Ruin of Dragons

by Clay Kronke

  "This area is restricted," a clear, slightly accented voice said from behind one of the helmets. "You will be detained if you persist."

  Gareth stopped. "All exits have been sealed," he said with a dismissive gesture. "We're already detained." He started walking forward again, holding his arms out wide.

  "You've been warned," the guard pressed as both disengaged the safeties on their weapons. Gareth grinned, taking another step and closing his eyes as both guards pulled their triggers.

  The two energy blasts caught Gareth square in the chest, the force powerful enough to push him bodily backward. The plasma energy, however, fractured and washed harmlessly over, leaving Gareth with little more than a tingling sensation over the surface of his skin. He straightened up and started forward again, but instead of the cry of alarm or shift in tactics Gareth was expecting, the guards simply pressed a button above their firearm grips, which rotated the stock and center chamber sections behind the barrel. The weapons locked, and they readjusted their aim.

  "Ah, hell—" Gareth immediately dove for the floor as the guards opened fire again, this time with actual ballistic rounds instead of energy bursts. The shots missed – barely – ripping into the walls far behind where Gareth had been standing and expelling shards of hot metal out into the air. He barely had time to react as they shifted their aim downward and continued firing, as he flung himself sideways, rolling out of the way as the floor was torn up under him. He grabbed for the retracted staff on his back and aimed it toward the door, jabbing at the first button he could get to.

  A flash round fired into the chest of the closest guard, exploding into a blinding cloud of expanding sparks and flare and affording Gareth the second of distraction he needed to get back on his feet. The guard hit with the round staggered backward trying to clear the air in front of his face, while the second tried to pivot and adjust his aim, but Gareth was faster. In two strides he was between them, extending his staff and throwing his weight behind it as he struck out at both guards' throats. They hit the floor as Gareth slapped at the door controls, ducking through as it opened and immediately jabbing at the inner panel. The door shut behind him and he fired a pulse round into the controls, frying the locking mechanism.

  Gareth exhaled and stood still as silence descended around him. He listened for a moment, and after testing the door to make sure it wouldn't open, he allowed himself to relax a bit. He turned around to face a dark chamber. Stepping in, the lights came up to reveal a wide open space, three sets of conveyor tracks and passthroughs along the far wall, accompanying sets of manipulator arms in gantries above, but instead of the staging racks normally used for prepping specimen for transport, there were dozens upon dozens of smaller pods filling the entirety of the space.

  They were too small to be used for specimen containment, but each one had a cable conduit and series of hoses attached to the end, and they seemed to be fed into the main chemical delivery pipeline as the rest of the cryo system. Each pod had a monitor attached and Gareth stepped up to the closest one, leaning down for a closer look.

  A loud clanging noise startled him, and he took a step back, but quickly realized it was coming from behind him. A concussive pounding was coming from the direction of the door, followed by sparks and wisps of smoke curling out from the charred control panel. The guards had not stayed down long and were wasting no time in trying to force open the door. Gareth turned back to the pod, endeavoring to hurry.

  The screen was a medical monitor, similar to the one attached to the dragon specimen he had seen the day before in Technology Development, with a pair of neural activity waveforms scrolling across the top, along with a running list of numerical data Gareth didn't know how to read. The accompanying pod seemed to be similar in design to a dragon specimen tube, but only about seven feet in length. It had a translucent glass upper half that was covered in a thin layer of frost. He reached down and wiped some of the frost aside—

  And took an involuntary step back, horrified. Inside the pod was a young man in a clinical uniform with closed eyes and an impassive expression on his face. Gareth moved over to the next one, wiping away frost. Another clinical tech, this time a woman. He leaned in closer. They were under some kind of stasis, but their neural patterns were active, and he could see rapid eye movement below their closed lids.

  "This must be it," he breathed, realizing he had found the source of the dragons' control, and the reason why there were two separate waveforms on the neural monitor. One belonged to the person, and the other to their dragon counterpart.

  He looked at the monitor and the hardware it was attached to. "But how do I turn it off?" There didn't seem to be a control interface, and there were no switches anywhere on the unit. He stepped around to examine the end of the pod. The cable conduit and pipes were bolted securely into the pod's housing, and there didn't seem to be a way to easily disconnect them, though Gareth began to wonder what that would do to the people inside. He frowned. "Maybe I can pry them open." Hoping to find a toolset or something similar, he remembered there was equipment storage in the adjoining cryo hold.

  He turned back to the front door, listening. The banging noises had stopped, which meant the guards had either stopped shooting at it to try a different tactic or were about to come through. He quickened his pace and headed for the rear door at the opposite end. He crossed the connector passage, stepped through the main cryo hold door as it opened and was immediately inundated with the sudden sounds of shrieking, crashing, and squealing metal. He looked up and barely had time to dive out of the way as a gantry beam almost fell on him from above. He quickly made his way out of the open and over to the corner, under what was left of the control station, and as he poked his head back out from the overhang, he had the rare opportunity to witness several dozen fully awake, exceedingly angry dragons absolutely tearing the massive chamber apart.

