by Ben Hale
A touch of static followed, and then silence. Kolas nodded to himself. “We’re running out of time. We need a way out. And fast.”
Sounds of an approaching team came, and they hurried across the room to duck into the next hall. On soft feet they rushed away from the encroaching soldiers, evading a second team by seconds as they crossed a wide courtyard and entered a series of holding cells. The area’s shield emitters had been pried from the sides of the doors, leaving gaping openings into cells used to house criminals. They sprinted the length of the hallways and dropped down the end stairs just as beams of light came from behind.
“We’re approaching the south corner,” Kolas said.
“We should split up,” Siena panted. “You distract them, and I’ll attack from their flank.”
“If I didn’t need you right now, I’d be worried about your tactical talent.”
She grinned and retreated back into the shadows. She flitted through the darkness, her feet silent upon the dust and rubble. Passing a doorway, she ducked behind a broken wall just as a beam of light swung over her head. Footfalls approached, and muttered orders directed the second and third dakorians to search neighboring rooms. Just as they reached her hiding spot, Kolas opened fire.
Balls of plasma streaked down the corridor and splashed on walls and the lead dakorian, the heat burning his exoskeleton. He growled and fired back, his hammer sending ion bolts crashing into the wall Kolas was using as cover. The other two charged, using the covering fire to close the gap.
Siena waited for them to pass, then spun into the open. The firing dakorian saw her and swung his hammer, but she reversed the gravity, and the head of the lance was jerked into the ceiling. Dust and debris rained down on Siena as she sliced the dakorian from heel to hip. She struck three times in quick succession before the dakorian recovered from the shock of his hammer being yanked into the ceiling and swung a bony fist. Siena ducked under the swinging arm and backed into the darkness.
The dakorian drew his seracrete dagger and charged. “Come here, little runt,” he hissed. “I promise I’ll only break a few bones.”
The dakorian lunged, and Siena jumped to the wall. She warped the gravity so she stuck sideways, and took three steps on the wall before jumping into a rolling flip over the dakorian’s head. She caught his horn as she passed. Her body lacked a few hundred pounds to bring him down, but she leashed the gravity to her legs so that both of them tumbled backwards. Her enemy slammed into the floor, and she swiveled and drove her blade through both of his hearts. It was a lethal blow, but the dakorian struck her in the face, knocking her sprawling. Dazed, she grabbed a crack in the wall, stood, and retreated before the dying dakorian could strike again.
Blood dripped down her face where the dakorian’s bones had cut her skin. She grimaced and activated her healing augment, then remembered that Kolas would see a partially healed wound. Reluctantly, she left the cuts but numbed the wound. Her cheek and eye felt stiff.
“Quent,” the dakorian growled, his voice growing faint, “the girl, she’s a—”
She burst his communications cortex and hurried into the hallways. Following the sounds of ion bolts and plasma, she swerved through a pair of rooms and found the two dakorians closing in on Kolas. He was firing one-handed as he ducked and retreated, the ion bolts burning across his shoulders, one searing to the skin. Another one grazed his leg.
Siena hesitated as she saw them close the gap. Kolas had wounded one severely, but they would still be able to kill him. Siena could just turn and go, and with her augments, she knew she could escape the building. No one would see her ability and Ero would be safe. She even took half a step back into the darkness before her feet stalled. The guilt was as sharp as her energy blade. The seconds ticked away as Siena wrestled with the decision, and then she released an explosive breath and turned towards Kolas.
She sprinted the length of the corridor. In her haste, she forgot to muffle her footsteps. One of the dakorians turned back, grinned, and swiveled to point his hammer at her. Several plasma burns scored his outer bones, but he reached for a small circular disk attached to his belt and tossed it to the floor at Siena’s feet.
The disk opened to the sides and the gravity warped in a micro bubble, yanking Siena to her knees.
“I’ve captured the human,” he transmitted.
“Excellent,” Quent said through the beamcast. “We’re twenty seconds from your position. I want her unconscious and ready for transport.”
Siena fought to hold her head up in the gravity cage as the dakorian drew close. The second had Kolas pinned in an alcove, the barrage of ion bolts ripping through walls and shattering seracrete. Siena growled in anger and wrapped the gravity around her body, breathing it in until it seemed to cover every inch of her skin. The indigo light warbled, and just as the soldier reached for her neck, she raised her hand and grabbed his throat.
The gravity flowed off her arm and up six feet to wrap around the soldier’s neck, lifting him off the floor. His eyes bulged in disbelief and his legs flailed as he clawed at the invisible rope. He tried to swing his hammer with his free hand, but the weapon bounced off the waves of gravity radiating from Siena’s body.
“What are you?” he rasped.
“Something you should fear,” Siena said, and then hurled him at his companion.
The dakorians collided with bone-breaking force, the impact sending them crashing through the wall. The ion barrage on Kolas ended as the hammer tumbled from the dakorian’s fingers and fired into neighboring supports. The already weakened ceiling caved in. Stone and seracrete beams dropped on the two dakorians, cutting off their shouts.
