by Scott Moon
“Roland, is that you? Is this thing working,” a woman’s scratchy radio voice said.
“Laura?”
“Thank God!”
Kin made eye contact with Dog, who checked his navigation system and maps of the underground complex. He nodded and hurried forward.
“We are coming to you, Laura. Dog has your position fixed. Can you give me a sit-rep?”
“A what?”
“Situation report,” Kin said.
“The Rage has Rebecca and the others cornered in a large cavern — I haven’t seen it myself, so I can’t explain it to you — with the Omega and his bodyguards. William was trying to negotiate with the Emperor — Omega, whatever — when that thing caught up to us. We split into two groups. I am with Dwarf, Jojo, and a bunch of other people.”
“Hold on a second. I need to talk to Dog,” Kin said.
“Okay, Kin. Was that a nuclear explosion we felt?”
Kin faced Dog. “Do you know the place she is describing?”
“I know it. Basically, it is where Macy’s Bowels stops and natural tunnels cut deep into the planet. Probably Reaper-made, but no one has ever found one down that far.”
“Okay. We need to get there and make a plan.”
Droon moved into the lead, squatted, and stared down a spiraling ramp large enough to move heavy machinery into the core of the planet. Clingers twitched all over his body. He looked over his shoulder at Kin.
This is the way?
“Dog, will this take us there?”
“Close enough. Once we reach the bottom of this shaft, there is a heightened security area that can’t be breached without the proper access codes,” Dog said. “Or the Rage, I am guessing.”
They moved fast enough to risk falling on the steep, spiraling ramp made for specialized vehicles. Kin talked to Laura when he could, but the radio didn’t always work and she had little additional information on the situation below. The reinforced security doors had been cut to pieces and flung across the broad space. Dust fell from a ceiling so high that all Kin could see was darkness.
“The next room is larger. If Laura is right, that’s where we will find the Rage,” Dog said.
“I can’t raise Rebecca or the others on the radio,” Kin said. “Can you contact anyone on the other side? We need to coordinate our attack.”
Dog shook his head.
Why does Kin-rol-an-da wait?
Kin shrugged. “Kin-rol-an-da doesn’t know.”
Droon moved close to Kin and looked into his eyes. “Try not to die, Kin-rol-an-da.”
“Touching,” Dog said. “How about a goodbye kiss?”
Kin checked his armor, readied his rifle, and faced the last door between him and the Rage. “Let’s get this over with.”
Kin flew through the gap, engaging the back of the Rage before he was all the way into the massive cavern. A distant ceiling twinkled with subterranean minerals like stars. Dog moved to his left and placed a stream of well-aimed bullets into the Rage. Droon leaped forward and struck the Burning One as he turned.
Incandescent claws slashed Droon, opening him from throat to groin. Kin reloaded on the move and concentrated his fire on the knees of the Slomn-Reaper. Dog had the same idea. Kin couldn’t tell if that made the assault more or less effective. It might have been better if they were striking multiple areas of the enraged shapeshifter.
Doors on the other side of the cavern slammed open. Two Mechs charged forward and spread out. Behind Kin, Ceana launched into the air. Curses distracted him when he thought of Rickson. The boy lacked even basic skills with the FSPAA-IIA armor but would be right in the thick of it.
“Shift left!” Rebecca called over the radio.
Kin dragged Droon clear of the hellfire that was about to be unleashed by the two most destructive infantry units on the planet. Streams of heavy weapon munitions lanced into the Rage, who hadn’t expected such a coordinated attack. The monster roared fire and hate, blasting random parts of the cavern as he turned from the barrage.
“Lay it on him!” Kin shouted into his mic. “He can heal faster than we can hurt him, but there is an energy cost. Wear him down!”
Kin moved and fired at the back of the Rage as it rampaged toward Rebecca and Trak. The Mech units moved away from each other and the Rage followed Rebecca with renewed fury.
Ceana circled above, then dove with his sword, driving it into straight down into the neck of the monster. An instant later, fire melted the weapon to slag as the Winger fell back in shock.
