Despite how long they’d staked out the warehouse, she still expected some stray former Shadow Coalition members to be waiting for them. But silence hung over the vast room. The only sounds she detected were the echoes of their footsteps and the soft noises of their breathing.
“Any sign of the damn vault Xadrian said that we’d find?” Holly asked softly.
“Hey I’m here, guys,” Darius’s voice suddenly said in Holly’s ear. “I got your back. Currently watching through Holly’s camera.”
“Stalker,” Holly said, laughing.
“Yes, Darius, that strikes me as somewhat creepy,” Shiro said, the slightest hint of laughter in his voice.
“Fine, I’ll switch to your camera,” Darius said.
“Not so far, Holly, no sign of a vault,” Odeon answered.
The crew moved together through the shadows. For the most part they saw nothing of interest. As they rounded a pyramid shaped stack of crates, something stirred in the gloom at the far corner. Holly froze, her heart suddenly roaring in her ears.
“What was that?” She whispered, her lungs nearly paralyzed in fear.
“I saw it too,” Iain said. “A rat or something. Hard to make out in this light.”
“Moving toward it,” Shiro said, his voice steady.
Iain and Holly stayed behind them. Holly checked continuously over her shoulder to keep the rear clear.
She looked back to the corner to study the mysterious object. It seemed to be a pile of trash, initially, but it had stirred. Perhaps a rodent of some kind.
As they neared the trash, the object in question emerged as more than just trash. In the poor lighting conditions, it became clear that what they were seeing was in fact a body and the trash was tattered, dirty clothing.
Not a rodent.
“Does someone have a flashlight?” Holly asked softly.
“It looks like a body,” Odeon said.
Iain flicked on a flashlight and focused the beam on the body. Holly bit her lip, pleading with the Universe that it wasn’t a dead child—a dead anything, really. They were almost on top of it now, Shiro and Odeon having determined that whatever it was, it wasn’t a threat.
She could finally see it now as the beam of light landed on the face.
Holly cursed. She recognized the face, despite the smudges of dirt coating the cheeks and the dried blood gathered around his mouth. Some of what she thought was dirt was likely bruising. She was angry, and seeing someone she knew like this, beaten and abandoned in the warehouse, left for dead, stirred her blood toward boiling temperatures.
“How many—” she cut off, too angry to speak. It would be fair to assert that this was a standard ploy of Xadrian’s and Dave’s—to send her on a job to retrieve a human, but not mention that little fact. Why they couldn’t just tell her that she was going after a person? It was something she’d force Dave and Xadrian to answer when this was over.
“What’s happening?” Darius asked. “Whoa, that looks like a person. Am I seeing this right?”
“Yes, lad. It’s Jamie. From the Shakti job. He’s hurt. Unconscious, doesn’t look good.”
Holly appreciated Shiro’s answer. She was furious and only just getting a grip on her anger. Would it have made a difference to know? Could they have gotten there faster and spared Jamie the abuse? They would never have the answers now.
“Why is he here, like this?” Odeon asked softly.
“A trap?” Shiro answered.
“Help him,” Holly said. “Iain?”
“Yes, and give me some light, please.” He handed her the flashlight, which she held focused on Jamie as Iain put the aether gun down and started assessing the man. He found Jamie’s wrist and held it skillfully. “He’s alive.”
Holly breathed a sigh of relief. “The camera outside. Someone must know we’re here. And now we have Jamie. Stay alert. I don’t think this was a trap, but I don’t think we’re safe.” Even as she spoke the words, she began to wonder if it could be a trap laid by none other than Xadrian. She considered it, working out the various angles, then settled on it not having been orchestrated by Xadrian and Dave. At the very least, the part they may have played in it was that they’d been set up by someone else.
“Why Jamie, though?” Odeon asked again.
“Good question,” Holly said.
“Whoever did it will be here to clean up after themselves. They likely thought he would die alone here, silenced by that death. I see no mortal wounds. He may be dehydrated. His skin doesn’t look good. And his face is covered with bruises, so whoever did this beat him pretty soundly.” Iain pulled a small bottle of water from the field medicine pack he’d put together and poured it over Jamie’s face.
Darius’s voice suddenly came over the comms. “Guys, I’m picking up some transmissions on the net on Itzcap. Someone is aware of you there. Stay alert.”
Jamie sputtered and stirred. His eyes opened gradually. The water covering his face glistened in the flashlight beam.
“Hey lad,” Shiro said gently. “You’re safe now.”
Jamie tried to sit up, but hissed in pain.
“What’s happened to you, Jamie?” Holly asked. “Why are you here?”
“Sorry Holly, first things first,” Iain said, interrupting Holly. “Do you have any serious injuries? I need to know before we let you move. I checked and didn’t see any, but you were unconscious.”
Jamie’s hands were tied. Iain used a knife to cut through the plastic wire holding his wrists together. This helped Jamie sit up. But before he moved very much, he flinched and fell back.
“What is it?” Iain asked.
“My leg,” Jamie said, reaching for his leg. He groaned and began to whimper. “There, near my knee.”
