Battle For Earth

by Daniela A. Wolfe

  We killed dozens of hunters, peppering them with blasts, but there were dozens more to take their place. We were able to pick them off one by one and I was beginning to think that we might get out of the whole mess in one piece, but then everything went to shit.

  “Fuck!” Lily cursed. “The reactor is getting hot. I have to bring the shields down.”

  I gritted my teeth and nodded as Lily scurried back into the ship. I focused my efforts on killing as many warriors as I could before they came down. I only managed to take out a half a dozen before I was suddenly lambasted with a deluge of water.

  “Take Cover!”

  I didn’t look up or wait for further confirmation that the shields were indeed down. Instead, I leapt forward and slammed into the nearest Qharr sending my unsuspecting victim careening down to the ground. A second warrior met a similar fate, but when I spun around to face a third I realized that this time my opponent was Duvak.

  I got the first blow in and immediately ducked when he attempted to counter. I dove in, swing my fists at his chest, but he blocked me and sent me spinning away. We circled each other exchanging blows, but neither one of us gained the upper hand. Finally, I faked left, but then spun around kicking him across the waist. The blow got in, but then so did his counter attack. I fell backward landing on my ass, but was back on my feet in a heartbeat.

  Several times I felt something slam into my back, but I was so caught up fighting Duvak that I had no time to investigate. I gritted my teeth against the pain, each time it faded away and was accompanied by the soft metallic ping of something hitting the floor. I didn’t spend the time to investigate what it might have been, but it seemed pretty obvious the gray skins had a new weapon. Something, no doubt, specifically targeted towards bonded humans.

  I heard screams from my friends, but for good or bad I was too occupied with Duvak to help them. Duvak was a skilled and cunning fighter and I knew the longer we fought the more likely he’d find a weakness and expose it. The sooner I ended it the better, but that was easier said than done and every time I went in to attack he either blocked me or else countered. I decided to try a different tactic. Instead of pressing the attack, I’d let him strike first then see if I could sneak in a blow and do real damage when he least expected it.

  I didn’t have long to wait. He came lumbering in with fists swinging, and while I was able to block each of his attacks he kept me on my feet, I wasn’t able to counter. One of his attacks, a stinging blow against the side of my jaw, got in and I was sent careening into a nearby cluster of boulders. I shook my head and before I could duck out of the way another slammed into my shoulder. I grunted then staggered away just barely managing to block a third and a fourth blow. I regained some of my composure and countered with two successive blows to the head.

  He seemed dazed and I seized the opportunity to follow up with another punch. This one he was able to block and I went on the defensive again as he rushed me delivering blow after blow. I blocked each one as best I could, but every one of his attacks seemed to be strategically placed and it was getting harder to block them.

  His attacks forced me back into the cluster of boulders. They were tall and smooth and lacked any handhelds for me to grapple, and because Duvak had me cornered the only avenue of escape was up. Any ordinary human might not have been able to climb out, but with my abilities it was well within the realm of possibilities.

  Unfortunately, Duvak was pummeling me with blows and I was having less and less success blocking them. Every time I tried to scale the rocks, my former master grabbed me by an ankle or a wrist and dragged me back down. I had as good as given up, but then I heard my sister’s voice call out.

  “You bastard! Get away from my sister!” Becca’s screams were followed by a round of phase blasts which slammed into his back.

  As I expected, they didn’t have any physical effect on Duvak, but they distracted him enough that I was able to break free. Duvak backhanded Becca and she went tumbling to the ground at his feet. I moved in jumping up and slamming my elbow into his chest, the blow was powerful enough that it sent him stumbling back a few steps and more importantly it diverted his attention from my sister who was still struggling to recover from his blow.

  “I’m the one you want. Leave Becca the fucking hell alone,” I screamed jumping up and kicking him across the chest with both feet which proved to be a mistake. He grabbed me by the ankles, spinning me around and slammed me into the boulders with such force that I could actually feel pieces of the rock break away. Once my vision cleared, I found that Duvak had one of his hands clenched around my throat. “Now, it is time for you to finally die.”

