“Raise the gravity generator to the max,” Johnny said, noting his friends’ puzzled stares.
The pilot was already pressing buttons, toggling switches. “You know that’s dangerous, right?”
“Doesn’t seem like that’s something that would make you refuse,” Johnny said.
The pilot grinned, eyeing him and his friends one by one. “No. But once this thing goes off, it’s going to be—”
The sound of movement from the smaller cabin cut him short. He noticed his friends lurch back.
“Hold that thought,” Johnny said, sliding back the charge of his pistol. He glanced at his friends, confusion and terror rallying across their faces. “Get ready to fight.”
“It’ll be a few minutes before the generator is fully charged up,” the pilot said as Johnny jogged for the door that led to the side cabin.
“We went out with a bang already,” Skunk said in the background. “And we became mind slaves for it.”
Johnny felt a pang of pity, but they needed to kill the Ascendi, and this offered their only chance. Plus death would break the Ascendi Major’s control over the slaves. He was pretty sure they’d gladly surrender to the militia once they were free.
Scratching from inside the cabin warned that an Anunnaki might’ve slipped through. Or it might be a trap for him. Either way, this could get ugly.
He twisted the knob gently and eased open the small cabin door. The whole thing was upside down, but the window would still be in the same spot, more or less. After the door was propped open a few inches, his handgun led the way. It poked past the door, the window still out of view.
A pulse surge whined. He jumped back and waited. Only a slight ringing sounded in his ear.
A sizzling from above warned that the Anunnaki were cutting multiple entry paths into the shuttle. Johnny pulled at his lip with his teeth. He couldn’t afford to play coy right now. If he needed to die for his plan to work, he’d die.
In a single motion, he slammed the door open and sprang forward. An Anunnaki materialized outside the window, palm up. Johnny squeezed the trigger automatically. It crumpled over, the bullet lodged in its forehead.
A hot sting pierced his shoulder. Pain erupted through it and he shrank back. Above, a flash of light grabbed his attention. Sparks must’ve hit him from the Anunnaki cutting through the ceiling.
The others were yelling madly. He pivoted to find the wall cut apart, replaced by dark metal shields. The Anunnaki used those for exactly these kinds of purposes. Breaking into hot spots.
A few feet away, his friends stood battle-ready, their pickaxes and shovels held like swords in their hands.
“Get back,” the pilot yelled. Johnny watched as a flash-bang grenade flew into the pack of shielded Anunnaki. Johnny cupped his ears and balled up on the ground. The explosion rattled his brain and left the white-hot sensation of blood in his ears.
He couldn’t worry about that now, though. The Anunnaki would be feeling the effects of the stun grenade worse, and he needed to use that to his advantage. Rolling around, he leveled his pistol and fired at the exposed Anunnaki. They collapsed behind their shields, piling up in the entryway.
A good effort, but you are forgetting one thing, the Ascendi warned.
Johnny watched in horror as the same Anunnaki he’d just shot rose, rubbed the blood off their heads, and raised their shields. The life Conifer. He noted the lightness of his handgun. A reminder of how few bullets were left.
At the far end of the shuttle, a piece of the ceiling burst and fell to the black dirt, tossing up a plume of it. Massive shadows flickered. Johnny depressed the trigger twice. But then a shield lowered in. To his side more Anunnaki were forcing their way in.
“Everyone get to the trench,” he said, unleashing the last of his ammunition.
He felt like a captain trying to hold back a flood in a ship. Sunlight spilled in as the Anunnaki cut a second opening in the room.
“One more minute,” the pilot yelled.
“They’re going to throw in a wailer,” Sarah cried. She must’ve heard them say that.
The five of them skidded into the trench. Johnny thought they’d be safer here, but Anunnaki were piling in even along the wall a few feet from the trench. He had no choice. He snatched the grenade from his front pouch, tore out the pin, and lobbed it over the mass of shielded Anunnaki. At the same time, Naga hands reached out from behind their shields, about to fire pulse surges.
