by M. R. Forbes
She called out to the naniates. They were all around her, living in every human in the crowd, hundreds of trillions of them. They came to her, latching onto her tattoos and covering her body once more.
She bent down, grabbing the com link and then bouncing up, the strength of the lightsuit giving her clearance over the front of the crowd. Grun roared behind her, and the crowd screamed as he tore into them, shoving them violently aside.
There was activity near the front door. The other two Goreshin she had seen entered in human form, changing immediately when they saw what was happening.
She landed in the middle of the suddenly fleeing masses, hitting the ground and sprinting ahead. She remembered the door the skink had tried to lure her through. Was there really a truck waiting out there?
She was going to find out.
She glanced to her left. The three Goreshin were converging on her, trampling the other individuals around them in their mad rush to catch up to her. Their qi was a sharp, furious red. Whatever Devain had done to make them bigger and stronger and more powerful also made them more angry.
She held the com link, charging toward the door. She ordered the naniates out to it, sending them forward to make sure it was unlocked when she reached it. Her tattoos flared with blue light, which was matched at the wall as they worked on the lock.
She smelled Grun right behind her, and she dove forward, tucking her shoulder and rolling ahead as his claws swept over her. Then she was up and at the door. She hit it hard with her shoulder, shoving it open and crashing through, losing her balance and tumbling to the ground again.
She didn’t stay there. She pushed herself up. A number of vehicles were sitting behind the Firehouse, mostly larger lorries and transports. She spotted a smaller, sporty-looking vehicle poking out from between two trucks.
She kept moving, racing toward it. Would she be able to get in and get moving before the Goreshin caught up with her?
Once more, she sent the naniates ahead into the electronics of the car to short the security and get it started. She bounced up to the roof of the truck beside it as it started to whine, the headlights flashing on.
“Don’t move!” a high-pitched, guttural voice said as she jumped down on the driver’s side.
Hayley turned. The damn skink was standing near the back of his truck, aiming an oversized rifle at her. Bastard.
Desperate times.
She grabbed the door to the racer, yanking it open.
The skink started shooting.
She put her hand up, the naniates flowing away from her. Large, heavy slugs became visible in the air in front of her, slowed by a sudden web of energy cast out by the molecular machines.
She didn’t stay to watch. She jumped into the car, grabbing the yoke and jamming down on the throttle, pulling back hard to get some height as it lunged forward.
Anti-gravity plates whined beneath it, atmospheric thrusters sucking in air and spitting it out, sending the car violently forward.
The Goreshin reached her, one of them leaping the distance and landing hard on the top of the vehicle. The impact caused it to lose altitude, smashing the bottom into the rear of the truck in front of them.
The car shuddered, the engines making a horrifying screeching sound as they fought to recover. Hayley yanked the yoke all the way to the side, and the vehicle rolled in response, dropping the Goreshin to the ground.
She rolled it back, yanking the controls hard left to avoid the edge of a building by centimeters. Then she was up and away, shooting ahead a dozen meters off the ground.
Tears streamed from her dead eyes as she fought to keep herself conscious. She could stop bullets with the Meijo, but it took more out of her than any other command. The naniates didn’t exactly like sacrificing themselves or burning up their energy reserves.
Her entire body felt like rubber, each movement seeming to take forever, her responses nowhere near as precise as she wanted them. She turned the racer around, looking down at the Hole and the parking area behind the Firehouse as she did. The three Goreshin had returned to their first form, but their qi was still heavy with red. They watched her pass overhead.
She was certain they hadn’t given up.
“Colonel, do you copy?” she said, able to communicate now that she had her visor back on her head.
“Roger, Witchy. Sitrep.”
“Coming your way in an air-racer, sir,” she said. “I’ve got the dropship’s com link, but I’ve also got the bad guys on my tail.”
“Shit,” Quark said. “Probably for the best. We’ve got more bad guys closing on our position. I spotted White with my own eyes.” He laughed. He always laughed when he mentioned his eyes. “I’ve never seen such a big, ugly fragger.”
“Roger. Orders?”
“Drop in for pickup. We’ll meet you on the roof.”
“Yes, sir.”
Hayley continued ahead. The building Quark and Tibor were hiding in was less than a klick away, but she had no way of triangulating it until she had Quark’s beacon. Even then, it was going to be a challenge. Distances were one thing on foot. Up here?
She didn’t have a license for a reason.
She couldn’t even see the tops of all the buildings she was navigating between. She was dependent on energy fields, and they didn’t always travel that far from the ground. She was able to use the ground to guide her right now, but if there were an overhang or extrusion she wasn’t expecting? She would crash into it without ever seeing it coming.
Quark was showing a lot of faith in her by directing her to go higher.
“Gant, give me coordinates to Quark’s beacon the second it stops moving. Three dimensions.”
“Aye, Witchy,” the AI replied.
She swept across the city, picking out a building to stake, turning left when she reached the corner. She went a few blocks and staked again, angling around the second building back to the first in a small rectangular pattern.
She had made the loop three times when something started beeping in the cockpit.
“What the hell?” she said.
“Collision warning,” Gant said.