Rickson fired wildly but kept his mouth shut on the radio, which was a blessing. Most green troopers cried for their mothers or cursed and boasted once the shooting started.
“Dwarf and Jojo are en route with help,” Dog said.
“They’re too late,” Kin said.
The battle continued until Kin’s armor was limping through smoke and burnt Reaper flesh. From time to time, he saw Droon fighting with one hand and holding his entrails in with the other.
Do not die, Kin-rol-an-da!
The Rage, suddenly close, punched Kin in the faceplate, sending him onto his back ten paces away. Kin rolled onto his feet, barely able see through the stars dancing in his vision,
“What’s the matter? Are you out of fire?”
Everything stopped as the Rage stalked forward. “You don’t know my name.” He sounded both angry and sad.
Kin looked into the shapeshifter’s eyes, wishing he had learned who this creature had been before being permanently transformed into this monster. “Your name is Death.”
The Rage roared with the last of his fire, superheating Kin’s armor but not exceeding the protection it offered. He staggered back, then turned to the door beyond which waited the Omega.
“You should have killed the Omega,” the Rage said. “I am just one monster. He is many.”
Droon leaped on his back, opened his jaws wide, and tried to bite off his head.
Kin staggered forward to help, wondering why he was the only human still fighting. In his peripheral vision, he saw that Dog was down but still moving. Rickson had driven his FSPAA-IIA into a corner and couldn’t get turned around. Rebecca and Trak stomped forward, out of ammunition.
Kin reached behind his back for the hilt of the sword Dax had given him what seemed ages ago. At first he walked, then ran, then sprinted at the tangled confusion of Reaper and Slomn-Reaper.
Kin-rol-an-da! The dream-link words from Droon sounded sad and far away—weak like the last desperate prayer of a dying trooper.
Kin drove the sword through the back of Droon’s neck, into the neck of the Rage, then ran in a circle until both monsters were decapitated.
Standing and looking at the bodies, he wasn’t sure what to do next.
“Kin?” Rebecca said, hovering over him like a robotic mother.
He looked up. “Where is the Omega?”
Rebecca looked around.
“Where is William?” Rickson asked.
CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE
The Omega
BEYOND the door, there was a smaller room — still large compared to any underground cavern Kin had seen excepting only the place beneath Crashdown where he had found a lost Earth Fleet. Shapeshifter guards surrounded the Omega, each in his or her true form with modern armor made to fit them. On another day in another place, the human-lupine features would have fascinated Kin. Tall and graceful, they exhibited the strength of predators contrary to how he had always thought of shapeshifters. For the first time, he realized he had considered them victims and servants of more dominant races.
William stood facing the fierce warriors, apparently at the end of some argument without a resolution.
“Are you okay, William?” Kin asked.
“You killed the Rage,” the Omega said from behind his guards.
Kin was tired, even more exhausted as he shifted his attention from the son of Orlan to the false Mazz Emperor. He knew that he should think before he spoke but didn’t have the patience or the energy
. “You killed your entire race with this crazy scheme.”
Some of the shapeshifters flinched.
“How do you become the Omega?” Kin asked. “Did they vote for you or were you the only madman up for the job?”
“The Omega is the most skilled of us,” the Omega said. “I could be you, Kin Roland. I could be more you than you are. Do you understand?”
“No, and I don’t care. That is just more of your crazy talk.”
William retreated from the front line of the bodyguards and stood by Kin. “I don’t want to be the Omega.”
Kin took off his helmet. “That is the only way we will get past his bodyguards. We don’t have ammunition and we’re all wounded.”
The Omega’s laugh made a scraping sound in the silent room. “You are too young to be the best of us. And you are a human mix breed.”
William approached the first of the guards and stood in silent communion with the man. Tears streaked down the man’s face. William approached the next shapeshifter warrior the same way.
“Kill the half-breed!” the Omega shouted at his guards.
