Prime Alpha (Planetary Powers Book 1)

by Joshua Boring

  Shreen!

  -Scizzor’s second war sword came down like a guillotine, cutting through the tightly-strapped, arm-mounted Mojave. Trent heard a pop and a hiss of pressurized air as the propellant tube on the Mojave burst, spraying propellant all over the floor and ending any hopes of using the deadly toxin further. Not that Trent had any time to worry about it as Scizzor violently kicked his legs out from under him and finished up with a vicious strike to the small of his back, making his whole body spasm as Scizzor ground his spike-kneed armor into Trent's spine.

  Several feet away, Kyler groaned and slammed the deck with a fist, forcing himself to his knees like a wounded mammoth. Scizzor looked up, saw Kyler was about to charge anew, and dive-rolled off the sniper. Trent started to struggle to his feet, head swimming in and out of consciousness. Then the concussion grenade the general had planted on his chest exploded, blasting him over backwards so hard his body scissored over his knees before hitting the floor again. As the concussion grenade went off, Scizzor completed his roll and came up into a combat stance, just as Kyler took an unsteady—but angry—step toward Scizzor.

  When the general rolled onto one knee, he turned his body halfway toward the giant. Cradled carefully in his arms like a letter from a lover was the discarded Pennington rocket launcher, held in an improvised backwards grip. Without needing to check his aim, or see his opponent's reaction, Scizzor clicked the trigger with his thumb. The rocket launcher belched one last time. In the second it took for the rocket to reach its target, Kyler yelled.

  “Oh SP-”

  Kyler Jeston vanished into a cloud of smoke and ashes. The resounding boom rang through the Vorch warrior's armor, and shuddered through the floor. Scizzor waited as rocket shards and hot concussion waves dashed against his back, deliberately turning his helmeted head away. The spectacle concluded with the sound of a single, lethargic, thud. After a few seconds, the booming echo of the explosion died away, and the central axis went silent.

  ***

  The master general let out a disappointed sigh.

  Scizzor stood and dumped the Pennington onto the ravaged floor, naturally sheathing his second war sword in its scabbard with a snick-click. Scowling, he walked away without stopping to recover his Xazzler, cell blaster, or his first war sword which was still smoldering against the wall. He didn't even bother to reload his wrist rifle. Behind him, two avatars of war lay motionless on the floor, mystic armor broken. Scizzor kept walking until he reached the petrified faces of Prince Tars and his troops, who had watched the whole thing, start to finish. Scizzor looked at Tars from behind his battle visor and gave a dismissive shrug.

  “Mediocre,” was all he said.

  The general sighed and walked past the shell-shocked Alliance troops, looking down at the deck as he went, hands clasped behind his back. Tars watched him, unable to tear his unblinking eyes away until he was out of sight. Once he was gone and everyone began to breathe again, Tars looked down at his own hands, wondering at how inept they suddenly seemed.

  “Wao jdo fahlas kein,” he murmured awestruck under his breath. “Curse out my eyes... I've just witnessed demons.”

  ***

  Kyler Jeston coughed, feeling his heart pounding in his ears as his vision swam. His blue Genesis alloy trembled in its symbiosis, trying to balance numbing the pain with repairing the damage. His whole body was on the verge of shutting down, arms and legs refusing to respond. After the racking coughs stopped, the giant sighed.

  “…what the bloody hell,” he muttered, playing over the fight in his mind.

  The Paxtonite hunter rolled his head to the side, then regretted it as something painful cracked in his neck. He groaned loudly as his back ached. He couldn't move his arms, both locked in different levels of pain. His right leg, knee in particular, wouldn't stop screaming. He couldn't find anything that didn't hurt. Off to his right, a low groan like a hiss of smoke rose from a badly contorted Trenton Baxter.

  “...K-Kyler?

  “Oy,” Kyler said, looking over at the sniper worriedly. “You okay?”

  Trent turned his head toward the gunner, weakly. “You mean compared to you?”

  Something shouted in Albiac down one of the corridors. Kyler tried not to turn his head, biting down on his own teeth to force the pain back.

