“I’m not a healer,” I said, taking the hint and moving toward the orc when I stopped. “Wait, how can you open the locks if they’re magical?”
“Oh, you’re clever,” Chloe said, right before she lunged at me, one hand arcing out in a blow that would have knocked my head clean off my shoulders. I ducked the attack thanks to my magic, but it was a near thing. As her fist sailed clean over my head, I planted my palm in the center of her stomach and blasted her with pure force.
The attack threw her backward against the cages, and as she burst through the metal bars and hit the wall behind them, her entire body exploded into green goo.
“What the actual fuck?” I asked, right before more of the cages opened and more copies of Chloe came sauntering out.
“Hey, Mallory. Long time no see.” They all cocked her stupid cheeky grin at me before rushing me, teeth bared.
10
I called upon my power as the werewolf clones rushed me. As I did, the ground beneath me shifted. The whole of it shimmered and pulsed before turning wet and slimy. Glistening pink flesh surrounded me, and as the air hit me like a moist breath, the Chloes morphed into writhing bits of tentacles and protoplasm.
A shriek tore from my lips as I spun on my heel to look for an exit, but all I saw were huge teeth closing around me.
“Mallory Quinn, save yourself!” Morg cried, and as I spun toward the sound of his voice, I saw tentacles wrap around his body, pulling him down into the gullet of the massive creature trying to turn us into bite-sized snacks.
“Fuck this,” I mumbled, shutting my eyes. I knew it was stupid what with the whole thing being a trap to eat me, but that was okay because I had a trump card. Magic. And I was about to magic the fuck out of this bitch.
I called upon my power, and as I did, I felt it pulsing in the air. The symphony of energy I always heard opened up to me as I allowed it to travel around my body and engulf me.
Envisioning what I wanted to happen was easy. I focused on the image of what I wanted, projecting it out, wrapping it in layer upon layer of spell-infused energy.
It was go time.
“Bring it,” I whispered as time slowed to a crawl around me.
My power whipped out like a nuclear blast. Everything slowed like we were caught in the gravity well of a black hole. I sprinted forward, weaving past the tentacles. My hand wrapped around Morg’s breastplate as my other hand whipped out, tearing a hole in space and time to create a portal that led back outside the door we’d come through.
I dragged the huge orc backward, hauling him with all the strength my magic-laden muscles could bear. We hit the portal a second later, bursting through it and back into the room beyond as the jaws of the thing snapped down. I knew because I could see the massive white teeth on the other side of the threshold.
Time sprang back into place as I stared at the creature that had just tried to eat us. It was beyond massive.
“I dunno what you are, but that isn’t cool. You tried to eat me, and you didn’t even have the decency to buy me a drink first.” The creature’s pink flesh undulated as I spoke, and then, very slowly, its mouth began to open to reveal a huge black tongue.
“Watch out,” Morg said, pulling me down on top of him as the tongue shot out, zipping by us and splattering globules across the hallway that caused the steel to bubble and spit. Then before I could even thank him, Morg pulled a chain-dagger from his belt and swept it in an outward arc that severed the tongue. It hit the ground like a writhing eel before burning a hole through the floor and disappearing.
More ichor sprayed from the wounded stump, but a hastily called up shield was enough to deflect it. As I watched the acidic spit try to eat through my shield, I glanced at the orc.
“What is that?” I asked as the ship rocked suddenly, swaying so hard, we slid into the wall.
“Space dragon. I think that was a Mothrin. They have that whole chameleon thing,” Morg said as the head tore free of the structure with a shriek of tortured metal, leaving a gulf in the space beyond. As it continued to scream and flail, ichor dripping from its mouth, it pulled its massive, winged body free from its perch on the ship and leapt into space. Its enormous wings beating against the vacuum of space and propelling itself forward against all laws of physics.
“So uh, saying I buy that a space dragon tried to eat us.” I pointed to the spot where I could actually see space. “Why aren’t we being sucked outside?”
