by Larkin, Matt
Still missiles ravaged her shields until they failed. MAG rounds couldn’t hit them at this speed, but missiles opened breaches along her hull.
Rachel screamed, agonizing pain ripping her apart. Her insides were torn to shreds by the insects around her.
She was only dimly aware of David carving the Jericho cruisers up with the ion cannons. Two cruisers exploded, then a third, and a fourth. So many dead.
And still she wanted more vengeance. Her hands trembled with pain. She jumped through the Conduit Gate, shimmering colors surrounding her. Safety.
She fell from the chair, clutching her sides. Trying to remember which parts of her were whole. “David, take the chair …”
He ran to it, but the Ark scraped the sides of the Conduit before he could take control. It was like having bits of her flesh torn off. Frozen and burned all at once.
David would be able to lose their pursuers. He was a master. He slipped into the chair.
The bridge door opened.
Raziel strode in.
CHAPTER EIGHTY-FIVE
Maybe I was wrong about everything. The realization Galizur—Raziel—had been manipulating me from the moment he sent me to Gehenna leaves me uncertain of anything anymore.
The door opened and David jerked around to level his pulse pistol at the intruder. An Angel. Despite himself, he lowered the weapon. How could he threaten such a being? The Angel must have overridden Rachel’s lock on the door, perhaps through psionics.
David tried to keep his focus on navigating the Conduit.
“Wait!” Rachel shouted, pushing herself up off the floor.
The Angel strode toward her without pause. He was the size of a man—a big man—but with that wingspan he seemed to take up the entire bridge. “Surrender command, Ms. Jordan. Turn the Ark over to me and no harm will befall you.”
The way she set her jaw, David knew it wouldn’t be good. “Lass …”
“I am prepared to turn the ship over … But you have to let us get to Knight first. He’s on Gadara, not far.”
“We’re almost there,” David said.
Raziel spread his hands as though making a magnanimous gesture. “By all means, Ms. Jordan. Retrieve the mercenary.”
“He’s the one, isn’t he?” Rachel said, and stood. She hardly seemed frightened of the Angel. David suspected she should be. “The one you were testing, your pawn on Gehenna.”
“What makes you think there was only one pawn on my board, Ms. Jordan?”
Rachel snorted in a decidedly unpious manner. David prayed Raziel didn’t decide to smite anyone.
He pulled the Ark around a few more bends in the Conduit, then jumped out of the Gate. Gadara was the third planet from the sun in this system, a tiny world covered by a couple of small cities and not much else. A glacier blanketed the entire northern hemisphere, so the only cities sat on the equator.
“We have arrived,” Raziel said. He pointed to a city on the display. “Your friend is there, Ms. Jordan.”
Rachel glowered. “You know that because you were working with the Lazarus Group. Just another set of pawns? Do they know what you are, Angel?”
“Turn over command of this vessel, Ms. Jordan. I do not want to be forced to harm you or Commander McGregor, but I am taking the Ark. Now.”
Rachel’s chest trembled, then she stumbled. David leapt from the chair to catch her as she fell. She went limp in his arms. His heart caught in his throat. He couldn’t breathe.
“Did you … ?” he tried to ask the Angel.
“No. She is unharmed. The shock of severing the connection with the Ark made her faint. Now go.”
David lifted Rachel into his arms. So she was free of this thing? She must have willingly handed it over to Raziel. And the truth was, he was glad of it. Rachel had been losing herself in the Ark from the moment they found this relic. It wasn’t ever meant for mankind, that much was clear. It belonged where it was—back in Angel hands, though Rachel might never agree. He supposed she’d seen anything was better than losing it to Jericho Corp.
He walked from the bridge and went to join the others in the lab. Leah and Phoebe stood around talking. When he walked in, Rachel unconscious in his arms, Leah rushed over to examine her.
“Put her on the table.”
“I think she’s all right,” he said, but did as the doctor ordered.
