No one replied to Gurt’s comment. Seb shuffled to ease the pain of sitting on the unforgiving ground and he looked at Phulp. Just before he spoke, another stampede of boots rushed past outside. Once it had gone, he said in a whisper, “So what happens now?”
Replying in the same low volume, Phulp said, “We wait until the commotion has died down outside.”
Gurt leaned forward with his usual aggression. “Isn’t that a bit risky? I’m not sure if you can hear it or not, but it sounds like there’s a ton of soldiers outside.”
Despite Gurt’s confrontational stance, Phulp remained calm. “They won’t look for us in the huts. They’ll assume we’ve run away from the slum and go that way. We go outside now and we’ll make ourselves much easier to find.”
“How do you know that to be the case?” Sparks asked.
“Would you search every hut in this place?” Phulp replied.
Silence, and then Sparks nodded. “Fair point.”
“No, the soldiers will probably search for the rest of the night, and they don’t know what any of us look like. I’d imagine they’ll be bored by morning.”
“What about the soldier you owed money to?” Seb said.
Phulp shook his head. “She wouldn’t have told anyone other than those with her. Gambling is punishable by death, even for the Crimson foot soldiers.”
“So even though some of them are dead,” Seb said, “they’ll still give up searching for us?”
“The life of a soldier is cheap. They won’t waste the resources on the detective work.”
Gurt leaned from the shadows again and stared down at Phulp. “You seem to know a lot about the soldiers.”
Silence returned to the hut. The alarm continued to pulse outside and footsteps ran back and forth, but at that moment, Seb and his three team members all stared at Phulp.
Their small and pale host looked like he knew he had to answer carefully. “I … uh, used to be one of them.”
Seb blinked and Gurt had already drawn his gun and aimed it at Phulp.
“Pretty much every adult male in this place used to be one of them.”
Gurt kept his gun raised. “And you aren’t one now?”
“Do I look like one?”
Instead of replying, Gurt kept his gun up.
“No,” Phulp said. “I’m not a soldier anymore. I told you this hut used to belong to my cousin before his son killed him, right?”
None of the others spoke.
“Well, the Crimson Countess has a special recruitment process for her foot soldiers.” A distant look washed over Phulp’s red eyes. “From time to time, she takes as many teenage boys as she can find and rounds them up. She then forces them to kill all their loved ones before she puts them in the training camps.”
“We saw that in the square,” Seb said.
“With no family left,” Phulp continued, “you exist in the pens and call her mother. They take years to make sure the soldiers are totally subservient to the Crimson Countess—or at least for them to believe they are subservient to her. If you can’t convince the regime that you’re loyal, they throw your body over the ledge of the city down into the slums below. The truth is, it seems that most of the soldiers hate the Crimson Countess.”
“Why don’t they overthrow her, then?” Sparks asked.
“Fear. You’ve seen the size of her army. That’s a lot of people to persuade she needs to be overthrown. We don’t talk to one another with any kind of depth. You say the wrong thing to the wrong soldier and you end up dead. So even if I did find like-minded soldiers, the risk of finding one who would sell us out seemed too great. Living in Caloon is a daily reminder that you don’t own your life, she does. It’s a simple fact that those who march to the beat of her drum live longer.”
Seb replayed the massacre in the square. “So you had to kill …”
“My mum, dad, and baby sister.” After a heavy sigh, Phulp said, “She was only two. When she saw me kill Mum and Dad, she cried louder than I’d ever heard her cry before. I thought she’d be too young to understand, but she ran straight to me for comfort.” Phulp sighed and ran a shaking hand over his pale head. “I held her with the blood of our parents on my hands. The foot soldiers then gave me a knife and pulled her head back to expose her throat.”
SA gasped and Seb looked at her, his stomach turning in against itself.
“So when you were one of the soldiers, you had to do the same to young boys?” Seb asked.
Another heavy sigh and Phulp looked at the ground.
