“We had thought you dead, Great One,” the lead Korkaran said in his sibilant language. “It will be an honor to do combat with you.”
“You may not think so when I’m done,” Crusher rumbled, staring at the pair with unadulterated hatred.
“It will be an honor no matter the outcome,” the Korkaran insisted. “May we pay homage to the old ways?”
“If you insist,” Crusher said. “It will only prolong the inevitable.” Without another word, both Korkarans tossed their larger weapons aside and then pulled out two sidearms apiece and tossed those as well. Crusher watched coldly as he also flung his plasma rifle away, along with the large projectile pistol he had in a thigh holster.
As soon as his pistol hit the pavement, both mercenaries split and tried to surround him, crouching down into a fighting stance as they did. Crusher looked at them with contempt and didn’t budge. Once the pair thought him surrounded to the point that he couldn’t track them both, the Galvetic warrior lunged to his right with frightening speed. With a powerful overhand blow, Crusher managed to surprise the merc for just the fraction of a second he needed to rake his claws down the other’s face, then followed up with a left-handed uppercut that sent the Korkaran flying backwards. Only his tail kept him from rolling all the way over, and when he came back up he was down to one good eye, the other hanging uselessly out of the socket.
The other Korkaran hadn’t stood idle during the attack, however, and before Crusher could turn to face him he felt talons rip down across the back of his armor and into his left shoulder.
*****
Jason paused as he heard another roar echo across the island, audible even over the sound of the waves breaking against the rock. “I hope he knows what he’s doing,” he muttered.
“Crusher knows exactly what he is doing. Do not worry, Captain,” Lucky reassured him as they scanned the area around what remained of the boat dock. Jason only grunted, not wanting to get distracted by a conversation in which he would demand that Lucky divulge what he knew.
“Can you see anything?”
“I am detecting trace amounts of a lubricant that is almost exclusive to synths, or more specifically our gross motor actuators,” Lucky said as he strode confidently away from the shore.
“How are you detecting it?”
“It looks like that,” Lucky said, pointing to a blue gel-like substance that was clearly visible on the pavement. Jason just rolled his eyes and gestured up the walkway.
“After you,” he said, falling in behind the battlesynth as he followed the “blood” trail left by Deetz after he had pried himself out of the wreckage. “We can assume he’s setting up an ambush for us, so let’s head to the main cellblock since that’s one of the more obvious destinations.” Lucky stopped and looked at him.
“After you,” he gestured, mimicking Jason.
“I really need better friends,” Jason grumbled as he walked by to take point on the way up to the cellblock building. While he was making his way towards the dominating structure, he was also glancing down every so often to see if he could see another spatter of actuator lubricant.
They made it up past the residential apartments, or what was left of them after the thermobaric missile detonation, and walked slowly up the path towards the main cellblock. The old prison was forbidding as they stopped near the base and scanned left and right.
“Let’s work our way around to the left and see if we can find anyplace obvious he may have gotten in,” Jason said. Lucky just nodded and switched his operational mode to combat. His eyes took on a muted red glow, and a barely perceptible whine could be heard as all his weapons began charging.
The pair crept around the base of the building until they came to a ragged hole in the side. The jagged edges and discoloration around the area indicated that this was a new addition to the cellblock. Jason made a move to step closer and try to clear the area when Lucky reached out and stopped him. When he looked over, the battlesynth just shook his head and pointed further down with his free hand. Jason nodded once and followed Lucky as they continued on. That was obviously Deetz’s point of entry, but the synth was no fool. He would know the ragged hole would be noticed and had likely booby trapped the opening with whatever he was able to grab when he left his ship.
They moved quickly around to the side of the cellblock that faced the lighthouse and paused by the locked main entrance. Jason wished he had paid more attention during his tour of the island nearly twenty years before, at least enough to know what was on each floor of the building they were now facing. As quietly as he could manage, he grabbed the double doors and pulled until he could hear metal snapping and the doors popped loose out of the frame. He laid them on the ground and nodded to Lucky as he hefted his railgun and disengaged the safety.
