The temptation was strong, but she didn’t rise to the bait. Maybe it wasn’t intended as bait and he really was surprised. Either way, she knew that it wouldn’t do any good to argue with him about inter-species sexism.
“You’re not going to be very interesting, are you,” the Kriori said with a sigh. “What is your name?”
“Sergeant Andrea Dolan. ESS Marines,” she replied flatly.
He waited.
She stayed silent.
“Maybe I should talk to one of your compatriots here,” he went on. “Perhaps they will have more to tell me.”
“I’m the sergeant. Talk to me,” she said.
He waved a hand dismissively. When he did, she saw the spine-like protrusions along the inside of his palm. It was a reminder of what those protrusions were for and just what his ability was. She wasn’t in any rush to learn firsthand, and hoped she wouldn’t.
“You aren’t very entertaining to talk to, nor particularly informative,” he said. “Your little team invaded our compound and shut down our communication system. While that isn’t overly troublesome, I assume there is more to your plan. And you will tell me what that is or you will find yourself on the next ship full of slaves heading for the Kriori Empire. One way or another, you will tell me what I want to know.
“You can be assured of that, Sergeant Andrea Dolan.”
Chapter 9
0755 Hours
Andy tried to figure out how long it was that the three of them had been the not-so-honored guests of this Kriori. She guessed it couldn’t have been more than a half-hour, but she wasn’t able to be sure. All she had was a sense of time passing and her ability to estimate, which wasn’t very scientific but she was usually pretty good at figuring these things out.
At the moment, her lead captor wasn’t trying to lure more conversation out of her and he wasn’t moving into full-on interrogation techniques. She wondered how long it would be before they reached that point.
She watched him across the room while he dealt with a prisoner who actually tried to cause the guards trouble. The woman, of a race that Andy didn’t recognize, had started screaming incoherently. Admittedly, Andy didn’t know if it was on purpose or just a byproduct of it all, but it had been effective to draw them over.
Of course, keeping herself still when they exercised their means of quieting her down wasn’t particularly easy. She didn’t silence after the first hit, but the second seemed to do it. It went against everything in Andy to stay put, but she knew that she was in no position to fight them right then.
While the guards were distracted, she examined her restraints and tried to shift her wrists. The lock was unlike anything she had seen before and they didn’t budge with just the pressure she applied to it. There wasn’t actually any obvious locking mechanism, but it was also obviously not something like a tied rope.
“Sergeant,” Anallin said in a low voice that she interpreted as urgency.
She looked up in time to see the lead guard approaching and she stopped messing with her bonds. If he noticed what she had been doing, he didn’t let on. In fact, he didn’t come back to them at all. He paced close to them, but was talking with one of the other guards, a non-Kriori humanoid.
At first, it surprised her that they were talking within her earshot, but maybe they were just used to slaves who had stopped caring, or maybe they themselves didn’t care because they assumed that she couldn’t do anything with whatever she heard.
“I think the latest lack of discernment in the raids has given us a worthless crop,” the humanoid guard was saying. “I would toss them all out and find new ones, find better ones.”
“How good does a slave have to be to be thrown onto a front line?” the lead guard, the one who had been talking to her before, replied snidely. “Think it through, you fool. We need them to serve only one purpose, and it doesn’t matter what state they are in when they serve that purpose, so long as they draw breath.”
Andy forced herself to keep her head down, appearing defeated. She didn’t want them to know that she was listening, but she was intent on their words. The Kriori were, what, building an army? Did they not already have their military forces? Slaving was practically a way of life for the species, so they would be building an army for their race and not just themselves as slavers...but why?
“We cannot withstand the storm without more forces,” the lead guard said, his voice practically a hiss of anger. “You know that. So why bring this to me?”
The other was silent for a moment and sounded chastised when he replied, “I suppose I am just frustrated with the ones that we have here.” There was another pause. “Most of them are nothing more than lumps of flesh while others are—”
As if to make his point for him, one of the slaves in shackles began to shout. The words were garbled, but they seemed to be somewhere along the lines of, “I will not fight in your damned army, Kriori filth!” He raged against his own chains, pulling at them as if he could pull them from the walls and get his hands on the guards.
One of the guards began to approach him with his hand raised, but the man didn’t even need it. He just collapsed to a pile. The guard looked disappointed and kicked the body on the way past.
“I don’t exactly find this much more tolerable than that man did,” Jade murmured.
Andy glanced around quickly to try to spot their captors. They weren’t looking back in their direction yet, still engaged in their own conversation, so she turned to Jade. The younger woman was staring at the slave who had fallen.
“It’s not tolerable,” Andy agreed. “It shouldn’t be. If you bow to the shackles put upon you, then all of you is lost even if your body remains. We will get out of here, we will not be lost. Take in everything around you and be ready when our opportunity comes.”
“Yes, Sergeant,” Jade said tightly, nodding a little.
