Star Angel: Awakening (Star Angel Book 1)

by David G. McDaniel

Willet flashed up on the left and she passed him. Running so fast she was already to the wall.

  “Jump!” Willet called from somewhere behind. “Jump! Jump! Jump!”

  And she did. Planting and thrusting like a gymnast, leaping out of pure terror—with enough force to launch the armor high into the air without the jump-jets.

  The jump-jets. At the last possible moment she remembered. Activated them by voice command right at the top of her arc and …

  WHOOOOSH! the surge punched her in the back, knocking the wind out of her and she was flying, waving her arms, the suit’s gyros correcting for balance, bringing the legs up for a landing …

  FOOOMP! The jets popped off and the top of the wall was suddenly a dozen feet below. She aimed her feet toward the wide edge, vertigo seizing her as she began to fall …

  Poomp, the knees absorbed the landing and she was up.

  I’m on the wall!

  She spun her arms frantically to stay balanced, gyro’s whirring heavily somewhere in the bowels of the suit, working to compensate. On the other side, within the compound, it was dark; no activity. Up on the wall she felt as vulnerable as on the field—though no bullets were yet zinging in her direction. Instead they peppered the field, searching out …

  Willet. His jets blazed blue-hot below and he was arcing up to meet her. Flying close … he hit the wall clean and ran over to her as the searchlights held them under a million lumens of scrutiny. More guns were coming, of this Jess was sure.

  “Where’s Darvon?!” she scanned the field. The shots had ceased. For the moment.

  “He didn’t make it!”

  “He got shot?!”

  “Went back!”

  “Darvon!” she called him on the radio, desperate.

  “I shut off his channel! It’s you and me now!”

  Darvon would never make it out of there. “We can’t leave him!”

  “We’ve got no choice!”

  “What—”

  “Get ready!” There was no time for discussion and Willet knew it. “Grab your gun!”

  Shots burst up from the ground below, inside the compound. Soldiers. Regular guys with guns.

  Willet turned and his cannon was off his back and in his hand.

  BRRRIIIIIIIIP! he stitched a line of ultra-sonic bullets across the men on the ground far below, shredding two and sending the others for cover. They wore normal combat gear; foot soldiers, far outmatched by the giant suits of powered armor.

  Jess grabbed her own cannon from her back, just like they’d practiced, heart pounding in her chest. She wondered if she’d survive the trauma. This was it. They were in combat.

  I’m in combat!

  She couldn’t stop swallowing; her mouth was so dry.

  This was no game.

  “Go!” said Willet and leapt from the wall to the darkness below. Jets flared, shooting blue light into shadows, then darkness enveloped him and he was on the ground. Jess gulped and followed, freaking at the leap into thin air but desperate to get away from the wall where she was nothing but a target. Vertigo hitched her gut as the suit automatically flared the jets before she could think to do it … and she was down and in the action.

  Bap! Bap! Bap! shots pinged the corner of a building near her, sparks flying.

  “This way!” and Willet was on his way around the corner and down another path. She followed in a hurry.

  Ping! a shot connected. She heard the shot more than felt it. The handheld rifles of the soldiers were made for killing humans; against the powered armor they barely registered on the HUD.

  But the guy who shot her was suddenly right there, in plate body armor and full helmet, crouched behind a protrusion, rifle pointed at her and … she couldn’t shoot.

  Ping! Ping! Ping! another bust hit her in the chest.

  BRRIIP! the man exploded in a spray of blood and she nearly screamed.

  Willet.

  She found him up ahead, coolant steam blowing from the barrel of his massive rail gun.

  “It’s you or them!” he said. “Come on!”

  She followed, heaving. Willet fired, precise, controlled bursts at arriving targets. These soldiers were just doing their jobs. Jess recalled the Dominion boys back in the bar, then saw something out of the corner of her eye and …

  Unloaded. The cannon’s rapid-fire hammer-pulse vibrated the armor in a zipper-burst of sonic booms, absolutely devastating the section of wall she fired on. Shrapnel and dust filled the air.

  But there was no one there.

  “Conserve ammo!” Willet cautioned, popping off short bursts. “Pick your targets!”