Before he could reply, Seb said, “It’s okay. I don’t need you to answer that.”
“So,” Phulp said, “although I hate the Crimson Countess, and whatever you’re on this planet to do is fine by me, just know how much of a risk I’m taking to try to get you into the city.”
“You’re not doing it for free.” After Seb had said it, he felt like a complete dick.
“No, you’re right, and I wouldn’t do it for free, but the fact that I’m putting my life at risk doesn’t go away, regardless of how much you pay me.”
Shame made Seb slump where he sat and he felt the others look at him. “I’m sorry. I can see that. Sorry.”
Phulp shuffled as if to make himself comfortable on the hard ground. “That’s okay,” he said as he curled up into a ball like a domestic cat. “Let’s get some rest. We’re going to need it for the morning.”
Why did Seb have to be such an arsehole? Although he thought about speaking again, he had nothing that could undo what he’d already said. Instead, he copied the others in lying down. Despite his extreme discomfort, exhaustion won out. When Seb closed his eyes, he instantly fell asleep.
Chapter 32
Everything ached when Seb woke up. Sore from the cold, hard ground, he groaned as he stretched the tiredness from his body. Upon properly opening his eyes, he saw everyone else had already woken up and they all stared at him.
“Um … uh, how long have you guys been up for?”
“A while,” Gurt said. “I said we should have woken you. I was up for dropping a bucket of water on your head—” he flashed Seb a facetious smile “—bucket and all.”
Seb forced the same facetiousness back through his tired haze. Like in the last hut, the entrance had been blocked by scrap wood to act as a door, although it didn’t quite fit as tightly as the other one had. A look outside showed him it remained dark. He relaxed again. “Will someone wake me up when it’s morning?”
“It is morning,” Phulp said.
Seb sat up again. “Huh?”
“It’s morning.”
When no further explanation came, Seb looked at Sparks, who said, “It’s always dark on Solsans.”
“Always?”
She rolled her purple eyes. “Always.”
“My god. How long before we get off this cursed planet?”
Gurt spoke this time. “Well, if you didn’t spend the entire time asleep, then we would be going a lot sooner.”
“You should have woken me up.”
“I know!” Gurt said. “But, like I said, the others wouldn’t let me.”
“Well, moan at them.” With his glare fixed on Gurt, Seb added, “They might actually care what you have to say.”
A scowl crushed Gurt’s fat face, but before Seb could say anything else, a shrill whistling sound flew through the air. A second later white light flashed through his vision, temporarily blinding him. The ground shook like an earthquake ran through it, and the sound of tearing wood accompanied the hut collapsing around them. A thick cloud of dust kicked up from the fallen wood, which blinded him further as his world flipped into slow motion.
Seb’s head spun and his ears rang. He rubbed his stinging eyes. The brick dust itched his throat and he wheezed when he breathed. Thick smoke made it almost impossible to see, but he could just about make out the large form of Gurt in the hut with him. It looked like everyone else had gone.
The smoke and dust continued to blind Seb, but with a fierce he
at coming from one side of them, both he and Gurt moved against the far wall of the hut. It felt like the only strong wall of the structure, the one wall that kept the shack standing.
As the dust settled, Seb saw the orange glow of flames streak through the black smoke. A large beam had fallen across their path and burned bright. It blocked their exit. He turned to Gurt, but before he could speak, Gurt drove a hard punch into the solid wall they leaned against. It made a loud thwack, but the wall didn’t budge.
The weak spots of his surroundings came to Seb. Gurt’s chin, his damaged right knee, the beam. But no matter what part of the solid wall he looked at, he couldn’t see any frailty to it.
In his panic, Seb’s heart sped up and he breathed quicker, pulling in more of the dark black smoke that filled their cramped space. His eyes stung and tears streamed down his cheeks. The thick and dark clouds stuck to his skin like tar.
Another punch against the wall and another loud thwack before Gurt shoved Seb. “Do something. Help me try to get us out of here.”
