“Place looks fucked up,” Hiram remarked.
“Status on the Vulpin ship?” Reno asked.
“Landed,” Aela said. “Estimates put us a few hours behind them.”
“Good. Match their trajectory and bring us down,” she said. “Cadets? Get ready.”
32
We tracked Vanceval’s rented Vulpin cruiser to a landing site on the outskirts of Ashfall’s only remaining city. Reno brought the Eastwood in slowly, wary of taking any fire from the Vulpin. The whole scene was eerily still, though. Nothing moved on our screens except the clouds of dust, swirling across the landscape. The buildings themselves—blocky and scorched and probably irradiated—were slowly eroding, blowing away bit by bit like sandcastles on a shore.
All of them except for the obsidian temple at the center of the city—the only place still standing, seemingly impervious to whatever had destroyed the rest of Ashfall.
Melian stood next to me, rubbing her upper arms. She leaned toward the screen to get a better view. “What is that down there? Up against the temple?”
My throat felt scratchy. “A ship,” I said quietly. “My dad’s ship.”
The broken husk of the ISV Clarity lay against one of the temple’s black walls, the skeletal remains of its hull covered in ash.
“Oh, I’m sorry, Syd,” Melian said. “I didn’t realize they crashed.”
“They didn’t,” I said, feeling a chill run down my spine. Rockets flying into space through a cloud of ash. “I think they did that after.”
Everyone watched the screens as we descended. Even Hiram wet his lips nervously. Zara saw, and her tail flicked back and forth in amusement.
“What’s wrong, human?” she asked. “Do you wish you were somewhere tropical counting plants?”
“Shut up,” Hiram replied, glancing at me, like he hoped I hadn’t noticed his brief moment of nerves. “It’s like a graveyard out there. That’s all.”
“Not our graveyard,” I said.
“No,” Hiram replied, nodding vigorously. “Hell no.”
The Eastwood set down in a field of dead grass. We sat for a moment, only a hundred yards or so from the Vulpin ship, waiting for any signs of life.
“Scans?” Reno asked.
“No one on board,” Aela reported. “Atmosphere is breathable but filled with irritants. Prolonged exposure could be carcinogenic. I’m getting some faint heat signatures from inside the city.”
“Let’s have a look around,” Reno said.
The entire crew made their way to the airlock, where all of us except for H’Jossu and Aela strapped on breathing apparati that would filter whatever crap was floating through the air.
I tapped the module over my nose and mouth, raising an eyebrow at H’Jossu. “You don’t need one of these?”
He shook his shaggy head. “My lungs aren’t really in use,” he rasped, glancing out a porthole. “Time for a quick top-five post-apocalyptic Earth movies?”
At that moment, there weren’t any movies popping into my brain. “We’ll have to save that for later,” I told him.
H’Jossu clapped a clawed hand over his face. “Oh man, Syd. Don’t you know not to promise to do something later in a situation like this? That’s like a guarantee now that one of us is going to get axed out there.”
“Don’t even joke,” Melian said, having overheard. I noticed that she’d stuck close to Batzian ever since we’d landed. Both of the Denzans seemed spooked but were trying not to show it. I guess that went for all of us.
“Don’t worry, Mel,” I said. “He’s confusing his tropes, anyway. That’s a horror-movie thing, but we’re well into science fiction territory here.”
“Is this going to be on your test, Syd?” Batzian asked.
H’Jossu sighed and patted my shoulder. “We’ll see if you’re still trope-shaming me when a xenomorph is burrowing into your guts.”
“Touché,” I replied.
“Enough chatter,” Reno barked. “Point team is myself, Hiram, Darcy, and Syd. The rest of you stay at a safe distance. At least one hundred yards. Comms open. We’ll signal when it’s safe to advance.”
“I should be on the point team,” Zara said.
“When you’re impervious to blaster fire, you can be up front with us meat shields,” Reno responded. Zara’s lips curled back over her teeth, but before she could complain further, Reno gently punched her arm. “I need a fighter I can trust to protect the others,” the captain said quietly. “And if we get pinned down at some point, I want you sweeping around to flank. Got it?”
