“In case you didn’t notice, you all were going to get killed if I didn’t do this,” Orion protested. “I ran millions of simulations first. I knew just where the granks had to hit. I had it calculated. They were safest in those cages. And we can fix them up the rest of the way on my ship. Which you need to be getting to now.”
“And what about all of them?” Sabira gestured at the thousands of mutilated and crushed bodies. “They were Human too. Do their lives mean nothing?”
“Every one of them would have vaporized all of you in a second. We had zero chance of freeing those slaves. I’m sorry, but it’s true. And none of you had a chance of being free again unless we got them out of the way. Which I did. You’re welcome. Or did you have a plan for getting off a battleship filled with enemy soldiers I wasn’t aware of? Now stop wasting time or all this will be for nothing.”
“He is right, Sabira.” Gabriel’s deep voice sounded weak, exhausted. He had followed the cleared-out grank trails to get to them. He held Edlashuul’s thin, shivering body cradled in his arms. “Orion, get this creature to kneel so I can lay him up there.”
The grank that wasn’t projecting Orion’s holo shifted down onto his knees. Gabriel, as carefully as he could manage, lay Edlashuul down on the weapons platform. “Hold on just a little longer, Ed,” he whispered. “I have to take care of something first.”
Gabriel, sucking in his swollen bottom lip, looked from Sabira to Spear to Sabira again. “No way in hell,” he grumbled before he bounded forward and kicked his shin across Spear’s jaw. The old man flopped back in a spray of blood and sweat and grit. Gabriel was on top of him, bludgeoning his head with the metal caps over his severed arms. With each hit he grunted, until the grunts became screams, until the screams became sobs. Beneath him, Spear’s face dripped with blood and shattered teeth.
Sabira clubbed Gabriel in the ribs with the palukai. He doubled over and tumbled into a wall of debris. Tears and blood streaked down his face.
“If I don’t kill him, you don’t!” Sabira screamed. She pointed the barrel of the stick at Gabriel’s chest. “Back off!”
Gabriel pushed himself to his feet, visibly trying to staunch his tears. “Maia . . . That son of a bitch . . . killed Maia . . .”
“I said no!” Sabira fired into the chalky air over Gabriel’s head.
“Sabira, girl, you’ve got anger issues,” said Orion.
Gabriel held out his arms as if he would be gesturing for peace and rationality, if he still had hands to gesture. “Sabira, you still have that gem. We know what it does to you. You know what it does. Please, stop touching it. We don’t have time to fight among ourselves.”
“No.”
“Sabira, I promise. I won’t kill this man. Just put the gem away. I don’t know why you want to spare Maia’s murderer, but I’ll do as you say.”
Sabira clenched her fists. She didn’t like it but knew Gabriel was right. She bent down and reached inside her boot. A messy, thick coat of blood and grime covered them. She pulled out the glowing blue yarist, bigger than any she had seen before, torn from the ceremonial armor of the Ihvgohn-Lo himself. The weapon that made her the weapon. If they lived, it would make a legendary trophy. Another part of her wanted to throw it as far into the wreckage as she could. She dropped it into her tunic pocket.
The adrenaline crash hit soon after. Without the gem fueling her any longer, Sabira’s knees buckled, and her vision tunneled to just a pinprick of light before going black.
When she could see again, she was on her knees. Spear lay a few meters in front of her, coated in the same blood and dust and grime that covered her. His silver eye stared at her, blank and unreadable. Gabriel was at her side too, saying something, asking nervous questions.
“Help me stand,” she said. He hooked his forearm beneath her armpit and helped raise her up. His eye tightened, the only hint of the agony lifting her must have caused him. She placed a hand on his chest to steady herself while she waited for her vision to stop teetering.
“I’m going back for Maia. I won’t leave her in this place,” said Gabriel.
“We really need to hurry,” said Orion. “The Monarchy is just about—”
The entire pyramid rattled sharply. Battle klaxons wailed down through the open holes in the upper decks.
“Revise that. The Monarchy fleet’s here,” Orion said. “The counterattack has started.”
“Orion, get this grank moving over to Maia, save us some time,” said Gabriel. The big war beast rose to its feet and plodded through the debris. “And then we’ve got to find the others and get to a ship.”
