by J. N. Chaney
Leira turned back. “Dash, behind us!”
Three of the Dreadfoot scurried along behind them just at the edge of their vision—one along the floor, the other two hugging the walls. Dash aimed the plasma pistol back and fired.
When the incandescent flash cleared, he saw each Dreadfoot had gone inert. One fell from the wall and clattered hard to the deck, but more lurked behind them, hanging back, waiting to resume the chase as soon as they started moving again.
“They’re trying to bait you into firing,” Ragsdale said. “I guess they think there’s more of them than you can kill with whatever shots you have left.”
“I think they’re probably right,” Dash replied. “That first one I shot—I think I saw another one trying to repair it.”
Leira cursed. “If they can fix the ones we take out, then there just aren’t enough plasma shots.”
“So all we can do is try to outrun them,” Ragsdale said. “Get outside this damned ship and hope your big robot thing out there can help us.”
If Sentinel hasn’t been knocked entirely offline, maybe permanently, Dash thought, but he didn’t say it aloud. There was no point taking away what little hope they had left.
“What we need,” Leira said, “is something else we can shoot at them. Something as deadly as these plasma pistols, or even deadlier, but with more shots.”
Ragsdale sniffed. “Sure. How about a company of assault marines while we’re at it?”
But Dash gave Leira a keen look. “Maybe we can find something like that.”
“How?” Leira asked.
“Let’s ask the Golden,” Dash said, and there was a new resolve on his features.
“What?” Ragsdale asked, confused.
He gestured along the corridor. “Let’s go. I need to find a working console.”
Dash decided he was heartily sick of hard decisions when the options sucked.
“Dash, we need to go one way or the other here.” Ragsdale was scowling at the growing cacophony of shrieks and squeals. The Dreadfoot could only be a half a minute behind them, maybe less.
Dash looked down the corridor, spotting a side passage lit with the telltale glow of Golden conduits.
“This way,” he said, striding ahead with a certainty that buoyed the others.
The first way led them back outside—except they’d expended all their plasma shots but one from Dash’s pistol and two from Leira’s, and still had a long way to go. There was a good chance they’d just be run down by the pursuing Dreadfoot before they could reach the exit from the ship, and the possible help of Sentinel, who still wasn’t answering Dash.
On the other hand, the second way might just be a dead-end, leaving them trapped and helpless as the Dreadfoot swarm implacably closed in on them. But, if there was any hope of finding some way of dealing with them, it would be in there.
Dash peered down the passage, his mind whirling with possibilities. He had to protect his people and get them to safety. They would trust him, and follow him, despite being only too keenly aware that he might choose wrongly and get them killed—or acquired for something far worse than a simple death.
This was what it meant to be the Messenger, and Dash wore it with greater ease as his choice became clearer. He turned to the side corridor. “This way.” There was no doubt in his voice. There could be none, given their situation.
Without hesitating, they followed into the compartment. With the metallic shriek of the Dreadfoot wailing behind them, Dash tapped at the console beside the door, closing and sealing it.
“Uh, Dash?” Conover said.
He turned. “What?”
Conover gestured around the compartment. There were no other exits.
“That’s a problem,” Dash said, eyes searching the seamless walls.
“I don’t imagine that door is going to hold back those Dreadfoot things for long,” Viktor said. “If you have a plan, Dash, now would be a good time for it.”
“A plan? I haven’t had one of those since we crawled into this bloody ship, but I have something else.” He nonetheless turned to the nearest console, the reason they’d come in here in the first place. As he did, Leira moved to Amy, who slumped against the wall, gasping.
“Sorry,” Amy said. “Can’t seem…to catch my…breath.”
“You lost a lot of blood,” Leira replied. “I guess Sentinel couldn’t get the Golden tech to do anything about that.”
“Yeah, well…it did this.” She pulled aside her slashed excursion suit. The long gash that had almost killed her stood out, but there was a dark undertone to the wound that didn’t look good.
