“Come on,” I said to Kovac. “Let’s go for a ride.”
A moment later, we were grabbing on to the cat’s thick velvety skin as she leapt down the track from container to container. The building shook again violently as we bounced down the track and as I looked back, I saw several large groups of Egghead troopers raining down after even more landings had collapsed.
I also saw heavy equipment near the top of the building break loose and go tumbling down—some landed in the metal vats, some ricocheted off of lower landings toward us, and a single, transport-sized piece of chunky processing equipment slammed into the tracks just in front of us.
The cat jumped onto the giant piece of equipment and then leapt to the next container without breaking stride. And then, before I knew it, we were back on the ground. Ahead of us was a sea of Dominion troopers who were all running toward the loading bay door.
I wrapped an arm around the cat’s neck, leaned forward, and pointed to the doors. “Take us through there. Quickly!” I said.
We moved even faster, bounding between—and sometimes onto—troopers who were running for their lives to exit the building. And in just a few moments, our mount burst outside with a mechanical roar.
I leaned down again and pointed toward the towering capitol building. “Get us there as fast as you can!” I yelled.
We flew down the streets toward the capitol. There was a battle taking place in front of the mining facility. A sizable group of Peacekeeper soldiers with plasma weapons were driving back a much larger group of Dominion troopers, all of whose weapons had lost their energy. I took us on a slight detour around the battle—along the path Kovac and I had taken to get to the facility in the first place—and in no time at all we had arrived back at the capitol.
The courtyard was completely silent, and as we approached the entrance, we saw that its enormous double-doors were still wide open. We dismounted the cat and I told her to go hide behind a nearby row of tall bushes and wait there until I called—just in case an eager Peacekeeper soldier got excited.
Kovac and I hurried as fast as our tired and broken bodies would take us through the empty halls and toward the security center. Its metal sliding door was pinched shut just the way I’d left it.
I was completely out of energy at this point, so I looked around and blessedly spotted a vending machine just down the hallway. Of course, I didn’t have my credit module with me, so—making sure there weren’t any government employees around—I lived out my teenaged dreams, took out my rod-sword, and smashed its synthetic-glass front. I sheathed my sword, pulled out a couple bags of Super Salty Kuiper Rings, and devoured one as I ran back to the security room.
Kovac was trying to pry open the door with his hands, which he might have been able to do if he kept it up long enough. But I had him stand back, handed him the other bag of Kuiper Rings, and raised my Power Glove to peel the door open.
“Rand? Lopez?” I yelled into the room.
Nothing.
We peeked inside, searching desperately for any sign of our crew. But the only thing we saw was a large duffel bag on the center console, next to a very wrinkled magazine. And on the floor beneath the console lay a large, rectangular ventilation cover.
“Uh, oh,” I said.
39
WE STOOD IN the doorway to the empty security center, unable to believe that Rand and Lopez were gone.
“Lopez must have been desperate,” I said. Kovac snorted.
A banging noise came from behind us and we both spun around with our glowing weapons drawn.
The hallway was empty. There was another banging noise, followed by a muffled shout, which I now realized was coming from somewhere behind a wall. This was followed by a much louder scratching noise and then a loud clang to our left.
We turned and saw a ventilation screen laying on the floor, and soon two arms in faded blue dust-covered fatigues poked out from a nearby rectangular hole at the base of the wall. These arms were soon followed by the rest of Rand, who now looked like an old wizard with his gray hair and dusty mustache.
Kovac ran up to Rand and gave him a big bear hug, lifting him into the air.
“I’m . . . delighted . . . too,” Rand said.
Kovac set him down, chuckled, and then slapped him on the back. In an instant, the two were surrounded by a cloud of dust.
We heard Lopez’s coughing before we saw her slide out from the ventilation shaft. Her raven black hair was now lighter and a lot dirtier. She brushed herself off, cursing under her breath the entire time. When she looked up to see Kovac and me smiling, we got a quick, half-hearted “shut up,” and then she went back to cleaning herself.
“We—we—” Rand sneezed, then continued. “We were under the impression you’d been eliminated by the Dominion.”
“I thought you said you’d eat Rand before you’d crawl through a ventilation shaft,” I said to Lopez.
She stopped cleaning herself just long enough to stare daggers at me.
“Too stringy,” she said with no intonation whatsoever. Then she went back to swatting the dust off of her pants.
“I can be quite persuasive,” Rand said with a grin. “All it required was my absconding with her Sol Weekly magazine and reading its articles out loud, asking constant follow-up questions.”
“Ha ha,” Lopez said sarcastically. “So, what the hell took you guys so long?”
Kovac and I began talking excitedly over each other.
“There was a secret entrance—” I said.
“My glowing hammer—” Kovac said.
“And an epic sword fight—”
“Trooper MY SIZE—”
“Craniax and these evil-looking—”
“A glowing staff—”
“Used the stones together—”
“Slammed my hammer—”
“And my giant pet robocat—”
That’s when a team of Peacekeeper soldiers ran into the building with their weapons drawn and yelled at us to put our hands on our heads. After convincing them we were also Peacekeepers from Nix station, one of the soldiers spoke into a comm unit and ordered us to come with him.
