“You’re asking me to give up my position as president so you can be the president on Callisto?”
Slade eyed him intently. “Yes. This is for technical reasons. The Kelhoon want me in charge. They like my style.”
“No president would do that.”
“I want you there with me, Mr. President. I don’t want to have to tell them that you’re not on board. They need the signature. They need proof you’re going to do what I’m asking. You don’t do this, then I don’t know what they’ll do to you or your daughters.”
Craig let out an angry laugh. “You’re threatening me? You’re crazy. I’m not signing a thing.”
“You must.” Slade gestured to Craig’s computer. “Turn it on.”
“Wha – ” Craig glanced around, looking at his hidden camera again. He hoped Lon was watching right now and perhaps somehow Ken or someone close to Ken had hacked into this feed. Maybe Ken’s eyes were glued to a holodisplay now, watching this drama take place. The more eyes seeing this, the better.
Slade pulled out his pistol. “Turn it on!”
Craig turned it on and a holoscreen folded open a few inches above his desk.
“Go to our spacenet and open the email I sent to you, titled, I have your wife and kids.”
Craig’s eyes went wide. “No. What did you do?”
“Open it up and you’ll see.”
Craig’s hands shook as he opened the spacenet and then his email.
“Press on the video,” ordered Slade.
Craig did and his wife, bound and gagged, hands tied behind her back, was sitting on a bed, her two young daughters next to her, both crying, also bound and gagged. On video, Slade walked into camera view and pressed a gun against Craig’s wife’s head. He pulled the trigger.
Craig shot up at once. “No!”
“If you don’t sign those papers, your daughters are next.”
Slade walked to the door and watched it open. He took a glance over his shoulder at the President. Craig put his head in his hands, sobbing, his shoulders shaking, whispering, “This isn’t happening...this...isn’t...happening.”
Slade stepped through the doorway. “Sign the papers, Mr. President.”
Craig slid his hand under the desk and flicked the camera switch off, then wiped his tears. He took in a deep breath and grinned. “Damn, I’m good.” It was a good act, one deserving a trophy even better than an Oscar.
The next step in their plan was well underway.
26
North of Flood of Dawn, Callisto ~ J-Quadrant, Solar System
Rivkah looked over the war field, lit by several of Jupiter’s pale moons glowing on the Kelhoon encampment.
Her palms were singeing with heat, her adrenaline nearly jumping through the atmosphere. She glanced at her hands. They were trembling, not out of fear, but energy.
The Kelhoon were falling over themselves, rushing this way and that way, grabbing weapons, jumping on turrets and rotating them into firing position.
A photon grenade lobbed over a temporary encampment wall, hurtled toward Rivkah. She thrust her hands out, directing Chi at the grenade. It blew apart and a cloud of purplish-blue erupted just above the wall, shards bombarded a Kelhoon tank gunner, throwing him off the tank. He was knocked out cold, green blood oozing from his leg.
Rivkah brought her hands up and glared at her palms. She was more powerful than she could have ever imagined. She was unstoppable.
She directed her hands downward and ran toward the wall, where Atlanteans and Kelhoon were in hand to hand combat. A Kelhoon ducked an Atlantean punch and grabbed the Atlantean’s legs, swiping his feet out from under him. The Atlantean landed on his back. The Kelhoon pulled out a dagger and raised his arm for an ending blow.
Rivkah aimed her hands in the Kelhoon’s direction.
The Kelhoon lifted off his feet. He spun around, swiping at air. Rivkah dropped her arm and the Kelhoon went down fast, bouncing off the ground – unconscious.
Rivkah rushed over to the Atlantean and pulled him to his feet, then bolted toward another Kelhoon kicking the shit out of several Atlanteans. Rivkah pushed the energy through her hands, targeting the Kelhoon’s legs. His legs were taken out from under him and he flopped face first onto the ground.
He twirled around just as an Atlantean landed a foot on his chest, pinning the Kelhoon to the cold, hard, slated land. The Atlantean pointed its trident at the Kelhoon. The three-pronged weapon sizzled, then recoiled as three blasts exited the pointed barrels. The Kelhoon twitched twice before it lay at rest, motionless.