That seemed to pacify Zara. “Yes, Captain.”
Tycius caught my eye above his breathing mask. He nodded. I nodded back. Nothing more needed to be discussed.
“Here we go,” Reno said.
Led by the captain, we four humans made our way off the Eastwood. The ground underfoot was soft with ash, the air a bitter cold. Even through my breathing mask, the whole planet smelled like the inside of an oven.
Silently, we fanned out, double-checking the area around the Vulpin ship. There were no mercenaries lying in wait, but they did leave a trail of footprints heading into the city. They made no effort to cover their tracks.
“You got a count?” Reno asked.
“Uh . . .” Hiram puzzled over the interweaving tracks.
“Ten of them,” Darcy and I answered in unison.
“Good odds for us,” Reno said. “Let’s proceed.”
We made our way toward the buildings. The city was laid out in a regimented grid structure, although some collapsed towers created roadblocks. It didn’t matter. All avenues inevitably led to the obsidian temple. There was no question where the Vulpin were headed, and there was no doubt where we needed to go, too.
Breathing through my apparatus was noisy, so I found myself holding my breath to listen. The only place I’d been that was this quiet was out in the Vastness. Aside from our crunching footfalls, there were no other sounds besides the wind whistling through the shattered windows of buildings. No insects buzzing or birds chirping, not even the sound of leaves rustling. This place was completely dead.
And so was the first Vulpin we found.
We were only two blocks into the city when we saw him. The mercenary was splayed out in the middle of the intersection, like he was doing a snow angel in the ash. The footprints that we’d been following since we landed split up at this point, scattering in different directions. Two of them stuck together, though, one set with a larger stride than the other.
I pointed down a perpendicular block. “Vanceval went that way.”
“Could be a trap,” Darcy said. “They saw us land. Fanned out. Dead guy’s faking it to lure us in.”
“Or something scared them into the buildings,” Hiram replied.
“Approach with caution,” Reno said.
We didn’t need to worry that the mercenary was playing possum. He was big dead. There was a hole in his chest about the size of a fist, the edges cauterized from the force of whatever had passed through him. Standing over him, I could see a clear cross-section of his ribs.
I couldn’t help but touch my own sternum. Was this the exact block the Etherazi had shown me in that first vision of Ashfall? The one where something lanced through me—just like this Vulpin—and killed me?
Was that meant as a warning from the Etherazi? Was it his way of guiding me through Ashfall so that I could go blow up a planet for him? Or had Goldy let these Vulpin escape to get killed in my place?
And, most important, what the hell had done that to the Vulpin? What could do that to me?
“Tycius,” Reno said into her comm. “Come up here. I want you to take a look at this.”
The second group was a fair distance behind us, but we could still make them out. “On my way,” my uncle said, detaching from the others to jog to our position.
“Gross,” Hiram said, crouching over the body. He reached out to touch the wound, but stopped himself. “Stinks,” he said, looking up at me. “
You smell that?”
The whole planet smelled to me like a face full of exhaust fumes. I pushed my breathing apparatus down a bit to see if I could smell what Hiram did, but it was just the same congested-highway stench. I shook my head at him, distracted. There was something about where the Vulpin had fallen and the placement of the hole in his chest and the memory of my own shooting—the angle. What was that angle?
I stepped back, studying the skyline of the desolate city. “I don’t think we’re safe out here,” I said.
“Pfft,” Hiram said. “We’re safe everywhere, Earther. Get a grip.”
Tycius arrived, staring down at the body. “Captain?”
“Any idea what kind of weapon could do that?” Reno asked. “Because I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Tycius peered down at the hole in the Vulpin. “A projectile of some kind. But he’s wearing body armor . . .”
“There’s another one!” Darcy shouted. She’d slipped off to peek down a nearby block, where a second Vulpin was laid out in the road. This one was missing its head, like it’d been swiped away by an eraser. “It’s much nastier.”
I took a few steps in Darcy’s direction. I looked up, squinting in the gray light, mapping out the trajectories.
