She started climbing down the gate as quickly as possible. She wanted to be with Dave at the end. About halfway down, a bullet passed through her left thigh without doing any damage. It did, however, cause her anger to flare. With one hand, she aimed the snipers rifle at the crowd of mercs trying to get at Dave and fired rapidly. Each bullet took out at least one, sometimes two. As the crowd of mercs recoiled, Kathy jumped down to land next to Dave, their backs against the gate.
Dave noted the large wet spot at her abdomen. "You're hit!" he cried.
"It's nothing. Watch your left, there!"
From far off to the south, toward the rolling hills with their beautiful blue fern covered sides, they heard rapid machine gun and cannon fire followed by explosions. Kathy knew it was the V-tols engaging the E'meset. That was it, then. Kathy abandoned all hope, and just prayed she died before Dave. She did not want to see him die.
Chapter 27
Fight and flight
Dave also heard the gunfire coming from the south, but he had no idea what anybody could be shooting at so far away.
Dave was functioning like a machine of war. His arms and legs moved like lightning, and with each stroke, a merc fell back either wounded or dead. Occasionally, he fired his weapon, but only when he was sure of his target.
Thus far, Dave had been shot in the right forearm and the left calf; neither was affecting his operation. He had been sliced across the chest twice but his breastplate had stopped the blade.
Dave knew full well the situation was desperate. Regardless, he wanted Kathy to live through this mess, but he could think of nothing to ensure that outcome.
From their rear, more shouting could be heard and a single rifle firing. Dave managed a peek into the compound. The crew of the PC with the mini gun mounted on it had exited the vehicle to attempt to repair the damaged gun. While the crew had been working feverishly, several air lock doors in the side of the city had burst open, and men and women of the civilian population, armed with nothing more than pieces of rubble from inside the city, assaulted the PC. They killed the crew and began an assault on the machine and its gun.
Out at the gate, a large merc approached Dave. The guy was huge—nearly the size of an E'meset, and as wide as a bus. He was built like a Greek god, and his body was heavily scarred. He drew near, and with a hard push with his two tree trunk-like arms, caused all the other mercs around them to stop fighting. With a thick eastern European accent, he spoke, "Come. You fight me only." The big man tossed away the rifle he was carrying and balled up his fists.
Dave took a step forward and stopped. "You know I'm a SUB, right?"
"Da. I am having a steel reinforced jaw," he smiled to reveal stainless steel teeth. "I am having a metal plate in head and para-aramidic fibers in bones and in skin. I am genetically made strong as horse. Come, we fight man to…" the giant laughed, "whatever you have been turned into."
The big man advanced on Dave, his right fist poised to strike. He threw a roundhouse at Dave, who caught the fist in his right hand and stopped it like he'd caught a house fly.
"What did you say your name was?" Dave casually asked as he increased the pressure on the man's hand.
"Maksim," the man replied between clenched teeth, his face contorted by the pain.
"You really should have read up on Cyberneticly Enhanced and Uploaded Human Beings." Dave then crushed the man's hand and kicked him hard in the chest, breaking all the ribs loose from his sternum.
The other mercs stood mute a moment, then Dave shouted with his voice volume at max, "Come on!"
At just that moment, all eyes turned toward the south as five hundred E'meset warriors ran up and dove directly into the fray. Close combat fighting was their forte. They’d swapped out their rifles for their native weapons. At the head of this mass of Indigs were Cassie and Mitch.
"Kathy, look! The O'Connell's have come to call!" Dave shouted.
"I saw them coming from the south but I thought the V-tols had wiped them out."
Dave thought Kathy's voice sounded a little weak.
The new arrivals joined the combat with a flash of energy like none Dave had ever seen. They shouted a horrendous war cry as they charged.
At exactly the moment the two sides clashed, an explosion, the likes of which this planet had never seen, occurred at the intersection of the forest trail leading east and the edge of the cleared kill zone.