Or natural.
“What the hell is that?” Leira asked.
“I think…it’s that…Dark Metal stuff. The liquid…type,” Amy said, peering intently at her own wound.
Leira just stared, but Conover immediately stepped toward her. “You’ve got Dark Metal in you?” He spun on Dash. “Did you know about this?”
“I didn’t,” Dash said, his attention on the terminal and the symbols scrolling across it as he poked away at it. “Sentinel just said she’d heal Amy, not how.”
“But…Dark Metal? Inside her? Golden Dark metal?”
“I don’t think Dark Metal is Golden or Unseen or anything else, any more than the air we’re breathing is Golden air,” Dash said evenly.
“Yeah, but are you sure?”
“Not entirely, but I won’t turn away anything that keeps her alive and breathing, regardless of the effects. She has to live, and I’ll deal with the consequences later. We’re straddling reality and—whatever this shitstorm is turning into. But for now, Amy’s alive, and that’s what we need. What she needs,” Dash said.
Conover gave a chastened nod. “Yeah, okay. Sorry, Dash.”
Dash shook his head. “It’s fine. Honestly, I’m surprised no one’s cracked yet, but we’re going to keep on, okay? We have to.”
Something slammed the door, hard. It shuddered but held.
“That’s not good,” Ragsdale said. “Dash, have you found anything?”
“Working.” He stared at the console. “Just…give me a second.” He frowned at new information scrolling onto the display. He couldn’t understand it completely, but he realized it was a map of this part of the ship, which was just what he’d been looking for. He touched it, sliding it across the display, looking for something that must be here. His fingers danced, the tips causing small pools of light in the ether between realities that only he—and maybe Conover—could see.
The door shuddered again then began to bow inward. A nerve-wracking squeal rose from the other side of it.
Dash felt the fear rippling through the cramped compartment. He swiped around the map, desperately seeking something, anything they could use. It seemed futile.
Until it wasn’t.
22
He slid his finger back, pulling something onto the screen he’d almost missed.
“Yes. Okay…there. Right there.” He pointed at it. “We need to get there.”
“Why?” Viktor asked, eyes fixed on the door.
It still held, but for how much longer?
“This is a warship, right?” Dash said. “So they must have an armory. More than one, probably. But that’s the closest one, right there.”
“All very well and fine,” Ragsdale said, raising his voice over another blast of squealing. “But how do we get there?”
Dash studied the map for another second, then turned and pointed at a spot on a bulkhead near the floor. “There’s a conduit, right there. It leads back to the main corridor out there.”
“That’s going to be full of those Dreadfoot things.”
Dash nodded. “I know. In fact, I’m counting on it.”
Dash touched the panel ahead of him. According to the map, beyond this panel was the main corridor, the one that would take them outside—except, of course, for the Dreadfoot swarm blocking their way.
He looked at Leira beside him. As well as being too low t
o stand, the conduit was barely big enough for both of them to squeeze side-by-side. “Ready?” he asked.
She nodded, but said, “Are you sure about this?”
“Leira, I can’t remember the last time I was sure about something.”
“Dash,” he heard Ragsdale say from somewhere behind him, “they’ve broken into the compartment we just left.”
I know, Dash thought as that horrific squeal sounded both behind and ahead of them now. It would probably take the Dreadfoot only a moment to figure out where they’d gone then move to seal off both ends of this conduit. Even if they were too big to fit into it themselves, they only had to wait. Dash and the others couldn’t stay huddled up inside it forever.
But they wouldn’t have to. At least, that was what Dash hoped, anyway.
He gave Leira a wink. “Follow me.”
Dash gripped the plasma pistol. He’d already made the necessary tweaks to it; he just had to trigger it, and about five seconds later it would detonate like a bomb. That five seconds nagged at him—he remembered the carnage when a plasma pistol reduced Clan Shirna’s flagship to glowing debris. That same explosion, in this confined space—there’d be nothing left but charred dust.
