by David Beers
While Alistair was being flown through multiple dimensions, heading from Earth to Pluto, giddy panic had set in. He couldn’t tell anyone. He didn’t have the words to describe it, the ones he naturally understood from others, yet he felt the bond growing physically closer.
His fate was nearly upon him.
When Alistair landed on Pluto, Obs lost the ability to sleep. He could hardly even lie down. He paced incessantly, driving Linc mad. He couldn't help it, though.
The moment he saw Alistair Kane was burned in the animal’s mind. He’d sat outside the small room, staring in, frightened in the best way. The animal wasn’t capable of understanding what was going through the human’s mind at that time, that some huge dog-like creature was about to be thrust on him.
Had Obs been able to consider it from Alistair’s point of view, he wouldn’t have cared.
Obs had found his home, and it was wherever this man was.
Now they were tied together in a way others couldn’t understand. Obs knew that if Prometheus died, he would too. That was the way of the drathe, yet his death wasn’t what motivated the animal. He would fight an entire army to keep his soul-bond alive, even if it meant his death.
It was a loyalty humans could only understand when they thought about a mother and her children.
So when his master said find the Whip or we die, Obs didn’t hear the “we” part. He heard, find the Whip or I die.
His master would die.
No force in the universe could have kept the animal from doing his master’s bidding. He would find the Whip, or he would die.
There are an endless number of great things about animals, but the one humanity often overlooks is how much they trust their instincts. Obs didn’t fret or worry about how he’d find the Whip, and when he felt the weapon, he didn’t question that either. He could feel it because his soul-bond could feel it. Perhaps that was the difference between his and Alistair’s ability to find the Whip. Men had a hard time being and trusting themselves. Thoughts and questions constantly plagued their minds.
Obs had no such issues.
The drathe flew through the halls, hundreds of pounds of muscle moving so quickly one could entirely miss him. He rounded corners and sped through corridor after corridor, trusting his instincts.
He slowed when he reached the door that held his master’s murderous lasers.
For the first time, he heard the siren. The drathe had no idea how long it’d been going off, but he understood its meaning. Help was needed.
He crept up to the door, lowering himself almost to the ground, his muscles primed.
The door opened, and one of those strange-smelling manlike animals stood on the other side. It never had a chance.
Obs pounced, over two hundred pounds crashing into the unsuspecting creature. The drathe wasted no time; he ripped the thing’s throat out and leaped on the second one.
The second hybrid was more prepared than the first, slugging Obs and trying to spin at the same time.
Obs took the punch in his ribs and flew against the wall. He didn’t slow but found his feet and faced the enemy.
The hybrid’s weapon sat on a table next to the Whip they’d probably been trying to figure out how to turn on.
He slowly started moving toward it. Obs understood that he had one chance to win this, and if the hybrid got the weapon, his master was going to die.
A cold focus came over the animal. No siren blared. Nothing in the universe existed but the slowly walking man.
The glance was Obs’ opening. The hybrid looked at the table for a split-second.
The drathe launched himself with no thought for the consequences, like his master. The need to kill dominated.
The hybrid was inhumanly fast, faster even than the drathe.
He grabbed Obs under his front legs, but the animal’s weight slammed them both against the wall. Snarls and spit flew from Obs’ mouth as he bit and tore everything in front of him.
Blows rained on his ribs, but he didn’t feel them.
In the end, Obs stood over the hybrid’s body, gasping. His blood and that of the hybrid coated his fur.
He looked once more at the hybrid in a rare selfish act and yanked on the cadaver’s neck, severing the spine.
A second wasted, but Obs couldn’t help himself.
That small victory complete, he bounded to the table, put his front paws on it, and delicately reached down with his teeth.
He picked up his master’s Whip, then once again bounded through the halls.
Alistair would have cared that he had perhaps sent his animal to his death.
Prometheus had no such concern. The beast would return, and Pro would destroy this place.
Nero’s calm demeanor had been replaced by a rage Pro had never seen in a gigante. The hybrids that came for him were thrown across the bridge, breaking equipment and knocking out pilots.
Prometheus moved across the area like the wind. His mind was free, and while he didn’t have his Whip, his hands and feet were deadlier than most men’s weapons. Pilot or hybrid, Pro didn’t care. He broke them all, anything that came toward him. Legs, knees, and skulls shattered beneath his speed and strength.
A siren was blaring, most likely throughout the ship. That meant more would come—many more.
He understood that they couldn’t hold them off forever. He had to find the Ice Queen and put her down. He had to kill the shepherd, but he’d lost her in the battle.
Pro felt the wind of something coming at him and he turned, his mind slinging a monitor through the air to brain the attacker.
He found his hand buried in fur and a giant drathe hanging in mid-air, staring at him.
The monitor stopped centimeters from Obs’ skull.
The animal held the Whip in his mouth.
“Good dog,” Pro said, releasing the drathe and grabbing the Whip from his mouth as he fell. Obs hit the deck and lightly nipped his calf for the remark.
