My shoulders slumped as I thought about my failure to fulfil my secret mission. Where was Olav now? Probably too far away for me to find him before I reported to Polgar at 06:00.
“Want another drink?” Zac asked me.
“Sure,” I said as I gave him my empty mug.
As he walked to a keg, the screaming of an engine came from above us. The high-pitched sound grew louder as a hoverbike landed in the field. The noise ceased as a purple-robed man turned the engines off and stepped down from the vehicle. He was Ronan, the same mage who had been with Olav and the other knights earlier. His robes were torn in places and covered in dark patches which might have been blood.
Every member of the crowd stared at him in the silence, which was vanquished as a chorus of high-pitched engines screeched. Four hoverbikes landed in formation around the first vehicle.
Olav, Moses, Flanagan, and Leith disembarked from their single-man crafts. Just like the mage, they appeared to have returned from a battlefield. Dirt caked their tabards, and their once shining armor was tarnished with blood and ichor.
Emeric, the Aquitanian knight, had thought Captain Cross brought the Stalwart to the planet to clear rifts, and the state of the knights’ armor seemed to confirm it. What else was the green blood staining their equipment if not a Grendel’s internal fluids?
But the mystery gave way in my mind to a surge of relief. Olav had returned. And there was still twelve hours until 06:00 Caledonian Universal Time. Captain Cross might expect an answer when I returned to the Stalwart, but at least I’d have time to follow Olav, and gather more information for Polgar. I could also tell the sorcerer what the Aquitanian knight had told me and the portal locations I’d seen on the giant monitor’s map.
The Space Knights made straight for Salenum’s king. The man cowered before the imposing presence of the armored men as they exchanged words. Almost as soon as their conversation began, it was over, and the knights were walking back to their bikes.
I couldn’t let them leave without following them. But how could I tail Olav without them noticing?
Zac came next to me and gave me a mug of beer. “You seem really interested in what the knights are up to,” he said. “Looks like you’ve been doing more of that digging I advised you not to do.”
“Zac, I need your help. Can we follow the knights? I want to see what they’re doing on the planet.”
“Listen, Nick. I already told you it’s a bad idea. We can’t--”
“Please.” I stared into his eyes and tried to show my desperation. “I can’t tell you everything, but I’m here to serve the queen. I need to find out what they’re doing.”
He cocked his head at me. “The Queen sent you to the Stalwart?”
“Kinda. Not really. Uhh . . . yes.”
Zac frowned and moved to face the gathered nobles. In the center of the courtyard, two boys chased each other with remote-controlled fighter skiffs. My friend watched them for a few moments. I feared the artilleryman wasn’t going to help me, so I decided it was best to leave the subject alone. I was about to walk away, but then Zac let out a long sigh.
“Alright,” he said. “I’ll help you out. But this better be worth it.”
Nathan popped his head out from my left side, and then Richard did the same on my right.
“So,” Richard said. “Where are we going?”
“We’re not going anywhere,” I said.
“You can’t fool us,” Nathan said. “We were listening the whole time. Quite the heart-to-heart you two were having.” He smirked at Zac and me.
“I’m coming with you guys, too,” Neville said as he entered the light.
I rolled my eyes. Did the squires have a habit of hiding in the shadows while they eavesdropped?
“Wait here,” Zac said. “I’ll get one of the transport ships organized.”
“We need to be fast,” I said. “The knights are leaving soon.”
While I waited for Zac to prepare the ship, I felt a tugging on my coat and peered down at a boy of about seven. He was holding up a toy soldier, and he said something to me in his native tongue. I smiled at him, and he continued waving the toy at me.
“I think he wants you to take it,” Neville said without looking at me. “It’s his gift to you.”
I paused for a moment, not wanting to take an item from a child. He might have been a noble, but even the upper classes were struggling. But I didn’t want to offend him either. I didn’t know Tachion customs, and I might hurt his feelings if I refused the gift.
“Do you want to give this to me?” I asked him.
