“Which brings us back to the whole ‘gotta fight to not die’ conundrum,” Jarek said.
“Indeed,” Alton said. “But perhaps we can adjust the scale of that fight to something more favorable.”
“A challenge?” Haldin asked.
Alton nodded. “A challenge.”
“What,” Rachel said, “the raknoth have some kind of warrior’s honor code or something?”
Alton scrunched his face. “Not precisely, but most of my kind do take fierce pride in their worth as warriors. I’ve rarely seen one of my people refuse a duel, and never a Zar.”
“Right on,” Jarek said. “So we cut off the head of the snake, and then what? Hope we can replace it with a slightly less douchey head?”
Silence and a few shrugs.
“Al’Krogoth might be reasoned with,” Alton said. “Or perhaps this Red King.”
They all turned that over in silence. Deposing one ruthless bastard to clear the way for a slightly more agreeable dictator to take his place? Who said America was dead and gone?
It wasn’t a flawless solution by any means, that was for damn sure. But the more Jarek thought about it, the more he was sure that it was the solution they needed—the one way he might be able to stop an army in its tracks with his lone sword.
Because now that the possibility was out there, he couldn’t turn away from it, could he?
Hell no, he couldn’t. Not after everything they’d been through in the past few days. Not after all the shit he’d spewed to Alaric about stepping up to the plate, about taking control.
Not when he had it in his power to save this many people.
This was bigger than him. Bigger than the dick-measuring politics and the cult-like institutional loyalties that had kept him steering clear of outfits like the Resistance for the past decade.
For the good of the tens of thousands of defenseless civilians in the area—and possibly even for the long-term survival of humanity—Zar’Golga needed to be stopped. And whether you wanted to call it fate or destiny or sheer damn bad luck, it had fallen to him to be one of the few people on the planet capable of single-handedly doing something about it.
Call it ego or recklessness or good ol’ delusions of grandeur, but, somehow, in that moment, Jarek knew what he had to do.
It was his turn to step up to the plate. This was how they won.
“Even if we can bait Golga into a fight,” Haldin was saying, “we still have to beat him.”
“He is quite formidable,” Alton said.
“Look who you’re talking to,” said the guy with the dark hair and the mustache.
Alton gave the slightest roll of his eyes but then added, “Hal does have a better chance than I do.”
Jarek was barely listening to them.
“Al,” he whispered, quietly enough that no one heard, “be a dear and open a local broadcast.”
“Sir, I know what you’re thinking, and I think you should take a moment to—”
“Just do it.”
“You’re certain?”
“I am.”
Al let out a somber sigh. “Very well, sir. Opening a local broadcast now.”
Jarek ran through a basic outline in his head, then put on his best showman’s grin and spread his hands wide, even though it was only his voice transmitting.
“Attention! To any pricks arrogant enough to call themselves the Overlord with a capital O.”
Understanding dawned in Rachel’s and Pryce’s widened eyes at the same time.
Rachel reached a helpless hand toward him. “Jarek, wait.”
He almost listened. But he couldn’t stop now.
“Jarek Slater here. Couldn’t help but notice you decided to put on your giant douche hat and start dropping bombs after we gave you the slip down South. Seriously, man? I mean, I might act like a five-year-old sometimes, but I’m only off by a couple decades. What’s your excuse, you immortal man-child?”
Rachel didn’t look happy about any of this. Haldin, on the other hand, wiped the surprise off his face and rolled his wrist as if to say keep it moving.
“Anyways,” Jarek continued, “let’s get to the point. You done crossed the line, Zar. So here’s the deal: I challenge your scaly ass to a duel. I can’t say it’s for the city, or anything like that. Those stakes aren’t mine to give. But what I can say is that if you don’t fight me, you can be damn sure every one of your red-eyed underlings are gonna know that the mighty Zar’Golga refused to duke it out with a sad little human. Oh, and the rakul, too. I’ll be sure to let them know before they rip this planet to shreds. How much favor do you think you’ll be currying after that?”
