Jake took a half step forward, half expecting Nobblar to spill from the worm like one of those disgusting wormlings. But that huge, ulcer-ridden mouth closed over and the old man disappeared for good.
“Nothing you can do,” Mandie said from somewhere behind him. It was a timely reminder to focus on the living. It was time to shoot their way out, if that was remotely possible. Jake fired Lust and Love indiscriminately, hoping to clear a path through the approaching worms on the western wall.
His customized pistols were powerful enough to tear flesh and stop some of the worms in their tracks, but the creatures had been whipped into a frenzy. For every worm that curled under the weight of plasma, two more headed their way.
Jake studied the queen, her hideous body convulsing as it digested Nobblar’s body. She needed to be taken down. There would be no escape as long as she was alive. That high-pitched wail was a call to arms, a telepathic call. The very skill that drew Van and the other monks here in the first place.
It was one thing to recognize the danger, another to formulate a workable plan. Even if the five of them could fire continuously into the beast without harassment from above, he doubted they could weaken this abomination.
Mandie was now standing against Jake’s back, having retreated from the advancing worms. Looking like she’d kill for a blaster, Fusar was crouched by the wall. Unfortunately the queen had swallowed Nobblar’s weapons whole. A worm to Jake’s right squealed and curled, ichor pouring from its maw. Verity and Sweet Jean took the opportunity to join Jake.
“I’m maxed out,” Sweet Jean muttered, barely able to hold her smoking blaster. “We won’t survive much longer down here.”
“And we can’t bring that thing down,” Jake said. The beast was settling its folds of gibberous fat to the cavern floor.
“Here it comes,” Jake said, making sure he was in front of Fusar. The queen slid across the slick cavern floor, unafraid to crush wormlings in her path. The other worms hung back, allowing the queen to have her way with the intruders. The huge worm’s pulsating flesh loomed over the Nostroma.
“Cover your eyes,” Jake said as the thing’s maw opened in a shower of saliva.
“Fuck,” Sweet Jean muttered, receiving a gob of acidic liquid on her cheek.
“That’s an improvement,” Jake said, forcing a smile. His ex-lover didn’t return it, unloading the last of her plasma charges into the beast’s mouth. It didn’t have any noticeable effect.
Droplets of saliva sprayed against Jake’s cheeks and forehead. The pain swept though him as the toxins found their way into his blood.
So this is it, he thought, firing weakly at the worm almost close enough to touch. The queen’s maw descended like a hellish fever dream and snapped at him repeatedly. He teetered on the spot, stunned. The next strike would consume him.
A man had entered the cavern. Van? Fashon? Maybe. Flesh was pale blue though. A voice in the back of Jake’s mind claimed he was an Aegisi. Surely not. The Aegisi weren’t strong enough to carry plasma gatlings on their own. But this one was. The face was familiar, as was the gait.
Michael Danner.
16
Of course, he’d seen the boy back at the monastery, but refused to believe his eyes at the time. Right now he had no reason to alter that policy, and yet there he was, advancing across the cavern with a seven-barreled gatling. Plasma spewed forth from those rotating barrels in a helical torrent, each blast chipping a gob of flesh from the quivering queen.
The creature was literally falling to pieces before their eyes. The veiny blancmange surged forward and Jake almost passed right through its weakened outer membrane. Danner kept firing mercilessly as Jake tumbled awkwardly to the floor. The plasma zinged less than a yard away from his face. He stayed put as the Aegisi ripped the queen to shreds. The cacophony seemed to last forever, or at least that’s how Jake’s fractured mind read the scene.
Finally the queen seemed to combust before his eyes. He lowered his head instinctively as a wave of soft meat covered him from head to toe. He could feel hands under his armpits and was vaguely aware of being pulled across the jagged floor.
“Are we still alive?” he asked Mandie, whose face filled his view. Her skin was pockmarked with acid burns and she looked impossibly tired.