Lucky raised his arms to point the now-exposed plasma cannons outward and rolled into the main entrance, covering the right side. A millisecond after he had cleared the doorway, Jason entered and raised his weapon, covering the left and Lucky’s back. Once they cleared the large, open area, Jason adjusted the spectrum input from his armor’s sensors. He picked his favorite for gloomy, low light situations: mid-wave infrared. The computer would do its best to determine coloration of objects and overlay that onto the image that Jason was “seeing.”
“Let’s move straight ahead through that security checkpoint,” Jason said, pointing to the sally port directly ahead of them. Once through the sally port and main gate they would be standing in front of B-Block, the middle of the three main cell blocks.
Since the prison was now a tourist attraction, they were able to make it through the security gates with ease. Once through and standing on the main floor of the building, they silently made their way to the right and began moving towards where Deetz had breached the wall to come in.
Jason switched back to simple light amplification since the midday sunlight was still streaming through the large windows of the structure and providing quite a bit of natural light to see by. They made it to Michigan Avenue, the corridor that ran between A-Block and B-Block, and peered up along the walkways, looking for some evidence the synth had been through there. Lucky took a step forward and froze as something seemed to move at the far end of the wide corridor. A second later there was a bright flash and Jason grunted as something impacted his hip. He spun and fell on his back, craning his head to see where the shots were coming from.
As soon as Jason was hit Lucky advanced, firing his arm-mounted plasma cannons towards the source of the incoming fire to keep Deetz’s head down while he closed the distance. He didn’t make it far. When he was about one-third of the way down the aisle, an explosive device detonated on his right with enough force to throw him clear through the bars of the cell to his left. Jason had managed to roll over on his stomach, but couldn’t get to his feet yet. He switched to long-wave infrared so he could see through the smoke and saw Deetz approaching at a slow walk, almost a swagger. He thought he could just make out the smug expression on the metallic face. Not wanting to give away his position by using the active sensors, he sighted manually through the optics of his railgun and squeezed the trigger. A hypersonic round screamed down Michigan Avenue, creating a vortex through the smoke and dust as it passed.
Although not as accurate as he would have liked, he still smiled with satisfaction as Deetz was flipped over backwards by the impact of the round and flung down the aisle. When the synth stood back up, he was missing his right arm from just above the elbow. Not looking nearly so smug, Deetz scrambled back down the corridor in an uncoordinated, jerky run and ran around the corner to the right with the stump of his ruined right appendage sparking the whole way. Jason sent six more railgun rounds after him but didn’t see any other impacts save for the large holes torn through the rear wall of the cellblock.
A couple of seconds after Deetz had fled, Jason heard a soft beep in his helmet indicating that his armor had reset and repaired the hip-joint. He slowly climbed to his feet, making sure to cover behind him in case Deet
z was trying to do an end-around, and gingerly put weight on his left leg. While the armor may have been able to repair itself, he could tell his squishy flesh that was underneath hadn’t fared so well. His hip and upper thigh were incredibly sore, but he could tell he had no broken bones and there were no sharp pains, so he ignored it.
Just as he was about to go and see if Lucky was OK, he saw his friend come around the corner at the far end of Michigan Avenue, near where Deetz had been waiting for them. “How did you get up there?” Jason asked as he approached.
“I was blown through the back wall of that cell so I removed the bars and came back around to try and catch Deetz by surprise,” Lucky said as he pointed in the direction of C-Block, which was off to their left. “I heard your railgun go off. I assume since I only saw an arm that we are still on the hunt for the rest of him.”
“You assume correctly,” Jason said. “He ran around over that way,” he indicated to his right, “so let’s keep moving around like we were originally. He may be expecting us to follow him.”
*****
Crusher was panting hard as he rolled to his left and flipped back up onto his feet. The two Korkarans were pressing him and he was feeling the strain. Not only that, but months and months of being cramped up in the Phoenix had done little for his conditioning and training. He was rusty and winded and the two mercenaries were starting to catch on to that.