At first, I wasn’t sure whether he understood me, but he gave me a firm nod and pressed the toy into my thigh. I crouched down, held out my palm, and the boy dropped the toy soldier into it.
“Thanks, kid.” I ruffled the boy’s hair as I slipped the toy into my belt pouch with my other hand.
I looked up to see Olav and the others walking toward their hoverbikes. Zac still wasn’t back from the transport ship yet, but I could see him fiddling with the engines of one vessel. I turned back to say goodbye to the boy, but he was already running toward a middle-aged woman I guessed was his mom. I smiled for a second and started turning back to the transport ship when a bright light tore the boy from his feet.
It was a laser blast.
The crowd of partygoers flinched from the sound of the shot.
Then everyone started screaming.
“We’re under attack!” I yelled above the music. Chaos exploded through the plaza as the civilians tried to figure out which way to run. There were no visible gunmen, so people ran in every direction to escape the bullets.
I temporarily forgot about the danger and ran over to the screaming mother. The woman now held the boy in her arms, and I knelt beside her. A patch of seared fabric and flesh marked his back, and his charred intestines were visible through the hole. A laser bolt had gone straight through him.
I glanced up at dozens of soldiers who seemed to materialize among the trestle tables and alcohol kegs on the far side of the courtyard.
I touched my helmet, and the visor shifted over my face. With my precision-vision lifting the cover of darkness, I could see the soldiers’ uniforms clearly. They weren’t the red suits the Aquitanian soldiers had worn, but a combination of red and blue pinstripes like the flag of the Rutheni Kingdom. The shimmer of their forms meant they were using advanced cloaking Runetech.
It also meant the Stalwart’s crew was in serious trouble.
Chapter 18
Laser shots rang out as the enemy soldiers opened fire on the partying nobles from between the containers. The nobles screamed as they tried to escape the field without getting shot, but their cries of fear did little to protect them. Desperate people dove behind the various trestle tables and alcohol kegs in an effort to take cover, but most of them failed, gunned down by the soldiers who had appeared in their midst.
Anger boiled inside of me, and I grabbed Emeric’s two-handed axe from the magnetons on my back. I hadn’t identified it, so I didn’t know its abilities. I would also take a severe damage penalty from wielding a weapon above my class since my squire palm rune couldn’t interface with the axe’s superior runes.
But I didn’t care.
I wanted to spill the blood of the Rutheni soldier who’d killed the boy and anyone who fought alongside him.
I activated my prot-field and sprinted through the chaotic crowd. One of the enemy soldiers saw me rushing toward him, and he raised his laser rifle at me. Blue beams of malice darted toward me, but the bolts glanced off my forcefield. His eyes broadened in terror as I reached him, and they opened even wider when the axe tore him in half.
Another soldier ran at me with his sword outthrust, but I slammed the axe into his chest with a bloody thump. He gargled blood, and I planted my boot onto his chest so I could heave my weapon free from the dead man’s ribcage.
I didn’t know whether either of these soldiers had been the one to murder the boy. Nothi
ng short of a confession would provide me with the murderer’s identity. My lack of knowledge meant I’d have to kill every last one of these Rutheni bastards to ensure I got the soldier responsible for blasting a hole in an innocent child.
I heard Olav roar from behind me as he leaped over a trestle table and joined the fray with his twin hatchets. A trio of soldiers were felled by the berserker’s spinning attack, and their comrades fled as Olav pursued them. As he ran, the knight slipped an axe into his prot-belt and grabbed a nearby ale mug with his free hand. He drained the ale as he buried his hatchet into the back of a soldier, and then he smashed the empty mug onto the man’s face.
My attention was drawn to a throng of screaming nobles. The soldiers had rounded them up like cattle and were slaughtering them by the dozens. I searched the field for where the enemies fired from, and anger flared in my stomach when I found a group of Rutheni crouching within a transport container.
I heaved the axe over my shoulder as I ran for the uniformed men. They stopped firing laser bolts, and their bayonets gleamed as I entered the container.
