by R S Penney
“Yes, ma'am,” Terron said.
A wave of her hand revealed a thick red line along the corridor wall. A major power conduit. If Anna was feeling particularly ambitious, she would follow that all the way to the power core and try to disable the station. However, her enemies would anticipate that tactic, and Ben would need to follow the power lines to get where he was going. Better to just disable their ability to track her
Anna backed away from the wall.
She lifted her pistol in both hands, aiming for a spot just above the power conduit. If she hit the damn thing dead on, the explosion would almost certainly kill her. “High-impact,” she ordered. The LEDs on her weapon turned red.
She fired.
A powerful slug left a dent in the wall, a crater nearly the size of her fist with a hole just large enough to poke a finger through. It was dark on the other side, but she knew the power conduit would be there.
Anna frowned, then lowered her eyes to the floor. Strands of red hair fell over her face. “Hurry up, Lenai,” she told herself. “You stand around here much longer, and you're gonna end up with a bullet in the head.”
It was hard not to think of Jack.
Anna took an EMP charge from her pocket. A bit of adhesive on the back allowed her to attach it to the wall over the hole. Direct exposure to the power lines ought to do the trick. Now, all she had to do was trigger it.
She turned and ran up the hallway.
Once she had put some distance between herself and the hole in the wall, she turned around and tapped the screen of her multi-tool to trigger the remote detonator. A brilliant white flash was followed by a shower of sparks pouring out from the wall, and then the lights went out.
Emergency lights came on half a second later, providing just enough illumination for her to see. Not that she would need it. She could navigate these corridors blindfolded with Seth's help.
Footsteps and voices in the distance told her that a security team was on its way. In all likelihood, they would be coming around the corner any moment now. It was time to be away from this place.
She ducked into an adjoining hallway.
The CIC was abuzz with activity as her officers scrambled to respond to the threat. Security teams in full tactical gear were on their way to neutralize the intruders. No doubt the Leyrians had sent some of their Justice Keepers. Kyla had always wondered if the stories about those fabled warriors were true, and you could call it cowardice if you were so inclined, but she was glad she wasn't the one who had to find out.
“Ma'am,” Lieutenant Tarson said, looking up from his control console. “We've just lost a power conduit in Blue Sector. Level 3, corridor 6-B.” A tight frown put creases in his brow, and then he shook his head in disgust. “We just lost another. Level 2, corridor 4-A. Ma'am, Blue Sector is on emergency power. We can't track them with sensors.”
Kyla shivered.
As she paced across the floor, running her hand along the back of a console, a very ugly thought occurred to her. She had been wondering why the intruders were sticking to Blue Sector, and now it was clear. “Send ten officers to secure the SlipGate,” she barked. “Now that their advanced scouts have disabled our defenses, the Leyrians are bound to send more troops in.”
“Aye, ma'am.”
Kyla stiffened in frustration. “Ten more officers to reinforce the Detention Area, and ten here to CIC,” she added. “If we lose control of this room, it's all over.”
Alani Terron looked up to study her, blinking as though confused by what she had just heard. “Ma'am, this station is run by a skeleton crew,” she said. As if Kyla was not thoroughly aware of that fact. “We only have sixty security officers. This will make it much harder to catch the intruders.”
“Carry out my orders, Lieutenant!” Kyla snapped. “The rest of our security staff will break into teams of two or three and sweep the corridors. Start at the edge of Blue Sector and work your way inward. Try to box them in.”
“Yes, ma'am.”
Kyla faced her people with hands clasped behind her back, her chin thrust out. “I want everybody else to begin preparations for a full evacuation,” she went on. “Destroy all sensitive information and equipment, then make your way to the shuttle bay in Green Sector. When the way is clear, bring the telepaths. I'm not losing them to the Leyrians…And launch fighters! I want that Leyrian ship destroyed.”
She would tell the computer to deactivate life support in one hour; that should give her people enough time to escape. With any luck, the Leyrians would be stuck here with no air and no shuttle. It was highly unlikely that they would be able to break Antauran command codes; the odds of them gaining control of the computer and reactivating the CO2 scrubbers were small. One way or another, she wasn't letting them out of here.
Jack was crouched on a set of stairs that led up to the second level, peering through a doorway that looked out on a long white hallway. The emergency lights provided more than enough illumination for him to see into the distance, but contact with Summer was even more helpful.
There were several intersecting corridors in the wall to his right and doors on either side. Given the spacing between one room and the next, it was very likely that these were crew quarters. He'd caught sight of the odd officer in blue just before the station went on full alert, but now the hallways were devoid of everyone but security personnel. No doubt the others had been told to stay in their rooms or leave the sector altogether.
Every now and then, he saw a small team of men and women in black tactical gear come around a corner and head down the hallway. So far, he had engaged none of them. His job was to damage their systems, not fight security officers.
He'd blown one of the major power conduits and cut fiber optic cable at several key locations; even if they were able to restore main power, their sensors would be useless in all the places he had visited.