“Stop fighting, Rivkah,” came Bogle’s voice inside Rivkah’s head. “Retrieve Fox and we’ll be on our way. We have no way of winning this battle, let alone this war.”
Rivkah dropped her arms by her side, her face twisted in a scowl. “Are you giving up on us again? Wow, Bogle, this was faster than I gave you credit for. My answer is, fuck you.”
“Look over the battlefield, Rivkah. This was only a diversion and a diversion for you to get Fox back into our ranks.”
Rivkah looked around. Atlanteans were holding, but it wouldn’t be for long. The Kelhoon were amassing after the surprise attack, gathering themselves for a big push. A Leaping Lizard starfighter lifted into the air.
“Dammit, you’re right.” Rivkah ran toward a rocky hill and crouched. She lunged forward, her hands aimed at the Leaping Lizard. The starfighter halted, as if it was doing its best to throttle forward, but it wouldn’t budge. Rivkah’s hands shook and she started to perspire. Out of the corner of her eye a heavy blast rocked the ground and Atlantean body parts flew everywhere.
“Get going, Rivkah. We don’t have time for you to play around with your gifts. Go!”
“Have I told you how much I want to kick the shit out of you, lately?” She shook her head and dashed forward, getting closer and closer to the Kelhoon encampment.
The problem was the starfighter was now loose from her energy grip and flew forward, passing directly overhead, strafing the landscape. Atlantean yells and screams accompanied their spilt blood over the battle terrain. Many were dying and there was more to come.
Rivkah reached for her phaser. “Dammit, Fox.” He had taken her gun and she knew this wouldn’t be the last time she reached for it.
She ran as fast as she could. She jumped over a downed Kelhoon, its green blood dripping out of its reptile, ugly-ass mouth, eyes wide and lifeless. “Fox, you got yourself up and captured. Now, I’m having to save your ass?”
Up ahead was a metallic wall. She zeroed in on a portion of the wall, the energy rising up her spine and to her brain, allowing her mind to make calculations nearly as fast as a computer. She pushed the Chi outward, sending a pulse wave at the wall. It washed through the wall, detecting subtle particles, then exited and swept back through it like a boomerang, absorbing back into Rivkah’s neural cortex. The wall was made from Bonvoid, a metal not found on Earth. It was stronger than the best armor the Earth could ever produce. Yet, her mind told her she was powerful enough to break through it.
She led with her hands, pulsing with hot, sizzling energy, and burst through a portion of the wall, collapsing it in front of her. A cloud of dust encircled her.
She advanced into the Kelhoon camp and dodged to the right. She was enjoying herself. “Last one in to stay alive is a rotten egg.” A drip of blood fell from her lip. She wiped it away. “Who’s first one down?”
A Kelhoon back-peddled, looking more surprised by Rivkah’s sudden appearance than scared. She watched as he finally realized what she was – a young, beautiful, healthy woman standing in front of him. Murder filled his eyes. Or was that hunger? She knew, to him, that she wasn’t the predator. She was the prey. The feast.
Rivkah didn’t see it that way. “I ain’t your food, lizard face.” Rivkah raced in his direction and the Kelhoon ran toward her, unclasping his gun from his holster. He pulled the trigger.
She side stepped as the phaser charge zipped by, nearly burning her hair. She slid
and barreled into the Kelhoon, snapping his legs at the knees.
“Kajanka!” he yelled, rolling forward in pain, grasping at his knees.
Rivkah grabbed his phaser and stuck two shots into his temple. She bolted left, just as a dozen razor sharp bullets rained down on her position.
“Where am I going, Bogle?”
“Follow Fox’s trail. You’ll sense it.”
A gang of Kelhoon were rushing her position. One dropped to a knee and placed a heavy pulse cannon on his shoulder. He adjusted the scope, closed one eye, and fired.
Whooshka!
The cannon vibrated and a ball of ion energy expelled, purposely tipped with argon-ion injections to color the energy blue, so they would know exactly where the energy ball traveled. Good news for those who fired the shot and good news for Rivkah. She concentrated on the ball. She jumped to the side, rolling away from the energy charge.
