There were still so many boats, and even more were coming from the oil rigs. Rowboats and fishing vessels filled with civilians. Everyone seemed to be rallying behind the octopus banner.
These people were ready to die for their home, just as her people were ready to die to take it from them.
She felt that familiar lump of dread in the pit of her stomach, but her heart knew that this was the right decision. El Pulpo was a cancer that had to be removed from the Metal Islands, just as Leon Jordan had been excised from the Hive. She would complete her mission even if it meant that some of her people, including her, had to die.
She heard pounding on the hatch to the deck. The enemy was outside, trying to get in. Edgar leveled his rifle and took several steps back until he was beside Katrina.
She tabbed the monitor on her right, smearing blood on the screen as she set a course straight for the enemy fleet.
Magnolia had been right. There were too many to fight.
Katrina pushed the binos up to her failing eyes. Two larger ships like the container ship she had destroyed were out in front—a floating wall of rusty metal.
She swept the glasses back and forth until she found the shiny boat with two stacks, and …
“No,” Katrina whispered. “That can’t be.”
Were her eyes playing tricks on her? Or was that really Magnolia?
Katrina coughed up blood and spat but kept the binos on the long boat. The woman tied to the windshield post looked just like her friend.
“I’m sorry I failed you, Mags,” she said aloud, “but I won’t fail our people.”
Katrina tapped the screen again, plotting a course directly for the two big ships blocking the way to the capitol tower. Dozens of sailors were on deck, pointing their guns at the USS Zion.
She steered right at them.
“I’m so sorry, Magnolia,” Katrina whispered. She opened a channel to Michael. “Raptor One, this is Captain DaVita, transmitting one final time. It’s up to you and Deliverance now. I love you all, and I was proud to serve as your captain.”
She closed the channel before anyone could respond.
Her body felt numb, the pain gone now. A bad sign. She was running out of time.
Please, just let me finish this …
Banging continued on the hatch, and a window shattered. Shouting came from inside the ship.
“They’re inside,” Edgar said.
“Hold ’em—” A loud whirring cut Katrina off. She unbuckled her harness to watch a massive object consume a swath of stars. Deliverance came in low over the water, and Katrina stood to watch.
Flashes of gunfire sparkled from the boats as the USS Zion plowed toward them. Bullets pounded the bridge. One punched through her armor, then another, her body jerking from the impacts.
Edgar dropped to the deck and reached up to pull Katrina down to safety, but she remained standing even as more bullets riddled her body. She took her final breath with a smile on her face, watching as Deliverance fired a salvo of missiles into the enemy armada.
* * * * *
Team Raptor had made it down to the thirtieth floor of the capitol tower. The central platform was lush with gardens, fruit trees, and a sparkling pool, but violence had torn the beauty asunder. Bushes still burned, tree limbs were broken, and fruit lay splattered on the ground.
“Coming in for another run in a few minutes,” Layla said over the comms. “Got another package for el Pulpo. How you doing down there, Commander Everhart?”
Now you use my formal name, he thought.
“Holding strong,” he replied. A white lie since the team was pinned down and running low on ammo. He looked through his binos at the field of burning debris on the water.
A massive wake rippled away from the zone of destruction. The USS Zion had plowed into two thin-skinned container ships, and both were sinking, one bow and one stern tilted upward and sliding under the dark water.
Reinforcements were coming from the other oil rigs as bells chimed, recruiting anyone who could fight. Not all the Cazadores were warriors, though. Breaking their way into the top floor of the tower, the team had even found some who spoke English, and this was where the man in the nice suit told him el Pulpo was keeping the “sky people.”
But when Team Raptor arrived, they found empty cages under a statue of an octopus, and a dozen soldiers waiting for them. The team took cover behind a rock wall.
Michael looked at the cages. Where the hell were X, Mags, and Miles?
Katrina’s message replayed in his mind, and now he knew that it was final. He had seen the USS Zion plow into burning ships as rockets streaked into its command center. Her last act as captain had been the most heroic he ever witnessed, providing a distraction so Deliverance could come in and take out most of the Cazador boats. The airship had retreated into the dark skies.
The sight of the USS Zion dead in the water, with Cazadores boarding it, filled him with rage.
If his friends weren’t dead, they would be soon.
He wiped away a tear. This was not the time to grieve—it was the time to avenge the brave souls on the warship.
Screaming, he popped up over the stone wall and fired a bolt through a Cazador running toward them. The man splashed into the pool, sending up a puff of steam from the cool water.
Another soldier lay facedown, turning the pool pink with his blood. The brazen man had run right into their fire, screaming wildly, just as Michael was doing right now.
All the warriors seemed to enjoy fighting, and many, like this guy, were downright suicidal.
He checked his team. Les had survived a shot to his helmet that knocked him out cold, but he was back on his feet.
Alexander had taken a round to the fleshy part of his thigh. Trey had been shot in the ankle, and still hadn’t stopped fighting. The father-son team continued to lay down a field of fire at the Cazador soldiers trying to storm their position.
