An ear-splitting roar washed over them as a large black aircraft banked around the side of the support building and moved in closer. Frankie couldn’t help glancing at the flyer and trying to figure out what it was doing here, which allowed Spectre to take the advantage and press her attack. Frankie defended herself, being pressed ever backwards as she did her best to keep track of events around her.
She watched as Hellion boarded the flyer, leaping from the catwalk over to the side loading door before looking back towards Spectre.
Frankie defended a couple more attacks before glancing over again and spotted Hellion taking aim at them with her pistol.
Frankie moved backwards, stepping away from Spectre as Hellion fired. Guessing that Hellion would be aiming at her rather than Spectre she wanted to focus on not getting shot than on Spectre’s attacks. Sparks flew as the bullets pinged off of the metal gantries between herself and Spectre as Frankie ducked for cover. Looking back, she suddenly saw that Spectre had turned and ran.
What? She thought. That was a distraction? Hellion wasn’t helping Spectre to kill her she realised; she was trying to help get Spectre away. Frankie jumped to her feet and sprinted after the ninja. She was determined that Hellion and her team would not escape them today.
She didn’t care if they ended up in custody or left here in body bags, but if she could at all help it, she would keep them from leaving no matter what.
Frankie took the corner onto the side branch of the walkway, using her hands to help her get around it while running before putting all her effort into catching Spectre. She wasn’t too far ahead when the ninja reached the end of the gantry and leapt off the end. Frankie was right on her heels and followed suit, launching herself into the air between the walkway and the flyer.
As she sailed through the air, Frankie pulled her gun from her drop holster and in a deft movement, fired off several shots into the back of the ninja while she was in mid-air.
Blood blossomed from between her shoulder blades like liquid roses in the dim Undercity light while her leap to the flyer grew ragged as she arced in. Landing on her knee’s first, she crashed to the floor of the cargo hold of the aircraft, face planting herself onto the floor of the flyer with a yell of pain. Frankie dropped in right behind her, her gun in both hands as she unloaded two more into the back of Spectre’s skull.
Hellion’s boot smashed into the side of Frankie’s face with savage force.
‘You bitch, you couldn’t let her live, could you?’ Hellion barked.
Frankie looked up at Hellion, past the blinking red icons in her vision, only to see another boot come flying in and kick the gun from her hand. Frankie watched in dismay as it skated across the hull of the flyer and out the door before disappearing into the shadows below.
‘You had to do it didn’t you, you had to end her?’ Hellion yelled.
Frankie got back to her feet. ‘I’m sorry, but yes, I did. She would have done the same to me eventually, and you know it,’ Frankie said.
‘Not if you’d just let us leave. We might have called this mission ended,’ Hellion said, her body trembling with rage.
‘Give me a break. You know that’s not true. Psytech would have just sent you back out with another team, thrown more money at you to finish the job. They don’t care about you, they only care about results. Don’t try and pretend otherwise,’ Frankie said.
‘You want results? I can give you results,’ Hellion scowled at her before she lunged in and grabbed Frankie by the throat. She moved so quickly that Frankie barely had time to react. Hellion twisted and threw Frankie across the hold, into the side wall of the flyer. Frankie pulled herself up, but Hellion was there again with another lightning attack and punched her across the face.
Frankie reeled from it while her internal warning systems went crazy. Hellion grabbed her by the collar again and threw her across the cargo hold for a second time. A few more flashing red icons made little difference now, she knew Hellion was hurting her. Instead, she focused on getting to her feet and trying to regain some control over the situation.
Frankie noticed that Hellion wasn’t hitting her right away again, but then her enhanced hearing picked out the sound of Hellion drawing her sword. Frankie looked up and shook her head, she needed to defend herself. Hellion swung her blade in, giving Frankie no time to pull her own sword. Frankie swiped at it with her hands, knocking the weapon sideways as she hit the flat of the blade with her palm. Frankie rolled to her right and in a swift movement, pulled her own sword with barely a second left to bring it to bear as Hellion swept in again. Their swords rang out as the flyer wobbled in the updrafts.