No choice now, Dash thought .He kicked out, knocking the access panel ahead of him halfway across the corridor. The screech of the Dreadfoot outside trying to get into the compartment they’d just left made his teeth vibrate. Jaw tight, he reached out with the pistol, triggered it, flung it back in the direction of the side corridor they’d taken to get into this dead-end, then yanked himself back to brace for impact.
…four…five…
…six…
…seven…
He opened his eyes and looked at Leira. She gave him a tired smile. “It was a good try, Dash.”
The world flashed white.
Dash stumbled along the corridor, the others close behind. Shattered, sparking wreckage of at least one Dreadfoot, but probably several, littered the deck, clattering as they kicked the pieces aside. Dash glanced back. Ragsdale was shouting something about more of the mechanical horrors appearing, but Dash’s ears rang—no, his brain rang. The corridor had been a far more confined space than the bridge of Nathis’s ship, so the plasma blast had been far more concentrated. They’d barely been brushed by the fringe of it, and not only had the blast made his bones rattle, both he and Leira had nasty sunburns.
Didn’t matter. It gave them a chance to break contact with the Dreadfoot long enough to get to another side corridor. This one led into darkness.
“I can’t help thinking, Dash,” Viktor shouted, “that we’re heading deeper back inside this ship!”
Amy nodded. “The way out is that way, isn’t it?” She pointed back up the corridor.
“So are a bunch of our friends,” Dash said. Sure enough, the piercing squeal of the Golden mechs rose once more as those protected from the blast in the compartment they’d just vacated boiled back into the corridor and started after them.
Without another word, Dash led them down the corridor to a cross-junction. Then left. The whine in his head grew, as did flickering glimpses of the Golden map. It was an echo in his memory, and he fought to maintain control over the lines and pathways that would lead them to freedom. To victory.
Dash remembered hearing somewhere that your first instinct was correct.
So, he went left, seeking a junction—it was there, right where he’d remembered. They hit that and went right, along a corridor that passed a compartment on side, yes, and then other, even better, and then ended at a door.
A door.
“Not just a door,” Dash said.
“What is it then?” Leira asked. Her eyes were clouded with fear.
Their only chance now would be for him to Meld with the ship. But without Sentinel’s cyber defenses, he’d be at the mercy of the Golden security systems, and they might bury him in artificial realities so deep he’d never know what was real again.
“Sentinel,” he muttered, “I could really use your help right now.”
“How can I assist?”
Dash jumped. “Sentinel? You’re back with us?”
“I am.”
“I thought we might have lost you completely!”
“After I saw to Amy’s welfare, I had to engage fully with the Golden security routines. It took longer, and was far more difficult, than I’d anticipated. They were most robust. One might say vicious,” Sentinel said.
“Um, Dash?” Leira said. “I hate to interrupt your reunion, but—”
“Right, yeah. Sentinel, I need this door opened.”
The door slid open smoothly. Dash hadn’t expected that either.
They rushed into the open compartment, and Dash let out a bark of laughter at the sight before him.
Weapons. Brutal, lethal, gorgeous weapons, all in obedient racks, waiting to be used.
Ragsdale grabbed one. It looked a cross between a submachine gun and someone’s idea of abstract art, all curves and angles. “Hope it’s got no security locks on it.”
“I have disabled the security features on all of these weapons,” Sentinel said. “They are all fully functional.”
“Excellent,” Ragsdale said through his teeth. He strode to the door, aimed down the corridor, and squeezed what seemed to be the trigger. A dazzling blue pulse shot from the weapon, striking the far bulkhead and spalling glowing chunks of debris from it.
“We’re in business,” Dash said. “Everybody take one—no, take two. Take as many as you can carry. We’re all in on this.”