Siena heard dakorians rushing up the nearby stairs. She jumped twenty feet down the hall, the gravity making her feel like she was floating, then punched the pillar next to the stairs. The gravity around her fist hit the stone so hard that it cracked in half and fell onto the steps, sending a shudder through the floor. It crashed and rolled, ripping through the stairs until it hit the landing and closed off the ascent. Muffling shouts of dismay came from the opposite side.
The last of the power from the gravity cage gone, the light around Siena’s body wavered and then winked out. She rocked on her feet as the dim hallway spun, then fell to her knees and vomited. She fought to stay conscious, and was dimly aware of a krey hand grabbing her and pulling her away from the blocked stairwell.
Kolas pulled her through the gap made from the pillar and across a new hallway. At the end, he shouldered a door open and pulled her onto a balcony. The rain finally settled her spinning vision, and she looked up into the stormy sky. Then Kolas appeared in her periphery.
“Well done, little augment.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Siena was leaning against the balcony railing for support, but the sudden fear drove away the last of her dizziness. Had he seen her? How much had he seen?
She managed a strained laugh. “I’m lucky the gravity cage failed.”
He gave her an incredulous look. “You threw a dakorian like he was a roak—and then snapped a pillar that probably weighted two thousand kilos.”
She cast about for a lie, one that would be convincing, but the krey’s eyes said it all. He’d seen her. He knew the truth. And he would tell the Rangers that Ero Bright’Lor was making augments. Her hand swung up and the energy blade flowed into her hand, extending to point at his throat.
“I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “I tried to keep you from seeing what I could do.”
“Are you going to kill me?” he asked, his eyes flicking to the blade and back.
“I don’t want to,” she replied, “but Ero is my friend. I’m not letting you bring down his House.”
“You really believe he’s your friend, don’t you?”
She didn’t move a muscle. “I know you can’t understand what that means, but it’s true. He’s saved my life and I’ve saved his. That’s what friends do.”
Shouts came from behind the door, drawing clos
er. Kolas held Siena’s gaze, and she tried to drive the energy blade into his throat, but her arm refused to listen.
The krey slowly pointed to the door. “You have about fifteen seconds before they come through that door. What are you going to do?”
She growled and tried to kill him. But again her arm refused. Fighting the dakorians was defending her life, but this was murder. And it was wrong. She felt it to her bones, and her bones would not do it. Grimacing, she lowered the blade, grabbed his elbow, and shoved them both off the balcony. To the Ranger’s credit, he didn’t cry out as they fell a hundred feet to the unforgiving street. She warped the gravity into a cushion, slowing their descent.
The moment their feet touched cobblestone she darted into a nearby alley, disappearing just as the door on the balcony banged open and Quent appeared. He swung his hammer lance across the empty space and leaned over the railing to scan the path below. In the shadows of the alley across the street, Siena held her breath as the weapon tracked over their hiding spot. Then a second soldier appeared next to the TOR captain.
“There’s no sign of them,” he said, eyeing the long drop. “You think they made it to the street?”
“Not possible,” Quent growled.
“She is an augment, is she not?”
Quent glared at him. “She can’t fly. They must be still in the building. Get the new soldiers into teams of four. I want every speck of dust searched within thirty minutes. And tell the Kildor to scan the streets. If they did survive the drop, they’re injured and won’t make it far.”
“As you order.”
The dakorian retreated, and Quent eyed the street one more time before following him back inside. Siena breathed a sigh of relief when the door clanged shut. The weakness from what she’d done with the gravity cage still assailed her body, and she wasn’t sure she was up for another fight.
“That’s the third time you’ve saved my life,” Kolas said.
“You’re counting?” she asked, exiting the alcove and threading into the alley.
“I do when it’s a human.”
She wasn’t sure if he was going to try and arrest her or leave, but he kept pace with her, and the two hurried away from the old Ranger office. Through the taller buildings she spotted the Kildor rising from the roof and beginning its search of the streets.
“Are you going to arrest me?” she asked.
“I think I’d need a dozen TOR officers to do that,” he said dryly. “Or perhaps a Heltorgreathian-class dreadnaught?”
She snorted. “I’m still human.”
“Not anymore,” he said evenly.
She stopped and faced him. “What do you want, Captain?”
“The truth.”
“About what?” She could not keep the exasperation from her voice. “You already know what I am.”
“Why did you save my life?” he asked. “What’s more, why did you come back when you could have clearly just walked away?”
“Because it was just…wrong.” She shook her head, unable to explain more.
He regarded her with a curious expression. “A human that cares about krey?”
“Not all of them.” She turned and walked away.
They continued in silence for several minutes, and she kept a wary eye on the krey officer. He walked with a slight limp and the burn across his shoulder looked painful, but he seemed lost in thought. Her own injuries began to ache, and she wished she could get away from the krey long enough to heal. But even if she did, where would she go? She couldn’t operate the World Gate to get back to Lumineia—or anywhere else, for that matter. She was trapped on the planet with no way to communicate with House Bright’Lor.
They turned a corner and found a pair of krey barring the way. They took one look at Kolas with his burned and bloodied uniform and fled, casting nervous backwards glances. Siena barely noticed them. She was tired, hungry, and alone. What was she going to do?
