Aalto rubbed his chin. ‘We are four weak Shades against one powerful one—and Grangar.’
Oberen stepped forth. ‘We have a number of people with E—some have already drawn hard on it, but this battle cannot be lost. We must draw upon every last drop.’
Berossus looked around. There was Henning, Sofia, who had passed out again, Tredd, Eddie, and Jill. ‘I count five.’
Oberen surveyed the room. ‘There’s seven. Did you count yourself—and me?’
Berossus opened his mouth to say something, but could only manage to stammer, ‘I— am I? Uh… I don’t… the Thaqaran is gone.’
‘I have E, and so did Jilius. You, my son, are strong in E. Otherwise you wouldn’t have had a chance with the Thaqaran inside you. Now that you’re free, your reserve of E is yours to use.’
‘But I can’t—’
‘You will learn eventually. I will teach you, but for now, it’s enough that you come along, and perhaps I could tap into your E.’
Berossus never knew he had E. He thought he was handicapped, that he went crazy on a planet. But it wasn’t him. It was the Thaqaran inside. And the Thaqaran fed on his E. What could he possibly do with it? It was not the time to worry about that, though.
‘We have to get closer to Nenetl,’ said Aalto. ‘For you to help, you need to get into your ships and follow us.’
‘We can take everyone with E onboard our ship,’ said Tredd.
‘It’s too risky. Nenetl has brought in squadrons from the other side. We need multiple ships and serious firepower.’
Berossus looked around; the Shuttler-shop garage had a number of craft ready to go, but only a few were capable of space flight, and none of them had any firepower.
An unknown middle-aged man with a rough face stepped down to the garage. ’Hey! You need a transport?’
‘Daler!’ Evie shouted, and ran to him.
‘Noir,’ Daler said, as he ambled towards the group. ‘They’re my people and are waiting outside with more than a dozen spaceflight-capable ships with crews ready to roll.’
‘Great news,’ said Henning. ‘Let’s balance it out so that we have at least two people with E together, OK?’
‘Sounds good,’ Aalto said. Berossus agreed, and it seemed that Tredd, Eddie, Jill, Belinda, Evie and Oberen did, too.
‘One more thing,’ Daler said, pulling out a handheld device. ‘Marc Puissance gave me the codes that should grant control access to his cyborgs.’
‘How— How did you get them?’ Evie stammered.
‘Well, let’s say I remembered some of the basic things my mother taught me, things I had forgotten. These codes came to light once I lifted the darkness that has haunted me throughout my adult life.’
Berossus didn’t understand what he meant, but it seemed Evie did. They bumped their devices to copy the codes.
‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I’ll see what I can do with them.’
‘That’s it, then.’
Aalto spoke with the Shades. Then, one-by-one, they turned to mist: Aalto was blue, Warrigal yellow, Shinzaburo red, and Efia green. Each strand of coloured mist twirled upwards and coiled together, to form a thick torrent of glowing amber.
Chapter Fifty
Belinda sat in the co-pilot’s seat while Jill guided Noir’s HWK-200 between the massive obsidian buildings and up through the atmosphere of Spit City. The navy hadn’t used the old Hawk model for ages, and inside were all kinds of additional units and customised applications that were supposed to modernise it, but, in reality, made it a complex mess, although the basic functionality was pretty much the same as the newer models. On the screen ahead of them, loomed Grangar.
The Shades were somewhere between them and Grangar, but they were too small to be seen—and their sensors hadn’t detected the mist into which they had transformed.
Belinda turned suddenly. ‘Eyes on the road, miss.’
Jill laughed and focused on the controls. ‘You know, now that I’ve got to know you better, you’re not the monster I thought you were.’
‘Monster, me?’
‘You did do some crazy blasting stuff.’
‘Well—’
‘And now I understand why. And that you’re not a monster.’
Belinda paused. ‘Did you really mean it?’
‘Mean what?’
‘Well, when you spoke to Tredd Bounty down there…’ She was talking about when Jill had said I love you.