There. A building much taller than the others and not nearly as decomposed, some kind of skyscraper once, with hundreds of broken windows that hung open and black like screaming mouths. That would be the place.
“It’s a sniper,” I said, pointing. “I think he’d be—”
Crack.
The sound was loud in the empty city, like a boulder smashing down into the bottom of a canyon. The bullet whined as it zipped through the air, right for me.
Whump.
Tycius banged his shoulder into me, shoving me aside. His portable bodyguard deployed, an ultonate shield rippling into the space in front of us, like an impenetrable umbrella opening.
Except the bullet tore straight through the ultonate and lanced into the street. It wedged into the pavement behind me. I had a moment to register that the projectile was silver, about the size of a railroad spike, and dripping with something black and viscous.
The force from the impact on his shield sent my uncle flying down the block. He quickly rolled into the cover of a nearby archway.
Laughing, Hiram rubbed his hands together and stepped into the middle of the intersection. “Check this out. I’m going to catch one of those bastards and pitch it back at him.”
“Hiram!” I shouted, sprinting toward him. “Don’t—!”
Crack.
I reached Hiram a split second ahead of the next shot, grabbing him around the shoulders and slinging us both into the cover of a broken building. We landed hard on some rubble—but with my invulnerable skin, that was just a mild discomfort. Hiram and I were face-to-face when we hit. His eyes were wide, skin unusually pale.
“Syd?” Hiram asked, his voice small. “I don’t like this feeling—”
The feeling was pain.
The bullet had torn through the front of Hiram’s thigh and sheared out the back, his leg barely attached to his body. Bone shards and gristle, dark blood coagulating, and the sludge-like substance that covered the projectile all mixed together in a stew that pooled beneath Hiram. I felt hot fluid rising in my throat and had to swallow it back.
“Apply pressure,” I said, squeezing above the wound on Hiram’s leg with all my strength. “That’s what we’re supposed to do.”
“I’m not supposed to be hurt,” Hiram whined. “I can’t be hurt.”
Crack.
Crack.
More shots. I couldn’t tell where they were hitting, but there was shouting all over the comm. Our crew scattered under fire just like the Vulpins had before us.
Scrabbling footsteps behind me and then Darcy was leaning over my shoulder. She screamed when she saw Hiram’s wound. I grabbed her arm.
“You’re faster than me,” I said. “Can you get him back to the ship?”
Darcy nodded, blinking her eyes rapidly.
“Hiram? You with me?” I asked, snapping my fingers in his face.
“I feel . . . distant,” Hiram responded. The guy had probably never felt dizzy or faint in his entire life, much less suffered blood loss. I grabbed his wrists and moved his hands to his thigh.
“You need to squeeze as tight as you can,” I told him. I squinted at the viscous residue that lingered around Hiram’s wound, then glanced up at Darcy. “Don’t get any of that shit on you.”
Hiram did as I told him, and, even with his ebbing strength, his grip was enough to stop the bleeding for now. Darcy bent down and scooped him up easily, cradling him like a baby.
“Status report!” Reno barked over the comm.
“Hiram is wounded,” I responded. “Darcy’s carrying him back to the Eastwood. Melian, you out there?”
“I’m here, Syd,” Melian replied, breathless. “I got separated from the others. I’m—”
“Go back to the ship,” I told her. “We need you in the infirmary.”
“That’s a good order, Cadet,” Reno added. I guessed maybe I was stepping on her role as captain a bit, but in the middle of a crisis, she didn’t seem to care. “Everyone else. Report!”
Go, I mouthed to Darcy. “Stay low.”
She took off with Hiram, leaving me to pick my way through the rubble toward the street. I heeded my own advice, making sure to keep a wall between me and the sniper in the tower.
“I’m with Zara,” Batzian said. “She has acquired a blaster.”
Zzzp zzzp zzzp.
As if on cue, Zara fired a series of plasma bursts at the tower. Just like I had, she’d figured out which building the sniper was in, but there were a lot of windows to choose from.
Crack.
