They’d overwhelm him long before he could get inside.
“Ana! GO!” he yelled.
“NO!” she shrieked back, her stubbornness a force as potent as any he’d encountered.
“DAMN IT!” he fired again, his nostrils filled with the scent of his own flesh burning.
It gave him a flash of inspiration.
He risked a glance down; his ammo was nearly out. Ana was by his side now, aiming and firing, aiming and firing. She kept her cool between shots, concentrating fire on the nearest target until she brought it down before looking for the next.
As brave as she is clever… and as irritating.
Kind of handy, though.
“Keep them off me!”
He squeezed one eye shut and peered through his scope, letting the enhanced night vision pick out the silhouettes rushing towards him.
There!
Another huge man, this one grossly fat, had been selected to bear the heavy tanks. Lukas drew a bead on him, struggling to ignore the tunnel full of flashing blades coming right at him.
One more second…
The fat man was so large he almost obscured the tank on his back, waddling forward with the same rabid determination of the leaner monsters around him.
One more second! Damn it!
And then Ana’s shot burned into the Transgressor beside his mark, causing it to stagger. A hole opened, giving Lukas his chance, and he took it.
He fired on maximum power — a single blast only.
There wasn’t enough power for a second.
Dropping his rifle he twisted, diving for the massive doorway behind him. He snagged Ana on the way past, sweeping her off her feet and dragging her through the air with him.
An ear-splitting boom shook the tunnel as he sailed through it.
He landed hard, flinging the child away to avoid crushing her — and lay staring at the raging inferno racing up the tunnel towards him.
Hopefully one of the others would close the door in time…
1
Tris snapped his helmet into place, feeling a rush of air as his suit pressurised. The armour was part of a new outfit that Kreon had dredged from the depths of the Folly’s armoury, and he was under strict instructions not to leave the giant battle station without it.
Especially when they were headed full-tilt into the middle of a war zone.
They’d already been en route to the Pit when the first distress calls came in.
The location of the Lemurian Resistance’s HQ had been their most closely guarded secret — a secret which the psychic torturers on Helicon Prime had torn from Àurea’s mind, along with every detail she could remember about their planned uprising.
As a direct result, that uprising had been crippled.
Almost everyone Àurea tried to contact had been dead already — the handful of exceptions were fighting for their lives, or had disappeared without a trace.
It wasn’t the best news they could have received.
But against impossible odds they’d escaped from the Tower of Justice, and the brutal torment they’d endured inside. Though utterly exhausted, and bearing psychological scars they hadn’t had a chance to analyse, they were free and they were alive.
If only the same could be said of everyone.
As victories went, it felt remarkably like defeat.
Tris selected a rifle, locking a powerpack into place with a practised hand and checking the charge automatically. At some point in the past few months he seemed to have become an expert at this. His gaze panned around the chamber, taking in the racks of laser rifles, pistols, close combat weapons and exotic grenades. All the way down the back were heavier pieces, most of which he still couldn’t name.
When he’d first seen the Folly’s armoury he’d been blown away, but Tris couldn’t help thinking that at the rate they were burning through its contents, it would be empty in a couple of months.
Satisfied that the new armour was functioning as it should, he stowed the rifle and pulled his helmet off again. A thick mop of dark brown hair sprang loose as he did so; getting it cut had been a fairly low priority. It was starting to get in his eyes though, which wasn’t ideal in the middle of a firefight. He stretched and rolled his shoulders, testing the limits of the armour’s motion. Heavy plates of some kind of ceramic were joined with narrow strips of a more flexible, but presumably more vulnerable fabric. Overall it wasn’t bad. Certainly more protection than he was used to, which was probably a good thing given the amount of people that had been shooting at him lately. He still missed the clean lines and comfort of his first Aioro jumpsuit, though. Clearly he had expensive taste.
It occurred to him that, with the disgraced Earth Warden Sera now at least tentatively back on their side, perhaps he could consider asking her for a replacement? She’d bought him the first one as a present…
And yet, Sera was a monster.
