by Lisa Lace
"You ready?"
"I think so." I pulled my satchel in front of me and drew out a container filled with military rations I had packed for him. "You never showed up to the party. It's going to be a big night. Accomplishing anything on an empty stomach is hard. I know, I've been there."
"You didn't have to do that." Laz turned back to face me. He raised one eyebrow as he accepted the container. "But thank you. I'll eat this later."
"It's not a problem. I'm your wife now." I said lightly. "You've been watching out for me for so long that I better start doing the same for you. Is there anything I can do to help?"
"I don't think so. I'm just wrapping up here." Laz reached for something on the wall and hopped out of the shuttle, holding a weapon. He tossed it to me.
"This is for you."
I yelped and dove for the gun. The brassy rose-gold pistol was heavier than I expected.
"Don't worry. The safety is engaged. You're going to have to wait in one of the shuttles until we return, so I'm giving you a lightweight pistol for protection. It's not the most powerful weapon we have in stock, but it should be enough to protect you without my worrying that you'll accidentally kill yourself. I'm going to leave it with you in case anything happens. Have you ever fired a gun?"
I shook my head, feeling a chill of intimidation.
"I went to a shooting range once after one of my fights with Jake to blow off some steam, but I was horrible at it. I'm not great at the aiming thing. I wouldn't trust me with a water gun."
Laz cracked his first smile of the day. "Fortunately for you, there's a stabilizing feature built into this model. Come with me."
Laz walked behind the shuttle and set up five empty cans. He stood a good distance way from the targets and motioned me to come closer. I walked up to him, pointing the gun at the ground, holding it with both hands. My rattling heart pounded harder against my chest when Laz positioned himself behind me. Did he have to stand this close to me? I could feel the bristles of his beard lightly tickling the nape of my neck.
"Relax. I'll walk you through it."
"I'm as relaxed as I can get with this death machine."
"Don't be dramatic. Raise your weapon with one hand and keep it steady with the other."
I did as he told me but my arms were starting to hurt from the weight of the pistol.
"I'm going to need to place my hands on yours to show you what to do. Is that okay?"
I nodded, swallowing to soothe my dry throat. My hands disappeared from view as Laz wrapped his rough, strong fingers over mine. I liked the way his palms felt against my flesh. It was a testament to all the manual labor he had performed over the years.
"Turn off the safety feature on the right side of the weapon, and loosely put one of your fingers on the trigger."
My palms were getting sweatier by the second. It was a miracle the pistol hadn't flown out of my fingers. Laz raised my stretched arms to eye-level and aligned the can to the gun sight. I squeezed one eye shut and peered through the sight posts. With his finger guiding mine, he gently pulled back the trigger.
A bolt of blue laser fire blasted out the mouth of the pistol, knocking down the can in the middle.
"Go ahead. Give it a try yourself." He removed his hands, leaving me alone.
I started shaking, but I felt the pistol stabilizing itself in my grip. I pulled back on the trigger five times in succession. Blue bolts flew out the weapon, striking two of the four remaining cans. Satisfied, I turned the safety on again and whirled around giddily to face Laz.
"I suppose that will have to do." He jerked his head towards the shuttle. "We should go. The crew is waiting for us."
I leaned my elbows against the armrests of the shuttle seat and nestled my head in my hands. To make up for the time lost at the impromptu shooting practice, Laz had flown the shuttle over to Synic's base faster than I had ever gone before. I unfastened my seatbelt and clamped a hand over my mouth.
"Did we have to go so fast?"
"If you need to throw up, there's an empty bucket somewhere in the back," said Laz without looking up at me. He was busy performing a double-check of the equipment in his satchel and on his person.
"I think I'll be fine, as long as I never fly again."
"We're leaving now. Keep the door locked. If all goes well, we'll be back in less than an hour."
"I will," I promised. I wasn't sure what to do. Should I kiss him goodbye? Hug him? Fuck him because he might die? I wet my lips as I reached over, deciding to touch him tentatively on the shoulder. "Laz? Be careful."
