It was two meters long, thin with a scaly hide and had more legs than Jackson could quickly count. It was a dull, earthy color, with a red head and a nasty looking black pincer mouth. It pounced on the still rolling rock, mandibles flashing.
Warlord pulled the spanner lever back on his crossbow. A bolt from a magazine automatically fed into the groove. He sighted on the creature. It moved. He adjusted his aim. Thwump.
The bolt streaked across the clearing and struck the kinsella.
The thing jerked, rose up, and let out a harsh whistle. Warlord spanned his crossbow again. Another bolt automatically fed into place. He aimed and let it fly, this time taking the creature in its midsection. The kinsella fell onto its back and writhed.
“That thing was nasty!” Katze exclaimed. “Good shooting.”
“Oh, we are just getting started, my friends.”
And as if waiting for their cue, all around the field, whistles and pops began to sound.
“Now the fun begins,” Warlord said as he reloaded.
There was a whistle behind them. Jackson spun around and caught sight of something rushing along a branch above.
“Incoming!” Jackson shouted.
And then dozens of kinsella attacked.
Chapter 16
Jackson raised his Wakal and fired. There was a fast thump, thump, thump as three of the bolts streaked out the barrel. He’d rushed. The first two missed. The third one hit the creature in midflight and blasted right through it.
Katze turned and opened up with her 20mm. The exo took the massive recoil and the suppressor kept it remarkably quiet. Huge bullets shredded one kinsella’s neck. Its head landed at Katze’s feet, the pincers still grasping. She kicked it away and searched for more targets.
“More movement in the trees,” Bushey warned.
Jackson spotted another kinsella moving in the branches, he took aim, led the quick-moving creature, and fired a bolt that struck clean and pinned the kinsella to the tree. The rest of the crew were knocking kinsella out of the trees.
Warlord sounded a little amused as he said, “One of you might want to help me with the clearing.”
Jackson turned. Kinsella were pouring out of holes. Long and multilegged. All the clacking mandibles and scuffling legs made a clicking, buzzing wave.
“Lord,” Tui said.
Warlord spanned his crossbow, aimed, and shot, spanned, shot, spanned again. He was smooth and calm, like they were all out on a picnic.
Tui automatically fell into command mode as he realized just how many of the things were coming at them. “Katze, watch our backs. Jackson, Bushey, zap the clearing.”
“Got it, Chief!” Katze said.
Talk about a target-rich environment. Jackson sighted on one, shot, sighted on another, shot again. Shot yet again, and again, and again. The sound of the kinsella turned from a buzzing wave to a furious hiss. And the Warlord began to laugh. This wasn’t hunting, this was slaughter, and he was loving it. He spanned, aimed, and released. Spanned, aimed, and released again.
The muffled noise of Katze’s rifle continued as she fired at kinsella in the trees behind them. And then there was a human scream as a creature dropped from a branch and latched onto the faceplate of one of the security guards. The exo flopped over, powerful arms flailing uncontrollably, as the man fed the exo’s limbs far too much stimulus.
Katze shifted a bit, and suddenly hot 20mm shell casings were bouncing off Jackson’s exo. He turned, shot a kinsella that was three feet away. Shot another. Shot another that was winding at such a rapid rate it took him three tries to hit it.
The kinsella were writhing and whistling and slithering all over the field. The chittering and had grown in tempo so that it was almost a high RPM engine wail, a near banshee sound.
“I hate this friggin’ planet!” Bushey shouted as he stomped on one that was trying to run up Tui’s leg.
And then the ground shook. A mound of dirt rose in the center, bulging as something huge pushed from beneath. Insectoid legs pierced through the mud.
“There she is!” Warlord cried. “There she is!”
“There who is?” Tui bellowed.
“The queen!”
The biggest, scariest, nastiest thing Jackson had ever seen tore itself free of the ground. This kinsella was pale, the color of grubs, but was at least triple the size of the others and wide as a horse.
Right then Jackson really wished he was the guy in the mech. He risked a quick glance back, but the old T-Bolt was busy trying to pull the kinsella off his buddy’s helmet.
