Each time he did, the cub would smile and push the dog’s head away. It was entertaining to watch the captain’s expression. It was a mixture of parental pride, love and consternation. His eyes stayed on the screen for longer than a quick assessment would take, but Mack waited in silence, and I didn’t want to spoil the moment.
In the end, the Hunt Master gave a heartfelt sigh. “Show me your forces, again,” he ordered, returning his attention to Mack.
Tens obliged, and once more the screen showed the waiting vespis, weavers, humans and wolves. This time the Hunt Master seemed to notice the wolves. His ears pricked.
“Whose pack are they?” he asked.
“They are under my protection,” Mack replied, daring him to demand more.
I couldn’t see the point in hiding Angravine’s request, but trusted Mack knew what he was doing. After all, I wasn’t the one who knew the lupar best. Both Mack and Tens had been doing a shit ton more research than me on the subject.
The wolf captain gave Mack a long, contemplative look, and then let the subject lie. “They may fight,” he said, and turned to Tens. “Prepare your troops. I want us transported into the rear of Barangail’s forces.”
“You don’t want to be set down in the middle?” Tens asked, but the wolf captain shook his head.
“No, I know the caliber of mercenary he can afford. We’ll need to take them apart one squad at a time.”
It was a relief to see he wasn’t going to risk us for the sake of swift revenge.
“Understood,” Tens told him. “Let me know when you are ready, and who you want teleported with you.”
The wolf leader cocked his head. “You can track me?” he asked, and Tens flushed.
“I can monitor your movements and see who is around you,” he admitted.
The Hunt Master gave him a happy grin. “Good. Then come this way.”
He turned to Varian. “Muster the strike force.”
“Yessir.”
Varian headed for the door, his squad moving on his heels.
The captain turned to us. “Come with me.”
Mack and I waited as he rounded the desk, and then followed him out of the room.
Five minutes later, we were standing beside him as Tens wrapped us in silver and teleported us into the battle.
27—Battle Joined
“Tens, get her out of here!” Mack roared, pushing me to the ground and covering me with his body.
Case and Stepyan bracketed us, taking down the mercenaries who’d turned to face us.
Being in the front line with the wolf captain might have been an honor, but it was a disaster if you happened to have been teleported sans weapons and armor. I wondered why Tens hadn’t picked up on it sooner, and figured it had something to do with the dealing with the wolves.
That didn’t mean I wanted to be pinned to the ground as silver licked around me and then faded.
Mack and Tens swore in chorus, as the teleport failed.
“Stim me!” I demanded, figuring the wolf captain wouldn’t be happy with us for the delay.
Mack caught that thought and decided not to argue.
He slapped me with an autoinjector with the stars knew what inside it and bounded forward. The wolf captain hadn’t waited. As soon as he’d materialized, he leapt forward, catching the mercenary rear guard as they began to turn.
Like he said, Barangail could afford to hire the best, and these guys were good. If Tens hadn’t taken the precaution of setting us down under shelter, we’d all have died before we could close the distance.
The mercenaries reacted to the slight jolt in the air as we came into being, turning and firing toward it. The first barrage hit the stone wall bordering the building we’d set down in front of, as the wolves returned fire.
“Mack, incoming. Don’t let them get killed”, Tens instructed.
“Captain, my forces are arriving.”
“Relayed.”
That brief communications through the comms was accompanied by a sharp yip and a brief howl that carried over the battle field.
And then the vespis joined in.
Somewhere, either during the flight, or during the time we’d been ‘negotiating’ with the wolves, they’d found harnesses and weapons suitable for their unique style of battle. I wondered what Stepyan would have to say about them raiding his armory.
“Who do you think organized it?”
Well, that answered that, then.
I scanned the battlefield. I couldn’t go in from the front, but I sure as shit could create some havoc from the sides. I slapped Mack on the shoulder.
“Go!” I told him, and broke to one side.
