He nodded nervously before going over to the nearest terminal and getting to work.
“I’m going to head over to the bell tower,” I announced as I pulled out the ear-pieces from my pocket and tossed them around to others, “you guys will be acting officers for the men on the ground, round up all the survivors you can and get ready for a fight.”
Juno’s brow furrowed with confusion, “You think we can fight off a kinetic bombardment? Sorry, I left my catcher’s mitt on Alby.” she said condescendingly.
“No, but this won’t be the end of it. They’ll wait until the city’s on the ground, then they’ll send in a clean-up crew.”
“And just how do you know this?” she asked in a tone not unlike suspicion.
I didn’t like the idea of her accusing me of conspiracy, but I had to keep my cool if we were going to survive, “If they weren’t going to they would have just scorched the city. They need this to look like Abhijeet fought us off.”
“The pods are on their way, I guessed where you two would want them,” Jurol said as he came back over to the group, the shakiness in his voice completely gone, “again though, the only things in those pods are medical supplies. How are we meant to save the city with those and these?” Jurol asked, waving his service pistol in the air.
“Because we’re bound to get hurt and, if I’m not mistaken, I think I saw you put a whole lot of CRS in those pods, which I’m sure some of the soldiers on the ground are going to need.” he still seemed unconvinced, which was fair, so I followed up with the second part of my still formulating plan, “I also noticed some weapons downstairs in his trophy room. I’m sure they’ll do until we can get our hands on something better.”
That was enough to make him feel at least a little more confident, “Alright then, what’s the plan?”
I hid a weak smile and started walking toward the trophy room, “Get the survivors we can together after we touch down, then get them out into the forest. From there I’m sure we can get Alby to deliver a message to any Commonwealth ships in the area.”
“Are you sure there even are any?” Xario asked, the void in his voice still present as he undoubtedly questioned every aspect of his life.
“There’d have to be, the amount of troops that are in the city-” I stopped as another barrage hit Ruishinda and an explosion went off in the distance, “Someone would’ve had to bring them, right?”
“I suppose so. But even still, whatever’s hitting us would surely have some kind of scanning equipment, they’d find us no matter where we hid.”
“True, but they’d still have to fight us. If they try and scorch the planet there’ll be no way they could even attempt to lie about their intentions here.”
“But they’ll have more men,” Juno said, finally deciding it was her turn to argue, “we’ll be crushed by their sheer numbers.”
There was an unbearably loud crashing sound and we all fell to the floor, the palace only just maintaining its structural integrity as we hit the ground and the final barrage smashed Ruishinda, the emergency thrusters around the base of the city being the only thing that saved us from certain death.
“Commonwealth soldiers have always been better in the forest, everyone knows that. Trust me,” I said, a smile landing on my face as I climbed to my feet and looked over the wall of weapons, “we can win this.”
Awkward Rescue
The high-tech scope adjusted with my blinks and before long it was as if it was simply an extension of my eye. It was a beautiful weapon, a rifle that Abhijeet would’ve been using against animals when it was the kind of thing that was used to take out tanks.
It took me a little longer than expected to get to the top of my sniper’s nest, but once I did I had a perfect view of the city, the six foot medical pod beside me acting as an additional piece of cover while three full waves of transport ships brought down Androids, soldiers, and enough vehicles to bulldoze a small town.
Eventually we’d gotten into a position to fight right back, the few soldiers that were unharmed in the city helping the others while laying down massive amounts of fire on the horde of Feddies.
Then there was me, hitting what targets I could and giving orders to the other Spectres on the ground. It felt good to be in an at least semi structured situation again.
I tracked a transport Rhino as it thundered down a nearby street, its six massive wheels crushing a dozen of the Federation’s own Androids without regard. It was sickening. I charged up my rifle, released the air that I’d been holding in my lungs, and pulled the trigger, a brilliant beam of yellow lanced the engine, effectively turning the vehicle into a flying chunk of slag.
The occupant’s screams didn’t even register as I scanned the battlefield for a fresh target, “Xario? I need a squad on West and 52nd. Android’s are digging in.” I said automatically and calmly as I noticed them in my peripheral vision.
“You got it Kurla. Jurol, Trell… TRELL! Quit that blubbering! You’re with m-!” I took out my ear-piece and set it down beside me while he went on to bark more orders, not because he was distracting me or anything, no, but a sole transport was on its way down, and something about that didn’t sit right with me.
I followed it as it came closer, charged up my rifle, and let the yellow lightning sing through the air, striking the target but missing the cockpit and instead blowing off part of the back. Good news was I’d sent it into a tailspin, but something about the shuttle made me want to keep my eyes on it, like I knew what was coming next.
Suddenly the door went flying off and what appeared to be a person could be seen barely holding onto something inside the ship that managed to pull them in before they were sent flying into the city below.
The pilot was good, damn good, levelling out the craft and flying maybe a hundred feet up straight toward me and the palace, but that didn’t save him from me. I charged up my rifle once more and, when the shot was perfect, let the laser fly, taking off one of the shuttle’s wings.
