The towers, though, could be her ticket inside. Some had windows surrounding the lookout, but the one in front of her didn’t. It was open, made for weapons—cannons, rifles, or whatever else the Kelhoon could set up on a tripod—to blow any advancing enemy to shit and back.
This tower in front of her wasn’t just for looking out.
She took in a deep breath, observing the rock wall more closely, pressing her hands up against it, finding a good hand hold. Some pieces of rock jagged inward and others jagged outward.
An evil smile curled on her lips. She could climb it, easily and quickly.
She hung the rifle over her shoulder and across her body, so it wouldn’t fall during the ascent. She reached for a portion of the wall that jutted out, and grabbed hold. She found a small outcropping to place her foot on. She took a step up, climbing one rock at a time. She was careful, silent, and her movements were precise.
Five minutes of scaling, she glanced down. She was more than halfway up. “Don’t stop now. Keep going Rivkah,” she whispered to herself.
Her foot slipped, and she gasped, her fingers grasping the rough rock, her legs dangling and flailing as she attempted to find another foot placement.
She heard several clicks from the lookout, and a Kelhoon stepped forward.
Rivkah found a foothold and pressed herself as flat against the wall as she could, hoping the shadows did their trick. Her body shook, not from fear, but because her muscles were straining from the effort of keeping her flat against the wall. Tightening her stomach, her biceps and chest muscles kept her posture as straight as possible, and it wasn’t easy. Most people would relax and fall, their muscles not trained like hers. She patted herself on the back, mentally. Not too shabby for someone who was out of practice and quite rusty.
The Kelhoon leaned over, observing the wall, and then the ground. “Goskajava kamanka.”
Rivkah closed her eyes, imagining she was invisible. It felt like a child’s trick, but it had worked with Slade, though that mental cloaking was designed to hide her energy signature, not her physical body. She had no idea if Abdu’s parlor trick would render her invisible.
The Kelhoon made a few clicks with his throat, then backed away.
Rivkah took a deep breath, then relaxed, curling her spine away from the wall, stretching it out as best she could without losing her grip. She pulled herself up and climbed until she made it to the edge of the lookout. She took a peak over the tower’s lip. A Kelhoon was sitting, drinking from a pipe which extended down into a mug. He was probably sipping blood—human or Atlantean.
Rage came over her and her Chi rose from her solar plexus and blasted through her limbs. She catapulted herself into the lookout, landing on the metallic floor.
The Kelhoon’s eyes bugged out and he flung the mug in the air, reaching for his photon rifle that was leaning against a wall. The mugs contents splattered over his chin and on his chest, dripping blood down its combat uniform.
Rivkah kicked the Kelhoon’s weapon across the floor, and slipped her rifle off of her shoulder. She went to one knee and released a purple blast.
The Kelhoon lurched forward, then bucked back from the impact. He bounced off the wall, his hands outstretched, and his eyes rolled back into his head. He slumped to the ground. Green blood oozed out of his chest, and he took a last breath, exhaling slowly. He toppled to his side, his eyes open and lifeless.
She ducked, hiding herself from any retaliatory gun fire that might come her way. When none came, she slowly rose in her crouch, peering over the edge of the lookout. It was nothing but stillness and quiet. Hopefully no one heard the commotion she’d just created.
“How the hell do I get down?”
She eyed a closed latch in the middle of the floor. She tried to open it. It was locked. She pulled again. It didn’t budge.
She began to run her Chi, then stopped when she saw a control panel on the wall. It had Kelhoon numbers she wasn’t schooled in, and if she was, the panel was probably a code box encoded with a password she didn’t know.
A light flashed across the hills and thunder rolled across the land. The tower quivered in response, and she went to her hands and knees. The battle over the hills was still raging.
She crawled to the control panel and tapped a few buttons. The digital buttons lit up, but nothing happened.
“Screw this shit,” she moaned. She didn’t know the passcodes. “I’ll pry the floor open.”