My skin shivered and electricity burst through my body. Mack hesitated, but I was gone, seeing Case and Stepyan move to flank Mack, catching a glimpse of Angravine and his team as they took on the mercenaries’ flank, their outliers fighting with them, instead of to the side.
I wondered if that was normal.
‘They’ve got a point to prove,” Tens told me. ‘Focus.”
Focus. Right. I’d chosen my target.
“Remember you’re not wearing armor.’
“So?” It looked like I was going to have to be quick, then.
“Fuck.”
“Not right, now, Tens and not with you.” I slipped away from Mack, moving closer to where Angravine and his crew were working, and choosing a point the mercenaries had turned from. On one side, they were moving to end the threat from the wolf squad. On the other, they were looking to Mack.
I guess one unarmed and unarmored girl didn’t rate a mention. I laughed, remembering to keep it soft so as not to draw attention. If it worried Tens, it would worry anyone else that heard it.
‘Doc, we’ve got a problem.”
Doc? What would he need him for?
“Can you get her out of there?” Doc asked, and I moved faster.
I had things to do before they hauled me back onto the ship.
“You really want a stimmed -up Cutter on the ship?”
“Yeah, see, Doc? Someone has an ounce of sense.” As I thought it, I bounded forward. There were no convenient bodies lying at the edge of the battle field. No matter.
I might not have armor, but I wasn’t going to stay unarmed for very long.
“Oh, Hells no,” Doc answered, “but...”
“I got you, Doc.”
I was glad Tens understood, because it sounded to me like Doc hadn’t made his argument, yet.
I heard their conversation as one part of my mind rummaged along the comms line, and another mapped a path to Barangail. The only question was whether I’d reach him before the wolves did, and how many of the mercenaries around him were arach.
That thought brought more cursing, and I toyed with the idea of trying to stop Tens from teleporting me out.
“I thought I told you to put a leash on her,” the wolf captain growled, as he fired from the hip with one hand, and used two feet of blade with the other. It would have been impressive, if he hadn’t been so slow.
I leapt, just as the closest mercenary realized I might be a threat, after all.
“Ha! Sucks to be you.”
I didn’t bother trying to take him off his feet. Heavy armor kinda made that a moot point. However, he was carrying two extra blades over his back, and neither of them were strapped down. I took both, glad of the training I’d done that allowed me to use them.
“Time to slice and dice!”
That thought brought more concern, but I activated the blades and kicked off the merc’s back, flipping to come down on my feet...or that had been the plan. I hit a chunk of stone and fell on my ass, just as the merc turned.
He registered me down, but still didn’t move fast enough to nail me before I turned my awkward landing into a backward roll and came to my feet. His solids hit the space I’d occupied, and I bounced to the side, taking myself around him and drawing his attention from the vespis that dropped out of the sky to land beside him.
“We have her”. I recognized the reddish tones to her carapace, and smiled.
The queen’s guard, and she wasn’t trying to stop me. “Hell’s yes!”
“Well there’s no need to sound so happy about it,” Mack grumbled, but I could feel his relief.
“Did either one of you knuckleheads remember to let Odyssey know you were joining a planetary revolution?” Case’s words might have stopped us in our tracks, if we hadn’t been kinda busy fighting for our lives.
Mack’s reply kinda said it all. “Fuck!”
“I’ve got it,” Tens reassured him.
I let them have their conversation, threading my way through the mercenary ranks, and shredding whatever got in my way. Man! These guys had the best gear.
“You can keep those,” Stepyan told me, as I slashed one blade across the servos of a knee joint, and plunged the other through the fallen merc’s back. His spare blaster wasn’t lashed down, so I picked that up, briefly hit the ground on my belly, rolled, dropped the other blade and picked up another blaster to come up firing.
“Never mind.”
To be honest, I was a little disappointed I’d had to leave the blades behind.
“I’ll get you more,” Stepyan reassured me. “Focus.”
Focus? I didn’t know what he meant. I was focused.