She saw the flare of energy closing in on her just in time. She banked to the left, the projectile shooting just below the racer and hitting the building behind her.
“Frag!” she shouted, looking back. Three streaks of heat energy washed past her.
Drones.
“I can’t fly this thing against drones,” she said, feeling overmatched. “Where the hell is Quark?”
“Still moving,” Gant said. “Ascending at a rate of point six meters per second, currently at an altitude of one hundred ten meters.”
“Direction?”
“One thousand meters behind you, seventy-one point six meters right, sixty-one meters up.”
It had so little meaning to her up here; she struggled to make sense of it. The important part was that she was going the wrong way.
She turned her head side-to-side, searching for the drones. The racer didn’t have the same kind of sensor equipment a military vehicle would, so it wouldn’t be of much use unless…
The beeping sounded again. Collision alert. She shoved the yoke forward, sending the vehicle into a sharp dive and pulling it out a moment later as the next round of missiles passed overhead and hit the buildings around her.
At least the air-car was agile as all hell.
She swooped down toward the ground, pulling the yoke back and leveling off only a few meters up, the fields of naniates and qi giving her a full frame of vision once more. She stayed low, turning back in the right direction and gaining speed.
“Coordinates,” she said, asking Gant for an update.
“Three hundred meters ahead, sixty meters to your left. One hundred meters up.”
Hayley shifted her attention upward. Without enough energy flowing along the outside of the buildings, she couldn’t see them at all.
“Keep feeding me altitude,” she said.
“Aye, Wi
tchy,” Gant replied. “One hundred meters.”
She pulled back on the yoke.
“Ninety meters. Eighty meters. Seventy meters.” The AI counted down until she reached zero.
“Witchy, we’re topside,” Quark said. “I think you just blew past. Are you reading my beacon?”
“Doing my best,” she replied. “How many other blind people do you know who can fly an air-car?”
He laughed. “Just you, kid. You’re doing great, but we need to hurry. You’ve got a trio of drones on your ass, and the Nephilim are on their way up.”
“Gant, keep giving me distances,” she said.
“Four hundred meters behind. Ten meters left. Maintain altitude.”
Hayley tried to maintain altitude, but the sound of sharp cracks behind her caused an immediate reaction, forcing her to bank and dive as the drones opened up with forward cannons. The rounds came way too close to the racer, a few of them pinging off the metal exterior but thankfully not hitting her.
She maintained control of the air-car, pressed against her seat as she made a hard turn. Gant continued to feed her coordinates, and she went nearly vertical to quickly gain altitude.
“One hundred meters,” Gant said. “Dead ahead.”
She pulled back on the throttle. She could see Quark and Tibor’s qi in front of her now. She could see the qi of something else climbing the outside of the building. From the size, it had to be White.
“Shit, Colonel,” she said. “White’s climbing the walls.”
“Better get us the frag out of here then.”
She chose a spot ahead of Quark to dip the car to the rooftop, hoping it was clear and safe. She touched down without exploding, quickly moving into the back of the vehicle while the doors swung open.
Quark climbed in on the driver’s side. He didn’t hesitate, throwing the throttle to full and grabbing the yoke. Tibor nearly fell out of the side as the car lifted and turned.
Hayley looked down as White cleared the side of the building, reaching the roof. He howled loudly, running after them.
“You gotta be fragging kidding me,” Quark said, eyeing the Goreshin behind them. The racer was accelerating quickly.
Quickly enough?
“Come on, you piece of shit,” Quark said.
White reached the edge of the rooftop behind them. He didn’t slow at all. He planted his powerful hind legs, flexed them slightly, and jumped.
Hayley followed the Goreshin’s trajectory - a long jump on an intersecting path. She could see the concentration in White’s qi, along with his anger. He reached out toward them, slashing at the car with his claws. He was nearly twice the size of it in his second form. He was unbelievably massive.
Quark jerked the air-car to the side, just as White’s claws reached it. The tips of the sharp, dense nails scraped loudly against the side, sinking through the driver’s side door only centimeters from the Colonel’s leg.
The car was pulled sideways. Quark reached for the door latch, flipping it open. The door hung down to the side, the weight of the Goreshin straining the hinges.
Quark looked out at the Nephilim, dangling from the open door a hundred meters off the ground.
“See you next fall,” he said, using his left leg to kick at the door.
The force was just enough to convince the strained hinges to fail, and both the door and White fell away, plummeting toward the city below.
“I don’t suppose that will kill him?” Quark said, redirecting his attention from the falling Goreshin to the drones, still giving chase at their backs.
“I wouldn’t count on it,” Tibor said, still looking down.
“Wishful thinking. Well, we aren’t out of this shit, yet. Hold on.”
Hayley wedged herself in the small backseat of the air-car as Quark banked hard again, the g-force crushing her back. When he finished the turn, the three drones were right in front of him; the collision alerts on the vehicle beeping loudly.
“Are you crazy?” Tibor said.
“What do you mean?” Quark asked.
The drones started firing, round after round of high-velocity slugs screaming around the racer. Quark held the yoke steady, letting the vehicle gain speed.
