Decadence: Darkstar Mercenaries Book 4

by Carven, Anna

  The Mhyndin came to a stop beside the Crurix. “Lukin, divide the squad. Six and three. I will go with the smaller group. You take the jungleside entrance at the rear. I will take the front. Kail gets the side entrance. You are to prioritize the safety of the captives at all costs.”

  “All costs,” Lukin agreed. There was no need to say any more. He was experienced enough to know exactly what Ikriss meant.

  Shoot to kill.

  No mercy.

  When they took these human females, the soldiers of the Syndicate forfeited any chance of receiving Ikriss’s mercy—not that he would have granted it, anyway.

  Ikriss stood as his seat’s restraints relaxed, the Sylth withdrawing the pilot’s harness from around his body.

  He walked across to the weapons store and selected a curved Callidum longblade, a pair of plasma guns and a long serrated dagger that borrowed its shape from the design of the skrath. He quickly affixed the weapons to his body, grateful for their familiar weight.

  His fingers twitched with the urge to fight. The promise of violence made his blood sing. Perhaps his human mate would never understand it, but this was a part of him that he could never deny.

  He uttered a soft command in Kordolian, activating his helm. It emerged from the neck of his exo-armor and slid into place over his head and face, sliding dangerously close to his tender horn-buds.

  Then he exited through the rear of the ship, slipping through the open hatch, dropping into freefall.

  He landed on the hard surface below with a soft thud.

  His men were all around him, but they’d already melted into the shadows, taking cover along the stone walls.

  In the distance, an Earth creature howled, triggering loud barks from its companions.

  There were no alarms; no mobilization from the human guards, no robotic defenses springing into action to attack the intruders.

  In the background, Lukin let out a soft laugh.

  As if on cue, a siren went off, wailing like a cursed skemosha from the innermost circle of the Nine Hells.

  Ikriss flinched, his sensitive hearing assaulted by the piercing noise.

  A pack of muscular four-legged furry black creatures burst from a side-house in the wall, barking loudly, baring their sharp teeth.

  But as the Kordolians advanced, they sniffed the air and suddenly took fright, retreating into the darkness with their tails tucked between their legs.

  They were replaced by a dozen humans clutching simple metal guns. The humans fanned out, shouting frantically in some indecipherable Earth language.

  Abruptly, the siren stopped.

  Lukin laughed louder. “So much for a quiet infiltration.”

  Ikriss inclined his head, acknowledging the ridiculousness of the situation even as a sudden storm of cold anger welled up inside him.

  These were the same people that were responsible for Sienna’s capture. Now they were doing the same to other defenseless humans… and thinking they could get away with it.

  Under his watch?

  The fucking audacity.

  “Silence them,” Ikriss said coldly as he glanced up at the tower. A little human resistance was nothing to worry about. The Syndicate fools would all be dead soon, and Ikriss and his crew would be long gone, the human females safely in their possession.

  His comm buzzed.

  “I’m in,” Kail informed him, and Ikriss wasn’t surprised in the least that their temanjin had already infiltrated so far. “I’ve reached the place where the captives are being held. It’s a holding room on the highest floor. Several of them have sustained superficial injuries from beatings, but none of them are in a particularly bad way. It looks like they’re preparing to move them to another location; off-planet, probably. They’re probably waiting for a vessel to arrive from outside Earth’s orbit. But that’s not going to happen.”

  “No,” Ikriss replied, shaking his head at the apparent stupidity of these humans. Did they not understand that there would be no more rogue ships? Ephrenian, Kordolian, human…

  Their surveillance net would intercept them all, whether the human Federation liked it or not.

  A strange niggling sensation settled at the base of his skull.

  All around him, the soldiers of the Syndicate fell; bodies thudding, guns clattering to the hard ground as life was stolen away by Callidum blades and lethal shots of plasma.

  For Ikriss’s warriors, this was a repeat of the past, a dance they fell into all too easily; superior Kordolian technology and power dominating the weaker species.