I shot one mercenary in the throat, put five quick rounds through the armor seam under another’s arm and sprayed ichor from an arach soldier as he turned to face me.
“Sucks to be you,” I told him.
He showed fang in reply. “No. Sucks to be you!”
I didn’t give him a chance to explain. He was still bringing his blaster around when I walked twin lines of fire up his chest and into his head. Barangail was next!
As I thought it, two more arach closed.
“What is it? My perfume?
You’re not wearing any,” Mack replied, “but you are the biggest threat there.”
“Cool.”
“Not cool. Focus!”
Man. Why was everyone telling me to do that? It’s not like I hadn’t already picked my next two targets and wasn’t dealing with them.
To prove my point, I fired both blasters, taking out an arach with each one.
“There,” I thought, taking aim on Barangail. “Focused enough for you?”
The vespis had engaged the mercenaries close enough to realize their employer was in mortal danger. I fired, just as the wolf captain broke through their lines and drove his blade into the man’s back. A solid round burned its way along my side as Mack slammed into me.
“No. Nowhere near enough,” he told me, grunting as he stopped the rest of the rounds that followed.
“Cease fire!” That order came from a merc.
I twisted under Mack, trying to see what was going on—and then I realized I was still stimmed.
All right! That shit made me insanely strong, and Mack wasn’t that heavy...not when I was like this. Not even when he was armored...
“Don’t you...” he growled and I laughed, pushing both hands into the ground and drawing up my knees. “Girl...”
I flipped us over onto his back and rolled clear of him before he could think to wrap his arms round my chest and pin me. That might have ended badly, if Tens hadn’t grabbed me with the teleporter and yanked me aboard the ship.
“Tens! You mud-sucking, star-fu...” I stopped.
The man was grinning like a Cheshire cat and holding up my armor, a duffle-bag of weapons open at his feet. “Yes?”
“I could kiss you,” I told him, coming off the teleport station and diving for the armor.
Tens helped me into it. “Please don’t. Mack would kill me.”
Oh, he would, huh?
“Cutter...”
“You sending me back?” I demanded.
Tens rolled his eyes. “Wouldn’t go to all the trouble of getting you kitted out if I wasn’t.”
I smiled. “Good boy.”
That brought a scowl, and he yanked needlessly hard on the harness he’d pulled over the armor. “Don’t make me regret this.”
I turned, running my hands over my gear and making sure it was all there. Halfway back to the teleport, I stopped and pulled each and every one of my weapons, checking the charges and load out. It didn’t take long, and Tens whistled.
“Whatever Doc gave you, it’s made you fast.”
I stepped onto the teleport, and grinned. “You noticed, huh?”
“It’s a bit hard not to,” he replied, his hands moving over the control console as he spoke. “Now, go look after Mack.”
As I hit the battlefield and looked for Mack, I realized this latest pack of stims still left me as suggestible as all hell.
“I got you, girl,” Mack told me, wrapping an arm around my shoulders as the light faded.
Good thing he spoke, because my body was reacting before I’d registered who was grabbing me. I managed to stop the blade before I pierced his armor.
He looked down, eyebrows raised. “You good, there?”
“Sure,” I snapped, “now I know the knucklehead grabbing me is you!”
That brought snickers, and I realized the battlefield was silent. Looking around, it didn’t take long to work out why.
“Your freedom is your fee,” the wolf captain snarled, addressing Barangail’s mercenaries. “If you do not fight for me, you will spend the rest of your lives serving the lupar.”
Tens gave the alert as he spoke. “We have incoming!”
“Where’d they come from?” Mack wanted to know, keeping a tight grip on me as I looked for something to kill.
It didn’t do me any good. Even I couldn’t stop a starship coming in that fast—especially when there was no signal to ride to g...
“Cutter...” Mack’s voice brought me back, as the newly arrive wolf ships hailed Tens.
“Yes, Mack?”
“Leave the wolves alone.”