She folded her fingers around the latch’s edge, shifting her weight, and brought more Chi through her hands. The door moved an inch. Rivkah blew out an exasperated breath, her face red, her body sweating from too much exertion. She collapsed, catching her breath. “Is this latch made out of Chi-proof material?”
“Solka, jinshakaa hoji,” came a voice from where the dead Kelhoon lay.
Rivkah went into a defensive position; her leg extended, her elbow up, her other palm out and facing the Kelhoon. The Kelhoon didn’t move. He was still dead.
She realized it was the Kelhoon’s radio receiver and crawled to the Kelhoon, listening intently, wanting to locate the source of the voice.
“Solka, jinshakaa hoji,” said the voice again. Rivkah spotted a device behind the guy’s ear. It was his communication link. “Solka, jinshakaa hoji,” repeated the voice, this time clearly more irritated.
Rivkah hurried over to the latch and placed her fingers on its edge, and with all her might, she pried it open another few inches. After a few minutes of limited success, she let go and lay on her back, out of breath. “What is this, the galaxy’s greatest latch?”
Footsteps from outside echoed into the tower. She pushed herself up and cautiously peaked over the lip. Several Kelhoon were making their way toward her tower. She rushed to where she had entered, readying herself to climb back down.
It only took her two seconds to change her mind. She wasn’t in this rescue half way, or even eighty percent of the way. She was in this one hundred and ten percent, and counting. These children needed her help and they needed their parents, and she wasn’t going to let them die on her watch.
Wapooo!
A blast struck her wrist, spinning her and knocking her to the floor.
Wapooo! Wapooo!
Two more shots rang out, barreling into the side of the lookout tower. The tower shuddered, and rocks exploded outward, some pelting Rivkah.
She curled on the floor, her hand hot and damaged, blood slithering down her forearm and to the floor. She tried to move her hand and winced in agony, the pain enveloping her wrist like sharp fangs ripping apart every muscle in her body.
She held her damaged wrist with her other hand, holding it up to take a good look. “It’s done.” The wrist, and consequently, her hand was useless. Her skin was flapped back, her tendons sliced off the bone where they connected. And both bones in her forearm were closed breaks—cracked and separated.
From previous experience with broken bones in combat, she knew she had about six hours of adrenaline to keep her functional. Then what came afterwards was pure hell. She rested her hand on the ground, cringing, and unclipped a knife from her belt with her good hand.
She glanced at her pant leg, lowered the knife, cut and ripped the jumpsuit material at her shin. She grabbed and tugged a long piece of jumpsuit off. She sat up and a lightning-like throb ran up her bad arm, and her vision narrowed, her head going faint.
She slapped her face with her good hand to wake herself up, to keep herself from going unconscious. It worked…for the time being.
She scooted over to the bamboo rifle and leaned it up against a wall.
Kackow!
She pulled back in a start, covering her face. An explosive that must have been placed under the latch threw the latch wide open, breaking it off the hinges. She slid back, bumping her shoulder on the wall, jiggling her wrist.
She bit her lip and squeezed her eyes shut, doing her best not to cry out in pain.
Crap. This wasn’t good. The Kelhoon were eithe
r on their way up, or just about to the top of the ladder already. She only had a minute, at best.
She eyed the rifle, and kicked the lower half, causing a portion of the upper half to bend and break off, giving her about six inches of bamboo rifle barrel she could use.
She set her broken wrist and arm on the floor, placed the tip of the broken barrel on her palm, and let the remainder of the barrel rest on her wrist and halfway down her anterior forearm. Her arm burned but she held in the scream.
She grabbed the torn piece of jumpsuit and wrapped it around her palm and the broken piece of rifle barrel, and all the way past her wrist as firmly as she could handle. Her eyes teared up in pain, and she held in a vomit. This was beyond excruciating.
She lifted her broken wrist toward her mouth and used her good hand and her teeth to tie a knot, then pulled back tightly, making sure the knot wouldn’t come loose.