Instantly, Dave knew this explosion was unlike any he'd ever experienced. At only three hundred meters or so away, the explosion should have blown every individual into small pieces, and their parts picked up and thrown by the blast. The heat should have incinerated half those on the field. Secondary projectiles such as grains of sand, stones, dirt, twigs should have been blown into them like shotgun pellets. The concussive force should have blown down a large piece of the reinforced city wall. But none of this transpired. Instead, all that occurred was a blinding flash, an ear-splitting report, and a massive column of smoke.
All combat ceased. Everyone stood frozen just where they were. Out of the column of smoke walked a bevy of people all wearing medieval-looking robes with hoods, and under the hoods respirators could be seen.
At the head of this gaggle stood Sir Reginald Gawain, and with him were Doctors Bess and Jerry Goldman, whom Dave and Kathy had last seen on the fish. It appeared the entire complement of humans from the fish were present, but unarmed.
Sir Gawain stepped forward and began to speak. Though he had neither megaphone nor voice amplifier, everyone present heard his voice and understood him.
"That will be quite enough. This battle is over." With his walking stick, he pointed down the trail behind him, and up ran tens of thousands of E'meset warriors. They poured into the clearing, filling it. Thousands more appeared out of the forests on either flank—and still, they came.
The mercs, seeing their advantage lost, laid down their arms.
From somewhere off to their left, Dave and Kathy heard a familiar, if frail, voice—Le'ha. The bullet the sniper had fired struck her under her left arm and only punched a small, painful hole through the muscle.
Dave felt a nudge; it was Kathy prompting him forward. Dave grabbed two mercs who were still watching the wizard and his vast army. "Move!" Dave commanded and the multitude of mercenaries in front of them parted like the Red Sea.
Dave and Kathy ran to Le'ha and they all hugged.
"Sister," Kathy shouted her voice choked with emotion, "you are hurt."
"Sis," Le'ha replied, "it is not a bad hurt. But I see the white blood of the Hopeerlun E'meset coming from you."
"Yeah," Dave asked, "what about that?"
"I told you, it's nothing." Kathy said curtly.
"Honey, I don't want this to be our first argument, but there is an exit wound on your back. The bullet passed very close to your G-buc. Just humor me, and let's have Zolna take a look at you."
"Dave, this thing isn’t over."
"Of course, it's over."
"Dave,” Kathy said in a fearful voice, “where's Wilmington?"
As Kathy and Dave were speaking, Reggie had dispatched a runner who in short order returned with the E'meset's Poh`palm meas, or medicine man. Accompanying him was Zolna who had lost a large section of scalp and his left ear in the fighting. He ran up and squatted next to Kathy with his titanium skull glistening in the sunlight. "Give me your left hand, ma'am," he asked, and quickly examined the entrance and exit wounds.
She slowly raised her hand and Zolna grasped it firmly.
Dave watched Zolna's eyes which seemed to be reading some unseen text, then his eyes shot up to look into Kathy's. "You know this and you said nothing?"
"What?" Dave demanded.
"Carry her as quickly as possible into the Cybertronic Maintenance Bay, I don't want her walking," Zolna said, then he turned to another SUB standing near him. "You…get me the body of any SUB that died as a result of a head wound. Hurry!"
As Dave picked up Kathy, she extended her hand to Le'ha
who was standing quite still with her arm in the air as the Poh`palm meas massaged yellow algae into her wound.
"Are you going to be all right?" Kathy asked.
"I am already well, my sister. Here," she pulled a piece of carved metal from around her waist and put it in Kathy's hand. "May Lu'aya be at your side and see you return to us."
Dave turned, and with Kathy cradled in his arms, ran toward the city; fear for the condition of the woman he loved replaced all other concerns and emotions inside him. Glancing down, he noticed that Kathy was examining the piece of metal.
"Darling," she said weakly, “it's not a piece of a SUB. It's a piece of a remote ground sensor array."
Behind Dave ran Zolna carrying the body of a headless SUB. They ran past the ever-growing throng of civilians flooding out of the city and into an airlock.
Fifteen minutes later, Dave was gently laying Kathy down on an examination table in the CMB.
"Okay, Major," Zolna said, "I have it from here."
"Zolna," Dave took him by the arm, "tell me what's wrong."