  “Here they come,” he said, managing to move his right arm, slowly regaining some strength. “Can you walk?”

  Trent's arms shook in a way that made the hunter very uneasy as the sniper tried to look down past his own smoldering chest alloy.

  “I can't move my legs,” the sniper said. Then, more afraid. “Buckshot, I, I can't feel my...”

  A Golo shouted something stern, whipping troops into action. Kyler scrambled to find an encouraging course of action.

  “We ken deal with thes,” he said, forcing a smile. “Et's not thet bad.”

  Trent lifted a hand weakly in question. “Y-You got any ideas?”

  Kyler's smile fell. “Oh crap, et is thet bad! Youh askin' me foh ideas!?”

  Trent coughed, barely able to move from his crumpled position. “Got any?”

  Kyler thought for a second as microtank engines revved on nearby. The tromp of Golo boots drew closer behind him. After a second, Kyler worked his one responding hand up to his chest.

  “Well, I got one stupid idea.”

  “What?”

  Kyler worked his Rhino magnum out of its heavy shoulder holster with a jerk. “Turn youh back.”

  “I don't like your idea,” Trent said, knowing exactly where Kyler was going.

  “Then you shouldn't have asked,” Kyler said, taking a deep breath and pointing his magnum at his team mate. “Now roll ovah.”

  Trent worked through waves of pain as he groped for a handhold with his shaking hands. Behind Kyler, the sounds of Vorch squads drew closer. The charge of cell blasters could be heard over the cautious mumbles as the Yew forces closed in on their wounded prey. Any second now, they would be captured, or each take a killshot to the head. Trent grunted, legs refusing to respond, as he used his arms to try and roll himself onto his side. Kyler swallowed, gathering his strength for the next few seconds. He would need it, if anyone was left alive, much less the ESCs. Trent groaned loudly and pulled himself onto his right side, exposing the intact Mojave gas tank on his back.

  Kyler fired his roaring magnum just as a massive Golo boot came down on his aching chest.

  The Mojave exploded, showering everything with liquid gas. In seconds, the gas oxidized, and everything died.

  Chapter 54

  The inner workings of the Orbit Angel looked like a jungle.

  Cables swayed gently in the shadows like vines. Pipes wound too and fro like tree trunks. Low, quiet thrums vibrated through the deck from the emergency gravity, like nocturnal calls. Somewhere the trickle of water could be heard from a burst pipe, like a miniature waterfall. Shadows from the biolights moved, giving the illusion that everything was alive. All these things came together to create an interesting simile of a real-life brush.

  But it was the smell that instantly filled Nathen with unease.

  There were smells of rust, mildew, oil. All old smells. But there was another one that did not belong. The stench of craving, slinking, snarling death.

  Nathen knew that scent.

  “Sir?”

  Nathen looked over his shoulder at Calico. She was waiting a few feet away, face strangely illuminated in the pulsing green light from the bio badge. The translator pointed at Nathen's leg.

  “We need to get that treated before we can go any further.”

  Nathen turned back around, scanning the shadows and trying to catch the scent again. “Later.”

  “Later never comes,” Calico said, stepping forward and pulling on Nathen's arm. “You're going to get us both killed if we don't take this moment to fix that wound.”

  Nathen tried to think of an excuse, but he didn't have one. A patch kit would have pain-numbing anti-toxins that would slow down his reaction
time. But even he had to admit the wound was worse than he'd first thought. He was limping far more than he wanted to, so he was going to be slowed down either way. Might as well be without the distraction of pain.

  “Alright,” he said, reluctantly backing down. “One minute, that's all.”

  Nathen sat down on the deck, stretching his leg out and placing Gordon's Karl 9 next to him, within easy reach. He pulled out the patch kit and handed it to Calico, who knelt down in front of him and started tearing open the package. Nathen reached down and painfully dug his fingers into the seared breach in the fabric of his white and black White Sun uniform.

  “Brace yourself,” he warned.

  With a wrench, he ripped open the thigh of his uniform, unleashing a stench of stale ozone. The pungent, retching odor of burned flesh caused Calico to recoil and grab her own nose.