A bolt fired back at Zara’s location, smashing through brick. I heard Zara curse over the comm.
“We’re drawing fire,” Batzian said. “Obviously.”
“Aela and I are in cover,” H’Jossu reported. “Hanging back.”
I wiped some sweat off my forehead. I hoped the others were smart enough to stay back. We hadn’t been in the sniper’s crosshairs until we reached the intersection where the Vulpin lay dead. Maybe his weapon didn’t have the range for anything farther.
“I’m holding my position,” Tycius said, the last of our crew to report in. “How bad was Hiram?”
“Not good,” I responded, peeking out at the tower.
“We’re taking this coward down,” Reno growled.
“I agree that we should neutralize the threat,” Ty said patiently, “but we should at least attempt to safely disarm him.”
“Ever the pacifist,” Reno snapped back.
“Captain, we came to this abandoned planet for answers,” Ty replied calmly. “We know it’s not the Vulpin or Vanceval up there. There’s only one other person who we can confirm to be alive on Ashfall.”
No.
In my panic to save Hiram, I hadn’t gotten the chance to think through who was attacking us. My stomach dropped. I wanted to deny it, but Ty’s conclusion made too much sense.
“My dad,” I said into the mic. “My dad is shooting at us.”
“Jesus Christ,” Reno grumbled.
“He may not know that we’re friendly,” Ty said. “Or—well—there’s a chance he’s been alone here for a very long time. He . . .”
“He might be bat-shit crazy,” I said.
“Indeed.”
“All right, Syd, you know where we’re going, right?” Reno asked.
“The big spire to the north,” I replied.
“You and I are going to push that way. Follow my lead,” the captain said. “Zara, see if you can draw some more fire.”
“With pleasure,” Zara replied.
“The rest of you stay clear,” Reno warned.
I didn’t understand what Reno had in mind until I heard the first wall explode. I poked my head out from my hiding spot to see a fresh cloud of dust rising into
the air from where Reno had toppled an entire wall.
She was punching through buildings on her way to the tower.
“Cannonball style,” I said. “Excellent.”
I oriented myself in the direction of the tower, got a running start, and slammed into the nearest wall knees-first. The stone was already cracked and crumbling, so my body smashed through it like I was diving through a paper banner at a pep rally. I burst onto the street outside, leaped over a fallen column, then hit the next wall with my shoulder, like a linebacker, blasting into the cover of a new building. On a parallel trajectory to mine, I could hear Reno making her own destructive sprint. I was also aware of the distant zipping sound of Zara’s blaster and the occasional percussive responses from the sniper.
“I can see the temple from my vantage point,” Aela reported in my ear. “Vanceval and a group of Vulpin are making a break for it.”
I gritted my teeth. They were using us as a distraction. I barreled into the next building, blinking granules of stone out of my eyes.
Crack. Crack.
“Two Vulpin down,” Aela came back. “Vanceval and a woman made it inside, though.”
“Try to keep an eye on their position,” Reno responded. “We’ll deal with them next.”
I lunged into the next building and felt a sudden heat spread across my rib cage.
I looked down at myself. The right side of my uniform had been burned away, the skin beneath irritated and tingly. I’d been shot with a plasma rifle. It felt more like I’d let the water get too hot in the shower.
One of Vanceval’s hired Vulpin mercenaries was crouched behind an outcropping of stone, just a few feet away, his blaster still pointed at me. I’d smashed right into his hiding place and he’d fired at me point-blank.
The mercenary dropped his rifle and held up his hands. “Truce?”
“Nope,” I said, and backhanded him with enough force to knock him unconscious. These guys would’ve killed me and my uncle and did nearly murder Zara. He was lucky I didn’t hit him harder.
I resumed my run toward the tower, hurtling over rubble and breaking through walls. As I got closer, the thunderclap of the sniper’s gun got louder, and one of the spikes drove into the ground just a few yards behind me. He knew we were coming and was taking speculative shots at us now. There was so much new debris in the air from Reno and I crushing our way across town, I doubted the sniper could get anything close to a clear look.
Ashfall Legacy Page 29