They had given up on frontal assaults on the more powerful Galvetic and were now lunging in and out with alternating feints and attacks, forcing Crusher to expend energy to either defend or press the attack himself. The Korkarans weren’t able to do this with impunity, however. In addition to having lost his eye in the first moments of the brutal fight, one of the mercenaries was bleeding out of several deep gashes, a couple down to the bone in places, courtesy of Crusher’s steel-hard claws. His right arm also dangled uselessly, having been broken in three places when he tried to lunge in and catch the Galvetic warrior by surprise.
The other Korkaran hadn’t done much better in staying out of the raging warrior’s grasp. His abdomen had a set of slashes in it so deep that he was losing mobility, and the left side of his face was deformed, rendering his jaws useless. He’d lost most of his teeth in an attempted biting attack to Crusher’s shoulder, but had instead ended up being flipped around and having his face smashed into the pavement repeatedly.
But still they came. In proving why their kind was so feared, they got up from every injury and still tried to press the dark-skinned warrior into making that one fatal mistake. For his part, Crusher was bleeding profusely from several nasty cuts and bites. Korkaran saliva was mildly venomous, so he knew he didn’t have much time before he would need medical attention, and his right knee wouldn’t fully support his weight thanks to a tail-whip that had caught him unawares.
The Korkarans hissed and lunged at Crusher, trying to get him to push off with his injured knee so they could try and pounce on him. The experienced fighter wouldn’t take the bait and he waited. He had gotten their timing down and he had learned the tells quickly that would signal if they were actually committing to an attack or if it was another fake.
The more injured of the two came in for another feint, but slipped in one of the many pools of congealing blood that dotted the battlefield. As he slipped, his one good eye widened in surprise and Crusher knew he had a chance. With a tremendous roar he launched off with his good leg and brought his right hand over and around to grasp the end of the reptilian alien’s muzzle while grabbing him around the back of the neck with his left. With all of his strength, he pulled in with his left arm and up with his right to bend the merc’s head back and up as far as it would go. Shifting his weight to spin his adversary slightly so he was pressed up against his side, he now had the leverage he was looking for. With a snarl, he yanked his hands apart and with a sickening wet crunch the spinal column of the Korkaran gave. Crusher dropped his twitching body and turned just in time for the other mercenary to plunge a blade into the upper thigh of his left leg, signaling an end to honoring the old ways. He roared in pain and rage, spinning and smashing his open palm into the chest of his adversary with enough force that the blow would have killed most species. As it was, the Korkaran was sent flying and landed in a heap, climbing slowly to his feet. Crusher pulled the blade out and tossed it aside, thankful that it hadn’t hit any major blood vessels. It still hurt like hell though and had effectively hobbled him; between the injuries to his right knee and left thigh, he would be unable to pursue the Korkaran very far.
“I knew your cowardly kind couldn’t go long without dishonoring yourselves,” Crusher snarled. The Korkaran hissed back at him, but wouldn’t take the bait. The pair circled each other slowly, both looking for an opportunity to end the fight.
*****
“You think he went down there?” Jason asked quietly. They were standing in the far corridor by A-Block, named Sunrise Alley, and were peering into the gloom of a flight of stairs that led into the basement.
“I believe he did,” Lucky answered. “But to what end I could not guess. He seems to have trapped himself.”
“Maybe,” Jason said doubtfully. So far Deetz had been able to control their encounters, but maybe wounding him so seriously had altered his ability to make rational decisions. “But we’re getting nothing done by hanging out up here.” He stepped cautiously down into the stairwell and switched his optical input to infrared.
When he reached the bottom of the stairs, he looked down the long corridor but could see nothing. He moved forward a step to make room for Lucky as he also descended the stairs. They began to move forward, both scanning left and right as they navigated the narrow passageway. The cells lining the walls looked like they’d been used for solitary confinement or punishment for the prisoners who were once housed there. It would have gave Jason the creeps had he not been so focused on making sure Deetz wasn’t about to spring another trap on them.