Leah scanned Rachel, then nodded. “Yeah, I think she’ll be fine. It was probably just shock.”
That and the psionic energies of Eden. Maybe mankind never did have any business returning there. Eden wasn’t meant to be a place, but an idea. A warning about what could be lost.
“We’re over Gadara,” David said. “Knight is down there, waiting for extraction.” He glanced at Rachel’s prone, helpless form. “One of us …”
“No, I’ll do it,” Phoebe said. “Stay with her.”
David nodded, grateful she understood. He couldn’t leave Rachel like this. Void, even if she woke he wouldn’t want to leave her under the circumstances. She’d just lost the Ark to an Angel and he didn’t trust her not to do anything self-destructive. She had a habit of doing just that, especially where Angels were concerned. She’d shot down her own career, lost her family, and since then managed to enrage every corporation and government in the universe. It was kind of impressive, actually, in an off rotation way.
Phoebe rushed toward the hangar. There were still QI troopers on the ship, but David supposed Raziel would tell them not to attack. Besides, they were probably busy rounding up any final Jericho Corp intruders.
He pulled up a chair to sit beside Rachel and brushed her forehead with his hand. Not the same without skin on skin contact. He stripped off his glove and pressed his palm against her face.
“She’s a lucky woman,” Leah said.
“What?”
“She’s lucky to have someone like you, David. You’re a good man.”
Was he? He hadn’t felt like one, lately. He’d lost his commission, committed treason … He felt like his whole life had gotten lost in the Conduit. And somehow he was still glad to be here, right beside Rachel. After everything they’d been through, all she had done, he still wanted her nearby.
Leah’s words warmed him inside. They’d been friends since the Academy at Hazaroth, but to hear her speak like that, like she was so proud of him … It made him feel proud of himself. For the first time in a while.
“I’m the lucky one,” he said, at last.
Leah shook her head, smiling at something he clearly had missed. “Oh, David. You have no idea.”
No idea how lucky he was? He thought he did. At long last, he thought he could see it. With the loss of the Ark, he’d lost his chance to help Mizraim against Asherah. There was still a war going on, and his people still needed him. But right now, he was here with Rachel. He knew she loved him. For now, that was enough.
“I’ll give her something to wake her up.” Leah pressed a tab on Rachel’s forehead, and she cracked her eyes open.
“Mac …” Rachel shut her eyes again, and her body shook. “It’s gone.” When she opened her eyes again, tears welled there. “It’s gone.”
He’d almost never seen Rachel cry. He pulled himself up on the table to sit beside her and wrapped his arms around her. “Aye, lass.” He rubbed his hand over her back and held her close. “Aye, I know.”
“I was connected to something,” she said, her voice breaking. “It was so … divine.”
“You’re still connected to something.” He kissed her cheek. “You always will be.”
CHAPTER EIGHTY-SIX
If all of this was his plan, if Raziel meant for me to find the Sefer and then the Ark, I am left wondering what his endgame is. Why hide the Ark at all, if he was going to lead a human to it, centuries later?
Knight whipped his staff around him, then cracked another Grouper on the head, sending him flying off the building. The man plummeted toward the street thirty stories below. He’d lost all track of how many people he’d
killed today, but the Groupers just kept coming. They fought like men possessed, like some divine force drove them to disregard their own lives.
A hover carrier leveled out over the building and Knight dove behind the entrance to the stairwell, trying to keep the smaller structure between himself and the carrier. Would the walls even stop a MAG round?
“Stand down, now,” the carrier ordered him over a loud speaker.
Knight had brought down a pair of carriers once already. He’d telekinetically grabbed one and sent it careening into the other. The effort had left him lying on the ground, barely conscious. He needed a new tactic for this one.
Maybe he could scale the stairwell and jump onto the carrier. If he could board it, he might be able to use it to escape the city.