Pryce had gone a few shades paler. Haldin gave Jarek a thumbs-up as if Jarek was simply delivering a good bout at debate club rather than poking the meanest, strongest bear on the planet. Rachel ceased glaring at Jarek only long enough to skewer Haldin with the same look.
Almost done. Just one more thing.
“So what do you say, Zar? You wanna come play with my Big Whacker?” He drew a deep breath and pushed through the adrenaline-tinged fear. “High noon tomorrow. Port Newark, round two. Let’s go, you son of a bitch.” Then he allowed the fear to spill over and mix with the anger into something manic as he cried, “Toodles!”
Al cut the line.
“What the hell did you just do?” Rachel asked.
Jarek blew out a long breath, tension bleeding out of his body and leaving him feeling drained in more ways than one. “Saved the day, with any luck.” He tried to conjure a grin with the words, but couldn’t seem to find one lying around.
Rachel held him on the point of her stare until he felt like he’d shrivel. Then she whirled and stalked out of the room, cracking her staff forcefully into the floor with each step.
When she’d gone, Haldin clapped him on an armored shoulder. “That was well done.” He cocked his head. “I think.”
There were a few murmured assents. Pryce finally closed his gaping mouth.
“Yeah,” Jarek said quietly, feeling a lot less confident than he had a minute ago. “Go me.”
21
After she’d had a few minutes to cool down in the hallway, Rachel decided Jarek’s stunt wasn’t the worst solution to their otherwise untenable problem. Taking Zar’Golga on directly was far better than trying to meet his forces in the field, and especially better than doing so without crippling either side of the engagement and leaving them worthless to fight the coming rakul. And if anyone was certified for a one-on-one deathmatch with the world’s most dangerous space vampire, it was probably Jarek.
Or her.
No. On paper, her abilities might qualify her for the job. She could smack a raknoth around with the best of them. But stepping into the arena for a fight to the death with the Overlord? She wasn’t built for that like Jarek was.
She couldn’t help but wish someone else—maybe Haldin, but anybody really—could have stepped up. But she understood why Jarek had taken the hot seat, why he’d decided to take the weight of the world on his shoulders. It didn’t make her any less pissed he hadn’t thought to at least stop and talk about it, but she got it.
Because deep down, underneath the layers of devil-may-care showmanship and general wise-assery, beyond his distrust of all organized establishment, Jarek Slater was the guy who’d fight to his last breath to protect the people who needed protecting.
It was probably why she… what? Liked him? Did she like Jarek? She leaned her head against the cool cinder block wall and sighed.
Of course she liked him. She was a master of sticking head in sand, but she wasn’t quite good enough to deny that one. He was a child, and he drove her more than a little crazy at times, but he also made her smile—consistently. That was no small feat. She’d never felt safer knowing someone had her back, and sometimes, when he was looking at her, she even thought…
Jesus, what was the world coming to? And why was she lurking in the hallway like an angsty teen when there were people dying out t
here?
She needed to do something.
Jarek had played his hand, there was no stopping that now, but she’d be damned if she was going to let him waltz into that stadium and die alone tomorrow. The chances of Zar’Golga showing up seemed decent enough. The chances of him doing it in good faith and giving Jarek a fair fight seemed drastically slimmer.
So she’d go. She’d make sure Jarek’s back was clear while he cut down that savage monster, and then, with any luck, they could breathe long enough to turn their attention to other things—like the second coming of the apocalypse.
By the time Jarek and Haldin emerged from medical into the hallway, Rachel was actually feeling half okay about the plan.
Jarek eyed her as if she were an armed explosive device. “We’re gonna see if Stumpy has any useful input if you wanna come.”
His wariness only grew when she nodded wordlessly and gestured for him to lead on.
Approaching the Red King’s cell felt less intimidating this time around. After everything they’d learned, the raknoth were no longer the mystery-shrouded monstrosities they’d seemed just days ago. Still monstrosities, maybe, but it made a difference, understanding some of the hows and whys that had brought them to Earth and led them to do what they’d done to the planet.