A sudden klaxon interrupted them, accompanied by a pulsating red light. A number of black Remolan ships had appeared around them, and from the portside, a missile was headed towards their ship. It was a gamble; the shields of the Hawk could take a small one, but with anything bigger than an RX-2 missile, they’d be fried in an instant.
Jill released a cloud of heavy particles as a countermeasure to the missiles and made a quick evasive manoeuvre.
A loud boom shook the ship. The last thing Jill heard was Belinda screaming.
Tredd sat beside Eddie in the snug cockpit of the Rutger. While he had upgraded the old workhorse, the cockpit was still the same as ever, down to the worn leather seats, which, for Tredd, were better than new ones could ever be.
He wasn’t planning to leave Nanira for the grime of the Spit, but then curiosity, and perhaps a chance to do something meaningful, made the scales tip and he called Eddie. It was nice to see the good folks of FIST again, but losing Gus had struck him to the core; he found it hard to believe he was gone.
There were multiple ships from Noir with them (former Sweeps people—who could ever have thought he’d fight with them on the same side!) and in the one in front of them was Jill. Ever since she’d left him, he’d had a hole inside, but he couldn’t see why she’d chosen to leave. Now he couldn’t stop thinking about the weird exchange. Jill had seemed so happy and radiant. He knew Belinda had been into Jill. But he never thought she’d be into her.
‘Mate,’ Eddie said. ‘We’ve got company.’
A number of black ships pinched in, that seemed as if they were a mix of navy and Remola material. They came in shooting.
Before Tredd had even realised what was happening, Eddie had turned their ship in a dive. ‘Turn, goddamnit! It’s like a cow in the sky!’
‘Don’t insult the Rutger,’ said Tredd. ‘It might not be the fastest, but at least it’s packing some punch now.’
All their ships went into spinning manoeuvres to avoid enemy fire. A small Hawk got hit by a missile that flashed white on the view screen.
Tredd’s heart jumped. ‘Don’t say that was…’
‘Jill’s ship. The hull seems intact, but it’s out of power—god knows if they have life support.’
‘We have to help them.’
‘How are you?’ Henning asked Sofia, who had faded in and out of consciousness three times in the past few hours.
With a yawn, she stretched against the seat’s harness. ‘Lightheaded, but it’s all right.’
‘Ready for one final push?’
‘I guess you can never be too ready.’
They sat behind the Noir pilots, two experienced-looking fellows who seemed at home in the ship—as if they’d grown up in it. Following the four Shades, they would fly in formation closer to Grangar and Nenetl, and use their powers to augment the Shades, who would push Grangar away from Spit City.
She seemed so soft and delicate in the heavy-set old-school military seat, with a tight five-spot harness pressing her down. When they met, she had only worked in the lab—now she’d been fighting monsters, hiding from the police. and drawing E up to the point of exhaustion. While seeming soft on the outside, inside she was a fighter.
Alarms rang out, and their ship accelerated fast.
‘What’s going on?’ Henning said, trying to peer over to see the pilots’ screens.
‘Incoming.’
‘A number of unidentified ships just appeared out of nowhere.’
‘They’re shooting at us.’
‘Engage.’
One took the ship into
a rolling manoeuvre and the other engaged the weapons systems. In seconds, they were firing back. Outside was a fast exchange of blue and purple bolts, missiles and energy rays. It was all a blur, dotted with explosions, of ships from both sides.
‘Wonder if the Shades can help us,’ Sofia said.
‘I hope so,’ said Henning.
Their ship jerked with an explosion just beside it. Henning grasped the armrest.
‘That was too close,’ the pilot grunted, and turned the ship. The co-pilot aimed at one of the smaller enemy ships and let a stream of blue bolts fly. Only one of them hit, just scraping the metal.
‘Unless we clear out the Remolan, twisted, ships,’ said Henning, ‘we can’t do anything about Grangar.’
Berossus locked an energy ray onto one of the bigger enemy vessels, while Oberen steered their ship around the smaller fighters.
‘Just a little more,’ Berossus said, as the ray scorched away the Remolan ship’s shield.