"It's complicated sir, in a nutshell—our supercapacitors are based on electrodes made from graphene quantum dots, called GQD's. They are built on HACNTs, horizontally aligned carbon nanotubes, which—"
"Condense it down for me, Zolna."
"The bullet damaged some HACNTs. The damage is causing her power to drain. I'm going to attempt to replace her damaged G-buc. If there's enough time left."
"You've done this before, right?"
"Yeah. But not to a subject I wished to see get up off the table when it was over."
From across the room, Dave heard Kathy call to him. "I'm right here, baby," he replied.
"Dave," Kathy said weakly, "Wilmington. He must be trying to get up to the Demeter."
"Why?"
"It's his only escape, now. He goes back to Earth and with the help of the IIEA returns with a larger army."
"How would he get up there?"
"If I may," it was the voice of Indra, now inside the city both their COMdes and Ismay were functioning. "In the city's southwest quadrant, there is a separate facility known as Fac Nine which houses an emergency shuttle. Mr. Wilmington had it secretly installed eighteen years and four months ago. He is headed there now. He is on level two of section eleven. His destination within the city will be the vehicle garage in the bottom of section ten. From there, he will drive out to Fac Nine to board the shuttle and make his escape.
"Be aware, Major Mitchel, he is not alone. He is traveling with three mercenaries from his personal bodyguard which he calls his Executive Committee. The leader of this group is a man who calls himself Vlad. It is not generally known, but Vlad is a prototype military SUB built secretly by the IIEA for an eastern European power. He is extremely powerful, but of the same general design as yourself."
"Thanks for the heads up, Indra."
"Major," Indra continued, "gain access to the roof of the city where you can, with your SUB's speed, run a direct heading to Fac Nine and arrive in advance of Mr. Wilmington. Here is a map showing the location of Fac Nine and how you may access the roof." The map appeared in Dave's mind.
Kathy too had heard Indra's instructions. She took Dave's hand and gently squeezed it. "Go on, honey, I'll be fine."
Dave shot Zolna a glance. Zolna looked up from Kathy into Dave's eyes. His features remained serious and expressionless. Dave did not take that as a positive sign.
"Okay," Dave said to Kathy, "do as the doctor tells you. And you better damn well be here when I get back." He kissed her and then led Zolna to one side. "Listen, not that I don't have confidence in you, Zolna, but see if you can find Doctor Alfred Lester, he performed this exact surgery on me."
"I'll put out an APB, but we don't have much time."
Dave forced a grin and slapped Zolna on the shoulder. He returned to Kathy for one more kiss and then darted off.
As he followed the map provided by Indra, a few pieces fell into place. The sound of gunfire he had heard to the south was Indra engaging the V-tols that Wilmington sent to engage the five hundred approaching E'meset. Dave remembered that last time they were at the east gate, Indra's tower had attacked, and been attacked, by the V-tols. It had caught fire and suffered a series of explosions. It was no longer operational. But all the other towers on the wall remained lethal.
On the roof, Dave found that it was considerably windier than on the ground, and to add to his difficulties, the roof was anything but flat. It was covered with all manner of protuberances; sensor arrays, ventilation ducts, observation domes, weather instruments, various experimentation packages, conduits, photovoltaic cell arrays, and much more. As Dave raced toward the southwest, he jumped over some conduits mere centimeters in diameter. Others presented major obstacles, requiring him to leap atop sensor housings then onto and over massive tubes that stretched across his path like oil pipelines. He dodged domes, spheres, and cubes ranging in size from shoe boxes to monorail cars.
Dave had run over fourteen kilometers when he heard the cry, a sound he recalled hearing in the forest, but always some distance away. This cry seemed to be very close. He heard it again, above and behind him. Looking over his shoulder, he saw a huge Lentavat Top'Aya, a very large, winged creature.