I watched in amazement as the shuttle came hurtling to the ground, until I noticed its trajectory and panicked. My own personal autopilot took over and I grabbed the heavy blaster pistol I’d brought with me and an injection of CRS from the pod before leaping out of the bell tower right as the shuttle came smashing into the base of it.
It was hard, but I managed to force myself not to hold my breath as I slammed the auto-injector into my thigh the second before I hit the ground, ignoring the pain that ripped through my back as my spine broke and healed at the same time.
My body screeched for the embrace of death, but I managed to push past it and get to my feet, taking a few deep breaths and chuckling when I discovered that the beret was still sitting firmly on my head.
“Sleep mode!” a shrill voice shouted from the base of the tower, “Sleep mode activated!”
I spun around, pulling out the heavy blaster as I did, and aimed for the source. At first I thought it was the destroyed shuttle, but as I drew nearer it became clear that it was something else inside it.
I pushed my back up against the side of the shuttle, said a silent prayer, then popped around, blaster held high as I took aim at where the sound had come from before lowering it as I discovered who it was.
She was white, like a ghost, her hair too, and she was significantly larger than when I’d last seen her, but it was definitely Freyja wearing what appeared to be a red and black mix between a wetsuit, a demonic space samurai, and the astronaut equivalent of plate mail.
I couldn’t just leave her there, but I couldn’t exactly wake her up, especially not when there was another person in there that was even bigger and in the same uniform but with the helmet on. That’s when I noticed some chains and, though certainly not one of my proudest ideas, made the decision to bind her wrists and drag her to the safety of the forest.
I felt like the world’s biggest creep about it, don’t get me wrong, but I rationalised it so that I could convince myself that it’d be a good idea to have POW with me.
<
br /> To tell the truth though, I just wanted to save her before someone else got to the shuttle, and with the roaming Pangolin tanks and Androids that I’d last seen edging nearer and nearer to my position I figured it’d be best if we didn’t stick around the crash site.
Probably would’ve been better if I’d just woken her up.
Reverse Stockholm
Syndrome?
An exhausting few minutes went by with me dragging Freyja through the dirt until I managed to find a pond and discovered that, after a great deal of slow testing, Freyja and her suit could float. It was weird, like I was taking my pet duck for a walk, but my back and arms were finally getting some rest as I looked around for a place to set up camp and wait for Alby and the crew.
I managed to get a good deal of exploring done before I heard Freyja groaning.
“Ah, you’re awake,” I said casually as if I hadn’t spent the last twenty minutes trying to save her, “good, I was tired of dragging you.”
She looked around awkwardly, still floating on her back, “Where am I?” she asked groggily.
I didn’t know exactly where we were, and I didn’t know how specific I had to be, so I went with “Nasanwahti, your ship crashed about half an hour ago. Your suit’s busted by the way.”
“What!?” she shrieked as she got to feet and looked in stunned surprise at the chains around her wrists.
“Yeah,” I said coolly, which I was exceptionally proud of myself for, “your helmet opened up and it said something about going into sleep mode. Keep up.”
I gave the chain a few good pulls until she finally managed to drag herself onto the shore like the first fish to crawl out of the sea.
I pretended to ignore the fact that she was obviously staring at me, figuring that she was just trying to get a read on me, until her eyes fell onto the blaster I’d holstered on my thigh, “Well, that’s a big’un.”
“Keep moving.” I said flatly
I felt the chain tighten as we entered the trees away from the pond and turned to face the defiant looking Freyja, “And why should I?”
“Because you’re my prisoner.”
She jangled her chains in front of her face then let the drop back down, “Really? You think these are gonna hold me?”
“They should,” I said surely before giving the area around us a quick look for a good place to stop and deciding we needed to go further and pulling the chain, “if not, I can just shoot you.”
“That’s… That’s a really good incentive actually… If you can just shoot me if I try to bail on you then why bother with the chains?”
I gave an uncaring shrug, “Makes me feel more comfortable, now please be quiet. It’s very hard to focus with you talking so much.”
She clearly remembered me, but obviously hadn’t pinpointed it yet. I didn’t want to push it though, in case it wasn’t her and I’d simply kidnapped someone who sounded and looked just like her.
“My name’s Kurleida.” I said nervously, the idea being that it’d be enough to remind her if it was Freyja, but also not forward enough to make me look like an idiot, “What’s yours?”
“Nokri,” she said after a long pause that gave the forest even more time to darken as night set in, “Freyja Nokri.”
“That’s a… nice name,” I said, trying not to let on that I knew exactly who she was, “where’s it from?”
“Kaltjarna. Urbetes.”
I stopped us, “Urbetes?” I asked in an attempt to pull the last few pieces from her mouth so that she might remember.
“Yeah, how come..?” she trailed off, “Oh Gods…” there it was, “You’re the one who got me out of there! Xiang, right?”
I turned and smiled, “It’s Xiao actually, and I’m glad you remember it that way. Better than ‘the bomber’ or ‘the girl who stowed away on your ship and then made a huge mess on the way out’.”