  Then a guy was right in front of her. Two guys, running at her, guns up and—she sprayed them with a rain of ultra-sonic death. Perfect aim this time, their upper bodies exploding in a shower of gore, chewed away by the heavy-caliber rounds. The strike was surreal, leaving only their lower torsos intact, just the legs, still running at her—continuing their last action until they crumbled into a disjointed tumble at her feet.

  She gagged. Gagged again and … puked. As the yak left her mouth the suit’s circ units sucked the confines of the helmet with a violent rush, emptying the mess and leaving behind only the stench. Vomit. She puked again, the jarring rush of suction rocking her senses as the suit vacuumed up each purge. Gathering what wits she could she stepped behind a protrusion and froze. Just stood there. Breathing deep. Holding steady.

  “You okay?!”

  She couldn’t answer.

  “Jessica!”

  “I’m—” she gagged again. Shots peppered the air outside her hiding place. Pop! Pop! Pop! “I’m okay!”

  “These soldiers can’t stop us!” Willet said. “But they’ll have powered armor on the way! We’ve got to get to the command building!”

  She mustered resolve. “I know!”

  “Can you make it?” He was genuinely concerned. And the fact that he could even be concerned in the midst of such utter chaos snapped her just a little bit out of it. Enough, at least, to continue.

  Willet can take it, she told herself. So can I.

  “Here I come!” she said and raised her cannon. Checking visual and scan indicators she mentally switched herself into the right frame of mind. This was a game. It had to be.

  It has to be.

  A bloody game, a game where people died, and if she feared it too much she’d be too paralyzed to act.

  As Willet said, it was her or them.

  Two more guys fired on her and she flinched, then opened up and killed them. Swallowed down the revulsion, the terrible feeling of taking lives, and pressed on.

  “Let’s go!” Willet led the way.

  And they ran through the pathways of the compound, past windowless buildings, under runs of giant piping, shooting their way clear. Jess was utterly freaked but managed to keep to cover as she worked her way forward. She remembered playing paintball, laser tag; how the feeling was similar, cringing at every corner, afraid you were going to get hit. Only in paintball the hits weren’t lethal. In paintball your shots didn’t shred the other guy to bloody ribbons.

  Her guts knotted.

  Then a brilliant blast of energy singed her and she went down. The shock rattled her teeth but the armor absorbed it. Combat info screamed at her on the HUD as she staggered to cover and pointed her gun every which way, trying to find the new attacker.

  “Astake!” Willet identified them.

  Then she found them. Scans outlined two; she zoomed in as they strode across a wide landing pad, guns up. The Astake were the samurai armor, like the ones Zac fought right after they arrived on this world, the Dominion equivalent of Skull Boys. She recalled the power of their plasma cannons, recognizing those same guns in the hands of these two. She’d just been hit by one.

  BRRRRIIIIIIIIIPP!!!! A withering volley from Willet, sparks flying as the two samurai suits jerked back and forth from multiple impacts. Jess watched the fireworks, superheated air steaming along the path of Willet’s bullets, concussions rocking th
e air. But the Astake stayed on their feet—and got serious. They crouched and dispersed to cover at either edge of the wide pad.

  WHOOOOM!! a sun-bright flash of plasma lanced across the compound, casting stark shadows. It struck the wall near Willet in a shower of molten debris.

  “Are you hit?!” Jess screamed, desperate.

  “No!”

  Suddenly she had the thought to leap to the top of the building beside her … and did. Now from a vantage some thirty-feet up she stepped to the edge, found the Astake below on the left, still looking down and across at Willet and … opened fire.

  BRRRIIIIIP!! she hammered its head from above, right on target. The shots jarred the Astake, bad, having missed the new threat, but it was too late. As it tried to raise its gun, tried to return fire, she let loose with two more sustained bursts, perfectly aimed directly into its face and nailed it, broken, to the ground.

  “Yeah!” Willet enthused. He let loose a volley from below as the other Astake watched its comrade fall—distracted just a second too long. Now that one staggered, into the open, and from her vantage Jess leveled a new stream of kinetic death right into it. Into its face, just like the last. Willet backed off and a surge of bloodlust came over her as she drove it, blistering and fragmenting to the ground beside the other.