Laz stared at my hand. He blinked at me and nodded, ducking out the shuttle door. I secured all the locks and dimmed the lights. Peering out the window of the shuttle, I watched the Maztek lower themselves down the edge of the cliff. The plan was to take Synic by surprise from above. One by one, the men faded into the darkness of the abyss.
I trotted to the pilot seat and sat in front of the dark cockpit controls. I started to entertain myself with the irresistibly bright buttons and limited shuttle features. Unsurprisingly, pretending to be a deep-space explorer lost its luster in minutes. However, in the midst of my bored random poking, I discovered a small game hidden in the cockpit screen.
The 8-bit graphic adventure was mindless but entertaining. It was probably installed to provide Xylo pilots with something to do while they waited for their away teams to return. Now it was doing the same thing for me.
I don't know how long I had been playing the game before I heard the voices. I sat up immediately and peered out the tinted windows. Two Xylo soldiers were poking around the Maztek shuttles. My breath caught in my throat. As they approached the first ship, they started firing at the doors. Steel bullets rang loudly in the quiet of the night, ricocheting off the thick metal.
The soldiers cried out and grumbled, but as soon as they spotted my Xylo shuttle, they stopped talking and moved toward it.
"Shit."
I grabbed the pistol from the seat next to me and slid down to the ground, squeezing myself into a space under the cockpit controls. I heard their footsteps growing louder as they approached the shuttle doors. They didn't need to fire bullets at this ship; they knew how to enter a spacecraft of their design. I hear a loud beep as the locks disengaged. The doors whirred open.
My eyes grew wide at the two pairs of boots leaving clouds of black dust as they paced around the cockpit. Would they see me? They looked around the ship but thankfully avoided my hiding spot.
The soldiers angrily muttered in defeat as they turned away to leave the shuttle. That was when I felt it - a fluttery tickle rising in my nostrils that I couldn't ignore.
When the loud sneeze came out of my mouth, they both looked at me, raising their weapons.
Chapter Seventeen
LAZ
I had forgotten how much easier combat was when people worked together. In the corridor before me, a dozen Xylo soldiers lay on the dirty floor. I stepped carefully over the one in my path, avoiding the puddle of blood coming from the wounds on his throat. My hand signaled to my squad, silently directing them to conceal the bodies in case we needed to make a rapid retreat.
If everything went to plan, we would be in and out of this place in an hour. We had split into four teams for this part of the operation, evenly dividing our forces into units led by myself, Dallas, Kraig, and King Jacquim. The different groups of troops were independently responsible for eliminating the soldiers on the outskirts of Synic's fortress. After we had taken care of the enemy forces, we were supposed to reunite and infiltrate the core of the lair together.
In theory, we would escort the hostages to safety after surrounding Synic and his remaining soldiers. The best possible scenario involved Synic's surrender. None of us wanted to get into a firefight with civilians at risk. After his arrest, he would be arraigned, tried, and sentenced.
In theory.
But one thing I knew about Synic was that bloodshed was inevitable.
Synic's bizarre avian obsessi
on was on prominent display through the ghastly aesthetics of his headquarters. He chose to show headdresses made from exotic bird feathers on the ragged walls. A collection of moldy and deformed stuffed vultures with multiple heads and appendages hung from the leaking ceilings. Strangely there were no live birds, rodents, or even insects.
Everything in the underground chambers had the scent of death, even the technology. The rooms contained a lot of equipment, but what was here seemed to be on its last legs. Synic's technicians had left carts with missing wheels and disemboweled shuttle parts to rust in random corners of the building. It looked as if Synic had once enjoyed top-of-the-line toys, but he had neglected them over the past few decades.
My communicator vibrated, playing an incoming message from Dallas. "General – we are in position and are now on standby."
"Copy that." I held the communicator close to my mouth and spoke quietly into the microphone. "Stand down and wait for my call."