Andy’s dark eyes kept flicking up to keep a location on the guards in between her attempts to analyze her hands and what kept them bound. Their feet had not been bound, so when the time came, they would be able to move. She tried to determine if there was any way to learn where in the building they were so if they managed an escape, they would know where they were heading.
It wouldn’t do to get free only to get lost.
“You’re never going to get free,” a voice who had not been part of the conversation before chimed in.
Andy blinked and looked up, spotting the slave nearest to where they were being kept. It was a woman and she looked to be human. She was in shackles and a collar, sitting on the cold stone floor with her head back against the wall. She glanced at them from time to time in between staring at the ceiling.
“You have that look of a new slave,” she said. “You know, one who still has hope that they will get out, but it won’t happen. I’ve been sold again and again, usually get sent back for my rebelliousness, but despite all my efforts and all of my attempts... Well, I’m still here, aren’t I?”
“Maybe today is the day that’ll change,” Andy said quietly.
The woman laughed. It was a high-pitched, thin sound that almost hurt Andy’s ears. It was a bitter sound like what she often heard from her mother, on those rare occasions their conversations went on for longer than five minutes. It grated on her right down to her soul, but she pressed her lips together.
“We’ll never escape,” the woman said, her vacant eyes keeping up its in-depth examination of the cold ceiling.
“We’re going to get out of here,” Andy said to Jade and Anallin. “Oorah.”
“Oorah,” they both echoed, very quietly.
Chapter 10
Everything had settled down after a few minutes.
Andy was beginning to wonder where the rest of her squad was, not to mention the rest of the marine deployment. It couldn’t be that difficult to track them, could it? The compound was a single building, so they had to be able to find them soon. She wasn’t sure about their chances of escape, or at least didn’t have a pl
an yet, and she wasn’t keen to find out how things were going to go if they remained too long.
The guards left the other slaves alone now, since they were no longer acting up. Andy felt sure that their attention would turn to them soon enough, even though they were still distracted with each other.
Andy kept at it with her bindings, thinking that she might have identified the locking mechanism. Of course, she hadn’t yet figured out how to break it, but knowing was half the battle. It was slow-going because she had to keep checking the location and attention spans of the guards, to make sure she wasn’t found out.
“What are you doing there?!”
The voice was loud, angry, and demanding. Andy’s heart skipped a couple of beats when she realized that she hadn’t been as covert as she thought. She had been found out. Lifting her head, she saw the lead guard staring in her direction, but...not at her. He was staring at Jade, who looked guilty. Had she been working on her restraints as well?
“I already know that you are useless,” he said casually, seemingly no longer angry. He lifted his hand, and Andy just knew what was coming.
Andy didn’t stop and think. The direct and deadly threat to her squad-mate, who she was tasked to protect as much as to lead, was just too much. Instinct kicked in. She made the most of her unbound feet and propelled herself up and over, throwing herself quite literally in front of her teammate just as Jade gasped.
To her credit and Andy’s pride, the younger woman did not scream. Whatever was going to happen, she was going to take it with stoicism and bravery.
That was only a moment of recognition amid a rapid-fire succession of events. As Andy was pushing herself in front of Jade, the Kriori fired a lightning bolt. It wasn’t like the mythological bolts thrown by the god Zeus, it simply fired from the Kriori’s palm. She could see the orange glow of the bolt as it arced across the distance between them. Everything seemed to slow down in that moment.
The split-second she had as the bolt shot at them gave her the time to think about the fact that she was going to die. This lightning was going to hit her, center mass, and electrocute her. She was a tough woman, but she couldn’t imagine a way for her to survive that. It seemed fairly clear that she was about to die.
She wasn’t afraid. Andy knew that any of her squad would lay down their lives for her and she had no regrets in doing so for them. Her only regret was leaving her people without her to face their captivity, but hopefully, the 33rd would be showing up soon...
The electricity struck her directly on the chest.
She felt the crackling as it raced over her skin, and her heart skipped a beat. Everything felt very hot all of a sudden and time sped up again, dropping her to the floor with a heavy thud as she waited for darkness to take over her again. This time, for good.
It never came.
All she did was hit the ground. Everything was still hot, and she thought she could hear the crackling sound, but everything else came to a halt. It didn’t even seem like anyone was breathing, including her.
What just happened?
She was still alive, and she didn’t even feel injured. She felt a little strange, but perfectly healthy and intact.
Pushing herself to her feet, she looked around and saw the Kriori who fired the bolt just standing there, bewildered. She felt everyone staring at her, and she didn’t blame them.
“That...” the guard began, before gesturing again.
For the second time, she watched as that lightning bolt streaked from his open palm. The antenna on the top of his head sparked and waved, and the spines in his hand seemed to pulse with the red-orange light that leapt forward. Just like it had before, it crested the space between them.
She didn’t even try to move out of the way. Was it shock? Or was it some new found confidence?
In fact, the moment she saw it leave his hand, she didn’t even watch it like she had the first time. She looked at the guard, who seemed...disconcerted by her reaction. He expected her to jump or scream or something. She almost expected herself to do it. But she didn’t. She just held his gaze as his lightning hit her straight on for the second time.
