by brett hicks
“Baby, fight this!”
Her words rushed through my mind with the thundering clarity of truth.
“Come on, you’re much too stubborn to let some stupid whispers kick your ass!”
Seraphina poured soothing and loving emotions and I looked up into her glowing jade eyes. She had my head in her lap and I didn’t remember moving. I blinked in confusion and I noticed Skylar peeking over at me with naked worry and fear in his expression.
“What the hell just happened?”
I asked through a raspy tone and I noticed my throat was sore.
Feint glowing surrounded the entire cab and I looked over to Ariel, who had her hands braced on either side of the two front seats.
“I’ve erected a very potent barrier of light, but we better hope we are almost there, because I cannot hold this without a ritual indefinitely.”
I nodded and licked my lips.
“Thanks, chicka, next round’s on me when we get home.”
She smiled brightly and nodded.
“I’m not cheap, so you better not bitch about the bill later.”
I shrugged and waved lazily in Seri’s direction.
“Her interest seems to cover a lot of things that could scare you stupid.”
Seri sniffed and rolled her eyes at me. I found myself looking up into her green eyes as if they were the only reason my sanity remained.
After what felt like eons of agony, the darkness split and our lights illuminated the ancient silver and grey alloy walls of the dusty old warehouse-like expanse we had entered.
I recognized the design from my dreams when I was out of it. We were home, my home, Atlantis.
Eleven:
This looked to be some type of cargo-bay of a sort. Grey alloy crates of some unknown design were on either side of the wide section of dusty roadway. We had been dropped right inside the gates of the massive subterranean city.
Dust was thick on everything, like no one had so much as taken a single step inside this large cargo-chamber in hundreds, if not thousands of years. The deeply musty smell and lingering traces of rot and decay still filled the air.
Overhead lights kicked on as I stepped towards the doors that seemed to lead into the city proper. I studied the silver glowing texts and my eyes were wide with surprise at the strange language. I had seen all of this before in my dreams, just not this particular room.
“Someone’s altered the codes.”
I looked up and saw Reyline typing into a translucent holographic screen. She seemed to be moving with a nimble dexterity that would make the top human hackers of the world green with envy.
“Um, where did that come from?”
I asked dumbly and she waved me off.
“Please, there are terminals in every corridor. From the looks of things, someone has logged in as you and has implemented a series of master overrides. This is not good.”
She sounded dreary and ominously vague.
“What does that mean?”
I pushed and she looked at me squarely and sighed.
“That we will be dealing with a gauntlet of traps, snares and other nasty devices your father designed to deter your enemies. And, if that was not enough, it looks as though hundreds of inhuman life-signs are currently milling about in the interior of Atlantis. So, even if we manage to survive the traps, we are going to have an army on our hands.”
I ran my hand through my hair and I let out a long gust of air.
“Well, shit…”
Reyline nodded in agreement and Seri frowned and studied the red dots moving about.
“Who do you think these people are?”
She asked and Reyline typed up a fury and suddenly a dozen camera images flooded into the new holographic screens around us. Each showed differently armed inhumans and only a few of them I recognized from some border incidents.
“Boston domain, of course, Henry wouldn’t do anything without his mommy and daddy’s protection.”
Seri grunted in agreement and Liam came to stand behind me.
“Well then, that certainly ups the stakes, doesn’t it?”
I frowned and turned to face him and I nodded towards the screens.
“How good are they?”
Bix moved forward and she popped her hands on her hips and sniffed at the question.
“Not nearly as good as we are, even you little princess.”
I bit my cheek and I frowned as my mind ran through the possibilities.
“We need to make it through as quietly as possible and we need to keep the only advantage we have, stealth. We have better fighters, but fewer numbers by far and our reinforcements will not be here for a while yet. We have to play this smart.”
“We only have to get Thea to the controls. The bridge can be ordered to do a DNA test to ensure that no one is trying to impersonate the heiress.”
“DNA… shit, he probably stole the blood sample I had to file with the NYPD! Shit!”
Reyline shrugged and she spread her hands widely.
“He has already played that hand, my dear, he cannot play it again. You just have to stand on the bridge and you will be able to remove him and all his people with the might of the city’s defenses.”
Reyline said and Skylar raised his hand.
“Excuse me; we are going to be relying on these same powerful defenses that will first try to keep us out of the city. Does that sound a bit crazy to anyone else?”
Bix shrugged and she walked over and clapped Skylar on the shoulder.
“Welcome to the big league's kid. We don’t fuck around when we throw down the gauntlet here.”
“Or when we make sweet, sweet love either.”
Liam added in and earned himself a baleful look of reproach from his kin. He was as unrepentant as ever and I was sure Bix was going to kill him before either the city or the Boston domain inhumans could.
“What kinds of defenses are we talking about here?”
Seri asked, bringing the conversation back on track. Reyline turned slightly and motioned vaguely ahead of us.
“Energy-weapon batteries and various types of weight or motion activated traps. There are some pits hidden in the floors of some corridors and a veritable plethora of projectile firing mechanisms.”