  “Oh God,” she said, shocked at the condition of the wound. “How are you still standing?”

  Nathen gritted his teeth and reached for the open patch kit. “Gimme that. Quick.”

  Calico handed it over, and Nathen flipped through the miniature medical kit until he found the burn salve wipe. It would have been better if he'd had a canister of the stuff, but then again it would have been better if he'd never gotten shot at all. Nathen rubbed around the wound, making sure to get the entry point on the back of his leg as well. It stung badly, but it would help the burn swelling go down in the long run. Nathen tossed the soiled wipe away and reached for the patches. Calico watched, taking her hand away from her mouth.

  “How many times have you been shot before?”

  Nathen peeled the film off the patch and let the air activate the adhesive. “Blaster bolts or just in general?”

  “Uh, I guess, just blasters.”

  “Five, including this.”

  Calico curled her fingers into a fist, looking down at her hand. “Wow.”

  Nathen pulled back the ripped leg of his uniform. “Still, I'd rather say I've been shot than killed. One of these days someone will get lucky when I’m out of armor. Here. I need your hands.”

  Calico scooted forward, trying to shine the light from her badge on Nathen's leg. “Okay. What do I do?”

  Nathen hovered the patch over the wicked wound where the blaster had come out the front. “We need to hold down on this. Ready? Now!”

  Nathen put the patch over the wound and flattened his hands over it while Calico flattened her hands over his. Despite preparing himself mentally for the pain, Nathen bit out a harsh, short cry that carried through the emptiness. His pain cried out to the darkness.

  The darkness cried back, with a short, sick mewl.

  Nathen and Calico both looked up, hands pressed, as the haunting sound from far away lingered in their ears.

  “Tell me that was an echo,” Calico said.

  Nathen responded by consciously taking his hand away from the patch wound and picking up the Karl 9. Calico drew her own pistol and stood up, looking around and trying to find the direction the mysterious moan had come from. Nathen, not putting his gun down, quickly went about applying the other patch.

  “We're not alone down here,” he said.

  Nathen slid the second patch under his leg and pressed hard, pulling his knee into his chest and cringing. When the patch had bonded with his leg, Nathen took a few deep breaths, then unsteadily got to his feet as the worst of the pain trickled away. Calico's head went from looking down to looking up as Nathen stood to his full height. The Commander still leaned a little to one side.

  “Mmmaybe we should put a tourniquet on, too,” she suggested.

  Nathen shook his head. “This will hold. This is cutting edge ESC gear. Not your average slap-on bandage.”

  Calico turned, sweeping the area with the light of her badge. “Okay... Where do we go from here?”

  Nathen walked past her with a slightly more confident stride. “The nearest exit.”

  Calico followed. “We're not there yet. Why are we leaving?”

  “Because we're being hunted.”

  Five minutes passed, and barely a word was spoken between the two elites. Their journey through the jungle maze of pipes and tight spaces was cloaked in silence. It was eerily uncomfortable, passing the machinery that should have been alive and active. It was like walking through the cold body of a gigantic corpse, with nothing but the sound of their own footsteps to accompany them.

  Until at last, from just a few meters away, a wet gurgle came from the shadows.

  Nathen froze, halting Calico and listening. At first, nothing. Then, about a dozen meters ahead, just out of range of the biolights, the deck shook under the weight of something hitting it. The dead air vibrated with a hollow, hot exhale. Nathen stepped back into a combat stance and slapped a palm against his light badge.

  “Put the light out,” he said, urgently.

  Calico quickly extinguished her light, casting the duo back into total blackness.

  For several seconds, the sound of slow, hesitant breath was the only sound. Then, several meters ahead in the darkness, the deck shuddered under the weight of something moving. A short, wet growl popped the silence, followed by an almost whip-like throaty snarl. The breathing increased rapidly as calm turned to anxiety. The deck rattled under their feet as something large clawed toward them in the darkness. The echo of heavy breathing closed in, drawing nearer, nearer, until it peaked with a snapping lunge. Calico issued a startled scream as the darkness flashed like a thunderclap, momentarily highlighting Nathen's profile as he held the Karl 9 at arm's length. A wicked shadow poised in mid air was visible for the split second that the flash of a gunshot lit up the darkness, and then there was a heavy thud, practically right at their feet. Weak gurgles like a clogged brook continued for several seconds, until there was one last gasp, and then the gurgling stopped. It was with nervous fingers that Calico reached up to her chest and activated her biolight. The badge glowed on, drawing from her bio energy, and Calico quickly took a step back from the corpse before her.