Warlord let a bolt fly. It struck the queen’s thick carapace and glanced off. His next shot hit it square on, but that bolt simply bounced away.
Jackson shot a smaller kinsella that was almost on him, cursed, then shot two more. Tui killed one in a tree and another far out into the field. Jackson scanned his zone, saw one more kinsella, shot it, but he knew the monster that had just arisen was the one they needed to take out. Jackson emptied the rest of the Wakal’s magazine at the queen. Some of the bolts bounced off. Some seemed to penetrate, but not deep enough.
“Call in your mech to blast her!” Jackson shouted.
“That would hardly be sporting,” Warlord replied.
The monster kinsella let out a terrible roar, slammed down to the ground, and charged.
Warlord grabbed one of his javelins and ran to meet it. “Cover me.”
“You’re nuts,” Tui said. Jackson couldn’t believe his eyes. Did the man actually think his javelin was going to pierce that armor? But he was already on the way, so they’d better do as he asked! Jackson saw a smaller kinsella streaking toward the Warlord and shot it. Tui dropped another. And then they watched in horror as their host closed on the queen.
The white monster rose up and opened its pincers.
Warlord leapt, javelin in hand.
The exo-powered lunge took him high. The monster’s head tracked upward, following his arc, but on the way down Warlord hurled the javelin straight into the creature’s maw. It sank deep, and then the javelin shuddered as the powered blades released. There was a grinding noise as they sliced through bone and chiton.
The queen let out an earsplitting cry of anger and pain. It thrashed to the side, trying to dislodge the weapon.
Warlord landed in a crouch, exo limbs taking the impact. He pulled another javelin from his quiver, and waited just a moment, looking for his opportunity to close on the thrashing beast. Then he surged toward the kinsella’s head, driving the javelin through one of its four eyes.
The kinsella shuddered, whistled. The javelin’s blades sprang open inside the creature’s skull. The queen whipped her head to one side. The Warlord leapt away, rolled, and rose with another javelin in his hand.
The smaller creatures out on the field stopped and turned to look. They paused as if confused. Some lifted their heads up in the air as if smelling something.
And then the mother kinsella dropped to the ground with a thud.
Warlord casually walked up to it, picked another eye, and sunk his javelin deep.
The queen shuddered, then lay still.
The remaining kinsella dropped to their bellies and scurried away from the clearing as fast as possible. They vanished nearly as quickly as they’d revealed themselves. The sudden retreat made Jackson think of roaches scurrying away.
Warlord retrieved his blood-soaked javelins and walked back toward the crew. He was grinning.
“He’s crazy,” Katze sent over their net.
“Or trying to send a message,” Jackson responded.
“Or just full of toa,” Tui said aloud, with some respect.
Old habits die hard, and Jackson found himself reloading the Wakal by reflex. His hands were shaking. There hadn’t been time to be afraid when those things had swarmed, but it had been terrifying. Then he looked down at all the dismembered bodies, some of which were still kicking, pinned to the ground by pneumatic bolts.
A moment later, Warlord joined them aga
in. “Did I not promise you a hunt? A primal experience?”
“Oh, you promised,” Katze said, obviously trying not to sound freaked out.
“Such a thing cleanses all, does it not?”
“Maybe the bowels,” Bushey transmitted.
Warlord smiled with a hungry bliss. “Do you wish to try the javelin next time, my dear?”
“I think I like my twenty.” She patted her rifle.
Their host turned to Jackson. “How do you feel?”
“Alive,” Jackson said, figuring that’s what Warlord would want to hear.
“Alive,” he nodded. “It’s different, isn’t it? Being outside the protective shell of a mech. It is good for men like us to remind ourselves what it feels like to be mortal.”
“One of your men is dead.” Tui nodded toward where the guards were standing around the bloody exo lying in the mud. “His face is bitten in half.”
Warlord looked over, then shrugged. “Leave him.”
“We’re not taking his body back?” Katze asked.
