REV: Requiem: an epic military sci-fi novel (REV Warriors Part 2 Book 3)

by T. R. Harris

  “What’s your plan?”

  Zac’s heart was racing, and the Rev was strong. He was activated and ready for anything. Having his friends step through the door was the last—the very last—thing he ever expected.

  The Seken face grinned. “Plan? Well, now that’s another issue. We can try parading you out of here in our custody, but I don’t think we’ll get too far with Kallen around.”

  The tallest of the Humans/Seken came forward. “We need to get him out of the room. I think your plan will be good enough to get us moving.”

  Zac frowned. The language was English, and a voice he recognized.

  “David Cross?”

  “In the flesh, Zac.”

  Zac was about to jump to his feet, but now he sagged back in the chair. “I can’t believe it. Of all people—”

  “Yeah, I love you, too.”

  “How did you get here?”

  “We appropriated a Seken mothership for the cruise,” Angus said. “It was quite a pleasant journey, even if the food was lacking in quality.”

  “Where’s the ship now?”

  “We left it in orbit,” said the clipped British accent of Angus Price. “But don’t worry about that. We have another way to get out of here. And speaking of that, I may have an idea as to how we can get out of this building—or whatever you call it.” He was at the window, looking down at how the bubble was embedded in the arch. “There are domes all the way down, in fact, a lot more the closer it is to the ground. If we can get through this window, I think we could slide down, using the bubbles like steppingstones.”

  Cross was at the window, as well. “That has to be five hundred feet down. What if we slide off?”

  “Then I guess we die, doc.” Angus’s Seken face grinned. “But don’t worry about that either. You’ve lived long enough already. Now, I just may have a tool with me that can cut through this glass.”

  He reached into a Seken satchel he carried and pulled out a small arc-burner. He’d brought it in case they needed to cut cell bars or through door locks. It should work on tempered glass.

  The other REV female—Zac hadn’t been introduced—looked along the structure’s sweeping arc. “It could work. We just have to control the descent. Go ahead, Mr. Price.”

  The others nodded, and a moment later, Angus lit the small burner, producing an intense blue-white light at the tip.

  He began cutting at the window’s base and then came up about four feet before swinging across and back down again. When he was done, he stepped back and kicked out the panel.

  There was an immediate rush of air out of the room along with a pronounced whistling. The wind outside was swift and brisk, and the pressure changed slightly to equal that of the outside.

  “Since it was your idea, you go first,” said David Cross.

  “I’m game. And doc, don’t forget that you’re a REV. I know you have been trying to hide that fact for like, well, forever, but this is the time to have faith in your abilities. Let’s go.”

  “What about the collar,” Zac asked suddenly. “This thing is a bitch. And they can track me using it.”

  The other female Alpha REV came up to Zac and grasped the collar in both hands. “I’m Monica, by the way. Let me help you with that.” She strained as she pulled, but a moment later, the locking clasp snapped, and the collar separated.

  Zac looked into her dark eyes, knowing they were contact lenses made to look like Seken. But there was something familiar about them.

  “Eh, thanks,” he said. Even he couldn’t break a security collar; he’d tried. Now, he began to think this woman may be something other than an Alpha. Having Cross here confirmed it.

  She grinned. “I’ll look out for you. Don’t worry.”

  Zac raised his eyebrows. She was going to look out for him? That was a first.

  But now Angus was out the window and onto the windswept spongy surface of the arch. “This should help with our footing,” he yelled through the wind and whistling through the window. “It will keep us from slipping too much.”

  One by one, the team made it out the window.

  For Zac, it was a completely different sensation than looking through the window. The sky was vast above them, and the panoramic view of the city was unnerving. But he didn’t have time to sightsee. Angus was already leading them toward the center of the large arch, where there was more room on each side should any of them lose their footing and begin sliding. But he was right; the surface material was slightly spongy. That would help.

  Each member grabbed the belt of the one in front of him or her. The Seken robes had ties around the waist, and Zac had a traditional belt. Monica was behind him, holding on and bringing up the rear.

  Now, the tricky part began. Angus was moving down the arch where the slope increased. At first, it wasn’t bad since they were near the top. It would get progressively more difficult the lower they went until the angle was almost vertical.

  They came to the first of several bubble offices jutting out of the arch. This one, they skirted around, looking through the all-encompassing window. Fortunately, it was late night, and no one was in the office. They continued, moving from bubble to bubble, reaching out their hands to slow the ever-constant pull of gravity on their bodies. It was working. But for how long was anyone’s guess.

  Chapter 23

  Kallen found the photo file of the Seken and began scanning the images. There were a lot of them, mostly candid; the Seken didn’t pose for photos. He focused on the eyes, seeing a pattern develop.

  Then he checked another file, one having to do with physiology. Double flaps; it was right there.

  Yes, the female he spoke with had the traditional black orbs, but he didn’t see the second transparent flap that would periodically blink to moisturize the eye. Was there no need to do so? Or was it something else? Anything having to do with Zac Murphy had to be looked at with caution. The arrival of the Seken at this particular moment raised questions. And the attitude of the leader seemed intentional… personal. As if she knew him.