“I think it’s over for now,” she said, her words dipped in molasses. She held something under his nose and a shooting pain rocked his sinuses. Suddenly he was alert and cognizant of his surroundings. The cavern was strewn with worm flesh and random bits of debris. A cluster of sacs lay a few yards away. Thankfully, there was no sign of wormlings. The adult worms had retreated into the tunnels.
The water seeping through the soil profile was now threatening to flood some of the lower tunnels. Deep pools had formed across the floor. The soft patter of post-battle conversation emerged. It was stilted and uncertain. Everyone was stunned by what had transpired.
Jake forced himself to his feet even though the idea of shutting his eyes was impossibly attractive.
“Steady,” Mandie said. “You copped a hammering.”
Jake didn’t doubt it - his body felt like one big tender bruise. Fusar seemed well enough, more shell shocked than anything else. The colony that had overshadowed her life for so many years was gone. That was a lot for her to take in. She needed sunlight. She needed to stand on the wide open plain and feel free for the first time.
Michael was nowhere to be seen.
“Was he a dream …?” he asked aloud, worried that he’d been hallucinating.
Mandie smiled.
“The Aegisi was here,” she said. “He climbed into one of the upper tunnels.”
Jack nodded, not knowing what to make of it all.
“It’s time to go, Fusar,” he said, eyeing off the lower tunnels.
But Fusar was inspecting the fleshy sacs - all that remained of the worms’ infrastructure. Human forms were visible inside - monks who had offered themselves for tenderization. One of the monks inside was missing his right leg. It had melded with the sac in an angry-red lump. Frowning in disgust, Jake pulled Fusar away to inspect the tunnels on offer.
Verity and Sweet Jean followed at a discreet distance, neither friendly nor hostile. Injured and banged-up as they were, it made sense for them to follow in Jake’s wake. Besides, they still had mission objectives at play. For the moment Jake was too tired to care.
Still, the female tandem presumably had a functional ship. He didn’t. There would be some serious negotiations before he could get Fusar off-world.
Jake allowed the girl to inspect the tunnels. She stopped at one and it was easy to see why - a gentle breeze ruffled her braids.
“Here,” she said, looking at Jake expectantly. The duellist nodded and wasted no time getting to work. With a grunt he dropped to his hands and knees, not relishing another long crawl.
“Look sharp, Flane,” he called over his shoulder. The mercenary would know he was referring specifically to the dangerous female tandem behind them. The tunnel sloped downward, which was certainly promising, but became progressively softer and wetter.
Jake’s stream diversion was still impacting the soil profile and threatened to collapse the worm’s entire network. No great loss, to be sure, but the passage could easily become a tomb at any moment. He decided to holster both pistols and move forward quickly, figuring that speed was now key.
The worms had dispersed as soon as the queen was destroyed. The nest was effectively headless, and unless a new queen emerged, doomed to extinction.
At length the tunnel opened out a little but became sticky with mud.
“Gettin’ a little unstable in here,” Jake commented as he plowed through the muck. A boom echoed from somewhere above them.
“The monastery,” Fusar said. It had been her only home.
“I’ll show you better places than this,” Jake said, knowing the chances of that were fairly remote. “I promise.”
Fusar forced a smile, knowing Jake was talking shit. There
was a charming quality to that smile, despite her fearsome incisors.
“I don’t like this,” Mandie warned as the rumble got louder.
“Me either,” Jake said, getting to his feet. The tunnel now allowed him to scurry forward. It was murder on his ageing knees but that rolling quake was getting closer.
The tunnel dipped sharply and Jake fell on his ass. The slick mud transported him for over a hundred yards.
“Hurry!” Verity said from close behind.
“I’m tryin’,” Jake protested, standing again. He stumbled forward as the earth began to shake. The next thing he knew he was free falling with the mountain. The drop must have been more than fifteen yards but the mud softened the impact. The four women crashed into him with varying levels of awkwardness. Clods of thick clay followed the bodies, building up around them.
“Dig through that dirt!” Sweet Jean yelled angrily. “Use your fucking hands!”