“So, Star Wars meets Indiana Jones, no freakin’ pressure there!”
Skylar snarked and Ariel seemed to be deep in thought.
“We can use spells and Shiki to set off traps and help us navigate the maze. I assume you know the way to the bridge?”
She asked Reyline, who nodded and Atlas stepped forward and he crossed his arms over his enormous chest.
“I know the way as well.”
I nodded and I bit my lip.
“Good, because we need to split into two groups. Reyline, you take Skylar, Ariel, Vivian and some of your people, I will take Seri, Bix, Liam, and the rest. You and I both should be able to override the controls, right?”
She nodded in confirmation.
“Good, we need to split up so that if one group is detected, then the other might be able to go unnoticed.”
“What about the Shiki?”
“Can you spell them to obey me?”
Ariel nodded in confirmation.
“Then do it and then use your own Shiki to keep free of the traps.”
“Without me there to cast more, you will eventually run out.”
I nodded and I held out my hand.
“Give me some extras and I will cast it myself. I am pretty sure I can handle a simple Shinto Shiki humanoid.”
Ariel looked at me very quizzically for a long moment but nodded and she reached into one of her enormous sacks and she snatched out what looked like a bunch of cut-out paper dolls. These were made from enchanted paper and they were spelled with the instructions needed to animate to a life-sized human clone.
I had just absorbed a lot of Japanese Shinto-style arts and I have been studying general magic for about a year. While I was not Ariel, I still had my own s
trengths to fall back on with magic. She seemed to be concerned with moving with my aunt’s party and Skylar also seemed a bit crestfallen. Honestly, I was hoping for them to be able to use the shadows and hide from the veritable army milling about, while I suspected my group would be raising hell. If there was one thing I knew how to do, it was to make noise and draw attention. The Boston inhumans would regret that fact that I survived their streets to become an adult if I had anything to say about it.
Seri looked at me with a supportive look and I gave her a tiny smile of reassurance.
“We’re going to make it through this, whatever is waiting for us will not have been prepared to fight off an Old-Blood and the most powerful vampire chick to ever grace this earth.”
“Aye, and nothing will prepare them for me.”
Liam said smugly from behind us and Seri rolled her eyes at him.
***
We unloaded weapons, equipment, and magical items. We each stood ready to pounce through the doors of our different entrance doors. One thing that we knew Henry couldn’t lock me out of, were the palm readers on the doors. Not unless he wanted to lose control of the rest of the systems he had gained access to through my blood. I had a feeling that he was going to be very wary of my presence here. He might not know to check for my aunt, but I had a feeling that he would be on to me the second I started to open doors.
So, for the first two, my aunt Reyline had unlocked both doors with her palm print. She was immediately recognized and any doubts I might have had to her authenticity were put to bed.
Seri and I hung close to the door and Bix watched as a patrol passed by with some kind of magic lanterns.
She nodded after they crossed back the way they came. We noticed how they stuck to a single center point of the roads, likely a safe spot.
“We should take them down and use their patrol route for the first leg of our journey.”
Seri said and Bix nodded in agreement. They both looked to me for my input and I nodded as well. I checked the Smith and Wesson and I screwed on a long thick suppressor. Then I chambered my first round, ready to go now, I nodded again.
I could hear Reyline counting down form five and my body chilled with the surge of fresh adrenaline. I was frosty and my mind seemed to go to the detached place that was becoming all too familiar to me when engaging in battle.
Bix had a pair of .45 caliber handguns with matching black suppressors and Liam had a tactical assault rifle with a larger suppressor. I didn’t think I would ever get used to Seri’s seemingly limitless reach, or what she could acquire with her wealth. Seri herself had a modified desert-eagle with a grip more suited for a female hand. Everyone was using hollow-point ammo for maximum stopping power. We were going in hard and dirty, so we needed all the help we could get.
“Good thing we thought to pack two bags of ammo, huh?”
Liam asked me and I smiled at him and snorted. He couldn’t seem to take anything seriously, but I knew he was focused in his own way. Liam was likely using his pre-cognitive ability even now, trying to peek into the potential possible futures. While he said that most of the world was blacked out to seers now, a period they called “The Grand Junction,” he could still catch flickers of near future possibilities.
“One!”
My aunt said and the doors hissed open as the patrol turned back. I took aim over Seri’s shoulder and I tapped my trigger three times with neat precision of my marksmanship training. Two in the chest and one in the forehead that was more a military black-ops style of a takedown, but it was the most effective way to fight supernatural beings with inhuman regeneration capabilities.
Muted clacking sounds of suppressed small-arms fire peppered our first foot-falls of forward-motion.
“Check them for coms or something we might be able to use to gain intel on our enemy.”
I whispered to Bix, who moved like a shadow daemon, so I knew she would not get picked off by a random shooter, even an inhuman shooter. She nodded and she moved low and carefully, utilizing the center of the street like the guards had been doing. She moved to the guards in a few hammering beats of my heart and she crouched, checking their pulses and then patting them down for anything useful.
