by C. G. Hatton
“We don’t know why they won’t come into the tunnels,” she said. “We think they just don’t like the small spaces. But they don’t need to. They can just wait us out. We’re surrounded. We’re not sure how we’re going to get you out of here.”
There was something else she wasn’t saying and he couldn’t figure out what, couldn’t hear clearly enough beyond her worry to see it.
“What’s wrong?” he muttered.
She squeezed his shoulder. “Don’t worry about it.”
The way she said it made his breath catch in his chest. “What…?”
He was still struggling to move but he managed to push up onto one elbow, pain flaring then in his side and Duncan protesting and pushing him back down. He gave in, turning his head to the side to look across the tight space of the underground tunnel.
Hil was sitting with Spacey, showing her how to strip a weapon, talking to her softly. She caught his eye as he watched and gave him a small smile. It was difficult not to think that he’d made a mistake going to get her, pulling her and the rest of the kids right into the middle of all this crap.
“If you hadn’t,” Duncan said, “they’d be dead.”
LC felt a couple of shots hit his neck. Go-juice. That pretty much did nothing anymore. He needed Sienna but he couldn’t sense her anywhere near. He could hardly keep his eyes open.
“There was a shaman,” he mumbled. “Did you see it?”
“Yeah. Keep still.”
He heard Duncan shout across to Hilyer that they needed a medic. Not Sienna and injectors. Not first aid kits or patches. A medic.
Needing a medic in the field was bad. Every time he’d ever needed a medic in the field, it had been bad.
“It is bad,” the big man said. “This isn’t just poison.”
‘What…?’ He couldn’t sit up to look but he saw it in Sean’s mind. Black mottled tendrils were spreading out from beneath the blood-soaked dressing Duncan was holding in place, like a lightning strike flashing across his skin, jagged lines extending out in all directions, around his stomach, up to his chest, creeping down past his waistband.
Shit.
Duncan shouted again, swearing, something about a goddamned medevac being no good. “No,” he yelled, “we need him up and running if we’re gonna get out of here alive. For fuck’s sake, just get a medic in here.”
LC tried to move. ‘What…?’ Christ, he couldn’t think straight.
Duncan pushed down and the pain spiked, sky high, so bad he screamed, kicked out and blacked out again as Duncan slugged him across the jaw.
Chapter 11
“This changes everything.”
Sebastian regarded the Man. “You’ve seen this before.” It wasn’t a question, he could feel it, see it in the Man’s mind.
“A blight.”
The Man was tempering his reaction, Sebastian could sense it, dampening the memories of the last race the Bhenykhn had destroyed with a blight, a sweeping, devastating disease that had annihilated all life in an entire galaxy, self-destructive, killing millions of Bhenykhn themselves and wiping out any chance of colonisation or even utilisation of resources.
Sebastian leaned back against the ancillary console. “I highly doubt they would do that here,” he muttered. “The Bhenykhn are enjoying the delights of this galaxy far too much. No, this is a targeted contagion. Nasty. But targeted against our human-alien hybrid virus.”
“Did Luka survive it?”
“That child has way more than nine lives. What do you think?”
•
Cold sharp stings hit his neck, hands pulling at his arms.
“Up we get, Felix. C’mon, kid. Sleep time’s over. We’re getting outta here.”
It was weird hearing them call him by his guild call sign, almost as if none of this was happening and it was a tab, just a normal tab. He clung onto that, his head spinning as they got him upright, stomach muscles complaining. He was wiped out. It wasn’t just that his side was sore, he felt stiff in every muscle and joint, a breathless catch in his chest as he stood up. The virus seemed sluggish, like it was just waking up and realising what a state he was in.
He felt himself swaying, Sean on one side and the medic on the other steadying him. The others were hustling. He could feel the tension as they got ready to move. Spacey was scared, watching him, sticking close to Hilyer. All of them waiting for him to get his ass into gear.