This was Frankie’s last chance to either bring her down or take Hellion into custody. If she escaped this, Frankie guessed she would quickly disappear until she decided the time was right for revenge.
Defending herself against Hellion’s latest series of strikes, Frankie pushed back, forcing Hellion onto her back heel and using the rolling movement of the flyer to her favour.
But it didn’t last, and Hellion managed to get a shove in on Frankie, forcing her back across the hold before she attacked with her weapon, swiping with her sword again and again, forcing her back.
Frankie jumped away and glanced back to see the open side loading door on the flyer right behind her. The metal interior of the flyer felt a little slick underfoot, and as Hellion pushed in, Frankie felt her foot nearly slip out from under her as she edged backwards.
Hellion’s attacks were no longer the cool and calm strikes. They were no longer measured and professional. Instead, she was filled with rage, her face a picture of raw emotion as she threw herself into the fight. The difference to Frankie was stark, but somehow, Hellion remained as deadly as before. She might be emotionally compromised now, but she was still as dangerous.
Frankie found the difference in her curious and quite stark. She didn’t seem too bothered that Venal had been killed when she had overheard Hellion speaking to the agents a short time ago, but the deaths of the sniper, Wildkat, and more specifically Spectre, the ninja woman, had apparently hit a nerve.
‘Will… you… just… fucking… die…’ Hellion raged, barking each word out between hits, her voice overflowing with hatred. ‘You… bitch…’
Frankie could only defend herself, losing her footing at one point and having to grab the frame of the hatch to keep from falling out of the flyer.
‘Frankie, duck,’ called out Veronica’s voice through their neural link.
The interruption caught her by surprise for a moment, and it took her a second to realise what was happening. Hellion struck again before the instruction clicked into place and Frankie threw herself to the floor, much to Hellions surprise. She landed to the side and slightly behind Hellion, doing her best to keep out of Veronica’s way.
The rapport from the gunshot was faint at this distance, but she heard the “thwip” of the round as it zipped in, struck Hellion in the chest and exploded out of her back, sending bits of metal and synth skin flying.
Hellion staggered and paused, a look of surprise on her face as she looked down at the wound. There was now a hole right in the centre of her chest and a much bigger one in the centre of her back.
“Thwip.” There it was again, and Hellion jerked as the second bullet hit and put another huge hole right through her.
Frankie watched as Hellion looked down at her with a look of confusion and anger.
‘What…’ she said.
Frankie stood up slowly, and passed her sword to her off hand as Hellion turned to face her, her mouth open in shock.
Frankie punched Hellion hard across the face, channelling her rage and fury at this woman into that one hit and making it count. Hellion twisted and fell to one knee on the floor of the cargo hold and spat something onto the floor. It wasn’t blood, but it didn’t look healthy either.
Frankie stood there and looked down at Hellion, and saw a desperate woman, someone she actually felt sorry for, someone who seemed to care
more about her money than she did anything else. She was obviously upset about losing a couple of her teammates, but if she’d really cared for them, would she have brought them into such a dangerous profession?
Hellion growled, looked up and stared at Frankie with a look of pure hatred. Before Frankie knew it, Hellion was up and lunging at her, reaching for her as her growl turned into a scream. Frankie just reacted and brought her foot up, kicking Hellion in the chest and throwing her back.
Hellion sailed out of the side loading hatch, failing to grab onto anything to save herself before she started to fall to the street a few hundred foot below.
Frankie ran to the door, looked out and saw Hellion drop before she suddenly hit the ground and lay still.
Frankie watched her for a moment as the flyer banked around. She needed to get down there, she thought, but she also couldn’t let the pilot escape either. Frankie pulled her sword and stepped up to the cockpit, brandishing it for the pilot to see.
