She ran into the door with her shoulder forward, smashing it open so that it collided with the adjacent wall. She burst into the main foyer in a crouched position. Doors led off on either side and a wide set of stairs rose straight ahead. Gunshots rang through the air from the back of the house.
Three men with guns appeared at the top of the stairs. Two crouched and they all pointed their weapons at Nova.
She dove to the side as a volley of cracks burst through the air and pieces of plaster exploded from the walls. Nova ducked behind the stairs as white powder coated her shoulders and scratched her throat.
Heavy footsteps thumped down the stairs. "She's just over the side."
"Is it the one we've been looking for?"
"Sure as hell looked like her."
"Boss'll be pleased."
Nova took a deep breath and jumped to her feet, using their voices to aim. She held down the trigger and fired a series of blasts at the stairs. The first man grunted as a blue blast of energy punctured his chest and slammed him against the wall.
The other two careened to a halt and back-stepped away from their companion's tumbling body.
Nova pushed the advantage, swinging around the base of the stairs and firing. Balls of energy slammed into the walls and left burning holes, but the line of fire caught the two men. Flames licked across their chests as they clutched their chests and fell to their knees, sprawling across the stairs.
Nova kept her gun trained on the top of the stairs, ears straining for footsteps.
"Clear," Tanguin's voice crackled through Nova's communicator.
"Clear," Cal replied.
Nova took a deep breath and used her shoulder to wipe the sweat from her brow. She placed one foot on the first step. "Alright, that's the ground floor. I'm going upstairs. Form a defensive line at the base and monitor the front door, I don't want anyone coming up behind me."
There weren't that many steps but it felt like hundreds to Nova's exhausted legs. Her breath wheezed in her lungs and her head spun, sending the stairs twirling in front of her. She staggered and snatched the handrail, her stomach clenching.
Her muscles burned but she had come too far now. Whoever was upstairs had nearly killed her, they'd put her through weeks of torture, and worst of all, they were going after The Jagged Maw.
Nova made it to the landing and froze, listening. Three doors led off from the hallway and her death could be behind any one of them. The window with the sniper had been on the far left. She moved to the left door and held her gun ready.
She placed her hand on the doorknob and took a deep breath.
"Where you going, little snitch?"
Nova turned towards the voice and ducked. Too slow; the man at the other end of the hall had already fired. A red ball of energy shot towards her and slammed into her left shoulder. Searing pain shot up her arm. She screamed.
"Nova!" Tanguin called, footsteps pounding the stairs.
"Don't come up!" Nova yelled. She couldn't watch Tanguin die.
"It's okay, I'll kill your friend when I go downstairs," the big man stepped towards Nova.
"I don't think so," Nova said. She lifted her gun with her uninjured arm and fired.
A bolt of energy shot out. The man was too big to get out of the way in the confined corridor and the missile hit him square in the chest. He gasped and fell forward.
Nova let out a sigh of relief mixed with pain. Warm blood dribbled down her arm and sharp jabs of agony shot out from her shoulder. The smell of burning flesh filled her nostrils and her stomach rolled. She stumbled to the far right door where the man had come from, holding her arm against her side.
She tightened her grip on her gun and spun around the door to face the room. An elaborate set of glassware took up most of the space. Steam billowed out of long glass tubes and liquid boiled in others. In the far corner a plastic bag overflowed with green pills.
They spilled out over the floor and shimmered in the sunlight filtering through the window.
Nova's heart leapt into her throat and she fell against the doorframe, her head spinning. The cravings, which she'd thought she'd left far behind, surged back with new force. The urge to snatch the pills from the floor and run washed over Nova like a tidal wave and she took an involuntary step forward.
Her hand shook as she reached out to the pills, her blood pounding against her temples.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
"Nova! Are you okay?" Tanguin's voice echoed from downstairs.
Nova squeezed her eyes shut. Tanguin's voice weaved into her consciousness and warred against the cravings. If she succumbed to the drug now, Tanguin and Cal and everyone at The Jagged Maw could die.
She bit her lip until blood dribbled over her tongue. The sharp metallic taste brought reality smashing down and she stumbled backwards out of the room.
She lurched down the hall to the closed left most door. Her hands trembled and blood dribbled from her injured shoulder.
Readying her gun, she placed her hand on the doorknob, took a deep breath, and pushed. She ducked back behind the door as a rain of shots fired past her and slammed into the opposite wall.
She peeked around the door. It was the same room Spidey had seen. A sniper rifled leant against the wall beneath a broken window. A large wooden desk sat in the centre of the room, shielding the middle-aged man with a smug smile on his face. A man stood on his right and a woman on his left; their bloodshot eyes gave away their addiction but they gripped their guns with firm hands, and fired.
Nova ducked out of the way.
The heat of a passing plasma blast seared her cheek like a hard slap. She ripped her gun around the corner and fired blindly into the large room.
Furniture clattered to the ground and someone grunted.
She took a deep breath, ready to press ahead, when something cold pressed against the back of her head.
"I think that's enough out of you." The man behind her snatched the gun out of her hand and shoved her forward through the door.
