Timberwolf

by Tom Julian

  In a dark part of the bay, four men chased the fleeting indications in their heads-up displays. Above them, Timberwolf, or a holographic image of him, jumped from container to container, leading them farther into the labyrinth of the cargo bay. At a juncture, he jumped down and landed right in front of a man named Tovah, then leaped away again as an orgy of friendly-fire hit the man from all directions. Gray watched in his heads-up as Tovah’s icon faded to gray. “Get back to the airlock! Turn off your goddamned heads-up displays!”

  An explosion sent a man named Scariot flying off the third level. “Lay down suppressive fire and fall back! One man fires, the other man moves! Come on!” Gray’s anger swelled. None of these men were worthy to even be in the same room with Timberwolf, let alone fighting him. He took a moment to enjoy this for him. You’re making a good mess of us, you bastard.

  THE LATTICE

  Achilles and Salla worked their way through the interconnected lattice works over the cargo bay. The fires and the fighting raged below them. Plasma bursts swiped past. “You don’t kill the people you’re making a diversion for!” Achilles complained.

  Salla hung onto the lattice. On the other side was the landing they were trying to reach. On the landing a small airlock connected a willowy atmosphere recycling hose to Nina. Salla’s plan was to go through the recycling hose over to Dacha’s ship.

  Achilles moved through the lattice works deftly, swinging his small body through the struts. He yelled over the fray, “This is easy. We’re circus people. Ever feed a leopard out of your hand?”

  “Jesus. No.”

  A stray plasma burst singed her arm. She slipped and hung there by just a few fingers, licking flames rising from a mountain of crates below her. With surprising strength, Achilles pulled her back up into the lattice. She tried to move, but she found herself frozen. “Let’s go. You can’t stay here. I don’t think you have a job anymore.”

  Salla squeezed her eyes shut. “I hate this job. I’m supposed to be a lawyer.”

  “I’ve got connections. If you get through this you’ll earn a shingle.” She hardened up and followed Achilles through the lattice, finally reaching the relative safety of the landing.

  Something caught Gray’s eye above the action. He looked to the lattice works over the cargo bay, then to the atmosphere recycling hose connected to Nina. He thought he saw something moving up there. Was that two people? He put the plan together. They’re going to hold their breath and go through the recycler! “I need directed fire on the landing above the window!” Gray yelled into the com link, but no one even heard him. The channel was a cacophony of panic and frantic plasma fire. “We need Wrath here now!” he called out to Thomas over the com link.

  Back in the darkened storage room near the elevator, Wrath lay belly up, his breath coming lightly in snorting grunts. Thomas approached gingerly. Over his earbud came the sounds of the fight in the cargo bay, muffled yelling, gunfire, and radio chatter. Eyes wide, Thomas adjusted his rifle and it whined like a defibrillator charging. He came closer, stepping between Wrath’s splayed back legs. He looked down at the beast’s chest. Between the gaps in his armor, Wrath’s skin glowed with a dull orange bio-luminescence Thomas had never noticed before. He aimed the rifled at Wrath’s neck, closed his eyes and pulled the trigger.

  With an arch of electricity, Wrath suddenly became a spasm of teeth and claws. Instantly, the beast was up and had Thomas pinned against a wall. Bayonets from Wrath’s forearms crossed Thomas’s throat and with an awful growl, the beast’s breath washed over his face.

  “Minahel! Minahel!” Wrath relaxed. His forearm bayonets slowly retracted as he recognized his master. Thomas breathed again, but before surrendering fully, Wrath gave a last animal twitch and a sneer. “Wrath’s awake!” Thomas said over the com link, to a response of audio feedback and gunfire.

  AWAKE

  Salla opened the airlock over the cargo bay. When she broke the seal, a rush of stale air she knew was flush with carbon dioxide came out. Over the airlock, she could see the white, willowy recycling hose connected to Nina. It had the thickness of a windsock and she had no allusions about its integrity. Recycler hoses were supposed to be replaced every six months. Drogel had had her sign off they had been, but of course they never were. Compared to the rest of the things he asked her to do, she’d never considered this a big deal. She never figured she’d be using one to protect her from the vacuum of space.