“It was some kind of bio-round they shot you with,” the medic said, close to his ear, too loud, the words resounding around his head. “Whatever it is, it seems to have nullified the healing properties of the virus.”
Like the neurotoxin they’d given him in the prison on Aston. If it was developed from Bhenykhn DNA then no wonder the virus was struggling.
Sean was holding his arm. Rubbing her hand across his back. “They got it out,” she said, calming, reassuring. “They got the round out. You’re going to be fine.”
The medic threw her a glance as if he didn’t agree but wasn’t going to say it.
Sienna appeared in front of them. She reached a hand to his cheek, gentle, to steady him, looking intensely into his eyes. “A Bhenykhn command ship just moved into orbit. Do you understand?”
A vague nod.
“We have one chance to get out of here,” she said. “We need you on your feet and we need you to connect with that command ship and do your stuff. You understand?”
He blinked. Connect with it and find NG. He could do that.
“This…” She held up an injector in her other hand, thin blue stripe flashing in the candlelight. “This isn’t krakn. I’m not gonna give it to you unless you want it.”
He almost flinched when she said it, knowing Sean was there, feeling her disapproval. And knowing everyone was watching. It was a shot of insanity Sienna was offering, he read that in her thoughts. Dark matter the grunts called it. Even with their normally cavalier approach to stuff like go-juice and krakn, they baulked at insanity. It created the berserkers of legend, turned men into monsters but the side effects were hideous. He could feel her reluctance to give it to him. She’d never ever offered him that before.
He didn’t hesitate.
He nodded.
She reached and pressed it gently against his neck.
“You sure?”
Another nod.
He was shivering.
The ampoule pulsed against his skin. The insanity flooded into his bloodstream.
It felt like his soul had spontaneously ignited. Like his heart could punch out of his chest. He felt belligerent. Obnoxiously up for a fight. He almost laughed.
“I’m good,” he insisted, shrugging them off, fighting the drug to maintain control.
Hil was yelling them to go. And he wanted to go. Straight at them.
He must have asked where his rifle was. Someone pushed it into his hands and someone else pushed the helmet back onto his head.
Then they were moving. Through the tunnels to the bottom of a stairwell.
Hilyer was on point. He gestured them to wait, talking quietly to Sienna. He was speaking to the AIs. Relaying back what they wanted. The MOV was calling the shots. Another damned AI.
LC watched, eyes narrow. He hated what Hil had become, hated the AIs, hated all of them and everything they’d ever done to him. He could almost feel the scrutiny of the Thundercloud in orbit, crawling down the back of his neck. He’d never trusted them. Hated everything about…
Duncan’s hand landed heavy on his shoulder and the big man spoke quietly, intensely into his ear. “If you’re going to use this shit, use it to fight the damned Bhenykhn. Not us.”
LC took a deep controlled breath, feeling the switch flick back, the heat of the insanity redirect.
Refocusing a lens.
He nodded, slowly.
“Good,” Duncan whispered as Hil gestured them to move. “Now let’s get the hell out of here. You know what you have to do?”
They emerged into a dark street. LC felt the pr
esence of the hive intensified, as if they were taunting him, provoking him to confront them. He wanted to call them out. Run out there and throw down a challenge to their biggest champion and take it on, hand to hand. Right there in the street.
Except when they hit the warm air of the Hanover night, the Bhenykhn dropped whatever the hell it was they had jamming comms and it was all LC could do to flinch away from the onslaught of emotion, from everyone close by, more flooding in from crew on every ship in orbit, as everyone’s Sensons linked. There was an instant connection of raw thoughts before everyone realised what they were sending, then a calculated collective pause as they dealt with everything that was going on.
LC shut it out. Hard and fast.
The Bhenykhn hive was revelling in it. Feeding on the fear, amplified by the sudden reconnection, mass hysteria spreading.
Sienna grabbed his arm and pulled him close. They had gunships and drop ships incoming. Fast. He could see it in her mind, feel her processing the intel she was getting direct now she had comms. He also read that she had another vial of insanity in her pocket.