Prometheus’ Whip unfurled, all three lasers sensing their owner’s desire for destruction.
Hybrids as well as humans were flooding into the room. The Ice Queen’s slaves and soldiers had come to save her.
A certain dead businessman would have recognized the god of death as he sprang at them. Prometheus cut through them, spinning, leaping, ducking… Bodies fell around him as if he were scything grain in a field.
More came, though. Prometheus didn’t know where Nero or Obs or the Ice Queen were. He cut through the hordes, their screams and cries drowning out the blaring siren.
As he spun around one hybrid, decapitating him and plunging his Whip into the human running at him, he glanced at the queen’s chair.
She stood just in front of it, smiling.
The siren quit blaring, and two voices replaced the noise.
The Ice Queen’s and one Pro didn’t recognize.
The battle halted as all turned toward the chair. The bitch was smiling at him. The male voice came over the speakers.
“You’re godsdamn out of your mind, Cristin. Are we ready to launch the attack?”
The woman looked at Pro, still smiling. Her voice rang out over everyone. “Drop everything you have on the capital. Now.”
“Dropping now,” came the male’s response, then his line clicked off.
The Ice Queen spoke once more and her voice was heard by everyone, but she was only speaking to one man on the bridge. “See you on the battlefield.”
She sat on the chair, and it sank beneath the floor. The Ice Queen was gone.
Pro leaped over a table and cut down a pilot as he reached the spot where she’d been. A metal barrier had replaced the chair, cutting him off from her escape.
Obs bounded over to him.
Nero was standing at the edge of the bridge.
The flood of enemies had ceased. Those remaining were rushing out as their queen had commanded. Only the sounds of the dying filled the room.
The battle was no longer here.
It was in th
e capital.
So was the shepherd.
Chapter Sixteen
Servia had been in battles. She’d watched her lover die. She’d seen a planet burn, barely escaping with her life.
Yet, standing in what had once been a boardroom and was now a war room, she’d never witnessed anything like what she now saw.
It would have been beautiful if it wasn’t so terrifying.
How is mankind so wonderful but so brutal? she wondered as she stepped to the window.
Red, yellow, and orange streaked through the sky. Some bands were wide, a half-kilometer. Others were much thinner, twice the height of a person.
The colors were beautiful, and the technology used to create them was genius. The result? Blood was about to spill across the land.
Servia had mapped out a projected plan of how they would attack, but Pro must have changed something in that dreadnought. They hadn’t thought individuals would fall, raining from the sky like tiny bullets, but that was what she now saw.
Thousands of warriors in man-sized capsules shot from the dreadnoughts, aiming for the city.
Corvettes were breaching the planet’s atmosphere, and soon their lasers and plasma blasters would devastate the people and buildings. Servia saw the massive delivery ships dropping as well; those were the ones creating huge streaks of color behind them. When they landed, thousands more soldiers would fill the city.
Would they return to the sky to get more? Or had Prometheus made that an impossibility?
“Jeeves,” Servia said, “connect me to Thoreaux.”
She heard a soft click in her ear, alerting her that she was on with him. “You seeing this?”
“It’d be impossible to miss.” She heard the awe in his voice.
“Where are you?”
“Taking the north side. Caesar has the east. We’ve each got three squads of gigantes with us.”
A quick moment of silence passed between the two.
“It’s not gonna be enough, Serv,” Thoreaux stated.
“Just keep fighting. I’m going to see what’s going on with Faitrin. Out.”
Jeeves, hearing the conversation, connected Servia to the pilot. “Faitrin, it’s Servia. We’ve got thirty seconds until the individual soldiers are going to be within range. Are you in a place to kill some before they land?”
It was Jeeves’ voice that came back since Faitrin had harmonized with her ship and was no longer speaking verbally. “Already in place. Lasers targeting the first one that breaches. We’ve got ten other corvettes out here now, too. I’m in contact with all. We’ll deliver the best air defense we can.”
“Good woman,” Servia said and ended the connection.
She then took a brief few seconds, and for the first time in her life, prayed to the gods.
She prayed for two things: that they might somehow intervene to save the ones she loved, and if not that, she prayed for a quick and merciful defeat.
Prometheus stood among the dead. He’d killed a lot of them, probably half. He was staring at the remaining undamaged panels, watching as three armies first flew through space, then gravity pulled them toward the planet.
He had to figure out the best way to fight. He had a dreadnought now but no crew to run it, and it wasn’t like he could open up the plasma sprayers on the city. He’d kill as many of his men as theirs.
Nero was pacing, glancing at the panels every few feet. The rage that had possessed him hadn’t dissipated. The gigante’s bloodlust was running high, and remaining here was aggravating it.
Prometheus saw only one way out. “We’ve got to find a smaller ship and get down there.”
Nero grunted but said nothing as he continued walking to and fro.
Something clicked in Pro’s mind. He hadn’t thought about it before, and he wasn’t even sure it would work. There were different trigger words for AIs, and the advanced ones like Jeeves could often tell by inflection or the question when they were being targeted with questions. Based on what he’d seen so far, he imagined the dreadnought’s AI was more like the latter.
