Talon was good at his job. He and Hera made their way past the hangar using a picker. It was a small hover vehicle capable of light travel with three to four people. It was slow but it was easier then walking. Most pickers ran on battery power captured from solar cells. Most pickers were used sparingly given the Erebus was never usually close enough to a star to collect sufficient solar power. None of that mattered now. This was our final stand and we were going to use everything at our disposal to survive. Trevor disappeared away from them. Apparently Hera had sough him out hoping to learn what had become of me. It wasn’t fair that I was alive my consciousness right there by her side.
Balkava had promoted Hera to Echo Squad and given certain experiences she had while inside the nexus. It was better then going into stasis since she was no longer a user she was no longer useful onboard the ship (aside form genetic purposes). I’m sure if she had said no they would have found something else for her to do. There was still R&D and certain levels of maintenance that needed living humans to perform sanctioned tasks. She was a fighter though and she was more then capable of taking care of herself. She would never be anything but. During the first wave of attacks by the antliods Hera had been one of the few going in and rescuing people trapped inside quarantined areas and venues of the ship. She was small and could crawl easily through most vents unnoticed and unlock sealed doors without any trouble.
Near the blockage of the barricade the antliods thrashed at metal barriers we had built to keep them away. Turrets fired pulse after pulse into the mass of blackness. Echo Squad including Talon and Hera made their stand behind a barricade that sat four feet off the ground. They aimed through portholes at the monsters with precision from their hiding place. The battle outside the Erebus seemed to rage on as the hull shook again and again. At times even the floor below seemed to turn as the gravity field fell into flux. Sometimes Talon’s body felt lighter then air, other times it felt like he had gained several hundred. We had been trained to handle this in simulations but actually feeling your weight shift minute to minute was enough to make even the best fall sick with vertigo and nausea. Several people three up and others seemed to cough blood as if their insides were collapsing and breaking apart with each forced shift.
There was no stopping the barrage of antliods. When they saw a massive hive queen crawl up out of the darkness and towards them Echo Squad made the only choice they could. Trapping hundreds of lives inside stasis condemning them to death Echo abandoned the passageway setting charges and blowing the structures around them.
Talon didn’t want to run with the rest of the group, he was ready become a ghost. Hera wouldn’t let him.
I watched her grab him and push him out of the way as the force of the blast sent both to their knees. Her push had saved both of their lives.
A few antliods escaped and quickly began spilling out the corridors of the Erebus slashing and dismembering crew and soldiers with their teeth, tails, and claws. Mutilated antliods crawled over the corpses of dead soldiers while others fired shot after shot swinging blades violently in the air. This was an open war human>skrav>antliods>nature everything and everyone fighting for their right to live, for dominance.
“Echo this is Crossbones can you read?”
It was an unfamiliar voice.
“This is Talon of Echo?” Talon said with a question. “The Red Queen is secure; two minutes until impact,” the voice cut out. “What does that mean? Two minutes until impact?” Hera asked. “We’re crashing the ship,” said Talon, “the Skrav and the Aelita are
already down. If we stay in space any longer our engines are so badly damaged we will be ripped apart.” “What the hell do we do?” Hera said almost crying. Her voice was soft and her words seemed choked as if they had been spoken by a scared child.
“There is a panic room big enough for several hundred built for the elders, its close to the core and we have just enough time to make it if we hurry,” Talon answered already on the move in front of Hera.
None of the other echo members said a word. They knew this would mean leaving loved ones and family behind. From what I could remember and what I had been told in the past was that the bunker had been built for the elders and key personal and not one more person. It was a lifeboat, a last resort. The Erebus was made of several different layers - each reinforced the other. The bunker was a place of solitude for the elders buried deep in the core of the ship but easily accessed through elevators and tunnels. The bunker had seldom been seen by outside eyes. Balkava had turned it into a sanctuary as of late, a place that she went alone to meditate. Now more then ever it was serving its one true purpose - protect a select few so that the human race could start all over. It would be a new world built on the blood of the old one.
“We can’t leave all these people behind!” cried Hera. Talon was pulling her with him now; grasping her hand tight. He pulled her up on the picker with a few others and they began driving through the chaos as the antliods continued to tear there way through the only world so many of them had ever known. I could see the look on his face reflected on one of the walls. It looked like the last several hours had aged him rapidly. The look in his eyes said it all. He agreed with Hera but there was nothing that could be done. His eyes were full of sadness and regret.
Before they arrived at the entrance to the bunker a Drok flew out of the air and onto the picker. With it’s long two-handed blade cut from the bones of a hellbeast he decapitated the driver. Word had quickly spread. Everyone had been listening to Crossbones message through their comms. Everyone knew the bunker was open and only a few knew the pass codes (Talon and the rest of Echo being a part of the lucky few). Talon immediately started firing on the Drok who seemed to stand there and take every shot pointblank in the chest. He was still screaming when the picker ran into a wall and flipped over. The Drok was dead, buried beneath the ruins of the wrecked picker. Talon, Hera and what was left of Echo began to lift themselves up and press forward as a mob of people began moving towards them. The Erebus had become anarchy. There was no order anymore just the chaos as humanity sat on the brink of destruction. None of Echo wanted to fire into the crowd but it was an oncoming storm. If they didn’t fire they would die, if they did they would be murderers - no better then the Skrav or antliods. I couldn’t tell who took the first shot but it was obvious now. Civil war had begun.