  It almost felt too easy.

  “We’re coming up,” Ikriss snapped, moving quickly through the warm, stifling night; past blood-stained pavement and lifeless human forms. The Second Division fell in behind him; silent, lethal, and perfectly in their element. It was quiet again. Even the barking creatures had gone silent. “Do not make a move until the safety of the human captives is absolutely guaranteed,” he said softly into his comm. “We will only attack when we are certain that we can take all of them out at once—without harming a single hair on the head of any female. And if you encounter the one called Eva, you are to notify me immediately. She is mine.” More specifically, she belonged to Sienna, but anything that his mate claimed as hers was also his.

  “Don’t worry, I’m not moving until you get here,” Kail replied, his voice low and dangerous. “There are six that we need to take out here, and at least two dozen more on your way up. It might be easier to ambush them when they are on the move.”

  “Let’s go,” Ikriss ordered, making signals with his hands in Eluti, the silent hand-language of the Kordolian military.

  His squadron split into two groups.

  Ikriss took the front entrance with three warriors—Gryke, Tarin, and Ruk. Lukin and the rest of his six went for the back.

  As he reached a wide glass door at the front of the complex, Ikriss drew his longsword.

  Absurdly, the doors slid open, and their unit stalked into a wide, cavernous entrance that reminded Ikriss a little of the opulent Jentian stone foyers that he’d seen installed in the ships of various wealthy pirate-traders—after he’d seized them.

  Not a single guard rushed out to defend the tower.

  They were all dead.

  There were indeed humans on this floor. He could hear their murmurings; their clumsy footfalls.

  But they were in hiding.

  Cowering.

  Ikriss ignored the humans as his men scoped the floor.

  As much as they wanted to be, the humans were not a threat, and the only thing he cared about was getting to the females as quickly as possible.

  Before all the hells broke loose.

  Ruk made a signal with his hands. Over here. Access point.

  Sword raised in one hand, plasma gun in the other, Ikriss brought up the rear as his men filed into a narrow stairwell. In contrast with the polished exterior, the stairwell was old and poorly maintained, with rusting metal railings and water leaking down the walls.

  “Incoming,” Tarin warned.

  A massive burst of fire roared down the stairwell, covering them in searing, licking flames.

  Ikriss raised his gun through the fire; through the heat, aiming for a flicker of movement that he felt more than saw.

  There.

  Boom! His plasma gun roared.

  The flames died. Didn’t they know that Kordolian armor was impervious to this kind of low-heat attack?

  A body fell from above, bouncing off the railings, landing with a gruesome thud on the hard steps below.

  Ikriss and his trio ignored it as they raced up the steps, taking them three at a time. A small army of Syndicate soldiers rushed in from some side-door, firing wildly.

  In this confined space, their aim was terribly off, and even when they found their targets, human electric-fire and bullets were no match for Callidum exo-armor.

  Ikriss provided cover-fire from behind, picking them off one-by-one as his men advanced, their dark blades flash
ing in close quarters.

  Human blood sprayed across walls and floors, leaving vicious swirls of crimson.

  Ikriss’s anger evaporated. He embraced the void; the feeling of cold nothingness that descended upon him whenever he went into battle.

  After the storm of the Mating Fever, it was an unwelcome relief.

  But it was better this way.

  He would not make hotheaded mistakes.

  And thank the Goddess she would never have to see him like this.

  At last, the final attacker died, a wisp of a cry evaporating on his lips. They reached the top of the stairs, where a red light was flashing. The metal door that led to the outside was locked, but Gryke made short work of it with a blast of plasma.

  “Stealth is clearly not your priority right now,” Kail grumbled through the comm. “Down the corridor, to your right. They’re on the move. I’m already on the roof. That’s where they’re going. I don’t speak much street Earthian, but from what I can gather, a transport’s on the way. Get into formation and get yourself four clean headshots. I can take the remaining two. Have Mak ready and waiting above us with the evacuation pods. We’ll be gone before they even understand what has happened. Tch. Foolish humans. They should know better by now.”

