Critical Strike (The Critical Series Book 3)

by Wearmouth

  “What’s to happen to them?” Mike asked the lead man, a member of the Unity council he recognized but whose name he couldn’t recall.

  The old man with white hair turned to face Mike and bowed. “Jail until we’ve decided. We’re having a council meeting later today to help organize the aftermath.”

  “I see.”

  “I’m sorry about Mai,” he said. “We owe both of you a debt of gratitude for what you did. Without your help…” He looked around at the utter destruction of Unity’s buildings and then back to the line of dejected-looking men and women. “Without your help, it would have been us in chains.”

  “Thank you… have you seen her?”

  The white-haired man shook his head. “I’m sorry, I haven’t. I just heard… well, pay no mind to rumors.”

  “What rumors?” Mike asked, his heart now thudding against his chest. It was all sounding as if Mai had died given the way he was speaking, but a part of Mike couldn’t quite bring himself to believe it.

  “It’s not really my place to say. I know this is difficult, but I just don’t know the facts and I don’t believe in spreading gossip. I’ll get this lot out of your way and you can head over to the hospital. I hope it all works out for you.”

  Clutching his elbow as the painkillers continued to wear off, Mike opened his mouth to speak, but he was too late, the man was already moving, taking the line of farm workers with him. A few of them looked up at Mike with what looked like pity in their faces. Others were full of sorrow and regret.

  He couldn’t entirely blame them. He doubted they had much choice but to do what Augustus had wanted of them. He was as cruel as anyone or anything Mike had seen, but still, despite that, he looked on these people with a boiling hate inside him.

  If it wasn’t for them, he and Mai wouldn’t have been under pressure to get the weapon working and she wouldn’t have…

  No, he thought, he couldn’t say it, wouldn’t believe it until he saw her for himself.

  All the time he didn’t know for sure, he had hope within him.

  It took just a few more minutes to reach the hospital. He waited outside for a moment before finally gaining the strength to open the flap door and enter. The place was larger than it looked on the outside. Hundreds of makeshift beds were created from canvas and other materials stretched across crude frames made from wood and metal poles, all parts of salvage Unity had stockpiled from their scavenging expeditions.

  One of the human nurses, bent over a croatoan engineer, looked up and saw Mike. He finished bandaging the small alien and approached Mike. “How are you?” the man said, looking at Mike’s elbow.

  “It’s okay, just hurts a bit.”

  “I just wanted to thank you for what you and Mai did. We all do, we’ve spoken about nothing else since your heroics.”

  It seemed like everyone within the hospital tent looked his way then, all sharing the same expression of gratitude.

  “Um… thanks, it’s the least we could do,” he said, flustered and not sure how to cope with the focus on him. He lowered his voice to the nurse. “Where is Mai?”

  “This way,” the man said, his face now solemn.

  The expression hit Mike, made his legs feel weak, but he remained as strong as he could and followed the young man through the tent and beyond a second set of fabric doors.

  “She’s over there,” the man said, pointing to a bed on the right.

  A sheet lay over her frail body. Mike couldn’t see any movement. His throat went dry and he heard voices and sounds as though he were in a fishbowl filled with cotton wool. Like a zombie, his limbs seemingly moving by their own volition, he moved to Mai’s bed, his good arm reaching out to grab the sheet.

  His hand shook, but he pressed on, pulling the sheet back to Mai’s shoulders.

  She was lying on her side, her face away from him.

  Mike fell to his knees and slumped against the low bed, his hand on her shoulder. “I’m so sorry,” he said, his voice finally cracking as the tears started to well up. “I didn’t want to leave you. I wanted to be with you until… I’m sorry, Mai. I love you so much, I hope you knew that before…”

  He closed his eyes and bowed his head, resting his forehead against her shoulder, unable to continue on. A wave of grief welled up inside him and he fought to keep it down, afraid it would come out in an unending torrent of anguish.