After rounding a corner to the left, the pair continued down another passageway. A soft scraping sound stopped them in their tracks as they both listened for it to repeat. It didn’t. They began moving forward again until, without warning, Lucky grabbed Jason and shoved him into an open cell. He stumbled and hit the floor in a heap, turning around just in time to see a massive plasma discharge hit Lucky square in the chest.
“Lucky!” he shouted as he struggled to his feet. The battlesynth had been thrown a good ten meters back down the way they came and was moving very slowly, his chest armor smoking and hissing. Jason spun and saw Deetz standing in the passageway with a panicked look on his face. That one massive shot, meant to kill him, had depleted the power source on his plasma rifle. With only one hand, he was having issues trying to swap the spent power cell out with one he’d likely had in the small satchel that was slung over his shoulder. After fumbling and dropping the rifle in a clatter, Deetz chose the only option left to him: he ran.
He took off down the corridor, running disjointedly away from his pursuers, not trying to evade in any way. Jason took his time, lined up his shot, and caressed the trigger on his railgun.
The hypersonic round was deafening in the narrow passageway as it found its mark and blew Deetz’s left leg completely off at the hip. With a warbling cry the synth went down and stayed down. As Jason approached him slowly, he was pathetically trying to crawl away using his only good arm, his other intact leg dragging uselessly. All the impotent rage over the last few weeks of chasing Deetz around came boiling to the surface and Jason swung a savage kick into the synth’s side, rolling him over twice until he slammed up against the wall. He propped himself up and stared at the business end of Jason’s railgun which was aimed right at his face.
Switching the weapon to low-velocity, still enough to blow apart the synth’s head at that range, Jason retracted his helmet so he could look at his enemy in the sputtering light of the few bulbs that had survived the railgun projectile’s passage.
“Why? Why do this?” Jason demande
d. “I let you go even after you tried to sell us all like cattle and this is my thanks?”
“You arrogant simpleton,” Deetz labored to get the words out, his voice cracking and modulating. “Did you ever wonder why I brought you along at all when you climbed up into my ship? Did you ever ask yourself why I would need a talking primate who could barely comprehend his own existence?”
“I may have at one time,” Jason admitted. “But now I don’t care. The Phoenix is mine. You forfeited your claim on that ship when we tossed you out on your ass.” Jason paused as Lucky, now recovered from the heavy jolt he received, walked up beside him and stared down at his brethren. His chest armor was scorched, but intact.
“So that’s the real question, isn’t it, Jason,” Deetz said with a metallic laugh. “Did I come back for you, or the ship?”
“We have no time for this, Captain,” Lucky said as he advanced on Deetz.
“Wait, wait, wait!! It was the ship! I came back for the DL7, don’t you want to know why? Don’t you want to know what that ship is carrying?” Deetz’s voice was shrill, and he was struggling to formulate the words. Before Jason could answer, Lucky took matters into his own hands.
“No more games. No more tricks. No more LIES!!” Lucky lunged at the helpless Deetz and clamped his right hand up under the smaller synth’s neck while slamming his left hand down on the other’s shoulder. Deetz’s eyes opened wide in horror as, with a slight whine of strained servos and actuators, Lucky ripped his head off in a shower of sparks and screeching metal.
“It … was … no … tri—”
The life faded in Deetz’s eyes as the last capacitor in his severed head discharged and his processors shut down for the last time. Holding the head in his massive hand, Lucky stared down at it. Jason, still shaken up from the unusual display of emotion from his friend, just stood there for a moment.
“Are you okay, buddy?”
“I am fine, Captain,” Lucky said, turning to him. “There are so few of us left, it is a difficult thing to kill one. But it had to be done. Deetz would never stop being who he was. The innocent lives he would destroy for his own personal gain were not an acceptable price to allow him to continue to live.”
Omega Force: Savage Homecoming Page 23