the metal to rise out of hidden compartments and slide over his head as an opaque visor moved into place before his eyes.
The visor was for the benefit of onlookers; it made the helmet appear more natural. Inside, the entire thing seemed transparent. Traven’s multiband projected data directly into his visual cortex. He could see everything, as if he wasn’t wearing a helmet at all. Plus, the multiband added its own images, creating an augmented reality for combat.
Traven detached a small sentinel from his left thigh and tossed it to the ground. It rolled toward the front of the gazebo, where it attached to the wood. A video stream began pouring through the multiband into his mind.
It’d taken him years to get used to the amount of information the band could transfer into his brain. Multiple visual fields were the worst. It wasn’t something he could describe—it had to be experienced firsthand. He could see with his own eyes and the sentinel’s camera simultaneously. He’d taken to calling it “sentinel eyes” when he was in training.
The shots from the window were still directed away from his position. Seizing the opportunity, he ran across the street to the front of a brick bakery that shared the same building as the diner, pushed open the glass door, and ran toward the back. He’d sneak up on the assailant from behind.
The place was deserted. Cleanup crew did their job. The smell of freshly baked doughnuts made his stomach growl as he passed through the kitchen. Racks of the gourmet pastries were overflowing with more kinds than he’d ever seen before. He’d only been introduced to doughnuts when he’d arrived on Earth, and they were everything he never knew he always wanted.
His mouth watering, he tore his eyes from the divine circlets of doughy goodness and pushed open the back door, stepping out onto the side walk. The back of the stores was rugged compared to the fronts, with small parking lots that opened to the street. Although there were cars scattered through the lot, it too was empty.
Staying close to the buildings outer wall, He ran from the bakery to the diner’s back door.
What?
The door was covered by a shimmering energy barrier. And not just any energy barrier—the emitter in the bottom right corner was identical to the one he carried in the armored slot on his left calf.
With sentinel eyes, he could see the shots at the front had stopped. Using the band, he put the sentinel into distract mode. Immediately it began pelting the diner’s second-story window with plasma bolts.
Bringing his own rifle to bear on the shield emitter at the bottom of the door, he destroyed it, then quickly shot the lock and swung the door open.
Red circles, projected into his vision from the multiband, highlighting a dozen small black spheres scattered across the diner’s floor and up the staircase directly to the right of the entrance. The spheres each sprouted eight metallic legs and began crawling toward him with alarming speed.
Shit.
He backed away from the door and grabbed his shoulder in pain as a plasma bolt pierced his armor and tore through his flesh. He jumped to the outside wall of the diner and pressed his back against it. The shot had come from a small vent on the second floor. He hoped the ledge just above his head would block him from a second.
Ignoring the stabbing pain, he reached his right hand to his thigh. An upside-down compartment opened, dropping a dozen of his own small black spheres into his hand.
At the door, the metallic seekers began scuttling out of the building toward him. He rolled his set to the others and they sprouted legs, intercepting the approaching enemy.
Raising his rifle, he began picking off the closest seekers one by one. Meanwhile, the two swarms engaged in an electric battle, blue sparks dancing between them as they attempted to disable each other.
Now the sentinel. Traven closed his eyes. He hadn’t used magic in battle for a very long time. He imagined the small black device nestled into the vent. It was there—he could feel it. Mentally nudging it, he felt it shift. Not much, but enough. He had only moments before its sensors would detect the change and reorient the weapon.
He held his breath, stepped out from the ledge, fired a short burst of plasma shells into vent, and then pressed himself back against the wall. Closing his eyes, he felt for the sentinel.
Got it. I think.
The battle raging between the seekers had ended. There were no victors, except Traven. The metal carcasses all lay motionless on the ground.
Stepping slowly out from the wall, he kept his rifle aimed at the doorway. If the sentinel was still above him, he’d soon be dead. He swallowed hard, knowing if he checked, moving his focus from the door, he’d also be dead.
Guard training relied heavily on distraction to press an attack, and he was pretty sure his enemy had that same exact training. Which meant he’d be just on the other side of the doorway now, waiting for his moment.
Traven took a slow, quiet breath. He’d have to give it to him. He’d have to be faster.
Diving and twisting across the open doorway, he fired a single shot at the dark form on the other side. A return blast nearly grazed him but missed. The sound of his own body slamming onto the pavement muffled any sounds from a man falling inside.
Traven scrambled to his feet, holding his rifle at the ready and trying to ignore the searing pain running from his injured shoulder into his neck and arm. Slowly entering the diner, he took in the Council Guard lying before him. The man was breathing heavily but didn’t attempt to move. A smoldering hole in his opponent’s torso told Traven all he needed to know. He kicked the rifle away, then felt for the small outside switch on the man’s helmet.
The armor shifted as the helmet rushed back inside. Traven stood with shock. Before him was a gray-haired elderly man.
“Who are you?” Traven asked.