“Stay calm, Hunter,” he whispered. “You just have to keep this up a little while longer while Ben rescues the telepath.”
He moved up the stairs.
In the hallway that extended from the second-floor landing, he saw two large men walking side by side with their backs turned, each one carrying an Antauran-style assault rifle. He ducked low in case one of them decided to look over his shoulder.
They turned down an adjoining corridor.
Jack closed his eyes, pressing a hand to his forehead. He rubbed away a layer of sweat. We've done all the damage we can, he noted. We're going to have to start making some noise if we wanna keep them off Ben.
He moved into the corridor, keeping a hand on the pistol that was holstered at his hip. The gun was set for stun-rounds – he wanted to get through this without killing if at all possible – but he left it powered on so that he could draw quickly.
Footsteps to his right.
Jack spun around, pressing his back to the corridor wall. For a very long moment, he just listened, trying to pick up some sign that someone was coming this way. If only Nassai came with the ability to see around corners. For some odd reason, Summer felt guilty about that. Or at least sorry.
After nearly half a minute of silence, he decided to start inching his way toward the intersection. If he could find some kind of critical system – a science lab, perhaps – and do some damage, that would get-
A security officer stepped out from the adjoining hallway and and froze when he saw Jack. His eyes flared behind the visor of his helmet. “Intruder alert! He's right here in corridor 4-C!” The guy tried to aim his rifle.
Jack snap-kicked, striking the barrel and pointing it upward just before the weapon went off with a POP! POP! POP! Chunks of some kind of building material rained down on the soldier's helmeted head.
Jack slipped past his opponent.
He whirled around, wrapping an arm around the guy's neck and holding the man's body against his own. As he backed away from the intersection, another armoured guard appeared. This one wasted no time shouting for help.
Instead he lifted his rifle for
a kill shot, squinting through the visor of his helmet. “Let him go,” the man ordered in a thick accent. He wouldn't fire so long as Jack continued to use his comrade as a shield. “Now!”
“Say please.”
“Let him-”
Jack gave his captive a shove.
The man went stumbling forward like a freight train gone off the tracks, careening toward his partner. Sadly, the second guard was quick-witted. He stepped out of the way and took aim with his rifle.
Jack jumped and did the splits in midair just before the gun went off. Three bullets sped through the space beneath him, and then he dropped to the floor to land in a crouch. Another stream of bullets went over his head.
Jack somersaulted across the cold floor tiles, uncurling to lie flat on his back right in front of his opponent. He kicked up, striking the rifle and ripping it from the man's grip before he could fire.
The guard gasped.
Curling his legs against his chest, Jack kicked out with both feet. A powerful hit to the chest sent the security officer stumbling backward to collide with his colleague, and they both went down in a tangle of limbs.
Jack got to his feet.
Drawing his pistol, he pointed it down at the pair of men who were writhing on the floor. He fired a stun-round into the first guard's neck and watched as the man spasmed from the jolt of electric current.
The other one managed to roll out from underneath his collapsed partner and push himself up on all fours. A stun-round took him in the neck as well – that armour would absorb the current if struck directly; so Jack had to aim for a weak spot – and he flopped about like a fish on dry land before collapsing to the floor.
Best to leave now.
Jack started up the adjoining corridor, silently congratulating himself for defusing that situation without resorting to any of his special abilities. Anna would be proud, and Summer was grateful that he hadn't asked her to tire herself.
The hallway stretched on for several hundred feet with three intersecting corridors in the wall to his left and one in the wall to his right. No sooner had he finished praising himself for defeating two guards than three more came around the corner.
Two men and one woman stepped out from an intersecting corridor, each carrying an assault rifle. Like the others, they were all dressed in black body armour and round helmets with clear visors pulled down over their faces.
They froze upon seeing him.
Half a second later, they had rifles up and ready to fire. Only one thing to do. With Summer's aid, he crafted a Bending, wrapping space-time back upon itself. The air before him seemed to shimmer, light stretching and refracting until the only thing he could see was a blur of swirling colours.
Bullets jerked to a halt in front of him, curving slowly as they followed the path of twisted space-time, each one heading back in the direction it had come from. He allowed the Bending to dissipate.
Three guards were staggering backward through the corridor, having just suffered the sting of their own gunfire. The man on the right had dropped his rifle, and now stood rubbing his upper arm. The guy in the middle looked dazed. Time to press his advantage.
He Bent gravity.
Jack flew through the corridor with his legs curled up against his chest, propelled by an irresistible pull toward his opponents. He planted both feet against the middle guard's chest and rode him down to the floor.
Instinct made him turn in time to see the woman round on him and try to take aim. Jack kicked her hard in the belly. She went flying backward to hit the corridor wall at full force, dropping her weapon on impact.
He grabbed her by the shoulders.
With a growl, Jack turned and flung her at the man who was still standing. They collided before the guy could finish drawing his sidearm, and they both fell to the floor. Now was a good time to-
Jack yelped.
