Ranger

by William Stacey

  "What the hell are you doing with a nuclear bomb?"

  "The answer to that is obvious—it's for the dark elves." He sighed, now looking older and worn out. "We should have used it the moment they appeared in Kamchatka. It would have saved so many lives."

  "Kamchatka? Where the dark elves—"

  "Entered Russia, yes. Just as they did all over the world, in multiple locations—Europe, Asia, the United States, even your Canada, although it was only in your country they were hostile, attacking Fort St. John. Our intelligence staff assessed the attack upon the city must have had something to do with your secret base in the region, your Magic Kingdom."

  "You knew of Operation Rubicon?"

  "Not everything. Rumors of inter-dimensional travel. When the aliens, the dark elves, appeared in the Sredinny Mountains of Kamchatka, we suspected your Operation Rubicon, but we had no proof. And with so many other incursion sites around the world, we were preoccupied. When the United Nations begged the sovereign nations to set up quarantine zones, my country agreed. Despite how your movies portray us, we're not war-crazy monsters. No one wanted to destroy an alien species on first contact. My president accepted the wishes of the UN Secretary-General and dispatched an entire battalion of soldiers to quarantine the aliens in the mountains, but he also sent my team with the suitcase as a safeguard."

  "You're Spetsnaz, aren't you?"

  Valentin nodded. "Special Group Alpha, of the Russian Federal Security Services—we acted under the direct control of my country's political leadership, who sent my team and me to aid the battalion tactical group tasked with enforcing the quarantine zone."

  "And the nuclear bomb, the suitcase?"

  "A safeguard if events… got out of hand."

  "The Culling wasn't out of hand?"

  "We didn't know what had happened. When the sky flashed green, most of the battalion tactical group disappeared. We were forward of the others with a company of mechanized infantry, fighting vehicles and two hundred soldiers. The battalion commander wanted to evacuate a mining town in the mountains he deemed was too close to the alien incursion site, and my men and I joined the mission to get a closer look at the aliens. Going along saved our lives. Had we been with the others… well, we wouldn't be talking right now."

  "Null zones," said Alex. "It was the same everywhere the dark elves set up their towers that spread the Culling wave across the planet. The towers created a safe zone for a hundred kilometers around them. But everyone outside those null zones…"

  Valentin, wiping his hands over his face, nodded. "That makes sense. We only knew our radio calls went unanswered. But we had no time to ponder where everyone was because the dark elves surged out of their incursion site, attacking us. We fought them for eight weeks, losing far too many good men, most to those damned invisible mages. Believe me—I considered using the suitcase every single day, but for all I knew, the villagers we were protecting were the last people left on the planet. As it turns out, they were only the last Russians on the planet. So we fought for time, defensively, holding the dark elves and their monsters back. When Mount Ichinski blew two months later, we had no choice but to escape the mountain and its growing ash cloud. Unfortunately for us, we only made it as far as a rip in the very fabric of existence, one of the same rifts you used to get here. The volcano was behind us, so we took the only path we could, forward to this world."

  "With your bomb?"

  "And two hundred soldiers, twenty armored fighting vehicles stocked with ammunition and supplies, and the villagers—the miners and their families. In a single moment, we passed from the ashes and snows of the Sredinny Mountains to a temperate forest on an alien world. But unlike you, we had no dwarven allies to help us. We were on our own. When our vehicles ran dry, we built a small settlement in the forest. We learned how to hunt and fish, and in time, the local redcaps found us and traded with us, teaching us the common tongue—and warning us of the dark elves, their fae-seelie masters. But we saw no dark elves. We didn't know at the time, but their civil war kept them out of our hair. For a year, we lived in that settlement, surviving, trading with the redcaps. I took a wife. We had a baby, a boy."

  He paused, stared at his hands. "And then the queen found us. In a single night of fire and death, they attacked. We fought, but it was hopeless. The boggarts and trolls, we could see and fight, but the dark elves turned invisible and cast magic, killing with a gesture. We held out as long as we could, but when Queen Tuatha de Talinor sent an envoy to offer us terms, I accepted."

  "You surrendered?"

  "You'd have done the same."

  "Don't be so certain, but that doesn't explain how you became her warlord."

  "Isn't it obvious?"