‘Would be easier without that bogey on our back.’
Berossus swiped through the plasma targeting system, and found the one: a small navy Eagle with some bizarre black appendages. Just as he thought, he couldn’t set it as a target, so he switched on manual targeting. The targeting grid blinked on the spot where the enemy would be in the next second, and he fired.
But the enemy took a quick turn, and the shot missed. A shot back missed them, but just barely.
A missile lock buzzed on the dashboard.
‘If you’re planning to take it out,’ said Oberen, ‘now would be a good time.’
‘Really, think so?’ Berossus engaged the aftermarket missile jamming unit. The missile lock alarm went silent—for a moment.
A quick look at the bolted-on tactics display revealed there were about the same number of alien ships as there were Noir. Earlier explosions had wiped out a few from both sides.
Berossus followed the enemy on the targeting screen. Always when he was about to fire, the little ship seemed to slip away. He got the red target, and pressed the trigger, but as soon as the shot fired, it was gone and the bolt missed its target.
Their ship rumbled, and he had to grab the chair for support. Shields had dropped to seventy-one percent.
‘There are two of them on us now,’ Oberen said. ‘Make it one, and then none, won’t you?’
‘I’m a mechanic!’
‘Not today, son. Today, you’re a hero.’
Berossus was speechless; his father had just called him a hero.
He knew how to shoot. He had done it before, and he was going to do it again. He was going to do it for Mianea. Images of her filled his mind. He wanted so badly to get back to her. He wanted to tell her everything. He wanted to marry her. He wanted to have a family. He wanted his father in his life. He wanted to have a life. And if these little buggers were between him and his future, he was going to remove them.
The little ship was moving fast, but he was going to catch it. Again, he got the red, but it disappeared as quickly as it had appeared. He pressed the trigger halfway, and just before he thought the aim was going to turn red, he pressed it fully down.
A heavy plasma bolt hit the enemy ship, shattering through its shield and hull, incapacitating it.
‘Good on you, son, but we’re not done yet.’
With a newfound confidence in his shooting skills, Berossus moved on to the next target.
Jill opened her eyes to a headache. She was on the floor of the dark cockpit, the explosions outside the window providing occasional flashes of light.
‘Belinda,’ she said, to no reply. ‘Bells, are you all right, honey?’
She staggered up. Outside, the battle raged on. She must have been unconscious for a moment. All systems were down, including life support, but that also meant the enemy left them to float in peace.
Belinda lay on the floor beside her chair. A pool of blood was under her head, smothering her blonde hair in a crimson mess.
Jill found it difficult to breathe. She went to her side and touched her neck: a faint pulse. She was alive. But she needed medical attention.
‘Wake up. Bells, please wake up!’
But she remained unconscious. A perfect silence.
‘We’re gonna get you out, just hang in there.’
Jill didn’t want her to die. Not now. Not ever. There were so many things for them to do together.
Jill wished she could have told her she loved her.
Tears welled up. It couldn’t end like this. If she was gone, it didn’t matter who won. Life without her would be meaningless. Jill only wished she had realised it earlier.
She bent down, and her cheek touched Belinda’s.
Her voice breaking, she whispered, ‘Yes, I meant it. I love you, and I want to spend the rest of my life with you, however long or short it may be.’ She let her cheek linger on hers.
Belinda’s body moved.
Jill tensed, and raised her head. ‘Belinda!’
She opened her eyes—they were bloodshot—and whined as she tried to touch the back of her head.
‘Don’t move,’ Jill said.
‘Where are we?’
‘We got shot. We have to—’
‘Aah!’ Belinda shouted as she tried to move.
‘You’re hurt, but you’ll be all right.’
‘The colours are so beautiful,’ she said, staring past Jill. ‘I love fireworks.’
‘Hang on with me.’ She hoped someone would get to them soon. Belinda didn’t have much time.
‘You’re beautiful,’ Belinda said.
‘You too. Now don’t let go…’
Chapter Fifty-One
Henning was beginning to feel nervous, looking at the battle without being able to do much to help. Their pilots had blasted up a number of the enemy fighters, and their squadron had lost a few ships; the battle was an even one.