Dog stepped around Kin and threw a hand-axe. The blade tumbled through the air, taking the Omega by surprise, but not his bodyguards. Two of them threw their bodies between the attack and their leader as the weapon missed its mark.
“So close,” Dwarf said from behind Kin. “I bet you couldn’t do that. You’re only a Level IV weapons master.”
“And you’re only a pain in my ass,” Kin said, moving forward to stand beside William. He waited until the guards were once again focused on William as he challenged the Omega’s right to be the Omega.
Stepping past them to stand over the Omega, he hesitated as he saw something curious.
William turned aside the guards too easily. He was being drawn into a trap.
“There are only two shapeshifters in this room,” Kin said. “The Omega trusts no one. These guards are an illusion.”
Dog strode through the crowd of guards, picking up speed as he moved. “That’s rich. You are about to meet your maker, whoever the fuck you are.”
All of the guards became one, the false Emperor, armed with a spear he thrust straight into Dog’s chest. The big man fell. Kin caught him and lowered him to the ground.
“Dog!” Dwarf screamed. For a long moment, it seemed he would charge forward to his own death, but he staggered to his knees and scrambled to his friend. With the efficiency of the ultimate combat veteran, he pulled Dog back with one hand and treated the wound with the other. “Dog, you stupid asshole mother fucker!”
Kin faced the Omega. They circled each other for several moments. “How do you think this will go with just you and me?” Kin asked.
Pale faced and trembling, the Omega tried to retreat.
Kin was on him like a Reaper in Bloodlust.
Kin-rol-an-da!
Kin missed a step, glancing over his shoulder for Droon — knowing his longtime enemy to be deader than any Reaper on the planet but unable to ignore the voice. The words shrieked at him, hissing malevolence.
Screeeee! Kin-rol-an-da!
Kin dropped to the floor as a swarm of black shapes shot above him.
We hate Kin-rol-an-da!
Kin bounced to his feet and quickly sidestepped more of the parasites as they coiled into tubes and launched from Droon’s body. He thought they struck the Omega but couldn’t be sure.
Twisting to look at the Crashdown nightmares as they grappled with air, he laughed crazily.
The Omega wasn’t as invisible as he probably intended.
Kin dove forward, slashing at the knees, then rolling to his feet. He reversed his attack and thrust the blade backward through the Omega’s spine.
Quicker than his mind could follow, the shapeshifter changed into one deadly creature after another.
William ran forward to confront the Omega. Rickson lurched forward in the too powerful FSPAA-IIA and grabbed the boy by both arms, hauling him toward safety.
Kin ripped his sword free, turned, and slashed downward at an angle.
Silence spread through the cavernous room.
“Nice cut,” grunted Dog Rolston.
CHAPTER SIXTY
Sanctuary in Hell
REFUGEES crowded into the staging area Dwarf established. For a complete asshole, he was a good organizer. Kin would never trust him, or like him, or stop calling him Dwarf, but the man did his job. I can trust him to help others, just not me. The bastard has plenty of cause to push me off a cliff.
“How many do we have?” Kin asked as Dog Rolston limped toward the cave opening using a broken rifle as a crutch.
“Each prison bunker holds a thousand men or women. None of them were made to be coed. Once that happened, there were population explosions in the Alpha, Baker, Omega, and Zulu installations. Everyplace else went the other direction. Start fighting over women and it is all downhill from there,” Dog said. After looking right, then left, he leaned near to Kin. “You want me to take one of them off your hands?”
“If I was smart, I would say yes. But since I’m in denial, I will pretend we aren’t having this conversation,” Kin said. The exchange didn’t have the normal energy soldiers shared when harassing each other, because Kin doubted Dog would last much longer. His injuries were hard to catalog and categorize, but at least two shapeshifter warriors had swiped at his guts with wicked talons. The spear in the chest wasn’t the worst insult his body had suffered during the battle for Macy’s Bowels. Only his legendary willpower and radical first aid tricks had kept him going until the end. Antibiotics and binding glue only went so far. Kin thought there was internal damage.