“Get down,” he shouted, pulling Krem and Hamiad to the deepest part of the trench. The ensuing blast sent a sea of dirt and smoke over them. A shield clanged overhead as another embedded in the ground a few inches from Johnny’s face. He began coughing from the mess of it. His eyes watering, he knew they had no chance of surviving.
This was the bang. Now it was time for them to go out.
But he discovered his knife still in his grip.
The others saw him. Saw what it implied.
Hamiad stared at him fiercely and tightened his grip on his shovel. “One last push. Come on.”
They stood up, readying their weapons. Johnny and Hamiad charged. Krem, Sarah, and Skunk followed close. Together they sped at the cluster of Anunnaki shields. Johnny couldn’t even see his target. Only their shields. That’s how desperate this was. Knife, shovel, and pickax crashed against Anunnaki metal. Somehow Johnny expected more. To make a dent or a solid scratch at least. Instead, the shields brushed the weapons off.
Suddenly off balance, he could only watch the shield rushing at him. It collided with him all at once. The intense, jarring impact seemed to squeeze his entire body. More numbing than painful.
Soft ground padded his fall. He looked down to see a blurred vision of the crevasse beneath. The others were writhing there with him. Dazed and beaten but not fatally injured. It didn’t matter. The Anunnaki would be on top of them any second.
A pulse surge. Strange to hear one now after everything else. Johnny whipped his head around. The pilot’s arms hung limply from his seat, head sagging. A flashing yellow button on the cockpit station was all that remained of his efforts.
“The button,” Johnny uttered. His voice sounded weaker than he’d expected. He took a step, knowing what he needed to do.
“Let me,” Krem said, running out.
“Krem,” Sarah shouted. She started to run after him, but Hamiad caught her from the shoulders.
“What would Johnny do?” Krem hollered.
It happened too fast. He bolted toward the pilot’s station. Pulse surges filled the chamber. Krem’s body twitched in horrible, unnatural ways. Pitching left and right but still charging onward. Johnny sensed the inevitability of this. He was watching something that couldn’t be stopped, no matter how painful.
Krem slapped the button and skidded onto the ground. The pulse surges ceased. Johnny’s throat tightened at the sight of his friend, bloodied and cold-looking somehow. What would Johnny do? Krem’s last thought. Only Johnny didn’t have to do it.
That was a friend, he thought. Someone who sensed the good in you. Not just that. Krem had sensed his intentions and acted on them himself. Johnny’s eyes softened as he juggled sadness on the one hand, and admiration for his friend on the other.
Then with a gut-wrenching feel, Johnny realized there was something worse to worry about. The gravity generator. He could hear the humming now. Violent humming. Like it had a mind of its own and planned to kill them.
He had the sensation of falling, even though he was actually floating toward the pilot’s station. Floating at a growing speed. All around, the world had gone nuts. Dirt was coasting into the air, bullet shells too.
The Anunnaki were confused, moonwalking as they tried to fight off the growing gravity. Their shields pulled out of their hands.
Johnny kicked against the ground, but the invisible laws of physics had him strong in their grasp. He flailed his arms. The shuttle’s hull began to shake behind him. As far as he’d learned, the Anunnaki gravity generators worked through t
he flooring, so the generator itself wouldn’t suck in the ceiling. But everything else was fair game. The Anunnaki, the dirt, scraps of debris, him, and his friends. They’d be sucked to the floor.
This thing wasn’t going to double or triple their weight. Right now it was probably at two g. He’d still remembered that weird bit of trivia in a textbook. Anunnaki aircraft have been recorded with capabilities of going up to fifty times normal gravity. What would that do to him?
He could only imagine how this would affect his body. The Eagle said she’d needed a new liver and kidneys and received her limp from the intensity of the generator. The one she had barely survived.
His heart sped as the room blurred around him. Loss of vision? On its way. And he could only hear a waver of cries and alarm. Loss of hearing? Getting there. His whole body felt ready to burst or tear apart. He couldn’t tell which.
He hurtled toward the ceiling, shields, bullet casings, dirt, scraps of metal, his friends, their shovels and pickaxes, Anunnaki, and electrical wires swarming with him. And the gravity Conifer.