  "Your families," Alex realized.

  "The civilians we rescued from the mining town. My wife and son, neither of whom I've seen in over a year. She holds them hostage. So we serve as her specialists, using our tactics, our weapons to win her civil war. And so two hundred Russian soldiers are now the thirty-seven you captured."

  "I… I'm sorry. Why didn’t you say something?"

  "Say what, Alex? What difference would it have made? We fought for her because we had to, but I never forgot who she was, what she did on Earth. I've kept the suitcase for her, because I always knew someday she'd no longer need us. When that day came, I intended to use it to force her to release the hostages or, failing that, to make her pay for their lives."

  "This is insane, Valentin. You can't bargain with someone who can snuff out over seven billion lives."

  "We do what we must, Alex. Now you must set us free. As soon as she hears of this defeat and the death of her last daughter, she'll no longer need our families, then she'll slaughter them. Let us go, Alex, please. Give us back the suitcase and our weapons, and we'll leave. You'll never see us again."

  Alex shook his head, coldness spreading through his core when he looked into the other man's desperate eyes. Would you have done anything differently, Alex? "Valentin, I'm… I'm sorry. We can't just let you go, especially not with a nuclear weapon. I'm sorry, but there's just no way."

  "Please," Valentin begged. "She will kill them."

  "He's not wrong, Alex the Ranger," Veraxia said in a tone she could have been using to discuss a rainy day. "Queen Tuatha de Talinor has no softness in her core for others. If the hostages are no longer of any use to her, she will put them to death. It would give her pleasure."

  "We must go save them," Valentin pleaded.

  "You'd never get there, not in time," said Veraxia. "I've been inside the queen's fortress on Wildspike Island. It's off the southeastern coast of Faerum, at least a day's flight by wyvern. Even on kelpie, you'd be at least a week away."

  The look of helplessness that passed between Valentin, Dimmi, and Dominika confirmed what Veraxia was saying.

  "You’ve been inside her fortress?" Alex asked. "Why?"

  "I've been many places on Faerum, Alex the Ranger. I was there as an envoy standing for House Ulfindor. But of course, the queen did not know I was a priestess of the Grandfather, else I'd never have escaped."

  "Is he telling the truth?"

  Veraxia inclined her head. A strand of white hair fell across her eyes, and she flicked it away. "Deep in the bowels of her fortress, there is an underground grotto, a lake filled with seawater. In the center of this grotto sits an island prison with only a single bridge leading to it. The queen keeps her hostages within that prison, never letting them see daylight."

  "How well guarded?"

  "Her army is defeated, but she has her elite Storm Guard warriors, hundreds of fanatical female fae-seelie warriors, many of them mages—they will never surrender. She also has a nearly inexhaustible supply of boggart warriors, although it will take time to ready them for war." She shook her head. "No. You'd need a much larger army than you and the dwarves to fight your way inside her fortress, even with your lovely weapons. And even if you did, long before you reached them, she'd kill the hostages, if for no other reason
than gleeful spite."

  "I have to try," said Valentin. "She'll kill them, anyhow. Please, if it were your family…"

  Alex, his anger now replaced by self-loathing, thought of Noah and the things he had done in Noah's memory. He understood Valentin perfectly, but it wasn't just him, not anymore. Besides, he had already let Huck down once. He shook his head. "I'm sorry. The answer is still no. We can't take the chance. Nor can we let you go with a working nuclear bomb. If the queen captured you, she might force you to use it on us. No, the bomb stays until we can figure out how to destroy it."

  "Then you doom my family."

  "Not necessarily. We beat her army. It'll take time for her to raise another. We'll send an envoy and barter with her, arrange a ransom for your families."

  Valentin's voice rose, trembling now with desperation. "If you wish me to beg, I will do so. You've never met her. She doesn’t barter. Please, let us—"

  An explosion shook the compound, sending them reeling.

  50

  Alex's heart pounded as he sprinted for the workshop, Leela, Martinez, Veraxia, and Lee on his heels. There must have been an industrial explosion, but they kept no explosives in the workshop. Had the dwarves kept something dangerous in the compound? Thick black smoke and the stench of explosive residue hung in the air as he came closer. This is bad.

