by Azalea Ellis
After a few hours to rest and recuperate, I woke up while the others still slept and sat down with Blaine and Birch to satisfy his curiosity and my own. While I kept up a constant stream of petting, praise, and reassurance toward the sleepy cub, Blaine took samples of his various bodily fluids, fur, and feathers.
“Give me an update on the real world,” I said. “What’s been happening while we’ve been gone? Have you been able to safely avoid NIX?”
Blaine spoke without looking at me, intent on his samples of an alien life form. “Yes. We have been a step ahead of them the whole time. However, if not for my…especially wide skill set, that would not be the case. Everything we buy is on untraceable credit, and I’ve put some additional measures in place to avoid recognition by the satellites or cameras. It is not perfect, though. I may be a genius, but I am only one person, and they have resources most people can barely imagine.”
“That can work against them, too. They may be big and powerful, but they’re also secretive. They haven’t let the world find out about them. It’ll end up being just one more incentive for them to decide we’re more trouble than we’re worth, no matter how much power they have. Have you made any progress on verifying their method of teleportation?”
“From the feedback on the monitoring system, it seems your hunch was right. The sphere device in the courtyard of NIX’s compound is in control of the Boneshaker. I still do not understand how it works, unfortunately. I cannot block it.”
“That’s okay. I know another way.”
He was silent for long enough that I thought maybe he wasn’t going to continue the conversation, but then he said, “What do you think the chances are? That you will be able to pull this off, I mean? This commitment you have made to all of us, it is quite…large. Save my sister’s kids, free the rest of the team from the Game, strike a blow to NIX and force them to leave us alone afterward… Can you do it?”
“Blaine, there’s only one answer I can give you. I won’t allow a future in which I fail. I’m going to keep everyone safe.”
He pulled out a syringe and pierced my arm, drawing blood. “What if you cannot? What if NIX is too strong for us, even now?”
I suppressed a small surge of anger at his doubt, recognizing it for the emotional volatility born of my new power. I hadn’t been to my mental room of peace for a while, and needed to visit it and tend the box within. “I won’t fail. You may see something new in that blood when you examine it, Blaine. I asked about what’s happened here, but I haven’t told you about our little trip yet.”
We talked for a couple hours after that, exchanging information and more plans. Though I wasn’t willing to accept aloud the possibility of a second defeat at NIX’s hands, I still made plans to keep Zed far away and safe in the event that I was wrong. I was cocky, yes, but never let it be said that I didn’t learn from my mistakes.
Log of Captivity 5
Mental Log of Captivity-Estimated Day: Two thousand, six hundred forty-two.
She is back again, though she was gone long enough I worried myself to distraction. I have tried to reach her, and though I can feel our blood-covenant-bond, I cannot touch her. She has adapted some sort of warrior’s-technique to protect her mind. I am grateful that she grows strong, but I feel her coming close to this place of two-leg-maggots, and I worry that she will attempt to find me again. It is shameful that my child-master must save her blood-covenant-champion. But my mother-lord would approve of her.
Chapter 37
They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion.
― Dylan Thomas
I sat on the mountainside behind the bowl of NIX, which I’d just realized was similar to Behelaino’s tip, only less defensible and harsh. A map of NIX floated in front of my face, and I’d shared it with Jacky and Adam, who sat on either side of me. We were going over the plan for our attack, and reviewing the myriad variations we’d come up with, in case of surprises.
The sun had just risen, and its cleansing light was almost harsh despite the early hour. We would come at dawn instead of in darkness this time. I let the wind whipping along the mountainside rush over me as I contemplated what was to come, willing my victory into existence.
--WE’RE READY.--
-Sam-
I’d sent Sam around to the other side of NIX with Blaine. Sam would be able to heal the hostages if needed, so that everyone would be in condition to escape without being a burden. When they were finished, Blaine would take off with the kids and Chanelle, and Sam would come back around as backup for my group.
Bunny, now officially our man on the inside, had unlocked a door for them. Blaine would be going for the prototype of the electronically powered armor suit he’d given to NIX first, which would augment his fighting ability and hopefully allow him to hold his own while they broke Chanelle and the kids out.
Zed and Birch were on their way out of the country, to a place that would be safe if the unthinkable happened. Not that any place would be truly safe, if Zed had to keep going to the Trials, especially without our protection. I’d wanted Blaine to go with him, to keep him safe and out of the way, but he’d refused to leave Kris and Zeke to anyone’s protection but his own, and insisted he could be useful. Zed would have to do his traveling alone, because as much as I hated it, in truth I couldn’t spare the manpower to go with him. I’d left Birch with him, since the cub needed protection as much as he did.
I had a quick image of China dying, but this time it was Zed's eyes staring back at me. I clenched my fist. That wouldn't happen. It wasn't an option.
The ground of the huge courtyard rumbled below, and a hole in the ground dilated open. Three heli-pods rose from it, their blades making a deep thwump-ing sound. I watched them rise slowly, then head away at top speed. Whatever NIX was doing, it would just be a distraction from us, something to slow down their reaction speed a little more.