“I’m guessing that the ship is prepared for the dragon to come and go?” Morg offered, shrugging. “It looks like there’s some kind of energy shield.” He took my hand and adjusted my finger toward a weird shimmer.
“Oh,” I mumbled, shaking off the comment because that seemed a lot more reasonable than a space dragon. As I watched it disappear into a speck in the distance, a horrible thought struck me. Where were my friends?
I shut my eyes and reached out for them with my power. I felt them out there in the distance just past where we were. Only it was weird because while before the ribbons had seemed to dead-end within the room with the dragon, now they clearly moved past it, through the empty void left by the dragon’s head and into a wall beyond. What’s more, they felt close. Closer than they’d felt when I’d entered the room.
“I think my friends are through there,” I said, practically leaping to my feet with excitement.
“Makes sense. This way, any rescue parties would have to go through the dragon to get to them. Then they’d get eaten.” He sighed. “Feel bad for the troll now. He probably was the dragon’s caretaker. That’s a dirty job I’d never wanna do.”
“Well, now they’re both in space,” I said, not caring at all about the troll as I helped Morg to his feet. He was a bit wobbly but was otherwise fine. “Also, the dagger is pretty cool.”
“It’s no axe, but it’ll have to do,” Morg said, nodding toward me as we approached the door. All that was left of the room was a series of mesh netting along that stretched out for almost the length of a football field. Was that where the dragon had lain?
On the other side of the mesh was another door. All the ribbons were dead-ending there, so after I took a cursory look around, I made my way across the net. It wasn’t even hard because the mesh was thick and sturdy.
After only a few moments, Morg and I found ourselves on the other side and facing another door with a magical lock. I reached out, flicking my power at it, and as it opened, I found myself staring at a bunch of tubes straight out of Alien Resurrection. Only instead of containing clones of Ripley, these tanks were filled with the unconscious bodies of my friends.
11
“Well, if that’s not creepy as fuck, I don’t know what is,” I said, moving toward the closest tank where Niko Buttertree, my crew’s resident fairy, hung suspended in viscous green goo. Her hair fluttered around her as she stared dead-eyed off into the distance. There were more tanks in the room, and a cursory glance revealed them to contain Jeffry, Oliver, and Chloe.
“I can’t decipher these controls,” Morg said, looking over at me from his position beside a massive console. It sort of looked like a flat board with holographic projections of controls. Multi-colored lights blinked in erratic patterns across its surface, and with each shade of color came a completely different set of controls.
“I get that,” I said, turning to look at him as I tapped the glass for the fifth time. Like all other times, it elicited no response. “‘Cause, you know, you’ve said it five times.”
“Well, I’m an orc, not a scientist.” He shrugged at me. It was a fair point.
“Let me guess, they didn’t teach you how to control a Planet Breaker in Orc School.” As I said the words, I almost wished I hadn’t because he harrumphed and turned back to the console, annoyance clear on his face. I knew he was trying, but well, we’d been in here for a while now. So far, all he’d managed to do was get stumped and make angry noises.
Neither of those things were getting my friends out. Now, it was time to take things int
o my own hands.
“Okay, stand back,” I muttered, turning toward Niko’s tank. “I’m gonna try this my way.”
“We’ve talked about this, Mallory Quinn,” Morg said. “You don’t know what kind of technology is in place. Blowing the tank might do them irreparable harm.”
“Well, your face is doing me irreparable harm,” I sneered, calling on my magic. As I did, I felt the room come alive in a way it hadn’t before. Magical energy swirled around every piece of machinery in the room, and as I opened my eyes to it, I found I could see each and every tank glowing. Cords of power wrapped around them like a bizarre spider’s web. I leaned in close to look at Niko’s tank.
The cords were rooted to her. They fed from her out into the tank itself. Glistening pink and purple sparks traveled along it, culminating in the lid where it flared like a miniature sun. Interesting.
I reached out toward it and felt the hop, skip of the beat of the power. It still had that strange, unnatural twinge to it, but this was a lot more natural than anything else I’d felt, and what’s more, it felt like Niko.
