by Gorman, K.
She glanced toward the bed.
They’d laid Tylanus across a standard hospital bed―one from an Alliance ship, by the looks of it. He’d been stripped of his clothing and sported a number of electrodes across his body, as well as a diagnostics crown, and his right-hand wrist had a double I.V. dripping a fluid into him.
By the holos around the room, they’d already run a series of scans on him. And not all of them looked to be entirely medical.
“Have you done anything to him?” she asked the nearest doctor.
“No, ma’am. Just scans, fluids, and sedation. We―we were told to keep him under.”
His voice shook, uncertain. Most likely, he’d noticed the blood on her armor.
“Good.”
She reached forward and eased the I.V. needle out of his wrist.
The Alliance doctor gave a cry and leapt forward. “Hey, you can’t―”
Nomiki intercepted her and slammed her into the wall. “You don’t want to be messing with her right now.”
The doctor seemed shaken, her spine stiffening and her gaze darting across the room.
Karin pulled the electrodes off his chest and removed the diagnostics crown. Then, she bent over him and began to pull him off the bed.
“’Miki, give me a hand?”
Her sister stopped restraining the Alliance doctor and helped lift Tylanus onto Karin’s back. His arms lolled over her shoulders and his face and chin butted into the back of her head. She hoisted him up, squatting to hike his legs up around her, piggy-back style.
Shouts echoed up the corridor. She heard her name. Reeve appeared in the window, shock and confusion painted on his face. His voice traveled through the open door. “Karin, what’s going on? What―”
She shifted them back into the Shadow world.
More Shadows had gathered in the room and halls in their absence. She ignored them, heading again for the stairs.
“Huh.” Nomiki stared at the place Reeve had been standing. He’d been replaced by a Shadow. “That power’s pretty convenient.”
“Yep. They should have used it while they had the chance.”
“No kidding. What’s your plan? Are you going to talk to Fallon?”
“Sure,” she responded. “Once I’m in orbit and have a fleet behind me. How about you―are you coming with me?’
Nomiki hesitated. “I should stay behind, make sure Marc and the others will be safe.”
“Will you be okay?”
Nomiki hesitated. “Yeah, I think so. Besides, if I’m not, I have Jon. I’m sure we can get out of anything I get us into. I have a few contingencies.”
That was one thing about her sister. She always had contingency plans.
She nodded. “All right. I’ll drop you close to the Nemina.”
They avoided the first floor and its disgusting, hellish mess of rotting gore, instead taking the long route and circling back down the stairwell to the fourth floor down and through the back door of the compound. The night was calm and quiet outside, the jungle around them dark and still. Her gaze caught sight of part of the ruins down the hill. More Shadows gathered around them, facing them in a circle, and a memory of the Macedonian compound came to her.
When she’d switched to the Shadow side and flown over its ruins, a number of Shadows had been standing in a wide circle around the stones, staring at them.
More were gathered by the empty spot where the Nemina was parked in the real world.
She guessed that, with the Shadow Nemina already existing in the real world, there wouldn’t be another duplicate here.
Nomiki stopped short and gave her a long stare. A pang slid through her chest, then vanished under the glass that kept the rest of her emotions away from her.
“Ready?” she asked.
Nomiki gave her a nod, then reached over and rubbed her shoulder. She barely felt the gesture. “See you on the flip side, sister.”
She nodded back. “Stay safe.”
Then, with a twist of the worlds, Nomiki was gone.
She let go of a long breath, feeling a part of her relax. Tylanus weighed unevenly on her back, making her stoop so that he wouldn’t fall. His arms hung limply over her shoulders, fingers slack and curled slightly.
Around them, Shadows gathered, and the jungle watched.
She turned and walked through the quiet encampment, idly watching her own shadow flit around from the varying light sources. Her Eos powers slid into her, giving her an insignificant boost of energy. Over it all, she could feel the weight of a looming headache.
