by Anna Carven
His brother’s mate had demanded it of him, and that was akin to a request from Rykal himself.
The woman entered data into some sort of input advice. “The Captain will want to question you himself, but before you see him, you need to change. It’s inappropriate for you to be wearing combat armor while in custody.” She thrust a pile of grey clothing at him. “Had to get these custom manufactured. I don’t think you’d fit any standard Human-issue outfit. I’ll give you some privacy now. Leave your armor in the corner.”
She couldn’t help but give him a quick appraising up-and-down look. Her scrutiny annoyed him. Kail stared back, not bothering to take the clothing.
What kind of nonsense was this? “My armor is not detachable.”
“Y-you’re under the Federation’s jurisdiction, Kail. Your co-operation will make this easier on all of us, you included.”
They still didn’t understand that he was here by choice. Although Kail appeared outwardly calm, underneath the surface he was seething with impatience. He studied his opponents. The lead woman had a gun holstered underneath one arm. There were three males behind her, each clutching a long bolt-powered gun. Their protective helmets gleamed under the harsh artificial lights, obscuring their features.
“Don’t make us resort to using force. You’re not on Kythia anymore. You were caught outside your approved area of combat. Remove your armor and comply. We really don’t want this to turn into a major diplomatic incident, but we will enforce the law by any means necessary.”
Kail’s silence seemed to have emboldened her. Did Humans interpret silence as weakness?
It didn’t matter. He was beginning to lose patience. It was time to end this nonsense. “Let me show you why your request is impossible.” He was already fully armored from the neck down. All he had to do was activate his helm. “Perhaps it is beyond your Human comprehension.”
He issued a simple mental command and the nanites in his bloodstream responded. The Humans didn’t understand that he was no longer a creature of only flesh and blood. In an excruciating series of experiments, the Imperial Military’s Medical Division had grafted billions of semi-sentient nano-particles into his body, turning him into a monster.
Out of thousands, he’d been one of the few who’d survived. They’d erased all memories of his past life and given him a new identity.
Who was he? What was he? A tool of the Empire. A killer with no identity, no past, and nothing to set him apart except the strange markings across his face and back.
Temanjin? No, he wasn’t even that, although General Tarak had tried to reinvent him in that mould, with some success.
Kail visualized the familiar prototype of his protective helm, right down to the innate circuitry of his semi-transparent visor. The nano-particles began to move through bone and sinew and muscle, surfacing on his skin. As always, the process was exquisitely painful.
“What the hell?” Too late, the Humans started to react. “I told you we should have fucking-”
Confusion reigned. They shouted at one another in their odd language as Kail rose. He moved swiftly, silently, using the element of surprise to his advantage.
He lunged and grabbed one of the bolt-guns by its long barrel, wrenching it out of the Human’s hands before the man realized what was happening. In the same fluid motion, he swung the weapon around and slammed its butt into the side of the man’s helmet. There was a loud crack and the man slumped to the floor, unconscious.
A blast of bolt-energy hit him in his side as the next man fired. Pain ripped through Kail’s torso, but he ignored it. He couldn’t allow anything to slow his momentum, and his armor had absorbed most of the blast’s energy.
He dodged as another bolt of electrical charge streaked past, hitting the glass plate on the other side. He flipped the weapon in his hands and pulled the trigger, returning the favor.
The blast threw his attacker back, scattering the remaining two Humans. An alarm went off in the distance. Kail growled. He had to hurry.
“Stop!” The woman pulled her gun free of its holster, aiming it at his head. Kail ignored her, moving swiftly, summoning the kind of speed no Human could hope to match.
He endured another excruciating blast to his torso. This one stopped him dead in his tracks, forcing him to momentarily tense as the charge dissipated. A slight stinging sensation rippled across his skin.
Move.
With a grunt of exertion, he broke free of his sudden paralysis, turned, and squeezed off another shot, hitting his third attacker in the chest.
The man crumpled to the ground and Kail stepped over him, coming face-to-face with the woman. She raised her gun, but he was too fast, grabbing her wrist and squeezing hard.
She gasped in pain as the weapon fell out of her hand, clattering to the floor.
“Where is she?” Kail demanded. He placed the point of the gun underneath her chin.
“She?”
“The Human you detained. She is under my protection.”
The soldier’s grey eyes widened. “Y-you can’t do this. An entire enforcement squad is on its way. You won’t get out of here alive.”
They thought they could contain him? Of course they did. They always thought that, and he always ended up correcting their foolish, misguided notions. “I won’t repeat myself again,” Kail said quietly. “Do you want to live or die?”
Her jaw trembled. Kail waited. Fear was a powerful motivator, and silence could be more effective than threats.
This Human was terrified. He read fear in her dilated black pupils, in the vessels pulsating wildly at the base of her neck, and in the way the soft pink hues had drained from her face, leaving her skin a ghostly shade of white.
The trail of bodies Kail had left behind was more than enough proof that he was deadly serious.
The Human hesitated, a flurry of emotion crossing her face. Finally, she spoke. “The prisoner’s been transported to the infirmary.”