  I gasped for air clawing at his hand, as his it tightened around my throat. I kicked and pummeled his arms, but his grip was like iron and my efforts all proved futile. It was over, that bastard had won, and as hypoxia settled in I felt a grim sort of acceptance come over me. I didn’t know what the next life held, but I really hoped that I would at least get to see my parents again. I saw a bright light, but before I could reach out to it I was suddenly thrown to the ground and, after a period of near endless coughing, air flooded back into my lungs.

  I shook my head and looked up to find Becca standing just to Duvak’s side. Our former master had a knife firmly embedded into his arm and it didn’t take a genius to realize that my sister had put it there. The High Inquisitor pulled the knife free then let it clatter to the ground. He pulled a phase pistol from the holster under his arm then trained it on Becca who flinched away from the weapon with wide eyes.

  “You are nothing more than a hindrance slave. You were useless from the day I first captured you. It’s time your meaningless life comes to an end,” Duvak narrowed his eyes and squeezed the trigger.

  I screamed out, and jumped to my feet, but it was Kaya, appearing from nowhere, who slammed into my sister and took her place as the beam blasted into her chest.

  “Kaya!” I screamed and reached out to catch her as she fell.

  When she landed in my arms she turned to meet my gaze. I will never forget the look I saw reflected in her eyes and I somehow knew she only had seconds left. She reached out to touch my face and I saw something reflected within her eyes that I thought I would never see again, love.

  “Lexa… I’m sorry, for everything,” Kaya whispered reaching out to touch my face, just before the life drained from her eyes.

  Unable to look into those once bright eyes, I glanced down at the phase wound which had consumed much of her chest. Thee damage was severe and the phase energy had cauterized much of the wound, but in a few places blood was seeping through. A few drops splattered against my arm and I gasped then dropped her lifeless corpse. I let out a blood-curdling scream as I stared back at Duvak and rage exploded out from me like molten rock from a volcano.

  “You,” I said narrowing my eyes and gritted my teeth. He’d had a hand, with direct or not, in nearly every horrid thing that had ever happened to me. He had taken part in the invasion of Earth, murdered my parents, separated me from my sister and finally killed Kaya while trying to kill Becca. It was time he got his comeuppance, and I wanted to, no, I _needed_ to be the one to end his life.

  “You fucking bastard!” I yelled snatching my sister’s knife from the ground and pounced on him. He didn’t know it yet, but he’d just signed his own death warrant.

  Coalescence

  Duvak’s attack on our ship had left us devastated with little hope of escaping. Would we once again escape the clutched of the Qharr or would we face a gruesome and terrible fate as we fought to stay alive?

  Chapter One

  Kaya was dead. The same thought repeated itself over and over in my mind. I had witnessed the death of my parents and countless friends over my short twenty-eight years, but Kaya’s was different. My parents’ demise had a vague and distant memory and life under the gray skins had taught me to expect loss, but this was too much. The mother of my child had been killed right in front of my eyes by the very same bastard w
ho had killed my parents.

  I screamed, producing a howl of pure primal fury that sounded inhuman even to my ears and pounced. I slammed my knife into his chest and yanked it free with a speed and strength that no other human could match then I stabbed again and again filling his torso with stab wound after stab wound. The ferocity of my attacks was such that Duvak could do nothing to counter me. In a few short moments I had him pinned against the ground. His wounds were starting to heal–no doubt the work of his symbiote–and I knew that the small blade would not be enough to kill my former master. At least not in the way I’d been using it.

  I brought the blade away, gritted my teeth and readied myself to plunge it into his throat, but before I could Duvak wrapped his massive paw around my hand and forced it away. He pushed back into me, the knife clattered to the ground and I was thrown away with near-bone-shattering force. He didn’t give me a chance to recover before rolling on top of me and started pummeling me with blows.