  “Humans will never lie down and accept total oppression. They might appear weak on the surface, but fighting is in their blood.”

  “Hm. Your mate taught you that, did she?”

  Ikriss snorted softly as he followed his team down the wide corridor, which cut through a series of wide glass-walled rooms furnished with chairs and tables and lush green plants. Warm electric light suffused the rooms, which looked out over the sprawling settlement below.

  The spaces were completely deserted.

  Under the cover of darkness, the city beyond was surprisingly beautiful; a glittering network of many-hued lights that appeared startlingly intense to his sensitive Kordolian eyes.

  It occurred to him that Sienna might enjoy this place, with its spectacular hillsides and wide beaches and the vast, glittering ocean beyond. He might bring her here sometime—when he was in a different mindset.

  At the mere thought of her, his horn-buds started to ache again.

  Focus.

  This was important to her.

  He took a deep breath, trying to quell the wisp of madness that threatened to grow inside him.

  Again.

  Not yet. Not now. There will be time for this later.

  Fucking focus.

  He caught the sound of voices and footfalls. The scent of humans drifted toward him.

  Lukin and his six emerged from a side door, shadows of death trailing behind them. They said nothing as they filed in behind Ikriss.

  The Second Division were closing in on their prey.

  “I’m on the roof,” Kail said softly. “Our precious cargo are being prepared for retrieval. If I’m not mistaken, that’s the sound of incoming.”

  Ikriss went still for a heartbeat. Kail was right; he could hear it too, the distant sound of crude, noisy engines, growing closer and closer.

  A human craft.

  Were they insane?

  Surely their human masters would have alerted them to their presence by now.

  Ordinarily, he would order Makhel to shoot it down, but he was no longer in the business of risking innocent lives. A burning wreckage could hit the settlement below… or even their precious humans.

  “I need four snipers, now,” Kail snapped. “Neutralize the threat and get the females out before this cursed human transport arrives.”

  Ikriss moved to the front of his Division. Lukin, Gryke, and the others slowed, allowing him to pass. They reached a glass-walled winding staircase that led up onto the roof space, where the flight platform jutted out into the night sky.

  “Coming up now,” he informed Kail. “Just tell us where to shoot.”

  “Three-six-one, nine-four, seven-half, four-and-six,” Kail snapped, giving the squad valuable co-ordinates in a mathematically precise way that only they would understand.

  Ikriss ran up the stairs and out into the warm night.

  The stars were there to greet him, brilliant and alluring, but he hardly noticed, because he was raising his guns, one in each hand, the sights perfectly aligned to the co-ordinates Kail had given, and…

  Boom.

  Boom.

  Two humans disintegrated, filling the warm night air with the stench of charred flesh.

  Boom. Ruk took out one.

  Boom. Lukin got the other.

  The Syndicate guards died with their guns in their hands.

  For all their heavy armor and massive guns, their trigger speed was just too slow.

  Screams from a dozen human females split the after-echo of plasma-fire.

  In the background, Kail was busy eviscerating his second victim with his hunting blade. The First Division warrior casually threw the dead human’s body off the side of the roof.

  Now Ikriss could see the transport in the far-off distance. A grey triangle-shaped human flyer made of metal, it was crude and ungainly looking.

  Destroy it.

  No. Not yet.

  It was right over the city, slowing as it neared its destination. If they shot it down now, it would fall and incinerate the densely populated settlement below.

  He would not kill innocents in her name.

  She would never forgive him.

  “Can I take this fucking thing down already?” Makhel comm’ed in, his voice taut with urgency. “You’re not going to believe this, boss, but somehow, they got past our surveillance undetected. If I were a wagering type, I would almost suspect they had cloaking tech like ours.”