“Infirmary?” His tone darkened as a frantic sense of urgency swept through him. What had they done to her? “Where is it?”
“D-down the corridor. To the left. Follow the blue signs.” She swallowed. “You won’t get there, though. They’re coming for you. You won’t get past an entire squadron-” Her voice wavered as Kail pressed the gun just a little bit harder against her soft skin.
The Human blinked. Cold realization entered her eyes. It was the look that came when one realized they stood on the precipice between life and death.
“Please don’t kill me,” she whispered, shrinking back. “I was just following orders.”
Kail had used death as a threat. Life was to be granted in exchange for correct answers, and the Human had told him what he wanted to know. There was no way she could be lying, because he would have sensed it.
He always knew when they were lying.
He turned, not sparing her a second glance as he stalked out of the holding cell and into the corridor.
He walked right into a swarm of Humans. They flooded the passage, closing in on him from both sides. “Don’t move or we’ll shoot!”
“Get out of my way,” Kail thundered. It was the only warning they would get.
Guns appeared from all directions. Kail braced himself for the onslaught. It would be painful, and he would take some damage, but he’d been through far worse. He wished his Callidum weapons were at hand, because close-quarters combat was always easier and faster with a good set of blades, but at least he had his fists and his claws and this stupidly weighted Human bolt-gun.
All he had to do now was get to Riana before her captors realized one very important truth.
She was under his protection. She was the only living thing in this entire facility he would not willfully harm. He had to get to her before they tried to use her against him again.
And in turn, she would lead him to the truth. His inner temanjin was convinced of it. His instincts screamed at him, telling him to follow her, to keep her alive, no matter what.
&
nbsp; As the first gun went off, Kail started to run, and chaos descended all around him. He welcomed it, because he of all people knew that in order to restore balance, one occasionally had to invoke chaos.
He was rather good at invoking chaos, as all of his kind were.
Chapter Fourteen
“The toxin’s kicking in. She’s feverish.”
Bright white light flooded Riana’s vision. Her headache had intensified, and her stomach felt fucking awful. A crippling wave of nausea hit her, and she curled up into the fetal position, trying to ride it out.
Dark shadows loomed over her. People were standing around her, observing.
“So what happens now?” The voice echoing inside the cell was cold and detached. Through a haze of pain and nausea, Riana tried to sit up, but a cold hand pressed on her neck, holding her down.
“Stay put, princess.” It was the captain from earlier, the one who had arrested her. “You’re supposed to be too sick to move.”
“Sick?” Riana’s voice came out as a hoarse croak. “You’ve poisoned me, haven’t you?”
“Infected,” a woman corrected, smoothing her dark suit with gloved hands. “At least that’s what they’ll conclude on the autopsy. Multi-resistant strains of enteric bacteria are common in this part of the world. They’ve been known to be acquired in detention facilities from time to time. Usually, it’s the food. Sorry, darling. Nothing personal. It’s just that there’s a serious bounty on your head, and I want a piece of it.”
“Who wants me dead?” Riana whispered, although she knew it was futile to expect an answer.
This can’t be happening to me.
Her world had become a surreal, painful nightmare, and a part of her brain had detached from reality. She’d never felt so powerless before. She was at the mercy of a mysterious, sinister enemy, and there was nothing she could do to fight back.
All she could do was try and stay alive.
“Doesn’t matter who, love. You’ll be dead by morning, so don’t torture yourself with pointless questions.”
She could actually fucking die here. Her own life was slipping out of her grasp. For the first time, she realized how fragile the thread of her own mortality was. She was insignificant, nothing more than a minuscule speck in the rich tapestry of the Universe.
“There’ll be an inquiry,” the captain grumbled. “Deaths in custody are rare, but they happen. They won’t suspect murder, only negligence at best. Doesn’t matter, though. If this works out, we’ll get our retirement package and be out of here before anyone’s the wiser.”
“A billion credits can buy you freedom anywhere in this galaxy.” The woman let out a dry laugh. “Once we send them proof of death by natural causes, we’re out of here.”
Riana’s breath caught. A billion credits? That was a damn respectable bounty.
Another wave of nausea swept through her, making her groan as she clutched her stomach. Bile rose in her throat, and the contents of her gut threatened to spill forth. She fought to control the urge to retch. She didn’t want to do that in front of her killers.
“Why do they want me dead?” Her vision blurred, then snapped back into focus.
“I’m curious about that too,” the captain said. “Why would a pretty little thing like you have such a price on her head? What the hell did you do to piss off our corporate overlords? No offense, but you don’t exactly strike me as cyber-terrorist material.”
“That’s the whole point,” Riana tried to say, but her voice wouldn’t work properly. Her vision swam, and the two figures standing over her became four, then eight.
The captain held up his hand, his features creasing. He pressed his finger against a comm device in his left ear. “What the hell is going on?” Alarm entered the captain’s voice. “Sergeant, give me a status report.”
A faint voice crackled through his comm.
“What do you mean, he’s broken out? You’ve got a whole fucking squadron backing you up, you have goddamn bolt-guns, and he’s totally unarmed. How hard is it for you to contain one prisoner?”