“Maybe we can hang a few off Grundel, here,” Conover said, pointing at the Golden corpse that he and Freya had managed to bring through all the shit that had gotten them here.
Viktor looked at Conover. “Grundel?”
“Back on Penumbra,” Conover said, jamming a Golden gun onto the corpse, “Grundel was our resident drunk. I think I only ever saw him being carried out of places.”
“Grundel the Golden. Has a nice ring to it.”
“Almost heroic,” Amy said.
Dash pushed past them. “Well, unless Grundel can fire that gun, let’s not worry about him right now, okay?” He joined Ragsdale at the door. “We’ve got who knows how many Dreadfoot to fight our way through yet.”
“Your friend, Sentinel, seems to have control of this ship,” Freya said. “Can’t she just shut them all down?”
Dash and Ragsdale shared a why didn’t I think of that look. “Sentinel,” Dash said, “can you do that? Just shut all the Dreadfoot down?”
“Unfortunately, no. They are autonomous.”
“Worth a try.”
“Moreover, my control over the ship is limited and will diminish as the security systems circumvent the countermeasures I have erected. I must shut the ship’s systems down now. Is there anything else you require from me before I do?”
Dash glanced at the Golden weapons they all hefted, exchanged another look with Ragsdale, then shrugged. “Can’t think of anything.”
“Very well.”
Around them, the ship began to die, systems flickering and going dark, lights fading back into darkness, the soft, pervasive rumble of countless functions going still, but the quiet did not linger for long.
It was filled by their own ragged breathing, their heartbeats, and under it all, the distant shriek of the Dreadfoot on their inexorable march towards them.
Dash lifted the Golden pulse gun, a real smile breaking his features into something bright. “Okay, everyone. Let’s go home.”
As soon as Ragsdale and Viktor opened up with their pulse guns, Dash turned and ran back to the massive doors they’d first encountered upon entering the ship. Beyond them was the final compartment, the one mostly filled with dirt and debris, that would take them to the hatch leading outside. As Dash ran, the chorus of squeals and shrieks from the Dreadfoot intensified behind him. There seemed no end to the damned things. Since the armory, it had been a running battle, the Golden pulse guns punching through Dread
foot shells, blowing off jointed limbs, taking them down in a way the slug carbines or plasma pistols couldn’t. The punishing fusillade left glowing wreckage as they advanced, liquid metal streaming away from the Dreadfoot as they twitched toward stillness.
But the pulse guns couldn’t fire forever, despite whatever arcane tech powered them. By the time they’d fought through the Dreadfoot swarm that had survived the impromptu plasma pistol-grenade and cleared the way out of the ship, they’d burned through three of them. Countless more of the horrific mechs had come boiling out of the ship behind them in hot pursuit; keeping them at bay had reduced each of them to a single, working pulse gun. Unfortunately, Dash had no idea how to tell how many shots each had left, so they only knew the weapon had been exhausted when squeezing the trigger did nothing.
He dove under cover, behind one of the huge blast doors, and looked across at Ragsdale on the other side of the gap. “You ready?”
Ragsdale raised a finger. “Just a second. Catching my breath.” He raised the pulse gun and snapped off a shot. “I’m surprised these Dreadfoot things don’t have some kind of weapon. Something like this,” he said, hefting the pulse gun.
A Dreadfoot scrambled into view, charging them. Dash aimed and fired a double-tap, punching two shots into the mech. It slewed to the right, the legs on that side giving out. Another Dreadfoot immediately raced forward to replace it.
“It’s not what they’re for,” Dash called back, shifting his aim and firing again. This time, he missed and snapped out a curse.
“What are they for, then?”
The Dreadfoot scuttled behind a hulking piece of machinery. “They’re called Dreadfoot because that’s the closest translation of what the Golden call them. But they call them something else, too.” He glanced at Ragsdale. “Harvesters.”
“I can guess what they’re meant to harvest.”
“Yeah. Us. Their imperative is to take us alive.”