Twisted and barbaric as their actions had been, on some level, the raknoth of Earth were still people—or beings, at least— that just wanted to be free.
Or maybe that was only Alton Parker.
Zar’Golga certainly didn’t seem to have any qualms about indiscriminately killing humans. Understanding that the raknoth were operating on more than pure evil was one thing, but it didn’t change the fact that humans were basically a resource to them and that most of them seemed intent on keeping it that way. That was unforgivable.
And then there was the other tiny ember burning her straight in the eye: the matter of what the raknoth had done to her family.
From what awful scraps her mind hadn’t wiped blank, the home invasion had always seemed like just that: a brutal but ultimately run-of-the-mill crime. People had been doing that since forever. She’d always wanted to believe it had been something more—meant something more—but John had eventually convinced her that if the answers had ever been out there, they’d been wiped clean when the bombs had fallen.
Slowly, she’d started to come to terms with it. Only to find now that there was more to it, that all the horrible events of her life really were connected, and that the raknoth were sitting at the center of it all.
She wasn’t ready to forgive that either—probably never would be. At some point, her and Alton were going to have a long, potentially painful talk about it. But for now…
She’d seen what was coming for them—in far more detail than she’d needed.
When the rakul arrived, they’d be needing all the help they could get, no matter how bitter the pill she’d have to swallow. So she kept her mouth shut and paraded after Jarek, thinking neutral thoughts.
As usual, three Resistance troops were standing guard outside the Red King’s cell.
Jarek nodded to them. “Gents.” Then, toward the cell door, “Stumpy. I know you can hear me in there, buddy. Didja miss me?”
The guards traded is this guy nuts? glances as they unlocked the door and parted to let them through. Jarek winked at the one with the key, pushed the door open, and led the way into the cell.
Inside, the Red King’s cell was exactly as they’d left it, with the one exception of the raknoth himself, who’d regenerated an alarming amount of tissue. His marred hand was now whole again, and the arm that had been removed from near the elbow wasn’t so far behind.
“Looks like you’re gonna have to rethink your brilliant nickname,” she muttered toward Jarek.
“Maybe so,” he said, “but he’ll always be Stumpy in my heart.”
The Red King’s limb lengths weren’t the only things that had changed. Inky black lines had appeared, crawling their way up along his neck from underneath his shirt collar and down along the length of his fresh limbs in patterns that reminded her of spiderwebs.
He looked ill.
“He needs to feed,” Haldin said quietly.
The Red King looked at Haldin, took a few curious sniffs, then went back to staring at the ceiling.
“That’s what those lines mean?” Rachel asked.
Haldin nodded. “He needs blood. The same thing happened to Alton when we, uh, first took him prisoner a while back.”
“Alton?”
Rachel nearly jumped at the sound of the Red King’s voice. He was watching them again with a feeble crimson glow in his eyes.
“His true name is Braka,” Haldin said.
The King gave a growl-hiss of laughter. “Al’Braka? Was he not one of the fools who ran off to die with Zar’Faenor?”
“The only one who didn’t die,” Haldin said. He looked at her and Jarek as if asking permission to continue.
She shrugged. He could knock himself out. If it got them anywhere, she didn’t really give a crap.
“He came back here to try to cure the sickness so your people can move on,” Haldin said. He reached inside his jacket and produced a small plastic blood bag he must’ve nabbed from medical. “But now it looks like we’ve got a rakul problem to worry about first.”
The King licked his lips at the sight of the blood and eyed Haldin with renewed interest. “What do you know about the harvesters, human?”
Haldin telekinetically slit the top of the bag with a wave of his finger and shrugged. “Enough to know we’re all screwed if we don’t pull our heads out of our asses and start getting ready for them.”
Another growl-hiss of laughter. “There is no ‘getting ready’ for the rakul, human. There is submitting, and there is dying. In our case, they are one and the same.”
