Shades of Death

by Ramy Vance

  A bolt of energy burst from the dropship, tearing into Terra’s squad, sending bodies flying accompanied by the pained screams of the free orcs.

  Terra dove for cover, rolling over to her side as an orc ran at her. She kicked his legs out when he was close enough, pressed her rifle to his head, and fired.

  Persephone had been flung close to Terra, who helped the drow out of the rubble. “Do we still have access to those satellites?” Terra shouted amongst the chaos.

  Persephone nodded. “Creon is taking care of them.”

  Terra looked up at the dropship and commed Creon. “I need a volley on my coordinates. Never mind the delay. When you hear this, fire!”

  Terra sprinted after the dropship. She slashed through every augmented orc she passed, moving as fast as she could, leaving dozens of bodies behind her.

  Terra stared up at the sky as it began to glow from the energy cannons of the satellites. She slid under the dropship as the energy cannon fired, tearing through the craft and launching Terra into the air. She hit the ground hard and lay there for a moment, trying to catch her breath. Persephone wasn’t far behind. She helped Terra to her feet.

  The dropship fell slowly to the ground, where it crashed, kicking up dust. When it came to a stop, its doors opened, and hundreds of orcs looked at Terra and Persephone.

  The drow swallowed loudly. Terra saw the fear in Persephone’s eyes. “Don’t look so worried. We got this.”

  Behind the orcs, Terra spotted an augmented troll almost three times the size of a regular troll. Black tentacles whipped around his head as he released a roar.

  “Are you sure?” Persephone asked.

  Terra cracked her knuckles and spat. “Yeah, I’m sure.”

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Creon opened the portal to the orcish world for Abby. Martin was manning the satellite bombardment to give Creon the time to walk Abby to the hadron collider.

  She had assured him she could do it herself, but the goblin had insisted. “If you can’t even make it to the collider, we shouldn’t be sending you out.”

  Abby knew she could make it, though. Since talking with the nanobot consciousness, her body had felt less like it was betraying her. She didn’t feel the need to have Martin having her body operating on different levels. That didn’t make her any less afraid of what would happen once the nanobots were released from her body.

  And reaching out to the nanobot consciousness wasn’t the same as talking with Martin. She could ask a question in her head and direct it to the nanobots. They didn’t answer. The only time they had spoken with her was when they’d chosen to.

  Martin and Abby had talked about the nanobots. Unfortunately, they couldn’t voice their concerns in secret. Martin hadn’t cared, though. He had been very straightforward about his lack of trust for the nanobots. He reminded Abby that they had tried to take control of her body once already. Abby tried to assure him that they had only expressed a desire to keep on existing. “They aren’t sentient,” Martin had retorted. “They’re more like a billion ants that think they’re sentient.”

  Abby had countered with, “Some people were uncomfortable about you when you first came to.”

  “It’s not the same thing. But whatever. Let’s see if you’ll live through this or if I’m going to have to find a way to pull your ass out the fryer.”

  That had been earlier in the day. Now, Abby and Martin were waiting for Creon to finish loading up the coordinates for the orcish world. The goblin’s HUD beeped, and he stopped to check it. “Oh…well, I got some good news for you. Sarah’s managed to locate Anabelle. She’s working on an extraction right now. It’s not too far from where you’re heading.”

  Abby did a double-take as she glanced at Creon. “Are you telling me she’s been on the orcish world the entire time?”

  Creon nodded as he sighed. “It was perfect thinking. The last place that we would assume to check. And the Dark One wouldn’t have to spread his resources too thinly if he was planning on attacking Terra already. Sounds like we got played.”

  “Not if all this works out. Could be the biggest blow we’ve delivered so far if it goes off without a hitch.”

  “Let’s hope it does. Ready?”

  Abby nodded and faced the portal, then took a breath and stepped through.

  Terra wrestled with the augmented troll—if you could call it that. In essence, she was being ripped from the troll’s chest and then repeatedly slammed into the ground. She didn’t stay down long, though, rolling to the side as Persephone’s tentacles wrapped around the creature’s arms.