Jake certainly hadn’t missed her harsh voice. He applied himself as feverishly as his battered body would allow. It wasn’t easy to scoop the hard clay from the newly-formed wall but the women worked like demons. With her elongated claws, Fusar in particular was instrumental in breaking through the packed dirt.
The party worked without speaking for what seemed like hours. The air in their little pocket became stale. Jake’s breathing was labored as the party hit a vein of rock.
“Great,” he said. “Now what?”
“Wait,” Sweet Jean said, drawing her massive blaster.
She fired once into the granite and watched with satisfaction as a gob of slag dropped to the dirt. She fired several times before demanding another blaster. Verity obliged and everyone watched the tall duellist go about her seemingly futile exercise. Jake mopped his brow - firing in an enclosed space generated extreme heat.
Sweet Jean swore in triumph as a shaft of light entered the dank space. She’d actually made it through the rock.
“Just enough to crawl through,” Jake said.
“I know what I’m fucking doing,” came the terse reply.
Jake made sure Fusar was beyond the range of spitting slag now piling up at their feet. At length Sweet Jean tested the hole by climbing through herself. When she returned her face was flushed with frustration.
“Sheer cliff face,” she said. “We haven’t come down far enough.”
It was as Jack suspected. By his rough calculations they’d cleared a good three hundred feet in altitude but that wasn’t enough to reach the lower slopes of the mountain.
“How far?” he asked.
Sweet Jean was already pulling a thin wire from her utility belt.
“I might be able to make it with this,” she said.
Jake snorted in disbelief. It was a garrote wire - the kind duellists used for quick, silent kills.
“There’s an outcrop below us,” Jean said to Verity, ignoring Jake. “I think it’s the outlet of a lower tunnel. I can either travel through it or lower myself further down the cliff.”
Verity didn’t seem overjoyed with either option but nodded. Once Sweet Jean had her mind set on a task, there was no stopping her.
“I’ll go,” Jake offered.
“You don’t have the eagle access codes,” she said coldly before hauling herself through the hole.
A tapping noise suggested she was fixing one end of the wire to the rock face. Jake was confident it would hold Jean’s considerable weight for a short period of time - such material was high-end assassination gear and didn’t come cheaply.
Once Sweet Jean had begun her descent the rest of the party made themselves as comfortable as possible. It would be hours at least before Jean would return.
Silence ruled the air pocket for several minutes. Everyone seemed content to ruminate on the horrible, intense events of the day. Jake found himself uncomfortable on a number of fronts. First there was Fusar, his first priority. She sat next to him quietly, her magenta braids vivid in the weak light. There was so much he wanted to ask, but the moment just didn’t seem right. For now it was enough that she was alive and sane.
Mandie was next to Fusar. Like Jake, she was bruised, battered and needed a good shower. He felt a stirring within him when he considered her, a physical need that may or may not have an emotional connection. Whatever the case, he wouldn’t be able to find out anytime soon. All he could do was protect her - human lives tended to lack currency in this day and age.
Finally there was Verity Le Sondre. She sat as far away from Jake as was possible. She fiddled with her blaster chamber, occasionally throwing Jake a poisonous glance, as if he was the architect of all her woes.
“What’s your deal?” Mandie eventually barked. Jake snapped to attention - the merc was actually talking to Verity. He braced himself for the coming storm. He hadn’t realized Mandie had grown so protective of him.
“If you haven’t noticed already, merc,” Verity said. “I’m Jake’s flesh and blood. Family. Although you may not have come to that conclusion if you were on Faegen twelve years ago.”
Jake groaned.
“The fuck you are, Verity,” he said. “Neither the time nor place.”
Verity raised her arms mockingly. “Look around you, little brother,” she said. “Perfect time for a chat.”
“All I know is this man did exactly what he said he would do,” Fusar said. “He said he would come for me, and he did. As far as I can tell he isn’t going to sell me to slavers or hand me over to your pathetic leaders. Don’t take this the wrong way, but right now I don’t give a fuck what he did to you.”
Jake blinked. This was insane. Verity smiled mirthlessly - she hadn’t been expecting that.