  The workshop stored not only the laptops containing the gateway machine schematics but also the keying device—their only way of sending a message to Boulder City to let McKnight and Simmons know when and where to open a gateway. Alex's panic surged when he saw two bodies lying in the open yard before the double doors leading to the workshop—the two sentries they had left in place.

  He stumbled to a halt, surveying the scene. One soldier had his left leg torn away at the hip, the discarded leg lying nearby, while something had crushed the other soldier's head like an egg. This was no industrial accident.

  He drew Witch-Bane.

  The others stopped beside him.

  "What the hell?" said Martinez.

  Just then, Liv clomped through the open workshop doorway in her rig. She held someone by the back of their neck in her right hand—Duril, the apprentice technomancer.

  "Liv, what are you—"

  Liv tossed Duril underhand as if she were throwing a softball, but with her rig's augmented strength, she threw the dwarf so hard he slammed into Alex and the others, knocking them down and sending his sword skidding away. Alex untangled himself from Duril, seeing in a moment he was dead, his head twisted unnaturally. Liv, her face pale, her long blond hair streaming unbound behind her, pointed one of her arm-mounted needle launchers at him.

  "No!" screamed Leela, trying to protect Alex with her body.

  But just as Liv's needle launcher discharged a salvo of fléchettes, Veraxia lunged in front of both of them. Scores of darts thudded into the dark-elf priestess while others whizzed over their heads.

  Someone fired a pistol, the bullet ricocheted from Liv's rig, and she bolted back inside the workshop.

  "Are you all right?" Alex asked Leela.

  "Fine. I'm fine."

  Martinez and Lee checked on Veraxia, who was lying motionless. Both men now held pistols.

  Alex picked up Witch-Bane, staring in confusion at the doorway and the thick black smoke that drifted from it. "Keep everyone back," he said.

  More soldiers arrived, and Martinez took charge, ordering them to stay back and secure the area.

  "How bad is she?" Alex asked Lee, who was bent over Veraxia. He knew in his heart she must be dead, shredded by the razor-sharp fléchettes.

  The dark-elf priestess sat up, brushing the darts from her silver chain mail. They tinkled as they fell upon the stones. "My armor is strong, Alex the Ranger. I yet live to fight."

  Alex stared in disbelief, doubting even MR armor would have stopped those darts. When this was over, he needed to ask Ylra about dark-elf chain mail. But not now.

  He peered through the open doorway, unable to see clearly because of the smoke and angle, but they heard Liv coughing. "This is crazy. Why's she doing this?"

  "She's CoG," Leela said bitterly. "Children of Gaia. She was the one who levitated the terrorists over the base fence for that MP asshole to hide until they attacked the gateway machine."

  Alex stared at his wife. "How…"

  "I had my suspicions when she floated herself and Huck up the cliff, and I should have said something then, but… damn it, I'm an idiot! I thought I was being paranoid. Oh shit! Ylra! We need to go in there."

  "No." He pulled her back by her arm. "You can't do anything without magic."

  "I can break that skinny blond bitch's neck."

  "Not when she's wearing her exo-suit."

  "How do you want to do this, Major?" Martinez asked. "We can toss grenades or even burn her out."

  He shook his head. "Not if Ylra's still alive. Besides, the keying device and laptops are in there. What is she doing? She can't escape."

  "She's a fanatic," said Leela. "She's not trying to escape but to stop humanity from coming here."

  "Alex, you out there?" Liv's voice rang out, followed by a bout of coughing.

  "I'm here," he yelled back. "Come out. Let's talk."

  She wheezed then laughed. "Yeah, I'll get right on that. You come inside. Just you."

  Martinez shook his head.

  "You can't," Leela whispered, fear in her eyes.

  "Alex," Liv called out, "I have Ylra, and if you don't get in here in five seconds, I'm going to turn her head into a piñata."

  Alex, his pulse racing, stepped toward the open doorway. "Fine, I'll be fine," he promised his wife, knowing he couldn't possibly keep that promise. The desperation in her face matched the hopelessness he felt, but he walked through the doorway.

  The explosion had devastated the workshop. Broken pieces of machinery lay scattered on the floor. Liv stood near the back, beneath a steel chimney chute bolted to the ceiling, where the smoke escaped, clearing the air for her to breathe.

