Fortress Earth (Extinction Wars Book 4)

by Fortress Earth (epub)

  Lizard flesh smoked. Saurian blood boiled, and a haze began filling the vast bridge. Saurians made croaking noises. Some of the personnel in the pit on the edges tried to scramble away. One or two charged us. A few hid. Those were the smart ones.

  In the end, it didn’t matter. We killed them all. Five assault troopers in a controlled fury butchered the bridge-full of Saurians in less than thirty seconds.

  During that time, a few Saurian rounds bounced off my armor. A plasma beam darkened Ella’s power-pack. That was it. Otherwise, this part of the Family perished trying to protect the little bastard up there.

  I was the first to look up. The Jelk pressed controls, shouted orders and finally pointed at me.

  It had been too long since I’d seen one of them. It brought old memories rushing back into my mind, but that didn’t slow my reflexes.

  Maybe he realized this wasn’t his day. He pressed a control and an opening appeared above him. At the same time, his throne-chair began to levitate up toward the escape hatch.

  Rollo beamed the throne-chair. Dmitri sent dense slugs at the opening, wrecking it.

  The little Jelk leaped from his chair. He must have been wearing something, because he flew for the mangled opening.

  In a blink, I scanned above and teleported there. The Jelk flew up into my arms, and squealed like a pig.

  I jumped down with the Jelk, hearing him grunt with pain at the jar of my landing.

  “How did you do that?” he asked in his grating voice.

  I squeezed him so the Jelk howled with pain.

  “Let me have some fun, too,” Rollo said. He shoved cold steel into the Jelk’s belly.

  That caused the creature to twist and writhe in my grip. “I shall remember this until you’re all dead,” he gasped.

  “Yeah, yeah,” I said. “When are you going to do your trick for us?”

  Rollo twisted the knife. I crushed the Jelk as if I could fold him up into a flesh-ball, remembering how these hard-hearted capitalists had screwed with humanity for generations. They’d never shown us mercy. I wasn’t going to start here with this one.

  Suddenly, the Jelk’s flesh sizzled. In a flash, the flesh and uniform disappeared. I let go out of surprise. Rollo staggered backward.

  “Fools!” the Jelk said as he transformed. “Ultimately, you cannot harm me. Now, though, I know you and have marked you for revenge.”

  He finished the metamorphosis, returning to his true state, and the Jelk began to float away.

  Ella rushed up, shoving the pronged weapon at him. Electrical currents passed between the prongs and the pulsating ball of energy. It stopped, appeared to try to move again, but failed.

  “How’s that feel?” Rollo shouted. “How do you like it, you little schemer?”

  Screeching sounds came from the energy creature. The thing began to thin as its light lost luster. Then, as if sucked up by a vacuum cleaner, the energy creature flowed into the tube and filled the containment cube with roiling energy.

  I plucked that out of the Jelk Catcher, staring at the trapped creature. I’m not sure what I hoped to see. Maybe two eyes peering at me, trying to ask for mercy. I had a machine. That’s all. It wasn’t living. It was fuel for an ancient gun. I kept staring, wanting to ask it questions, but now was not the time for that.

  Finally, I slotted the cube onto my belt. I swear I felt warmth coming through my armored glove. I definitely felt movement on my belt.

  “We have one,” I said. “Now, let’s get us a few more.”

  It took the others several seconds to recalibrate. They’d been watching me closely. Finally, each of them began scanning other, nearby battlejumpers.

  “I found another,” Dmitri said. “This Jelk is alone in his harem.”

  I linked to Dmitri’s scanner. It wasn’t a human harem, but a Saurian one.

  “This is crazy,” I said. “I always thought Claath had gathered a human harem because he looked like us. Now…I don’t know what’s going on. Are you sure that’s a harem?”

  “What else could it be?” Dmitri asked.

  The Jelk on my belt continued to move as if still struggling against its new confinement. We were on a tight schedule, and we needed plenty of ammo for our Abaddon-killing weapon.

  “Let’s get another Jelk,” I said. “Three, two, one…go!”