Reaching out proved more of an effort than walking straight while drunk. But his fingers flicked it. If the gravity Conifer was in any way similar to his, it would be enough.
Concentrating hard, he willed it into his grasp. He clutched it there and focused. Breathing short and fast, he pushed back against the gravity. Tried to force it away. Meld your mind with your Conifer, Orun always told him. He’d been only a child with a child’s mind, so it was harder. Now it wasn’t so hard. But it was still his first time.
He slid to a stop on the dirt. Then two objects smacked him in the back. No, not objects. Because objects didn’t clutch at your shoulder and cry “Johnny, what’s going on?”
His whole head began aching. Everything grew fuzzy around him. But he made out Sarah on his left shoulder, Hamiad on his right, clutching Skunk. Somehow he was maintaining their position while the rest of the shuttle went to chaos.
Ahead, the Anunnaki pounded against the ceiling. Shovels and his knife collided with a few. Others just hit against the ceiling and struggled there. Krem joined them, motionless.
The ceiling began sucking in the dirt, drawing it out from beneath their feet.
Pain erupted throughout Johnny’s body. No doubt the gravity was growing. Suddenly the edges of the ceiling trembled and crumpled inward as if the gravity generator was making everything into a tight ball. This would get worse before it got better.
“Help me,” he said, his vision still blurry.
“How?” Skunk asked, frantic.
“I don’t know,” Johnny said, feeling the onrush of panic.
“Touch the Conifer,” Sarah said, reaching out her hand.
Could they do that? Could more than one person use a Conifer at the same time? Johnny had never tried it.
Yet at her touch, the load lightened. Only a little, but enough to let him breathe without the crushing sensation in his lungs. Then Hamiad joined in. And the pull of the gravity generator on them weakened. Skunk too. Suddenly they weren’t about to die.
But the Anunnaki were. Pieces of their body armor tore off and sunk into the growing pile of debris behind them. They quivered, trying to fight against it. But the pressure stripped their body armor clean.
“Focus on this spot,” Johnny said. Somehow he felt aware of objects moving toward them from behind. The rest of the shuttle wreckage, more dirt, electrical wires. And he pushed them away. “We can create our own gravity field.”
They’d have to contend with a lot of gravity now. Maybe five g or more, given how powerfully the ceiling was sucking in the dirt and debris. Sun spilled down on them as the gravity generator devoured the ceiling. A giant ball of dirt, metal, and debris sat in front of them, expanding every second.
And across its surface the Ascendi’s face contorted as he twitched. He seemed locked in a perpetual state of pain as the life Conifer flashed violet in his hand. How long could it stay alive that way?
“What about Krem?” Sarah said. Johnny looked to see him strapped to the growing planetoid. If the gravity generator kept up, eventually the planetoid would consume Krem. Johnny’s vision was still fuzzy and he couldn’t see his friend’s face clearly. What if he was already gone?
The words caught in Johnny’s throat.
“I don’t know,” he said. He meant to say it softly, but the strain forced the words out rough.
“Well, I’m not letting him go like this,” Sarah snapped.
Johnny blinked until he could see Krem’s poor body better. For a split second he swore he detected something in his eyes. Something like fear. The kind of insane fear that tormented you, lost in an abyss. Alone and nightmarish.
She was right. Everyone caught in the gravity generator’s planetoid would crumple soon from the sheer strain of it. Dead or not, Krem deserved more from them. But just staying in this one spot required all their concentration and energy. The veins in his head throbbed, his body sweating furiously. The gravity was raging, trying to consume them. A single misstep in their mental will could screw this whole thing up.
Hamiad must’ve thought the same.
“I can’t draw him in. This is impossible. We’ll lose it.”
Hearing his friend like that, it sounded bad. He racked his mind for the most reassuring thing he could say in that moment.
“All those times we used to pull cards out of the stacks we made,” Johnny said. “Try to think of Krem like one of those cards.”
And he decided to try it himself. Imagine Krem as just a small piece of a large pile of cards they used to stack. A precise, consistent pull. That’s what it took.
