True Traitor (First Wave Book 7)

by Mikayla Lane

  “You think we can get around them?” Mikey asked after a few minutes.

  Sarge stopped suddenly and turned to Mikey. “Boy, I don’t know about you but I think I can make it past Deputy Dawg and a bunch of ROTC kids. If you think you can’t handle it, head back to the Humvee and I’ll meet ya back there later,” Sarge said, eyeing the kid up and down.

  Mikey felt like an idiot and just nodded. “Yeah, I meant that the other guys I saw earlier, might still be around . . .,” Mikey said and let his voice trail off when Sarge turned back around and headed off again.

  Mikey snorted and headed after the man. Hell, it wasn’t like he had anything better to do for the next few weeks, killing some time on a hike wasn’t going to kill him. And he definitely wasn’t afraid of some ROTC kids and a bored deputy.

  The others guys he’d seen earlier, now they were a different story. Everything about that group screamed highly trained and heavily geared. They weren’t screwing around and they were definitely prepared for anything. Overkill came to mind the moment he’d seen them. You didn’t need that kind of hardware to prevent people from going into a dangerous area. Most people weren’t that stupid and followed the rules of order with being threatened with an AR-15.

  Mikey’s instincts tingled through his veins, an early warning he’d always had, that told him he was getting ready to head into a shit storm. He picked up a small rock and threw it at Sarge to get his attention.

  When Sarge turned around, his expression curious, Mikey signaled him to get down. Without a thought, Sarge dropped to the ground at the same time that Mikey did, both men looking around them and listening for what had set off Mikey’s senses.

  After a few minutes, Sarge shook his head in irritation and stood at the same time that both men felt a massive wave of heat and wind, like rotor downdraft. Both looked above them at the churning dust above them and Mikey immediately saw the large craft moving slowly, no more than 20 feet above them.

  Shielding his eyes with his arms he looked at Sarge and knew immediately that the man couldn’t see the ship. He threw handfuls of small rocks at him until Sarge looked over at him with wide eyes.

  Moving slowly to make sure Sarge could see what he was doing, Mikey grabbed two handfuls of rocks and threw them at the ship. He watched Sarge’s face as the rocks bounced off what Sarge saw as thin air, but Mikey knew was the bottom of an aircraft that he couldn’t identify to save his life.

  Sarge’s eyes grew larger than Mikey thought possible and he let off a handful of rocks of his own, shocked that they bounced off thin air back to him. He was getting ready to throw another handful when Mikey hit him with another rock and shook his head, using his hands to signal that the craft had moved too far away.

  Sarge sat there for a moment, the rocks in his hand, shaking his head at what had just happened. Mikey stayed low and scurried over to Sarge, sitting down beside him.

  “You can see the damn things can’t you?” Sarge asked, looking around the skies above them.

  Mikey nodded.

  “Yeah, it helped to tip me off earlier,” he admitted, his heart racing and his blood pumping like crazy through his veins.

  “What the fuck is that, boy?” Sarge asked, trying to figure out if he was having a heart attack or adrenaline rush.

  Mikey chuckled softly and shook his head. “Damn Sarge, I wish like hell I knew,” he said, scanning the skies for more aircraft.

  Sarge lightly threw a rock at him. “Well, tell me what it looks like you idiot,” he said in frustration and excitement.

  Mikey grinned. “It looks like a UFO,” he said.

  Sarge just stared at the kid for a minute, his mind trying to process what the kid had said and what he’d seen and experienced with his own eyes.

  “Boy, do you think it could be one of ours?” he asked.

  Mikey’s mind and senses seemed to rebel at the thought and he knew right away it wasn’t one of theirs.

  “No, I don’t think it’s one of ours,” he said, wondering if Sarge would believe him, even after what he’d just witnessed.

  Sarge nodded his head. “You see any more of them?”

  “No, but that one went that way,” Mikey said pointing towards the direction the craft went.

  Sarge chuckled lightly. “You’re pretty handy, boy. Let’s go find us a UFO,” he said, his heart pumping with more adrenaline and excitement than he’d felt in years.