A few of my men moved at my command, slinking off to search for any other ways to get more information about Synic's defenses. I instructed the rest of my men to fall back in the tunnel and enlisted the help of Wyla as my backup. The young nineteen-year-old soldier was small but made up for what she lacked in size in speed, agility, and a supernatural ability to focus. She was also one of the best shots I had ever seen and competent in hand-to-hand combat.
Wyla and I headed west down the tunnel, counting the air ducts until we found one that lead to Synic's security control room. I crouched down and boosted her off the ground. She pulled out a drill and started unscrewing the bolts. Squeezing her fingers through the grills, she wrenched off the vent opening and shined a light into the duct tunnel. Wyla shook off the dust from her bright pink hair.
"It smells worse than the men's bunkers in the summertime, but it's clear."
"Good. You've shared a room with Kraig for two consecutive summers. I'm sure the odor won't be a problem for you."
Wyla rolled her eyes. She shimmied up the duct and extended her arm to me, helping pull me to her level. I took the light from her and moved to take the point. We moved down the tube, looking through the vents underneath us and using the rooms as markers.
I stopped when I heard a noise behind me. Wyla was loudly clicking her tongue against the roof of her mouth. Had I missed something? She moved her chin down, motioning to the vent between us. I was thankful there was a lot of background noise. The hissing and clanking from the aged pipelines behind the walls masked the sounds of the ducts groaning from our weight. I put my head close to the grill to get a better view.
The security control room was directly underneath us. The walls contained several flat screen monitors featuring live camera feeds from all over the lair. We had wondered why our entry had been relatively effortless, and how we could gain access to the compound without triggering any alarms. Now I knew why.
The soldiers manning security were neglecting their duties. Some of Synic's guards had their monitors set to games or configured to display underground fight club matches. The ones who weren't near computers were wasting time in different ways. Some were playing with a homemade brown ball made from metal scraps. Others read magazines while chugging back bottles of liquor.
"Check out the asshole on the far right," Wyla whispered. She wrinkled her button nose and made a disgusted face. "He's either the most stupid or most admirable Xylo on the planet. I can't imagine anyone pursuing such bold extracurricular activities on company time."
Curious, I steered my eyes to the soldier Wyla indicated and laughed. His desktop featured a full-screen slide show of overweight Xylo women posing in schoolgirl outfits. However, with every passing photograph, it became more difficult for me to determine if the subjects were actually all women. The bony guard rocked back and forth in his chair, noisily sucking on his teeth and rubbing the crotch of his pants like he was trying to put out a fire.
"It's time to put an end to this party." I removed my laser pistol from my holster and turned off the safety. Wyla twisted a silencer around her drill, unscrewing the bolts from the vent. As she removed the last bolt, the guard with a penchant for male and female Xylo jerked back in his seat. He looked around him wildly until his eyes latched onto the wobbling grill of the vent duct overhead.
The Xylo screamed a warning. The other guards rose out of their seats at once, scrambling for their weapons. They weren't fast enough. Wyla and I opened fire, striking all the soldiers at the control station before anyone could ring an alarm. The guard on the far right keeled over and slid down his seat, perishing with a tent in his trousers.
"Watch out!"
Wyla and I rolled away from the vent opening as the remaining Xylo retaliated with weapons fire. We pulled ourselves out of the way just in time - one of the soldiers hurled a metal ball in our direction. A thunderous explosion echoed through the vent and a noticeable dent from the collision appeared only a few centimeters from Wyla's nose.
I retreated, narrowly missing the solid line of fire. A trail of bullet holes stopped shortly between my legs. When I looked up, I saw the shells embedded in the ceiling were still smoking. There was a pause of silence. I assumed they were reloading. We moved back to the opening for our chance to retaliate.
Wyla pointed her weapon away from the soldiers. She peered into the mirror, studying the positions of the remaining Xylo. Tapping two fingers against her raised fist, she told me two guards were on my side, and one on hers. I nodded in reply, showing her a countdown with my fingers.
I squeezed one eye shut and gazed intently into my scope. Aiming it at a soldier taking cover behind a file cabinet, I breathed out slowly and pulled on the trigger. It was a straight shot between the eyes, splitting open the back of his head. He lurched backward and smeared the walls with his blood as he slunk to the ground. Wyla had already eliminated her two soldiers in half the time it had taken me.