  Cloaking? That was strange. Ikriss couldn’t shake the niggling feeling that something wasn’t right.

  Humans shouldn’t have been able to get past their surveillance net.

  Careful.

  Perhaps all wasn’t as it appeared.

  He cast a quick, appraising eye over the human captives. They wore only their intimate undergarments, and their wrists and ankles were bound. Some were curled up, heads tucked in, arms wrapped around their bodies. Several were screaming, trying futilely to stand. Some just stared, their eyes blank with shock, unable to comprehend what was unfolding.

  He counted twenty-five in total; all relatively young.

  All frightened out of their wits.

  Except for one.

  One of them—dark-haired, dark-eyed, and a little crazy looking—glared back.

  “Shit,” Gryke muttered. “They’re hysterical. Of course they are. We just exploded heads in front of them. Now we’re supposed to come in and tell them we’re their noble saviors? Tch. Humans don’t adjust that quickly.”

  “Take them down to the ground level, now,” Ikriss barked. An idea was forming in his mind, but to make it work, he would have to act fast.

  His men obeyed without question, forming a tight circle around the humans.

  “Get up,” Lukin ordered in Universal, lowering his weapon. “Listen carefully, humans, because I am not going to repeat myself. We are not going to harm you, and we are not going to enslave you. Right now, your survival depends on your absolute co-operation. You do exactly as I say. When I tell you to move, you move.”

  The females might be afraid, but they weren’t stupid. They rose shakily to their feet, shuffling awkwardly in their ankle restraints.

  “We’ll remove those,” Ruk growled, drawing his longsword. “Let’s get you all off this roof.”

  Ikriss surveyed the group one last time, his attention snapping toward the dark-haired woman in the center of the group. She was staring at him openly, without even a lick of fear in her eyes.

  She doesn’t have a very good sense of danger. Sienna’s words danced through his mind.

  “You are Eva Patel,” he said, walking swiftly through the group of women to reach her side. They parted before him like a school of silver fish in the cold arctic sea.

  The dark-hair
ed woman glared. “And who the hell are you?” She spoke in English. Luckily for Ikriss, he could understand her perfectly well.

  Ikriss laughed. “Sienna was right about you.”

  “Sienna? What the hell does she have to do this fucking nightmare?”

  “She sent me.” Ikriss gave her a tiny mock-bow. “I am her humble servant.”

  “Sent you? Okay, now I’m confused,” Eva hissed. “Is this the same Sienna we’re talking about? Nice Sienna? She doesn’t associate with creatures like you.”

  There was hatred in her voice.

  Why?

  No time for that now.

  The roar of the approaching ship grew louder.

  His horn-buds were throbbing like crazy. The pain was getting worse. In frustration, he commanded his helm to retract, revealing his face. “She is mine,” he growled.

  Fear flickered across Eva’s face. She flinched. “Y-you’re crazy.”

  Suddenly, the roar of the ship was right in his ears.

  It was too close. It shouldn’t have been able to move that fast.

  “Incoming!” he shouted in Kordolian. “Get them down to safety, now.” He drew his sword. Eva and the other women screamed.

  Ikriss brought his blade down and severed the flexible restraints that bound Eva’s ankles together. The other warriors did the same, and in a heartbeat, the women regained the use of their legs.

  “Run!” Ikriss roared.

  The humans fled, swarming into the doorway that led to the staircase below.

  “Kail, with me,” he ordered. “We’re going to take this thing dow—”

  A familiar blue light flickered at the periphery of his vision.

  Shit.

  He knew that light very well.

  Instinctively, he brought his protective helm back over his face, ignoring the agony of his horn-buds.

  This was going to be bad.

  “Plasma cannon!” both Ikriss and Kail warned in unison. The transport had almost reached the border of the compound. “Take it down, Makhel.”

  They were already moving, putting their bodies between the arc of blue fire and the humans as a beam of deadly plasma shot from a dark cannon in the transport’s lower hull.