by Kyle West
The entire ground was a single, teeming mass of movement. It seemed to...slither...from east to west in an unending tide, breaking against the steep eastern slope of the plateau, an island in a roiling sea. The tens of thousands of monsters on the ground seemed to move as a single entity. And above, swirling by the hundreds, were the xenodragons. More yet joined the fray from the east. This swarm was at least five times bigger than the one we’d seen in Los Angeles, and perhaps even larger, especially as more monsters reinforced from the east.
The plateau, by contrast, was bare. A thick line of soldiers manned its eastern flank, defending it from the coming storm. I couldn’t even imagine what was going through those soldiers’ minds.
Situated in the center of the plateau was the railgun, pointing to the east. A streak of fire shot from its long barrel, almost instantly connecting with an unsuspecting dragon. The force of the projectile pushed the dragon upward, sending a purple spray of blood out the dragon’s back. It spiraled to the ground below, just as a thunderous crack and boom resounded, audible even inside the bridge. The ship’s hull vibrated.
“Damn,” Julian said.
“We can’t come in from the east,” Makara said. “It’s too thick.”
The railgun shot again, blasting another dragon from the sky.
“Go around,” Anna said. “Come in from the west.”
“Yeah, on it.”
Makara changed the ship’s trajectory, sticking to the periphery of the battle.
Jonas’s voice left the speakers.
“Makara, that railgun will tear you to shreds. It’s completely automated and might mistake you for a dragon.”
“We’re moving,” Makara said. “We’ll be on the ground soon. From the west side.”
“We need everybody down here. The men could use your encouragement.”
“Where’s the Emperor?”
“On the frontlines, with his men,” Jonas said. “Same as Carin.”
“I didn’t ask about that scumbag. Just tell Augustus we’ll be there soon.”
Before Jonas could even confirm that order, Makara switched the channel off.
We descended toward the plateau’s western side. The mood on board became tense. I could see the railgun firing another shot, not too far away. Yet another a stream of fire belched from its barrel.
At last, Perseus touched down next to Orion. Everyone made for the armory, where Samuel doled out its stock of rifles, handguns, grenades, and hundreds of rounds of ammunition, all of which everyone stuffed into their packs. Fully loaded magazines clicked into place. Once everyone was armed to the teeth, he shut the armory door.
When we had all gathered in the wardroom. Samuel faced us all. Anna joined me.
“Whatever happens out there,” Samuel said. “We will make it through, believe me. I know what we saw out there might seem impossible to deal with. We just have to hold on, for as long as we can. Let’s give them hell.”
Makara walked to the door. “Alright. Let’s go kill some crawlers.”
She pressed the exit button, opening the door to the plateau. Anna and I watched as everyone walked out.
Michael was the last to go. He held Lauren, kissing her on the lips.
“Don’t die,” Lauren said, after they had parted.
“I won’t. Tell Callie I love her.”
“Don’t talk like that,” Lauren said. “I thought you were coming back.”
“I am,” Michael said. “Still...tell Callie I love her. That I always will.”
“Go, Michael,” Lauren said, tears in her eyes.
Michael adjusted his rifle strap, looking at Lauren a moment longer before walking off the boarding ramp. He didn’t look back as the door shut behind him.
Lauren turned to us, wiping the tears from her eyes. “Let’s get moving. We can’t hang around here any longer.”
We returned to the bridge, Anna taking up the controls. The engine had merely idled while we waited. With a pull of the control stick, Anna lifted Perseus into the air.
In front of the ship, I could see my friends running to the frontlines – Makara, Samuel, Michael, Ruth, and Julian.
I could only hope they were still standing by the time I got back.
***
We were making good speed north when the first dragon attacked. A whoosh of wind, followed by a piercing wail, shook the frame of the ship.
Anna angled the ship into a dive. “It’s to starboard.”
“Two more aft,” I said, looking at the LCD. “Make that three chasing us.”
