by O. J. Lowe
“Understood, Angel One. Your will shall be done.”
He settled back in his seat, wished that he’d gotten some popcorn to bring to the observation room with him. Watching this would be very interesting indeed. He hoped Roper’s death would be slow and painful.
Chapter Eight. Escape from Withdean.
“What, Withdean? Yes, yes, dear boy, I designed it all myself. Architecture has often been a hobby of mine. I like the mechanics of it. I laid the first brick down in the foundations, though not the rest of them admittedly. Withdean, it’s named for an old friend of mine. Dean Saunders. Cracking chap. Complex. Layered. I made my house that way in his memory. Died a long time ago, back in the war. Unity has its price unfortunately. You know what they say about the good and when they go. The arseholes live forever unfortunately, if you know what I’m saying. The older I get, the more I think we should have a war every decade or two, just to cut some of the chaff from society. It’s a terrible thing, I’ll admit that. But I don’t necessarily think it’s a terrible idea. Forgive me, my mind wanders sometimes. What was the question again?”
Brennan Frewster in an interview five years ago.
Typical!
Nick swore under his breath, hand went for his blaster. He had the X9S in hand already as he looked across at Frewster. Part of him wondered if the old man had set this up, the rest of him quashed it down. There’d be time to wonder about that later. Right now. Survival. That was the aim. Best to quickly realise that before the violence started. Split focus served no master.
A distant explosion rocked the house, and he struggled to hide the wince. That sounded like the speeder he’d hired. A glance out the window and he saw the plumes of smoke dancing above the flames, reaching towards the sky. He’d like that speeder as well. Some part of him felt annoyed at the notion he’d just lost his security deposit.
“They’re taking out any chance of an easy exit,” he said. “Tell me you have some other way to make a break for it.”
“Dear boy,” Frewster said, managing to raise an irate eyebrow. “We currently have two speeders in the garage. We will not make it out of here with that ship in the air. It cut yours into pieces with little effort. I simply dread to think what it’ll do to mine.”
“You have surface to air defences?” Nick knew it was likely a stupid question. He’d be surprised if Frewster replied with anything other than a withering look. Duly, he was obliged. The old man gave him the sort of look that said, ‘don’t be so fucking stupid’. “I didn’t think so. I can’t take that thing down with a blaster. Not…”
He didn’t get the chance to finish saying what he couldn’t do, he heard the crash of glass shattering behind him and he turned on the spot, blaster raised. His finger was on the trigger, would have pulled it had the figure not been inside his reach before he could get the shot away. An elbow crashed into his wrist, fingers opened, and the blaster bounced away across the floor. He let out a gasp as a palm hit him in the chest, the breath driven from him as another fist came towards his face, he managed to get a forearm up to block it, sucking in grateful gasps of air. It hadn’t been a hard blow, he’d taken stronger.
The features of his attacker barely registered, the jumpsuit black with pink stripes on the shoulder, not a design he’d ever seen before. It didn’t matter. Going for his other weapon wasn’t an option, she didn’t look like she had a weapon, at least not one that he could see. Her hands were empty, already her other one was coming at him. He blocked it, grunted with the effort. She might not be the biggest, but the little bitch had one hells of a swing behind her. He’d fought men twice her size who didn’t hit like her. Disciplined as well, he had to note. Perfect form. That didn’t bode well. There were Unisco graduates who didn’t fight as naturally as her.
Time to test her, see how good she was. He slid into a fighting stance, not moving to attack, just keeping a wary eye on her. She circled, studied him like a cobra perusing a tasty-looking mouse. She was good, he almost didn’t see the attack coming until it was on him and then he moved, ducking the blow and hitting her midriff with a shoulder. She was good, she wasn’t terrific. He recognised it now. She knew how to fight, but it was how she’d been taught, she hadn’t become a master through experiencing it for herself. She’d been taught the moves, it was all well and good until it came to face another opponent.