The pyramid shuddered again. Piles of rubble slid and shifted. Grating and clashing sounds reverberated across the deck.
“There’s not enough time,” said Orion.
“I’ll go get them,” said Sabira. “Gabriel, get Maia’s body and take Ed to the drop ships. The hanger is that way.” She pointed with the barrel of the palukai. “The brig is a deck below. I’ll take the other grank and free them. We’ll be on the next dropper right behind you.”
“She’s right, Gabe. It’s the best way,” Orion said. “Don’t worry, I’ll keep an eye on her.”
“I’ll see you on the Shishiguchi,” Gabriel said. He turned to follow as quickly as he could behind the grank.
“Get on up. We can’t waste any more time.” Orion’s holo faded out, and the grank knelt down on its massive front knees.
Sabira climbed the beast’s front leg up onto the platform. She got a good look at the glyphs stamped onto its horned face and recognized it immediately. The same one. The same godsdamned grank that had chased her through the pens and nearly trampled her. She wondered if the animal recognized her too.
The ship rumbled, and klaxons screamed danger at whoever remained alive to hear. Roaring fireballs launched through the upper decks, throwing harsh, racing shadows through the smoke and dust clouds.
“What do we do about the old man?” asked Orion’s disembodied voice after Sabira positioned herself behind the grank’s curving horns.
“Just go,” she murmured. “We’ll leave him to his Gods.”
The grank rose to its full height. It followed a cleared-out trail left by one of its fellows, into a newly created tunnel in the pen wall. Looking back as they left, she saw Grandfather Spear push himself to his feet. He stood, swaying, dazed, and watched her go. Their eyes locked across the expanding distance until all she could see was smoke and ruin.
44.
SABIRA COULDN'T SEE more than a few meters ahead of the beast's horns, not that she could steer the biomech one way or the other. It charged at nearly full speed through the tunnel. The thick mass of its stride and momentum undulated beneath her. She had to trust the grank, and Orion's control over it, not to smash through a bulkhead and spit them both out into cold vacuum.
The deck floorings that separated each tier of the pyramid were more than three meters deep, stuffed with biomech conduits and machinery that kept the ship operating. The grank pens were recessed into the deck itself, so when the beasts plowed through the pen walls, they tore into the ship’s innards like a drill carving a tunnel through stone.
Ruptured pipes and cables spewed thick clouds of steam and gases into the tunnel. The damaged biomech conduits oozed a noxious, blood-like oil. Small fires burned everywhere, adding more toxic fumes and stinging odors to the miasma. With one hand Sabira held the collar of her uniform tunic across her nose and mouth while keeping her palukai leveled and ready with the other.
After stashing the yarist gem, exhaustion pulled at her bones. Sharp pains bit at every part of her. It wasn’t until she climbed on the grank that she realized a hundred cuts and bruises covered her entire body. Her head rang. Her heart raced. She remained as alert and cautious as she could, but the exhaustion made focus difficult. Sitting on the grank’s wide neck gave her some small bit of rest.
The tunnel had been bored out by a pack of charging granks, ruptu
re fields disintegrating everything they contacted. Armored plates and stomping hooves demolished everything else. Several grank tunnels veered off, causing the main shaft to narrow the further in they went. The tunnel shrank until it was barely wider than the beast itself.
The grank abruptly stopped. The heavy momentum settling into its frame crashed like a wave beneath her and startled her back to full wakefulness. A transport shaft cut vertically through the tunnel before them.
Orion’s hologram projected into the open air of the shaft, mocking the ship’s artificial gravity. “This is the best access point I could find to the lower deck,” he said. “With all the damage, I’m cut off from any systems below the grank deck. Losing contact with a lot of the upper decks too. Last I was able to see, there were five warseers at the far end down there. This side there were only two.”
Sabira climbed down from the grank and inspected the shaft. The dark interior spanned farther, both above and below, than she could see. Most of the utility light strips were out, and smoke clogged the upper reaches. Portal doors for the transport lift were directly above and below her. The bored-out grank tunnel continued on the far side of the shaft.