The ion ball slammed into an unmanned, Kelhoon tank. The tank lifted off its sleds and bounded into the air, crashing back down. A black spot on the tank’s side armor marked the impact, but it had absorbed the ion cannon blast with ease.
Rivkah, knowing she had no chance against a mass of human-hungry Kelhoons, took off running in the opposite direction. She drained the Chi from her hands, moved it down her solar plexus, and finally into her legs. They heated up with every step she took, pulling her farther away from the oncoming Kelhoon soldiers.
A blast behind her threw rock and debris against her boots, but she dared not look behind her to see exactly what it was. It might stop her. It might slow her down. She hadn’t tested this powerful energy’s effects with running and right now wasn’t the best time to do so.
A section of the camp wall was up ahead. She darted in between a make-shift alleyway with two large buildings on either side. They butted up against the wall. The alleyway blocked the Kelhoon view of her for a moment and that’s all she needed.
Pumping hard, breathing heavy, she’d need a couple more steps before she could leap off the wall and find a new way inside or perhaps hide for a while to get them off her trail.
Two more steps. One more step. She planted her foot and jumped.
An arm wrapped around her hips and brought her to her feet, then another hand covered her mouth. She quickly pulled backward, the edge of her boot heels dragging on the ground. She did her best to wrestle herself free, but whoever had her was strong and somehow had the power as well.
A door opened and she was pulled into the building. A second later the door shut, leaving only blackness, and the dull thumps of the battle outside.
The capturer let up and Rivkah pushed away. She went into her customary Muay Thai defensive crouch, waiting for whoever it was that nabbed her. Probably a Kelhoon, or many of them.
She brought the Chi back into her hands and arms. “I’m not afraid of you.”
“I would hope not.”
It was Bogle. What the hell was she doing here?
Kelhoons were giving chase, pounded past the building. They shouted incoherent noises at one another.
Rivkah looked over her shoulder and toward the sounds, ready for the Kelhoon to break in at any second.
“Don’t worry about that now. I have the door and building energetically locked. I don’t know how long that will hold, but it will hold for a while. Their sensors will detect us any minute, but they will not dare to blow this building up.”
“Why?”
“It has their most precious artifacts.”
“Like what?” Rivkah unclipped a flashlight from her belt and turned it on. She yelped and dropped it, took a step back, and covered her mouth. “You’re sick!”
A fist pounding on the door told Rivkah that the Kelhoon had found her locale. None of this was good. Bogle had led her into another trap.
27
Edge of M-Quadrant, Nearing Jupiter ~ Starship Atlantis
Slade pushed a soldier out of the way and aimed his gun. He pulled the trigger, then pulled it again.
P-taff! P-taff!
An enemy soldier, someone wanting to help the government take control of the ship, flopped like a rag doll to the ground. Blood oozed from his neck and head. Enemy guards ducked back around the corner of the hallway.
Senator Ken Furr’s and Governor Boz Brown’s piece of shit idea was working and Slade didn’t like it. Slade was not going to allow the mutineers to succeed, not by any means.
They had taken over Deck 7 and parts of Deck 6. He hoped they hadn’t found the envoy, the Kelhoon troops that were also on Deck 6, waiting in a few storage bays, ready to strike, probably digging in to the raw meat Slade had left them. They had been there for almost a week, sneaking past the Secret Space Program’s detection system in their transport ship, using the SSP signatures Slade had assigned them.
Slade rushed ahead through clearing smoke. He shot a volley towards the enemy soldiers, keeping them pinned in position. He went down another hallway, stopped and leaned his back against the wall. He eyed his soldiers, more than twenty, hiding in doorways, weapons ready. He put two fingers to his eyes and touched his hands together. He pointed forward, indicating two enemy squads were down the corridor. Two squads meant there’d be twenty-six soldiers, which was better than earlier in the day where they had downed three other squads trying to take over this deck.
His troops nodded.