He looked up. Sean was watching him. LC averted his eyes, checking the rifle. He wished she wasn’t there.
Hil glanced back, giving them a nod.
There was a roar from above. Numerous shafts of sheer white light speared down through the atmosphere, simultaneous detonations all around as the Thundercloud took out multiple targets around them. Gunships swept overhead and the mass of a drop ship descended dangerously close.
Sienna tugged on his sleeve and yelled, “Straight to the drop ship, you hear me? Don’t try anything until we get into orbit.”
LC glanced at Spacey. Across to Sean. And nodded. Hyperfocused to a level he’d never been before. He could sense every life sign in the city, each incoming pilot, every individual Bhenykhn warrior moving in.
He breathed. And moved.
The sound of gunfire was deafening. The Bhenykhn wanted him alive. He could feel it. They were pouring troops into the hunt. The fire from the Thundercloud was relentless, taking out target after target, flashes of energy lighting up the sky followed by explosions resounding around the city. It felt hideously like the night the guild had come in for them at the FOB. Only then they’d been fighting their way through trees, not streets. And he hadn’t been able to walk never mind run.
But that had only been a forward operating base. Not a full on invasion fleet.
He ran, rifle up, stopping to cover Sean as she ran past with Spacey in tow, firing into a side street that was teeming with huge hulking figures. The Bennies weren’t rushing them, they were herding them, trying to corner them, cut them off from the ship that was banking round furiously with a jet of exhaust that was burning into the buildings, landing hard and fast, to retrieve them.
He targeted each alien and sent out short, sharp blasts of energy to take out the shield pods. Clinical. Turning, and firing the rifle into the opposite alleyway, moving as Duncan nudged him, only pausing to blast more energy pods on the approaching aliens.
That pissed them off even more.
He felt the anger of the hive as a roar, a challenge.
They knew it was him. And they knew what he was doing.
He turned and did it again, reaching further.
Hilyer ran past, grabbing his arm and pulling him along.
The mass of the drop ship hit the ground with a bang that resounded through the tarmac under his boots, landing gear crushed, sparks flying as the ramp hit the road.
Guild Security ran out to meet them, guns up, shepherding the others inside. LC was running. He saw Sean stop at the ramp, turning to look for him, talking to Sienna through the Senson. He glanced backwards. Sienna and some of the grunts were coming up behind him. They were running, firing at massive figures that were emerging from a side street, ducking as a gunship swooped low, covering them, slewing round.
They were going to get cut off.
LC slowed, turning, walking backwards, bringing his rifle up to bear on the same targets. He took out their energy pods, concentrated his fire on the grey cloak, same as Sienna was doing. She was yelling him to get in the drop ship, screaming, swearing at him.
He started walking towards them, focusing more energy and blasting the bastards direct into their brains. He felt like he was on fire, arms burning with the weight of the rifle and the constant twitching pull of his finger on the trigger, awareness so damned sharp it felt like the universe was spinning in slow motion around him.
The Bennies fell.
There were more behind them, pushing past the bodies, one throwing an enormous curved blade, the alien metal dancing with flashes of orange from the flames of the burning buildings.
LC threw the rifle aside as it clicked empty and sprinted, bowling into Sienna and twisting her aside. They rolled, the razor sharp metal edge skimming past the back of his neck, snagging the arm of his jacket, other blades ricocheting away as he blasted them. He missed one and one of the grunts dropped. LC curled up against the second-hand pain as the blade he’d failed to deflect bit deep into the guy’s chest, tearing into his heart, the punch of void deep, echoed through Sienna as she yelled.
He knelt there, shielding her, lifting a shot of insanity from her pocket, heart pounding. And as someone else screamed, the burning rage he’d been barely controlling finally consumed him.
He raised his eyes, pinpointed each and every Bhenykhn and blasted them. Simultaneous bolts of insanity-fuelled energy into their brains.