  Could it be possible? There was one way to find out.

  He jumped from the chair and turned to the other two Antaere.

  “Bring weapons, then come with me.”

  “We are not allowed weapons in the building,” one of them pointed out.

  “I know you have them. Hide them on your person. Let’s go.”

  The trio raced out of the office and down two short corridors to the holding room. The guard was still outside the door.

  “Are they still in there?” Kallen asked.

  “Yes. But you cannot—”

  Kallen opened the door and rushed inside. The door had not been locked after the Seken entered.

  Cold night air filled the room, the source coming from the panel cut out of the glass. The room was empty.

  The guard had followed Kallen inside; he now had a communicator to his mouth, reporting the escape.

  “Tell them they are not Seken, but Humans in disguise,” Kallen said to the guard, who nodded and relayed the information.

  He then went to the window and looked out. Although dozens of spotlights lighted the arch, he saw no movement outside. Did they have an air vehicle carry them away? That would not be possible. As such a tall and vital structure, there were warning systems in place to protect against crashes or other incursions. They must be outside, moving down the arch, Kallen concluded. He had to reach the bottom before they did.

  The going was getting harder, but also faster. The team had let go of each other and were now racing down the slope from one dome to another, using the protrusions to stop their forward momentum. At one point, Angus anchored a Human arm chain to lower Zac down to the next bubble, where he then caught the others as they dropped. Fortunately, it was late night in Sanfor, so most of the offices were empty.

  And then Cross slipped.

  He slid rapidly down the side, crashing into a window and cracking it. But then he slid off the other side and fell again, this t
ime smashing through the glass top before bouncing on a hard wooden floor.

  The team was at the dome a moment later, looking through the hole in the glass.

  “Are you okay?” Monica called down.

  Cross was getting to his feet. “I’m okay. Nothing seems to be broken, as far as I can tell. Everything is working fine.”

  “I’m coming down,” said Angus as he jumped through the hole. The drop was about twenty feet, and he landed easily on his feet, maintaining balance as if he just stepped off a single step. He moved past Cross and began cutting another hole in the glass.

  This bubble was protruding out the side of a near-vertical wall, with glass taking up half of the sphere, the upper half. Cutting a hole in the window would leave them twelve feet out from the surface of the arch and staring down at the ground about a hundred feet below.

  “We can’t make it,” Cross stated.

  Angus sat down with his back against the glass. “No, we can’t.” Then he swung back around and lay on the floor, his head out the hole he just cut. “But we could swing down to the next bubble.”

  “What do you mean swing?”

  “Like this.”

  Angus was out the window feet first and holding onto the edge of the window with his hands. The curvature of the bubble allowed him to swing back and forth. As his feet swung in under the dome, he let go, flipping once before crashing into the top of the dome below. He landed hard, but not too hard for a REV. He climbed to his feet and motioned for Cross to join him.

  Looking out the hole in the window, Cross shook his head vehemently.

  “C’mon, you pussy. It’s fun. Either that or we’ll leave you there.”

  The other team members had made it down past the bubble Cross was in and were now standing next to Angus.

  “We will catch you?” said the young man whose name Zac had heard was Anton.

  Reluctantly, Cross disappeared back through the window and then a few moments later, he reappeared, coming out feet first. He got the swing of the swing quickly and then had the courage to let go at the right time. As promised, the team caught him.

  Zac looked down at the ground below, now awash in a myriad of darting flashlight beams and flashing globes of various colors. People were scrambling around, weapons drawn.

  “Looks like we’ve been found out,” Zac said for the second time in one night. This time he didn’t have a ready answer for how to get away.

  Angus took out one of the Seken energy weapons. “Any of you see how these things work? How good are they?”

  “They’re okay,” Ashley said. “But nothing to write home about. They’ll kill Azloreans, and they have about twenty shots per power pack.”

  “That’s not too bad,” Angus said.

  Ashley looked over the side of the dome. “Yeah, but there are about two hundred people out there waiting for us.”

  “We have to go back inside,” Zac stated. “There’s a subway system under the building.”

  “Now you tell us,” said Angus.

  ‘Hey, you were the one so quick to jump outside. C’mon, get out your handy cutter. Everyone is expecting us to be outside. We may get a jump on them from inside the building.”

  Five minutes later, Zac poked his head out of the office door and surveyed the empty corridor outside. Most of the guards were outside, waiting for them to slide down the side of the building. Zac had only a vague idea where to go. He’d been brought in this way earlier in the evening, and along the way, he half noticed the signs at the various hallway intersection. But he did know some had those cockeyed arrows pointing down.

  “Follow me. And David, give me your weapon.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m better with it than you are.”

  Cross didn’t argue; he handed Zac the gun.

  “Okay, here we go. Shoot anything that isn’t us.”

  They set off down the corridor, heading deeper into what was one of the arch’s wide bases. An Azlorean appeared out of a doorway and was immediately gunned down. Zac considered the energy weapon. Tight, compact and no recoil. It didn’t have the penetrating power of an Azlorean beam weapon, but what did? The Seken gun would do in a pinch.

