by Larkin, Matt
Knowledge was power. And the Ark might offer absolute knowledge.
“Any brilliant ideas?” Knight shouted back at her, steering through another alley. He was probably trying to dart between buildings, spaces too narrow for carriers to follow.
From the moment they exited the Undercity, the government troops had been onto them. The hum of a half dozen hoverbikes echoed just meters behind them, and he was asking her for advice?
“You’re the bodyguard! Get us out of here!”
“Yeah, thanks! I got that part!” He jerked the bike right, zipping out into another street. Knight was good, she’d give him that. He bobbed around hovers, weaving in and out of fast-moving traffic.
Rachel spared a glance over her shoulder. Gibborim on hoverbikes darted into traffic too, at least five of them. “Knight!”
“I know.”
He adjusted some dial on the handlebar and the bike jumped upward, its hover jets going into overdrive. Knight used the added lift to angle them over a hover, sending them literally flying through the air.
Rachel’s stomach lurched. Hovering was one thing, but the jets on this bike weren’t designed for flying.
The bike dropped like a stone and actually collided with the street, streaking along it. The scraping shriek of metal made her head ring, and sparks flew all around her, before the hoverbike bounced back up to its usual altitude of about a meter off the ground.
The hover they’d jumped veered out of control, its driver blaring a siren at their insane maneuver. Knight darted the bike around another hover. He’d really lost his mind. But then, what else could he do?
A lance impacted a hover just behind them. The hover twisted, slammed into another, and both careened into a building. An explosion rocked behind them, but they were going so fast Rachel never even felt the heat.
A carrier crested the corner ahead. Shots retorted along the road, tearing it to pieces. Exploding asphalt and metal roared in a shower around her. Rachel screamed. A nearby hover was torn in half by MAG slugs. A wave of heat washed over her, almost threw her off the bike.
Knight spun it around, gunning right into the flow of oncoming traffic. Her scream was lost in her throat. Hovers zipped by so fast she couldn’t track them, and Knight somehow dodged the bike around them.
He pulled the mono sword from his coat.
“What the—”
One of the Gibborim bikes zoomed by and Knight cleaved through it. The top half flipped forward, spinning through the air and crashing into the road ahead. A cascade of explosions erupted behind them.
“Holy shit!” God, don’t let them die here. Please, God, please God!
Another Gibborim spun a hoverbike around, mimicking Knight, mono blade in hand. The Gibborim raced past swinging. Knight parried the thrust and rammed his blade into the bike’s rear thruster. The other bike flipped vertically, slamming the Gibborim into the ground at hundreds of kilometers an hour. A hover crashed into the wreck. Even through her breather Rachel smelled fumes an instant before the pileup exploded.
Rachel whimpered, trying not to lose her grip on Knight. She considered herself a tough girl. But holy shit, Gibborim were having a sword fight on hover bikes traveling in opposite directions at two hundred kilometers an hour.
The street ahead exploded, MAG rounds from the carrier shredding it. Knight jerked to the right, shooting the bike through another alley. A heartbeat later another hoverbike was following them. Goddamn Gibborim just wouldn’t give up!
She tightened her grip around Knight and aimed the MAG rifle with one hand. He’d said not to use it outside, but desperate times…
Rachel squeezed the trigger. The rails charged and fired, but the shot went wide. Recoil stripped the gun right out of her hand. It clattered along the alley, under the Gibborim’s bike.
“Did you get him?” Knight shouted at her.
“No!”
Every second they spent doing this was a risk. Sooner or later one of those carriers would catch them and that would be the end, even if none of Knight’s former brethren caught up. She glanced back at the other hoverbike. Knight’s reflexes might have been faster, but the Gibborim had better bikes. They clearly accelerated more quickly.
They needed to get off the streets. “The Ark. We have to get to the moon!”
He grumbled something she couldn’t catch at this speed, then spun the bike around again, almost flinging her off.