“The wall won’t break.”
Gurt gave it another whack, so hard it shook the ground. “How do you know?”
“Trust me.”
Thwack.
Thwack.
Thwack.
Repeated hits did nothing. In Seb’s slowed-down state, he saw Gurt’s large fist bleed when he hit the wall again.
The smoke initially rose and filled the roof space of the hut, but it now pushed down on top of Seb and Gurt. Seb lay on his front to get as far away from it as possible.
Gurt followed his lead and the two of them lay nose to nose.
“How are we going to get out of here?” Gurt asked, his red eyes wide.
Seb shook his head. His lungs tightened with every inhale, his head spun, and the plastic taste of burned rubber stuck to the back of his throat. “I’m not sure we can.”
Chapter 33
The smoke rose to give Seb a clearer view when he pressed his cheek against the cold ground and looked along it. The gap under the flaming beam seemed tiny. No way could he or Gurt sneak beneath it. He drew shallow breaths into his tight lungs to try to combat his panic. The urge to cough burned in his dry throat and made his eyes water worse than ever. The coughing itself would be fine. However, the deep inhale after each one would drag the poisonous air into his lungs and turn his lights out.
A shadow moved across the gap outside and Seb suddenly saw one purple eye staring back at him. He spoke with a wheeze and so quietly that she wouldn’t be able to hear him. “Sparks?”
The bespectacled eye blinked several times. If she did try to talk to him, Seb heard nothing over the roar, pop, and crackle of the fire.
Another explosion shook the ground and Seb heard screams come from a way off. Some more dust fell from the ceiling above him. Tears blurred his eyes, and although he couldn’t see clearly, he recognised the bottom of Sparks’ rucksack when she put it down on the ground outside.
A second later Sparks slid something metal into the small gap beneath the flaming beam. It looked like a miniature car jack. When she wound a handle, it grew taller and lifted the beam with it.
Seb watched Sparks’ large hand spin the handle until it locked at full height. Still too tight for him to get out, and certainly too tight for Gurt, Seb wanted to call out to Sparks to ask her what she planned to do. But the more breath he used, the closer he would get to passing out.
Then Seb saw Sparks’ face again. Her purple eyes spread so wide it looked like her eyeballs would fall out. She ducked down low and crawled beneath the flaming beam, every pop and crackle making her jump as she moved.
Once inside, Sparks reached back through the gap for her bag and dragged it under. On its way through, it caught the jack, pulled the bottom away from it, and the device collapsed, the beam coming down with it. It landed flush with the ground and left no space to reinsert the jack.
By the time Sparks had crossed the small hut to Seb, her eyes streamed with tears. Her hands shook as she rummaged around in her bag. When she’d retrieved a small metal device, she handed it to him and shouted over the roaring fire. “Stick this to the ceiling and press the red button.”
Seb had no time to question her order, so he drew a deep breath, stood up in the smoke, and did exactly as Sparks had said. When he dropped back down again, he saw Sparks had unfolded a large fireproof blanket, which she pulled over the three of them.
Sparks counted down from three. On one, Seb heard a pop and then a fizz before Sparks said, “We can look again now.”
Although still smokey, the entire room had been covered in white foam that had put the fire out. Sparks threw the blanket away from them, pulled a small blowtorch-like device from her bag and cut into the wall that Gurt couldn’t break through.
It only took a few minutes, during which time Sparks needed to pull back down several times to ground level so she could breathe away from the smoke, which, although thinning considerably, still hung heavily enough to choke them. She finally managed to cut through to the neighbouring hut.
Gurt hit the wall this time and it crumbled, allowing the three of them to get through.
Once they all got outside, Seb let his cough go. Deep seal-like barks bucked through him as the cough gathered momentum. Stars swam in his vision from the effort and he heaved several times.
When Seb felt a hand on his back, he turned to see SA smiling down at him. A second later, a hot rush of vomit leapt into his throat and he didn’t have time to turn away before he threw up all over SA’s shoes. Barely able to see for his tears and with the taste of sick seared into the back of his nose, he put a hand across his mouth. “I’m so, so sorry.”