  -32-

  I should have remembered our ultimate objective. I should have thought about what we were doing more carefully. I hadn’t paid enough attention to the differences. I was still thinking of this as a regular assault trooper attack, just with niftier weapons.

  It wasn’t anything like that…

  We had T-suits that were thousands or possibly millions of years old constructed by the Ronin 9. The Ronin were extinct, and they had challenged the premier race in our galaxy. That race seemed to have the attributes of angels or possibly even gods. The Forerunners had built the artifacts, the jump gates and the Fortress of Light. This wasn’t just soldiers shooting it out with guns. This was fantastic battle-wear for use against a possibly mythic adversary.

  A trip to the center of the galaxy by jump routes would take years. I’d already been to Sagittarius A* and back, and that had taken less than a few days. Humans are incredibly adaptive. We could get used to just about anything. I’d already become familiar with the Fortresses of Light, teleporting suits and turning Jelk into balls of energy to power up a devil-slaying weapon.

  So yeah, I should have thought things through a little more carefully before cavalierly, almost single-handedly attacking Abaddon’s Super Fleet.

  But the thing was we weren’t attacking the fleet. We were ninjas, assassins, trying to slip in and out, taking out the head before the main fleet battle began.

  My suit buzzed with power, and the gory battlejumper bridge disappeared. In a split second, I crossed space and appeared on another battlejumper.

  Lounging Saurians were everywhere. A few splashed in a big pool. Others fanned themselves as they sprawled on cushions. A group surrounded a Jelk as he lay on a couch. He had his shirt open, showing a skinny, ridged chest. He even wore a gold chain with a glowing ball dangling on the end.

  The area was as big as several basketball courts, with a high ceiling. It seemed strange now that a machine—a Jelk—worked furiously to collect money and indulge in such decadent living.

  What motivated a Jelk to do that? Had the Curator told me the whole truth?

  I lurched slightly, having appeared a little too high off the floor. One T-suited trooper fell from five meters up, splashing into the pool.

  Rollo appeared perfectly in a crouch. His beam weapon glowed, and light speared out, striking a Saurian. The lizard exploded. I do not mean to say that it blew up. Instead, it exploded and grew with astonishing speed. Thick tentacles sprouted as a vast rubbery body took up ten times the space the “Saurian” had.

  Instead of one of the Family facing us, it was an alien thing of incredible vitality. Then, I realized these transformations were taking place all around us. Each so-called Saurian exploded into the same sort of octopus monster-thing.

  The ones in the pool moved faster than those on the dry areas.

  The pool! I swiveled fast. Dmitri had landed in the pool. He hadn’t come up yet. Instead, tentacles thrashed, slapping the water and disappearing from sight.

  I roared an oath, charging the pool, beaming it. Steam hissed as the beam touched the liquid, filling the chamber at an excessive rate. Was that water? No! It was some other liquid that reacted furiously with my beam.

  I skidded to the edge. I could see Dmitri down there. The tentacle monsters had him and were pulling hard, trying to rip off his suit. Why didn’t Dmitri disappear? Maybe he couldn’t think of it. The monsters had his arms and legs in vise-like rubbery grips.

  I aimed my arm cannon and began firing careful shots. The liquid acted as a brake on the slugs, but not as much as one would expect—that must have been due to the density of each bullet.

  I shot up one gia
nt octopus-body and began on another. Black blood began spreading like a film from the shredded flesh. Soon, I wouldn’t be able to see Dmitri down there.

  I realized I was the fool. I concentrated, used my scanner, targeting the bottom of the pool, and teleported to Dmitri.

  After wrapping an arm around Dmitri’s torso—so I knew exactly where he was—I fired one dense shell after another into the nearby monsters.

  Tentacles began sliding off Dmitri. Finally, the Cossack slapped my shoulder.

  “Creed,” he panted through the comm.

  “Teleport out of the pool!” I shouted.

  “Oh. Da. I do that now.” Dmitri buzzed. I could feel it with my one arm. Then, he was gone.

  The remaining tentacles lashed at me.