Hera was the first to throw down her rifle and run. Her M7 had been fitted with a PDA. It was her PDA that began displaying various door codes that threw the crowd into a frenzy. They swarmed after it thinking it was the key to safety. Echo Squad only needed one code to open the door and Talon and several others knew it by heart. Hera had by mistake bought everyone enough time to slip away.
In the aftermath of what happened Hera and the rest of Echo watched slipping through the cracks as several civilians fought over the PDA and rifle gunning one another down again and again in the process. From one hand to the next it went around each more bloodied then the last. Echo never fired another shot. The people left behind were tearing themselves apart. A loose bullet from the ripper teared through Talon’s arm. Hera now held his hand leading him towards the bunker.
Talon held up his wrist. A ray of light shined out of s small sphere on the wall and scanned an RFID chip he had implanted. One of the benefits of having once been protectors of the elders. The codes were accepted and the door opened. The moment the remaining members of Echo were inside Talon blasted the door with his rifle. No one else was going to survive. Hera began hitting him and cursing him. ‘Others could have made it - more people could have moved inside, ‘ her words fell on deaf ears. They were already inside an elevator shaft listening to the sound of gears grind as they moved lower and lower.
Talon was still bleeding when he looked Hera in the eyes, “The Erebus can still survive the fall, if the ship is able to jump into the immer and back out for even a fraction of a second while falling through the atmosphere the ship itself is strong enough to survive the impact of t
he crash. Being in the bunker isn’t to protect us from the impact. He was right. The chaos wasn’t about crashing into the planet. The hull of the Erebus has become too weak so that once it hits the atmosphere the thin layers of biomass would strip like a snake shedding its skin. Anyone not deep inside would be burned up by radiation and the intense pressure change inside the hull.
“I’ll do it then,” Hera said.
“Do what?” asked Talon.
“I know my way to engineering even from here, we can get on a console
and tell the ship to make the jump, even override existing auto-pilot commands if we have to,” she said.
“Do you even know how this ship works?” said Talon angrily.
“I know it just as well as anyone else,” she said.
Just then Talon shot her in the leg.
She screamed cursing him.
“Just as well as anyone else, including me,” Talon said before looking up at the other members of Echo who stared in surprise.
“Its a flesh wound but make sure a medic sees her after you are safe inside the bunker,” Talon said stopping the elevator, “take her to safety,” he ordered.
In almost a whisper I could hear Talon speak, “tell her to find the man she loves, Sev, tell her this new world needs people like her.”
My vision blurs back and forth between the hellbeast of my own reality and the past. The next few images look like still photos set before my eyes. My immune system must be attacking the shard treating it like some kind of infection or disease. I fall in and out of the blur, in and out of darkness.
I slowly begin to feel like I’m drowning.
Talon is running injured through the Erebus and through several large rooms I have never seen before. The black and grey walls are lined with massive tubes and wires run through various parts of the wall and the ground. Statues of elders stand before him almost like he has walked into some kind of cathedral wrapped in gothic garb. It is an old church - a meeting ground for the Order of the Sons of Sol during the days of the Erebus’s maiden voyage. I have never actually seen the Erebus control room - few have - there are several located near the core used to send messages to the ships computer and steer it through space. The control room is also where engineers can jump us in and out of the immer. Talon was trying to figure out the right path when an antliod got the jump on him.
“Almost there,” he cries a small map appearing from his wrist PDA right before his eyes. The antliod pierces his arm tearing at his wound forcing him to the ground. He stabs it several times in the gut with a small retractable blade built into his suit and forces it off of him. The weight of the creature broke several of his ribs. I feel like I can feel all of his pain as if my own ribs are being torn apart. For all I know the hellbeast is on top of me. I fear the moment I ‘wake up’ knowing that it could be my last.
I remember seeing the Erebus fall.
I search my own mind trying to figure out what happened whether or not I had watched it jump in or out of the immer while I was being chased. It seemed almost funny - imagining that massive ship pulling the same technique used by Hayden and myself as we crashed on the surface of this world.
Talon ignores the pain. As do I.
Talon moves to open a round door. Two flat shields move away in a circular motion. Another antliod attacks him from behind. A pincher tears through the back of his armor and comes out through the front of his torso. He stabs the antliod with the same hidden blade he used before killing it. He removes the pincher. Talon continues to move across through the door into a large hallway lit by small white and blue lights. His eyes slowly begin to adjust but everything is still blurring in and out for me.
I wake up and see the hellbeast standing over me.
The vision has one to a stop.