The rounds missed completely, aimed with the logical expectation the car would slow or change direction. Quark did neither of these, showing nerves of steel and a steady hand in guiding them in a completely straight line.
The drones passed overhead, close enough that Hayley could smell their exhaust as it washed in through the open driver’s side door.
“Whoo,” Quark said. “I love it when I’m right.”
Hayley looked out the rear of the car. The drones continued in the wrong direction instead of turning back to give chase. They must have realized they couldn’t catch up to the racer at maximum velocity.
“Clear!” Quark said, laughing. “Fragging clear!”
Hayley smiled. They had done it. She leaned back against the seat, exhausted.
“We need somewhere to go,” Quark said. “To set up the com link and hope for the best. Tibs, you got anything for me?”
The Goreshin looked out the passenger-side window. “Yeah,” he said. “I know a place.” He looked back at Quark. “If you thought Kelvar City was a shithole, you’re going to love the Pit.”
18
They got out of the city by staying low and fast, running full throttle only a few meters off the ground.
“You know what kind of car this is, Hal?” Quark said.
She was still catching her breath. Still in disbelief they had made it out of the city alive.
“No,” she replied.
She could feel how soft the upholstery was, and judging by the speed and nimbleness, she knew it had to be something expensive.
“Triton Tech AMG Six,” he said. “Four million coins for the base model. I know because I went shopping for one once. Back before I decided fancy cars wouldn’t make me happy.”
“What does make you happy?” Tibor asked.
“A good cause. A good cigar. From Earth, preferably. A good woman. I’m not that picky about their origins, though they do have to be human. A good team.”
“And good money,” Hayley said, finishing the spiel for him. She had heard this all before. “In order of importance from least to most.”
“That’s not true,” Quark said.
“Since when?”
He glanced back at her. “Since your Mom trusted me to take care of you. Stick a good kid onto the end of that list, and move a good cause up a few places.”
Hayley watched Quark’s qi change to a lighter red.
“You getting soft, Colonel?” she asked.
“I’m getting old,” he replied. “Nearly getting ripped in half by a fragging Goreshin got me thinking it’s time to shift my priorities a little. I hope you know it’s true, kid. I don’t say it in front of the others because I don’t want them thinking you’re getting special treatment.”
“If this is what you call special treatment, I’d love to go back to being treated like shit.”
He laughed. “You’re the only reason we’re here and alive, instead of back in Kelvar City and dead.”
“Are you kidding? I’ve already screwed up more times than I can count.”
“You can screw up a million times. What matters is results.”
“I got Currl killed.”
“Nope. Nephilim bastards killed Black Squad. Not you. Get that fool thought out of your head. It won’t bring them back, and it could get you dead.”
“There,” Tibor said, pointing. “The Pit is down there.”
“Why do they call it the Pit?” Hayley asked.
“You’ll see.”
“Is it safe?”
“Nowhere on Kelvar is inherently safe right now. It’s safer. That’s the best we can do.”
“Roger.” She craned her neck to see where he was pointing. “I don’t see anything.”
“You’re blind,” Tibor said.
&nb
sp; “Funny. I mean I don’t sense any energy. No qi. No Meijo. No anything.”
“Probably because we haven’t crested the Pit yet,” Tibor said. “It sneaks up on individuals who see with their eyes, too.”
“How do you know about it?” Quark asked.
“All I can say is this isn’t the first time I’ve tried to escape.”
“Seriously?” Hayley said.
“You saw what she was doing to me. I was never a believer. Neither was Grun. Devain brought us in line with torture and pain. One of the nights we went to the Hole, I made a run for it. I got all the way to the Pit before they caught up to me.”
They had been on the move for over an hour, covering nearly one hundred kilometers.
“You stole a car?” Hayley asked.
“No. I ran. Made it in one night.”
“A hundred kilometers?”
“That’s a light run. Which was also the problem. I didn’t go far enough. I was hoping I could catch a shuttle off-world from there, but I didn’t know the PIt doesn’t have any shuttles off-world.”
“Wait a second,” Quark said. “No shuttles? Why the hell are we going there?”
The Pit appeared beneath the car at that same moment. It was as it was named. A massive hole in the ground, a crater kind of like the Hole, only bigger and filled with more bluffs and cliffs and crags. There were ramshackle buildings lining the edges, metal and wooden scaffolding and bridges intersecting it every which way, and what felt to Hayley like more individuals than there had been in Kelvar City.
“The Pit,” Tibor said. “I think you know why we’re here.”
“Because there are only two ways off this rock,” Quark said. “Either that link makes the connection to the Quasar, or we need to go through the Nephilim. And we aren’t getting through the Nephilim without a few guns, at the very least.”
“Yup.”
“How long do you think it will take them to find us here?” Hayley asked.
“Not long,” Tibor replied. “This thing is fast, and they’ll want to get re-organized. An hour. Two at most.”
“Then we need to stay busy,” Quark said.
He guided the racer into the Pit, navigating around the multiple bridges while the individuals on them stared. Hayley could see their qi turn green when the car passed, both with curiosity and envy of the money they thought was inside. They were probably wondering why someone so rich would even bother coming to their settlement.