Like before, she didn’t die. She wasn’t electrocuted. The force of it pushed her back, but she kept her feet.
Heat. She felt a lot of heat now, but it wasn’t burning her. There was that charged feeling to the air around her, but it didn’t hurt. She glanced down at herself and thought she could even see the tiny dancing bits of electricity playing on her skin, yet there was no pain.
Still, there was that sense of everything standing still. There was no breathing. Her heartbeat was quiet. There was just the sound of the lingering lightning and all of the questions floating in her head. How had this happened?
How was she not dead?
Andy flexed her fingers, even though they were still bound before her, and looked up to see the Kriori guard now well past dumbfounded into outright shock. His small mouth was open with an as of yet silent question and those intense eyes pierced her. She just stared right back at him. Although she hadn’t been willing to show any fear toward him before, now she felt even less of any fear she might have had before.
“What are you?” he asked, shaking his head slowly. “You cannot possibly be human.”
“You know, I’m hearing that a lot,” Andy replied with a faint smile.
Of course, now she knew that she had just painted a target on herself.
She was a threat.
Chapter 11
Fortune favors the bold.
Andy knew that she couldn’t be either smart or cautious now. She was, somehow, immune to their primary power and their primary source of threat. It had also been made obvious that she wasn’t afraid of them and was willing to get in their way. Every tactical brain cell that she had knew this meant they would want her taken out fast.
She did the first thing that came to mind, which was a direct charge.
Even though her hands were bound, they were bound in front of her allowing her to use them, and her feet were free. Since he couldn’t use his lightning on her, she just ran straight for him in the hopes that he wouldn’t be able to do much else.
The space between them hadn’t been very great and she crossed it quickly. As soon as she was in reach, she planted her feet and laced her fingers together, swinging her clasped hands like a warhammer for the Kriori’s head. He recovered from his shock only just in time to jump back and avoid her strike.
He swung wide and she ducked under his fist, not coming back up immediately. Instead, she drove forward and put her shoulder into his midsection. They went down together, but she was on top and she pinned him. Using her club-like hands, she swung hard and caught him in the side of the head before he could do anything to stop her.
The first hit stunned him, while the second and third rendered him unconscious—or dead. There wasn’t time to check.
Another guard came for her, shooting more lightning. It hit her like a fist, but it didn’t knock her over. She threw herself to her feet and off the Kriori beneath her, spinning to find the offender. There were now four guards and all of them were coming for her, but Andy was no longer alone. Jade and Anallin were also on their feet.
Part of her wanted to tell them not to, because she knew they wouldn’t be immune to lightning, but she was also aware of the fact that she wasn’t likely to do well in a four against one fight, especially when she didn’t have full use of her hands. Of course, she wasn’t going to let that slow her down. Not now.
Anallin charged the closest Kriori guard, fists swinging wildly, catching the guard in the head. It happened so fast, the guard couldn’t even raise a defense and the power behind the Hanaran’s swing brought that guard down instantly.
As Andy swung at the non-Kriori, she was peripherally aware of Jade getting her arms around the next guard’s neck, using her own bound hands like a rope and pulling against his throat until he fell forward with her on his back. She used that leverage to pull harder until she wa
s sure he was down.
Andy’s first strike was blocked, but she quickly shifted her weight onto her back leg and used the forward foot to snap out and catch the other in a leg joint. She heard the cracking of the bone and knew another guard was out of the fight.
One guard left.
Andy felt like her heart was about to beat right out of her chest from the adrenaline coursing through her, made stronger by the lingering static she could still feel. She had to face down the last Kriori before Anallin or Jade took a lightning bolt that would do far more damage to them then they had to her. Ignoring the downed guards, she spun to seek out the last guard.
And she found him already engaging Anallin. This guard did a better job of blocking the strikes, but the Hanaran did a good job of keeping the Kriori from being able to bring his lightning power fully to bear. Andy didn’t know how long that would last, though.
While Anallin kept the guard busy from the front, Andy hurried around behind. By now, the rest of the captives were noisy. They shouted encouragement for the marines and abuse for the guards. Andy had to drown out any attempt to understand the words, but she appreciated the noise itself because it kept the guard from knowing she was coming.
Lifting her hands, she brought her fist down on the back of his neck. Given he was considerably taller than her, this was the best angle of attack. Once that had stupefied him somewhat and his upper half lowered, she caught him again on the back of the head and drove him to the ground.
Andy looked at his prone form and then to Anallin and Jade. She saw Jade staggering slightly, but on her feet and not showing any obvious sign of injury. The sergeant checked over Anallin as well, just to make sure there were no signs of injury. As the adrenaline started to fade, Andy marveled at the fact they had taken down four armed guards—while bound.
Oorah!
“I’ll be damned,” she said with a soft laugh and a shake of her head, although her words were drowned out in the noise of the captives all around them. She finally tuned into what they were saying a little better and realized she could pick out a couple of words, although there was no harmony to any of it.
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