The man he was standing on had seized one of his legs and was now trying to force him off his feet. Keeper strength got him through that mess. Jack pulled his leg free and kicked the guard's face.
He ran past them and ducked into the nearest corridor, seeking cover wherever he could find it. Those three would be on their feet again any moment now.
Move, Hunter, he thought. Move.
Anna had made her way down to the ground level where the dimly-lit corridors felt like long caverns that led to the lair of a sleeping demon. Sometimes, when she passed an intersection, she caught the sound of footsteps or frenzied voices, and one of the locked doors was muffling the sound of a young man who was clearly sobbing, but aside from the odd glimpse of black tactical gear, she had been able to evade her pursuers.
She turned down a corridor that ran parallel to the one outside the cargo bay and froze. Two men walked side by side about thirty paces away, both facing away from her. Should she stun them now?
Anna ducked around the corner.
Pressing her back to the wall, she drew in a slow breath. “Have patience,” she whispered to herself. “No need to start a confrontation. For all you know, they have ten more buddies around the corner.”
She ventured a glance and saw that the two had made it all the way to the far end of the corridor. She was about to follow when something else caught her eye. The doors in this part of the station were a little different.
Instead of the standard-sized doorways that would probably lead to workrooms or crew quarters, one large opening in the wall to her left led to what appeared to be a mess hall. She couldn't get a good look from this angle, but if she was correct, that would be a great place to hide and plan her next move.
Anna started up the hallway.
Scrubbing a hand over her face, she ran fingers through her sweat-drenched hair. “So far, so good, Lenai,” she noted. “Just hold out for Ben to give the all clear, and you can make your way back to the SlipGate.”
She approached the opening and froze.
A man in black stood there with his back turned, peering into a large room with a low ceiling. Several long tables were positioned against the wall to her right, and there was a serving counter along the wall to her left. Definitely a mess hall.
The guard must have heard her footsteps because he turned around and stumbled backward when he saw her. “She's here!” he shouted at the top of his lungs. “We've got an intruder in the mess hall!”
He thrust a gun in her face.
Anna crouched down, seizing his wrist in both hands and pointing the gun upward before it went off with a POP! With Seth's help, she Bent gravity and lifted the man right off the floor.
He flew up to collide with the ceiling, then dropped to the floor, landing face-down at her feet. A groan was her reward for all that trouble. Half a moment later, he looked up to blink at her through the visor.
Anna touched a foot to his chest.
A second flare of Bent gravity sent him sliding backward through the mess hall, screaming as he clawed at the floor to steady himself. For those brief few seconds, he was falling toward the far wall.
Footsteps in the hallway.
Anna reached out to the side, brushing a plastic chair that was positioned at the end of a table. The light Bending she applied would last for barely half a second, but it would have to be enough.
The chair flew backward.
It collided with a guard who tried to come in through the doorway behind her. Knocked back by the impact, he stumbled into the hallway and tripped over the next officer in line. Both men toppled over, falling to the floor.
Anna broke into a sprint, running across the floor tiles. When she looked up, she saw that the man she had kicked across the room had recovered and was already getting to his feet.
Anna leaped, somersaulting through the air. She uncurled to land behind him, then whirled around to face the man. Wrapping an arm around his neck kept him from struggling too much.
She grabbed her stun-pen.
Pressing the tip to the man's neck, she thumbed the release and extended the needle into his carotid artery.
In just a few seconds, her captive went still as the tranquilizer put him down. Damn it but this guy was heavy.
Glancing around him, she saw the other two security officers on the far side of the room, standing just inside the doors with assault rifles pointed at her. Neither one would fire so long as she held their comrade captive. “Looks like we have a standoff,” she said.
“Let him go.”
Anna closed her eyes, sweat matting damp hair to her brow. “I don't think so,” she said, shaking her head. “Now, the thing is, I'd rather avoid any more violence. But you're going to have to put down those guns.”
The man cocked his head to one side, blinking at her from behind the visor. “You invade our facility,” he said in a thick accent. “Then you blame us for the use of violence. Leyrians are such arrogant-”
“You have a telepath prisoner here.”
“What of it?”
“You don't understand why holding a human being captive is a problem? And you call me arrogant?”
She drew her pistol and took aim.
A flickering force-field appeared in front of both men just before she squeezed the trigger, her shots bouncing off the buzzing wall of electrostatic energy. Thinking on her feet, she tossed the body aside.
She dove to her right, passing through a narrow opening in the serving counter, and landed on her side next to a stainless steel island. No doubt the serving bots used that to chop up vegetables. “Multi-tool active!” she gasped. “Begin white noise protocol. Jam all electromagnetic and SlipSpace radio frequencies!”
Shots rang out, striking the counter and sending chunks of wood flying. Some of them punched right through, hit the island and ricocheted off it. Her body was aching, but she couldn't stay here.
Anna crawled on her belly across the tiled floor, moving through the narrow space between the island on her left and a series of ovens on her right. There were cupboards at the back of the kitchen, a fridge and several dishwashers. She noticed a large set of doors that would probably lead into the pantry.