At first glance, he thought he was looking at a prehistoric pterodactyl. On closer examination, taken as he ran, he could see this was nothing of the kind. The flying nightmare behind him was more an insect than anything else. Its three-piece body was partially covered in those feather-like things he'd seen Le'ha decorate herself with. Its wings looked leathery and they were barbed. It had eight insect-like legs, also barbed, and two chelicerae, pincer-like appendages on either side of its horrible jaws. The creature's insect-like eyes were enormous, taking up most of its head, and those eyes were fixed on Dave. It was lining up for a run on him. Dave kept running, reaching 42 kilometers per hour. Trying to watch both his path and the Lentavat Top'Aya, his foot hit a set of louvers on the roof and he stumbled, fell, and tumbled across the roof.
The creature dove for him and Dave threw himself prone. With amazing aerial dexterity, the thing executed a tight hundred-and-eighty-degree turn right in front of him and hovered, its wings beating furiously.
Dave dove toward a large pipe running along the roof and tried to squeeze under it. The big bug sprang after him, its clawed feet and barbed legs trying to dig him out from under his cover. Dave managed to get the rifle off his back and fired a round into the belly of the insect. The bullet ricocheted off its tough exoskeleton. Dave fired three more rounds. Two bounced off, but one struck the joint where a leg joined the abdomen. It must have felt that one, and took to the air with a sound like a hundred women screaming.
Dave jumped up and resumed his run, reaching for all the speed he could muster, at the same time he scanned the sky.
The creature came in low and fast this time, and again from behind. It struck Dave with sufficient force to have broken every bone in a bio's body, sending Dave sprawling across several meters of roof. Dave leapt back to his feet, and again pulled his rifle.
The insect had shot up and away at an incredible speed, almost straight up to an altitude of over ninety meters then swung around for another run.
Dave stopped, turned to face the oncoming menace, and quickly took up a supported kneeling firing position. He would fight back. Perhaps the thing's huge eyes were vulnerable. He placed his left elbow on his left knee and took careful aim. He fired once, twice, three times. Each round he was sure hit its mark but the monster kept coming.
"Ah, shit." Dave declared.
Just as he was starting his move, a white streak of light flashed over him and struck the Lentavat Top'Aya right in the face. The explosion destroyed the thing, and its remains fell to the roof, splattering the creature's yellowish gore everywhere, a quantity of which splashed all over Dave.
He knew instantly what had happened. Slowly, Dave turned, and there, hovering twenty meters away, was a badly shot-up and
smoking V-tol. Dave could see blood splattered on the inside of the canopy.
Dave stood looking into the missile pods of the hovering craft. There would be no escape at this range. The detonation would destroy the V-tol as well, but by the looks of things, the pilot was beyond caring.
The seconds seemed to last centuries. What was he waiting for? Was this his idea of a pound of flesh, or was he reporting to Wilmington?
The aircraft seemed to wobble a little, then slowly it sat down on the roof with its landing gear still retracted. The engines powered down, and the aircraft lay there at a precarious angle, its now-quiet engines smoking.
Dave readied his rifle and slowly walked toward the ship. He could see the pilot inside. His helmeted head was down. As Dave drew near, the pilot looked up, opened his visor, and then removed the helmet completely. In an exhausted fashion, he waved Dave to come closer.
Dave was leery, but advanced. The man was bleeding badly from the corner of his mouth…he was coughing up blood.
Dave stood next to the canopy and the man looked at him and spoke. "Can…you hear me?"
Dave had to increase the sensitivity of his hearing but he could hear him well enough. "Yes," he said loudly, and nodded.
The pilot coughed up some more blood, then reached across his chest to press the bloody fingers of his right hand against the canopy. "You are pursuing Wilmington?" He asked with a thick French accent.
"Yes, I am," Dave replied.
"Do you know where he is going…what he plans?"
"Yeah, he's going to the Demeter, then back to Earth for reinforcements."
"Close, he does plan…to return to Earth, but…before he leaves…he will fire a nuclear missile at New Roanoke. He plans to start all this horror over on the other continent where the…peacocks don't know him. Mon ami…my poor ship failed me before I could reach him…it is you who must stop him."
"Yeah…open this thing and let me help you."
"Neither of us has the time for that, besides—" he held up his personal respirator, it was completely smashed. "Now go, and watch out for Vlad…he is the largest of Wilmington's bodyguards, a SUB, and a dangerous man. Kill him first!"
The Vampires of Antyllus Page 38