She gave me a half-hearted shrug, “We gotta do what we gotta do. It’s not like you enjoyed it.”
“Exactly, and it’s not like you enjo-”
“I’m going to stop you right there,” she said, raising her hands, “I did enjoy it, I’m not gonna pretend I didn’t, and I’d do it again.” she paused for a second and looked at me for a little while before continuing on, “I’m from a warrior society, there’s honour in battle for me. That and the fact that this,” she said, pointing in the rough direction of Ruishinda, “was a sort of retaliation for me personally, not just for the Federation.”
“What do you mean by that?” I asked, tilting my head in confusion, “Not for the Federation?”
“It’s getting dark,” she said, dodging the question, “we should keep moving. These jungles aren’t known for their cuddly plush critters.”
I was confused, but I still liked her and figured that she’d tell me when we got to know each other a bit better.
It was like the weirdest first date of all time, and I know saying that makes me seem like a deranged lunatic, but I promise I’ve only done something like that once or twice before.
Kidding.
Obviously.
I was… I am very strange.
Getting to Know You
After a good long while of trekking through the dense forest Freyja’s suit had woken up and I’d made the decision to release her from the chains. Part of it came from the fact that I knew there was absolutely no way I could hold her anymore beyond the threat of near certain face melting, but most of my reasoning came from the fact that we’d really started to get to know each other.
I knew about her family trouble, and she knew about my broken one. She loved fighting and I loved quiet contemplation. The more I learned, the more I felt like we were the Commonwealth’s and the Federation’s representatives of Yin and Yang, two different parts of the same whole.
Is there even a word for reverse Stockholm syndrome?
“So… what are you?” I asked with a smile as I looked at Freyja from across the fire, but then I noticed between the flickering flames that she’d raised her eyebrow and I instantly realised what I’d said, “Oh! Sorry, not like that! No, I just mean you-”
“Grown?” she said with her musical laugh, “Honestly, it’s fine. After Urbetes I was pretty much ruined, and apparently brain death was an eventuality if I didn’t go through the procedure.”
“What procedure?” I asked, deciding the best thing to do in that situation was to change to an interested stance over the awkward weirdo one I was in.
“The one that turned me into a Guardian.” she said seriously, the last word hanging in the air for a second before she continued on, “Saved me from certain death and made me into the white devil super soldier you see before you.”
A smile landed on my face and a quiet little laugh escaped me. Then I turned my attention to her suit that had recently started thrumming from time to time, “And what’s that? I’ve never seen anything like it.”
She fell silent for a few moments, clearly juggling around whether or not she wanted to tell me. I didn’t want to pressure her or anything, so I went to tell her not to worry about it, but right before I could she pointed the straps across her chest, “This? Basically just a tiny piece of Warp-Tech.”
I smiled again, hiding how embarrassed I was that I’d tried to get her to give up what was clearly classified information, “Amazing… How does it work?”
She pulled what looked like a marble from the part where the straps clipped together and started her explanation, “Well, it’s simple really, all you gotta do is take this little ball and throw it.” she said with a grunt as she propelled the tiny thing deep into the forest around us.
After I was sure there was no way I could see where it went I decided the best thing to do was to get her to continue her presentation, “Then what?”
She gave me a cheeky look, “Then this.” she said as she pushed the button on her chest and vanished into thin air, like she’d been sucked into nothing.
I shot up and looked around, she was nowhere in sight and
I was immediately panicking, not because a prisoner had escaped, but because I was starting to care about Freyja and was convinced she’d been zapped into space.
“What?” I heard her ask from behind me.
I spun around and discovered she was sitting almost exactly where she’d been a few seconds prior, “But… you wer-”
“As the leaf? That’s what this thing does.” she said, pulling out the marble from her chest again then tossing it up and catching it a few times.
“How?” I asked as I looked on in amazement.
“As I said, tiny Warp-Tech. Really fancy stuff.” she said with a laugh, “You wanna try?”
I made no effort to hide how stunned I was by the question, “Seriously?”
She gave me a nod and started taking it off, something that her suit apparently didn’t like as it made the sounds of an angered cicada, “As anything.” she said as she started toward me, the device and its four straps dangling from her hands.
The device was rather daunting, and I certainly didn’t want to mess it up and have my skin make the sounds Freyja’s suit had, “Mind helping me get it on?”
“Course.” she said with a comforting smile before dropping the pack part of it over my head while holding the two straps over my shoulders before starting the strapping process.
She stood over me, my head only barely reaching the top of her chest, but for some reason it wasn’t threatening, it actually made me feel kind of safe. But I had to go ahead and ruin it and have my body start trembling like a leaf as she ran her hands around my waist looking for something on the pack.
I guessed that she’d found what she was looking for, the straps that looped under my arms tightening until the pack was almost completely formed to my back. That’s when I noticed that her hands were lingering on my hips and she was looking into my eyes. It was like she could see right through me.
I’d never had that before.
I’d never felt so… transparent.
“Ta-da!” she said as she quickly pulled away.
Spectres (Æthyrium Rising - Spectres Book 1) Page 16