The rest was a blur. He could hardly see, burned out, the pounding behind his eyeballs overwhelming. Sienna dragged him into a stumble towards the ship, Sean meeting them and pulling him forward and up the ramp. It closed behind them before they got into seats, the sudden acceleration almost sending them tumbling. Someone shoved him, pulled a harness tight over his chest and popped him on the cheek.
“Felix Amber, alive and secure,” he heard someone say.
An impact rocked the ship, alarms blaring.
LC curled up, bracing his legs and riding the g-forces as the pilot pushed every safety parameter to get them out of there. Combat drops were vicious. Evac lifts were worse. This was getting to be a habit.
A klaxon started screaming.
“Hold on tight, people,” another voice said calmly. “This is not gonna be fun.”
They rolled, took a hit that rocked them sideways and accelerated hard.
The pressure of the hive in his mind was immense. This was what he’d wanted. Another chance to find NG.
He closed his eyes, shot the insanity into his wrist, and connected. He reached out, reckless, looking for NG and punching through layer after layer, deeper and deeper. He felt the hive react and froze. A dense black wave hit hard. Pain spiked, darkness consuming so fast he couldn’t move, couldn’t think. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t even cry out.
The pain increased.
He pushed back. He wanted to know where NG was and once he knew, he would go there, and he would get NG and they would turn this war, and annihilate every damned Bhenykhn fleet and foot soldier in the entire galaxy.
He let them hear that and felt their response as a ripple.
Not uncertainty.
More a rising to the challenge.
And he knew he’d made a mistake.
The entire hive turned on him. Pinned him. Held him there, as they were holding NG. In that dark place he was so close to finding.
And they squeezed.
Laughing.
Chapter 12
“He was foolish to taunt the hive,” Sebastian said.
The Man was tracing his long fingers over the inert console. “You should know.” He looked up. “Desperation drives men to foolish ends. Luka has always been foolhardy, reckless. That naïve bravado is one of his strengths.”
“Bravado is one thing, suicidal is just stupid.”
“I assume you are managing to hide from the hive,” the Man said. “That must be taking some doing.”
Sebastian smirked. “I have my means.” He wasn’t going to give away all his secrets.
“Do the Bhenykhn even know you exist?”
He shrugged. Had they torn that piece of information from Nikolai he was sure they would have come after him. Nikolai was not invincible but he was tough and would never give him up willingly, despite all that had happened between them.
•
LC raised a shaky hand to wipe his nose, his fingers coming away red. His ears were ringing, heart pounding, headache pulsing in short agonising bursts.
The ship was drifting, he realised. No hive. No other ships he could sense. Just their drop ship hooked onto the MOV, comms quiet, hushed whispers, both ships dark, engines off, powered down.
“Where are we?” he muttered.
“Jump point,” Sienna said softly from next to him. “You connected with the hive,” she murmured into his ear. “You get anything?”
He sucked in a shaky breath. “No. I was really close. If we hadn’t jumped…”
Hal Duncan sent loud and clear straight into his mind, ‘Buddy, if we hadn’t jumped, you’d be dead.’
He didn’t argue, wiping the blood off his hand onto his pants leg. He reached out for Spacey and Sean, both present and alive, and squinted to look around for Hilyer, there, all accounted for.
Sienna touched his arm and he couldn’t help but flinch, sparks flaring and an involuntary shiver shuddering down his back. Coming down off the insanity. The krakn used to be that bad. Not any more. Was that a bad thing? His side was aching, pulling with every small movement. He could feel everyone looking at him. Could feel that his breathing was erratic. Heart rate skipping and fluttering.
Someone called for a medic and he faded out for a moment, not resisting as they eased him out of his jacket.
“Why are we not moving?” he breathed, throat beyond dry.
A sting hit the crook of his other elbow, someone pressing tape there to keep an IV line in place.
“We’re just taking it easy for a little while,” the medic said. “You relax, okay? I need to check that wound.”