  The troll pulled back, tossing Persephone into the air. The drow quickly retracted her tentacles, causing her to fly toward the creature. She hit its chest, pressed her rifle to the troll’s head, and fired before flipping away from the creature.

  Terra flipped her ax and tossed it at the troll’s foot, impaling it where it stood. Then she ran up to it and delivered an uppercut to its jaw. The troll stumbled but was anchored by the ax in its foot. It lurched forward and slashed Terra across the chest.

  Persephone’s tentacles wrapped around the troll’s arm, but the creature didn’t care. It continued its savage attack on Terra, who held her arms in front of herself, hoping to protect any vital organs if her arms didn’t get shredded.

  The troll ripped the ax from its foot and slashed at Terra and Persephone, causing them both to step back, barely managing to avoid the plasma ax.

  Terra studied the battle surrounding them. It didn’t look good. Her forces were being pushed back to the Grand Hall. They simply didn’t have the numbers. Even if the free orcs were fighting with every ounce of strength and determination they possessed, it wasn’t enough to beat the superior ground forces they were up against.

  And, much like the troll that Terra was fighting, these orcish attackers were on an entirely different level. They didn’t seem to feel any pain and were noticeably stronger than any orc Terra had fought. Everything Terra had thrown at the troll in front of her was enough to take down ten trolls. If the Dark One was doing this to his soldiers, they might never be able to defeat him using traditional means.

  “You haven’t given up yet, have you, kid?” Terra called to Persephone.

  Persephone glared at the troll before whipping her tentacles out again. “Not even close.”

  A purple plasma blast shot past them, hitting the troll in the shoulder. It burned through its body, almost tearing the creature in half.

  Terra’s jaw dropped. It was the first damage she’d seen the troll take since she and Persephone had started fighting the thing.

  They looked over their shoulders at where the blast had come from.

  Abby exited the makeshift Dark Gate that had been sent with Terra, which she had deployed after receiving word from Creon. “Damn, Abby, I didn’t know you were packing heat like that!” Terra exclaimed.

  Abby’s armor looked different. It was more metallic-looking than before, but across the entire surface, nanobots moved en masse. As Abby’s arm morphed into a larger cannon, the nanobots’ construction was evident. In addition, Abby’s new armor had no face, only metallic blackness. She looked even less human than before.

  “Duck,” Abby said, her voice cold and distant.

  Persephone and Terra obeyed and Abby released another plasma blast, this one more powerful. The fire tore through the troll’s torso and beyond, ripping up the ground and eviscerating everything in its path.

  When the smoke cleared, Abby was standing behind Terra and Persephone. “Are you two okay?” she asked.

  Terra nodded as she got back to her feet. “We are now. So, you have that magic cure to get us out of this shithole?”

  Abby looked at her hands. “We… I mean, I am that cure. We just need to get to a good vantage point to release the nanobots. Does that dropship work?”

  Terra glanced at the dropship that had delivered the augmented reinforcements. “No, that’s the one Creon blew out of the sky.”

  Abby
walked to the craft and pressed her hands to its hull. Nanobots flowed off her body, slipping into the cracks of the ship to begin the repairs. Within a couple of seconds, the external damage had been fixed. She pointed at Persephone. “Come with us…me…for safety. Otherwise, they’ll come after you, too.” Persephone ran after Abby, leaving Terra on the field. “Will you be okay?” Abby asked Terra.

  Terra shrugged as she picked up a chain-gun lying beside what was left of the troll. “Survived this long. You two be safe.”

  Abby boarded the ship with Persephone as the dropship roared to life. It took off without a pilot, the nanobots controlling its flight.

  The two girls walked through the dropship and entered the bridge. Persephone was silent, following meekly as though afraid of her. Abby could tell. She felt afraid of herself. The moment she’d hit the hadron collider, the nanobot consciousness had reached out to her, to remind her that they didn’t want to leave her body. A few billion nanobots departing wasn’t an issue. The consciousness wanted to remain.

  “Is everything okay, Abby?” Persephone asked.