A sharp sting went up to her fingers and back down her arm. She held her bloody wrist with her other hand, scrunching her eyes closed, waiting for the sensation to die down.
She opened her eyes. If the Kelhoon caught her like this, then she was a dead woman. No time for pain.
She snatched the rifle she’d just broken, and rested the now half-length barrel on her knee. She touched the trigger and aimed at the opening in the floor, hoping the shortened barrel wasn’t a major deterrent to the weapon’s function.
She remained quiet, targeting the open latch. Only an idiot would walk through that hole right now, unless they thought she was terribly injured, or dead.
They must have thought she was dead.
Fingers curled around the edge of the opening, then a green head, yellow highlights around the scaly brow, and white stripes near the mouth poked into view.
Wapooo!
The rifle pressed against the crease in Rivkah’s upper arm, letting out a purple blast. The shot whipped the idiot’s head to the side, cracking his skull where the ion blast impacted. The soldier lost its grip and fell lifeless down to the inner base of the tower, making a loud thud sound when it hit the ground.
A grunt accompanied the thud. There was no way that warrior survived the shot, let alone the fall. The lizard-head shouldn’t have made any sounds at any time after the fall.
It had to be a second Kelhoon.
She scooted over to the opening, slowly pointed her gun down, then peered cautiously through the hole. She quickly moved back, taking a picture in her mind at what she saw.
A long ladder from the lookout extended the entire way to the floor. And indeed, two Kelhoon lay at the bottom of the ladder. One clearly dead, smeared in green blood, and the other pushing himself into a seated position, rubbing his head.
Rivkah pointed her rifle at the Kelhoon, loudly whispering, “Hey.”
He looked up and hissed.
Wapooo!
Rivkah shot true—right between the eyes. The warrior slumped to the side.
She swung the rifle over her shoulder, the strap snug tightly against her, and let her bad arm drop to her side as she took a step after step down the ladder.
Her wrist aching, she did her best to use her bad hand to balance her on the ladder, practically flopping her hand on every rung, moving swiftly, holding in the agony at each step. At the bottom rung, she jumped away from the two dead Kelhoon, and landed, bending over in pain, holding her broken arm, shaking her head. There was no way she was going to save anyone in this condition.
Didn’t matter. She had to.
A cool breeze brushed against her, and she gazed up to see the bottom tower door wide open.
It was her exit. Or her death.
She made it to the doorway, and pressed up against a wall, peaking around the door frame to see if anyone was coming.
She quickly ducked inside. Dozens were heading her way, marching slowly, their rifles pointed at her tower. Slade wasn’t shitting around anymore.
She rushed over to the two motionless Kelhoon at the foot of the ladder. She patted them down, hoping to find a percussion weapon, something that resembled a G9, Galactic Scalable Offensive Hand Grenade.
Her good hand closed around cold metal. She pulled back. A knife. Kind of. This was no ordinary knife, this was a KH Whistle, which she’d used during her time in the Secret Space Program. She had no idea what the Kelhoon called these in their own screwed-up language, but these knives not only stuck into people like regular combat knives, they also had an explosive at the end of each hilt that could blow up an armored vehicle.
She withdrew it from the Kelhoon’s belt, placing it gently on the ground. She searched more, found another, placed it beside the first.
She frisked the second dead Kelhoon. Two more KHWs.
She picked them up one by one, attaching all but one to her belt. She held up the last one, tilting the hilt toward her eyes, wishing that it was day instead of night, so she could see the detonation timer.
“Just go with it, Rivkah,” she said to herself. She bit down on the dull side of the blade and twisted the round timer at the end of the hilt, hearing it click. She didn’t know how much time would elapse before the knife went boom, but going boom was all that mattered.
She flung the knife out of the tower. It whistled loudly as it flew in the air, until the blade stuck into the ground.
Silence.
Then commotion rang out from the Kelhoon advancing toward her, and many heavy feet pounded across the terrain, away from the KHW.
