The heavy beat of Gurt’s footsteps ran through the dusty ground. Nothing compared to the monsters that had chased them in the jungle, but enough to remind Seb that the brute closing in on him weighed easily twice as much as he did. No doubt one of his punches would reflect that.
Seb stepped to one side and avoided Gurt’s wild swing. The beast’s large fist flew past his face, dragging a gust of wind with it as it nearly scraped his nose. One thing he’d learned the hard way; if he got hit when his world had slowed down, it still bloody hurt.
After Seb’s successful evasion, he watched Gurt stumble past him, his face scrunched up with the rage he’d tried to channel into his punch. He cuffed the brute around the back of the head. He might have decided to go easy on Gurt’s knee, but that didn’t mean he’d miss the opportunity to humiliate him.
Gurt spun around—his wide frame hunched, his fat jaw hanging open with his ragged breaths—and Seb winked at him. “Come on, sweetheart, you can do better than that.”
Gurt screamed and rushed at Seb again.
It played out in the same way as before; Seb avoided Gurt’s swing and clipped him around the back of his head on his way past.
The second time Gurt turned to face him, Seb laughed. “Where’s the warrior you’d pretended to be? I thought you knew how to fight?”
Gurt rushed forward, but this time he didn’t get as far as Seb. Instead he collided with what seemed to be an invisible barrier between them. A loud tonk sounded and he fell backwards, landing on his arse on the dusty ground.
Seb put his hands out in front of him. When he felt the barrier, he pushed against it. It stood cold and resolute like a thick sheet of reinforced glass. “What the …?”
The impact seemed to have dazed Gurt, who lay on the ground, holding his head. Although Seb took a breath to speak, words flashed up on the barrier between them. They read YOU NEED TO GO OUTSIDE THE PIT TO FINISH THIS BATTLE.
Gurt must have received the same message, because he went from being dazed to getting to his feet and sprinting off toward the exit on his side of the arena. He seemed to realise he’d been given a lifeline.
Chapter 13
Seb followed Gurt’s lead and sprinted off in the opposite direction to the limping Mandulu. An exit on both sides of the pit—and a seemingly immovable barrier between them—he had to go back the way he’d come from.
The world had returned to normal speed and the hard ground ran shocks up Seb’s body as his tiredness flooded back into his system. Adrenaline from entering the pit had spurred him on, but now the opportunity to fight had passed, his fatigue returned with a vengeance. Had he not been such an egotistical prick more focused on humiliating Gurt than beating him, then he could have knocked the Mandulu out cold in the arena and he wouldn’t have to deal with this crap.
The slap of Seb’s clumsy feet echoed in the tunnel as he ran back through it. The wind whipped across the front of the space, sending out a deep and continuous tone like someone blowing across the top of a large bottle. When he burst out into the vibrancy of the jungle, he stopped dead.
As Seb stared at the small ship in front of him, he shook his head. Sparks flew the ships, not him. All the time he’d had to end Gurt, and it came to this. A battle in a thing he couldn’t even pilot.
Robbed of his motivation, Seb trudged toward the ship.
Once in the cockpit, Seb sat in the padded pilot’s seat. It smelled of leather and had been made from the hide of a hairy yellow-skinned creature. He looked at the console, hoping to be struck by inspiration. Nothing. An array of buttons—all of them in different shapes and sizes—Seb didn’t have the first clue on which one to press.
Lost as he stared at the cockpit, Seb reached out to touch one of the buttons but stopped dead when he looked out of the windscreen. A ship, identical to the one he occupied, hovered above him, its engines whining. Close enough for him to see the broken-tusked grin of the Mandulu in the cockpit, he muttered, “Damnit,” as two thick red beams hurtled toward him.
Seeing the world in normal speed, Seb barely drew a breath before the beams connected with his ship and white light exploded around him.