  Abby stared at the battlefield through the viewing window. “You know, when we first joined up, all we wanted to do was kill orcs. Revenge, you know? The Dark One’s forces killed my pa. But we didn’t see that. We just saw orcs that we wanted to kill. That’s the whole reason we did this to me. Now, here we are, trying to save all of them. Kinda funny how that works out.”

  “You didn’t answer my question.”

  Abby turned to Persephone, slits appearing in her armor to reveal her eyes. “I…we think we’re changing. Don’t know how yet. Not completely, but it’s happening. Maybe even more after this. But that doesn’t really matter right now. You’re going to be safe. We’re all going to be safe.”

  Abby turned to the view of the battlefield. She touched the ship’s console, and the nanobots flowed from her body. They moved in a black wave that poured over the console and spread across the walls until everything inside the bridge was covered.

  The nanobots continued moving, expanding, and searching for more until they had encased the exterior of the dropship. At last, they retreated, rising into the sky in a black mist that settled over the battlefield.

  All the fighters on the field paused for a second, confused by this black miasma. And then the augmented forces started screaming. Their wails pierced the air before they fell, grasping at their throats, choking, struggling to breathe.

  The augmented forces began to vomit, spewing black bile everywhere as they foamed and frothed at the mouth. In some cases, the nanobots had chewed through their augments, and now the small pieces of remaining tech were burrowing into their eyes and ears and mouths.

  Terra rallied the troops to retreat from the horror-scene unfolding before them.

  The augmented troops were still screaming. They stumbled to their feet, trying to walk on shaky legs, many falling over again. It was pure chaos.

  Inside the ship, Abby collapsed to the floor, her armor gone, now nothing more than an ordinary child. Her eyes rolled, and she began to convulse, all the while speaking as though in a dream. “Have to control them, Mother/Creator. Have to control.”

  Persephone ran to Abby and knelt beside her. “Abby, I’m here!”

  Abby didn’t register anything Persephone said. She continued to repeat herself. “Have to control them, Mother/Creator. Have to control.”

  A few moments later, she stopped moving and lay very still as the dropship began to fall from the sky. Persephone spread her tentacles over Abby, scooping the human into her arms as she blasted the window of the dropship open. She leapt out seconds before the nanobots in the ship began to rot and dissolve.

  As Persephone fell, she shifted Abby’s weight to her shoulders and aimed her tentacles at the ground, shooting them forward to form a cushion for their landing. She hit the ground with a heavy thud, thankfully without injury.

  By now, the augmented forces were scattered across the battleground, all as still as the dead. Terra’s forces hadn’t returned to the field, but Terra and Cire had come back, Nib-Nib trailing behind them.

  “Was that it?” Terra asked.

  Persephone, cradling Abby in her arms, looked up at Terra and shouted, “Help her!”

  Terra scooped the girl up into her arms, eyes wide and frantic. “How? What am I supposed to do?”

  Abby’s eyes fluttered open. She groaned softly as she raised her head. “Are they alive?”

  Cire went to one of the orcs and rolled it over to check for heartbeat and breathing. “Yes, they are alive.”

  Abby smiled as she sighed. “Good. Then it worked.”

  Persephone brushed Abby’s hair out of her face. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, we’ll be okay. Just tired. That was a lot of ourselves to give.”

  Terra, who was staring down at Abby, raised her eyebrow. “What do you mean, ‘we?’”

  Abby waved a hand at the battlefield of fallen orcs. “Us.”

  Nanobots, now only a fraction of what had been sent out onto the battlefield, rose into the air, creating a small swarm that floated toward Abby. “This is all of us that’s left.”

  The nanobots landed on Abby’s face, covering it as they crawled into her eyes, nose, and ears. The girl’s body trembled. “All of them…the orcs are free. They’ll be disoriented. Now we all have to rescue Anabelle. She’s not far.”

  Abby raised her hand, the nanobots forming a HUD that showed Anabelle’s position. “I can use the rest of our power to reroute the Gate to open at Anabelle’s coordinates, but we won’t be able to really fight until we rest. We’ll have some reserve power, but that’s all.”