  “That’s not air in there,” Achilles protested.

  “We won’t breathe much.” She tried to smile at him and then an explosion below illuminated the lattice behind them. They hadn’t noticed that there was a dead man wedged between the struts. It was just the top part of Forestground, his helmet blown off and his head bent to the side at almost a right angle. They’d climbed right past him.

  “It’s time to go, right now!” Achilles said.

  She took a deep breath and dove into the recycling hose, Achilles following. They scrambled, weightless, once beyond the bulkhead. The interior felt like crepe paper. They tried not touching the sides, but static electricity in the willowy fabric made it cling to them and they needed to pull themselves along.

  Achilles managed to get by her in the hose. When they were halfway across, she noticed something that at first didn’t register. Maybe it was a stone or piece of metal stuck in Achilles’s shoe, but a thin tear in the hose moved along with him. “You’re tearing it!” she yelled, inhaling too much. Immediately, she felt the bad air in her head and saw stars in front of her eyes. Achilles froze, pausing, weightless. She pulled his shoes off and pushed him forward. The tear was on the interior hose; an even thinner second layer was all that was left now holding out the vacuum.

  They reached the other side and Salla opened the airlock, thankful she had been paying attention when she’d learned how to open these things from the wrong side. A whoosh of air filled the hose, stretching the skin like an overblown balloon. She pulled herself through and then reached back for Achilles. Before she could pull him in, she heard a pop. He grabbed her hand, the hose flapping as the air from Nina rushed out. He struggled, almost slipping from her grip. Bracing her legs against the outside of the airlock, she pulled him in, sending them both tumbling into Nina. Achilles slammed the airlock shut and looked back at her. They’d both pulled the other to safety within the last five minutes. “We’re even now,” he said.

  Achilles slipped into the pilot’s seat on Nina’s bridge. With a scan of his eyeball, an A.I. came to life. “Hello Achilles,” a grandmotherly voice spoke from the computer.

  “Hello Penny,” Achilles responded. “I plan on departing with haste. I need you to disengage some safety protocols.”

  “That’s never a good idea!” Penny protested. “Which ones?”

  “All of them.”

  A DEMON

  In Cargo Bay 4, Gray and several others rose rhythmically like pistons from behind containers, firing plasma bursts. A few more men trickled back, taking cover near the airlock behind the hastily arranged defensive position. Windwhistle staggered from the fray, chemical stains up the side of his armor with plasma burns on his chest plate and helmet. The man fell to his knees and began to sob. Gray dragged him to his feet.

  “The men you trained and prayed with are dying out there!” Gray pressed Windwhistle’s weapon back into his hands. “You need to lay down some fire, friend!”

  “He’s a demon. Like’s been said!” Windwhistle said over and over, shaking his head.

  Gray shoved him to the deck. “Every man’s a demon! He just wears it on the outside.” Windwhistle crawled away, smart enough to get out of Gray’s sight.

  “I could have left you to die, Timber!” Gray bellowed into the chaos. “But I wanted you with me for this! Your story is to be a part of this!” For an instant, Gray wondered how he had let all of it go so wrong. There was a reason why Timberwolf wasn’t at his side and Gray fully accepted that it was his fault. Timberwolf blamed him for what happened during the Jack
hammer operation and that was fair…but if he only knew the full truth, would he understand? Would he be even angrier? He was a soldier, after all, and he understood duty.

  Michael came out of the darkness, firing back into the fray, covering a few stragglers that came with him. Michael and Timberwolf had started out so much the same and ended up so different…except that they both probably wouldn’t mind seeing me dead.

  In the darkness, Ulric, Mountainrock, and Swiftsilver fell back, their faces illuminated in their helmets. They fired bursts as they moved, covering each other. Suddenly, two glowing white half-moon shapes whirled among them. Timberwolf slashed them with plasma blades at the end of his gauntlets, which were as hot as the sun. Molten metal splashed from their armor. As Mountainrock fell, he fired a full clip into the ceiling. The white-hot compressed plasma struck a pressure seal and the exterior hull of the cargo bay buckled. Supporting bolts pinged off into space, and the seams connecting two huge sections of the ceiling spread apart, just by inches, before coming back together again.