  As Alex approached, Liv pointed one of her needle launchers at him. Ylra lay before her, and Alex advanced to about ten paces, gripping Witch-Bane and staring at the dwarf. "Is she—"

  "She's alive. I heard her groan a moment ago. Tough people, these dwarves, but you have them all fooled, and she got in my way. I don't hate her, or the other one, and I didn't want to hurt them. It's important you know that. That's why I wanted to talk to you, to explain this."

  Alex's gaze went from Ylra and Liv to the detritus. When he saw the twisted, burnt remains of the keying device amidst the burnt laptops, a wave of nausea swept through him. "Oh God, Liv. What have you done?"

  "What I had to do. There was just enough C-4 left to do the job."

  He shook his head in disbelief. There was no way to let McKnight know they were alive and had succeeded. "You fool. You've killed humanity, the children, everyone."

  "We killed ourselves a long time ago, Alex. It's just taken us longer to accept that. You don't understand. You can't accept it, but I'm a hero. We destroyed our world, and now you'd do the same to another."

  "We didn't destroy our world. The dark elves did. We're the victims."

  "Victims," said Liv with a short sharp laugh. "Do you hear yourself? Our world was dying long before the dark elves attacked—pollution, climate change, overpopulation, nonstop wars. God, even the oceans were dying, clogged with plastic—plastic! We screwed our world up so badly that it couldn't survive without us. That's why our children are sick, because the universe has had it with us. We're the disease. The Culling was the cure."

  When Liv's eyes darted to the workshop entrance, he turned and saw Leela join him, her hands held empty before her.

  "That's far enough," Liv ordered, raising her other arm and pointing a needle launcher at each of them.

  Leela glared at Liv. "You sabotaged Boko's rig, didn't you? That's why she couldn't create an escape gateway for the contact team. She was your partner, another mag-sens."

 
Rage twisted Liv's beautiful Nordic features. "She was a traitor to Mother Earth! All she ever cared about was finding another world for her stupid children to ruin."

  "How… how did you know the dark elves would attack the contact team?"

  Liv barked a nearly hysterical laugh. "Know? We had no idea the dark elves were waiting to ambush the contact team. We were just trying to wreck the mission. But it worked out perfectly for us."

  "Why now?" Alex asked. "Why betray us now?"

  "Now? Because I had to do something. Who would have believed this stupid plan might actually work? You've tricked those poor dwarves, fooled them into helping you destroy their world. I can't let you."

  "Yet you're the one that killed a dwarf, aren't you?" snapped Leela. "Maybe two if Ylra dies. Somehow, I don't think the others will thank you."

  "Doesn't matter," said Liv. "None of us will ever see Earth again, anyhow. I'm happy to die a martyr for this pristine world." Her eyes hardened.

  Alex tensed to charge, knowing he'd never reach her with his sword before she fired.

  But then Liv froze, staring in confusion at a soft green glow coming from the control console on her arm near the needle launcher. "What the hell is this?" she whispered.

  Now! Alex moved.

  Too slow, Liv saw him and aimed the launcher at his face, but before she could fire, Ylra—conscious after all—bolted upright, gripped the leg assembly of Liv's rig with both hands, and threw the woman's leg up, pushing her off balance. Alex smashed into Liv, sending her falling onto her back. Liv's heavy frame thundered to the stone floor, and her outstretched arm fired a salvo of fléchettes into the air—directly into the steel chimney flute. The fléchettes struck the steel and ricocheted back, and Alex threw himself over Ylra. Pain lanced through Alex's back, followed by a wet sensation.

  Before Liv could rise, Alex scrambled away from Ylra, ignoring the pain in his back, and raised Witch-Bane in both hands over Liv but stopped himself, his sword's point quivering over her bloody face. Most of her fléchettes had come directly back at her. Without her rig's armor to protect her, the razor-sharp missiles had cut her open. She was bleeding out, he knew, and nothing could save her. She'd die in pain no matter what he did. Even her suit's internal gears were smoking and sparking, with the fluid mixing with her spreading blood. The fléchettes had cut away most of her face as well as the bone around her skull, leaving bloody brain tissue exposed. Her ice-blue eyes, filled with terror and desperation, watched Alex. Much of her jaw and lower mouth was gone, but she tried to speak.