“So once I get down there, you’re telling me there are at least two—possibly up to seven—warseers between me and the brig?”
“Yes,” Orion said. “Possibly seven. Probably two. Probably.”
She might need the yarist again. The gem had already drained her, and if she used it now, she might black out. Though, if she didn’t, she might be slagged by seven Gohnzol-Lo. Better to wait, she decided, but be ready to use it without hesitation, if needed.
“I can’t open any of the doors down there,” Orion said, “but these lift doors popped open from the force of the previous grank jumping across.” He gestured at the open shaft, the movements stuttering and glitchy.
“I still may need to fight seven armed warseers.”
“I pity them,” he said. “Do you know how you can get the brig doors open?”
“I know a way.” Her face, caked in blood and fumes and grit, almost cracked a grin. Almost.
All around them the ship’s structure abruptly jolted back and forth, accompanied by the echoes of deep, resonating thuds. The Zol-Ori was getting hammered, on the outside from the Monarchy and from the inside by wild, flying granks.
The lift doors to the deck below warped out and over on themselves, creating a hole more than wide enough to get through. Sabira lowered herself down one-handed, keeping the stick level in front of her with the other hand as she dropped. Crouching in the corner, she took aim down the corridor. Most of the lights were blown, but here and there, a few sputtering light strips revealed a plain, empty corridor. Bulges periodically protruded from the ceiling for as far down as she could see. Grank tracks.
Sabira stalked down the corridor, turned left at the first crossway. Ihziz-Ri glyphs on the walls directed her to the brig. A few working klaxons continued their panicked wail, punctuated by automated calls to battle stations. She made it to the next crossway and stopped before passing the corner. The brig was close. According to the sign, it was just down the adjacent corridor. So far she hadn’t seen any warseers and worried she’d turn the corner and face all seven of them at once. The signs also indicated an armory at the opposite end of the cross corridor. The temptation to raid the armory first was short-lived. Another explosion rang the pyramid like a bell. No time. She wouldn’t be able to open the armory yet, anyway. The brig first, then more weapons.
Sabira closed her eyes, took a long, deep breath to center her focus, and turned the corner to the brig. The hall was dark and empty and dead-ended at a pair of reinforced doors.
“You, servant. Come here,” commanded a voice in Ihziz-Ri. “Report to the guard station.” To the right of the heavy doors, a horizontal panel slid back to reveal a single Gohnzol-Lo face studying her as she approached. “Move it, skin, move it. We’re under attack. Stop wasting time.”
“Yes, Warseer. Sorry, Warseer.” She jogged the rest of the way to the brig’s entrance.
“Godshit skin, what happened to you?”
“The granks, Warseer. They all malfunctioned during the ceremony. They’re tearing the ship apart from the inside. The Gods have seen me, I’m alive.”
The heavy doors slid apart, revealed a small anteroom with another pair of heavy double doors on the far wall. Inside the anteroom, a single door on the right slid open, and the warseer stepped through.
“I command you to take over guard duties,” he said. “I must get to my station. The other Gohnzol-Lo guards will return so—”
She blasted her palukai point-blank into his guts. A hole the size of Sabira’s fist burned clear through his torso in a flash of light and bitter smoke. His three pale orange eyes stared at her, wide with shock, as he dropped to his knees. Sabira spun and slashed. The blade along the barrel of her palukai sliced flesh and bone. His head fell one way, his body the other. Dark and viscous arterial spray splattered green across the walls, coated her chest.
After closing the main doors, Sabira picked up the warseer’s head by one of his horns. The orange eyes, though vacant now, continued to stare, bulging with terrified disbelief. She held the severed head, so it faced the interior doors. A red beam automatically scanned over it, and the doors slid open.
Shadows jerked across the brig corridor. One remaining light strip sputtered erratically along the ceiling and dripped burnt, bioluminescent globs down the walls. Nine cell doors ran down either side of the corridor. She had never been in the brig before, but it looked similar to the quarantine cells they had kept her in. One by one, she held the Gohnzol-Lo’s face before the cell doors to open them. The first three were dark and empty. When she opened the fourth, a scream of terror greeted her.