When she got to the Centauri ship, she stepped over its broken door, sat Tylanus on its lip, controlled his lolling head, then hopped up and dragged him inside.
A tinge of pain rolled through her head as she warped them over.
Instantly, the air warmed. Conversation muddied the space, the foreign words cascading across her ears. It halted almost instantly, and the person next to her gave a sharp intake of breath. She glanced up in time to see a cyborg, a different one than the man she’d slammed into the instrument panel earlier, give a start before he controlled himself.
After a second, Tillerman’s low voice drawled from toward the front of the ship. “That was ten minutes, not five, Grand Regent.”
She grunted, glancing up in her direction. “My apologies. I’ll be more prompt next time.”
The commander leaned against the wall of the corridor just behind the cockpit, her arms crossed over her chest and her cybernetics taking up nearly half the width of the hall. She raised an eyebrow as her gaze dropped to the very naked form of Tylanus that Karin had propped up against the wall. “New boyfriend?”
“The son of the crazy scientist.” She stood and pivoted toward the cockpit. “Someone put him in a crash seat, please. He’s valuable, and I want him alive and comfortable.”
Up front, the pilot and cyborg from before watched her. She took hold of one of the balance rings from the ceiling and shuffled past, leaning in to see through the front windows.
Shouts came from outside. Shouts and orders. But it didn’t feel as though what she’d done had hit yet. Everything was still complacent. Outside, the scientists in the nearest tent came to its entrance, their brows furrowed in concern. There was a booming voice in the near distance.
Crane.
“Have we had any communication?” she asked.
“Only from our own sources, Regent,” the cyborg in the navigator’s seat said.
The netlink in Karin’s suit began to buzz. She ignored it. Outside, the shouting had paused.
“Incoming from orbit,” the pilot said. “FSS Pathfinder and Alliance Amaranthe. What are your orders?”
An image of the two ships appeared in her mind. Both were combat ships, but lacked specification. The equivalent of sending a squad car out to check a report.
“Lift us off,” she said. “I want to get out of here.”
“Your boyfriend’s waking up,” Tillerman called from the back.
“Alliance is knocking on our back door,” the navigation officer commented. A feed came up at her gesture, and Karin caught a glimpse of several officers with blasters.
She chewed her tongue, considering. “This vessel has controlled-burn ion, right?”
The pilot stared at her, frowning.
Darn language barrier.
“Don’t let them in, but give them a warning before you burn the air in front of their faces.” She peeled away, lifting her arms to slide back around the cyborg in the hall. At the back, Tillerman had strapped Tylanus into a crash seat and was kneeling in front of him. His eyes were open, but fluttering, the blackness underneath shifting back and forth.
Karin squatted down next to him. “Get us out of here. I’ve got him.”
Tillerman stood and moved around her. “Where do you want to go?”
“Your camp.”
She nodded and vanished down the hallway.
A second later, the cyborg that had been near the front came to the back, standing
to the side.
“There is a seat behind you,” he said.
She glanced up. It was the same cyborg she’d shoved into the wall before.
He looked mildly uncomfortable. Awkward.
“Good,” she said, turning back to Tylanus. “Could you pull it out for me? I need to deal with something.”
She reached up and put her hand on Tylanus’ shoulder. His eyes fluttered toward her as she helped cover his nakedness with the shadow of her body.
Then, alarm stiffened his spine. An instant later, the shadows tensed around them. The fingers of his left hand gripped the edge of the seat hard, his arm awkwardly wedged through the gap in the crash harness.
“Easy does it,” she said as the shadows shifted around them, a bubble of her own light powers lifting through the armor on her wrist. “It’s me, Karin. You’re safe.”
He blinked up at her. “Karin?”
His respiration had increased, nostrils flaring and shoulders rising and falling. A smear of drool glistened on his chin when he moved. Smudges of red on his arms and legs must have come from her armor when she’d been carrying him.