“The kinsella should have their due.”
Bushey, Tui, and Katze glanced at each other. They all came from cultures were soldiers simply didn’t do that kind of thing. Leave no man behind. But life was cheap here.
“Don’t worry. We will strip his gear. We need every exo we can get.” Warlord eyed Katze, who was so spattered with kinsella blood that was so dark it was almost purple. He wiped a glob of kinsella off the side of her faceplate and flung it away. “Sometimes there are two or three queens. It’s too bad we just had the one. You would have enjoyed the fight, I think. But this was a good one. Worth a token. Why don’t you take one of your kills’ heads? They clean out and mount nicely on the wall.”
“Good idea,” Bushey said, then bent to the largest one in the area. He pulled out his knife and began to cut through a soft part at the base of its neck.
“Are you serious?” Katze sent over the net.
“We can put it up in the exercise room,” Bushey said.
“Would you like one?” Warlord asked Katze.
“That one’s plenty. Not a lot of head room on the ship as it is.”
“Very well. Now I am afraid we must hurry, my friends. The noise will have attracted predators and scavengers. Swindle rarely allows one time to relax.”
Bushey finished sawing and picked up the head. The security detail started walking back the way they’d come in. Jackson followed, passing by the body of the fallen man. They’d already stripped him of his exo and weapons, so he was just lying there, in a tattered suit, missing most of his face.
Jackson couldn’t believe they were just leaving him. Even on Gloss, they’d have at least tried to give the guy a burial. “Does he have any family?” he asked. “A companion?”
Warlord turned to one of his other men. “Did Norris have any family?”
“No,” the man answered. “A girlfriend maybe.”
Warlord said, “There you go. We were his family.”
Jackson looked at the stitched identity tag. There was a splatter of blood across the name Joshua. He figured whatever kinsella were left would soon devour him, and Jackson wondered if Joshua had known that would be part of his job.
They started onto a different trail. When Tui asked why, one of the men said, “Standard protocol. You don’t want your routes to be predictable.”
“Ambush predators?”
“Them and other things that live in these woods.”
And so they trekked along a trail that took them in a slightly different direction. The crew were on full alert now, constantly scanning the woods about them. Whatever they’d been expecting down here, this hadn’t been it.
They traveled for quite some time, and then Warlord told them they were getting close to the road. Jackson began to relax, but then a warning signal began to flash in the heads-up display. They were all sent a prerecorded message.
“Attention, Rangers, return to your nearest shelter and await orders.”
Shelter? Wasn’t that the protocol for when one of the really big monsters was sighted in the area? The kinsella had been bad enough. He really didn’t want to see a kaiju up close.
“So which way is the shelter?” Katze asked nervously, clearly thinking the same thing Jackson was.
Warlord held up a finger for her to wait for a moment as if he were listening to someone on the radio, and then turned to his men. “The bastard Originals are assaulting two crews. Let’s go get them.”
“Sir,” one of the security men said. “Perhaps we should wait for backup to arrive.”
A hardness came into Warlord’s eyes. “No, by then it will be too late.” He looked at the crew. “It’s time to do some real hunting now.”
Chapter 17
Warlord led the way, running swiftly through the woods. The security men fanned out, the one in the mech motioned for the crew to move. “Come with us for your safety,” but then he ran off before they could ask for details.
“What the heck is happening?” Jackson sent.
“Sounds like they’re under attack,” Tui sent back.
Not seeing much choice, the crew followed.
About five minutes later, the woods ended and opened up onto a long strip running through the hilly woods that had been recently burned clear of all trees and brush. The strip was about half a klick across. Warlord paused at the edge of the clearing and started giving orders to his men. “Achebe, dismount. I’m taking the mech.”
“Yes, sir.” The T-bolt slid to a stop in the grass, knelt, and locked its joints as the operator popped the hatch.
“What’s going on?” Tui demanded.
“The whoreson Originals are massacring my harvesters,” Warlord snapped as he began unbuckling himself from his exo.
“I thought that was a gang up in Big Town.”
