Embers of Esper: A Sci Fi Adventure (Warden's Legacy Book 1)

by Tony James Slater

  And without warning, she surged to her feet. Aldur was caught unawares by the motion, and the girl’s hands shot out, connecting with his chest and sending him flying backwards. He hit the far wall with a crunch and slid down it. Tris tensed, ready to spring — but Lukas got there first. Brawny arms wrapped around her slender frame from behind, pinning her against him.

  The girl’s reaction took him by surprise.

  She simply shrugged, spreading her arms — and Lukas staggered back, his hold broken. Unbalanced, he tipped over backwards, hitting the floor with a groan. And the girl, moving faster than she had any right to, snatched up the rifle that Aldur had dropped and opened fire.

  She sprayed shots at Tris, then turned on the spot to hose the rest of the room with energy. Screams came from the ex-prisoners as they dove for cover, the brilliant bolts slamming into walls and flesh indiscriminately.

  Tris had his knife out, and fumbled with the staff-handle as he rushed towards her. The Aegis deflected her blasts, and he covered the ground in a few steps. He reached her with the knife, clenching his teeth as he drove it deep into her chest — but no blood welled from the wound. She shoved him instead, taking one hand off her gun to do it, and the force of the blow was like a sledgehammer. She swung to target him, pouring fire into his protective shield.

  But though shocked, he managed to stay on his feet. There was no pain coming off her; no hatred, no fury… nothing at all. By some miracle, he’d kept hold of his knife; now, with one swift click, he attached it to the staff. As the bubble around him turned bright as the sun, he gripped the weapon’s telescopic handle and squeezed. The blade shot out, the staff tripling in length. It carried on expanding until it struck the girl in the face; the alien knife met no resistance as it slid home.

  It still didn’t stop the rampage. She remained upright, clicking the trigger on the rifle as its powerpack ran dry.

  What the hell? Tris yanked the blade free, spinning the staff above his head, and struck again from the side — lopping the girl’s head clean off.

  This time he was rewarded with a shower of sparks, and the girl’s arms went limp. Her body sagged forward, but remained upright; the angle of it offered him a view right down into what should have been her neck.

  Only it wasn’t. A tangle of wires and tiny servos sputtered and popped, and a thin trail of smoke rose from the stump.

  “What the—?”

  “A talos?” Lukas was back on his feet, and he prodded the inert girl in the back. Her body swayed, but didn’t move; she was incapacitated, if not outright destroyed.

  “Holy shit!” Tris glanced around the room, at the destruction the machine had wrought. Several people lay dead, twisted at awkward angles across the floor. A few more were emerging from hiding behind the podium at the front of the room. The air was thick with smoke, small fires burning where combustible material had been hit. There was blood everywhere, and the wailing of people in pain and shock.

  And above it all, the thunder rang out again.

  Oh shit… this is not good.

  Tris went first to Aldur, leaving Lukas to start with the civilians. The young man was conscious, and Tris helped him to his feet. He had a nasty bruise on the back of his head, but hopefully nothing was broken.

  “What… what was that?” he asked, wincing as he tested his injury.

  Tris was spared the need to reply when Kyra stormed through the doors, sword in hand. She did a double-take as she entered — clearly she wasn’t expecting the scene that presented itself.

  “Tris! What the hell is going on here?”

  Jen barged in next, a scowl on her face — but she also pulled up short when she saw the carnage. Her eyes went wide, and her jaw fell open.

  “Robot,” Tris reported, pointing at the decapitated girl. It was still upright, sagging forward like a puppet with its strings cut. “With a human face, which is all kinds of messed-up. I thought that was illegal.”

  “It is… even here.” Kyra rounded on Jen. “The commander has talos? Why the hell didn’t you tell me that?”

  The old woman’s gaze travelled around the room, taking in the dead bodies and the live, writhing ones. “He doesn’t,” she said at last. “Not a chance. We’d know.”

  Kyra pointed her sword at the evidence. Her blade was stained red, Tris noticed.