More soldiers poured out of the stairwell, he could hear them. They’d blown the door off ten minutes ago, and since then he’d fought at least fifteen men. He peered around the corner to see others repelling down from the carrier.
Ten. Ten soldiers.
He could do this. There was nowhere else to go. He might die, but he would make it as painful as possible for these little Lazarus shits.
He jumped up, grabbed the lip of the stairwell structure, and pulled himself onto the roof. He immediately started running toward the carrier. Eight meters. He could make that jump. They’d never know what hit them.
The carrier began to turn toward him.
A shuttle burst through the clouds. MAG cannons opened up on the carrier. The supersonic slugs tore it in half. It exploded, the impact knocking Knight on his back. He rose to see the shuttle come in to hover over the Lazarus soldiers.
It opened fire with the MAG cannons. In a fraction of a second, the people who had covered the roof had become nothing but blood stains. Knight rose. That was a Sentinel shuttle.
It landed on the roof and he stalked closer, hand on his staff. Had they come to arrest him again?
If so, he’d need to hit them hard and fast.
The hatch opened, and Phoebe stepped out.
Knight pulled up short. She had come for him. She had come for him. When he sent the distress call, he’d thought Rachel would come. Then David had signaled they couldn’t, and he’d known he was a dead man. With the realization of that inevitability had come a kind of peace. He couldn’t escape the planet, but he could make the Groupers bleed for taking him down.
But Phoebe was here, quirking that odd smile, like she knew something he didn’t. He’d given her no reason to care, and she’d come anyway. He’d thought she hated him after what happened on Ekron. Then, on Eden, he’d feared she wouldn’t make it out, despite his efforts. And he’d wanted her to—he’d wanted to save her.
Knight compressed the staff and walked into the shuttle, never taking his eyes from Phoebe’s. She watched him the whole way.
“Are you all right, ninja boy?”
“You saved me.”
“Yup, yup. I’m a heroic gal. I show up at the last minute and save the day. Every day, in fact. Except Tuesdays. I take Tuesdays off.” She returned to the pilot seat and took off. “We probably shouldn’t stay on Gadara any longer than necessary. I’m plotting a course back to the Ark. Some things have happened you need to know.”
He grabbed her arm to pull her around and look at him. His heart was beating fast, like he was still in that fight. “I thought I was going to die.”
“Yeah, well, you saved me on Eden, too. You didn’t have to do that.” For once, she seemed less inclined to look right in his eyes, and turned back to the console.
“I’ll never forget this, Phoebe.”
“Nope. Never gonna let you, either.”
Her arm was so warm beneath his touch. Her face looked so soft, so pale. Her pink hair was like lace he suddenly wanted to touch. He yanked her to her feet.
“Whoa!” She slapped something on the console.
Autopilot Engaged.
Now she did look right in his eyes. And he knew that look. The same hunger he felt. He kissed her, pressing his lips roughly against hers. She fell back against the shuttle hull, but wrapped her hands around his head, pulling him closer. Her hair brushing his cheek sent tingles all over his body. God, she was so hot. Like an inferno pressed against him, drawing him closer. Her breath was like a sauna.
Then she shoved him away.
He stumbled back, uncertain what she wanted.
She drew her thumb in a line between her breasts and her uniform parted where it passed. Nano-bonded jacket. She cast it aside. Underneath, she had a thin gray shirt, so tight he could see her nipples hard against it. She was panting, so intent he thought he’d never been so aroused.
He unbuttoned his jacket and cast it aside, and she yanked off her shirt, revealing her pale breasts and pink-white nipples.
“You’re a goddess.” He threw himself at her, showering kisses all over her neck and chest.
The hunger built inside of him like the invariable pull of gravity to a star. And there was no escaping the corona. She returned his kisses, pulling him out of his bloody shirt. He didn’t even know how many women he’d been with, but this was different. It was beyond lust. It was need.
She pulled him down to the shuttle floor and slipped out of her pants. Her heart beat against his chest and he could feel it. Part of him wanted to wrap her up and protect her from everything.