I have no idea if the crew of the Erebus is alive or dead and in a few moments it won’t matter because I will be nothing more then another casualty.
The hellbeast’s jaw open wide enough to swallow me whole. The bottom part of it’s jaw unhinges like a great white shark. All I see are rows of teeth and blood. It’s skull is so massive I feel like an average human could stand inside. I can smell its breath - the kills it has small, the smell of Terra Vesp flesh rotting in the air. Its silhouette blocks out the sun around me and all I can see is my death. Without hesitation I take the knife I took from the scourge, the cursed blade and push it up through the devil’s tongue. It wails itself up in the air letting out a cry that deafens my ears.
Everything goes silent.
Everything but a gunshot that echoes through the white landscape. I watch a bullet break the bone of the monster’s skull and fall in a straight line out the other side. Its blood splatters the ground like ink spilling from a pen. The penetration of the bullet forces the body of the beast to fall over to my left side only a few feet away from crushing me. There is nothing but silence. I sit staring up into the sky. I can still see the plum from the Erebus stretch across the horizon. Did they survive or burn I wondered. Talon was more of a hero then Devon Cross, Narville, or any of the other historical figures we grew up glorifying could ever be. I was numb for a few seconds but then the cold of the snow I sat half buried beneath began to sit in.
How long had I been laying by the hellbeast’s corpse?
I began to sit up. I could see in the distance a woman walking towards me. She had long black dreadlocked hair that went almost all the way down to her waist. I could see she was pale. Her skin seemed to blend with the snow as if she had adapted like a chameleon to blend with the landscape. Her armor gave her away; black and purple. A modded battle suit parts of it had been entwined with blades that could extend out over the top of ones hand. The back of the suit had a pack similar to mine plugged into an M44. She was human at the very least that meant there were survivors somewhere. Her hands a dark metal grey. Her hand and a part of her arm was cybernetic, her fingers seemed pointed like sharp little daggers. The closer she came the more I could make out. Below her eyes whew as wearing red war paint that covered small scars and wrinkles in her skin. Beside her walked a yellow giant. It was an armor I had never seen before round and tall. The yellow figure held what I could only assume to be something R&D had developed in secret as a heavy weapons rifle made from rare alien out-tech. It was nearly six feet long and wired directly into the giants suit. The rifle was black with the exception of several yellow and white stripes along the barrel. My mind wandered wondering if the yellow giant was some kind of new auto, cyborg, or if there was a human inside. It walked with the girl as if it was her protector. Perhaps she was someone of significant value, someone important enough to have a bodyguard. The yellow giant must have been the one that shot the hellbeast - no regular gun could have ripped through its skull like that. The giant had several spires that stretched out from its face and back into the air. Its hands looked like they could crush a skull without any real force. The closer they came the more afraid I became. Perhaps they weren’t human and they had claimed me as their kill.
“Sev,” the woman’s voice was soft and well pronounced as she spoke my name. It was feminine and familiar. The moment I locked eyes with her I knew who had saved my life. I shrieked her name overjoyed with excitement. I was thrilled. MY LONG LOST FRIEND WHOM I THOUGHT I would never see again - the other survivor of Errikus, the daughter of an elder and the young woman I had once called my best friend. AIRA.
“Long time no see,” she said.
“Well with the war and everything,” I said smiling trying to sound like my childlike self but the words were broken and my voice was cold raspy and old. She didn’t laugh or even smile back. She kept the same obdurate look on her face. I wasn’t sure what to think. It had been over ten years since we had last seen each other.
“I saved your life, but before you thank me or speak to me there is something you should know,” she paused in a moment of silence that seemed to last forever, “I’m not her”.
At first what she said hadn’t made much sense to
me. I wasn’t quite sure what to make of it or if I had even heard her right. Of course she was Aira. The Aelita had to have some survivors and it would make perfect sense that the daughter of one of the elders would be among them.
“I have changed, I am not the same girl you knew on Errikus. That girl died the day I was left onboard the Aelita,” she said. It began to make sense now. Ten years is too long and both of us had been changed. Both of us had grown up and become far different then who we were back then. “Ok,” I sighed not sure what else to say. I was pleased to see my old friend again but saddened by the fact that she seemed to loathe the sight of me. I could see clearly now the scars on her face. They were not inflicted by Skrav or antliods - something the Aelita never seems to have a problem with - rather they looked self inflicted or ceremonial.
On the Erebus we were told that we had it easy, that life on the Aelita was much more intense as it was our scout ship, the first to advance and take point on all expeditions from first contact to going into battle. We had been told that they bred their crew into warriors by any means necessary. They had no room for the weak on the Aelita. I now saw firsthand why our two ships never communicated visually with one another or visited one another by drop ship. I now saw the scars, the cybernetics, the skin grafts and the numbness in Aira’s eyes that had made her a part of their crew.
“Who’s your friend?” I asked,
“I want to thank them for saving my life.”
“It’s not a friend, it’s a companion. You know him by the name Lore,” she
Pull (Deep Darkness Book 1) Page 24