  “I’ve never seen anything like that before,” Jen said, her voice thick with dread. “They couldn’t build something that dangerous without us finding out. I’ll have to check with my sources.”

  “Yeah, we might want to get out of here first,” Kyra said. “This tunnel. Can you get everyone out that way?”

  “My people will stay and fight,” Jen chided her. “We’ve got bolt-holes everywhere, and we know this place much better than the commander’s lackeys. They won’t get rid of us that easily.”

  Kyra hissed at her. “They’ve taken the level above, and they’re moving down. We’ve got to go now.”

  “How many?” Tris asked. “Can we take ‘em?”

  She shook her head. “There’s too many, and they’re popping out everywhere. It’s tunnels and ductwork all over this place; I can’t fight like that. Grab everyone who can still walk. We’ve got to leave.”

  “The escape tunnel will see you safely away,” Jen said, taking Aldur by the arm. “You have to get them out,” she told him, her eyes boring into his. “They can solve all this, I know they can. Please make sure they reach the Harrespil.”

  Kyra grabbed the old woman by the shoulder. “There’s no way I’m leaving you down here. Even if they don’t take the whole place, there’ll be nothing left for you.”

  “I’ve lived down here for twenty-seven years!” Jen snapped, shrugging Kyra’s hand away. “You think I care what happens to me? I care about my son, and I care about my people. Free them for me — and take him while you’re at it.” There was a rifle dangling at her hip; she wrapped her gnarled hands around its grip, lifting it up to check the ammo counter.

  “Your people need you,” Kyra said, pleading with her. “Come with us! We need you. Leave the fighting to the soldiers.”

  A fierce pride came into the old woman’s eyes, and she straightened as if the weight of years had been lifted from her. Both hands clutched the rifle tightly across her chest. “This is Laugarren,” she said, her voice half a snarl. “We are all soldiers.”

  NINETEEN

  The tunnel Aldur led them to was cleverly concealed behind a random row of wall panels. He prised them off with a knife, proving that they’d be hard to find on a casual inspection.

  With the panels off, a passageway into pure darkness was revealed. “It’s lit in the middle,” he explained, “but not at the ends.”

  That made sense to Tris. What didn’t make sense was that almost no-one else was going; a total of four ex-prisoners had survived the robot massacre, and one of them had immediately been inspired to join the cause. Tris felt terrible — it was suicide, as far as he was concerned, without him and Kyra backing them up. But one look at Kyra’s face told him the decision had been made. He ground his teeth in frustration. This place had been doing weird things to her ever since they’d crash-landed here. He was concerned it was affecting her judgement, too — that she was leaving innocent people to die, while they took advantage of their hosts’ secret escape route.

  Then again, he knew Kyra. She’d seen a lot of action in a lot of different places. If she thought this was the right course of action, then he was best off following her lead… for now.

  Aldur waved the three ex-convicts into the tunnel, then stepped aside to let Lukas follow them. It wasn’t the widest entrance, and it took him a little longer than the others. While they were waiting, Aldur reeled off a few more handy hints.

  “When you reach the end, you’ll think you’re in the wrong place. You’re not — trust me. There’ll be people there who can help you.”

  Kyra’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “You’re coming with us, aren’t you?”

  Al
dur looked grim. “I can’t leave my mother.” He gripped his rifle so tightly that his knuckles went white.

  “She’d want you to come with us,” Kyra told him. “She ordered you to come with us.”

  He gave her a grin that looked like death. “That’s what kids are for, right? Disappointing their parents.”

  Then he turned and sprinted off down the corridor.

  Kyra shook her head. “Everyone’s a hero.”

  Tris was standing beside the hole, not yet fully committed to going through it. “Except us?” he asked, giving Aldur’s back a meaningful glance.

  “Get in the tunnel,” she told him, sounding disgusted. “The Laugarrens were a lost cause long before this.”