  Mikey nodded and stood, holding his hand out to Sarge and pulling him to his feet. They straightened their packs then Mikey led the way towards where the ship had gone. Back towards the roadblock and Burnt Tree Ridge.

  *****

  Grai paced behind Slate at the comm center, listening to all the reports that were rolling in, when the one he dreaded the most came through.

  “We got military choppers heading our way! ETA five minutes!” Slate called out.

  Grai opened his comm to Koda.

  “Be careful brother, the military will be here in five with choppers. I’m assuming it’ll be their standard Blackhawks and they’ll have heavy ammo. These guys know about our people and they’re looking for a new captive, so keep your eyes and ears open,” Grai warned.

  Koda chuckled.

  “We can handle a few helicopters, brother. Stop fretting, it’s embarrassing,” he teased.

  Grai sighed. “I am not trying to embarrass you,” he said.

  Koda laughed.

  “I was talking about you, not me. My new niece must be very special if she has turned you into a worrier,” Koda said teasingly.

  Grai shook his head and grinned as everyone chuckled at their brotherly banter. “Yeah, that’s me. Hurry up and get back so I can braid your hair while you hold her,” Grai said to stunned barks of laughter around him.

  Fiorn turned to Slate. “Put recovery craft and extraction teams on standby.”

  The next few minutes passed in tense silence until they saw the lights of the half dozen helicopters over the horizon. Then all hell broke loose.

  “ETA 30 seconds, sir!” Slate called out.

  Grai turned to Scaden. “How much longer until our ground forces are on the transports?”

  Scaden pulled up the information and shook his head. “We have six teams heading to extraction. They were doing debris retrieval and animal control. Jax is one of them,” he said, shooting Reven a sympathetic look.

  Reven cursed and Grai almost winced at the thought of anything happening to his pregnant friend and he opened his comm to Koda. “Koda, Jax is still out there in middle of everything. I’m sending you the tracking info on her comm,” he said.

  “On my way,” Koda said at the same time Sam broke through the general channel.

  “We’ve been compromised! Get her out of here! Now!”

  Grai watched in horror as the helicopter’s spotlights began lighting up the ground and he began shouting orders as he watched a tall blond male trying to cover a pregnant Jax among the trees.

  “Extraction teams to Jax’s position now!” Grai barked out.

  “We got fire! We got fire!” Slate shouted as they saw the telltale flashes of bullets being fired at Jax and Sam.

  “I’ve got to get to her!” Reven shouted as Ivint tried to hold him there.

  “You can’t get there in time! We’ll get her,” Ivint said, holding tightly to his friend to keep him from going outside.

  “Koda!” Grai shouted, praying his brother could get there in time.

  “What the hell . . .,” Fiorn said as they all watched the helicopter shooting at Jax and Sam, jerk violently before it appeared to be tossed onto the ground.

  They watched as it rolled to a stop and a few seconds later a crewmember crawled out of the crumpled craft and hefted hardware onto his shoulder, aimed at the skies.

  “They have RPGs,” Grai warned Koda, shaking his head at the idiot human pointing the heavy weapon erratically around him.

  Slate shouted an update. “The other choppers are trying to land around Jax and Sam! Anothe
r one is opening fire!”

  Grai watched a line of animals surround Sam and Jax’s location as they tried to hide among the trees from the helicopters shooting at them from above.

  Another chopper jerked violently before tumbling through the air as if thrown. It spun wildly, taking out the tops of trees before crashing to the ground half a mile from Jax and Sam.

  “What the hell is that?” Thjodhild asked in awe of the way the choppers were being taken out.

  Grai grinned, never taking his eyes off of the screens around them.

  “Koda modified the tractor beams so that we could disable human craft without killing everyone. He grabs them in the beam, then sends an EMP pulse through it to disable the craft, then puts it close enough to the ground to prevent needless loss of life,” he said with pride in his intelligent brother.

  Thjodhild chuckled. “So it really is what it looks like. He’s picking them up and chucking them on the ground like toys. Damn, you’ve got to get us some of those,” Thjodhild said with an appreciative smile.