Fist fights were chaos, you could know all the moves you wanted, but it didn’t mean you’d get the chance to unleash them all one after another in flawless motion. Especially not against an opponent with years of experience earned fighting for his life. You often had to work with what you got. She doubled, just slightly, he brought a fist up towards her chin and her head snapped back under his blow. He hadn’t expected her neck to break.
At the same time, he hadn’t expected her reaction, a casual tilt to the side and a smile. He caught the expression in her eyes and his blood ran cold. Pure, unadulterated hatred, anger and fury, a marriage of emotion blazed across her face. Either she’d entered the fight mad or he’d really pissed her off since the punches had started being thrown. Maybe both, Nick thought, he’d been known to have that effect on people. Her eyes were grey, almost colourless while she looked like she hadn’t seen the sun in weeks. Her hair was shorn almost to the scalp barring a thin length down the middle, eyebrows ripped away. Something about her looked familiar, he couldn’t place the face. Not that this was the time to do it.
She came at him again, crashed the full weight of her slender body onto him and he tried to duck back, almost tripped over the coffee table. She took him down hard, he felt the pain jar through him as he landed, her nails going to claw at his eyes. Panicked, he flailed out, searching for anything that he could use. Nothing.
Come on!
His fingers scrabbled around empty air, nails scraping against the glossed wood. Had to be something. His face was starting to bleed, he could feel the cuts, she’d started at his cheeks and was moving upwards. He brought his head forward, smashed the bridge of his skull into her nose, heard her shriek in pain as the cartilage gave way under the force of the blow. Dull pain thudded through his skull, he bellowed himself, trying not to let the feeling get to him as he brought it back again and again. He’d drive that cartilage back up into her brain if he had to, kill her that way. Her hands were away from his eyes, slender fingers locked around his throat and starting to squeeze. The way they’d locked together, he couldn’t move his neck, the breath cut from him.
He swept his eyes back and forth, anything, come on, anything. Asphyxiation was a horrible way to die, he’d heard. Painful. Just a little humiliating. The glint of the light off something caught his gaze, he reached out, stretched the sinews in his arm. The agony swept through him, a thousand burning needles tearing at his straining muscle. If he survived, he’d deal with it then. It was heavy, all too solid and it took him a second attempt to close his fingers around it. As he pulled it towards him, he heard the swirl of liquid inside it, the most beautiful sound he’d heard in a while.
It took a supreme effort, he tugged it into his hand, and smashed the heavy glass straight into the side of her face, a dozen sharp pains digging into his hands as it shattered under the blow. She screamed again, he couldn’t tell where his blood ended and hers began. One chunk of glass had embedded in her eye, suddenly he could breathe again, and he brought back a foot to kick her off him, drove it hard into her chest and kicked her to her feet, his body crying out in relief.
A miniature explosion rocked the room above him, and she hurled forward as if she’d leaped from a spring board, head smashing into the wall before she slid into an untidy heap against the skirting board. He could almost see the floor beneath her through the hole in her back, blood already starting to gather underneath her in a sticky pool of claret.
Frewster swore, slid the pump of his kinetic disperser and broke the empty cartridge out of it, it hit the carpet with a tiny thud. “My best bloody carpet,” he said. There wasn’t any mistake as to the
outrage in his voice. “Hells.”
He didn’t want to know where the old man had got the weapon from, it was a question that didn’t have a good answer. Kinetic dispersers were brutal weapons, loaded with shells filled with highly pressurised ionic energy, the blast something nobody in their right mind would want to get hit by. Normally they were used against foes who’d coated themselves in personal shields for defending themselves. Even a shield wouldn’t prevent the side effects. He’d seen them employed to devastating effect, hurling the targets several feet back through the air at rapid speeds, fast enough to hurt when they inevitably hit something.