Two put up their rifles, and dashed out of their doorway, moving to the next open doorway down the hall. Then the next two soldiers did the same, moving closer to the enemy.
Slade turned on his comm device on his shoulder and brought it close to his chin, notifying Central Ops on Deck 1, a command center that was still on his side. Headquarters, on the other hand, had turned against him. “I have a small team with me. We’ve almost got Deck 5 cleared. The politicians have more troops than I thought, but we’re in need of back up. Send ASAP. Copy?” They only had about a thousand well-trained soldiers on Starship Atlantis in the first place. These were the best of the best, taken from Earth, convinced to go along for the ride – and again, to be used as slaves and food some time down the road, but right now Slade needed to use them. And they needed to be the soldiers they were trained to be – ruthless, cunning weapons experts.
“Copy that, Colonel,” replied Central Ops. “We’re sending another squad.”
Slade rolled against the wall and took a few shots into the enemy’s position. His gun clicked, then clicked again. He unclipped his empty magazine, took a full one from his utility belt, and slammed it back into his semi-automatic.
There were more troops on the politicians’ side than he first thought. He imagined forty-percent were now with the assholes trying to take over the ship. It didn’t help that Deck 7 and Deck 5 were where the troop bunks were. It didn’t help that Deck 6 was where the majority of the politician's rooms were, either.
He whispered into his comm device, speaking to his troops. “We’ll take these guys if you rush their positions. We need three to lead, the rest follow. I’ll cover you until you pass my position. This should be quick and easy. Go.”
His soldiers hurried down the hall, opening phaser and bullet fire on the hiding enemy.
Slade curled around the corner, pulling his semi-automatic’s trigger several times, riddling the wall with bullets.
All of his troops but two passed him. He butted in front of the two and followed his team.
Bwoom!
A blast went off, concrete and metal splintered out in all directions and Slade was thrown backwards, flipping in the air, landing on his stomach. He let out a loud, “Oomph!” when he hit the hard floor.
He pushed himself up, his ears ringing. He shook his head like a dog and glanced up. His troop were a mess of limbs, guts, and blood scattered throughout the hallway. He glanced behind him, wondering if any of his troop had survived the explosion.
None had. Not even close. He was the only survivor. Then again, Slade always survived. It was his mantra.
He patted himself dow
n, feeling shrapnel in his stomach, blood oozing from the wound. Why wasn’t he a pile of flesh like the rest of his soldiers? He didn’t have time to think about it. He had to get out of the blood-stained corridor and to the blocked off location a few corridors away.
“My team is lost. I’m going to ready another team,” he said into his comm device, while stumbling down another hallway.
“Excuse me, Sir?” replied Central Ops. He’d had 20 men in his command. Now there were zero. He needed reinforcements. He could hear the judgement in Central Ops’ simple response.
“They threw an explosive or perhaps rigged the hall with a loose-trigger bomb. I don’t know, but I don’t have time to find out.” He turned off his comm device and rushed down another hallway, running toward a temporary armored wall – their make-shift road block. It went from floor to ceiling. It did the trick well.
He pulled out his badge and waived it to the wall as he ran. The wall opened up, splitting down the middle and opening inward. More than thirty of his soldiers, weapons drawn, pointing at any potential mutiny-troop on his tail, were on the other side.
Slade dashed past the wall and it closed up behind him. He halted and slumped to the floor, the gouge in his stomach burning. He cringed, attempting to pull the shrapnel out. It was too painful, too sharp. He had to do it anyway. He slid to the floor, closed his eyes, and gritted his teeth in readiness. He needed to yank it out before he lost any more blood.
“Stop,” yelled Doctor Andrea Cross. She bent over him, her eyes full of concern. “You pull that out and you might bleed to death, especially if it dug into your inferior vena cava vein.” She gestured to a few troops.
They lifted him up and escorted him to a room nearby.
Andrea was already inside, a syringe in her hand. She flicked it a couple of times. “Put him on the table and leave.”
The soldiers did and walked out of the room, shutting the door behind them.
The Complete Atlantis Series, Books 1 - 5: Ascendant Saga Page 62