Anna increased the thrust, pushing me back into my seat. Lauren gritted her teeth against all the twists and turns.
A dragon appeared from the sky above, dead ahead. It went into a dive.
Anna mashed the control stick and two missiles streaked outward, hissing in the air. Anna swerved to port just as the explosion crackled and boomed, shaking the bridge in a fiery explosion of light.
Ahead, no dragons threatened us from outside the windshield, and the safety of the clouds was near.
“Those dragons are still riding our ass,” Anna said.
“They’re so fast,” Lauren said.
“Yeah,” Anna said. “They do seem faster.”
“It’s the evolution,” I said. “They’re stronger.”
The entire ship jerked from back to front, the motion sending the ship into a slight spin. Anna steadied the ship’s course, giving it more thrust. The ship pitched again, violently, pointing the nose downward at the xenofungal plain below. Lauren screamed as we fell forward in our seats, restrained only by our seatbelts.
“Let me try something,” Anna said. “Hold on.”
She angled the ship even further down, at almost a forty-five degree angle. Lauren continued to scream as butterflies flew in my stomach. It was astounding how quickly the ground rose to meet us. The ground was close enough for me to see individual xenotrees and crawlers.
There were but a few seconds until we crashed.
“Anna!”
At last, she pulled the control stick back. The ship’s hull gave a great groan, as if it would rend in two. The ground was so near we must have been no more than thirty feet above it. Several of the crawlers were even trying to jump at us.
By the time we leveled out, I glanced at the LCD. The two dragons exited their dive, wings outspread. They had no problem keeping up with us, despite Anna’s gymnastics.
“Shit...” Anna said.
“Do something!” Lauren screamed.
“I’m trying! And you’re not helping.”
Anna swerved to the right, still skirting the ground. Hills, boulders, and dips in the terrain changed so quickly that it seemed impossible that Anna could react in time. I closed my eyes, knowing death was a possibility with every passing second. We zoomed over a hill filled with xenotrees, dipping over it as quickly as we’d gone above it. The LCD showed the trees ripping to shreds in our wake.
The dash read 168 mph.
“Anna...” I managed. “You have to end this.”
Gritting her teeth, she lifted us from the ground. The two dragons followed as if they were on leashes.
“I can’t lose them,” she said. “Anytime I pick up some speed, they cut me off and slow me down.”
Ahead, a flock of dragons swarmed toward the frontlines. Three of these dragons peeled off and headed in our direction.
“They’re herding us over there,” Anna said.
She turned to starboard, only to see two dragons blocking the way out. She angled upward, back for the clouds. Again, a dragon bashed the ship’s stern, making the ship lurch. In the crimson sky above, yet two more dragons went into a dive.
“We’re through,” Lauren said.
Jonas’s voice escaped from the dash.
“Anna. To port!”
“That’ll throw me right into the dragons!”
“If you want to get out alive, you better do as I say. Now do it!”
After a slight hesitation, Anna swerved l
eft, directly toward a massive dragon gunning right for us.
“Time to play chicken,” she said.
“You can’t play chicken with something that doesn’t care if it dies,” Lauren said.
“Jonas!”
“Hang in there....any second now.”
All we had were seconds. The dragon neared, neck outstretched and jaw agape. It let out an unholy roar. I closed my eyes and screamed.
When I opened them, a massive geyser of purple blood gushed from the dragon’s side. It shrieked as it spiraled to the ground. Anna lifted the ship just enough to pass over its falling form. The air crackled with the energy of the projectile that had obliterated the monster.
In the LCD, more dragons erupted in bursts of organic matter and chips of bone, misting the air with purple blood. Another dragon’s head simply disappeared, its neck writhing like a worm as it plummeted to the ground. Several more cracks resounded in the air.
The railgun had opened an escape path, and Anna veered the ship upward, at last gaining the speed necessary to outfly the dragons. As we ascended, several trailing dragons were shot down. Ripping sounds emanated long after the projectiles had hit. Realizing we were going to escape, the remaining dragons turned to rejoin the main host assaulting the plateau.