“Not what you were expecting?” the old man said, then let out a pained series of coughs. “I suppose I was you, once.”
“You were a Guard?”
The man nodded slowly, still coughing.
“Why? Why would you do this?”
“I’m a patriot now, or so they tell me. My grandchildren are safe. That’s all that matters.” The man’s eyes began closing.
“Who ordered you to do this? Who are they?”
The man’s chest stopped its rhythmic up-and-down motion.
He stared at the body. “My grandchildren are safe.” The words echoed hauntingly through his mind.
“Traven, you done playing around out there?” Kalma’s voice said. “We’re under attack. Get to the school—now.”
A map of the town jumped to life, hovering above his multiband. A few blocks from his position, a flashing yellow waypoint appeared over the top of a large structure that he knew had to be the high school.
“Who’s attacking you?” Traven asked.
Wren’s voice answered, “Everyone.”
CHAPTER 3
Traven approached the small high school cautiously. He could hear the characteristic thrum of plasma weapons discharge inside. He wasn’t exactly sure who they were up against, but he expected there’d be a
t least a few more of the fake Guard.
Fake or real? He couldn’t decide. The old man certainly fought like he knew what he was doing, but he was too old to be in the service. The Guard were either retired or promoted before fifty; older bodies just couldn’t take the strain of their missions.
The front entrance was empty. He brought up a map of the team’s locations, which appeared as colored dots in the multiband display. The building schematics weren’t in the archive, so he had no way of knowing exactly where they were in the school. They’d split up. Not a good sign.
Must be a hallway. The yellow dot, the farthest away, was traveling a straight line. It was Kalma. Wren’s blue and Zavier’s green dots weren’t moving.
“Zav, I’m closest to you. What’s your situation?”
“I’m pinned down. There are blasted seekers all over the place, and they’re after us.”
“Any friendlies?”
“There aren’t any. If it moves and it’s not one of us, kill it.”
“I’m coming to you.”
Traven instinctively reached down, opening a compartment on his right thigh. Nothing happened. Right, already used them. This is going to get tricky.
No one was in the lobby as he entered the school. Despite his best efforts to keep quiet, his boots squeaked against the white-tiled floor. There were multiple hallways leading out of the entrance, but from what he figured, Zavier was down the far left and around a corner on the right, probably in a class room.
The soft eerie sound of metal scuttling across tile made him stop in his tracks. Turning quickly, he saw dozens of seekers emerging from the hallways, all converging on his position.
He sprinted into the hallway on the left, directly toward a group of five seekers. The others scuttled toward him from behind, a lot faster than he’d have liked.
Firing rapidly at the autonomous bots, he managed to hit two of them as the other three began crawling up the walls and ceiling. Closing the distance, he fired relentlessly. If he slowed down, he’d be swarmed from behind, so he pushed forward.
When he passed beneath the first seeker, it dropped from the ceiling, landing on his shoulder. A jolt of pain ripped through his arm as it sent an electrical shock into his wound. The agony nearly sucked the air from him, and spots appeared before his eyes. Bringing up his side arm, he blasted the seeker off his shoulder. The heat from the plasma round seared his armor and seeped into his shoulder causing him to involuntarily cry out.
The second seeker jumped from the wall at his face. Ducking made it pass over his head and slam into a group behind him that were far too close for comfort. The last seeker scrambled across the row of gray lockers to his left. As it jumped toward him, he fired his weapon and got a lucky shot. The seeker slammed through the nearest locker and exploded, sending fragments of books and papers onto the floor.
At the end of the hallway, he slid around the corner, not slowing a bit, and ran straight into someone dressed like the Guard. The jolt knocked them both to the ground. His rifle was sandwiched between their bodies, and his side arm slid across the floor out of reach. Unsheathing his knife, he drove it into the man’s neck with as much force as he could muster. It broke through the armor and dug into the soldier.
Before he had any time to think, he felt eight razor-sharp blades stab deep into his left calf as rifle fire exploded above him.
This is it. This is the end.
“Get up,” Zavier screamed at him, and not through the multiband.
Traven rolled off the dead soldier and smashed the seeker climbing his leg onto the floor. Pain tore through him as the metal legs pushed deeper into muscle with the impact.
A strong hand grabbed him by the shoulder and dragged him across the floor into a small classroom. As they entered, he saw Zavier drop a charge just outside the door, then slam it shut. He was rolled onto his stomach, and the heat of a plasma bolt burned across his skin as Zavier shot the seeker off his leg.
Then the room exploded. Traven flew across the desks and slammed into a wall.
That’s when everything went black.
Traven struggled with his heavy eyelids. As they reluctantly opened, he found he was standing in the middle of the forest outside Madison City. The seared tree trunk that sent him into a vision months before was planted beside him. In the clearing, a girl with long black hair was teaching a boy how to use magic.