  “There you go!” Willet stepped out below, cautious. Jess turned her attention wide, across the compound.

  Buildings. Piping. Like a factory. Searchlights everywhere. Things moving, closing in. Suddenly she felt exposed and decided to jump back to the street.

  “There’ll be more!” Willet noted as she landed beside him. “This is only going to get worse!”

  As if on cue another Astake ran into the street ahead, gun up and blazing. WHOOOM! hot plasma cooked the air, just missing both of them but jarring stabilizers nonetheless. Willet opened up; Jess stepped to the side and went to one knee, adding her own enfilade to Willet’s. Together they took the Astake down.

  “Stay sharp!” Willet advised. “They travel in pairs!”

  Jess turned to look behind as Willet scanned the other direction, straining her already insanely amped senses, watching system scanners, calling up information, when …

  A man walked into the street. About a block away. Just one man, not even in armor, and she recognized him at once.

  “Kang,” she said, barely loud enough to hear. Cocky, sneering like before, walking solo down the street. Slowly, with deadly purpose. Like an Old West gunslinger and she was his High Noon appointment.

  She swallowed the lump rising in her throat. She’d seen what Zac did to three Astake. And Kang was like Zac.

  Then Willet cursed.

  For a moment Jess didn’t turn; just kept her eyes on the slowly approaching Kang.

  But then something about the tone in Willet’s voice impinged. He wasn’t just responding to her frightened announcement of the arrival of Kang. There was something else.

  Willet had seen something.

  Careful not to lose sight of the approaching threat she turned to see what had his attention and …

  Froze.

  There, in the street beyond, walking toward them from the other end and striding tall was …

  Zac.

  CHAPTER 34: KAZERAI ATTACK!

  Zac! The sight of him nearly made her leap for joy. Zac! But he’d changed. Brief, fleeting euphoria was lost quickly beneath the overwhelming reality of what she saw.

  Zac was back to being one of them.

  No!

  Heading for Willet, ready to pounce, looking every bit the enemy. She zoomed in, on Zac’s face; activated the Skull Boy’s feeds without thinking, desperate. This was not the real Zac, and if he was acting on the side of the bad guys then it was surely a mistake. And as she focused on his handsome, determined visage, looking through the enhanced imagery of the suit’s electronics, into those piercing blue eyes she did indeed see … doubt.

  He wasn’t quite convinced.

  Zac looked hesitant, and as she realized this hope swelled. She raised an arm to signal, to let him know it was her …

  And was impacted solidly from behind.

  Whump! the hit jarred her, knocking her down.

  Kang!

  “Do what you can!” Willet’s voice came to her, echoing in the suit’s helmet as she tumbled—even as she whirled and pushed off, leaping back to her feet to find Kang right behind her, winding up a punch.

  WHAM! the strike sent alarm klaxons buzzing, damage info scrolling urgently across her HUD. The punch knocked her back, denting the armor inward—enough to bang sharply against her side. She winced in pain. It hurt!

  You little son of a … !

  She took a step away to make space and brought the gun around, barrel pointed at him …

  Clang! he knocked it aside. She felt the sting in her arm, fingers instinctively following through and firing a burst. Bullets blistered the building across the street in a spray of superheated frag.

  Before she could try anything else Kang squatted and grabbed her leg. She released the gun with one hand and hammered blows to his back but that did nothing. She had to get him off his feet, which was exactly what he was trying to do to her. Before she could grab him he had her up, off balance and … falling back. In the last instant he heaved with another surge and, instead of falling directly to her back she was instead sent soaring through the air. And as she arced backwards, flailing, trying to twist so she would at least land on her feet, she caught sight of Willet engaged in a flurry of limbs with Zac.

  Zac!

  Clang! she hit the ground, the suit’s dampening systems and her own adrenaline absorbing the shock. At once Kang was leaping, but not before she rolled and had her gun up—aimed right into his face as he charged.

  BRRRRIIIIIIPPP! she unloaded a volley, peppering him with shockwaves that sent him flipping back the way he came, like a rag doll. He landed and rolled as if alive. She marveled that any living thing could survive that. If she didn’t know the strengths of the Kazerai she’d believe him dead for sure.

  But he probably wasn’t.