We sailed upward, none of us speaking. Anna didn’t slow down, even as we raced above the clouds.
We had escaped with our lives, and we had Carin and his railgun to thank.
***
The rest of the journey was made mostly in silence, and it wasn’t long before we began our descent. Anna alerted control of our arrival, and soon enough, we were descending through the open hangar door and settling on the floor. Word of our arrival had spread quickly – people stood on the periphery of the hangar, staring up at us.
As we walked Lauren to the blast door, we made our farewells.
“Please be safe,” Lauren said, pressing the exit button. “Don’t do anything stupid. Make sure Michael doesn’t do anything stupid, either. We’ve come too far for anyone to die now.”
“We’ll be careful,” I said.
When Lauren left, we returned to the bridge and immediately lifted off. We had to return to the battlefield as soon as possible.
During the flight south, Anna and I were quiet. I stared out the windshield, thinking mostly about Quietus. It had been about four hours since we left the Xenolith, and it would be quite a few hours more before Quietus even arrived at Ragnarok Crater. Considering how long she would have to speak to Askala to convince her, the clock was running against us.
And these dragons definitely seemed to be flying faster. What changes had the new strains made to the crawlers, or the Behemoths, or even other forms of xenolife that were surely attacking us? I thought of the three-headed Hydra we fought in Bunker One, and that strange, creepy monster we found in the Elekai forest underneath the Xenolith – the one that had attacked the Wanderer.
We would only find out what we were up against in due time.
***
We landed on the other side of Orion, near the railgun, within the circle of stakes the Reapers had built. No dragons had intercepted us during our descent, seeming to be concentrating mostly on attacking the front lines.
Anna called Makara’s channel. At first, there appeared to be an answer, but the only thing that exited the speakers were terrible sounds – screams, inhuman wails, high shrieks, and gunshots. Outside the ship, the railgun gave a deafening crack, followed by a deep boom.
“We have to go after them,” I said. “I’m not waiting here while Makara and the rest are in danger.”
“Let’s go, then.”
We headed for the armory. We slid the door open and filled our packs with ammo. I grabbed some 9 mm rounds for my Beretta, and 5.56 mm rounds for my AR-15. I hastily loaded the magazines for each weapon, throwing the rest of the ammo boxes in my pack. Meanwhile, Anna armed herself with her own assault rifle – she preferred to use her katana, but firing at long range would be a necessity out there. With just the two of us, we needed all the firepower we could carry.
We entered the wardroom and stood before the blast door. Anna looked at me.
“Ready?”
Before we stepped out, I kissed her on the lips. She seemed surprised by the move.
“Let’s kill as many of these freaks as we can.”
Locked and loaded, we stepped outside to face whatever was to come.
Chapter 14
When I hit the ground, the stench of blood, rot, and God knows what else assaulted my nostrils. The plateau appeared empty beyond the stakes implanted in the xenofungus – empty to the frontlines, perhaps half a mile away.
On our right, the railgun fired again, deafeningly loud, the sound like a colossal whip. The wind blew from the east, carrying with it the reek of thousands upon thousands of monsters.
Men stood at the railgun’s perimeter, their rifles pointed outward. We’d have to run across the empty expanse of the plateau to reach the frontlines, where Makara and the others had gone.
Anna and I weaved between two of the stakes and looked across the plateau. Nothing moved in any direction, so we set out at a quick run, toward a small rise a few hundred feet away. The shorter the amount of time we were exposed on the open terrain, the better.
We reached the rise, not slowing our pace as we raced to the top. I felt my heart beat wildly, but I only had to push myself long enough to reach the battle. Once we crested the top, we saw two crawlers engorging themselves on the flesh of a fallen soldier. These things were covered in thick chitin, from their angular heads to the tips of their scorpion tails, and were far more armored than any crawler we’d ever encountered. Three glowing eyes shone through their armored shells, one on each side of their heads, and one in the center.