Ero, she mentally called, hoping he was still on the planet. But there was no response. If he was even still on the planet, he was too far for her to reach with her memory augment. She considered the time augment, but she was so tired that just the prospect made her nauseous. And she couldn’t risk losing consciousness while still with Kolas. He would arrest her and bind her in shackles so big she would never get out.
“Are there others like you?” Kolas asked.
“I’m the only one.”
It was technically true, because she was the only supreme augment. Ero had told her that half-truths were easier to deliver because one actually believed it as truth. But Kolas didn’t seem convinced.
Siena paused at the intersection between several alleys. The rain had tapered off into a drizzle, and the water trickled down the narrow streets. No one was in sight, but several of the closest buildings had lights in the windows, and music came from nearby. Kolas stopped under an overhang as she tried to pick which way to go. She needed to regroup and think.
“The Burning Ghosts,” he said.
Confused, she rotated to face him. “What?”
“That’s who allied with Dragorn.”
She frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“That’s what Ero wanted to know from the Broker.”
“And how would you know the answer?”
“They came to visit him at the Ranger office on Mylttium,” he said. “We didn’t realize it until after the fact, but a known Ghost and hornless companion came to the office on Mylttium.”
“Reklin?” She couldn’t keep the hope from her voice.
He cocked his head to the side, his lips twitching. “Another friend?”
She flushed. “Reklin used to be in House Bright’Lor, but he sacrificed himself to keep me from being taken by the Ghosts. I want him back.”
He chuckled, but the sound bordered on admiration. The gray-eyed officer glanced down the alleys, both wary and amused, but they were far enough from the Kildor that they were unlikely to be found.
“How does a human girl get a noble and a soldier to look at her as anything but a slave? Or is it the augments that command such attention?”
She bristled. “The augments only enhance what is inside. They don’t make us different from who we were before.”
“Us?” He latched onto the word. “So there are more.”
She realized she was being interrogated and scowled. “Only one more.”
“Of course there is.” He smiled as if he didn’t believe her. “But you didn’t answer my question. If it is not the augments that makes them your friends, what does?”
“You’re a krey,” she said. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me.”
She shrugged. “Before I became what I am, Ero believed in me. He gave me freedoms and trusted me. I don’t know why. I just know that I learned to trust him as well.”
“A friend indeed.”
“Don’t act like you know what that word means.”
“On the contrary,” the officer said, and his face began to change into that of the Emperor. “I have worn many faces, and learned that alliances are always fleeting. Friendships are the opposite, and they represent the only things I can truly trust.”
The face changed again as the krey advanced and walked around Siena, forcing her to turn. He first assumed the look of a different male, with a scar down one check, and then a female. She smiled at Siena’s wariness.
“You speak of integrity and honor—two attributes rare in the Empire, and even rarer to find in a human. Why?”
“I don’t know.” Siena spun to keep the krey in her view.
“I think you do.” The woman changed back to the krey officer, and then to another face entirely. “I think you understand that the Empire is broken, that the krey are trapped in a cycle of greed and corruption, and that dakorians are trapped in servitude as much as humans.”
“Who are you?” she demanded.
She came to a halt, and the face changed to that of a female Siena recognized. Ravel, the recor
der that posted secret vids of krey corruption. She had red hair and smooth skin, and her gray eyes were fixed on Siena.
“I am many faces,” she said.
“You are the Broker,” Siena said. “And Ravel?”
“Kolas, the Broker, Ravel. I am all of them and none.”
Siena frowned. “Why would you tell me such a secret?”
“No one would believe you if you shared it,” she said, a faint smile on her lips. “And strangely, I don’t think you would.”
Siena struggled to comprehend the krey’s identity. Was this a ploy to get her to betray Ero? Or was it the truth? She already knew Kolas to be a skillful interrogator, and yet something about her words rang of honesty.
“How can you be so many at once?” Siena asked.
“It’s easier than you’d think,” Ravel said. “Kolas frequently works undercover, and Ravel is known for her secrecy, as is the Broker. When Ero contacted the Broker, I opted to bring the Rangers.”
“Why?”
Ravel held her gaze. “Because I thought that augments were an abomination.”
“We’re still human.”
“Do you have any idea of the rumors about you? Some say you look like demons, that you breathe fire and can kill with a touch.”
“That’s absurd.”
“Is it?” Ravel asked. “Augmenting humans is forbidden for a reason, and altering genomes has consequences.”
Siena heard the trace of bitterness in the woman’s voice. “You’re talking about yourself,” she guessed.
Ravel’s features began to change, the flesh slowly turning knobby and white, the scars twisting across her cheeks and down her throat. It was as though the skin had been folded and refolded until it no longer resembled what it had once been.
“My House was down in the rankings,” she said softly. “My father thought we could get an advantage if we altered our genome. We had always been gifted with science, and so we tried thousands of permutations until we discovered an alteration that worked. This is what it turned us into. We gained the power we wanted, but it came at a heavy cost. There are not many of us left.”