“Stop doing—”
The bike took off again, barely careening around the one pursuing them. Knight headed back down a main street. In the air ahead, a carrier lowered, leveling a pair of MAG cannons at them. A spotlight tracked them.
Her bodyguard twisted the bike and they were behind a massive hover truck, hiding in its shadow. What was he thinking? A second later the carrier opened fire on the truck, ripping it in half. Knight veered into another alley, heading straight for a massive building ahead.
“Hold on to me!” he shouted.
Rachel tightened her grip. Knight steered toward the building’s airlock and gunned it. Angel wrath’s, was he going to ram the—
He flung a chain of some kind at a light post, and suddenly they were ripped off the bike. The sudden jerk sent them slicing through the air. Rachel screamed. Her stomach jumped into her throat. Momentum carried them around in an arc, and they were upside down. They spun down in a full three-sixty circle and crashed into the ground.
The impact stole her breath. All she could feel was blackness creeping around her. Then Knight was pulling her up. His coat was torn. He’d sheltered her with his arms. He ripped off his cracked helmet. “Move!”
The bike had collided with the airlock and blown a hole right through it. Knight shoved her toward it, and she stumbled forward, trying to catch her balance. The Gibborim raced past them, then spun his bike to a stop. This one, Nu, pulled a sword and hoped off the bike. Knight ran at him, whipping the kyoketsu out.
Nu dove to the ground and rolled under the whip knife’s blade. He came up swinging, his blade tearing a gash in Knight’s coat.
A wince escaped her even as she dashed into the burning airlock. “Knight!” Had that hit him? The sudden thought that he might really die protecting her left her dizzy. It’s why she hired him, but Knight always seemed so… invincible.
Knight evaded the next strike, stepping past it and caught the man’s arm, then flipped him around and onto the ground. He kicked Nu’s sword up into his hand, then rammed it down into the fallen man’s chest.
More bikes spun around onto the street.
“Knight!”
He ran toward her and dove into the airlock.
“What is this place?” she asked, pulling him up.
“Government communications tower. There’ll be a shuttle pad on the roof.”
Dear God. This place had to be eighty stories tall. And it would be crawling with government troops.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
And yet, whatever secrets may lie in his blood, I find myself more worried for the man himself. My quest will likely cost him his life, and my own as well. And what will I have to show for it? If the Gehennans get the Sefer, Jericho will overthrow the Conglomerate and we risk giving rise to an autocracy to rival the Angels themselves. I should have left this all buried.
Another decapitated body fell before Knight, the tenth guard he’d killed since breaking into the tower. Rachel hesitated just behind him.
“Move, damn you!” He grabbed the girl and shoved her down the hall. He was not letting her die here, not now. Not after all this. If he thought for a second Sarah would let them go, he’d tell Rachel to give her the damn book. But the head of the Gibborim—Alpha herself—would torture Rachel to death, and do worse to Knight.
Gunfire rang out beside them, and he followed Rachel around the corner. She’d run to a lift across the hall. “Knight! If we take this we could be trapped, but…”
But there was no way they could run up eighty flights of stairs. He slammed the buzzer and the door
s opened. “It’ll take time for them to figure out where we are and what’s going on.”
He stepped in after Rachel. A lance impacted the doors just as they shut. Rachel hit the button for the roof. The lift shot upward, but they’d never make it to the top. It would take only seconds for security to stop the lifts.
Knight turned, glancing around the lift. A service hatch in the ceiling. He cut it open, then jumped up to it, pulling himself on top of the lift.
“What are you doing?” Rachel demanded.
He leaned down and offered her a hand, pulling her up when she took it. A second later the lift jerked to a stop and he had to grab her to keep her from falling.
“They found us,” she said.
“Obviously.”
The lift ran on magnetic rails. They couldn’t restart it without power, but there was a service ladder on the wall, just out of reach. “Follow me,” he said, leaping to the ladder.
Rachel mumbled something, then did the same. For a second, he held her trembling body. She was scared shitless.