Two more guns bristled up from the guards at the desk. The man in charge scrambled up from the floor and righted his chair, slumping into it as if he'd been there all along.
"Look what I found in the hall," the man behind her said, sidling around so that she could see his fat face.
He pushed the gun hard against her temple, the cold metal biting into her skull.
"Nova Tabryn," said the man in the chair, grinning. "It seems like we didn't have to go looking for you after all. Good work, Rex."
"And who the hell are you?"
Rex shoved the gun harder against Nova's temple, sending a throb of pain through her head. "Show some respect."
"It's alright Rex, she's bound to be a little put out. For your limited time left on Earth, you can call me Randall."
Nova glared at him. If they decided to shoot she was gone, but she would take the bastard with her.
"What the hell is the Confederacy doing here drugging people?"
Randall's smile faltered. "I don't know what you're talking about."
Nova snorted. "Please, this place reeks of the Confederacy."
Randall laid his palms flat on his desk. "I don't know what you think you're doing but you're in no position to ask questions. You've given me enough headaches. Kill her."
Rex flicked a switch on the side of his gun and it gave a high pitched whirr, charging up for a more powerful blast; there'd be nothing left of her body by the time the smoke cleared.
Nova's clenched her knees, ready to dive to the side.
The goon's fingers tightened on their triggers, a hair's breadth from firing.
The window behind them smashed open and Rex collapsed to the ground. Nova jumped at the sound of smashing glass and her heart pounded against her ribs.
Randall cried out and dived under his desk.
Nova wrestled her nerves under control and snatched her gun from Rex's limp fingers. She fired at the female guard and her body crumpled to the ground next to the already
dead male.
***
"Miss me?" Cal asked as he hovered through the broken window.
"You have no idea," Nova said between panting breaths.
"What are we doing with him?" Cal said, hovering under the desk to Randall. A pair of handcuffs dangled out of Cal's compartment and clicked closed over Randall's wrist. Cal pulled him out from under the desk.
"You can't stop this. You and your friends are as good as dead," Randall said. His eyes wide, manic.
Nova gritted her teeth and her fingers clenched around her pistol. She wanted nothing more than to kill him. He'd caused her extreme agony, nearly killed her, and planned to kill her friends, but something stayed her hand. Despite everything she couldn't kill him in cold blood.
Nova took a deep breath and holstered her gun. "We'll leave him with the patients from the hospital."
"Probability calculations suggest they'll kill him."
Nova shrugged and turned for the door. "He started it."
The three of them made it down the stairs to Tanguin whose face flushed with relief at seeing them.
"Hey Hunter," Randall said, jutting his chin towards the bottom of the stairs. "Look under that lamp."
Nova grimaced. "No."
"You'll like what you find."
Nova sighed and stomped to the lamp, ripping it off of the small side table. A fluorescent green pill sat underneath it.
Nova's stomach lurched and without realising it, her hand stretched out, shaking.
"Nova!" Tanguin said, yanking her back.
Nova jolted out of her trance and looked around with confusion.
"What—" she began.
"Haha! That will stay with you for the rest of your life. Enjoy!" Randall said, smirking.
Nova glared at the raving man. She pulled back her fist and slammed it into his face with an audible crunch. His laughter stopped mid-chuckle and his body collapsed to the floor. Cal dropped with the sudden weight.
"Sorry, I had to," Nova said.
"That's okay, his laughing was getting on my nerves too," Tanguin said.
"That's all very well for you, but you'll have to carry him now," Cal said, letting the handcuffs fall free of his compartment.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
"Attention. Attention, all Hunters," Tim's voice crackled over the speakers and into Aart's private room at The Jagged Maw.
"What the hell?" Aart said, standing. Never in his seven years of being at the Maw had he ever heard a voice come over those speakers.
Orion sat up straighter, his brows coming together.
"Attention, Hunters. This is an emergency announcement. Unmarked Confederacy cruisers are heading this way. They are prepped for battle."
"What?" Aart said, mind racing. What were Confederacy cruisers doing this far out? Who would they be fighting; there was no one in this region of space except the Hunters.
"We don't know what to expect but given their advance pattern we must assume the worst. All power will be diverted to shields and weaponry. All Hunters are required to take up arms and prepare to repel any incursion," Tim's voice shook. "If you want to leave you have about three minutes, but know that you won't be welcomed back."
"No way," said Aart.
"It can't be," said Orion.
***
Nova burst into Aart's private room just as the announcement ended, sweat dripping down her face. Tanguin stood panting behind her.
"I told you. This is it, they're coming for us," Nova said. She clutched a gun in her hand and another one hung over her back.
"That doesn't make any sense. Why would they attack the Maw?" Orion said.
"Don't you see?" Aart said, dragging guns out from under his bed. "The Hunters are the last source of defiance for this Quadrant. If the Confederacy takes out the Hunters, who else would stand up to them?"
"You're partially right," said Nova, heart racing. "But you started it. They got wind of your rebellion and now they've come to stamp it out."
Some of the colour drained from Aart's face. "But we haven't done anything."