‘Put her down; over there, quickly,’ she said. The pilot looked at her, and then at the sword before nodding.
‘Sure,’ he said and started to manoeuvre the aircraft down. Frankie ran back to the loading door, but she’d lost sight of Hellion’s corpse. There were corporate operatives around still, so she needed to move fast.
Frankie turned back and looked down at the body of Spectre in the hold. She felt sure Xenox would be interested in having a look at it as she was obviously an advanced model. Frankie stepped back to the cockpit and suddenly noticed the sidearm strapped to the pilot’s leg. She reached for it and pulled it from the holster. Judging from the weight, she felt sure it was loaded, and a quick check revealed her guess to be right. Stepping up beside the pilot, she jammed the gun into his side.
‘Down there, that way,’ she said, directing him. ‘Now, go right, and land over there,’ she said, feeling sure that Hellion was on this street somewhere.
The flyer descended and bumped down to the tarmac, the noise from its engines lowering in pitch as the slowed.
Frankie jabbed the pilot in the side again. ‘Okay, get out,’ she said and forced him from the cockpit and into the cargo hold where she pulled some binders out of her utility belt and secured him to a stanchion. Happy that he wasn’t going anywhere, Frankie dropped to the ground outside the flyer and moved around it to get a better view of the road and Hellion. But, as she walked, it soon became apparent that Hellion’s body was gone.
3.19
‘Are you close by?’ Director Forrester asked her through their neural link.
‘Yeah, I’m on Chilton Street, not far from you,’ she answered.
‘Okay, we’re coming to you now. Be there in a few seconds,’ he said and clicked off the link.
Frankie stood in the middle of the street, the nearby streetlamps, those that still worked anyway, lighting up the area just enough. She looked down at the tarmac and could see the spot where Hellion had landed. There were bits of metal and synth skin on the ground, all of which confirmed that this was where she had landed. But she wasn’t here any longer.
Frankie looked around her, hoping she might see someone or something, anything to give her some idea of where Hellion might have gone, but she saw nothing.
Hellion’s body had been out of sight for maybe a minute, a minute and a half at most, which was admittedly enough time for someone to come in and get her out of here if they were quick, organised, and ready.
Either that or someone was just in the right place at the right time. Either way, she was gone and Frankie had no idea if she was alive or dead. But, given that she was missing, she felt justified in thinking that Hellion was likely still alive and that this wasn’t the last they had seen of her.
The sound of incoming flyer engines caught her attention, and she watched an A.C.T. flyer descend to the street, escorted by two police flyers, their red and blue lights flashing and their spotlights hunting.
The A.C.T. flyer dropped down to the ground with the rear hatch already levering open. Frankie watched as William Forrester, the A.C.T. director, and Doctor Xenox stepped down and made their way over to her.
‘Sorry we were a little late to the party,’ William said.
‘Not your fault,’ Frankie offered. ‘They were thorough at cutting us off from outside help, and by the time I contacted you, we were already committed,’ she said.
‘Yeah, still, I wish we could have got to you sooner,’ he said. ‘We were aware that you had not been in touch for a while and were starting to follow up lines of enquiry, but it all happened so quickly, and our response was so slow that you could have died in that time. We’ll be conducting a review of our policy and lines of communication in the next few days. Anyway, enough of that, are you okay?’
‘I’m fine, I look worse than I feel,’ she said, feeling very aware that William was looking at the gunshot wound on her face rather than her eyes.
‘Okay, sorry, it just looks pretty nasty,’ he said.
‘I know, but don’t worry, I’m fine,’ she said.
‘Can I have a look?’ Xenox asked her.
Frankie nodded. ‘Sure.’
Xenox stepped up to her and taking her head in his fingers, moved her head this way and that, getting a good look at the wound. ‘You’re fine, no serious damage here. I can fix this quite easily,’ he said before backing away.
‘That’s what I figured. Thanks, Doc,’ she said. ‘Did you come straight to me, or did you stop by the tower first?’ Frankie asked the director.