  * * *

  Compared to the twisting metal labyrinth they’d come from, the tunnel was carved with laser-like precision directly through the bedrock. A rectangular shaft just about wide enough for one person, it felt far more claustrophobic than even the tightest spaces they’d crawled through on their way down here. The air was cold and stale, laden with dust that danced in the beam of Tris’ rifle-light. Panicked breathing echoed off the solid surfaces, mingling with the constant scuff of boots to make a dull rumble in his ears. He tried to calm his own thoughts, which were dominated by the carnage he’d just witnessed, and reached out behind them with the Gift to make sure no-one was following. So far, they were in the clear…

  When the dim glow of lights became visible ahead, their pace slowed. The tunnel widened slightly, and Kyra took the opportunity to elbow her way past him to the front of the group. Lukas followed her lead, apologising to the others as he squeezed his bulk past them; Tris decided he was better off as rear-guard. They picked up the pace then, with the terrified inmates responding to Kyra’s commands. Lukas’ reassuring bulk offered them some comfort, and Tris kept his mind scouring the tunnel behind them for any sign of pursuit.

  What the hell happened back there? That talos thing was a plant. The commander must have left it sitting in prison, just waiting for those guys to stage a rescue. Shit… I bet he made sure it was in our section, too. He might be paranoid, but he’s not stupid. He knew word would leak out. He’s probably got spies on their spies… He shook his head at the futility of it all. And now they’re killing each other. For no reason at all… I’m starting to see why this place does Kyra’s head in! Still. A frikkin’ robot? It looked human, acted human… hell, it even spoke! It’s like it had a personality.

  He thought about Askarra, and the handful of other AIs he’d encountered. The Lemurian Empire made widespread use of computer programs to run their facilities, and they turned captive humans into living weapons; horrendous cybernetic monstrosities. But even they don’t use robots…

  They entered the next dark section, though as his eyes adjusted, Tris could see a faint grey light peeping in up ahead. This last stretch was the shortest; all in all, they couldn’t have been gone from Laugarren for more than an hour and a half.

  The walls pressed in even closer. Ahead, and slightly above, a metal door hung buckled in its frame. It leaned inwards at a forty-five degree angle, and the end of the tunnel sloped up to meet it. Thin shafts of light were coming in through the gaps; it looked almost as bad as the bathroom door Tris had melted. He was about to voice doubt about whether or not it would open, when Kyra reached it. She paused just long enough to scan the surrounding area with the Gift, then nodded to Lukas. He braced himself and pushed up, clearly expecting a lot of resistance — but the door popped open, barely making a sound. He glanced back at Kyra, then pushed the door all the way open and climbed up through it.

  Daylight streamed in, and Tris held a hand up to block some of it. Kyra went through next, and the prisoners scrambled up hot on her heels. By the time Tris poked his head out, they were standing in a rough circle, gazing around themselves at a sea of wreckage. Huge chunks of metal were embedded in the ground like shrapnel from an apocalyptic explosion; great steel beams, twisted and blackened by fire, arched above them. Cables hung down, casting finger-like shadows across a floor mostly obscured by moss.

  At first glance, it looked like the hidden base they’d come to find had been discovered and blown to smithereens. The presence of a few small trees, struggling up through cracks in what appeared to be metal decking, told a different story. This was old damage; the forest was starting to reclaim it, though presumably hampered by the size and quantity of debris.

  “I know this place,” Kyra said, and there was something like wonder in her tone.

  “What happened here?” he asked her.

  “Oh, nothing much. Some dumb-assed kid tried to be a revolutionary. Got a lot of good people reduced to their component atoms.”

  “There’s no impact crater,” Lukas pointed out. “This was a bomb, not a missile.”

  “It was a bomb,” she confirmed. “The base here self-destructed.”

  “Not our base, I hope?” Tris lowered the bent door back into place, noting how comfortably it settled into its frame. “I’d say someone’s using this place to disguise the tunnel.”

  “Yup,” Kyra shielded her eyes and peered off into the distance. “And if those someones have got half a brain cell, they’ll be monitoring this place for new arrivals.” She dusted off a flat surface next to her and sat down on it. “Might as well get comfy. They’ll find us eventually.”