  Kneeling at her feet, Nathen pulled his retractable dagger from the killing stroke he'd dealt to their attacker's throat. The bullet had stopped it, but the body fell onto Nathen's waiting blade to finish the job. Calico took a long look at the creature, awed by its glistening snake-like scales, the deadly fangs, and its sleek feline figure nearly a meter long. Red blood oozed from two wounds toward the front of its body, flowing over its already-slick greenish scales. Its eyes were drooped shut, mouth hanging slightly agape, thin tongue lolled beside its curved fangs. Nathen stood, brushing himself off and taking gun in hand once more.

  “Maul,” he said, explaining. “Nasty business. Probably set loose down here to catch survivors. Like you and me.”

  Calico edged closer and gave the Maul's almost-triangular head a nudge. “Do they... all get this big?”

  Nathen shook his head, catching his breath as he switched on his biolight, which pulsed with his accelerated heartbeat. “No, this one's small. Probably the runt of the pack.”

  An extended, almost melancholy wail sounded in the distance. Nathen looked up and frowned.

  “They're following us,” he said, hand tightening around the Karl 9. “Let's go.”

  The ESCs hurried on their way, glancing once more at the corpse of the Maul before plunging back into the mechanical jungle. Through twists and turns they marched, constantly looking over their shoulder for fear that they would see a shadow flying through the darkness at them, wet fangs glistening. The biolights betrayed their beating hearts, like a beacon to the blood-sucking aliens. Soon, their tense retreat led to a different part of the maintenance corridors. One which had, Nathen reflected upon arrival, seen better days.

  Nathen paused for a moment at the top of the stairs, looking out across the piston room. Here, things widened a bit, giving the commandos some breathing room. Machines that should have been churning were still as sculptures. The room wasn't entirely silent, though. There was a constant hum in the air, probably from one of the em
ergency backup generators. There was also a slight breeze running through the room that tugged at the ESC's coats as the auxiliary atmospheric systems worked overtime. However, the number one thing that drew his attention to the room was the flooding.

  Nathen took a few steps down the short staircase, right to the edge of the dark water as a broken pipe trickled a constant stream of water down from the ceiling. He couldn't see the floor; the ripples kept distorting his view. But he guessed it might be about knee deep. It just depended on how far down the staircase went. Nathen looked up and tried to see the other side, but if there was one, the darkness withheld it from view. Resignedly, the Commander unslung his Coyote and handed it back to Calico, who took the assault rifle obediently.

  “This is the deck's primary pumping station,” he explained, looking about as he ran a sweaty hand through his hair, preparing for a cold wade through the dark. This really was beginning to feel like cave diving. “We're real close to the living quarters now. There should be an exit somewhere just up ahead.”

  Calico holstered her Denchura and took the Coyote in her hands. “Oh, man. I hate getting my feet wet.”

  Nathen started down, but had to stop to stifle a snicker. Calico, missing the reaction, arched an eyebrow in confusion. Clearing his throat and setting his face, Nathen took the first step into the cold water. He descended the last of the steps until he was in the water just up to his knees. His blaster wound was too high up to submerge. A shame, since it might have helped take the edge off the burn.

  Nathen waded ahead, plowing through the standing water. Calico followed, dropping herself into the water which reached her upper thighs. She hurried to catch up, kicking up a small wake behind her. Nathen led on, limited by weak light coming off of his badge. Following them everywhere was the gurgling trickle of water and the hush of slowly cycling air. The smell of wet rust was everywhere. But after the eerie silence and darkness that they had come through thus far, it was a welcome change to feel something a little more natural, a little more... alive.