“I think the machine is drawing on their own innate magic to power the tanks.” A smirk crossed my lips as I turned to look at Morg. “How many control patterns are there?”
“Four,” Morg said, and as he spoke a lightbulb practically turned on above his head. “One for each tank!” He smacked his fist against his palm. “Mallory Quinn, you’re a genius.”
“I know, but I still like hearing it,” I said, turning back toward the fairy’s tank. This time I reached out toward the power, and it responded, leaping to my metaphysical call.
Sparks jumped and danced, and the cords coming from Niko writhed. I wasn’t sure what that meant, but that didn’t matter because I had a plan. I touched the cylinder and concentrated on the underlying magic. As I did, the whole schema of the spell popped into my mind.
I called upon my own magic and used it to weave what amounted to a giant stick, then I shoved that giant stick into the spokes of the spell. The whole thing ground to a halt with an explosion of force that threw me backward across the room. My hip hit one of the empty tanks and pain exploded through me even as my suit re-routed the force across the entire surface area.
As I crashed to the ground, the lid of the tank containing Niko sputtered and popped, throwing sparks in every direction. Cotton candy pink light leapt from the apparatus as the liquid inside began to bubble. Then Niko turned to look at me.
Her eyes had lost that vacant gaze they’d held only moments before, and as she saw me, her face lit up. She reached out, tearing the ethereal threads attached to her away. Her legs began to kick, propelling her up to the surface.
A moment later, she was at the top of the tank, and as I tried to get back up so I could help her, Morg drove his hand through the top of the tank. The lid cracked with a sound like an egg hitting cement, and he reached in, pulling her free of the viscous goo.
It dripped off her entire body as he set her lightly on the ground. As she lifted her legs and wrung out her arms in an effort to throw the snotty substance off of her, she beamed at me.
“Thanks for saving me, Mallory.” Her words made a jolt of both pride and relief hit me.
“You’re welcome,” I said, nodding to her as she wiped a gob of slime off her face and flung it on the ground.
“That totally sucked by the way.” She shivered. “It was like being in an endless loop of my life, only as I got to the good parts it went into fast forward.”
“What happened to you guys?” I asked, overjoyed that she was all right. Despite whatever the tank had done to her, she seemed relatively okay, which was good. I was already going to blow this stupid ship to kingdom come, so I’d have needed to come up with something worse if these assholes had actually hurt my fairy friend.
“It’s hard to say,” she said, her footsteps leaving a slimy snail trail as she followed me toward the next tank. Oliver bobbed inside, but oddly enough the Atlantean seemed fairly at home in the fluid. Then again, he was a fish person from the bottom of the ocean, so this was likely fairly close to his natural habitat.
“How is it hard to say?” I asked as I concentrated on Oliver’s tank. Like with Niko’s tank, cords of magic ran all over the structure, turning his own innate powers against him and keeping him locked up tight. Sure, his was a bit different, like how all those kinds of spiders make different webs, but it was still a spider web. “Don’t you remember what happened?”
“Not really,” she said, shaking her head. “I remember being on the Endeavor when the orcish ship went kablooey. We went to intercept. Warm light wrapped around us, and as it did, everything went black. The next thing I knew, I was in an endless cycle of my life.” She pointed at me. “Then you woke me up.”
“Well, that’s super helpful,” I said, fashioning another one of my magical sticks and jamming it into the gears holding Oliver inside. Like last time, the magical spell ground itself into oblivion, and because I was ready for it, not only did I not get blasted across the room, but I was able to redirect the concussive force into the tank itself.
The glass shattered in a spray that hit the wall behind us, leaving Oliver’s bulbous form to collapse to the ground in front of us. He lay there for a moment, hands gripping the steel floor in a way that made me worry. Had I done something wrong?
“Are you okay?” I cried, dropping to my knees in the muck and grabbing hold of his shoulders. His eyes fluttered toward me, and he nodded absently.
“Yeah, just trying to orient myself back to reality,” he said in his glub, glub voice. Then he shook himself like a dog, splattering me with warm goo.