He was also afraid the giant had given up.
“I don’t believe Solaa is dead,” Dog said.
Kin didn’t know what to say. The human survivors of Hellsbreach were smart to assume the worst. Without a body, an enemy like Droon’s mate was best assumed to be alive and plotting revenge. “I felt Droon die when I took off his head. She isn’t as dangerous without her Reaper King.”
Dog held the silence between them for several moments. “Was he in your head?”
“He was in mine, I was in his.”
“What was that like?” Dog stared at the cave opening where Rickson, Rebecca, and two of the Hellsbreach veterans were returning from their reconnaissance of the possible escape route.
“Like dying.”
Dog grunted. “So it was slow and miserable.”
Kin started to speak.
“Shut your mouth, Kin,” Dog said. “We need to decide what to do with the Omega’s stolen ship.”
“That’s easy,” Dwarf said. “We get in and leave this hell hole behind us.”
“I don’t think that is what Kin has in mind,” Dog said.
“Don’t really give a fuck what the great Kin Roland has to say.” Dwarf stared into Kin’s eyes.
“Get these people moving,” Kin said.
“You heard him! Move your ass,” Rebecca shouted over the Mech speaker.
“You wouldn’t be so tough without that machine,” Dwarf said as he retreated.
Dog laughed like it hurt.
The exodus from Macy’s Bowels struggled through unfamiliar passages with the grim determination of people who had lived too long in Hell. Hours passed like a catalogue of eternity.
Then light streaked into the passage before them, promising escape from the subterranean riverbed.
“You know this is never going to work,” Laura said as she leaned close to Kin. “If you had taken Admiral Shield’s amnesty and stayed in the Fleet, you might have maintained a girl in every port.”
Kin watched Rebecca and Rickson searching a cluster of rocks before the rest of the party continued forward.
“I love you, Kin Roland.”
He drew back from the rest of the party, put away his gun, and held Laura’s shoulders. “You know I love you,” he said.
“It wouldn’t kill you to say it.”
“I love you.”<
br />
The silence between them was both companionable and awkward.
Kin sighed. Pain burned through more wounds, old and new, than he could count or wanted to consider. “I could be standing here wishing I told you I loved you before you died. I could be regretting the loss of you and Rebecca.”
Laura laughed, eyes widening in a well-rendered expression of annoyance. “We could be crying because you died. Do you ever think of that? Maybe we live and you are the one who doesn’t make it.”
Kin dropped his head, not wanting her to see his confusion. In all his life, he had never really believed he would go down. There was something in his soul that told him he would be the last man standing, no matter the odds or the scenario.
“In fact,” Laura said, “you could still have an unfortunate accident.”
“We should catch up with the others,” Kin said.
“Don’t get scared.”
“I have to live on the same planet with the two women most likely to kill me in my sleep, and you tell me not to be scared?”
Rickson shouted, “Kin! You need to see this!”
Kin laughed when he saw what had to be a final gift from Clavender.
Rickson shook his head. “We find a garden more beautiful than the legend of Old Earth and you laugh.”
“He’s crazy!” Rebecca loomed over the valley oasis in her Mech. Waterfalls larger and more diverse than Maiden’s Keep decorated the far side of the verdant scene. Birds flew from treetops. Grazing animals wandered across a meadow; none of them seemed to be capable of breathing fire or drinking poison or leaping between worlds to destroy the minds of their enemies.
Laura walked beyond the safety of the cavern opening to stand above the valley, one foot on the edge of the rock outcropping. She had one hand on her pistol and spared only a glance at Kin and Rebecca before letting a gentle breeze caress her hair back from her neck.
Dog limped into the light and glared at the cornucopia of wonder. “Nothing survives ten years on Hellsbreach,” Dog Rolston said.
“Shut your fucking mouth. We lived here all this time,” Dwarf said. He moved to Laura’s side, causing her to sneer and step away from him. “You’re just pissed that this fucking place was here and we were out there living in Reaper fun-land.”