I plowed into their ranks with my weapon, my axe blade carving them to pieces. When the soldiers realized they were trapped, they tried to charge past me. I met their escape attempt with the keen edges of my axe and soaked the container’s metal walls with their blood.
My chest heaved as I stepped outside. I sucked in air through my helmet and searched for the next group of enemies who would feel my wrath. Six meters in front of me, a squad of Rutheni was taking cover behind another container as they fired upon Zac and the artillerymen.
The corpses of nobles and enemy soldiers littered the field, and I weaved between them to meet the Rutheni squad. The enemies were so focused on firing at the Stalwart’s artillerymen, they didn’t see me coming. Their blood soaked my axe as my heartbeat pounded in my ears. I heard gunfire behind me, and then laser bolts struck my prot-field as I rolled to take cover behind an upturned trestle table.
Prot-field: 24%
I’d been tagged dozens of times since the battle had begun, and I hadn’t been keeping an eye on my prot-field status. I could probably take another dozen laser bolts, but then I’d only have my armor to protect me.
The enemy gunfire from behind me ceased, and I lifted my head above the table’s edge. Olav hurdled over a three-meter tall stack of beer kegs and soared above the soldiers who’d been firing at me. The enemies lifted their bayonets to skewer the knight, but he let his hatchets fly from his hands. The weapons spun and plunged into the solar plexuses of two soldiers, and the men died with surprised screams.
As I sprinted out from the table to assist my fellow crewmember, Olav landed atop the third soldier. The berserker’s thighs pinned the man to the ground and the knight’s right gauntlet burst with light as he pulled his arm back. Then Olav punched through the Rutheni soldier’s chest, tore out the enemy’s heart, and turned to me with a maniacal grin.
“You gonna use that fucking axe or what?” he yelled at me. “You are too damn slow, Squire.”
I stared in amazement while the berserker discarded the soldier’s heart over his shoulder and retrieved his axes from the two corpses. With a bloodcurdling roar, he charged another group of enemies. Olav’s twin weapons tore through enemy soldiers one by one. Not a single movement was wasted as the berserker performed with the precision of a surgeon. I found myself unable to turn away from the spectacle of his deadly dance, or the trail of dead in his wake.
After Olav disappeared behind a transport ship, my gaze flittered around the battlefield as I hunted for Rutheni to kill. The agonizing screams of injured soldiers and the terrified wailing of the Tachionese nobles were accompanied by the high-pitched flurries of laser fire and the sharp barking of the Stalwart’s artillerymen’s high-caliber rifles. Smoke shrouded the battlefield as lights flashed from all around me.
The overwhelming sensory input almost toppled me, but the Academy’s grueling combat training kept me focused. My wrath at these child-killers wasn’t satiated yet, and I allowed it to fill me. I located a pair of soldiers lying prone atop the shipping container in the middle of the array, and I activated my speed sequence so that I used every bit of the rune’s power.
Then I jump three meters on top of the center container, and let my axe edge satisfy my rage.
My weapon tore through the two prone men with ease, and blood splattered my visor. Laser fire came from behind me, and I flipped from the container to face more soldiers. My prot-field sparked like a fireworks show as a burst of projectiles slammed into me. Mini-explosions obscured my vision, but I didn’t need to see anymore; all I needed was the sweet sound of my kills as I charged the enemy.
Soon, I couldn’t tell whether it was my fury or the blood which stained my vision red. I let the anger take complete command of my body, my wrath controlling every axe swing.
I was broken from my battlelust by a warning sign flashing in my helmet.
DANGER!
Prot-field: 3%
Corpses surrounded me. Most of them were Rutheni soldiers, but some were innocent nobles. Anger reignited within me, but reason prevented me from allowing it the driver’s seat. I couldn’t throw myself into battle yet; I needed to take cover while my prot-field regenerated. If I went down now, I wouldn’t be able to finish what these bastards had started.
I slipped behind a shipping container and waited while my forcefield percentage ticked upwards.
At least the nobles I saved had fled to the safety of the palace. But there were others who were frozen in panic, unable to summon the will to take flight.