  I also teleported, appearing beside the pool, staggering. The chamber had changed dramatically since I’d first viewed it. Steam roiled everywhere, as did a black mist. Oily blood slicked the floor as tentacles and rubbery pieces of octopus bodies writhed and humped. It was an ugly sight.

  Rollo stalked the Jelk as Ella and N7 flanked him, beam-slicing the monsters and causing them to flop and tear apart with their bullets.

  I cataloged two problems. The first was that we were using up Ronin 9 ammo at a prodigious rate. Could that be one of Abaddon’s plans? The second thing was the Jelk. He was an elusive rascal, much more than I would have expected.

  Rollo chased him, lunged, and the Jelk shimmered for a second. Rollo grabbed empty air as the Jelk moved from his spot a foot from where he’d seemed to be at the instant of Rollo’s lunge.

  I used a beam, but instead of striking the fleet-footed Jelk, he shimmered. The beam harmlessly passed him as he continued to scamper around the chamber.

  That increased Rollo’s fury, making him more determined.

  It struck me suddenly. Abaddon had spoken to Ella in her sleep. The First One appeared to have read her mind. Abaddon knew our basic plan. Could he have set a trap for us?

  My heart thudded with a grim certainty. We were using weapons we didn’t truly understand. Yet that wasn’t half as critical as facing an opponent we didn’t truly understand. What did it mean to have lived for so long in another space-time continuum?

  “Rollo!” I said, using the comm.

  I heard Rollo’s harsh breathing.

  “Rollo,” I said again. “The Jelk is screwing with you.”

  I heard a labored curse over the comm.

  “You have to think or we’re screwed, man. Stand down, Rollo. Stand down and think!”

  Rollo hated aliens and Jelk more than most, yet he was a good soldier, the best assault trooper among us. He stopped and peered back at me.

  I took a quick scan of the situation. Most of the giant octopus creatures were dead. The ones in the pool boiled out, but Dmitri retreated from them as he used the beam to good effect.

  The Cossack was a master of the delaying tactic. Maybe it was in his genes.

  The Jelk stopped as he studied us. Once more, I noticed the glowing ball dangling from the end of his gold chain. It was as if we faced a miniature playboy from the ‘60s.

  What did the shimmering signify? He was always a little bit to the side of where we were shooting. Maybe the thing on his skinny chest was a distorter, a reflective device, showing him to be elsewhere than where he really was.

  I laughed aloud. “Aim around him,” I said. “He’s not where he appears to be, but nearby. He’s using our marksmanship against us.”

  So saying, I hosed on either side of the little red creep. Rollo did the same thing.

  N7 and Ella continued to keep the last monsters off Rollo and me.

  The Jelk got a scared look. He turned, tried to run and then screamed in agony. The beam didn’t seem to touch him but his skin began to shrivel under the beam’s intensity.

  In another few seconds, his skin burst apart as a glowing ball of light rose from a location several meters from where I was watching him. At the same time, the glowing amulet fell to the floor, as there was no longer a flesh and blood creature to hold up the gold chain.

  The energy creature seemed stunned, but I didn’t think that would last long.

  “Ella!” I said. “Use the Jelk Catcher before he gets away.”

  Ella started to run at him. The Jelk began to float away from her faster.

  “Teleport in front of him,” I said.

  She did. The ball of light stopped in seeming shock. Before it could change direction, Ella slid the pronged device from her shoulders. She flicked it on and caught him—it. As before, the light dimmed. All at once, the Jelk energy ball was sucked up into another cube.

  With a click, Ella turned off the Jelk Catcher.

  I strode to her, extracted the cube and stared at the caught machine. This one shook harder than the first. Could it be angry?

  As I hooked the ammo to my belt, the others circled me, killing the last of the octopus-like monsters.

  “What happened here?” Ella panted. “We saw Saurians and—”

  “What?” Dmitri asked her.

  “Is this what Saurians really are?” Ella asked.

  “I doubt that,” I said. “The monsters were made to look like Saurians.”

  “Not look like,” Ella said, “but were. It seemed as if they exploded out of their Saurian bodies.”

  “The Jelk had a device that distorted its actual position,” Rollo said. “Luckily, Creed figured that out.”