“Mallory Quinn, we’re going to have trouble,” Morg said, looking up from the controls. As I turned toward him, I saw that two spheres had gone from multihued kaleidoscopes of color to bright red. Worse, there were a bunch of angry symbols all around it.
“Any idea what that means?” I asked right before the far door opened and more of those four-armed Mornir came charging in.
“I’m guessing it means it’s calling for help,” Niko said, her bat-like wings beating the air furiously as she tried to lift off. Only she couldn’t move more than a few inches. “I won’t be able to fly until my wings dry off,” she muttered angrily as she raised one hand like she was going to throw a fireball at them. Only nothing happened. “And the goo washed all my dust off!”
“Stand back then,” I said, springing to my feet and calling on my own power as Morg launched himself into the cadre of soldiers. His chain-dagger whipped around, severing arms, heads, and all sorts of other body parts, but as pink blood splattered across the walls, I saw we were seconds from being overrun.
More soldiers were pouring through the door with every second, and as I took a step toward Morg to try to help him battle them, doors on either side of the room opened to reveal more of them.
“Were they just waiting to pin us down?” I cried, calling upon my magic and using it to grab ahold of the door and wrench it back in place. Something inside my brain snapped, and pain shot through me as the door cut through one of the soldiers, leaving half of him on our side and the other half trapped in the hallway beyond.
Blood began to pour from my nose, and as I reached up to touch it with one finger, Oliver grabbed me by the hair and jerked me backward.
I hit the ground hard as a plasma bolt cut through the air where I’d been. A Corim had joined the soldiers to the right, and Morg was way too busy rending limbs across the room to be of much help.
“I’m not much of a fighter, Mallory,” Oliver said as I scrambled to my feet, pain shooting through my temples in jagged bolts of lightning.
“Yeah, I know,” I grunted, calling upon my power, but as I did, the whole of my world went full tilt sideways. Power sparked off of me, and I could practically feel my flesh dissolving as I pointed a hand at the soldiers. They fired again, sending gouts of plasma toward us, but I had already summoned up my power.
Their shots froze
in midair and hovered there angrily. Strain filled my brain, and my vision started to darken around the edges as I shoved my hand back toward them. The plasma bolts launched backward, slamming into the lead soldiers and burning through their magic-deflecting chest plates. They hit the soldiers behind them, knocking them back and buying me a precious few seconds which I used to hock a bloody loogy onto the steel floor.
Everything tasted like blood, and the amulet on my chest burned like fire, but I pushed past it.
Morg was launched backward. His body slammed into a tank, shattering the glass as he flew through it to crash to the ground in a rain of debris.
“Is that all you’ve got? Because I’ve got to say, I’ve met elves who hit harder,” Morg snarled, climbing to his feet. Blood covered his body as he took a wobbly step toward the soldiers flooding into the room. His chest was a smoking ruin where his armor had been, and I could see charred, blackened flesh beneath.
“Damn,” I muttered, turning to look at Oliver as he knelt on the ground beside me. Niko wasn’t doing a lot better, but that was hardly her fault since she was tiny, and her magic wasn’t working.
“What’s the plan, Mallory?” Oliver asked, glancing at me. “Because I hate to say it, but it seems like we’re losing.
“Get me to Jeffry or Chloe,” I said as a wave of nausea hit me, and I struggled to keep from throwing up. I wasn’t sure what was going on, but I could feel my body overheating, feel the magic inside me rushing around without direction and focus. My veins were on fire, and worse, just those little spells I’d done felt like they’d nearly broken me.
“On it,” Oliver said, scooping me up and sprinting across the room. Plasma bolts filled the air as he wove by them.
We reached Jeffry’s tank a second later, and even though everything inside me hurt, I opened myself to the flow of magic. That was when I realized the problem. The goo clinging to my flesh was dark and angry, like diseased ticks sucking at my magic.
Planet Breaker: A Supernatural Space Opera (Witching on a Starship Book 2) Page 6