There was a pause, followed by more crackling static and frantic shouting down the line.
“What do you mean, the bolt-guns don’t work on him? You were supposed to have disarmed him and confiscated his combat armor. What is he, some sort of fucking immortal?”
His voice drifted in and out, fading into the background. Riana was trying to comprehend what he was saying, but the words had become a meaningless jumble. Her thoughts were sluggish, as if they’d been smothered in molasses.
Something was bothering her. It was incessant, intruding at the edges of her consciousness. What? It was an insistent, high-pitched wail that added another layer to her suffering.
An alarm.
It was the sound of chaos unleashed, and it gave her hope.
“What do you mean, he’s breached the Cell Block boundary? Are the prison guards asleep? Tell them to contain him in the main corridor… ” Naked panic had crept into the Enforcer’s voice. “He’s past the main corridor? Why didn’t someone alert me earlier?” The captain’s eyes were growing wider by the second. His face had turned a whiter shade of pale. “What do you mean… they’re all dead?”
Although Riana was hovering somewhere between consciousness, pain, and delirium, she could still appreciate the irony of it all.
The Kordolian she’d been so terrified of had now instilled a sense of hope in her. Her life was fading away, and only Kail could break through the madness and save her.
And even then, her survival wasn’t guaranteed.
Riana fucking hated this. She hated being so helpless. She hated being a victim. She hated being at the mercy of hidden enemies.
If she got out of here alive, she’d do everything in her power to make sure she was never put in such a situation ever again.
A muffled rumble shook the walls and floor. It sounded like an explosion had gone off in a confined space somewhere. Perhaps they were underground.
“Activate the emergency firelocks,” the captain shouted. “I don’t care if the oxygen depletion vents kick in. You have to stop him from reaching the main Cell Block.”
His voice droned in and out of Riana’s perception as he continued to rattle off orders, each futile command becoming more and more frantic. The woman in the dark suit had disappeared, and Riana took the opportunity to sit up on her elbows.
Her world blurred and swayed, and again she was overcome with the urge to spill her guts all over the floor.
“Get down, prisoner!” the captain snapped. Riana raised her head and stared at him. His face had turned red, and his temples bulged. White knuckles revealed the tension in his gun hand, which was clutching a bolt-gun.
He looked like a man who’d just lost a sure bet.
For some reason, all of Riana’s fear washed away. Her mind became clear, and she saw the captain for what he was; an aging Enforcer who’d become too comfortable in his position.
A man who thought he was the king of his small domain.
And now he was panicking, because a landsider like him who had probably never been past Earth’s exosphere had failed to understand that there were much bigger, badder things in the Universe than Humans, and Earth was really only just a tiny speck in the grand scheme of things.
Riana had understood that from the moment the Kordolians had set foot on Fortuna Tau.
A second explosion went off, this one louder and closer than the first. The walls and floor shook.
“Stay here,” the captain snarled at Riana as he raised his bolt-gun and made for the exit.
With the last of her fading strength, Riana gave him a withering look and promptly managed to empty the contents of her stomach onto the floor, dirtying the captain’s shiny black boots.
Chapter Fifteen
Kail was irritable. The Humans had tried to kill him with explosives, not once now, but twice.
Each time, the impact of the blast had thrown him backwards, but he’d managed to regain
his footing in time to counter the Humans that had swarmed into the narrow corridor behind him.
They were worse than those infernal swarming vakkandik flies; for every one that he put down, another appeared.
By the time he reached the end of the corridor, there was a trail of bodies lying in his wake.
He turned left and found himself in a brightly lit room. Stark grey walls surrounded him. They buttressed a cold, polished white floor.
A man burst out of a side door, raising his bolt-gun at Kail. It was the same man who’d forced Riana to her knees at gunpoint in the desert. Kail growled.
“Don’t move or I’ll shoot!” The man pivoted to face him, his eyes wide and frantic as he looked over Kail’s shoulder, as if searching for backup. “Give up, Kordolian. Even if you manage to kill a few of us, you won’t get through the outer reinforced zones. The peacekeepers will be here soon, and they’ll use whatever means necessary to take you down.”
Kail stared at him. He’d heard this sort of thing many times before. “Shoot me,” he shrugged. “See if it makes any difference.”
His nonchalance took the Human by surprise, and the man hesitated. It was all the time Kail needed. He surged forward, extending his arm and clamping his hand around the Human’s neck. Kail squeezed, pushing the man backwards until he was pressed against the hard grey wall. The bolt-gun fell from the Human’s grasp, clattering across the polished floor.
“Where is she?”
“Aargh!” The man choked as Kail exerted more pressure. He waited until the Human’s skin turned an unholy shade of purple.
Then he let go.
Interestingly, the man’s face turned red, then white as he gasped for air. Kail had seen this before. Some Humans tended to change color when distressed.
Such a strange species they were.
Kail didn’t say anything; he simply retracted his helm and stared at the man, waiting for an answer.
Silence was often more effective than repeated threats.