“Rachel. Rachel, look at me.” He pulled her chin around so he could look in her eyes. “Fear is the mind. Pain is in the mind. Don’t fear, don’t think. Just do it. I’m not going to let you die.”
Her breath came in gasps like she’d hyperventilate.
“Breathe, damn it!”
“Knight… Whatever happens, don’t let them get the Sefer.”
“Forget the damn—”
“Knight! You don’t understand what Jericho could do with this!”
Knight shook his head, then scrambled upward. They couldn’t pull this off for long, either—maybe eight or ten floors at the most. The key was to come out where no expected.
“Slow down, I can’t keep up,” she shouted from below.
“Trust me, just follow.” Another floor, then one more. He pulled a throwing knife from the sheath on his thigh, then waited for Rachel. When she drew close, he hit the emergency open on the lift outer doors. They slid open, revealing an empty hall. Knight jumped down into it.
Security would know where they were now. There would be troops in seconds. He dashed down the hall and around the corner. What was this, the sixtieth floor? Down the way another lift opened, revealing a clump of soldiers. One led the way out. Knight flung the knife into the man’s throat.
The soldier collapsed and another tripped over him. Knight leapt onto the wall, kicked off it, and pulled more knives in midair. He landed in a crouch, flinging four of them at the mass of soldiers trying to exit the narrow doorway.
The knives struck a few, and the confusion gave him time to close the distance. He kicked off a fallen soldier and forced his way into the lift. The soldiers tried to bring MAGs to bear, but in the narrow confines they were helpless. Too slow, too unprepared for an attack of this kind.
Knight kicked out one man’s knee, pinning a gun to the wall with his foot. He broke a wrist, slammed two heads together, jerked a man around and snapped his neck. A few seconds and Knight was the only one breathing in the lift. He paused just long enough to retrieve his knives and grab a shock grenade from one of the soldiers.
A sharp gasp escaped Rachel. These Mizraim types could be so soft sometimes. “Knight…”
“Go for the stairs, Rachel!” He shoved her and she ran for the stairway.
This lift might be active, but there was no repeating the trick. That was a sure way to get caught.
He dashed after her and onto the stairwell. A series of flights led round and round, each with a wide landing. The stairs would carry them all the way to the roof, he hoped. The girl ran, often taking steps two at a time, but she’d never maintain it for twenty floors.
Somewhere below, a door crashed open and shouts rang out. Knight glanced over the rail. Another squad, pursuing them up the stairs. Sooner or later, Rachel would tire, and they’d be caught.
“Knight,” she panted after a few more flights. “They’re planning an ambush ahead. I can feel it.”
Damn useful skill.
“Which floor?”
“It doesn’t work like that.”
All right then. He flung open a door. “Go! Don’t wait for me, find a place to hide and make your way up when you can!”
“Knight!”
He pushed her. “I’ll make a distraction.” He was good at that.
He shut the door behind her and continued upward, slowing so the soldiers behind could catch up. When they were just a floor behind, he primed the shock grenade and rolled it down the stairs. Then he jumped onto the rail, kicked off, and leapt to the next. Electricity crackled somewhere below, and men screamed.
Knight sprang from rail to rail, clearing floors faster than he could on the stairs. For a heartbeat he might run along a rail, before leaping up to the next. All Gibborim had to master Parkour before graduating. In seconds he’d cleared six floors, something he couldn’t do with Rachel beside him. He’d come back for her when the roof was secure. Soldiers burst through the door to the floor above.
Knight caught the rail and swung under it, kicking a soldier in the chest, then jumping from him onto another. His momentum carried the next soldier down, and Knight rocked back, flinging the man over the rail. The bastard fell screaming into the darkness.
Shouts went up among the soldiers. Knight kipped up, kicked a man in the groin, then smashed his head on the door, cracking his skull even through the helmet.
With elbow, fist, and foot, he dropped the rest of the soldiers. No time to make sure they were all dead. He ran up the last few flights of stairs, then carved through the lock on the roof. He kicked it open and ran out.