SA smiled as she continued to rub his back.
Once he’d recovered, Seb walked over to Sparks and gripped her in a tight hug. She made fake gargling noises at his affection and he whispered in her ear, “Thank you. Thank you so much. I know how much of a big deal that was. Thank you.”
Sparks flushed red as she pulled away from Seb, and before she could respond, a high-pitched whoosh tore through the air above them.
Seb looked up to see a ship race through the dark sky. A second later it dropped another bomb. Far enough away not to cause any immediate danger to them, he watched the plump device fall into the slum. The explosion shook the ground and a huge mushroom cloud of grey smoke rose into the sky. Wind rushed out from the blast and blew his hair back from his forehead. “What the …?”
Phulp had stood by them for the entire time, but it took for him to speak for Seb to remember he was there. “This happens sometimes. We get attacked from neighbouring planets because they want to take our resources. The Crimson fleet should be here soon.”
Although still blurred, Seb’s sight had improved since he’d stepped out of the burning building. He saw the black ships with red stripes along them. They tore through the air after the bombers, their laser fire going painfully wide.
“They’re nearly as accurate as you, Seb,” Gurt said. “No wonder they bomb this place, it’s not like there’s much of a deterrent not to. Give me a catapult and I’ll probably be more of a danger to the enemy ships than those clowns are.”
As Seb watched the bomber fly away, he shook his head. Gurt normally talked utter nonsense, but he had a point; the Crimson fleet couldn’t shoot at all. Of all the foot soldiers they could use, why pick the ones with such terrible aim?
The devastation on the ground took Seb’s attention away from the sky. Half of the slum remained on fire and dark smoke turned the black sky even blacker. Coughs and splutters surrounded him. Creatures wailed, brayed, and cried while the pop and crackle of fire ran as a constant background noise. It would take some time for the vast blaze to burn out. The huts being so close to one another would give the flames free rein to travel across the slum.
Chapter 34
If the streets through the slums had seemed narrow before, they now felt claustrophobic. Seb sweated from both their quick pace and the heat aroun
d them as he walked at the front of the pack directly behind Phulp. The slum burned on either side of them and the flames reached up into the sky. They touched at points above their heads, forming an archway of fire over them.
Like when he’d been in the hut, the smoke in the streets stung Seb’s eyes. Thick, acrid, and blinding at times, it rode the wind, choking him whenever a dense enough cloud hit him.
The smoke clung to Seb’s skin like soot and felt gritty every time he wiped the waterfall of sweat from his face.
Seb swallowed several times, but it did nothing to rid the taste of molten plastic from the back of his throat.
The screams and cries of what sounded like the suffering of a thousand different creatures surrounded the gang. But they could do nothing to help. Instead, they walked with their heads down, pushing deeper into hell with every step forward.
When Seb glanced behind, he saw Sparks close to him, muttering something to herself as if she needed the constant reassurance to keep going.
Phulp, who seemed totally at ease with the situation, looked back at Sparks and then smiled at Seb. “You have a good friend there, you know? You can see how fire makes her feel. Scared is normal, but for her, it goes beyond that.”
Another glance at the small Thrystian and Seb nodded. “We weren’t always friends, but I’m glad we are now. You’re right, she’d follow me into hell and back, and I her.” He looked beyond Sparks and saw SA walking with her usual grace, seemingly impervious to the scorching chaos around them, and Gurt moving along with his slight limp disguised by his alpha male gait.
“This is the best time to travel, you know,” Phulp said, pulling Seb’s attention back to him.
“Why’s that?”
“The Crimson foot soldiers tend to keep a low profile when the slums burn.”
“That makes sense.” Seb then said, “This happens often, does it?”
The Shadow Order - Books 1 - 8 + 120 Seconds (The complete series): A Space Opera Page 29