  The ex-prisoners were spreading out, stepping cautiously amongst the overgrown ruins. Lukas grunted and strode off to keep tabs on them. He looked keen to do a little exploring himself.

  Tris perched next to Kyra, his brain still churning through everything that had happened. “Should we really have left all those people to die?” he asked. He was trying not to make it sound like an accusation, but some of the hurt bled out into his voice.

  She blew out a breath. “Ordinarily, no. But Laugarrens are a pain in the ass. Too damn stubborn for their own good. I fixed all this for them before I left, you know? But were they happy? Noooooo! They had to go and let some maniac take control. How hard is it to just be nice to each other and enjoy life? I swear, they’d rather be miserable. Like now — they could have escaped with us, but they’d rather hide out in their shoddy little bunker. Defending it to the death, as though its somehow more important than any other chunk of basement.” She was getting angry now, like this was an old wound he’d poked. “The sheer number of people that died to give them their freedom, and one generation later this is what they’re up to? There comes a point where they’re just asking for it!”

  Tris took that with a pinch of salt. Evidently there was some bitterness here, and it was definitely colouring her decisions.

  Time to change the subject.

  “Have you ever seen a robot like that? It came with us all the way from the prison.”

  “Yeah… damn it. That one’s on me. Those guys kept scanning for IDs, and I never thought to check everyone with the Gift. It got so messy in there.”

  “Hey, I didn’t think of that either. Not until that thing started spraying lasers around the place. I generally don’t invade someone’s privacy unless they’re trying to kill me.”

  Kyra scoffed at him. “Tris, come on, you’ve got to stop being such a prude! I use the Gift to help me stay alive, and if I can grab some insider intel on whoever I’m dealing with, sure as shit I’m gonna take it.”

  “And yet you hate it when I look into your mind…”

  She turned to give him a reproachful look. “You read my thoughts and I will cut you.”

  “Okaaay… so… robots?”

  “No. I’ve seen illegal combat models before, but they’re usually chunkier. Armoured, covered in guns, that kind of thing. Why risk all that trouble to build something skinny and vulnerable?”

  “Vulnerable to your swords,” Tris pointed out. “And my knife. I’d be a goner without it. That thing flung Lukas around like he was made of paper. I don’t think anyone could fight something like that hand-to-hand and survive. Well, maybe Blas would have given it a g
o…”

  “Huh. Yeah… I’m pretty sure I saw Blas fight a spaceship hand-to-hand once.”

  “Really? Who won?”

  “You have to ask?”

  * * *

  Their contacts arrived not too long after.

  First Tris sensed the men, moving stealthily through the undergrowth towards them, then Kyra did. She snapped her fingers for attention, the sound loud enough against the stillness of the forest to draw everyone’s attention. She cast a meaningful glance at the prisoners, and at Lukas, then pointed — just as a squad of soldiers emerged in a crescent formation, their rifles raised threateningly. These guys sported a mottled green and brown camouflage, not too dissimilar to what troops back on Earth would wear.

  “Freeze!” their leader yelled. “You’re trespassing in a restricted area!” He was a solid-looking middle-aged man, with spiky blonde hair and a serious expression. Like all his men, he was bare-headed, though the cut of his outfit suggested parts of it incorporated armour.

  Kyra raised an eyebrow at him. “Freeze? I’m not even moving.”

  He didn’t respond to that. “You’re all under arrest,” he said. “Drop your weapons!”

  “No.” Kyra pushed off from the ledge and sauntered towards him. She had a rifle very obviously slung over her shoulder, but she made no effort to remove it. “We came through the tunnel looking for the Harrespil. I’d appreciate your help getting there, but I am done with letting people arrest me.”

  “Drop your weapons!” the man repeated. “You’re coming with us.”

  “Damn right we are,” she said. “But I’ll keep my weapons, thank-you very much.” She spread her arms as she approached him, keeping her hands in plain sight.

  He was slightly confused by this, but he wasn’t about to let her off the hook. “Stop there!”

  His men fanned out behind him, leaning into their rifles with their fingers on the triggers.