  “They’re firing on a pregnant female! Blow the bastards out of the fucking sky!” Reven roared, fighting against Ivint.

  Ivint nodded at Amun and Reven never noticed the mediband that Amun slipped onto the back of his neck, the sedatives inside calming him enough to make him stop fighting while Ivint and Fiorn helped him to sit down.

  Slate called out, “Extraction team ETA, four minutes!”

  Sam’s voice came through the comm. “They’re dropping troops! We need backup!”

  Grai growled in frustration. “Koda!”

  “I heard! I’m on my way!” Koda responded.

  Everyone watched with bated breath as another chopper tumbled from the sky, the men rappelling down catapulted through the air before crashing to the ground, unmoving. Grai looked to another screen and watched the dots, representing other hybrid teams, begin to converge on Jax and Sam. But, they were still far enough away to scare the hell out of him.

  “Grai, this won’t be pretty,” Koda warned, his voice strained.

  Grai knew immediately what his brother was saying and shook his head.

  “I don’t care. They opened fire first,” he said, then watched another helicopter burst into flames before hitting the ground near the soldiers that had rappelled from the other choppers.

  Grai shook his head at the unnecessary loss of life as the human body count rose. Still, they continued to rappel from the other choppers and fired on his people.

  If they are looking for a capture, it was dead or alive, he thought.

  This was much more aggressive than he was used to from the regular military forces, and he couldn’t help but think they were mercenaries.

  Grai watched another chopper jerk and knew Koda had the tractor beam locked onto the craft, inside of watching it tumble like the others, the remaining choppers began firing wildly around them. Grai had a sinking feeling in his stomach and opened the comm.

  “Koda, get the hell out of there!” he roared, his panic rising.

  But, it was too late. Grai watched in horror as an RPG hit Koda’s craft. His cloaking shimmered and Grai saw the ship come into view as the cloak failed.

  “What happened to his shields?” Thjodhild whispered in shock.

  Ivint shook his head.

  “He had to lower them to use the tractor beam. Get him out of there!”

  Grai trembled and struggled to remain calm.

  “Koda, get out of there and eject. We’ll come find you. I will find you, brother,” Grai said hoarsely, sending a call through the Shengari’ for his people to track Koda and prepare to extract.

  Slate called out.

  “Everyone but Jax, Sam and Koda are out of there!”

  Grai watched his brother fight to control his disabled ship as the helicopters continued to fire on him. Seconds later, two choppers exploded, lighting up the sky in a shower of flaming debris.

  “Hang on Koda!” Grai heard one of his fighters say as they swarmed the area.

  The last chopper was blown out of the sky as Koda’s ship limped deeper into the forest, avoiding populated areas. Grai had a white knuckled grip on the edge of the table, when the comm crackled and he heard Koda’s voice.

  “Grai, I’m going to set the dec-charge before I eject. Clear the damn area!” Koda said warningly, the stress in his voice clear, even to those who didn’t know him.

  “No!” Grai roared, his fear escalating. “No, Koda, we’ll take care of it when you’re clear,” Grai said, his tone telling everyone it was an order.

  “What’s a dec-charge?” Thjodhild asked, fearing the answer.

  Slate shouted, “We got Jax and Sam!”

  Grai gripped the table so hard, it was cracking beneath his fingers. “Koda, eject now!” he growled into the comm as he watched the craft continue deeper into the mountains.

  Koda’s comm crackled again.

  “Damn Grai, now you’re nagging. Next you’ll be wanting to tuck me in and cut my meat,” Koda teased before turning serious. “I’m getting clear of the Folly before I set the charge. Just be ready to pick me up.”

  “Koda, don’t do this!” Grai growled.

  “What’s a dec-charge?” Thjodhild asked again.

  Koda had gotten the damaged ship several miles from the folly when it began to lose all power to its main propulsion systems and he knew he was going to have to leave now. He programmed in the master sequence to the dec-charge and hit the button to eject.

  Koda watched the timer to the dec-charge count down as the protective skin shuttered over him and his seat before he was ejected from the craft.