‘We’ve just come from the tower. Everything is secure there now; we’ve arrested the Corporate forces and the Jackers,’ he said.
‘You might want to let the Jackers go, they’re the ones who helped us. Without them, we would never have been able to fight back like we did,’ Frankie said.
‘Gibson said the same. We’ll let them go, but we need to stop people from running off for the time being,’ he said. ‘I hope you don’t mind me saying, but you look a little… frustrated, Frankie,’ William commented.
Frankie smiled. Perceptive as ever, it seemed. ‘That’s because I am. It turns out that Psytech hired in a mercenary group to take us out, and they were the ones to set up this ambush. We got all but one of them in the end. Their leader, Hellion, I kicked her out of that flyer,’ she said, pointing to the corporate aircraft just up the street behind her. ‘She landed here, but by the time I got here, she was gone.’
‘But we got the others?’ Xenox asked.
‘They’re dead, but yes, we got them. One is in that flyer,’ she said. ‘They were powerful and fast, faster than me, anyway.’
‘Is that right? Mind if I have a look?’ Xenox asked William.
‘Knock yourself out,’ William said, and with that, Xenox walked away over to the corporate flyer.
‘You said someone called Hellion was the group’s leader?’ William asked.
‘Yeah. A blonde woman. She was deadly with a sword and was working with Psytech. She had a team of cybernetically enhanced mercs with her to help her out, along with two agents and a large team of operatives. They were good, and we were lucky,’ she said.
‘Don’t underestimate yourselves. You and your team are good, too; the best, in fact, as far as I’m concerned,’ William said.
‘Thank you, sir,’ she said. ‘Do you have any idea who Hellion is? Have you heard of her before?’
‘Not that I can remember, but we will certainly be looking into it. I would have thought there would be some reports of them somewhere if they’ve been doing this for a while. Leave it with me and I will see what I can find and let you know,’ he said.
‘So, we need to wrap this up now, I think.’
‘Agreed. Let’s head back to the tower. Xenox, we’re leaving, are you coming? The police can deal with him,’ he said, referring to the pilot.
‘I am, but I need to bring something with us,’ he said as he hauled the body of Spectre out and over his shoulder. ‘Coming,’ he said, his voice straining. ‘Anyone want
to help?’
‘You want that?’ Frankie asked him as she walked over to help.
‘But of course,’ he said as she helped him carry her. ‘You said they seemed more advanced than you? Faster, maybe?’
‘This one and Hellion were, yes. They were knocking bullets out of the air with their swords, so, pretty quick.’
‘Then I think I need to have a look at her. It sounds like they’re using some kind of experimental new tech, and if that truly is the case, then I need to have a look at it.’
‘Sure, makes sense,’ she said, wondering if he might apply this new tech to her one day. She helped lift Spectre’s body onto the flyer and took a seat as it rose up into the air.
‘Do you think this Hellion will be back for you?’ William asked.
‘I think we can count on it. She really wasn’t very pleased with me for killing her team, so I would be very surprised if we never saw her again,’ Frankie explained. ‘Another reason to find out as much as we can about her before she strikes again.’
‘Agreed,’ William said, nodding.
The trip up to the top of the support building to the flyer landing pad that was up there only took a few moments, and it wasn’t long before it had alighted on the pad and she was following William off of the flyer and into the service floor of the building through a side door. He led the way, and they soon entered the room they had been fighting in with its floor to ceiling windows along one wall.
Armed police were standing throughout the space with the corporate forces rounded up and sitting in one group, while the Jacker Gang sat in another, both of them surrounded by armed guards. Frankie noticed that amongst the corporate forces, the two agents she had fought with were amongst them. She hadn’t killed them. As she had feared, their Nanobots obviously having healed them during her trip away from the building. They scowled over at her, hatred in their faces.
The Prometheus Trap (The New Prometheus Book 3) Page 15