  It was an extraordinary sight, impressive and terrifying in equal measure. The immense system of racks and their support structures were being slowly dismantled as creatures alternately took bites out of them, knocked into them, ripping them from their mounts, or engulfed them in plasma, breaking them down into smaller chunks. Broken glass and bits of metal covered almost every surface, while other creatures crawled across the ceiling, destroying the gantry systems above each of the rows of racks. Still others were simply fighting with each other, rolling around locked in some kind of serpentine grapple, wrapping tails and necks around each other and snapping at exposed appendages, the occasional burst of dragonfire escaping in the scuffle. More than four or five pairs writhed around in the center of the space, taking out support beams and conveyor lines as they went.

  Gareth hugged the wall, moving from the corner and making for the equipment storage at the other end, hoping to stay out of sight by keeping to the shadows under the second level walkway that ringed the chamber. He hadn't made it more than halfway, however, before one of the creatures spotted his movement and lunged at him. He scrabbled backward to the wall as the dragon tried to shove its head up under the walkway struts. It couldn't get all of its head in, however, and spent a minute snapping at him before rearing back and trying a different angle.

  Gareth stumbled backward, trying to shove himself as far back into the support structure as possible, cursing himself for leaving his staff in the other room but wondering why the creature was pursuing him at all. Most dragons didn't pay any attention to humans unless one got in its way.

  The creature tried again, but instead of attempting to shove its head under the overhang, it clamped its jaws around the walkway itself and reared backward, ripping an entire section up and out of the wall, creating a large hole over Gareth's head. And as he watched his cover evaporate, he realized that dragons had significantly more self-awareness than he had previously given them credit for, and to this creature, which had been unceremoniously captured and put under cryostasis, Gareth represented its jailors.

 
As the creature swung left to drop the mass of metal, Gareth bolted out into the room past the creature, and made for the connector corridor he came in from, taking advantage of an avenue of empty space through the center of the chamber that had not yet been congested with large amounts of debris. The dragon saw him running and turned after him, but Gareth didn't stop, even as the creature hunched its shoulders and launched a column of plasma at him. It was intense and almost knocked him off balance, but he was running with the stream and managed to keep his feet under him.

  He grinned as the jet of flame helped clear the way ahead, but his relief was short lived as the door in front of him opened and the pair of guards stepped in, their weapons drawn.

  Gareth skidded to a halt, feeling the floor shake from the dragon he knew wasn't far behind him, and tensed, waiting to see what they would do. The guards, however, seemed likewise frozen and didn't immediately appear to see Gareth. Taking advantage of their momentary confusion – and remembering there was a dragon still behind him – he sprinted forward again, intending to simply barrel through the guards into the next chamber and hope for the best.

  He didn't get the chance. Halfway across the space the floor buckled under his feet, dropping him through collapsing grating into the conveyor space beneath the hold. He barely got himself turned over and his arms up before another section of metal fell on top of him. He shoved it aside and tried to get back to his feet but was knocked onto his back as the creature caught up and shoved its head down into the hole, snapping at the metal beams and bracing sticking out at odd angles above him. He scrambled backward into a recess behind him and tried to shield himself as best he could as other sections of the flooring collapsed in around him. About ten feet away another hole appeared with another dragon snout shoved down into it, only this time a column of dragonfire came with it, and Gareth found himself pinned as plasma and flame flowed out and spread to fill all of the space beneath the floor grating.

  It parted around him harmlessly, but it only took a few seconds to eat through the lower bulkhead. An explosion punched upwards, followed by the sharp hiss of escaping gas as the plasma punctured a coolant line. The dragon above ceased its assault and pulled its nose out of the hole, as did the one directly above Gareth. He got back up and attempted to shift over to where he could crawl back out, but a sudden alarm caught his attention, followed by the sounds of pressure doors closing, one after another. He spun back toward the gas leak and realized it wasn't escaping upward but being sucked outward.

  The plasma hadn't ruptured a coolant line, it had punctured the hull, triggering the pressure doors as the chamber's air began venting into space. Gareth grabbed the helmet from its shoulder mount, expanded it and got it on as quickly as he could, but froze as another explosion punched upwards nearby, followed by a low groan and the shrill squeal of tearing metal.

  "Ah, hell."

  Two columns of plasma punched down as dragons continued to rip up the floor, and Gareth felt the bulkhead under him drop a few inches as its structural integrity failed. He scrambled up and grabbed onto the cross-bracing in the nearest set of floor support beams as another three explosions buckled the metal around him. The bulkhead split open, rupturing outward completely, and it was all over. The floor dropped out from under his feet as sections of the inner hull were sucked out into space. Gareth hung on as the air in the chamber expelled outward through the breach, forming a momentary gust of wind and pressure that he struggled to fight against.

  He didn't have to wait long, however, for the torrent to abate and the pressure to equalize, and after another moment the chamber was still once again, airless and deathly silent. He watched as the dragons noticed the breach and one after another dropped down to the floor, flowing out through the opening into space. Gareth realized that with the air expelled he wouldn't be able to get back out with the pressure doors shut and took only a few seconds to weigh his options. He watched as a continuous stream of dragons continued to flow past the support girders he was wedged between and made a decision.

