Davor’s grin turned to a scowl, showing his grayish-black teeth. “Not until Hak says you are, Cub. Right now, you’re just a piece of meat with more potential than the rest. You’re not an Enforcer until he says so. Got it? They’re loading the program now. You have 30 seconds to prepare.”
From his own research and the stories of others archived on the candidate shared drives at the Academy, Hr’ent thought he knew the course. The basic objectives were constant across the stories. The course was 4.6 kilometers long and contained an elevation gain of roughly 200 meters. With hilly terrain, a few natural valleys with flowing water, and a final uphill sprint, the general layout was not much different than a host of obstacle courses he’d run in the SimLib and in real-life on Ocono. What made it a gauntlet were the various obstacles hidden within the confines of the course—massive barriers, spans filled with pointed stakes, and simulated soldiers meant to test a cadet’s ability to overcome enemies under a variety of circumstances. He’d even heard rumors of enemy combatants with lethal weapons, but none of the stories were consistent, as if the final course was built solely for each individual Peacemaker. Allegedly, no gauntlets were the same, although he’d never had an opportunity to compare notes with another cadet.
Over the span of several seconds, the gym evaporated around him and was replaced by entirely different surroundings. A tan building rose behind him, and a small deck appeared beneath his feet, overlooking a dense forest that could only exist on Ocono’s northern continents. A wide, dirt path stretched away from him down a hill and cut through the thick expanse of trees. Rain fell in large splattering drops. Hr’ent grinned.
It felt like home.
He made his way to the starting line and stretched his arms, neck, shoulders, and legs to loosen everything up. He bent over, as if he were setting up in the starting blocks of a race, and sucked in one long breath. His body felt like a coiled spring. He could feel the new power there, begging for release. He reveled in the sensation. He knew, without a doubt, that his body was capable of so much more, but he didn’t know what that really meant. It was time to find out just what Hak had done to him.
The starting buzzer sounded.
Hr’ent leapt forward, the bound carrying him easily five meters forward in a low arc. Startled, he almost stumbled when his feet finally touched the ground, but his body recovered instantly—automatically—as if it had a mind of its own. He raced down the hill, accelerating and reaching full speed in moments with long, loping strides that covered more distance than they ever had before. Hr’ent blew out his breath and sucked in another deep lungful of the moist air.
His hackles rose with the sudden rush of oxygen in his system. A tingle of electricity coursed along his entire body, as if he’d been charged by a power cell. He’d stormed down the hill, hit bottom, and rounded a slight bend in the path when the first obstacle appeared. The six-meter wall had often been a deciding factor in the courses of other cadets. While not smooth-faced, the height of the wall had proven more difficult for some candidates than others. Even Hr’ent, with his height and claws, considered it a worthy obstacle. He lowered his head and closed the distance. A few meters away, he jumped, intending to land three-quarters of the way up the wall with his claws bared to catch himself and scramble over. Instead, the wall passed under his widely thrashing legs in a surreal slow motion he could not believe.
What the—?
He landed without breaking stride and another obstacle loomed—a deep pit 10 meters across, full of sharpened stakes. He put on a burst of speed, planted his lead foot, and pushed off with every bit of his new strength. His body shot over the gap, and he controlled his orientation with a slow rotation of his arms as his legs pumped gently beneath him. He sailed over the obstacle with ease and came down on the other side, well past the edge of the pit. He did a forward tumble and came up at a dead run.
The trees flashed by faster than he thought possible. With his long stride and powerful legs, Hr’ent’s personal record for sprinting was 67 kph. He could only estimate, but he would swear he was doing twice that, probably around 130, and his sprinting speed didn’t seem to be burning him out as he’d expected. He was deliberately pushing himself, with the intent of slowing down to a jog when his heart rate reached a level he’d learned to predict during his time in the SimLib.
He pressed on, reveling in his new abilities as he tested the limits of a totally new physical paradigm.