“Yes, it’s me.” She leaned closer, putting more pressure on his shoulder so that he could feel it. “You’re safe now. I have you.”
“Safe?” He shook his head. “I―no. I’m not safe. I―”
All at once, pain crumpled his expression. He sucked in a huge breath, and energy spiked around them.
He screamed.
She yelled as the sound sliced across her mind. Loud, painful, brutally raw, full of pain. He spasmed, seizing in the harness. His head smacked hard against the seat cushion, and his free arm almost slapped her. She caught it and pressed it to his knee, growling as the scream in her head continued.
Then, its tone deepened. Energy shifted, deep and primal. Darkness flooded up, tearing from the walls in waves. She felt the dimensional boundary shiver. He spasmed under her hold, the scream still holding in her mind.
Her own power answered. Light burst from her skin like a flash grenade. She stood, wrestling his spasming form back down, fighting against the darkness―Gods, he was strong.
Rage bubbled up inside her, heavy and shivering.
For a moment, she wanted to kill him.
No, she thought to herself. Don’t kill him.
He would be better dead, Tia said. That way, Sasha can’t make another world.
Oh, so Tia was still in her head. She hadn’t heard from her since they’d taken the Cradle over.
I don’t think it’s that simple, she replied, the frown deepening on her face as she gritted her teeth and leaned into him.
Slowly, Tylanus’ breathing evened out. The scream stopped, leaving their minds with the gash of its absence, like the wound of a knife after the blade had been pulled out. He began to relax under her, the seizing in his limbs turning into a shallow, steady shake.
“What the fuck was that?” Tillerman called from the front.
“Don’t know. It’s done now, I think.”
“Fantastic. Just so you know, everyone knows where you are now.”
“Great. Get us out of here.”
“Get your ass into a crash seat,” Tillerman retorted.
If she hadn’t been a pilot, she might have been irked by the sarcastic command―but she was, and she knew precisely how annoying it was when people completely disregarded their need to be strapped in during flight.
She was still human, and human bodies were fragile. Plus, there were all sorts of sensitive-looking instrument panels in the walls around her.
And she was not wearing a helmet.
She glanced behind her. The cyborg that had been helping her looked somewhat worse for wear and was holding his head, but he’d pulled out the seat for her and made a gesture when she looked his way.
She pressed one last hand into Tylanus’ shoulder before she moved away.
“We’re in a ship, and we’re about to leave. Probably very fast. I’ll be right here.” She lifted her butt up, plunked it into the crash seat, and started to fiddle with the harness. After she buckled the last lock, she called back. “My ass is now in a crash seat.”
“Thank you, Regent. Kali, get us up.”
As the ship shifted and began to tilt―and the cyborg who’d helped her hurriedly buckled his own harness―Tylanus’ eyes stopped fluttering long enough to lock on her across the short hall. They were so close, their knees touched.
“Thank you, Karin.”
“Don’t thank me yet,” she grunted as the ship lifted off. “We still have a long road ahead.”
Chapter Seventeen
The ship lifted quickly, and a mechanical clunk sounded next to her shoulder―the ‘arms’ of the vessel’s propulsion and steering units swinging into position. Pressure forced her head to bow before the grav gen kicked in with an audible click. By the flip in her stomach, and the shift in light coming down the hall, they’d launched rapidly.
She’d been on a ship that had done that before. Once. An advanced military model with vertical ascent. The Nemina couldn’t do it―despite the surprising power and advancement of her engines, she just wasn’t built for that―but this ship clearly had both the flexibility and the engine power.
And gods it felt good. Exhilarating. A blind roar of enhanced speed, precision, and power.
The pilot part of Karin was in love.
Tylanus had closed his eyes again, but his arms were bracing against the ship’s movement, and his head hadn’t lolled. Tension knotted through his neck, shoulders, chest, and abdomen.
Still awake, and not enjoying the ride.