  I kicked out at Duvak with both legs and was able to gain just enough room to escape his grasp and jump back to my feet. I lunged at him, but before I could even blink he slammed his hand into my throat and pinned me against the ground. Duvak may have rallied, but his counter attacks were only serving to make me angrier and even more determined to end his life.

  I swung at him with my one free arm hitting him in the side of the head. He grunted and stumbled backward bringing a hand up to steady himself. I slid back down onto my ass, snatching up the knife then pounced on him slamming it into his chest as hard as I could. He jerked back and the blade slid free from his chest. I stabbed him again, this time with enough force that the guard and part of the handle were plunged into his chest. I twisted it and pushed it farther in until it was firmly embedded then I planted a fist in his jaw and watched as he spun away. He collapsed to the ground in front of me.

  I fell to my knees in front of him, pressing my arm into his throat as I gritted my teeth and glared down at him. “Die you bastard!”

  Duvak coughed spraying my face with blood. I narrowed my eyes and brought my free fist up. I slammed it into his face as hard as I could then brought it back for another strike and another. I just kept hitting him and on the fifth strike, I heard his skull crack. On the tenth blood, pieces of bones and brain matter splattered all over me. Even as my fist smashed through his face, completely obliterating the bone underneath, I just couldn’t stop.

  “DIE!” I screamed pummeling what was left of his face with blow after blow and even after I had beaten it to a bloody pulp I continued pounding at his head.

  Something touched my shoulder and I looked up to find Lily frowning down at me. “Alexana,” she said biting back tears as she shook her head. “He’s dead.”

  I gasped and looked down at what was left of Duvak’s head, shuddered and rose to my feet wiping the blood clean as best I could. My whole body shaking and when I turned to look around, I found all eyes on me. The fighting had momentarily ceased and for a moment I simply stood there staring at my hands and trying to fight down the urge to vomit.

  I’d had my revenge, Duvak was dead. So why then did I feel so empty? I wanted to curl up into a ball and cry, but I had just enough sense left to realize what a bad idea that would be. I locked my eyes on the opposite side of the field where the gray skins were watching me, and as if obeying some unspoken cue they opened fire.

  Most of the blasts were phase bolts and they weren’t directed at me, but four of the hunters had some large and cumbersome-looking weapons which were trained on me and Lily. I’d never seen their like, but as soon as I saw them I knew that they were responsible for the stabs of pain I’d felt while battling Duvak. Which meant they were some sort of projectile weapon and capable of doing both me and Lily harm.

  At this point, I wasn’t in the best state of mind as obvious by the way I’d pounded Duvak’s skull to mush and my own safety and well-being didn’t even come near to topping my list of priorities. I charged down the corridor screaming at the top of my lungs and slammed into the nearest of the hunters before she could open fire. I killed her, then rounded on the next, but before I could attack a barrage of bullets blasted into me.

  I grunted, gritted my teeth against the pain then pounded my fist into the nearest of my attackers. After three strikes he was down and I lifted up his body just enough to provide cover as the other two gunners opened fire. My skin started to itch and tingle and I could feel something pop out as Khala healed the wounds. It happened a half a dozen more times and each of those instances that a bullet was pushed out, my enhanced ears could hear the sound of the bullets’ splashing into the muddy ground.

  I rushed forward, with the corpse raised in front of me and slammed it into the nearest of the hunters. The third gray skin collapsed to the ground against the brunt of my attack and I spun around ready to pound on the final gunner. He put two bullets into me–one in my shoulder and another struck just a few inches away from my heart–before I was on top of him. I clenched my hands around his weapon, and forced it out of his grip.