Dawn, Coraz, Torque, and Playa sat huddled together in the back corner of the dark cell. Only the stuttering light from the corridor shed any illumination within. Thin, gray tunics had replaced the soft colors of their embassy clothes. Dawn continued to scream, vainly trying to scramble farther back into the wall. Coraz held her protectively.
A thudding boom echoed all around. Sabira realized how she must look: a silhouette smeared in gore, a gun in one hand and a severed head in the other. Before she could speak, Dawn screamed again, curling herself around her belly.
“Just be quick and finish it already,” shouted Playa.
“No—” started Sabira before Dawn’s cries cut her off again.
“Sabira?” asked Torque.
A deep rumble rocked the ship. The floor lurched beneath them. Sabira stumbled forward but managed to stay on her feet. Torque ran into her full force, wrapping her arms around her, yelling Sabira’s name over and over, and they stumbled back against the wall. A hundred wounds screamed in pain all at once. She dropped the head and embraced Torque with her free arm, squeezing her tight despite the burning pains.
“Sabira? What happened, girl?” asked Coraz, rising to ahns feet. “You’re covered in . . .”
“I’m alright. Is anyone injured?”
“No one’s hurt,” said Coraz. “Terrified. But not hurt.”
Playa helped Dawn to her feet. Tears streamed down their faces as they came forward and joined the embrace. Coraz, also tearing up, joined in the group hug. Sabira didn’t want it to end.
“We have to go.” Sabira reluctantly pulled herself from the collective embrace. “Where are the boys?”
Torque pulled away, her tunic now covered in blood and grit. “Just across the hall,” she said.
“Good. I’ll go get them.” Sabira picked up the severed head. “Start helping Dawn out. We’ll meet in the anteroom. Go.”
When she opened the door across the way, a swift, angry blur launched forward and tackled her hips. Fighting instincts nearly slammed down the butt of her stick on his spine, but she pulled back. She dropped the severed head and wrapped her forearm under Cal’s waist and lifted him off his feet.
“Stop stop stop. It’s me, you crazy mine rat,” she said.
Zonte burst from the cell, ran around Sabira to the other door, and fell into Playa’s arms. They both cried as they kissed.
“Sabira, is it really you?” asked Rain from inside the cell.
“As real as I’ve ever been. But we must go now. Rain, Derev. Now.” She tried to turn away, but Cal still clung to her, no longer struggling, but burying his face into her ribs, squeezing her waist. Before she could pry herself free, Rain grabbed her by the shoulders.
“Thank you, Sabira,” he whispered. “Our champion.”
Another impact rippled through the ship. “There’s no time. We have a way out, but we must hurry,” she said.
Derev emerged last from the cell. Wordlessly, he grabbed Cal’s hands, loosened them from Sabira’s waist, and pulled him toward the exit.
“No, wait!” Cal yanked free and ran back into the dark cell. Returned a moment later with the eeshl clutched to his chest.
They all gathered into the anteroom. Sabira stepped into the guard station, holding the severed head in one hand, palukai in the other. The security displays were all dead. She peered through the window to make sure the outside corridor remained empty.
“There’s an armory at the far end,” she said. “We go there first, but we have to be quick. Coraz, you stay with Dawn at the crossway and keep lookout. After that, down the corridor to the lift. There’s a biomech waiting for us. We’ll ride it to the hangers on the grank deck. Orion’s ship is nearby. Gabriel and Ed are already on their way.”
“Ed! Is he alright?” asked Cal.
“He’s hurt and sick, but he’s alive. Orion has a cure for him. He has a cure for all the Vleez.”
“You didn’t mention Maia. What about Maia?” asked Rain.
Sabira’s throat contracted. She could only manage to shake her head. Even in the dark room, she could see the sting of loss on every face.
Sabira led them to the armory, opened it with the warseer’s face, then tossed the head away. Inside, she grabbed palukai for Zonte, Rain, Derev, and Torque. She configured the sticks into assault rifles and gave them a quick lesson in firearms: Only point it at what you want to kill, then press the trigger. She also confiscated a bandolier of grenades for herself and a handful of field medic kits for Coraz and Dawn to carry.
Before the Shattered Gates of Heaven Page 29