I rose and took another deep breath, feeling a ball of something cold and hard in the center of my chest. All or nothing, now. "It's time," I said to the two next to me, as well as sending the words in a Window to Sam.
I adjusted the armored vest straps over my chest, pricked the back of my wrist, and fed it a few drops of blood. "Armor in place?" I asked the others, and received positive responses.
They were all wearing the impact absorbing body armor that Blaine had been so proud of developing when we first met him. I preferred my armored vest for the top, but I'd taken the leg covers. Unless we were shot in the head, or with a high-impact round from a tank, we wouldn't die from bullets. They would still hurt like hell, though, so the plan was to not get shot.
"Let's go," I told everyone, and started to lope down the mountainside, letting gravity accelerate my descent.
Jacky and Adam moved to my right and left, slightly behind me, so we ran in an arrow-like formation.
The guards noticed us before we reached the base of the mountain and the dirt road leading to NIX's only gate, a huge, double-doored thing cut into the side of the wall. No side entrances or sneaking for us this time.
They pointed their guns at us, and someone shouted for us to stop, raise our hands in the air, and identify ourselves.
I slowed, and Jacky and Adam slowed with me, but we didn't stop. We reached the road and walked on it, heading straight for the gate.
When we got closer, a guard called down with a megaphone, "Stop right there! One more step and we open fire!"
I stopped and looked up at the guns pointing down at us a couple hundred feet in both directions from the top of the wall. "Jacky," I said.
With only that, she crouched down and sprang up again, shooting over my head and toward the wall like she'd bounced from some epic trampoline. Combined with her Skill, gravity in the normal world was just low enough to allow her to m
ake such a move. She screamed as she went, a screech of excitement and aggression, and tucked her arms around her head to protect it from any bullets.
She needn't have bothered, because the guards were too stunned by her inhuman jump to aim or shoot at her.
By the time they recovered, she'd already disarmed and knocked out four of them. At least I thought they were unconscious. They may also have been dead.
The others turned and started to shoot at her then, but it was too late. She used their fallen comrades as shields, and continued to take them out, moving forward unstoppably. Using the distraction she created to our advantage, Adam and I moved forward. A few seconds of him fiddling with a keypad beside the huge gate, and it unlocked with a series of loud metal clicks. The doors rumbled open, and I stepped confidently through into the courtyard, Adam at my side. I unsheathed my claws and sank slightly lower into a fighting stance.
I was quite aware of the theatrical effect of all this to anyone watching. That was precisely the point of a show of force, wasn't it? Cue the epic music.
From the glass walls facing the inside of the courtyard, people in different uniforms and lab coats stood, looking down open-mouthed. The panic hadn’t hit yet.
Piercing alarms screeched through the compound, and the guards in the courtyard started shooting.
The bullets were aimed for our chests, rather than our heads, but we still dodged to try and avoid them.
Adam’s eyes met my own, and I gave him a nod. He shot off toward the concrete column forming a trunk topped by the huge, metal sphere in the center of the courtyard, while I moved toward the nearest guard. Adam would break through the concrete and jack into the twisting mass of wires within to gain retrograde access to NIX’s computer system, and thus their whole base, along with all their top-secret information.
My claws sank into the guard’s shoulder and ripped down, immobilizing the limb. I yanked them out, grabbed his gun, and smashed him in the side of the head. Lights out. I twisted and swung my leg up, slicing my toe claws across the back of another guard’s neck, and knocked him out, too.
I tossed the guns toward center of the courtyard. Guns were useless to me, since my DNA didn’t match the guards,’ and I wanted the weapons as far away from my opponents’ access as possible, just in case. I moved onto the next person, and the next, until blood splatters stained my whole body. Earth made me feel light, after all the time spent in Estreyer, and I didn’t hesitate or try to spare the guards I fought. I wasn’t actively trying to kill them, but if it happened, I wasn’t going to cry.
The air seemed to ripple with the force of all the alarms going off, and shouts and screams of pain filled the air, with the occasional burst of gunfire and booming crunch. A bullet barely grazed my left arm, and another hit the armor around my thigh.
Up above, Jacky was almost finished with the whole top of the wall, having disabled or killed most of the guards, and disarmed the mounted anti-aircraft gun stands.
I’d almost finished with the resistance on the ground level of the courtyard, and I saw Adam send a few distracted lightning bolts at a few guards who had slipped past me to attack him.
Only a minute or so had passed since the first bullet flew, and so far we were dominating. Of course, that's when the electronic doors all around the courtyard slid open, and soldier-types in full body armor and shields poured out.
"Damn," I said, watching as they moved into formation. These guys were not only better equipped than the normal guards on the walls and the randoms milling around the courtyard, they were prepared to fight people like us.
They moved in formation, the front line holding shields, while the center pointed guns the size of rocket launchers at us from safety. A soldier from the door closest to me tossed out a small metal pipe. As it arced through the air, it started to smoke, letting out billowing clouds of yellow gas.