“Jake and Sweet Jean took me in,” she said, determined to say her piece. “They were together at the time. Owned a small ranch house on the Dendar plateau. Grenton fowl, mostly. A nice wood on the far bank of the stream. Fuck, Sweet Jean even talked about kids. Seems like a lifetime ago.”
Verity pulled her blaster apart with nervous energy, a tic pumping furiously under her eye.
“Verity …” Jake warned, but he may as well have been invisible.
“I was addicted to fusion, which is not uncommon for a Nostroma, but I couldn’t hold down any jobs. Ajon Prime threatened to palm me off to the Sisters of Recall but I convinced him that the farm life was all this city girl needed.”
Verity smiled at some delicious memory. Jake didn’t want to know.
“Jake saw me at the front door and wrapped me in a bear hug so tight I couldn’t breathe,” she continued. “At first, Jean hated me. Left the room whenever I strayed too close. Something happened with their plans to start a family, and it felt like she was taking it out on me. One day she tossed my inhalers downstream. All the drugs that held me together - gone. I self-combusted. Didn’t know what to do with myself. Thought I would die on that plateau. Jean was practically begging me to fade away.”
Verity’s eyes met Jake’s for the first time.
“I turned to my brother here,” she said. “He held my hand and said that everything would be OK. He set me up in his own easy chair, threw a blanket over me, told me he’d be back soon. Said he knew a spirit healer in one of the sand belt towns. I let him go, but I knew my little brother. I knew he wasn’t coming back. He’d tamed Sweet Jean. He had that look in his eye - the nomad had taken over. He left me there, in the middle of nowhere, half dead in the twilight. If my will to live was hanging by a thread, he neatly severed it so he could get away. My brother.”
17
And that was it. Silence greeted Verity’s bitter tale. Jake couldn’t help but glance at the others. Mandie seemed indifferent. She had enough street smarts not to judge him. Fusar was a different prospect. She seemed troubled by Verity’s accusation but refused to acknowledge her.
Jake didn’t know where the dubious actions of a confused young man would sit within her Jajan moral code. He knew the species valued family and clan connections, but beyond that the Jaj were fiercely private. Finally he
looked at Verity, who had returned to her blaster. A long-simmering anger rose like a dark tide within him.
“I never asked you to come here,” he found himself saying. “I’d prefer not to be dragged back into your life.”
Verity remained silent for a few moments before she hurled her blaster at him. It thudded against the clay barely an inch from his head.
“I fucking hate you, Jake,” she snarled.
Jake tossed the weapon back.
“I need your ship,” he said coldly. “Give it to me.”
Verity looked up sharply but saw the steel in Jake’s eyes.
“Fashon wants to kill you,” she said quietly. “No matter how hard I try, I can’t bring myself to help him. Asshole.”
Jake turned away. He wished his siblings weren’t around, so he could concentrate on Fusar without all this drama. Verity had yet to reveal why she was here in the first place. If not to kill him or bring him to Ajon Prime, then what? He felt like he was sinking in a murky, toxic pool, a place that contained answers but at a very high personal cost.
No one said anything for quite some time after Verity’s bitter outburst. She was coiled tight, like a viper itching to strike. Rumor had it that she had become a devastatingly effective cybomancer. He didn’t relish the prospect of his own sister assaulting his mind. The problem with having family was the vulnerability it created.
At length a low boom scudded in from outside. Jake knew that sound - it was the orbital entry of a large craft. He exchanged a worried glance with Mandie. He tried peering through the crawl space but all he saw was a sliver of darkening sky.
The next hour passed interminably. It was hard to stay still knowing there was a new arrival on the planet. When Sweet Jean’s scarred face appeared he almost yanked her through the hole himself. She dropped to the ground, panting with exertion. Jake noticed climbing rope and a mechanized harpoon strapped to her back.
“We’ll need to do this the hard way,” she said. “Just over ninety feet, then we’re into the coriolis. From there, a hard march to the fighter.”
The Emerald Duellist (Five Empires Book 2) Page 13