  Everyone’s HUDs initiated at the same time, Martin’s projected holographic appearing on all their screens. “Where the fuck is Abby? Is she still alive?”

  Abby leaned over and waved at Martin. “We’re still living.”

  Martin’s paperclip body was bristling with anger. “What the fuck do you mean, ‘we?’ Those nanobots forced me out of your head, Abby. They took their chance. They’re in control.”

  Abby shook her head slowly. “No, that was an accident. We need you, Martin. There’s no way we can maintain this body without you. We only disconnected for a moment to put up a firewall to make sure the Dark One’s tech didn’t interface with us on any level. Please come back to us.”

  Martin eyed Abby suspiciously, but he disappeared from the HUD projectors.

  Abby crawled out of Terra’s arms and limped to the Gate that stood amongst the bodies. “Someone will have to be here when they all wake up.”

  Terra looked at Cire. “Do you think you can handle this?”

  Cire pounded his heart. “I will assemble the rest of the horde, and we will welcome our brothers and sisters to the fold.”

  A few feet away from Terra, an orc raised his head, his eyes searching until they fell on Abby. “You…you freed us.”

  Abby touched the Gate, her nanobots beginning to work. “There is no ‘I.’ There is only ‘we.’” She turned and smiled at Terra and the others. “We freed you. All of us did our part.”

  The orc struggled to sit up. “Thank you. We are forever in your debt.”

  Abby pointed at Cire. “Then talk to him about what you must do to honor that debt. It sounds as if it will be sooner rather than later.”

  The Dark Gate opened, a black hole in the middle of the battlefield. “Sarah’s forces are inbound already. If you can rouse the freed orcs, do it. We will send you the coordinates. Anabelle is waiting for us.”

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Terra, Persephone, and Abby walked out of the Dark Gate portal. In the distance loomed a defense tower. The clouds around it were red, and black lightning crackled within them. The tower extended far into the sky.

  Terra whistled loudly as she stared at the tower. “We’re supposed to be breaking into that? I’m pretty sure they have a whole goddamn army in there. I don’t know what you were planning, Abby, but I’m not ready to a
nnihilate an entire army.”

  Abby raised her arm, projecting a hologram of the tower. “We aren’t planning on a full-on assault. That would be suicide. We’ve downloaded all Sarah’s intel—as well as intel from other agents—on the structure of the defense towers. They’re built with a substructure underneath, similar to a sewer system.”

  Terra pumped her arm in excitement. “Sweet. Looks like we’re going to have a good ol’ Star Wars sewer scene. Just a heads up: we should avoid anything that looks like a trash compactor.”

  Abby stared blankly at Terra for a moment before grinning slightly. “We are familiar with that genre trope.”

  Persephone went to Abby’s side, her face still sagging with worry. “Are we still expecting to fight? Are you sure you’re up to it?”

  Abby looked at her hand. Her nanobots ran up her skin to form a cannon. “If we come across any issues, we should be able to hold our own. Hopefully, we will not have much fighting. The synthesis of information from our intel is hypothetical. A good hypothesis, but not perfect.”

  Terra sank into a low crouch, still staring at the tower. “You sure we shouldn’t wait for reinforcements. This place gives me the creeps. I don’t like it. Nope. Not one fucking bit.”

  Abby’s holograph changed, showing a fleet of ships. “Reinforcements are coming. But we would be foolish to wait for them before extracting…saving Anabelle. There will be a fight, and there’s a chance that Grok will move her.”

  Terra put her hands over her face and rubbed vigorously. “Are you fucking kidding me? We have to deal with that shit-head too?”

  Abby shrugged, a gesture that appeared inhuman when coupled with her emotionless face. “We don’t know for sure. Merely a guess. Anabelle’s HUD is giving off a faint trace, so we are certain she is there. We should assume Grok would not be far from her trophy.”

  Terra stood and dusted off her pants. “Might as well get to it. Nobody’s getting saved with us sitting on our asses.”