He came around another bend in the path and discovered nothing but forest before him with a worn path of trodden grass and underbrush leading the way between wider gaps through the trees. That’s new, he thought. He slowed his pace and stormed into the woods. He leapt over a boulder in his way, ducked under a low tree limb, and easily jumped a deep creek that cut across his path. His heightened senses and reflexes allowed him to keep up what used to be his old sprinting speed and still react quickly enough to traverse every obstacle.
He cleared a ropes course, skipping every other rope. He scrambled over a metal framework that rose 40 meters and dropped down. The forest thickened again, and something told him there was danger ahead.
As he charged through a deep thicket of shrubs and low trees, his eyes picked out a trip-line before him. He easily leapt over it and came down on a pile of dead branches beyond. He heard a crack of wood, the click of something releasing nearby, and then creaking timber and a fast-approaching whistling sound. As if in slow motion, a four-meter pole covered with 50-centimeter spikes swung out in an arc at waist level from behind a thick tree trunk. He watched it come around, almost fascinated at how slowly it seemed to move. Instinctively, he hopped up, reached out with one great paw, and grasped the pole as it swung toward him. The impact barely jarred his arm. His body rose above it, and he let his momentum and the impact turn his body forward in a quick double somersault.
As he landed, he spotted a six-by-ten-meter field of fallen branches covering the ground before him. Somehow, he knew it was a dead fall. He leapt again, grasped a branch five meters above it, and easily swung over. Again, he hit the ground running. The forest ahead of him revealed a straight path that seemed unencumbered by wires or dead falls. He glanced over his shoulder as he realized what he’d just done. He knew that, without a doubt, he could never have survived the pole trap had he been running through the forest without his new abilities.
Strength, speed, agility—even my reactions are twice or more what they used to be.
Elation soared in his breast. He couldn’t believe what he was now capable of, and he realized what a fool he’d been to turn down Hak’s offer the first time. They’d turned him into something very dangerous. And as that thought flashed through his mind, he realized that he would have to be exceedingly careful moving forward. As he was, he would most certainly have killed Raw’wna, Kor’shi, and the other Shadowclaw mercs. The blow to Su’mar’s chest would have crushed his heart. The claw strike would have taken Raw’wna’s head off. And considering what he’d done to Fen’wyn, he wondered if he could have torn an Oogar’s arm off.
If the fury ever takes hold of me again, people will die, he thought. And that reality gave him pause. Yes, I will have to be very, very careful. The reality of it was downright staggering.
He raced through the forest for another kilometer without encountering any more traps. He sailed over more boulders and creeks, settling into a steady run that would have been his sprinting speed before. His heart pounded in his chest. He could feel his blood pumping, but there didn’t seem to be any fatigue yet, or even the burning sensation that he would have expected in his muscles. It seemed even his endurance had been significantly enhanced.
The forest finally opened up before him, revealing a steep hill that rose up a couple hundred meters. The steps were wide and deep, designed for a being of Hr’ent’s stature. The hillside was covered with thick grasses broken by the occasional tree. As he approached the steps, he scanned the entire hillside for any sign of activity. He hadn’t run into any enemy comb
atants yet, but he knew they were out there. They always were in the Gauntlet.
He reached the bottom of the steps and ran up, taking them two at a time. At the halfway point, he finally started feeling his body protest against his exertions. His thighs began to burn with each step. The feeling was faint—almost distant—but he knew they were starting to strain. His heart rate increased, and his breathing became a bit labored. He sucked in air more frequently and blew it out with sharp breaths to clear the carbon dioxide fully.
When he reached the top of the stairs, his thighs searing like they were on a hotplate, he discovered a large, broken-down stone building without a roof that seemed to have been mostly overtaken by a forest that thickened heavily beyond the dilapidated structure. The building was at least 30 meters wide, and from the position of the trees beyond, he estimated it was roughly 30 meters to the far side as well.
He slowed to a jog and entered a wide gap of tumbled stones. Again, he reached out with his newly heightened senses. If he had designed the training sim, this is where he’d place enemy combatants. It was just like the real world. Enemies would utilize cover to their advantage and do their best to attack him from the sides or from behind barriers.