"I know there's one more," Wyla muttered, holding her laser pistol to her chest. She squinted into the vent. "Come out and play, you elusive piece of shit."
My ears perked up at a faint ticking sound in the room. "Is that a bomb? With a timer? How primitive."
A pale fist reached out from behind a couch, tossing a palm-sized red ball in our direction. I grabbed Wyla and yanked her to my side of the vent. The explosive flew up and landed next to my feet. As the lights on the circular disc began blinking erratically, I reacted without thinking. I snatched up the bomb and threw it back where it came from, behind the couch.
"Let's move out of here!" I shoved Wyla forward and started crawling. Wyla and I made it about twenty feet before the bomb detonated. A tumultuous bang from our rear made the ventilation tunnels begin to sway. The odor of burnt rubber and filled the air. We kept our eyes straight ahead, crawling further away until the tube stabilized.
"That was close," said Wyla, wheezing. "Should we proceed to the core chambers, General?"
I opened my mouth to give her the okay, but I swiftly fell silent at the activity below us. I heard a familiar voice that sent chills down my spine.
"I told you bastards to get your fucking hands off me!"
I waved at Wyla and made eye contact with her, gesturing with my gun. She nodded, silently inching over to work on the next vent cover. I leaned toward the hole in front of me, fighting against panic and attempting to observe the scene unfolding in the corridor.
Two Xylo guards had their arms hooked under Gabriella, dragging her behind them. She kicked out her legs repeatedly in futile desperation, trying to get a grip on the floor with the heels of her feet. I inhaled sharply, feeling my muscles start to flex when I saw the red marks on Gabriella's neck. Her head turned from one side to another as she looked for any way to escape.
"I said, let me go, you alien motherfuckers!"
"That's enough out of you." The guard on Gabriella's right swung his fist and clipped her in the mouth. I growled, looking over at Wyla, who was easing out the final bolt from the cover. Wyla nodded at me, set a line against t
he edge and jumped out of the vent, attacking the soldiers from above. She didn't even unclip the rope from her belt before she kicked a soldier in the jaw, knocking him off his feet.
I jumped down from the ceiling, prepared to fight the remaining Xylo. But as I turned to Gabriella with my body tensed to lunge at the other guard, I discovered that Gabriella had taken care of herself. She took advantage of Wyla's distraction and bit down on the guard's hand. He cried out in pain, releasing his prisoner and starting to look at his arm.
The distraction helped me approach from behind. I aimed my laser at the back of his head and executed him. Gabriella started shaking when she saw me.
"Take it easy." I caught Gabriella as she teetered backward, helping her regain composure and keeping her upright. "Are you all right?"
"I think so. I'm okay." She massaged her jaw with a groan. "I don't know what happened. I should have told you when I saw those guys snooping around the shuttle, but I panicked and tried to run. My jaw hurts."
A loud crack came from behind me. Wyla rose from the ground. She dusted her hands nonchalantly and stepped away from the limp-necked guard.
"Don't worry, General. I'll take care of her."
"You're coming with us. Stay close to Wyla, and keep your eyes peeled." Gabriella nodded. "Whatever you do, try to stay out of sight and avoid any confrontation."
I slid against the wall with the barrel of my laser pointed out. When I was sure there were no other soldiers around, I motioned them over. Even though Gabriella was taller than Wyla by a few inches, Wyla took control and guided Gabriella along the corridor behind me.
We crept down the empty passage towards the core chambers, only stopping when we heard distant chatter. I signaled for them to halt and leaned against the wall for a better view. Three soldiers paced around an industrial sliding door which served as one of the entrances to the chambers. Dirty windows provided a murky glimpse into the room holding the hostages.
I motioned to Wyla, assigning her to the opposite wall. We fired at the three guards. The guards slumped to the floor and expired instantly; they never knew what hit them. Wyla and I tiptoed to the doors and peeked through the smudged windows.