The bright flash of the explosion morphed into the stark and clinical glare of the simulator room as the pair were pulled from their virtual confrontation. Numb and exhausted from the experience, Seb looked across at Gurt, who stood panting as he stared out of the glass room at the spectators.
Now Seb had been dragged from the illusion, he remembered the crowd that had watched him go in. It seemed to have doubled in size. It looked like everyone in the complex had found their way there. All of them would have seen him toying with Gurt in the arena. An arrogant prick, he could have knocked him out and been done with it. Instead—
The hard pats on Seb’s back knocked him forward a step. When he turned to look at his smug opponent, he muttered, “Well done.”
A broad grin pushed Gurt’s large chin forward. “It was rather, wasn’t it? And for a moment I thought you might have had me beat in the arena.”
The victor always wrote history. No matter what had happened during the simulation, Seb had lost. Maybe he shouldn’t have pressed the button to drop Gurt’s bridge. Maybe he should have banged him out cold in the arena. Maybe he should have loosed his zip wire when he had the chance. Maybe he should have done a lot of things. But instead, he behaved like a moron because of his overinflated confidence. And now—in front of the entire complex—his pride had to pay the price.
After he’d watched Gurt leave the simulation room to be surrounded by many of the spectators, Seb walked out after him. SA remained in the crowd and watched him instead of Gurt. Her eyebrows lifted in the middle, almost like she felt sorry for him. Either that, or she’d been genuinely confused by his actions.
Before Seb could look at her any longer, Moses stepped in front of him. For a moment, the two stared at one another before Moses spoke. “You could have finished that several times. Don’t show your enemies the same kindness. There are no rules in war. You need to remember that.”
Shame set fire to Seb’s face and he didn’t reply. Once Moses had walked off, Seb looked at the ground and headed back to his room.
Chapter 14
“So why didn’t you just knock him out?” Sparks asked as they walked toward the canteen.
Seb involuntarily ground his jaw in reaction to Sparks’ question. Sure, it seemed like an obvious thing to ask him; after all, he did have Gurt at his mercy in the arena. Had he sparked him, then everything would have been settled. The click of his and Sparks’ heels fell into line together. The sound bounced off the hard steel walls of the corridor, highlighting his refusal to respond.
“I mean, we could all see you were toying with him, but …”
“Did SA see that? Oh, my god, I must have looked like such a prat.”
When Sparks didn’t reply, Seb looked at her to see she had an eyebrow raised at him. “I think it would take a bit more than that for her to think of you as an idiot.”
“She said something?” Seb instantly flushed hot. “I mean … um.”
Sparks’ shrill laugh echoed through the corridor. “Of course she hasn’t said anything. She doesn’t speak, remember?”
Seb looked at the canteen instead of Sparks. If his face looked like it felt, it currently glowed like a beacon.
The second Seb entered the room, the place fell quiet. So quiet he could hear his own pulse. The small few who hadn’t watched the simulation would have heard about it by now.
Seb’s stomach twisted and his pulse sped up as he walked past Gurt’s table. The vulgar creature sat surrounded by sycophants, members of his own species, and SA. To look at her made him want to crawl into a hole and hide with the shame of his own foolhardiness.
SA didn’t smile, but she didn’t look at Seb with contempt either. Impartial, she silently observed him. He sighed as he took in her long blonde hair, her yellow skin, her iridescent blue gaze. He’d been such a fool.
After Seb
had passed Gurt and his harem, his shoulders snapped to his neck to hear the large creature’s voice. “You could have finished me, you know?”
Seb stopped, but he didn’t turn around.
“You had me beat. You could have dropped my escalator into the crevice, but you didn’t. I don’t think you have what it takes.”
And maybe he didn’t. Gurt didn’t mention that he’d had him beat in the pit. Seb could tell him that he knew about his weak knee and he went easy on him, but he wouldn’t stoop to Gurt’s level. He’d made a choice to behave like an idiot once already, he didn’t need to do it again.