  “You silly old fool,” a voice said, making him open his eyes and lean back. He looked around, thinking one of the nurses or assistants were speaking to him, but the voice came again.

  “I’m not dead yet. You can’t get rid of me that easily.”

  “Mai?” Mike asked, bringing his attention back to her body.

  Mai shuffled her body over until she was facing him, a pained grin on her face.

  “It was only a minor heart attack. I’m tougher than that.”

  “Oh god, I thought you were… oh Mai, I’m so relieved… no one would tell me what happened. I thought I had left you to die.”

  “Nope, still around and still kicking. You’ll get my foot up your ass soon too if you don’t stop blubbing. Get a grip, my love, I’m fine. I just need to take things easy for a while. I’ll be up and about in no time.”

  Mike laughed, letting out the built-up tension in great guffaws. He leaned down and hugged her, her weak arms clasping around his neck.

  “We did it,” she whispered in his ear. “We beat that bastard.”

  “It was all you,” Mike said. “Those last modifications were genius. You saved us, Mai.”

  They just continued to hug, not wanting to let each other go until Mike sensed a hush come over the hospital. He heard the footsteps of a few people approaching. He let Mai go and they both turned toward the door.

  The flaps opened and four men entered, carrying a stretcher between them. Aimee’s body, burned and bloodied, lay on top. Everyone watched in silence as her body was taken through to the rear and placed on the floor, next to a long line of sixty linen body bags filled with Unity corpses that hadn’t been buried yet. A group of men and croatoans, who were tagging the bags, nodded at those who left Aimee with them.

  “That poor woman,” Mai finally said. “She led with such bravery.”

  “Aye, it’s a real shame. Didn’t have an easy life by all accounts,” Mike said.

  The four stretcher-bearers nodded with respect to Mai and Mike as they left, but the flaps didn’t close behind them. The nurse who showed Mike through held them open so the others could see through.

  Those who could stand did so, and those who couldn’t sat up in their beds.

  Together, they all gave Mike and Mai applause, many shouting their thanks and giving their respects for the help.

  The nurse then said a few words about Aimee. The tent hushed again out of respect. Mike and Mai stayed silent as two women dressed in Unity council tunics addressed the hospital.

  Mike zoned out after a while as they talked about Aimee’s goals for Unity and how she saw the society. They explained that they would lead the council until they could arrange for elections, but for now, they would continue to run things as Aimee had done in the past.

  After they had finished and left, there was one more visitor who stepped through to join Mai and Mike.

  “Maria, my girl!” Mai said. “So you’re quite the hero, I hear.”

  Maria shrugged her shoulders and looked down at her hands clasped in front of her. “I don’t know about that, I just tried to survive. Look, I wanted to speak with you two, to say sorry… Augustus, he made me tell…”

  Mike stood, his old knees cracking, and held her by the arm. “You don’t have anything to apologize for, you hear me? We all knew what he was like. He would have got what he wanted out of you one way or another. I’m just happy you’re safe now.”

  “I concur,” Mai said. “He was a madman. God knows what he would have done to you. It all worked out in the end, and you got to kill the bastard, so your name will be long held in regard here, I
’m sure. Don’t diminish your actions, girl.”

  Maria’s face blushed and she stammered, not sure what to say when she seemed to suddenly remember something. She opened her palms and showed an object to Mike and Mai.

  “I don’t know why I took this,” she said. “But in the heat of the moment I saw it on him and thought it might be something useful. I’ve never seen anything like it before, and it… well, it seems to have some kind of internal energy.”

  She handed the prism to Mike.

  He rolled it over in his hand, feeling the light vibrations coming from its warm, metal surface.

  “How interesting,” he said.

  He lowered it for Mai to have a look.

  She sat up in her bed and took it from Mike’s hand. “Hmm, I think a trip to the workshop is in order.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Charlie watched Vingo limp toward some steps cut into the ground. Dim lights lined green-tinged transparent glass on the walls leading down to a set of double red doors at the bottom. He paused at the top of them and encouraged everyone forward with a wave.