  On Gray’s heads-up, Ulric, Mountainrock, and Swiftsilver’s icons turned red and he saw they were no longer moving. Just then, Thomas appeared beside Gray with Wrath. Gray pointed to the landing above, where he had seen Achilles and Salla leap. “That’s the exit!”

  “Wrath, chadasha Timberwolf!” Thomas commanded. Released again, Wrath leapt into the fight. He knew exactly where Timberwolf was. He could smell his rig, sense the Sabatin hide that he was wearing. In his animal brain, he had a faint understanding that one of his kind had been butchered to make what Timberwolf fought in. This brought an extra fury to Wrath as he scrambled up to the lattice, fire reflected on his armor.

  Nina’s engines puffed to life and then roared. The walkway-tube connecting the ship to the station flexed like a reed as Achilles floored it. Michael steadied himself at the awful tug on the superstructure. “We need to get out of here! That airlock is not going to hold!” he said to Gray. He was right. With the power to the docking clamps off, the only way Nina was going to get away was to tear the airlock from the side of the cargo bay. Achilles gunned the engines and then backed off, creating a back-and-forth momentum that tore at the superstructure more each time.

  THE REED

  The little bastard is nuts! Timberwolf stumbled in the darkness as the floor shifted under his feet and the superstructure moaned. He fired a head-high plasma burst at the last of Gray’s fleeing men, clipping one on the side of the helmet. He used the thrusters in his rig to leap to the third level, where he could get a good look out the window. The power from Nina’s engines shook his helmet. He could see the walkway-tube out the window, connecting the cargo bay to the ship. It creaked and strained, bending in the middle like a violin’s bow. When Achilles got it to a point where the walkway-tube almost broke, he’d back off, letting the ship slide backwards, and then he’d do it again. That’s smart, but the little bastard is still nuts.

  It had been Salla’s idea to take the recycler tube over to Nina, and Timberwolf had been impressed at how she was able to think on her feet. He could see Gray and his men retreating back to Nemesis, docked on the other side of the cargo bay. He didn’t want to let Gray escape, but the cargo bay threatened to become extremely unlivable any moment. As Achilles pulled Nina forward again, an ugly groan came through the superstructure.

  Making his decision, Timberwolf headed for the landing. He planned to blast through the window above the airlock and thrust over to Nina. He leaped up to the lattice works, but there was something waiting for him.

  Wrath hit him from behind and they both fell to the deck below, entangled and swiping at each other. They landed with a crash and fell apart, then were back up instantly. Timberwolf went left, then right but Wrath mirrored his every feint. He eschewed the delicate approach and unloaded on Wrath with a fusillade of plasma, the recoil knocking him back and the white flashes dulling his visual sensors. When he stopped firing, Wrath was gone.

  Timberwolf couldn’t see Wrath on his heads-up and his readings were scattered. Outside, Nina pulled forward again, boxes and containers spilling all around him. He leaped to the second level, still unsure where Wrath was. He leaped up to the third level and then finally up to the landing, backing up carefully so he could see over the entire cargo bay.

  It wasn’t his sensors that told him to duck, but his instincts, the animal part of his reflexes. Wrath came from behind, his wrist bayonet grazing Timberwolf’s shoulder, setting off alarms all through his rig. The puncture sealed itself, but Timberwolf could feel he was cut and his heads-up confirmed it. Wrath blocked his way out, pacing back in forth in front of the airlock. Timberwolf watched the beast’s eyes and he could tell, even though his helmet covered his face, that Wrath was looking him right in the eye.

  RETREAT

  On the other side of Cargo Bay 4, Gray’s men staggered aboard Nemesis. They hauled their casualties, some supported between two men and limping, some not moving at all. Windwhistle had Sol under the arms and struggled with his body, even as the servos in his rig helped him. Gray took Sol’s feet and looked into Windwhistle’s eyes. This is what it’s about, son. They didn’t exchange any words, but the young man didn’t look away.