  “That’s not the problem,” I said. “Why was this room set up like this?”

  The others looked at me.

  “It was a setup,” Ella said, “a trap.”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “It didn’t matter in the end,” Dmitri said. “We captured another Jelk. Let’s get another.”

  “No,” Ella said. “Let’s get back to the Santa Maria. If they’re setting traps for us…”

  I looked at Ella, waiting for her to finish her thought. That’s when I noticed the chamber’s walls in the ultraviolet light range. They radiated with a strange pulsation.

  “Ella, what were you going to say?” I grabbed her. “Ella!” I shouted.

  “Creed,” she slurred. “My mind…is slowing down.”

  I glanced at the walls again. They shined more dangerously than before in the ultraviolet range.

  “Commander,” Dmitri said, “I can’t find the Santa Maria.”

  “Say again,” I said.

  “I can’t see the Santa Maria with my T-scanner,” Dmitri said.

  “Is the wall blocking us?”

  “No,” Rollo said. “I can see elsewhere, but not our ship.”

  “Link to me,” I said. I used my scanner, having found a battlejumper bridge. This one didn’t have a Jelk unfortunately. “Is everyone ready?”

  Something was very wrong, and I wanted to figure it out. But not here.

  “Three…two…one…teleport,” I said.

  -33-

  We appeared on the new bridge, dealing death to the Saurian officers and personnel. These stayed Saurians, at least.

  There was nothing fair or nice about our attack. It reminded me of the time as a kid I’d cleaned our family barn of wasps with several cans of Raid. Locate nest, aim Raid, depress nozzle, watch the white stuff attach to the angry wasps and see them fall and curl and twist on the ground. If one was too lively, I raced away and waited for the Raid to do its magic.

  On the battlejumper, we didn’t race away and wait. We cleared the bridge of enemy and took up their abandoned stations.

  Many years ago, we’d stormed and captured a Jelk battlejumper, so we were familiar with the controls for this one.

  First, we sealed the doors so the rest of the battlejumper’s Saurians couldn’t storm us too soon. Then, we each went to our old stations, taking over the panels.

  “The Super Fleet has moved,” Ella said. “It is no longer in the one billion kilometer range of the Santa Maria.”

  I saw that too. The Super Fleet had moved away hard from the six
th planet and the hidden moon. It also seemed as if more time had elapsed than should have. Could that have been the reason for the glowing walls in the last battlejumper? Had it been some sort of time delay room, giving the Super Fleet enough time to pull off its maneuver?

  “Abaddon knows that’s our ship,” Ella declared.

  “I agree,” I said.

  “Let’s use this battlejumper and start for the Santa Maria,” Rollo suggested. “We’ll maneuver back into the one billion kilometer range.”

  “That’s not going to work,” I said.

  “Commander,” Dmitri said. “Take a look at screen three.”

  I tapped my command chair, bringing up screen three. I saw it right away. The enemy was releasing T-missiles for a mass firing. If I were to guess, I’d say Abaddon was about to target the Santa Maria.

  “That doesn’t make sense,” Ella said. “Why would he destroy such a priceless vessel? I’d think Abaddon would want to capture it.”

  I thought back to a fight in the Solar System many years ago. The Starkiens had come at us, launching T-missiles at our sole captured battlejumper. Those missiles hadn’t used thermonuclear warheads, but had launched Lokhar space marines instead.

  “Abaddon does plan to capture the Santa Maria,” I said.

  “With nukes?” Dmitri asked.

  “No,” I said, “with space-suited Kargs in the T-missiles’ nosecones.”

  “Of course,” Ella said. “That makes perfect sense. He will capture the moon-ship, us, our T-suits—”

  “Listen to me,” I said, sternly. “We have two Jelk. That’s going to have to be it for now. We’re getting out of here.”

  “How?” Ella asked. “The Santa Maria is too far away for us to teleport there.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Listen up and listen good, ’cause I’m only going to say this once.”

  ***

  We teleported off the bridge onto a T-missile bay. The Saurian techs in there lasted less than a minute. Afterward, N7 opened his T-suit.