He pushed inside her. The sudden, incomparable warmth of her was almost too much to bear. And the way she looked at him, the wry, almost wicked look in her eye, meant she knew it. She kissed him deeply until he was lost, whoever he had been falling away.
CHAPTER EIGHTY-SEVEN
In a way, his obsession with Knight is even more disturbing than his other manipulations. Why would Angels need to create super soldiers at all? Perhaps the answer is that they intended to return, and to use the Nephilim as their enforcers.
When Knight and Phoebe returned, Raziel had them sealed inside the med lab with the others. Rachel suspected the locks were psionic, because there appeared to be no physical construct to override.
The pair walked in, casting sidelong glances at each other. The emotion between them was almost overwhelming. Her empathic abilities were just starting to return after losing her connection to the Ark, and it still felt a part of her was missing. The Ark had become an extension of her identity, and Raziel had forced her to sever it. David’s love, his intense devotion, had started to fill that hole, at least.
But there was something else, something different going on between Knight and Phoebe. She’d known they lusted after each other for a while, maybe from the first day they’d met. But it had changed, grown deeper. It was as if he’d thrown his whole being at her. He was riddled with determination and confusion and lust and hope and maybe even love.
Rachel cast a knowing look at Phoebe, who nodded at her. Yeah. They’d definitely had sex. Good for them. It was better this way. If Knight kept his focus on Phoebe, she wouldn’t have to fear any further … distraction from him. She belonged with David. She loved him, he loved her, and they had a long history. Her relationship with Knight—anything beyond friendship—had been nothing but lust and guilt.
Knight’s clothes were covered in blood, and Leah immediately went to his side. “Are you injured?”
“Yeah, here and there.”
At her admonishment, he removed his coat and shirt, but Rachel saw no indication of fresh wounds.
“Where?” Leah asked.
“Well, I … I guess it wasn’t as bad as I thought.”
Phoebe laughed. “He just wanted a chance to take off his shirt and impress the ladies with those abs.”
David coughed, and Rachel smiled.
Leah smirked, then waved for Knight to follow her. “I need to run some tests.”
She directed Knight to a corner where she took DNA samples and then had him run in place and do various exercises.
Rachel tried the door again, but it wouldn’t open. “So we really are prisoners in here,” she said.
David put a hand on her shoulder. “We’re alive, at least.”
Yeah. That was something. Still, they were going to have to get out of here. She had no idea what Raziel was planning, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to wait to find out.
He had … She shook her head. There was a hollowness in her heart, and if she stopped focusing on David or his love for even a moment, it threatened to devour her whole. It was like a black hole had opened in her mind with the loss of the Ark. She slipped her hand into David’s, clutching it as if her life depended on it. Maybe it did. She felt … small. Too fragile, too human.
Maybe she’d never be herself again. Maybe she would always feel the loss of connection, the loss of the greater universe at her fingertips. And if she didn’t do something, she’d lose what she had left to the Angels.
And the voices of Eden, whispering to her … begging her to save them. Except, she couldn’t save them. They were three thousand years dead, and not really ghosts at all, but the preserved fear of the greatest massacre in history.
Maybe they’d haunt her forever.
She had to get out of this room. Almost, she could understand David’s devotion to duty. He was totally dedicated to his purpose, and she could see that. These people were her crew, her family now, and she had led them to this fate. Which meant she had to get them out of here safely. She knew better than to rely on the mercy of Angels.
Angels had created Gehenna, the Gogmagog, and countless other atrocities against humanity. They knew nothing of mercy.
“Hey,” David said, rubbing her arm. “Don’t go away again, lass. We’re here with you.”
Rachel sat in one of the chairs, head in her hands. Phoebe had gone to watch the tests Leah was doing on Knight.
“Something is going on between those two,” David said at last.
“No kidding.”
“Wait, you mean … Does she have feelings for him?”