“Escape the field!” I screamed at them. “Get inside the palace!”
The deafening roar of battle prevented them from hearing me.
I sighted a Tachionese nobleman tugging two teenage boys as he sprinted in the opposite direction of the palace. At first, I thought his terror had conquered all sense, but he ran beyond the shipping containers and jumped into one of the Stalwart’s transport vessels. His two sons followed him, and I prayed the ship’s armor would keep them all safe.
In the space of a few seconds, an explosion boomed as a rocket destroyed the vessel and the nobles along with it. I searched for where the projectile had originated and noticed a Rutheni soldier standing beside the Stalwart’s other transport ship. He must have thrown the powerful rune-grenade that obliterated the transport ship.
“Hurry up!” I hissed at my prot-belt as I punched the ground. My cuirass boosted the regeneration time, but I hated waiting for even a second while innocent people were dying.
I couldn’t understand why these soldiers were attacking the nobles. It was clear they’d come to kill every last one of the people. But for what? The Rutheni’s actions might not have been an outright breach of the Triumvirate treaty, but I couldn’t imagine the other kingdoms turning a blind eye to this wanton slaughter.
An explosion boomed a few meters to my left, and I ducked to avoid shrapnel. As soon as the dust had settled, Neville jumped behind the container and took cover beside me.
“You alright?” he asked, and I was a bit surprised by the expression of concern on his face.
I nodded. “Just waiting for my prot-field to regenerate.” I rolled my shoulders to soothe my cramping muscles. The axe was about twenty kilos, and it was a bit too heavy for me to wield for a long time without activating its gravity runes. I didn’t exactly have a choice, though. I still had the laser rifle I’d taken from the Aquitanian soldiers, but projectiles weren’t much use even against low-level prot-fields.
I would have to make do with what I had.
“Ready for round two?” I said to Neville as my prot-field regenerated completely.
“Let’s do it,” he said as he rolled out from the container.
Together we jumped four Rutheni terrorizing a family of nobles hiding beneath a table. When they saw us, the soldiers fired their rifles, but our prot-fields absorbed the blue projectiles. I let my anger fill every part of my body as I f
lipped the axe into an uppercut. The blade caught the soldier underneath the jaw, and I smiled with grim determination as I gave him a two-inch facelift.
Neville poked a soldier full of holes, and the man’s wounds glowed a sickly green color immediately. He turned to face us as his eyes rolled to the back of his head and froth bubbled out from his mouth.
“Like my rapier’s rune effect?” Neville said, after the man died screaming.
The other two soldiers looked at us in terror after what we’d done to their comrades, but then Neville flicked the blades in both of his hands, and the soldiers clutched their leaking throats as they died.
I still didn’t feel any satisfaction. I knew I wouldn’t until the last Rutheni decorated the palace grounds with his corpse.
“Thank you!” the noblewoman cried as she grabbed her daughter and son before sprinting out from beneath the trestle table.
The Tachionese family ran toward the palace, only to be felled by a spray of laser bolts by a squad of charging soldiers as more Rutheni joined the first wave. The dirt courtyard was already littered with blue and red pinstriped carcasses, and I wondered how many more soldiers they could throw at us.
There were already too many dead civilians.
“We need to do something about these nobles,” I said to Neville. “They’re gonna keep getting killed out here.”
“Right,” he replied. “Let’s gather them up and get them inside the palace.”
Moses roared from the battlefield. He drove his spear through the stomach of one soldier before crushing the skull of another enemy in his gauntleted hands. While his eyes blazed with bloodlust, I kept a wide berth around him as I found the grieving mother. She was still holding the corpse of her boy, clutching it to her chest as tears ran rivulets down her makeup.
Nathan and Richard came behind me, and I told them our plan to herd the nobles into the palace. They didn’t need any convincing. Soon we had a group of a hundred kings, queens, and their attendants following us. Even the King of Salenum was easily navigated away from the slaughter.
Space Knight Page 27