Bullets zipped over the rock wall and broke through branches of the trees just beyond the barrier. One bullet hit an orange hanging from a branch just above Michael’s head. Citrus exploded all over his visor. He crouched down and checked on Les.
“We have to get out of here,” he said.
Les nodded.
Michael waited for a respite in the gunfire chipping into the rock wall and popped up to knock down another soldier running at them. Trey did the same thing, dropping his man with a single round to the neck.
“Push ’em back!” Michael yelled.
Trey and Les continued to pick off any warriors who dared cross the stretch between the trees and the open door leading back into the tower. Alexander, with a bullet hole in his thigh, remained sitting with his back to the rock wall, helping reload weapons.
There were only three ways off this platform: over the railing to splatter on the dock below, down in the elevator cage, or through the very door where the Cazadores were coming out of the tower’s interior.
He looked through his binos at the wakes of boats on their way to the capitol tower. Three long, narrow craft led the group, outpacing the others. He couldn’t see the sailors clearly, but he could see the octopus on the shiny side of one of the boats.
“El Pulpo, you sack of shark shit,” he muttered. Zooming in as far as he could, he saw two figures tied to the windshield posts.
That couldn’t be X and Mags … could it?
He stuffed the binos back into his vest.
“Team Raptor, we have to move!” he said. “Can’t stay here any longer. I’ll lay down suppressing fire with whatever laser bolts I have left.”
Michael checked the battery by pushing a button under the barrel, ejecting the unit. It had 21 percent remaining. Maybe fifty or sixty shots. He popped the battery back into the gun and glanced over the wall. Bullets chewed into bark and chipped the stonework.
In tha
t split-second glance, he identified four shooters lying in the dirt between the trees and the entrance back into the tower. They were crawling in the weak moonlight. More were behind them, and even more were inside the open door leading into the tower.
“Behind us!” Les shouted.
Grappling hooks fired over the railing, where reclining chairs were spread out on the platform. Les hunched down and moved toward the hooks but was forced back as rounds peppered the deck.
“Dad!” Trey yelled.
Michael grabbed Les and pulled him back. “You two lay down covering fire. I’ll dislodge those grapnels. Alexander, shoot anything that comes over the rail.”
Michael waited a beat, then sprinted for the railing. Halfway there, a head popped up, and he fired a laser bolt on the run, burning an apple-size hole where the man’s nose and eyes had been. Alexander took down the next climber with his pistol.
Gunfire cracked behind them as Trey and his father picked out targets.
Michael knew he had to do something drastic to get them out of here. But what? They would soon be taking fire on all sides.
There seemed only one option: use the ropes the Cazadores had shot up over the railing, and climb or rappel to a lower floor.
Just as he reached the grappling irons, another head popped up. With his robotic fist, he punched the soldier so hard that his face caved in. He fell away, dead before he hit the docks.
Looking down, Michael saw boats docked, and soldiers streaming out of a cargo ship. Fifty men, maybe more.
There was no escaping that way.
He took the grappling hook in his robotic fingers and yanked it loose. The men using ascenders to climb the rope screamed the entire thirty floors down.
As Michael grabbed the next hook, the highest climber looked up at him in terror. This man was no older than he. His mechanical fingers paused, resting on the hook.
“¡No, por Dios!” the man yelled.
Bullets slammed into the deck around him, and Michael ducked, seeing more Cazador soldiers rappelling down from the tower’s airship rooftop. Some had already hit the deck and were running for the cover of the gardens.
Alexander popped up, but heavy fire forced him back down, one round nicking his shoulder armor.
“Alexand—” A powerful wind almost knocked Michael down. Above him, Deliverance lowered toward the dead airship mounted atop the capitol tower. A bright flash dazzled his eyes as a missile streaked away from Deliverance and into the water.
An explosion sounded, and Michael crawled over to the railing. A billowing fireball enveloped the dock thirty floors beneath the platform. The climbers on the rope fell away, some of them ablaze.
Michael retreated to the momentary safety of the rock wall.
Ropes dropped in the space between him and the other Hell Divers, and he hunkered down as militia soldiers and civilians in armor rappelled from the cargo hold of Deliverance.
One of them descended too fast and hit the deck hard, yowling in pain. Gusting wind slammed into Michael as the turbofans whipped vortices of wind across the platform, swaying the tree branches wildly. He vaulted the wall and checked on Alexander.
“I’m good!” he shouted over the noise.
Many boots hit the deck behind them. Sergeant Sloan led the militia soldiers, and Cole Mintel led the civilians.
A score of Cazadores ran toward them, brandishing spears, swords, and guns.
“For Rodger!” Cole yelled.
The two forces clashed, filling the garden with screams of pain and the clang of steel. Michael tried to pick targets, but he couldn’t risk firing into the scrum. So he slung his rifle and ran into the skirmish. It was time to put his robotic arm to use.
A Cazador in full armor raised a sword over Michael’s head. Titanium-alloy knuckles shot out and punched him in the throat, breaking his windpipe. The soldier let out a gagging noise and dropped to the dirt. Another took his place, jabbing with a spear.
Michael moved to the side and wrested the shaft from the warrior’s grip. Then he broke it in half in his robotic hand and plunged the blade through the man’s eye and into the tree behind him, pinning him there.