“Thanks for the rescue,” he muttered. Gratitude hurt here. He’d just been saved by someone three times his age. It took him a moment to spin it as three times the experience, that did a wonder for his bruised ego. With that in mind, Nick glanced back at the body. Shit. What a mess! He shook his head, tried to clear the fog that had filled his head. Deep breaths, he had to still have some composure somewhere. He closed his eyes, tried to focus on his heart and the consistency of its beat. He needed to be sharp. Anything to get his mind back in the game. His eyes swept back and forth, fell on his dropped blaster.
Somewhere else in the mansion, he heard more booms of disperser shots followed by the higher chatter of a blaster rifle retorting. He picked up his blaster, checked everything was still in working order. Nick glanced back to Frewster, saw the colour had drained from his face.
“Helga,” he said. He could hear the terror in the old man’s voice, almost quavering with the fear. “They’re hunting her.”
“They’re after something,” Nick said. He inclined his head towards the weapon. “You got another one of those.”
The old man shook his head, cradled it even closer to his body. “Just the one in here. The one downstairs. Helga probably has it now. That was her order. Get it and shoot anything that moves if this happens.”
That didn’t bode well. Nick fought the urge to shake his head. “Terrible. You think we’ll be able to get close to her?”
“Helga has all manner of training in proficient use of the deadly arts, Nicholas,” Frewster said. “I pity those who cross her path.”
“Your butler was trained in the deadly arts?” Nick asked. He didn’t even want to know how that had come up. “That’s one way to ensure nobody steals the silverware.”
“I don’t appreciate your flippancy,” Frewster said, one eye on the window. It wasn’t out of the question someone else could come through it. Nick had been mentally preparing himself for that eventuality ever since the intruder had gone down. Next one who came through would get the greeting of a laser blast to the face. Fuck screwing around with hand-to-hand combat. They might not be the toughest one-on-one but two or three would be tricky, even before factoring in their resistance to pain. “It was long before I met her, if you must know.”
“Uh huh?” Nick didn’t care. He could still see the outline of the aeroship hovering outside, cutting off any easy escape route. “We need to move, you know that. Get out of here, get to the garage, take a speeder and head for the nearest Unisco office.”
“That would appear to be a plan. However, I do see several flaws in your thought process,” Frewster said. Nick tried to ignore the sarcasm in his voice. “We cannot escape. Not while that ship is out there.”
“I’ve got a plan,” Nick said. “Sort of. We need to go though. This room is compromised.” He jerked his head towards the window. “Too easy for them to gain access. Sooner or later we’ll be overrun if they take that route.” He looked at the video feeds on the screens in front of them, tried to formulate a plan.
Shit!
Too many to count, he could see them on every screen, all of them different shapes and sizes, maybe about twenty if he had to make a guess. One screen showed Helga with the disperser in hand, fury etched on her features as she fired, cycled, fired again. Frewster shook his head as he studied that one. A line of bodies led away from her, all of them looking like they’d suffered horribly. Limbs had been torn away, torsos crushed under incredible force, heads blunted back into unrecognisable shapes. She knew what she was doing, he had to give her that. Woman was a surgeon with the weapon
The crunching of glass gave them away, another two trying to get through the shattered windows behind them, he turned and put three shots through the first one before Frewster could even point his weapon at them. The first intruder gave way, staggered backwards through the window and took the woman behind him with him. The scream followed them all the way to the ground.
“Told you,” he said. “Compromised.” He jerked his head towards the door. “Come on, Brennan. We need to get the hells out of here as quickly as possible. I’ll take point. Follow my lead. Anyone who comes up behind us, blast them. I’ll deal with anyone who comes towards us. You good to do that?”
“Agent Roper, I was doing this long before you were born.” There was more than a hint of indignation in the old man’s voice at the way he’d asked the question. That was good. Nick wanted fire in Frewster’s heart. He wanted him pissed off, he wanted him alert. That might be the difference between surviving or dying and he’d take every slim advantage he could get. The slim margins were the decisive ones. “I just hope you can keep up with me. That one gave you some trouble.” He pointed the weapon to the one he’d already killed.