Upon seeing them, Anna and I dropped to the ground, working ourselves back so the hill would obscure us. Unfortunately, both creatures caught wind of us, somehow. Their heads turned in our direction, and they let out shrill shrieks as they charged up the hill.
Adrenaline coursed through my veins as I jumped up, raising my rifle to my shoulder with surprising alacrity. I fired several bursts into the lead crawler, and was soon joined by Anna. Our bullets ricocheted off their chitin, sending showers of sparks to the xenofungal surface. Both crawlers approached at a scuttling run, and our bullets merely glanced off their shells. They would do zero damage unless they hit the right spot.
We could do nothing but back away and take careful aim for their heads and eyes – which was nearly impossible to do considering their speed. The crawlers were now dashing up the hill, and by some stroke of luck, I got a few key hits on the left crawler, in the lower neck. It stopped in its tracks to shake its head, temporarily immobilized. The crawler on the right surged ahead. As it neared, Anna lowered her gun, letting it hang by the strap as she unsheathed her katana.
“Cover me.”
The lead crawler’s tail arced in the air. The spike jutting from the tip of its tail swirled, rising high over its body. The tail struck back and forth like a scorpion’s.
“Back!” I said.
The crawler screamed, charging right for Anna. I fired at the creature, somehow hitting its tiny head. The crawler hissed and changed trajectory, scuttling right for me. Its spike arched back, readying to strike.
Anna intercepted the monster, blade flashing.
I ran forward to hold Anna back, but she only charged for the crawler, closing the distance. The creature drew itself to its full height, at least twenty feet tall – a fair bit larger than the crawlers we’d fought before. The tail swiped around its body, overshooting Anna by inches, who now stood frighteningly close to the monster. There was nothing I could do but take careful aim above Anna’s head and fire into the creature’s exposed underbelly.
When my shots connected, the crawler shrieked, but still focused on stabbing Anna with its tail. She lifted her blade, slashing the creature’s belly from top to bottom. The crawler screamed as it t
oppled forward. Anna thrust her katana deep into the creature’s gut, withdrawing a blade coated with purple blood. Blackened entrails spewed from the fissure, covering Anna from head to toe in sickening filth. As the creature fell, Anna backed away. The crawler’s tail convulsed, wrapping Anna in a viselike grip, constricting. Her arms were lifted above her body, her right hand still wielding her katana. She allowed the katana’s blade to rotate downward, grabbing the hilt with both hands.
I ran forward as the tail continued to constrict her, but Anna stabbed into the tail, twisting the blade. A surge of purple ooze gushed upward, splattering her face. The tail’s grip loosened slightly, allowing Anna to suck in several deep breaths.
I reached the crawler’s tail, withdrawing my Beretta and unloading the entire magazine of fifteen rounds into the open wound. By the seventh bullet, the tail had fully loosened, allowing Anna to crawl free. She was covered head to toe in purple slime. All the same, she screamed as she went back for the attack, stepping past the tail and slashing again and again at the crawler’s exposed underbelly. With each strike, the creature convulsed in pain, until it was lying on its side, spindly legs quivering.
With a final scream, Anna brought the blade down on the crawler’s thin neck, hacking again and again until the head snapped off. She dodged as the creature slumped onto the ground, finally dead.
She panted as she tried to catch her breath. No part of her body was untouched by the purple slime except the white of her eyes and the blazing green of her irises. She flicked the blade, though it did little to rid it of the slime.
That was when the second creature, the one I’d shot earlier, came charging around the first crawler’s quivering form. The crawler’s mouth hung agape, flashing rows of sharp yellow teeth. Anna stood between me and the creature, so I couldn’t open fire.
“Anna, get...”
But with a primal scream, she turned and extended her blade. It found the crawler’s exposed neck, and in one sweep, the head flew right off. An eruption of purple blood issued from its severed neck, slamming into Anna’s abdomen, forcing her onto her back. The second crawler twitched and settled into death.