A long-fingered hand rested against Seb’s back and Sparks spoke so only he could hear. “Come on, let’s go and get some lunch.”
“I don’t feel very hungry,” Seb whispered to her.
“Don’t let him get to you. It’s not worth it.”
That much seemed obvious, but Gurt had burrowed into Seb like a tick, and he couldn’t get the vile creature out.
Before Seb moved off, Gurt laughed and said, “I think you’re a little mummy’s boy. You should go home and suck on her teat some more.”
Although Seb felt Sparks try to grab him, he got away from her as he dashed over toward Gurt. One step on an empty seat on the other side of the table from the large beast, and he launched himself at him. As he flew through the air, everything slowed down and he saw SA’s mouth fall open in shock.
Gurt flinched and raised his arms, but Seb knocked his defence aside and grabbed the Mandulu’s thick throat. His momentum knocked Gurt backwards off his seat, and the pair of them fell to the hard floor. Gurt bore the brunt of the landing as the empty chairs around them scattered and fell over.
Seb clenched his teeth so hard they ached. He raised his fist, saliva dribbling from his mouth as he drove his hand at Gurt’s bulbous chin. But before he could make contact, his arm stopped. When he looked up, he found Moses over him, every tooth in his wide mouth bared in a fierce warning. The world returned to normal speed and for the first time in what felt like forever, Seb backed down from a fight.
If it had been silent when Seb entered the canteen with Sparks, the lack of sound in the place had now turned it into a vacuum.
Moses shouted, the bass note of his voice blurring Seb’s vision and upsetting his balance. “Get off him now!”
Seb did as ordered, his breathing heavy from the exertion as he stood up and faced Moses.
With a thick finger, Moses pointed at Gurt, SA, and Sparks. “You, you, and you, I have a mission for you. Come with me.”
Instead of telling Seb to join them, Moses lifted him clean from the ground by the back of his shirt.
Seb couldn’t breathe and stars swam in his vision. Before he could pull at his collar to try to free his airways, Moses threw him in the direction of the canteen’s exit. Seb walked with his shoulders slumped and his head dropped. One day he and Moses would fall out. Then he would take back the pride the large man had just stripped from him.
Chapter 15
Moses held the door open for the four of them. Seb watched the three others enter before he did. SA led the line. She moved with her usual grace and confidence and walked into the place like she’d chosen to be there.
Gurt—oblivious to much other than himself and things that needed to be killed—lumbered in next.
Sparks’ eyes darted around the place, and maybe Seb was the only one to know why. He watched her look at every electrical device and power point. It gave her the edge should anything go wrong.
Seb followed them in to the bland room, the air conditioning cold enough to pull his skin tight, but not quite give him goosebumps.
Most of the lights were off and a row of seats had been laid out at the front. A monitor took up an entire wall. The only illumination came from small white spotlights embedded in the floor to highlight the path through the room, not that anyone other than a moron needed the guidance. Predictably, Gurt watched the floor as he walked.
The space reminded Seb of the cinemas he’d visited back on Danu, sans the reek of sweet food, child sick, and sweat.
Following the others’ leads, Seb sat down. When the only seat happened to be next to SA, he would have been rude to ignore it. Despite their path through training together, he hadn’t gotten close to her often, and to be next to her now, their shoulders close to touching, elevated his heart rate just enough to make him giddy. She smelled of sweet flowers. She smelled of summer on a planet he hadn’t yet visited, but one he could fall in love with when he found it.
It took for Gurt to look across, stare down at Seb’s right leg, and let out a low growl for him to realise he sat there with his leg bouncing. The excitement of sitting next to SA did strange things to him. He looked straight back at the large beast and made a point to bounce it more.
Before Gurt could react, Moses slammed the door, the shock of the loud bang forcing Seb to jump in his seat. The shark-like creature stomped down to the front of the room and pointed at Seb and Gurt. “I’m getting sick of the nonsense going on between you two. You’re about to go on a mission together, so you need to start working as a team. Whatever petty squabble you’re having, it ends now, got it?”