To his amazement, Krem’s body crept off the ceiling. He inched back toward them. Now Johnny could feel it. Krem locked in their own gravitational field. Slow, but steady, he urged himself and his friends, as if they shared his thoughts somehow.
But even when Krem was nearing and the stray dirt and wreckage was flying around them, breaking apart, Johnny could see the gravity’s wrath.
Along the gravitational planetoid, the Anunnaki’s skin began to peel off like the layers of an onion. Very soon the pressure won out over their bodies. The Naga shriveled, bones and veins rolling beneath their skin. Their chests and eyes sunk in, the walls scarlet with their blood. Johnny turned away. It hardly helped. He heard the groaning of bones, then the snaps, and could practically see their limbs imploding upon themselves. The moment seemed to last forever.
Below, the gravity had ripped out so much of the ground that it had left them floating in midair. In fact, the gravity planetoid was hovering above a crater. A crater growing deeper and deeper.
Focus on us, he told himself. That’s all they needed to do. The gravity was still peaking, but together they could hold it back.
A faint moan wisped around his head. He looked to see the Ascendi still recognizable. Still…alive. The life Conifer remained in his hand. And for as painful as this looked, the Conifer continued healing him. He was trapped in that cycle of painfully experiencing death only to be rejuvenated.
Sarah cradled Krem in her free arm. Wreckage funneled onward into the planetoid in front of them. The planetoid that would soon bury the Anunnaki trapped in it completely.
Johnny didn’t know if it was pity, the desire for closure, or simply the notion that he needed that life Conifer for Krem, but he knew he couldn’t let the Ascendi’s sickening torment continue. What the hell were they if they watched the Ascendi Major suffer? Not human. Something worse.
His parents’ voices caught in his head. Every Anunnaki is your enemy.
Not right now, Johnny thought. Right now this one was his to help. His to show mercy.
He inhaled deeply and focused on drawing the Ascendi in. Every bone threatened to tear out of his skin. That’s what the effort asked of him. But he’d gone through worse. He thought of his years of training. Orun pounding him in the liver and forcing him to continue through hours of work. His drill sergeant Ibdan running the recruits t
hrough dirt when they were sick and numb to the bone. His parents never telling him the words every child should hear.
The Ascendi had gone through hell too.
“Why’s it coming toward us?” Skunk snapped.
“Trust me,” Johnny said.
“Kill him,” Hamiad growled.
“No. We need him to trade for Orun.”
The idea came to Johnny spontaneously. He didn’t even know if he believed it could work.
Suddenly the Ascendi’s hand touched the gravity Conifer. But instead of the gravity generator sucking them in, there was a mechanical crunching noise. The violent humming and whirring became skipping sounds and quieted.
The swirling debris and the gust of sand flying all around stopped. Everything hit the crater formed by the gravity generator. All at once, the debris planetoid collapsed into a massive pile in the crater.
Johnny jerked the gravity Conifer out of the Ascendi’s reach and the life Conifer with it. He sensed the mind Conifer and tugged at that too. They’d been distorted by the intense gravity. Flattened to thin rocks.
The Ascendi made no motion to attack or flee. It stood there, Johnny’s captive. Fair is fair.
Chapter 52
They floated upward to steady ground. All this time, they’d been hovering in midair, the gravity sucking everything else around them. And once on the black dirt, Johnny raised the flattened life Conifer to Sarah and Krem. Little by little, his bruises faded, his jagged cuts sewed together, and his wounds healed.
With a burst of life, he began breathing again.
Krem’s eyes fluttered and he stared at them. “Was I…?”
It was a miraculous moment. A moment more of joy than triumph. Of all of them, Johnny never would’ve expected the Ascendi to answer.
“You weren’t dead. No Conifer can bring back the dead.”
Hamiad and Skunk watched the Major warily. Johnny had to admit his decision to save him must’ve come from momentary insanity. The mental strain of the gravity Conifer. But the Ascendi was alive and he wouldn’t kill him for no reason. He could use him to trade for Orun’s freedom.
The Deadliest Earthling Page 23