I sidestepped and made sure not to inhale, but within seconds each little team of soldiers had thrown multiple smoke pipes, and the yellow fumes began to fill the courtyard. A whiff of it, and my head felt a little lighter, my couple wounds a bit less distracting. I noticed the soldiers were wearing small air filters over their mouths, and lenses over one eye, no doubt to allow them to see through the sedative clouds.
"Bastards," I spat. "Don't breathe it!" I called to Adam and Jacky. I back-stepped as far away from the smoking canisters as possible and took a deep breath. I crouched low to the ground, digging in with both my hands and feet, and scrambled to pick up the canisters while holding my breath. I threw them past the soldiers, back through the open doorways through which the defenders had come.
I'd been quick enough with a section of the courtyard, but I wasn't lightning-fast like Adam, and I didn't get to the other half fast enough to mitigate the smoke profusion.
Still, at least some of the air was breathable. And any of the guards I'd downed before wouldn't be getting up again in a “surprise!” kind of way.
The soldiers in the front row of one group bent to a knee, and the row behind them started to shoot. I darted to the side to draw their attention and bullets.
--ALMOST THROUGH!--
-Adam-
It was imperative to keep him protected till he could accomplish his part in my plan. I sprinted forward, straight toward the shooting soldiers. Their bullets bruised me as they punched into my body armor. I jumped over the crouching first line of shield holders, and slammed feet first into the shoulders of a gun holder near the edge. I knocked him out of formation, and scrambled around behind him in a single movement. I couldn't use his gun past a couple bullets before it would shut down on me, so I snapped his neck and held him up, with my arms wrapped around his body. My fingers moved over his, and used his gun to spray down all his comrades. While I was at it I took out a few from another group not too far away.
It was a good start, but there were too many of them, and only one of me.
Already, more bullets were spraying at me from all around, and other groups turned their guns toward Adam.
"Shields!" I screamed.
He ripped little scraps of paper off the pin on the side of his pants they were attached to, and Animated them. Three broad, ink shields sprang up around him, protecting him from the sides and back. He had less than a minute before they ran out.
I slammed my back into an empty section of the wall, holding onto the soldier and using him as a meat shield from the bullets. I continued to shoot back, but I wasn't able to move from behind him without getting shot, and I knew I wouldn't be able to protect myself for long, let alone Adam. The smoke was clearing, blowing away in the breeze, but I saw more soldiers coming, lining up in the hallways leading radially out from the courtyard. Backups already arriving.
The only positive was we weren't taking fire from above, too.
Which also meant Jacky should be finished with her first assignment. "Jacky!" I said under my breath, sending it in a Window.
--ON IT.--
-Jacky-
A few seconds later, something plummeted from the top of the wall into the midst of a group of soldiers like a meteor fallen from space. The impact alone knocked them off their feet, and then Jacky stood up from her crouch and attacked. They didn't stand a chance.
When they were finished, she moved onto the next group. Her moves were like a crushing dance, kind of beautiful to watch, even as I thanked God she was on my side. But even she wasn't enough.
My commandeered gun ran out of bullets. "Damn it!"
Adam's shields would be running out any second.
Time for me to step it up. As it was, I hadn't been very awe-inspiring yet. I didn't want to use my trump card this soon, but I could still make a difference. I thrust the quite dead soldier forward, and hoped the bullets aimed at me would follow him. In half a second I'd flipped around and was scrambling up the wall, finger and toe claws punching into the cement. A couple rounds punched into my back, but my armored vest repelled them with little more damage to me than a painful bruise. I rea
ched the top in record time, and was more grateful than ever for the days and days I'd spent leading the others up Behelaino's mountain.
Imitating Jacky, I dashed around to the other end of the wall and took a running leap off of it, onto the shoulders of a soldier.
Some of the group had noticed me coming, but they were packed too tightly in their defensive formation to evade an attack from that unconventional route. The soldier crumpled under my weight, and I used my claws to slice into either side of his neck. The blood splurted out like a crimson sprinkler.
I wasn't as good as Jacky, but she didn't have claws, nor my Tumbling Feather Skill. I jumped and spun and sliced, hitting with my elbows and my knees, cutting with my hands and feet.
--GOT IT!--
-Adam-
Seconds after Adam sent the message, the center of the courtyard lit up. He had one hand plunged into the bare, twisting, coiling wires, and the other stretched outward as if it was trying to escape the pain of the current. Electricity jumped and branched out from him like a tree made of light.
I closed my eyes, remembering the last time he'd done something like this.
Sure enough, bright whiteness exploded, loud enough to send me rocking backward and cause me to slip in the pool of blood I'd created.
I opened my eyes after a second to be sure it was safe. My eyesight was a little dim and spotty, and my ears rang, but I made out Adam still standing in the center of the courtyard. He was the only person on his feet.
All around, charred bodies had fallen to the ground.
The hair on the back of my arms lifted, though I wasn't sure if it was from the smell of cooked human, or from residual electricity dancing through the air.