Seb drew a breath to reply, but Moses cut him short. “Don’t answer that. I’m not asking for your compliance; I’m giving you an order.”
The entire room lit up from the glow of the large screen when Moses waved his hand in front of it. It showed an image of what looked like a planet. The place seemed dark, like they’d captured the footage of it at night. Moses moved his hands to drag the representation from the screen and hold it in mid-air.
After he’d spun the image, he stopped it and pointed to a built-up part of what otherwise looked like a sparse planet. “This is the planet Solsans and its only city, Caloon.” Moses zoomed in on the built-up rendering of Caloon. “As you can see, the city has two distinct parts to it.” A large part of Caloon poked up from the ground, elevated from the rest of the dwellings surrounding it. Moses pointed at that part first. “This is the wealthy area of the city. The Crimson Countess’ palace is here. Residents with enough credits in their bank live on this elevated patch of land.
“And this,” Moses said as he pinched the air to go close in on the dwellings around the bottom, “is where the poor people live. The city is divided between the haves and the have-nots.”
As if scrunching up a ball of paper, Moses crushed the image in front of him and threw it back at the screen. This time, he used wider hands than before to pull a broader view of Solsans out in front of him. He tapped it so it spun on the spot and showed more of the rural area surrounding the city. “The rest of Solsans is covered in rocky mountains and thick woodland. It’s where a lot of the mines are, but most people don’t go away from the city because of the hostile landscape.”
When Seb felt Gurt lean forward next to him, he watched the large beast address Moses. “So why are you showing us this?”
His already broad chest puffed out further as Moses straightened his back with a deep inhale. “For the good of my health. Why do you think, you moron? You have a mission here.”
‘Moron’ didn’t sit well with Gurt, and Seb couldn’t help but smile to see him rest back in his seat, his bulbous jaw tight as he clenched it.
Like SA and Sparks further down the line, Seb kept his mouth shut and waited for Moses to explain.
“This is a search and rescue mission.” A tap in mid-air brought up the photo of a slightly podgy man with floppy hair. “This is George Camoron.” Moses seemed to take great pleasure in enunciating the ‘moron’ part of his name. “He’s got himself kidnapped by the Crimson Countess. His daddy, a rich tycoon who got to the top by screwing over anyone and everyone who got in his way, runs a commodity company. He owns a planet called Debula. Have you heard of them?”
“They’re the former politicians turned miners, right?” Sparks said.
Moses nodded.
“They use their old political connections to find o
ut which planets have resources worth stealing, go to those planets with the promise of employment and stabilisation, bleed them dry of every commodity they own, and then leave them bereft and unable to support their inflated economy that existed while the mining took place. They’re the galaxy’s parasites.”
A genuine smile split Moses’ face. “Someone knows their stuff. Obviously, with Debula now being our client, I’d advise holding some of those views back at the risk of causing offence.”
Sparks nodded.
“So little George went to Solsans hoping to check out the validity of setting up operations there. As you can imagine, the Crimson Countess didn’t take kindly to that. She captured and imprisoned him. George should have gone in on a covert mission, but it would seem that Camoron’s influence in certain parts of the galaxy had gone to his head. He thought he could knock on their front door and put the proposal to them.”
Seb looked down the line to his left when Sparks spoke again. “So why are we rescuing this vile creature? Surely he deserves everything he gets.”
Another scrunching motion to take the red-faced fop from the screen and Moses grinned, revealing his sharp teeth. “Because Daddy has a lot of money. A lot of money he’s prepared to pay to get young George back.”
The next image showed what seemed to be a female figure. She stood tall and was cloaked in red. “This is the Crimson Countess.”
“Why can’t we see her face?” Seb asked as he stared at the darkness inside her hood.
The Shadow Order - Books 1 - 8 + 120 Seconds (The complete series): A Space Opera Page 23