As he entered, heading for a wide doorway across a six-meter room, something scraped the stones to his left. He turned and saw a Lumar in combat armor swinging a stun baton at his head.
Reflex took hold.
Hr’ent grabbed the Lumar’s wrist, halting the baton only inches from his face. Mid-stride, he lifted the Lumar’s arm, ducked his head beneath the baton, and rotated his body. He pulled on the arm, yanking the Lumar off his feet, and punched as hard as he could into his opponent’s shoulder.
There was a sickening crunch of shattering bone, and the Lumar screamed as his body sailed across the room and crashed headlong into the stone wall with a damp-wood CRACK! The Lumar fell to the ground, limp-limbed. Hr’ent moved through the doorway and came out the other side where a pair of Lumar attacked, one from each side.
They crashed into his body like freight trains, all eight arms pounding him as they tumbled together across the stone floor of a wide room. A flurry of blows hammered his head and body, but he barely felt them as the Feral broke loose of its chains.
Hr’ent roared with a primal fury born out of the mists of his ancestors.
One Lumar fist crashed into the side of his face. He jerked his head back with a snarl and clamped down on the Lumar’s wrist as hard as he could. He felt flesh part and bone crunch. The taste of blood fueled his rage as his fearsome teeth clamped together. The Lumar screamed, drawing back a bloody stump. Its lifeless hand tumbled to the floor.
The second Lumar sent a titanic blow into Hr’ent’s mid-section, but it barely registered. In a flash, Hr’ent extended his claws and slashed, left-to-right, across the Lumar’s belly. Blood sprayed as intestines pushed through ravaged skin. Hr’ent surged forward and clamped down on the exposed neck just above the Lumar’s combat armor. Hot blood filled Hr’ent’s mouth, and the taste of flesh sent a surge of bloodlust through his body.
The Lumar screamed in agony and terror.
Hr’ent shook his head back and forth like an animal tearing into a carcass. Meat and bone tore free in the assault. The Lumar staggered back, clutching at a ruined neck that sprayed blood through his fingers in jets and surges of crimson.
Hr’ent spat the bloody chunk out, and it splattered against the Lumar’s chest before falling to the ground.
Hr’ent lifted his right leg and shot a fury-filled kick at the Lumar’s chest, sending him sailing across the room like he’d been fired from a cannon. The Lumar crashed into the wall and dropped to the ground.
Hr’ent spun on the other Lumar, who staggered back, still clutching what remained of his arm. The Lumar saw Hr’ent come at him and raised his two upper arms. It swung once at Hr’ent’s head. Hr’ent ducked, came up, and caught the Lumar’s other arm as it sailed toward his head. He held it firm and sent a lightning-fast strike at the Lumar’s throat with tightened knuckles that sank into the spine. There was a crunch of cartilage and bone.
The Lumar gurgled, his eyes going wide. He clutched at his crushed throat and tried to suck in air, but nothing could get past the mashed flesh of his esophagus. Hr’ent released the Lumar’s fist and sent a tremendous punch into the side of its head. The Lumar slammed onto the floor like a sack thrown from the back of a truck.
Hr’ent roared again, letting the fury flow through him. The blood in his mouth tasted better than he’d ever thought possible…and he wanted more. He stepped through the next doorway like some primeval predator. He sniffed at the air, trying to pick up the scent of his next victim. The next room was empty, as was the one after that, but as he approached the next doorway, he picked up their scent. He knew there were three enemy combatants just beyond the next door. He could smell the polycarbon tinge of their armor and the musky odor of their sweat.
They were waiting for him.
A snarling smile split his face and shifted into a tremulous growl that thundered out of his chest. Hungry for more blood, he moved forward slowly, a predator stalking prey. As he approached the doorway, he spotted the first one standing warily on the far side of the room with long combat knives held in each of his lower hands.
Hr’ent lowered his head, his hackles rising stiffly along his neck and down his back. The bloodlust surged again. The scent of his enemies was thick in his nostrils, and he hungered to end each of them in a gush of hot blood. He cautiously poked his head through the doorway and spotted two more. Each of them held a single combat knife in an upper hand. The three Lumar glanced at each other and nodded confidently.