  “I’m not gonna make it!” Willet yelled, soaring through her field of vision. She saw Zac briefly, stalking Willet’s Skull Boy, and again had the idea he wasn’t giving this his all. Like there was a certain hesitation in his gait.

  “Tell him it’s me!” she yelled. “Tell him it’s Jess!” She twisted and rose to her feet, hoping to get Zac’s attention …

  And was hit by Kang in a flying leap. From out of nowhere, recovered that fast and back after her. His huge velocity caused her to stagger.

  “NO!!” All at once she was furious. She turned and swung an uppercut to his jaw, sending him arcing through the air. Filled with an overwhelming bloodlust she leapt after him, “Die!” calling on her jets and propelling herself high, timing her landing to come down right on top of him.

  Crunch! It worked. A thrill shot through her as she hit feet first on his chest before he could roll away. Yes! she savored the success of the maneuver—the satisfying mass of the armor as it smashed his little bones. She began stomping, as hard as she could, pumping the hydraulic legs like she was on DanceDance Revolution, hyped on Red Bull and going for the number one spot. Her feet were a blur, Kang was a bug, and she was smashing him into the ground.

  But he pushed her aside and she nearly fell.

  “No! ”

  She brought the gun around before he could gain his footing and … unloaded. Not a shot. Not a burst. Everything. A fog of high-speed projectiles, spraying him into oblivion. Vibrations pulsed the Skull Boy armor, the giant cannon spitting bullets like a jackhammer, blurring her vision, knocking him rolling with crushing energy—like squirting dirt off a sidewalk with a hose. She kept on, shredding his clothes, little body flopping before the fury of it, nailing him to a building where she pinned him, bullets bringing down the wall until only a pile of rubble remained and the gun shut off automatically as it finally overheated. The barrel glowed cherry-red and was
hissing white clouds of coolant.

  She was enraged.

  He would pay.

  She threw down the gun and charged. Clang! Clang! Clang! heavy footfalls cracking the asphalt as she ran, hit the pile of rubble and threw it away in chunks, cursing as she went, finding Kang’s dazed form—no sign of damage, no bullet holes, no blood—DIE!—and she was punching him as hard as she could. Right in the head. Over and over. Harder. So hard. Bloodlust clouded her vision and she wailed on him, channeling the entirety of her rage into his destruction. She could tell he was stunned from the withering volley, and for the moment her blows kept him that way but ...

  He lived.

  Seeing this she hit even harder. His head snapped back with each strike, as if it would go flying off at any moment—as it should, by all rights—then he began to grin. Just a little, like a reflex, and with a collapsing wave of defeat she realized she’d never win.

  Kang was invincible.

  But she was not going to quit. All or nothing, she reminded herself, palmed the top of his head with one armored hand and lifted him from the rubble, hanging, skull in her grip like holding a basketball. His legs kicked, twitching, then his eyes focused and he looked right at her. She squeezed. Squeeze! As hard as she could. Expecting his head to pop, expecting blood to flow; anything … Desperately she punched him with the other hand. Like a human speed-bag, holding him out with one, squeezing his head, punching as hard as she could with the other. Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! His body flew back and forth …

  And she almost cried with the futility of it. Hot tears stung her eyes.

  What are these guys made of?!

  She kept hitting him yet …

  He was actually coming to.

  Then she was knocked to the side. Blindsided, dropping Kang altogether. She staggered and turned, fearing what she knew she was about to see …

  Zac.

  And she was done. Mentally, all at once. The tears came like a flood. The frustration, the loss, the sadness, made worse by her weary fatigue … It was too much. She cried as if a switch had been thrown.

  She had no more left.

  Zac drove into her again, hitting her square this time, low, jarring loose the tears, little salty droplets flying around the inside of the helmet as he took her the rest of the way to the ground. The suit cushioned her with its automatic systems but the blow knocked the wind from her. And whether from the utter, crushing sadness, the physical impact, or a combination of everything, suddenly she couldn’t breathe. She gasped for air, staring up at him through the helmet’s feeds. Zac! Wanting so badly to get his attention, not wanting to hurt him. And as she thought this, in that surreal, impossible moment, she realized—as if having somehow forgotten—it was her that was in danger of being hurt.