  Gray saw Drogel crumpled up on the deck, arms out, leg injured. He tapped Izabeck to take over hauling Sol’s body. The others passed by Drogel and stepped over him. “Can you walk?” Gray asked him. He nodded and struggled upright.

  “Barely.” Gray pulled him to his feet and he leaned against a bulkhead.

  “Can’t have that.”

  Gray shot him in his uninjured leg, mangling his knee. The man fell, screaming and writhing in pain. “Friend, your part in this story is over!” The anger swept through Gray. “Not telling me about Cardinal Jacob…the actions of your vice…your security letting Timberwolf escape.”

  “Please…please!”

  “Let’s see if you can crawl your way out of here.”

  Drogel took what passed as a reprieve and pulled himself hand over hand out of Gray’s sight. Gray watched him crawl around a container, trailing a red smear. He then turned to help the last remnants of his crew get aboard Nemesis. None of them had been a match for Timberwolf. He hoped Wrath was doing better than they had.

  DUEL

  On the landing above the cargo bay, Timberwolf and Wrath mirrored each other, neither seeing an opening to attack. Finally, Wrath lowered his head and took a few steps to charge. Timberwolf leaped easily to the side, the beast catching himself inches before slipping off the landing. As Wrath recovered, Timberwolf charged up his chemical laser and fired off a whining blast. Wrath simply put his head down, reflecting the deadly beam up into the ceiling.

  Out the window Nina finally bent the walkway-tube too far. It lost pressure, foam and hoses bursting from it as the atmosphere pressed out. It’s time to go. Timberwolf hit the window with a concussion blast, sending cracks through it. Then Wrath came at him, hissing and angry. The beast leaped, but Timberwolf fish-hooked him with the plasma blade at the end of his left gauntlet. Wrath’s eyes went wide as the blade ignited inside his mouth. He scrambled away, sizzling and charred. Out the window, Nina broke free, taking off like an arrow released from a bow.

  The airlock on the side of the cargo bay burst apart. It was like a jewelry box exploding, huge metal docking rings flying free. A docking ring spun towards the widow’s walk atop the central core of The Outpost, where the operations crew had gathered to watch the action in Cargo Bay 4. It had been a remote affair until now, but the ring smashed the panoramic window; atmosphere and people were sucked into the vacuum.

  Another docking ring carried itself much slower, but with terrific backspin. It sailed towards Cargo Bay 1, over to where St. Francis was still docked. The bridge crew of St. Francis scrambled out of their seats as the ring spun at them, painfully slowly. When it struck the ship, the ring’s backspin transferred all of its energy into the contact and it tore across the bridge like a dull buzz saw, shredding metal and plasti
c in an arc of flotsam. The impact tore the nose off the ship and left St. Francis floating free from the docking clamps, tumbling over.

  Timberwolf smashed through the window over the airlock with another concussion blast. The loss of pressure pulled him and a glistening trail of glass and debris into space. The walkway-tube, now floating free, spun by him and it smashed into the side of Cargo Bay 4. Timberwolf knew what else had followed him out into the vacuum. He whirled and he saw Wrath, his arms and legs trying to push against the vacuum, his teeth bared and his razor-tipped tongue licking for him. Timberwolf hit him with everything he had—chemical lasers, concussion blasts, plasma bursts. The beast flipped back, end-over-end, towards The Outpost.

  Timberwolf fired the thrusters in his rig but tapped them too much. He sailed under the belly of Nina, the shadow of the ship hanging above him. He searched his heads-up for the control he needed. Parachute, no…Micro-drones, no…Microwave, no…! In the instant before it was too late, he found it and fired the magnetic tow cable from over his right gauntlet. It was thin as a hair but several magnitudes stronger than steel. The hook at the end of the cable was smart enough to hunt for metal and it snagged the very tip of a strut on the side of Nina.

  He knew this next part was going to hurt like hell. When the cable reached its end his momentum ceased instantly. It was like he’d been hit by a train. He trailed Nina now, its engines roaring above him. He found himself swinging back and around the hull, his cable wrapping around a skinny part of the vessel’s fuselage. He swung around the axis of the ship faster and faster, getting closer and tighter. He finally hit the hull hard, feeling it give and knowing he’d made a nice dent.