“Lift-off secure and Alliance soldiers unharmed,” the pilot―Kali―reported after a few seconds as the light shifted up the ship’s corridor from the front windows. “On course to Base Camp One.”
Karin’s eyebrows twitched. Was there a Base Camp Two, or had they just given it a System name for her benefit?
“Fallon’s hailing us,” Tillerman called back. By the distance and slight muffling of her voice, she’d taken the co-pilot navigation seat. “FSS Courant, FL-CV-391-00.”
Karin closed her eyes.
Crane, probably.
“Can you patch it back here?” she asked.
“I will patch it to your comms device,” Tillerman said. “Hold it up and accept the transmission permission.”
She pulled the device out of her suit pocket just as it activated. The screen rolled up with a small beep, and a pop-up window appeared with the permission ticket. Tillerman must have switched the device to System Standard before she’d given it to her.
She tapped the button. Instantly, the image shifted―but, instead of Crane, General Ramesh appeared onscreen.
She narrowed her eyes. The call was supposed to be from the Courant, which was still parked at the Brazilian compound, but Ramesh was definitely in orbit on the FSS Manila. She could even see the distinct architecture of the Manila’s bridge and command square in the background of the feed.
Looks like we’re not the only ones patching transmissions around.
“Good afternoon, Karin. Is everything all right? I’ve been hearing…reports.”
‘Reports’ was a good way to put it. Considering he was hailing her through the Centauri transport, she’d bet he’d heard a great deal. Either that, or he’d noticed that the tracker on her suit coincided with the vessel’s path and had put two and two together. Fallon had been given access to the UN satellites, but she hadn’t been sure how accurate they were.
“Everything was fine until you brought Seirlin in on this mission and allowed them within a mile of the Cradle,” she said. “I am all right, though, thank you. As is Tylanus. How is General Crane?”
The Centauri comms device had a higher quality set-up from the cheaper netlinks she was used to. The interface itself had a high contrast design, meant for practicality rather than style, but Ramesh’s feed came in as a high definition transmission, with only a hint of pixelation―likely from being routed
through one of the UN satellites.
Ramesh hesitated, his expression growing thoughtful and his eyes narrowing, as if choosing his words. “He’s…not particularly happy with you.”
Ah. There had likely been some swearing involved with her name, then.
“Well, I guess that makes us even.” She leaned back in the chair, stretching her shoulders. “I didn’t hit him that hard.”
“You broke his arm.”
“Considering what I’m capable of, he got off easy.”
Gods, that was something Nomiki would say. Now, it was her, wielding enhanced combat bioengineering and psychopathy with a practiced ease.
She let out a breath, making her shoulders drop and feeling the pull of the ship’s flight on her body. In the short time that she’d been acquainted with General Ramesh, she’d come to like him. He’d always seemed a collected, logical person. Even now, after she’d attacked Fallon personnel, including his fellow officer, stolen their second-highest-valued asset, hidden their third-highest-valued asset, and left a few violently dead scientists in her wake, he was coming across as his usual, collected self.
He was, however, a Fallon general, and had likely known about the plan to involve Seirlin in the mission. And he was also in charge of a large, capable warship currently in orbit.
She resisted the urge to ask Tillerman where, specifically, the Manila was in its orbital path.
He let out a long breath. “Karin, I understand that you’re upset about the decision to involve Seirlin in our missions, but we are all together in this crisis, and they have the experience we need for this situation―”
“They caused this situation. And they brainwashed, tortured, and mutilated hundreds of children to do so―and then they profited off of it.”
“All of which will be dealt with in due time, and all of which makes them the sole experts on this.”
“No, actually, it doesn’t. Have you seen their files? Been through their records and database? Because we have. They are only experts in the branch of supersoldiers that Bernard Corringham fed them the plans for. Programs outside of that scope, like myself, Sasha, Tylanus, and ninety percent of the Programs Sasha was running in her own Project, are outside of their knowledge.”