She fished a com unit out of one of their ears and she tossed it to me. It was just a typical earbud unit used by military and some police raids.
I put the bud in my ear and I head a few sounds of chatter.
“Unit 17 all clear, no sign of intruders, we are still clear to proceed to phase two.”
That doesn’t sound good for us!
You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that phase two was likely code for lift-off. Not when one considers the quakes wracking the north-east.
We needed to hurry!
Twelve:
The ground began to rumble and quake beneath my feet. I had to crouch low just to keep my balance in the upheaval. The others seemed to be in similar states around me all struggling for footing.
This was so much more violent than the quakes in New York. This was an ancient flying city taking off from beneath the earth.
“We have to stop this!”
I exclaimed and Seri held on to my shoulder for support.
“How are we going to move in this?”
“We’ not, we’re going to take the SUV’s as far in as we can before we have to fight our way to the bridge.”
“Bix, keep eyes on the road while we get the SUV’s ready to go.”
“You do realize that you are painting a bull’s eye on us by doing this.”
Bix stated calmly and I nodded.
“It’s this or nothing at all as far as I see it now. We have about twenty-five miles to cover and we are short on time.”
She didn’t disagree, she nodded and she took a few careful steps forward to peer around the next intersection.
“Three more up ahead, we should take care of them before the SUV’s get here or we will be blown before we even make a single mile.”
I nodded and I vaguely saw Liam and Seri turning to go get the cars ready. I crouched beside Bix and I kept my gun pointed ahead of me. The world was shaking too much for me to trust my aim from this distance. I swore and I dropped to my belly and I began to crawl around the corner.
One was a frost giant and the other two were tiny by comparison, redcaps—I hate redcaps!
“We’re going to have to sneak up on them; I doubt my gun’s going to take down that giant.”
Bix nodded and said, “Aye, but that blade of yours will fell anything.”
I nodded to her and I began to crawl forward and I tucked my gun into my belt holster. Thankfully, I didn’t even have to do a damn thing to draw my sword; it came of its own accord when I needed it.
The light was dull and the street was smooth like stone and unlike any material I knew of on the surface-world above. The three guards ahead were pacing back and forth slowly on a deliberate footing. Even the giant seemed to be greatly encumbered by the quake.
Several empty grey stone buildings dotted the streets ahead, almost like a strip of stores in New York. This was once a city, a nexus of life and day-to-day business. This entire place was once a home, it was also where I had been born.
These three stuck to the street and they seemed to avoid the sidewalks for some reason. I remembered the warning about booby-traps, so I crawled out staying low and eyeing the three guards. Bix was silent beside me and was nearly fifteen-feet from the guards in the open when the quake stopped.
Bix and I shot to our feet as the redcaps snarled in surprise. Their red eyes flashed with murder and lust.
“You take the midgets; I’ll kill the big guy.”
One of the redcaps launched himself at me with molten rage at my casual dismissal and use of the word “midget.” Bix never let him reach me, he had an arrow shaft between his eyes and a dumbfounded look on his instantly faded and lifeless body.
She vanished and I knew what was coming next, but I didn’t have time to watch her.
I had a giant to slay and I didn’t even have five little stones to my name!
I rolled to the side and a massive ax crashed through the stony ground where I had just been standing. I swore vividly and I ducked another wide blow as my sword burst from my flesh and bones. Molten green flames erupted along the blade as I slashed through the third swing of his ax. I knew that my blade would dissolve his, it would purify the material if I wanted, and it was all mine to reform.
I envisioned the green glowing daggers and I pushed out and all the molten metal dripping from his half-destroyed ax became dancing daggers that shot through the air and pierced the giant’s thick hide and he bellowed out in agony and abject horror.
I rushed in with a blur of moving so fast I could almost feel Bix’s shock as I blurred out of sight. I rushed and my blade met no resistance and I reappeared behind the giant and his sizzling flesh stung my nose and his charred head dropped to the ground beside me a moment later.
“So, that happened.”
Bix muttered and we turned as the SUV’s rounded the corner. I released my hold on my katana and it dissolved back into my skin. I retrieved my pistol and I held it low towards the ground.
“Windows down and firearms at the ready. Whenever they do catch on, we need to take as many of them down as possible, before this turns into a proper firefight.”
Liam looked deeply amused as he eyed the giant corpse and I rolled my eyes and I climbed into Seri’s ungodly large SUV. I almost expected the girl to buy a damn hummer next, knowing her as I did; I wouldn’t put that thought past her.
“Let’s gain some ground while we can.”
She nodded in agreement and she gestured vaguely to the frost giant.
“Never seen one of those die like that, how in the hells did you manage to block a blow from a frost giant, even I couldn’t manage that.”
I shrugged and said, “I just started breaking down everything my sword came into contact with. Knowing what I am helps me know how to control my powers.”
Seri nodded in comprehension.