"Not yet maybe, but they're scared that we will. It's not like this is the first time this kind of thing has happened. Look at the motor gangs of last century; they were locked up just for being part of a group - they're going to do the same thing to us. I don't think we'll get the benefit of being locked up, they'll probably just kill us outright."
"We don't know that they're here for that," said Orion, eyes bulging.
"I can't think of any other reason they'd be here," Aart whispered.
"Trust us, we overheard them on Glod and raced straight here. We only just made it back in time to warn you, and that's only because the bureaucratic cogs of the Confederacy take so long to turn. Now get your arses moving!"
She looked back at Tanguin with sad eyes. As much as she had tried to deny the Confederacy's recent actions, she couldn't deny this. They were at her door, ready to beat it down.
"Damned if I'll let them take the Maw," Orion said, snatching a gun from a nearby table.
"Me neither," said Tanguin. Her voice quaked but she took her pistol from the holster at her waist.
"Let's go," said Aart, his face grim.
They moved out into the hallway where they were swept up in a current of people. Over two hundred Hunters currently stationed at The Jagged Maw, surged to the main exit with guns in hand. Some of them looked worried but mostly they looked angry. They'd all been screwed over by the Confederacy plenty of times; enough was enough. If some had chosen to flee, it wasn't many. That didn't surprise her, a lone bounty hunter was as good as dead and after running from a fight they'd never get accepted into another guild. On top of that, for many Hunters, The Jagged Maw was more home and family than anything else they'd ever known.
"Hunters. We've hailed the approaching vessels. They say they're here to collect a few individuals, but I have it on good authority that they plan to kill us all. They claim that if we lower our weapons and allow them entry that the people in question will be given fair trials," Tim said over the intercom. "I say, screw them."
The Hunters cheered and moved even faster towards the main entrance. There were already people lined up, rank after rank. Nova joined the nearest row with Tanguin and Aart on either side. There were many familiar faces in these ranks, some she liked and some she didn't, but all of them she liked better than the Confederacy.
"The Confederacy ships are taking aim," Tim announced.
Nova braced herself. Beside her the Hunters held their collective breath.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The room shook and a loud bang echoed over the chattering voices. Hunters were thrown off their feet and sprawled to the ground. A painting fell off of a nearby wall and crashed against the floor.
"Shields holding; they're preparing to board."
Nova checked her gun. It hummed under her fingers, ready to fire.
"How many?" Aart called out over the din.
Somehow Tim heard him. "There are seventy-five Confederacy land troops approaching, as well as twenty unidentified soldiers. They could be wearing mech suits. I regret to say they look very much like the super-soldier encountered at the Confederacy outpost."
Nova's stomach sunk. She looked at Aart with wide eyes and an open mouth. She shook her head from side to side. Aart's face whitened as he looked back at her. It couldn't be. How could they stand against twenty of those monstrosities when they had barely been able to kill one?
Boom. Boom. Boom.
The door from the landing bay buckled, the metal twisting inwards.
"Activating defence two, the first line has made it through the outer atmospheric shield. Three Confederacy fighter vessels were destroyed by external guns," Tim said.
A grating, grinding sound filled the entrance hall and then they were surrounded by gushing air. It whipped past them towards the buckled door, ripping hair and loose pieces of clothing towards the exit. The barest screams filtered through the whirlwind from the other sid
e of the door.
"What the?" Tanguin said.
"Tim opened the external shield," Nova said. "Anyone outside of their ships will have been sucked away. Hopefully to die painfully."
Tanguin nodded, her mouth set in a firm line.
"Fifty Confederacy foot soldiers still approaching. Ten unidentified figures remaining. The rest appear to have asphyxiated – at least we know they're not invincible," Tim said, his voice stern with the barest hint of satisfaction.
The air stopped rushing past them and Nova let out a long breath. Half of the creature-machines were gone, that was something. But ten of them was still ten too many.
"They're coming in," said Tim.
The banging resumed on the external door. It buckled and bent, crashing to the floor. Beyond the metal door stood rows of Confederacy soldiers wearing crisp blue uniforms and carrying identical plasma rifles in front of their chests.
A screen flickered to life inside The Jagged Maw, showing a view of the shipping bay. Ten monstrosities stood just behind the lines of Confederacy soldiers and behind them, farthest from the door, stood a man with a red stripe running down the centre of his chest. He brought an amplifier to his mouth and when he spoke his voice boomed through The Jagged Maw.
"This is your one and only chance for surrender," he said. "Lay down your weapons and you will see a fair trial for treason. Choose to fight and you will die."
"Kiss my arse," Orion muttered.
Nova recognised his voice and glanced back to see him resting a sniper rifle on his right shoulder. He peered down the sight and a moment later a bright spark burst out the end.
The bullet weaved between the ranks of Confederacy soldiers and slammed into the lieutenant. The man exploded in a shower of blood and tattered pieces of clothing.
The soldiers closest to him gasped and drew back, colour draining from their faces. Meanwhile the Hunters gave a muted cheer. Orion grinned and winked at his companions. Nova had heard he was good with a sniper, but she'd never had the chance to appreciate it in person.
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