  "Really hope I don't regret this," he said, taking a preparatory breath. He unsheathed the scale hooks on his wrists and leapt out into the breach.

  • • •

  The lift doors opened, and Mira and Voss were on the Command level. They stepped off, pausing in the lift alcove to ready their weapons. Mira pulled the sidearm she had procured from the guard, checking the rounds. "There should be sentries at the very least," she said, taking a breath.

  "There should be more than that," Voss countered. "They sent an entire contingent to retrieve me and Kale." She put her own sidearm into her belt and pulled the halfaxe from her back, checking its rounds. They exchanged a look, nodded, then stepped out into the corridor leading to Control. At the end of the hall was an empty security monitor station in front of the wide doorway that led onto the bridge. Inside the doorway on either side stood two helmeted guards, weapons in hand, standing at the ready. Everything was deathly quiet, and neither guard moved.

  "Only two?" Voss said as they approached, taking slow, steady steps.

  "They may have sent reinforcements to the Outer Ring," Mira suggested. "The dragons we set loose have likely not sat idle."

  "Let's hope so," Voss said, "but the fact that they're just letting us stroll right in is a little concerning."

  As if on cue, the heavy fire doors closed in front of the lift cluster, sealing off the level.

  "Oh," Voss said. "Well, okay then."

  With no place left to go but forward, they continued down the corridor, walked through the entryway between the two sentries, not lowering their own weapons, and stepped onto the bridge. It was a wide, semicircular space with a bay of large windows along the curved wall. There were two pairs of monitor and control stations on either side of the room, with an elf sitting silently at each. In the center of the space was a raised command deck, with a captain's chair flanked by helm and navigational stations. All three were empty, with a lone figure standing next to the captain's chair gazing out the front viewports, her dark hair loose at her shoulders, her clinical uniform white and pristine.

  "Director Greyc?" Mira breathed, stunned. She had known there was a probability Greyc would be involved, but Mira would never have guessed she was the one at the top.

  "Come in, miss Valric," Greyc said, looking over her shoulder, her gray eyes glinting. "I was hoping you would join me." She turned to face them, her hands wide as if in welcome. She was unarmed but wore a sly smile on her face. "And miss Voss," she continued. "You really should have stayed with your escort. You would have ended up here anyway, and your uncle would still be alive."

  Neither had lowered their weapons, keeping them up and loose, but at this, Voss shifted her aim to point hers at Greyc. Mira noticed as they stepped onto the bridge that the two guards stepped inside, allowing the wide blast doors to close behind them and effectively cut off any escape.

  "You're just in time," Greyc continued, gesturing to the front window. "Our forces are almost to the city."

  Mira walked past the command deck down to the front viewports with Voss close behind and looked out. Around the orbital on all side were vestiges of battle still going on, with fighters and dragons locked in combat. And down near the surface, too far away to be seen by human eyes, the two waves of dragons approached the center of Pyriom's capital.

  Mira turned away from the window and pointed her weapon at Greyc's head. "You have to call off the attack," she said. "Bring them back."

  Greyc's smile widened. "I'm afraid it's too late," she said, her voice icy. "The machine is already in motion, and all you can do is watch as Pyriom's capital is cleansed."

  Mira glanced over to the control stations, focusing on the screens to locate the communications monitor.

  Greyc noticed. "You can't stop them," she said, her voice all cool confidence. "The link isn't controlled from up here. And by the time Doctor Lorr's sabotage has
taken effect, it will all be over."

  Mira looked back at her, eyes wide.

  "Don't look so surprised," Greyc continued. "Did you really expect I wouldn't be monitoring every system on this station? The reactor will likely take more than ten minutes for the power levels to reach critical. Our forces will reach their target in two."

  Mira exhaled as she watched the last of her options evaporate. Voss had been locked out of the communications array, neither Petra nor Aris had been able to slow down the waves of dragons to any significant degree, Gareth had gotten to the core, but too late, and now they had no way of stopping any of the pieces that were already in play. Even their way off Avernus had been blocked. She turned back to the windows and the needless battle playing out beyond. It was all so senseless, it made Mira's heart physically hurt.

  She looked at Voss, who seemed to sense her pain and frustration, whose face echoed her own confusion, but who was still standing at her side, her weapon at the ready. Mira felt stronger for it, and took a deep breath, turning back to Greyc. "Why are you doing this?" she asked.

  "Balance," Greyc said. "You two of all people should understand. The Republic is a blight, spreading like a disease across this sector, laying waste to entire worlds, corrupting culture, destroying ecology, depleting natural resources, upsetting the balance. I am simply restoring that balance. Then this mission will be at its end," she spread her arms wide, gesturing to the elves on either side of her, "and we will join our ancestors in victory."

  Voss leveled her axe, aiming the barrel at Greyc. "Nobody's dying today," she said.

  Greyc's smile vanished and her eyes narrowed. "I'm not offering you a choice," she said. "When the power generator fails, it will either rupture, igniting the fuel cells and destroying much of this station, or it will simply shut down, in which you will have slightly longer to contemplate your mortality. In either case," her voice dropped a few degrees, "we all go down together."