They’re coordinating high and low attacks, he thought. He could see it in their eyes, the way they held the blades, and the positioning of their bodies. They have no idea what they’re dealing with.
Hr’ent took a step back and lost sight of the two on the sides. He focused all of his attention on the one standing on the far side of the room. He knew what he had to do. His timing would have to be perfect, as well as his aim. He never would have considered something as crazy—as impossible—as this in the past, but things were different now.
With blinding speed, he dropped into a crouch and leapt forward with all the strength his legs possessed. He flashed across the room like a bullet. The Lumar’s eyes hardened. He raised the blade in his right hand and swung downward to open Hr’ent’s throat. Hr’ent caught the swing in mid-air with his paw, and he tightened his grip. He twisted his head sideways as his free paw grasped the Lumar’s other elbow, pinning the arm. And then he clamped his jaws down around the Lumar’s throat, just above the combat armor. He bit down hard just as they crashed into the wall together.
A gush of blood filled Hr’ent’s mouth.
The thick stones of the wall gave way as nearly 1,000 pounds of mass smashed into them like a moving vehicle. The impact stunned Hr’ent for a moment, and he saw a flash of light, but the Lumar didn’t even have time to scream as his throat was torn out.
They tumbled together on the far side of the wall, both of them covered in dust and rubble. Hr’ent shook his head, letting another chunk of meat fly, and rose to his feet as the first of the remaining Lumar stormed through the gap in the wall.
It slashed at Hr’ent’s face. Hr’ent pulled his head back, the blade missing him by centimeters, and then a heavy blow crashed into Hr’ent’s chest. He whuffed out his breath. The Lumar came at him with a back swing meant to open his throat. Hr’ent caught the back-handed blow and jammed his paw into the extended limb with a loud CRACK as the joint gave way. The Lumar cried out in pain but sent another punch flying in from the side. It hammered into Hr’ent’s muzzle and twisted his head sideways. Unfazed, Hr’ent wrenched the combat knife from the Lumar’s nearly limp hand and jammed it up through the Lumar’s jaw and into his brain. The Lumar staggered back into his comrade who was just coming through the breach in the wall.
The third Lumar shoved
his dead partner aside just as Hr’ent reached down and plucked a combat knife from the hand of the dead Lumar at his feet. Coming up, he hurled the blade as hard as he could into the last Lumar’s chest. With a crack of pierced combat armor, the blade slammed in up to the hilt and drove the Lumar back, a surprised look on his face. A moment later, he toppled back as the combat knife fell from his hands.
For a moment, Hr’ent wanted to leap on the body. He wanted to taste blood again. He wanted to rip the Lumar’s throat out. But something stopped him. A semblance of the Peacemaker within him prodded at the back of his mind.
Take control, it said. You are not an animal.
Hr’ent’s heart was pounding in his chest. The Feral within him pushed against his senses, desperate to revel in his newfound abilities. He drew in a single deep breath and let it out slowly. With an incredible amount of effort, he re-shackled the beast and turned around. He sniffed at the air. The scent of blood was everywhere, as was the musky scent of the three dead bodies that lay on the cold, stony floor.
He was alone once again.
He took in another breath as the bloodlust receded and set off at a jog through what remained of the stone structure. He reached out with his senses, careful as he passed into each new room. There were no enemy combatants left, and when he exited the structure, the forest beyond was almost idyllic. The rain came down in a light drizzle, and the path before him cut through the trees once again, exposing damp forest floor and muddy soil.
Sucking in another breath to rejuvenate his body, he felt a surge of energy and set off at a dead run. The path twisted and turned through the forest, and while he stayed alert for traps and combatants, he found nothing but trees, grass, and brown earth passing beneath his pounding feet.
He’d covered about a kilometer when he saw two tall pylons rising out of the forest floor. Just past them he spotted a familiar form wearing his Peacemaker combat fatigues and vest.
Hak-Chet.
Enforcer Page 20