  After about a hundred yards, Zac found one of the downward arrows and turned left, taking a series of stairways down. There were side elevators, but he didn’t want to get trapped inside a metal box if he could avoid it. Besides, with REV leaping ability, the team made it down to the landing platform for the subway faster than an elevator could have carried them.

  There were a few more natives down here, which was their bad luck. The Humans showed no mercy.

  Zac bounded down into the tunnel and turned toward the red marker. He didn’t know where he was or how many rail lines served the building. And this wasn’t the same platform he’d been on before. Or was it? Damn, they all looked alike.

  He lead the team into the darkness, lit only by the occasional emergency light on the ceiling. He came to a side door, much like the one where he’d met the young Azlorean relative of Darion’s. He slammed a shoulder into it, and it swung open. At the same time, he turned the knob. It was unlocked.

  Ashley was behind him, watching. She shook her head.

  Now Zac ran on instinct, moving down corridors away from the building, or so he hoped.

  “Do you know where you’re going?” Angus asked.

  “Haven’t got a clue,” Zac answered. “But you’re welcome to take point if you want.”

  “That’s okay. If we go the wrong way, I want to be able to blame you for it.”

  They ran at REV speed, covering a mile of underground tunnels in about three minutes. Eventually, they reached one of the huge warehouses where the building’s supplies were brought in. Through a formerly-locked door at the side of a tall roll-aside panel, they made it outside.

  “Where are we?” Cross asked.

  “Amber, do you have our signal?” Ashley asked through her built-in comm.

  “I have your position. Is Zac with you?”

  “Yes, we got him.”

  “You are on the other side of the security building from the park.”

  “Is there another LZ on this side?”

  “Affirmative. A smaller park about two miles due east.”

  “Which way is east?”

  “Away from the building.”

  In unison, the team looked over their shoulders at the towering edifice of the security arch. It was impressive, splashed with light and know that they had climbed down most of it on the outside.

  “Roger that, Amber. We’re heading out—”

  Vehicles screeched to stops only feet from where they stood, with half a dozen Azloreans leaping from them, weapons drawn. Monica and Anton were in the air a split second later, soaring at least twenty feet up before landing on the roofs of the police cars. With blinding speed, they blasted away with the Seken handguns, killing the officers without a single miss. Zac watched the attack in awe. Yes, definitely more than Alphas, he thought. But what?

  More sirens were heard, and lights flashed against the side of nearby buildings. The word was out; everyone knew where they were by now.

  “Get ready, Amber!” Ashley yelled. “We’re on our way.”

  The team set off again, with Anton and Monica leading the way. It wasn’t that that was how Zac wanted it; it was just that he couldn’t stay up with the two young REVs. He, Ashley, Angus, and Cross brought up the rear.

  Then as the park came into view, a military vehicle slid in front of them and the back door open, spilling out even more troops.

  Anton and Monica didn’t miss a beat. They plowed into the natives, swinging with bare fists faster than the eye could see. Bodies were mowed down like grass and then tossed aside. Several shots were fired, not by the special beam weapons but by conventional energy guns. The REVs were hit, but it didn’t slow them down. They barreled through the bolts of light to take out the operators.

  Then the rest of the team caught up, but by
then, there was no one left to fight.

  The ground in the park suddenly began to shake and rumble, with some of it breaking loose and flying into the sky. Then a dark object appeared from above, coming down in a rain of landing jets.

  The REVs stood out of the blast zone until the Dart had settled to the ground. But then they were off, running through the hot exhaust and into an open side hatch. Zac lost his balance and slammed against a bulkhead as the buzz ship raced for the sky even before the outer hatch was closed. The angle was so steep that all the REVs could do was hold onto something to keep from ending up in a pile against a rear wall.

  Then the internal gravity kicked in, along with the compensators. Zac climbed to his feet and rushed to the cockpit. He had to congratulate the pilot. That was some fancy flying.

  But there was no one on the bridge.

  “Welcome, General Murphy,” said a familiar—and sexy—female voice through the intercom.

  “Amber! Is that you?”

  “Yes, sir. At your service.”

  “Damn, they called in all the big guns for this one,” Zac said.

  The others now crowded in.

  “I’m setting a course for beyond the system. I’ve initiated the first jump sequence. Calculating the next.”

  “What is she doing?” Zac asked.

  “We’ve learned how to do short-range gravity jumps, like the Azlorean fighters,” said Monica. “We also have stealth technology, and better than the Azloreans. We’ll be able to get away—”

  “No, stop!” Zac cried out. “Take us back, back to the mothership.”

  “Why?” Angus asked. “That’s where they’ll expect us to go. Besides, we’d be sitting ducks up there.”

  “Just do it. I have an idea…”

  Chapter 24

  Kallen Zaphin was livid. Not only had Zac Murphy escaped from the holding room, but apparently he’d also made it off the planet. And it was all because of the Humans disguised as Seken.

  “The Humans control the ship,” he was telling Torin Nassmar. “It’s the only Seken ship in orbit. It has to be them.”