Iain followed Jamie’s direction and ran his hands gently along his thigh. Holly kept the light focused on them, exchanging occasional looks with Shiro and Odeon as they kept a lookout around the perimeter of the warehouse.
Jamie suddenly yelped, “Ah, ah, right there.”
“I feel what I believe is a fracture beneath your skin. We’ll have to figure out a way to move you without making it worse.” Iain said, giving Holly a grave look. “I do have one syringe full of numbing medicine. I can give that to you until we get you to a hospital. Do you want that?”
“Yes, yes, please.”
Holly was eager to find out what the hell Jamie was doing there. She’d let Iain do the talking and administer to the man. But now she had to know. While Iain found the syringe and prepared to give to him, she spoke. “Jamie, why are you here? Who did this to you? Xadrian sent us here for you. Who brought you here?”
Jamie’s eyes glistened with tears. Perspiration was breaking out on his forehead. From the pain of his broken leg, she assumed. “Holly. So good to see you again. Thanks for coming for me. I was certain no one would ever find me after those bastards got me.”
“What bastards?” She gritted her teeth in frustration.
Shouts rose from the far side of the warehouse where the side entrance was. More shouts came from the area where Holly and her crew had entered. Damn. Both exits were out of the question now. Not only were they trapped, they were also trapped with someone who couldn’t run.
“Turn out the flashlight,” Iain whispered at Holly.
She did. They had no cover, nothing they could do. When they enemy arrived, Holly and her crew would surely be slaughtered.
Shiro and Odeon moved closer to the voices, to do what they could to protect Jamie, Holly, and Iain. Iain was the only one who had a projectile weapon, other than the knives in Holly’s sleeves. Shiro also kept a throwing knife on his body somewhere.
“Iain, your gun. I’ll cover Jamie. You do something to protect us with that gun. Or better, yet,” she said, thinking quickly as her mind raced for a way out of the warehouse, “blast a hole in the warehouse wall.”
“Good thinking,” Iain said, pulling the gun out and powering it up. “The weapon’s master at the training center eve
n modified it to have more power.”
The voices came closer.
Shiro and Odeon returned, their faces betraying the danger of the situation.
“These guys are armed. Not with knives and swords. Guns,” Odeon said quietly. “We must leave quickly.”
Iain aimed at the wall behind Jamie and blasted it. It was a thin corrugated steel like so many warehouses in areas with easy weather. Daylight poured in through the opening, blinding Holly for a moment. This initial opening wasn’t large enough for them to walk through. Before the dust cleared from that explosion, Iain fired another round violet-hued ball of aether at the wall, expanding the opening.
Shiro and Odeon immediately moved to carry Jamie out through the opening. Iain positioned himself in such a way to cover them with the aether gun while they crept through the opening.
Holly waited by the opening, ready to assist them. Jamie wailed at the pain from his leg—apparently the numbing solution hadn’t completely worked yet. Holly began to move to help by lifting the injured leg, not even sure if that would help. The report of gunfire deafened her. It was a pneumatic projectile weapon, not an aether gun like Iain’s. Holly’s ears immediately began ringing as she checked on Jamie and rest of her team. She saw Iain looking around. His gaze settled on Jamie. His face changed. And he began to move toward the opening the aether gun had left. Holly glanced at Jamie.
Horror swept over her.
The shouting coming from behind her was muffled beneath the high pitched ringing of her ears. They were coming.
Jamie was dead.
Holly dove for the opening which Odeon and Shiro had already passed through, dragging Jamie’s body with with them.
21
“Bring him,” Holly insisted.
“Holly, we can’t carry the dead and get away from them” Iain said, turning back to study her, speaking in a soft but firm voice. “It’s not Jamie anymore.”
They’d stopped just through the opening and Holly halted in her tracks, waiting. Odeon and Shiro had let go of Jamie’s body and prepared to keep moving. They exchanged a look, then glanced back between Iain and Holly.
Holly couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “We can’t leave him.”
Shiro began to speak, “Holly, lass—” but stopped short and looked away, his mouth compressing into a thin line.
“Jamie is no longer in the body,” Odeon said gently. “It’s just a shell. His spirit is everywhere now. He would understand.”
“It seems wrong.” Holly listened to herself, questioning even her own assertion that they endanger themselves to bring the body of a fallen comrade. What was she thinking? Jamie wasn’t a comrade, and yet he wasn’t an enemy. He’d died on her watch. She felt a responsibility to do something right for his remains, but whoever they were—former Shadow Coalition members, she assumed—they were coming after her crew. There were a lot of them, too. She could hear them pouring through the warehouse, searching, locking it down. She scanned the area and saw a stack of crates with a gap between one of the bottom ones and the wall of a neighboring warehouse.
“Let’s move his body there,” she said, jerking her chin in the direction of the crates. “And then we run for it.”
Together the four of them hoisted Jamie’s limp body and hurried toward the crates. The shouts of their enemy continued behind them, getting closer. Holly’s heart raced. She wasn’t sure if she and her crew could outrun them now. She’d never forgive herself if her insistence on doing something somewhat responsible with Jamie’s body endangered her crew.