  He actually got in a few punches before I was able to subdue him. He struggled, but snapping his neck put an end to that. I heard a low growl from behind and swirled around to watch the third gunner spring toward me. I jumped aside then jammed my elbow into his back forcing him into the same cluster of boulders that Duvak had corned me inside of. From there I made short work of him, by grabbing him by the back of his head and slamming him into one of the rocks.

  There were only three hunters left after I had taken care of the gunners, and I didn’t even have to raise my hand. Lily took out two of them and Farris finished off final one with a rapid succession of shots. I closed my eyes and fell to my knees, letting out a long drawn-out sigh. “Th-that takes care of th-those bastards, but what about the rest of them. The ones on the destroyer?”

  “The way I see it we have two options,” Rayland replied. “Simply put we can either run or fight.”

  “Fight? How the fuck are we supposed to do that? We don’t have any damn weapons on that tub!” Farris yelled his voice taking on a frantic edge.

  I opened my eyes and found my sister hovering over me. She pursed her lips and eyed Farris then turned back to regard me with wide-eyes. “Couldn’t we board their ship and disable it, or something?”

  “Yes, it’s either that, or we run. Like Rayland said.” I nodded fighting back tears as I folded my arms across my chest. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m sick of running. I’ll go into the ship, the rest of you stay here.”

  “What!?” Lily and Becca protested in unison each taking a step forward.

  “Lil, besides me, you’re the only person here who has even the remotest chance of being able to fly this thing. It’s better if I go alone anyone else would just slow me down.” The words made perfect logical sense, but in truth I didn’t want anyone else to come along because I was afraid that they’d get themselves killed. At least, if I went the only person who could be harmed would be me.

  “Fine,” Lily said clenching her fists at her side as she glared at me.

  My sister bit her lip and stepped back. “Just don’t die on us, okay?”

  “I don’t intend to.” I whispered stepping toward the exit hatch. “Just make sure the ship’s ready. I’ll be back, shortly.”

  Chapter Two

  I have to admit, a part of me really got a kick from the look the guards gave me when I let the corpse I’d propped up in the airlock viewport collapsed at their feet. I quickly dispatched the first, but the second gave me a little more grief. He head-butted me, just hard enough to disorient me, then took off running.

  I caught up to the wry bastard and slammed into his legs. We both went sprawling to the ground, but not before a loud screeching howl echoed through the corridor. I slammed my fist into the side of his head and untangled myself from his inert form as Khala’s form materialized in the corridor. “Well, that didn’t long.”

  “What?

  She folded h
er arms across her chest and pointed up at the ceiling. “The alarm.”

  “Yeah, speaking of which. Now would be a very good time to tell me where to go!”

  “I don’t know the ship’s exact layout, but your best bet is to find the engine room which should be in the back of the ship. From there you can do a lot of damage and, fortunately for us, they’re not as well guarded as the control room or the weapon room. You better hurry, it won’t take them long to find you.”

  I nodded and took off running down the corridor, moving at speeds that even a member of the Edant K’teth would be hard pressed to match. My advanced reflexes and eyesight allowed me to turn corners without slowing down, but when I found the corridor packed with gray-skinned guards I was forced to come to a stop.

  I slammed into the foremost sending him, and the duo behind him sprawling to the ground with bone-shattering force. The six remaining guards pounced on me much faster than I had anticipated, but not so quickly that I wasn’t able to counter. I blocked the first guard’s attack with my right hand then pounded my fist into the chest of the next attacker. His head snapped back and he collapsed to the ground.

  A hand grabbed me from behind and I coughed as something sharp burst through my rib cage. I gasped and glanced down to see a long blade protruding from my chest. I elbowed my attacker and I fell to my knees as he slid the blade free. Blood dripped from my mouth, I grunted, and gritted my teeth as wound began to heal, but not before I felt it slide its way into my back again.

  ‘That blade came dangerously close to hitting your heart. You need to neutralize that weapon before one of these sons of diseased dre’ks manages to kill you.’

  “One of these days, Khala, you and I are going to have a long talk about stating the obvious.”