“Well aren’t you just a chatty ray of sunshine today?” Jarek said. He looked at Haldin. “He must like you.”
The King looked like he might reply, but Haldin lowered the blood bag close to his mouth and began pouring, and for several seconds, the raknoth did nothing but slurp down mouthfuls of the dark, viscous fluid with a series of appreciative grunts.
“Well now you’re just cheating,” Jarek said. “Also, gross.”
Rachel couldn’t argue with the second part, even if the King did deserve a point or two for how tidy he managed to be in downing what must’ve been a pint of blood.
“What’s your real name?” Haldin asked when the bag was nearly empty. “I’m Haldin Raish.”
The King finished his thick drink and licked his lips clean before answering. “I am Al’Drogan,” he finally said. “Thank you, Haldin Raish.”
“Drogan,” Haldin repeated. “You’re welcome.”
“Doesn’t have the same ring as Stumpy,” Jarek said, “but hey, maybe it’ll grow on me. What if we told you that we know what’s coming, Drogan? And that we’re ready to consider setting everything else aside for the time being so we can all fight for our lives and live to kill each other another day?”
The King—Al’Drogan—considered Jarek. “If you plan to stand and fight,” he finally said, “then I would wager you do not truly understand what is coming.” He inclined his head toward Jarek. “You are a passable warrior—”
“Coming from the guy who lost his arms to me,” Jarek said.
“—but the weakest of the rakul would crush you like a petty insect—”
“Not the first time I’ve heard that.”
“—and even if you wish to make this foolish stand,” Drogan continued, an irritated growl slipping into his words, “the Overlord will never think to stand with you. He would sooner see this world burn than align himself against the masters alongside your kind. He may even think to burn it himself if he believes it will return him to their favor.”
“Yeah,” Jarek said. “That’s actually why we came to talk to you, buddy. You might have already heard in here with those creepy little ears of yours, but Golga’s ou
t there wrecking any shot we have at making this whole Earth alliance dream team happen. We need to stop him.”
Drogan took in each of them anew, scrutinizing, measuring. “You are serious about this.”
“Guilty as charged,” Jarek said.
“You do not know what you speak of. The rakul—”
“I do know,” Rachel said. “I’ve seen them.”
Drogan’s eyes widened, pulsing brighter.
“In memories,” she added, more quickly than she needed to.
Why did she care if she gave the bastard a literal or figurative heart attack?
“We both have,” Haldin said.
Drogan’s eyes dimmed. “Then you both understand how hopelessly doomed this planet is.”
“Oh, don’t be such a drama queen, Stumpy,” Jarek said. “You guys could learn a thing or two from humans if that’s all it takes for you to lay down and take it. Where’s the raknoth fight, man?”
“It died with the last raknoth clan that thought to shirk the masters’ rule.”
Jarek looked a shade less certain. “There have been revolts before?”
Drogan gave a growl-hiss of laughter. “Of course there have, you imbecile. Do you truly think my people would willingly go on like this for millennia without attempting to break free?”
Rachel resisted the urge to ask about the details of how and why the revolutions had failed. “It doesn’t matter now. We don’t have a choice here. The rakul are coming. You must’ve felt their message, even through that cloak.” She looked at Haldin. “I know we did.”
Drogan drew a sharp hiss of breath through his teeth. “Cursed void, I prayed I had only imagined it.”
“My brother was affected when the nest went off. He had some kind of seizure when the message came.”
For the first time, Drogan wriggled against his chains. “You must release me! It may only be a matter of days now.”
“Michael’s okay now, by the way,” Jarek said. “Thanks for asking.”
“What concern is the life of one human when the entire world sits on the precipice? Fools! We must move now.”
Jarek traded a surprised look with Rachel. “Just like that, huh? One hint that these guys are on their way and suddenly you’re on board with this thing you say can’t be done?”
The Complete Harvesters Series Page 43