A female warrior swung a cutlass at his chest. She clicked her teeth together, taunting him. He had never hit a woman before, and in his hesitation, she swung low, glancing the blade off his shin armor.
Then she tilted forward, and he saw exposed brain tissue where hair had been.
He backed away as Sergeant Sloan lowered her blaster.
“Mustn’t hesitate, Commander—” She screamed out in pain as a sword bit into her side armor. Michael pulled his handgun and shot the Cazador soldier twice in the chest, knocking him off his feet.
An explosion sounded behind them as he helped Sloan stand.
Deliverance had pulled away and was moving east over the water, firing more missiles at remaining boats. It didn’t get far before taking return fire. Two explosions bloomed across the hull, and a third under the stern.
Michael raced back toward the railing, yelling into the comm.
“Layla!”
The airship fought for altitude, trailing smoke.
“We’re going down,” Layla said over the open channel. “Brace for impact.”
The fear in her voice made his breath catch.
“Michael, I can’t …”
Her voice cut off, replaced by white noise on the comm channel. He grabbed the railing, clenching it so hard, the metal bent like taffy in his robotic hand.
The airship crashed into the water, pushing out a high, rippling wave in all directions. The speedboats turned, arcing toward the downed airship. The rocket launcher that had brought the airship down rotated on the gleaming black boat with the octopus logo.
El Pulpo’s boat.
Michael felt the fear and heartbreak turn into bubbling-hot anger.
He looked over the side, where the last grapnel rope hung. People with buckets of seawater had mostly put out the burning dock, and he spotted several WaveRunners bobbing in the water.
He turned back to the battle raging in the forest.
Cazador warriors with spears and cutlasses slashed through Hive militia and civilians. Dom, the owner of the noodle shop, went down with a spear through the chest. Cole Mintel and Sergeant Sloan were both injured but still in the fight. Trey and Les were side by side, firing single shots. A Cazador jumped on Trey and bit off some of his ear before Les shot the warrior in the head.
Two of the freed prisoners Katrina had conscripted were holding their own, but no one from the Hive was used to this type of hand-to-hand fighting. The Cazadores were winning the day, and with the airship down, Michael doubted his people could win the fight.
He drew his laser rifle again and began firing bolt after bolt, cutting down the Cazadores. Three of them went down in a row, and two more hit the deck before the barrel overheated.
More militia soldiers fell beside the dead Cazadores, their blood mixing and seeping into the fertile soil.
Les looked back at Michael. “Go, Commander!” he yelled. “Go help Layla, we’ll be right behind you!”
Michael was waiting for his gun to cool when a strange light hit the platform. He turned to the horizon, which had turned pale apricot.
The first sunrise he had ever seen spread its weak glow over Deliverance as self-inflating rafts exploded out of the side, keeping the airship afloat.
He had to get down there before it was too late. He had to save Layla.
Michael swung his legs over the side of the railing, clipped the rope through his two carabiners, and looked at his friends for what could be the last time. Les and Trey, though wounded, were holding steady.
Good luck, Michael thought as he kicked off from the platform and started rappelling. His mind kept coming back to X. Where the hell was he?
I could really
use your help right now, old man.
TWENTY-SIX
When X and Rhino finally made it back to the Metal Islands, the sun had risen over a scene of destruction. They motored through the field of floating debris. Patches of fuel burned on the surface. A neck and torso in a life vest floated amid the wreckage.
“Take over for me,” X said. Ceding the pilot’s seat to Rhino, he stood for a better view of the warship his people had commandeered.
Smaller Cazador vessels surrounded the ship like ants around a beetle. Soldiers climbed net ladders, and others moved freely across the deck. The Hell Divers had lost the ship.
“Shit,” X muttered. Squinting into the sun, he could make out what looked like a massive shell floating in the water, surrounded by inflated red rafts.
It wasn’t here before.
“Is that a sky ship?” Rhino asked.
X slumped against the windscreen. His heart sank at the thought that this was the Hive, but as they drew closer, he saw that it was Deliverance.
“Hurry this tin pot up!” X shouted.
Was he already too late to help his friends?
His heart thumped at the prospect that his friends and his dog were already dead. He twisted to look at the Cazador lieutenant.
“We gotta move!”
Rhino pushed the throttle lever, nearly making X take a pratfall. He moved back to the bow, trying to get a sense of what the hell was happening.
Deliverance and the warship had caused plenty of damage before they were disabled. Smoke billowed from the top of the capitol tower, and the walls and dwellings on one of the oil rigs burned. Boats moved away from the structure, some of them carrying construction equipment, including a small crane.
It looked like the rig he blew up when he first arrived here. Then he remembered that the Cazadores were working to restore it, which explained the cranes, but he didn’t recall seeing the prisonlike cages.
The breeze whipped his hair as he turned away and scanned the water. Most of the fighting seemed to have died down, but he could still hear sporadic gunfire. The action seemed to be moving to Deliverance as more boats sped away from the capitol tower, toward the downed airship.
Hell Divers V: Captives Page 31