They took us to the building’s lobby, where a tall, broad-chested man with tall, whitish-blond hair, dark green fatigues, and several colored bars on his chest stood waiting. As soon as we came to a stop, the four of us saluted.
“At ease, soldiers,” the colonel said.
Then, with a stone-cold look on his face, he asked, “I’m Colonel Lundgren. Now, which one of you was seen riding a giant purple monster out of the mining facility?”
“We were, sir,” I said. “Private Elric Kovac here and myself.”
The colonel took a step closer, scowling. “And you are . . .?”
“Private Lucas Walker, sir.”
He looked Kovac and me up and down.
“And you two are responsible for powering down the enemy’s weapons?” He asked.
“Well, not entirely, sir.” I said. “It’s been a long road, and it was really Colonel William Hiller who was in charge until . . .” But I couldn’t finish the thought.
I swallowed, then continued. “But Private Kovac and I wouldn’t have made it to the mining facility if it wasn’t for the rest of our crew—Private Maria Lopez and Chief Mechanic Aaron Rand.”
Colonel Lundgren nodded at the others and began to pace in front of us.
“Well done, soldiers. We owe you a great deal. Thanks to you, we’ve re-established interplanetary communications and will be receiving reinforcements shortly to finish off what’s left of the enemy and care for the wounded.”
He stopped in front of me and wrinkled his brow when he saw the sheath slung over my shoulder. “Is that a testing rod on your back, soldier?”
I opened my mouth to answer, but just then, the colonel was interrupted by the loud beeping of the comm unit on his wrist. He held up a finger, then gave two long taps on his inner-ear unit to put it into private mode and turned to the side.
�
��Go ahead,” he said.
A look of confusion came over his face.“What do you mean an anomalous reading around Neptune?”
Kovac, Rand, Lopez, and I all looked at each other.
A pause. “It’s probably just faulty equipment,” Lundgren said. “Central has been meaning to upgrade those sensors for years. I’m sure HQ there has already sent in a requisition for replacement parts, so don’t worry about it. I’ll be back to the office shortly.”
He tapped his inner-ear unit again and turned back to us.
“Thank you again for your service—we’ve just dodged a significant bullet, but we’re not in the clear quite yet.”
Colonel Lundgren motioned behind him and said, “These soldiers will escort you to HQ, where you will make your official reports and will likely be reassigned elsewhere.”
The colonel stood at attention and saluted, and we returned his salute before he walked away.
Rand turned to face the rest of us. “Did the colonel just say ‘anomalous reading’?”
“He sure did,” Kovac said.
Lopez exhaled. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Well,” I said with a smile, “I have a feeling our lives are about to get a lot more interesting.”
EPILOGUE
SO THERE I was, pausing for breath behind a barricade with my glowing yellow light sword held in front of me. I counted to three, then leapt out from behind a corner and reached out with my Power Glove toward the storage crate a few meters ahead of me. It rose into the air, and I sent it flying into the side of the large metal waste container with a loud bang, where it shattered into pieces.
I turned my glove over, palm up, and the broken pieces lifted into the air. I curled my fingers toward me slowly, and the pieces moved just as slowly through the air. When I turned my glove back over, the floating pieces dropped to the ground.
I quickly turned around and extended my glove toward a chair that was sitting in the center of the room. It rose a few meters, and then when I made a fist, a bright bolt of scarlet energy shot out from my hand, blew the chair apart, hit the wall on the other side of the chair with a small explosion, and kept going. Oops.
A door just beside the blast slid open and Lopez rushed inside. “Are we under attack?”
“Not yet,” I said, extinguishing my rod-sword.
“Wait a second,” Lopez said, turning around and looking at the giant scorch marks on the wall behind her. “Please don’t tell me you’re practicing with that stone from Brainiax again. You know they said it’s off limits.”
“Crainiax,” I corrected. Then I flexed my Power Glove and turned it around so she could see all three stones—violet, amber, and ruby—glowing faintly.
“Come on Lopez,” I said. “We’re the only ones who know what it really takes to beat the Dominion. I can’t just sit around and wait for someone in charge to tell me what to do. Promise you won’t say anything.”
Lopez stared at me blankly for a few seconds. “Fine,” she said. “Whatever you say, Luke.”
I clenched my jaw and tried not to let on how much I hated it when she called me that.
Lopez smirked, then continued. “Just don’t get caught taking Panthra out for any more rides.”
I looked to the far end of the room, where my mechanical feline was quietly licking her paw in the corner. Sure, the name was a little corny, but it definitely wasn’t any worse than the names of the Dominion’s leaders.
Just then, an intercom unit above the doorway crackled to life. “This is control. I have an urgent message for Sergeant Walker.”
“What is it?” I said loudly.
“Colonel Vaega has ordered you and your team to Neptune immediately. Please confirm.”
“Roger that,” I said.
I whistled loudly and Panthra was on her velvety paws and at my side in an instant. I held my yellow sword out in front of me, and as it flared brightly to life, I grinned.
This is what I always wanted to be, ever since I was a kid. And this is what I had finally become.
A hero.
Thank you for reading Rebel Sword, Book 1 of Galactic Knight. If you enjoyed this book, would you please leave a review?
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