Gunfire rang out. Bullets pegged the warehouse above her, cracking the metal and splitting it open. No words escaped the lips of her crew, they simply all scattered to the four winds. It was an escape plan that was always on the books—when in doubt and being pursued, simply run for it. And in that case, they all agreed that splitting up would almost always be for the best. They could rendezvous together, later, when their last ditch escape plan resulted in all of them surviving.
Holly dodged into the nearby alleyway, her forehead bent forward, her limbs carrying her fast as possible, moving on autopilot. Adrenalin coursed through her like fire and she nearly felt like she was floating or flying. More gunfire followed by the sound of bullets ricocheting and lodging deep into the steel of the warehouse, she slipped around some crates and boxes, attempting to hide herself during her escape. Up ahead when the alley ended, houses began. That worried her. She didn’t want some idiotic thug firing into an area that could result in innocent bystanders getting shot.
She lowered her head and sprinted, pushing everything she had in her into her legs. She crossed a street and jumped onto a sidewalk, then came to a brick fence and leapt at it using one booted foot to push herself upward. She grabbed the top and pulled herself over it. Before she jumped to the other side, she looked back the way she’d come.
Holly gasped. There were at least twenty former Shadow Coalition members spreading out and combing the area. She caught the tell-tale cephalopod tattoo on one of their necks—at least a mark that she assumed was that tattoo. She couldn’t be sure. She dropped onto the other side of the fence.
It turned out to be someone’s yard. There was a pool and water features all cramped together into the small yard. Holly didn’t stop running. She made it to the other side of the yard and leapt off a stone bench onto the fence surrounding the back edge of the yard. That let her down into another yard. Shouts behind her indicated that they were still hot on her tail.
She hadn’t heard from her team. She touched her ear. “Iain? Shiro? Odeon?”
She trotted through the next yard. This one wasn’t fenced in, and the yard led to a driveway. She waited, looking around to see if any of the SC members were on the road in front of her. Cries and gunfire behind her pushed her out into the road. She turned and ran down the hill just as an auto came screaming up the hill with SC members hanging out the windows wearing black clothing. Holly darted into the narrow driveways of the clusters of houses on the other side of the road, slipping over another small fence. The auto couldn’t follow her there, but the thugs could get out and hoof it after her. She skidded to a halt. The bay was on the other side of this row of houses and she nearly stumbled down the hill into the rocks below. There was lush vegetation growing along the cliffs where it wasn’t bald from the incline, and filled only with rocks.
Holly could try to climb along the narrow ridge behind the houses, but she would be exposed there. She held her breath and hurried down the steep hill into the vegetation. It would conceal her better than the alternative, and then she could continue putting distance between herself and the SC members pursuing her.
As she made her way south, she wondered about the others. Were they OK? She spoke again, asking after them, then after Darius or Charly back on Kota. Was someone there? Anyone?
There was only silence on the other end.
22
She stopped glancing behind her as she scrambled over exposed loops of roots and branches, which slapped her in the face. Brambles snagged on her clothes and clung to her, blocking her from her chosen path, forcing her to move around them or drop to her knees and crawl beneath clusters of shrubs.
Holly began to lose track of her location and how far she’d traversed. This was a wild section of the coast, an untamable area that was too steep to build on, which was covered with the talus of previous landslides. Where it wasn’t steep, it was blanketed with vegetation not meant to give easy passage. There were a few tall trees, but the majority of the landscape was covered with growth only a few feet taller than Holly and packed in densely.
Soon she found a covered area with a small clearing and a single large boulder covered in shade and shielded enough that if she stopped and rested, she wouldn’t be exposed to possible pursuers. She sank against the boulder, leaning her back into it and crouching down on her heels.
The blood still roared in her ears, though every sound, now that she’d stopped, was loud like it was being filte
red through a megaphone.
Holly stared back the way she’d come, taking long, deep breaths, attempting to calm her breathing while searching for signs of danger.
As she considered what had happened, she began to wonder if those who’d come after them knew who they were, or if they’d accidentally happened upon Holly and her friends in the warehouse. Were they originally coming back for Jamie? Had they seen them in the security camera before Holly tore it down?
Her rest was short lived. As she searched back the way she’d come, Holly spotted several heads cutting through the vegetation. She got up and continued on, choosing now to do her best to not leave a trail. She slipped between branches rather than tearing through them and tread carefully over the ground cover. How long could these idiots chase after her? Didn’t they have something better to do?
By the time the sun was closing in on the horizon, Holly’s fears were magnified. She couldn’t spend the night there. She needed shelter, but those who’d pursued her had forced her into an area of what seemed to be a jungle. Even if she could make it up the steep cliff, who knew what she’d find up there. The Shadow Coalition could still be combing the area, beating the bushes and trying to force Holly and the others out of hiding. And if she could make it back to their rental, she couldn’t say that it wasn’t being watching by the Shadow Coalition.
Holly had stopped calling them former Shadow Coalition members. It was clear now that whatever had happened to George, they had patched themselves back together and were still functioning like the operation he’d once headed up as the Heart.
Whatever she could do now, she needed to find somewhere safe to hide for the night. Before darkness fell.
The Colossus Collection : A Space Opera Adventure (Books 1-7 + Bonus Material) Page 99