  Grai watched the screen and prayed silently as he watched his brother’s ejection pod launch from the ship, seconds before a bright flash lit up the sky and the ship began to disappear in spectacular pops of light.

  Grai sunk to his knees and roared in rage and pain when Koda’s ejection pod was clipped by a pop of light from the dec-charge and broke up in the sky, three pieces each heading towards the ground in a rapid descent before flashes of fire erupted in the forest below.

  “Get teams there now!” Ivint roared.

  Grai turned to Fiorn. “Get me there!”

  Fiorn nodded, calling out orders as he led Grai to the hangar and one of their own choppers, Ivint and a few others following. Thjodhild remained behind with Scaden and a few others, who were silently praying for Koda’s safe return.

  “What just happened?” Thjodhild asked in confusion and concern.

  Scaden shook his head. “He used a dec-charge. A Decimator Charge. It’s a Relian design meant to eliminate all traces of something. He didn’t get fully clear of it,” Scaden said, sadly seeing no hope of finding Koda alive.

  Thjodhild gasped.

  “No!” she said, looking around her at the saddened Valendrans and hybrids before turning back to the screen and the fires now burning in the forest where the pod had crashed in flaming pieces.

  Seconds later the energy in the Shengari’ surged. When it resettled itself, everyone could feel an emptiness, as if something were missing. Hearing Grai’s roar of pain and rage echo down the tunnel, Thjodhild’s tears started to fall silently as she realized what had happened.

  Koda’s energy was gone. He and his beast were no longer connected to the Shengari’, his energy extinguished. A hush fell over the room and the Shengari’ until their people realized what had happened and that one of their own was gone . . . and who.

  Rage, pain, sympathy and love throbbed so strongly through the Shengari’ that those connected could feel the surge in their energy. Unable to contain the rising level of emotions, as one people, they cried out their pain for their fallen.

  A hush soon fell over the Shengari’ as one man, whose energy and power ran deeper than anyone knew, throbbed so strongly with rage that it replaced the pain. With each step he took down the tunnel, the emptiness inside of him, where his brother’s energy had resided only moments ago, was replaced by vengeance.

 
*****

  Halfway around the world, Mikal closed his beautiful white eyes and reeled from his father’s pain as it echoed through him. Moments later he knew the cause and ran to hold Tricia as she cried out in pain at the loss of Koda.

  Tristan, still in his warrior form, gently took his mother from Mikal’s arms and golden eyes stared intently at white while the brother’s spoke silently to one another. Mikal nodded his head and was gone in a sparkle of iridescent lights.

  Chapter Twenty Four

  Countdown Clock to Human Discovery

  1:00 Hours

  This is a WSBC special report. We have reached out to some of the homeowners and campers affected by the land slide that occurred almost 24 hours ago at Burnt Tree Ridge. We will have a full statement from 5 different people who were forced to evacuate the area.

  We have also learned that a local JROTC squad is helping direct traffic. We’ll talk to the teens about their volunteer effort first thing on WSBC news in the morning.

  Grai searched the area, frantically calling out Koda’s name until his voice became hoarse. Gibly and dozens of cats had dispersed the moment they landed, searching for any sign of Koda and still hadn’t found anything.

  Ten minutes later, Grai was led to Amun, who was standing over a large piece of debris. He saw right away that it was the ejection pod shield and fell to his knees on the ground beside it. With a shaking hand, he reached out to touch the blood soaked shield, then stared at it on his fingers.

  Amun put a hand on his shoulder.

  “It’s Koda’s . . . Grai, I’m so sorry,” he said, his own pain over Koda’s loss, bleeding from his energy.

  Grai shook his head.

  “He could still be alive . . . just unconscious,” he said, rising to his feet and looking around for more debris from the pod. The ship itself had been vaporized by the dec-charge.

  Fiorn and Ivint looked over at Amun and when the doctor shook his head at them, they knew the odds of Koda having survived the crash were zero. Ivint pulled Grai to a stop.

  “Son . . ., we need to get our people out of here before more of those bastards arrive,” he said, trying to get through the haze of pain and rage that was clouding Grai’s energy.