He walked into the clearing to take a closer look at the girl. Moving around her, he gazed into her mesmerizing green eyes. Eyes he’d never forget.
It was her. It was the Earthborn girl.
Pain pulsed through Traven’s shoulder. Someone was shaking him.
“Stop. Stop,” he urged.
“Get up! We’ve got to keep moving.”
Traven opened his eyes, stars dancing across his vision as he looked at Zavier standing above him.
“Wren’s pinned down and needs help.”
He stared blankly at Zavier. What’s happening? He couldn’t remember.
The pain in his shoulder increased as Zavier shook him harder.
“Why are you shaking me?” he asked.
“Come on, Traven. Don’t screw with me. We’ve got to get moving.”
Looking around, his memory slowly began to surface. The desks were strewn about the room, mostly in mangled heaps. A twisted fragment of tarnished metal curled at odd angles to his right. It took a minute, but he finally recognized it as the tattered leg of a chair. Where the rest of it was, he had no idea. Everything was in pieces.
He looked down and wiggled his toes, feeling them press against the soft interior of his boot. At least he seemed to be intact.
“Seriously, am I going to have to drag you outta here?”
“No, I’m all right,” Traven said. “The seekers?” He was finally putting everything together.
“In pieces. Your distraction in the hallway gave me time to take down the rest of the men. I dropped a charge to take out the seekers, dragged your lazy butt in here, slammed the door shut, and hoped we’d survive the blast.”
“Ah.” He reached down to his throbbing calf and groaned as his fingers brushed the holes in his leg.
“Yeah, got the seeker off you too. You’re welcome.”
The melted armor was stuck to his skin. “Thanks. I think.” Standing, the pain threatened to drop him back to the ground. Grinding his teeth, he brought himself up to his full height. “Right, let’s finish this.”
“Now you’re talking.” A wild grin spread across Zavier’s face. “Wren is pinned down just outside the gym.”
“I assume you know the way?”
“I do.”
Limping toward the gaping hole in the wall where the door used to be, Traven took in the carnage. Seeker parts littered the blasted hall, dark soot was everywhere, and the little that remained of the soldiers was scattered among the debris.
“Lead the way,” he said through clenched teeth. He would see this through even if he risked passing out during the battle. At least the wounds were cauterized; he wouldn’t bleed to death.
They made their way through a maze of lockers and classrooms until they approached a T in the hallway.
“The gym is on the other side of this wall. Wren’s one hall down on the left,” Zavier said, looking at his multiband. “The hallway goes completely around.”
“Split and meet in the middle. We’ll get them fighting on both sides and converge on Wren’s location.”
“Sounds good to me. I’ll take the left.”
Traven nodded. Geez, it even hurt to nod. He tried lifting his rifle with his right hand but couldn’t. His arm was useless. “Give me your side arm. You blew mine to bits with that charge.”
Zavier held the weapon out to him. “I’ve got another.”
“Thanks.” Traven took it with his left hand. It was a bit heavier than his own, but mostly the same otherwise. “See you soon.”
Zavier nodded, then ran off down the left hallway.
“We’re comin
g your way,” Traven told Wren through his multiband.
“Roger,” Wren replied.
Traven turned and moved through the hallways, which all looked the same. He passed multiple bodies; most were patrolman, collectors, and a few standard infantry. What the hell happened here? He couldn’t wrap his head around it. From the looks of it, they’d all turned on Wren, Zavier, and Kalma.
Passing the main entry to the gym, he aimed his weapon at the wood double doors and cautiously peered through the window. Biting his lip, he swallowed hard to keep bile from rising and quickly looked away.
It took a lot to make him squeamish, but this was enough. He swallowed again. He’d thought the days of Urlowen-led genocide had ended with the destruction of the Earthborn a long, long, long time ago. On this very planet, in fact. Malikane, the first High Councilman, was the only one to use such measures. The men who followed weren’t to be trifled with, but they’d never returned to Malikane’s techniques.
Apparently I was wrong.
Pushing his thoughts aside, he continued until he approached Wren’s position. Sliding up to a corner, he peered cautiously around it. There were at least seven Guard in the hallway. Who are these guys?
“Zavier, you in position?”
“I’ve been here forever. What took you so long?” Zavier replied.
Traven ignored him. “Wren, you ready?”
“Ready.”
“All right, on my count. Three, two, one.”
Instantly the hallway erupted in plasma bolts. Traven turned the corner, taking aim. Each shot connected, as did Zavier’s from down the hall, and Wren’s from out of the classroom. In a matter of seconds, all seven of the Guard were lying on the floor.
“That was too easy,” Wren said.
“It was fun though, right?” Zavier replied.
“I’d say we need therapy, but yeah. It was a blast.”
“Nice! I see what you did there—a blast, ’cause we blasted them.”
“It’s not funny if you explain it.”
Traven shifted his weight off his right leg and rolled his neck out. “Where’s Kalma?”
Earthborn Alliance Page 3