He just didn’t know if his voice would be able to trigger it.
Pro turned his head up, another way that would allow the AI to know it was being queried. “Are there any available corvettes or two-man ships?” Obs was coming along, but they didn’t want a ship that would require three pairs of hands.
“Yes,” the AI said from the speakers. One of the panels the Ice Queen had used rose in front of Prometheus. A map of the ship was in front of it, with a red line leading from the bridge to where the ship was housed. “There are ten ships of that caliber still available. Would you like me to ready one for you?”
“Yes.” Pro thought about one other thing. “Do we have any comms that can keep me connected to you during the flight and when I’m on land?”
“Affirmative.” The AI wasn’t programmed to sound human, though he imagined that had been done on purpose after meeting the bitch who owned it. “I will ensure that it is in the ship waiting for you.”
“Time to go,” Pro said.
Nero finally stopped pacing, grunted again, and walked toward the bridge’s exit. Prometheus had memorized the map and started jogging.
Nero and Obs matched his pace easily, keeping a few feet behind him as he led the way.
They made it to the hangar bay in five minutes. Prometheus had stepped back into his room for the time being, letting Alistair be in command.
It was obvious which ship was for them. It sat in the middle of the bay, directly above a launch hole. The two side doors were open, and when Alistair stepped in, he saw the earpiece.
He snapped it into place as he sat in the pilot’s chair.
Nero took his spot next to Alistair. “Let us hope you fly this better than the last ship.”
“This is why they pay me the big bucks, Nero. I use my brain. AI, can you hear me?”
“Affirmative.”
“Can you fly this thing if I tell you where I want you to land it?” Alistair asked.
“Affirmative. I have extensive training on all ships aboard the dreadnought.”
Alistair looked at Nero and winked. “Okay, I want you to get us to the coordinates I’m typing in now.” His hands rapidly hit the screens in front of him, putting in the target as the compound. Once he got there, he’d figure out the rest.
“Location confirmed. Are we ready for launch?” the AI asked.
“Affirmative.”
There was a brief pause before the AI came back. “I believe you were trying to make a joke at my expense. I will not dignify it with a response.”
Alistair smiled. I think I’m gonna like this one.
The launch hole opened beneath them, and the ship went through two chambers until it reached an air-sealed one.
It turned vertically so Alistair was staring at the deck. Another circular hole opened in front of him, and just before the engines fired, Alistair said, “Don’t hold anything back. Full speed.”
“Affirmative.”
Faitrin hadn’t said everything she wanted to when she’d spoken to Thoreaux in the war room. She’d said what needed to be said for the room, but not for Thoreaux. Now, as the first man was just about in range of her lasers, she knew she needed to.
It was a stupid decision; she knew that as well, but she also knew she might not get another chance. Prometheus was a god among men, but even gods failed.
If he failed, they all failed.
Her eyes were grayed over; she was harmonized with her ship.
Jeeves, she said with her mind, connect me to Thoreaux.
Connected, madam.
Faitrin spoke quickly. She was going to miss the shot she should have taken, but she had to get this out.
These past four or five months with you have been the scariest and best of my life. I love you, and I want you to know that. We’re going to make it out of this, but if for some reason, I don’t, know that I will love you until the end of time. Until all the stars explode and the
universe’s expansion stops, I’ll love you, Thoreaux. If there’s something after this life, with the gods, I’ll love you there too. Thank you for everything you’ve given me.
Jeeves cut the transmission.
She told the AI one last thing. Don’t let any transmissions from him come to me until I give permission.
Yes, madam.
She needed complete focus because a metric ton of murderous creatures had just entered her airspace.
Eyes gray, hands still, she opened fire with her mind. The first man-filled capsule exploded as the lasers hit it, and her corvette peeled to the right. There was no shortage of targets. The real concern was making sure she didn’t get smacked by one of those falling pricks.
It had been some time since she’d piloted like this, and she’d forgotten how much she missed dogfights. Her brain had been modified in a way that allowed her to simultaneously steer, adjust speed and trajectory, and aim. The better the pilot, the better they could do all those things at the same time.
Faitrin was a damn good pilot.
She cut the corvette left as a capsule nearly impaled it. She adjusted the lasers with a thought, aiming them to the right of her ship.
A second later, the capsule was in flames.
Weaving around the capsules, she slowly adjusted her altitude, still firing the lasers. In the distance, she could see other pilots doing the same.
Jeeves spoke through their harmony. We are down one corvette. Their fighter pilots have breached the capital. You can expect incoming fire from all directions.
Noted, she responded as she fired at a cluster of falling capsules. Four more enemies burned alive. Without speaking, she told Jeeves she wanted to broadcast to the entire fleet—if this small a group could be called that. We’re down one. Make sure the next one that goes isn’t you. If possible, remain close to the ground-to-air defense system. I’ll take care of the perimeter.
The transmission ended, and Faitrin hit the throttle hard. She watched as her team pulled in.