‘Who’s on that ship?’ Sofia pointed to a chunky vessel that had just made an enemy fighter explode.
‘It’s Berossus and Oberen.’
‘They’re having a great run—they’ve destroyed maybe half of the enemy.’
Comms beeped in. Henning picked it up.
It was Tredd. ‘You’ve got to help Jill and Belinda. Their ship is damaged and out of power. Eddie will send the mark.’
‘Gotcha. We’re on it.’
Tredd hesitated. ‘They might be—’
‘But if there’s even a small chance…’
Tredd nodded. ‘Thanks.’
‘Pilot,’ Henning said. ‘Check the incoming marker; we’re to get the crew of that ship safe. It’s mission critical.’
‘Sir,’ the pilot said. ‘On it.’
The vessel turned away from the fighting. Now there were fewer ships, and if everything went well, the enemy would soon be defeated. Henning stared at the mark on the screen. Without the square marker overlay, the small powerless craft would have been invisible to the eye.
In a few moments, they were beside it. The pilot turned around and opened the cargo space, pulling the small craft in like it was a stray rock.
Henning and Sofia were already in the cargo bay as the small craft glided in through the force field that kept the atmosphere and the vacuum separated. As it landed, it seemed completely dark and lifeless. Henning swallowed, and exchanged worried glances with Sofia.
A message from the cockpit crackled through. ‘We’ve got incoming! More alien vessels, dozens of them, they just keep coming!’
Henning swallowed. He had thought there wouldn’t be more after they had captured the Remolan universe, but Nenetl must have transferred the ships in advance, and was now pinching them in to join the fight. They had managed against an equal number, but this was another thing.
‘Just keep us alive,’ he said.
‘Doing our best,’ said the pilot. ‘That planet is closing in fast.’
They had to get everyone together with the Shades and overpower Nenetl to gain control over Grangar before it slammed against Spit City. B
ut as long as the enemy fighters kept coming, it was impossible.
‘Are you ready?’ Henning asked Sofia before the entrance to the craft.
She nodded. Henning turned a lever to open a small hatch. He went in first, and immediately heard Jill’s voice. ‘Please help her.’
He climbed in at the double and followed the sound of her voice to the cockpit. She stood in the doorway, the side of her face covered in blood.
‘You all right?’ he asked, staring at the wound on her forehead.
She tapped it and looked at the blood on her fingers. ‘It’s just a scratch. Belinda needs help, come. I patched her with the medpack, but I fear it’s not enough.’
Belinda was on her back behind the co-pilot’s seat. She had lost a lot of blood, but she had a pulse and was breathing shallow breaths. Henning turned her head carefully and found a patched-up spot behind her ear, but under it, the bone of the skull was cracked. Sofia gasped at the sight.
‘Can you heal her?’
‘I can try, but I can’t promise anything.’ Healing himself was easy, but healing someone else was like trying to catch a bug with heat gloves. ‘I need your help. Give me your hands.’
He turned his left palm up. Sofia put her hand on his, and Jill’s on top of Sofia’s. Henning cupped the side of Belinda’s head. He directed his own healing power to his palm, trying to find the pathways to her skin as if they were his own.
It didn’t work. It was too difficult to find a connection.
The ship trembled, and Sofia and Jill let go of Henning’s hand to regain balance.
He tried again. When he thought he had a line through, it slipped, and he had to start all over. He lifted his head, and grimaced.
Jill stared at him with a distraught expression. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘It’s difficult,’ Henning said.
‘Please, I can’t lose her!’
‘Let’s try again.’ He reckoned that while fixing her completely was beyond him, he could perhaps stop the bleeding and give her a chance.
Sofia and Jill took his hand, and he cupped Belinda’s head again. He searched for a connection from the cells on his skin to the cells on hers. The connection slipped, slipped and slipped again. Jill let out a distressed sigh. He concentrated hard. He searched for it and found a good one, finally. ‘Now,’ he said, and pulled E from Sofia and Jill.
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