Oh? But I could get down that comms signal really easily...
Mack shook me before my mind could do exactly that. “We have other things to do.”
Oh. Now he had my attention—and then Tens dragged it back.
“We have more company!”
This time, I went straight to the Shady’s scans. Oh...I could...
“No, Cutter,” Mack interrupted the thought, and then he said the only thing that could bring me back. “I need you to help me with the arach.”
Help him with the... Hell’s yes! I could do that!
“Stay with me, then, and don’t say anything.”
I would have mimed zipping my lips, but I was far too hyped. I settled for pressing my lips together, and bouncing excitedly on the spot.
“You’re gonna have to find that girl some action, soon,” Stepyan observed, and those around us snickered.
I didn’t see what was so fucking funny. The stims ran beneath my skin, setting my muscles on edge. I wanted to run, and...
Mack took a firm hold of one hand, and led me over to where the wolf captain was standing nose to nose with the merc leader.
“Your ships are here,” Mack told him, and gave the mercenary leader a deliberate glance before meeting the captain’s eye.
To my surprise, the wolf didn’t take offense.
“That’s because we’re equals,” Mack explained, eyeing the mercenary as he continued. “If he won’t comply, I can have them teleported aboard. Just have your captains send the right coordinates.”
The mercenary gaped at him in shock. “You can’t do that! You’re...we’re human!”
“Bought by whoever pays the highest,” Mack retorted. “I’d say your freedom was a pretty good price.” He shrugged. “Feel free to disagree, though.”
“Their time is up,” the wolf captain interrupted. “I will secure them, rather than have such a threat at my back.”
The mercenary opened his mouth to argue, but the silver light took him before he had a chance.
“Thank you, Tens.”
“Easy done,” Tens replied, and I noted his comms were opened to include the wolves, “but we have a problem. “Rennet’s world sent a fleet.”
28—Plans Awry
“Rennet’s? Well, of all the stars-cursed...” Mack gave an exaggerated sigh and looked to the wolf captain. “We have incoming. Your son is in danger.”
That earned him a sharp glance. “How much time do we have?”
“Thirty minutes. Less if they bounce it.”
“The wolves could do that? I had to...”
Mack shook me...hard.
“What?” I snapped.
“Stay with me. Let Tens deal with the wolves.”
“You are needed here,” the wolf captain told him.
As he spoke, the rubble at the base of one of the nearby buildings rippled, shuddered and collapsed, leaving a sinkhole several meters across. Before I could wonder what had happened, several ants emerged: the big kind, the ones with pincers as long as I was tall.
I tried to shrug Mack’s arms clear, but he tightened his grip. The movement did not go unnoticed, and the wolf captain looked over at me, ears pricked, jaw lowered in a lupar grin. “They are allies.”
Allies, huh? I glanced from the ant leader to the wolf and then up at Mack.
“Easy, Cutter...” he murmured, and I resisted the urge to drive my elbow into his stomach...my armored elbow, into his armored gut. A fat lot of good that would do me. Later...
I settled for scowling at the wolf leader, and he cocked his head, his lip curling in a snarl before he glanced at Mack. The growl that rumbled through Mack’s chest was as much a warning to me as a signal to the wolf to keep his snout of what was Mack’s business.
Really? I mean, REALLY? Of all the macho bullshit. This time, I did drive my elbow into Mack’s gut...and then I stamped down hard on his foot. The elbow did about as much as I expected it to, and so did the foot.
Mack was fully armored and unamused.
“Do you mind?” he demanded.
“There are more arach,” I growled, having watched several of the spider warriors emerge from the base of another building.
The arach king had come to play, and I wondered what was so important about taking this world that he would risk himself in battle. From what I could gather, his sole purpose was to attract a queen and perpetuate his line. For him to be out here on the field meant there was something in the rebel command center we didn’t want them to have.
Mack 'n' Me: The Wolves of Alpha 9 Page 24