  “Where the hell does this lead?” Charlie said. “You’re not taking us to meet more clusps?”

  “We need to go through the house to reach its transport deck.”

  “Won’t the owner be a little angry?” Layla said.

  “Their shuttle is missing. The house will be empty.”

  Denver turned, peering through his sights at their surroundings. Charlie spotted a few tredeyans moving around vehicles on brightly lit external transport decks. The decks lined the edge of a cliff that dropped away to the sea. Metal walkways sloped into the cliff, connecting the thirty-meter-wide platforms to dry land. He wondered why the owners kept the lights on with the scion air assault still in full flow, although the large prism had floated to a distant part of the star-filled sky to continue its bombardment.

  “Do you know who lives here?” Denver said.

  “A high-ranking tredeyan. Their houses are cut into the cliff and have the best views. The rest of us live in villages or the barracks in the cavern systems.”

  Vingo climbed down the stairs and pushed the door open. A shaft of artificial light brightened the stairwell.

  Charlie immediately followed him inside, pleased that they got themselves out of view, but he remained cautious. A scared tredeyan might be waiting around any corner with a loaded rifle, or one of those damned prisms might have floated in.

  The space opened up into a large corridor with smooth cream walls. Five small glass cases were screwed at eye level on either side, with dried flowers and plants inside. The décor took Charlie by surprise. So far, all he’d seen was functionality around the defense, a slaver cavern and pulse cannons on strategic hilltop positions. He guessed Layla would be in her element if they had time to poke around. A vehicle was priority number one, to reach the vaults, so he had no intention of giving her the opportunity.

  Denver closed the entrance door and made straight for a rack containing a tredeyan rifle. He grabbed it and checked the magazine. Charlie kept his rifle shouldered and stayed close to Vingo. The corridor opened up into a softly lit circular space, which he guessed was a living area. High-resolution screens were fixed against a wall in a sunken square area in the middle of the room, in front of an L-shaped bench. Two small helmets sat on the end of it.

  “Do you get to watch much television?” Charlie said.

  “I don’t understand,” Vingo said.

  “The screens down there. What do you use them for?”

  “Communication and work. The helmets are for the children to take virtual reality training.”

  Frosted glass doors led off in three directions. Directly ahead, in the direction of the transport pad, and to the left and right.

  “I don’t believe it,” Layla said.

  Charlie twisted in her direction. She stood in front of a plastic display case and pressed her gauntlet against it. Denver walked over and joined her.

  “What is it?” Charlie said.

  “Artifacts from Earth.” Layla turned to Vingo. “Do you have anything like this?”

  “I don’t have a sufficient level in our chain of command. These objects are taken from humans we integrated to supply our outposts. They had no need for possessions. We supply everything they need.”

  “Where are the outposts?” Denver said.

  “A long way from Tredeya. The ones alive don’t know about you, and Earth doesn’t know about them. I think it’s much simpler this way. Humans have strong personal connections that can compromise behavior.”

  “You said supply,” Layla said. “What do you mean by that?”

  “Create other humans. Your lifespan is short. The only way to keep a constant supply is by reproducing.”

  “You’re breeding us?” Charlie said, casting his mind back to the warehouses on Earth where aliens kept pregnant women. “You’re no better than the croatoans.”

  Vingo blinked and hobbled over to the display case. “We don’t need to encourage humans to breed. Each one has a purpose for their life, whether that’s guarding territory, flying or fighting. Most are happy working in different parts of the universe.”

  “You sell them?” Denver said.

  “We did in times of peace. Not now. We require all of the resources to stay alive. After our planet has fallen, all we’ll be left with is our smaller outposts.”

  “Which I assume the scion will be visiting in the near future?”

  “It’s reasonable to come to that conclusion,” Vingo said.