One of the guards said, “A bunch of them live down here. They claim we stole their lands, so they sabotage our groves and ambush our crews.”
“Only they’re not getting away this time.” Warlord’s persona had changed almost as if a switch had been flipped. While hunting the kinsella, he had been having a grand time. Now, he was seething with murderous anger. “We’ll hit them from the rear while they’re focused on the harvesters and slaughter every single one of them. Let no one escape.”
Tui held up one hand. “Hold on. My people signed up for a hunting trip, not a war.”
Warlord really didn’t like that, probably because he wasn’t used to people on this planet not immediately doing what he told them to. “I have given you my hospitality, but if you do not wish to help defend my home, then so be it. Hang back and stay out of my way. I will return you to your ship once this problem has been dealt with.”
The guard had made a clumsy exit from the mech, practically falling out the front, but Warlord vaulted into the cockpit with the practiced efficiency of someone who had done it hundreds of times. As the hatch closed, Jackson saw Warlord plug a spike into the base of his brain. Then the Thunderbolt took off like a shot, tons of metal zipping through the trees with the grace of a running deer. The difference between fly-by-mind and manual was staggering.
The security team ran after their boss, except for the one named Achebe, who was trying to get into Warlord’s abandoned exo.
Bushey muttered, “I really don’t want to try and find our way back without our guides.”
“No,” said the guard as he buckled the straps around his legs. “You guys really don’t want to do that. There’s safety in numbers, especially since all the predators in the area will hear the gunfire and get curious.” They couldn’t see the guard’s face through his breather, but he sounded sincere. “Would you give me a hand with the arms?”
Jackson moved to help the mech driver. “Any chance you could guide us?”
“You have met my boss, right?”
“The kind, forgiving one?”
“Yeah, that one. Look, you’ve got two real options. You follow us at a distance and act as a sn
ack out on the perimeter for the caliban or pinkers or whatever shows up. Which could slow them down for the rest of us. Or you stay close. And if you stay close, you fight.”
Jackson locked in the guard’s arm on this side. Katze locked in the other. The guard moved his arms and twisted a bit, making sure everything was tight. “Perfect,” he said. “Thanks and good luck.” And then he sprang over a huge root and ran after the others.
“Well, crap,” Tui said. “Bushey?”
“I don’t mind shooting terrorists, Chief.”
“Assuming they’re actually terrorists. Katze?”
“Shade said to make the client happy…”
“Jackson?”
The Warlord’s team was getting farther away, so it was decide fast, or the decision would be made for them. “I say we follow, observe, and make a call when we see it.”
Tui sighed. “Let’s go.”
They sprinted after the security team, which had already been left behind by the swiftly moving mech. Jackson had to admit he was impressed by Warlord’s piloting skills. The 4 wasn’t the smoothest runner, but he was rapidly outpacing them.
It still took some muscle power to drive an exo, and a whole lot of movement, which meant a whole lot of heat. They were sprinting now, so Jackson was sweating down the inside of his face shield. He was in excellent shape, but this was brutal. They ran up a hill with huge strides, ran along the crown for a bit, then sprinted down the other side, motors whirring. Strange animals were startled from their path. Bushey swore as he blundered into a bush that was filled with some sort of stinging wasp-analogs. The mech was now out of sight, but the tracks were easy to follow. They climbed one more hill.
And heard gunfire.
Down below were a pair of dropships, each far bigger than the one they’d used to get here. Jackson guessed that each one could easily carry twenty or more workers, and they had massive external tanks for the harvested CX. Except one of the dropships was lying at an awkward angle, its landing skids broken, and it was smoking as if it were about to catch on fire.
Around the ships was a chaos. The harvesters were in orange suits and work exos. They were running, hidden, or lying there bleeding. A little T7 Jackal had been pulling security for the crew, but Jackson could tell that it had taken a hit from an AP round, and the pilot had limped it behind the wounded dropship for cover. It was sparking and bleeding hydraulic fluid, but the pilot was still leaning around the tail, firing bursts from an autocannon.
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