Rivkah hid behind the metallic tower door and crouched.
Krackow!
The tower rocked back and forth, and dust from the cement holding the rocks together fell from the walls. A few hisses and whelps told her she’d tagged some Kelhoon slime buckets. Perhaps they were down for the count, never to get up again.
A Whistle screamed into the tower, then another. Two KHW’s twirled by her, whizzing a few feet from her face, and sticking into the back wall. She heard the tick of the timers counting down, and her stomach turned into a ball of lead trying to crawl its way up her throat.
If she did nothing, in a few seconds she’d be a mess of flesh spread all over the inside of this tower.
She unclipped a knife, and ran out of the tower. The Kelhoon were already baring down on her.
She rushed forward, her boots gripping the grass with every step. She heard a Kelhoon’s rifle fire, and instinctively went into a somersault, her bad wrist pounding the ground. She came to her feet, and continued to run, wanting to scream, wanting to cry, wanting to stop everything and roll in pain on the ground, but being an easy target wasn’t an option.
She placed the knife’s blade into her mouth, clicked the hilt timer a few times, grabbed the hilt and threw the KHW to the side.
Ten more steps and she’d be on concrete, and ten more steps, she would be upon a white, round, six story building that looked vacant. All the lights were off, and the first-floor windows looked perfectly inviting.
Right now, it was her only route.
Krackow!
The concussion nearly toppled her over, but she was able to remain on her feet, moving her legs as fast as they could take her. She had no idea if she hit any Kelhoon. Maybe she killed them all.
Not a chance.
A second rifle shot, and a third, then a fourth blasted from several rushing Kelhoon warriors. Rivkah dropped to the ground again, keeping her eyes on the goal—the building—and rolled to her feet, again avoiding more rifle bolts.
Her feet now off of the grass and pounding on the hard concrete, she activated her Chi and took a flying leap. The wind rushed against her body as she flew through the air. She rolled into a ball and broke through the window. The sound of shattering glass surrounded her and the collision knocked the wind out of her.
She landed hard, tumbling to the floor, and sliding across broken shards of glass.
She pushed herself up, fighting against her body’s attempts to keep her on the ground to grab a breath of fresh air. She didn’t have time to appease her body’s wis
hes. The grunts of Kelhoon lizard-heads were coming closer.
The glass stuck into her hands and knees, slicing them open, as she made it to a standing position. She spotted steps that went up to the next floor. An ion blast tagged the wall across from her. She ran to the first landing, and went up another set of stairs.
More gunfire and she paused. Should she go through a door or keep heading up? They might expect her to keep climbing. She raced to the door to her right and burst through it. Kicking it closed, she ran down the hallway, lit by the dim glow of lights outside.
Doors lined the corridor like a hotel. Halfway down the hall, she halted in front of a door numbered twenty-nine. She gripped the door knob, and twisted.
It was unlocked.
She swung it open, swiping her sweat-covered bangs away from her face, and entered the room. She closed it softly, fighting the urge to fall to the floor and rest her racing heart, to slow her quick breathing. She was bloodied and bleeding.
And, again, she should be dead. True to form, the voice in her head painted the worst scenario.
“Screw you, Dad.” She was no failure. A survivor, yes. A strong, brave woman, capable of fending for herself, yes. Few people endured what she had in life, and fewer lived to tell about it.
She walked into a living room, which was bathed in low light, but she could see the outlines of furniture—a coffee table, shelves, two couches, and a recliner. It was all built for a human, in shape and in size.
Behind the living room was an open kitchen. Between the kitchen and living room was a hallway that most likely led to a bathroom and bedrooms.
She was inside a fully furnished fancy hotel room, or an apartment. Why was it furnished? Was someone living here?
She closed her eyes, energetically scanning the room.
She shook her head, and let out a breath. No energy signatures.
No one was here.
Ascendant Saga Collection: Sci-Fi Fantasy Techno Thriller Page 84