  The thought of his species being used, brainwashed even, into someone else’s fight grated on Charlie, mainly because there wasn’t a single thing that they could do about it. Nobody on Earth had the technology to search and recover the ancestors of kidnapped men and women. The humans in space might not even want to return if they were indoctrinated into an alien culture from an early age.

  Charlie gazed at the contents of the display cabinet. The left half contained alien objects. A silver disc with luminous edges, two transparent blue teeth and a chrome pipe that looked like a musical instrument. The right half contained artifacts from Earth. A wooden comb with several teeth missing, a dagger with a boar’s head in a leather scabbard, iron buckles, and a pendant with three lions engraved on it.

  Most of the human objects looked medieval, although in better condition than anything his old team dug up at Quaternary Productions all those years ago. It made him think of Mike, and how excited he used to get when an unfamiliar object came to the finds tent. They didn’t realize at the time how much of a simple life they had.

  If people were taken centuries ago to fight about the galaxy, they’d have no idea of Earth’s advances and recent decline.

  “Grab me a bag, Vingo,” Charlie said.

  “What are you doing?” Vingo said. “You can’t take anything from here. A senior officer owns this house.”

  Charlie smashed his gauntlet against the cabinet and the clear protective sheet shattered. He reached inside and scooped up the contents. “If we make it back to Earth, I know a man who’ll love this.”

  “That’s theft,” Vingo said. “The security feed will have a recording of your actions.”

  “I don’t give a shit. Your allies stole my planet.”

  “Besides, we’re gonna steal his transport and you’ll be on the feed too,” Denver said.

  Vingo grunted and disappeared through the door on the left of the room. He returned with a small green sack. Charlie stuffed in his newly acquired hoard and slung it over his shoulder. He imagined Mike’s face as he poured the contents in front of him.

  A low rumbling explosion outside snapped Charlie out of a brief moment of wonder. The filter display in his visor clicked down to its final notch. “Lead the way, Vingo. We haven’t got long.”

  Vingo opened a door leading to a metallic tunnel and they clanked toward the transport pad outside. Charlie’s stomach fluttered when he looked out of the long thin window to h
is right. They were a hundred meters above the sea, which crashed against rocks at the bottom of the cliff. Thick metal girders curved from the bottom of the pad into the rock face just below them.

  A dark oval-shaped craft sat on the right-hand side, roughly the size of a car but on four square blocks instead of wheels. Charlie hadn’t seen transport like this before, but realized that he’d only seen invasion and colonization vehicles, and this was probably a civilian ride.

  Denver and Layla stood together on the edge of the platform, gazing at the distant skyline. The scion fighter presence had diminished in this area and it had been hours since Charlie saw anything tredeyan in the sky.

  Vingo sat in one of the two front seats, secured a rubber strap around the upper part of his suit and wrapped his gauntlet around two shiny rods on the dashboard. Charlie stepped in and glanced at the controls. A light red hologram appeared on the glass shelf in front of them, showing a 3D outline of the vehicle with measurements alongside.

  Like most tech he’d seen from the croatoans and tredeyans, it was nondescript until it burst into life, far exceeding anything on Earth.

  Layla and Denver sat behind them on a soft leathery bench and fastened their straps. A wise move considering the thing didn’t have any doors. A quick tilt would throw them overboard.

  The engines hummed and increased in pitch. They rose unsteadily to a height of three meters above the pad.

  “It might be bumpy because of the updraft. We’ll be over land soon,” Vingo said.

  Charlie secured his strap. “Go for it.”

  Vingo eased the rods in opposite directions. They gained height and thrust forward. Charlie took a deep breath as wind rushed around his suit. This vehicle made the catamaran feel like riding on the back of a snail in comparison.

  Bumping along in minor turbulence, Vingo swept to his left and headed along the right-hand side of the village. The ground below passed by in a blur. Ahead, a few lights dotted the dark horizon below the clear night sky.

  Charlie braced himself for the possible carnage of their main city. They’d heard a lot of explosions since arriving. The vaults were located there, and the scion were after information.