Just ahead, a shuttle. He had to get Rachel and they’d be out of here. The moon wasn’t exactly what he had in mind, but from the shuttle she could call that…
Something was wrong. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end, and Knight turned.
Someone stepped out of the shadows, revealing the Omega sign on his Gibborim armor.
“Hadrian.”
His friend pulled off the helmet and tossed it aside. “There was really only one place you could be heading in this building, Zeke.”
Knight spread his hands and stepped back, falling into a light fighting stance. “Don’t do this.”
“I tried to warn you.” Hadrian raised armor-clad fists before him and strode toward Knight.
“You can come with us! Finally get out of all this.”
Sadness filled his eyes, but Hadrian shook his head. “You know I can’t… Can’t betray her.”
“Sarah? You’re still…” Knight grimaced. “She’s never going to be yours.”
Hadrian circled him, his stance easy despite his taut face. Knight couldn’t even remember a time when Hadrian hadn’t been there for him, teaching him all the ways of the Gibborim. Teaching him to become the perfect killer. Teaching him to become a ghost, a shadow that stalked the night and spread death and terror and pain. A shadow no one could catch, no one could stop.
“It shouldn’t come to this between us,” Knight said.
Hadrian shook his head. “No. It shouldn’t have. You got out, Zeke. You should never have taken this kind of risk. Sarah would have let you alone, if you hadn’t. How many of us have you killed now?”
He wasn’t even sure. The Gibborim had been his brethren, his family. His sick, twisted family that had turned on him. Of them all, only Hadrian had been a true friend. And how could Knight ever raise a blade in earnest against him?
Hadrian drew his mono katana, extending it. “I’m sorry, Zeke.”
But if he didn’t fight here, Sarah would take him, would take Rachel. And they’d both be damned. There was no choice. He’d never had enough choices in life. Why should now be different?
“So am I.” Knight pulled his own sword. “You know you can’t beat me, Omega. None of you are fast enough.”
Hadrian dashed at him, swinging. Knight parried, moved into riposte, then suddenly had to jerk back as Hadrian’s next swing came much faster tha
n it should have. Knight parried, ducked, dodged, and rolled away.
What in the holy universe? Never, in all their years of training, had he seen another Gibborim move that fast.
“Things change,” his friend said.
Hadrian charged again, screaming and swinging. Knight parried again, turning into a faster riposte. He slashed open Hadrian’s side, cleaving through armor. His friend grunted and shoved, sending Knight stumbling backward. Hadrian’s offense had become more aggressive than ever, and Knight fell back, forced onto the defensive.
Parry, dodge, duck. He rolled under an attack, then parried over his head as another came in fast. He slammed his shoulder into Hadrian, sending the other man skidding along the roof.
Knight feinted with his katana, and when Hadrian moved to parry, kicked him in the chest. The Gibborim stumbled back, and Knight slammed his own sword into his friend’s, stripping it from his hand.
The blade clattered to the ground, and Knight kicked it away. He held his sword up, pointed at Hadrian’s chest. But how could he run him through? For a moment their eyes met.
Then a trio of angled blades erupted from each of Hadrian’s forearms, like he wore edged gauntlets. In his shock, Knight hesitated. Hadrian caught Knight’s sword between the blades and twisted, snapping it. Monofilament could cut through almost anything, but it didn’t make the blade stronger on the flat.
Hadrian’s palm struck Knight in the chest, sending him flying backward almost a meter. The nanomesh absorbed the worst of it, and Knight rolled up, jumping instantly to his feet.
“Angels above!” Knight said. “You’ve broken the First Commandment? You’re cybered!”
Hadrian advanced. A straight blade shot out from the joint of his wrist. A mono blade had rested inside his forearm, the size of a long knife. “It’s funny… First she said she had a way to make the rest of us as fast as you had been, Zeke.”
Knight found himself unable to swallow as he backed away. “How could you do this?”