“Took me by surprise,” Nick admitted, already making for the door. “Not going to happen again. Someone trained them well. I’d think you’d be able to appreciate that, Brennan.”
“Training is good,” Frewster said. “There’s no substitute for experience though, I think you’d know that by now.”
“Oh, I do,” Nick said. He put a hand on the door knob, deep breath and twist. It slid open with practiced ease, just a fraction and he put his eye to it. Nothing in the immediate vicinity. He pushed it open further, led with the X9S. Just in case. This house was hostile territory right now, he’d treat it as such. He didn’t want to think about the consequences of doing anything else. He managed to step out of the room, swept the corridor with his weapon. Only one direction. That was good. Meant they couldn’t be flanked. Getting caught between two forces with only a single blaster was a recipe for disaster. “Clear!”
Ideally, he should have taken the weapon from Frewster. A disperser would clear out any opposition with a lot more ease than his blaster pistol. He wasn’t surrendering his weapon to Frewster. Nor was he going to leave him defenceless. There wasn’t much of a choice to be made. The old man knew what he was doing. He’d called it right, he’d been doing this before Nick had been born. Who better to have his back? The killer instinct was still there inside Frewster, something hard-earned, even harder to lose. In the circumstances, he was glad to have him watching his back. Ideally, Frewster would have led the way. He knew this house better than any of the intruders. Not a chance he could let him go first.
“We’ll get there,” Frewster huffed. “Doesn’t matter how long it takes.”
“You might be right there,” Nick said. He’d seen the artillery they’d brought in to stop them leaving. That aeroship was bad news. It had taken out his speeder with little effort. “We might have time on our side.”
“What do you mean, lad?”
“If they wanted to kill us, they could level the house without too much sweat. No, they want someone alive. Might be me. Might be you.” Nick shrugged. “They could have taken me on the road here if they really wanted to. So… Like you say. They’ve come for you.”
“Excellent deduction, Nicholas. Is it really relevant now?”
They reached the T-shaped junction at the bottom of the corridor, Nick looked at the old man. “Which way to the garages?”
“Left. Down the stairs. Through the dining room, there’s a room at the back that leads to a corridor. One door in there leads to the kitchen. One to the garages. Servant’s route. I’ve not been there for years. Helga always picks me up out the front. Nicholas?” He paused behind him, came to
a sudden halt. Stubbornness etched his genial features. “I’ve made my choice. I’m not leaving without her.”
The strange thing was, he could appreciate the sentiment. People got attached to each other. There was clearly some strange sort of relationship there. Maybe Frewster was a deviant and Helga hit him about a bit to get him off. Exceptional loyalty, he’d seen that in her demeanour. A mystery he could ponder all day.
“We need her anyway,” he said. “Plan takes three people. We’ll see if we can find her. You know where she was? From the monitors.”
Frewster nodded. “Other wing. Looks like she made straight for the armoury.”
Of course, she bloody would be. Nick bit down a curse, looked at his weapon. “Okay,” he said. “Change of plan. We go for the garage. That’s the obvious escape route. If it was me, I’d have most of my forces concentrated there. Try and overwhelm us as we make a run for it. If we got out the front door, that aeroship will corner us. Our options aren’t fantastic.”
Frewster nodded. “There are options though. They might be terrible, dear boy, but there are always options. We could surrender, for example.”
Their eyes met for a moment before both burst out laughing. Unisco had been built on a foundation of never surrendering. To start now would be anathema for them. Laughing felt good, perhaps not the most appropriate time for it but truly appreciated.
“We’ll go for Helga first,” Nick said. “Get her with us. Three has more chance than two. It’s still half a chance but it’s better than nothing.”
“That’s the only sort of chance that we ask for. A slim one can work wonders for a sense of motivation to make the best of a bad situation.”