A murderer.
Wasn’t she? She was a warrior, and had been fighting a war — for the other side as it happened, but people switched sides in war. They weren’t then immediately put on trial for the soldiers they’d killed already, were they?
As far as Tris knew, humanity was currently at war with the race they called the Siszar. Yet at this very moment a clutch of the giant starfish-shaped aliens swirled around the Folly, their formidable nestships preparing to go into battle alongside his friends. Their leader, the Empress of the River of Silver Flashes, had become one of Tristan’s most trusted comrades. Had she been responsible for human deaths before her capture? His mind shied away from the obvious answer. Almost certainly. The massive alien’s efficiency in combat was truly frightening. Tris thanked God daily that she was on their side. Whatever she’d done in the past… hell, he wasn’t going to ask her about it.
His feelings about Sera were far more conflicted.
She hadn’t just been a fighter in some distant war; she was personally responsible for the deaths of people he cared deeply about. Or, kind of.
The first death he credited her with was the hard-as-nails super-soldier Blas. But technically Blas had sacrificed himself. Sera’s second victim, the talos Loader, was hopefully still alive somewhere… as much as he could ever have been called alive.
And on the other end of the scale, Tris himself had now killed more people than he’d had time to count. He was managing to sleep better — the genetically engineered assassin sharing his bed had something to do with that — but there was no denying the pain he’d inflicted and the lives he’d taken.
He was a warrior now, too. Did that make it alright?
He was one of the good guys… at least as far as he knew.
Did the people he’d killed know they were the bad guys?
Kreon and the Wardens operated in such a murky area that black could very easily become white with the changing of circumstances.
It made his head hurt.
Sera had spent most of the journey closeted with her recently-rediscovered daughter, presumably catching up on the last eighteen years of gossip. Their relationship seemed very different to the one Àurea had with her father; hardly surprising, considering their master/student arrangement, and his often-surly demeanour.
Then again, how much of Kreon’s attitude was at least in some part due to him believing his daughter had died in a far-off battle at the tender age of eighteen? It certainly wouldn’t have improved his temperament. Tris hadn’t dared ask direct questions about that episode (he didn’t want to appear nosey), but from what he’d gleaned Àurea had ditched Kreon as her mentor and signed on with another Warden to complete her training. That must have been awkward. And finding out second-hand that she’d been killed whilst on a mission for her new teacher had turned Kreon positively murderous. Whatever the case, their family history was the dictionary definition of complicated.
Did that help to excuse Sera’s actions over the last few months?
Tris honestly didn’t know.
But she had saved all their lives twice
in quick succession recently.
That had to count for something.
Would he ever feel comfortable in her presence again?
Now that really was a question.
The simple answer was ‘no’. She was way too volatile. He’d never forget the gleam of madness in her eyes as she threatened him with his father’s knife — he shuddered at the memory — and he’d never be able to trust that she wouldn’t turn back into that terrifying version of herself without warning.
Hanging the helmet from a catch on his hip, he turned to leave the armoury.
Best stay on her good side for now.
Double checking his weapons, he made his way to the bridge. The whole crew were gathering there to catch their first glimpse of the battle around the Pit. What they saw would determine their next actions… either an aggressive strike or a hasty withdrawal.
Tris wasn’t sure which option he was more afraid of.
The last time he’d seen the base, he’d been recuperating from having a giant hole blasted in his chest. The medical team that had worked on him, and several of the fighters who’d helped rescue him from the prison where he’d been shot, had become his friends. At this very moment, those friends could be fighting for their lives… or be lying dead in the ruins of their home.
Either way, he had to know. And he had to help. If he could.
The bridge doors swished open, revealing giant screens awash with the spectral static of grav-folded space-time. Under normal circumstances that view was oddly hypnotic; the changing patterns of light reminded him of a PC screensaver. Right now though, his mind was on other things.
Like the life-and-death struggle they were about to enter.
The rest of the crew were already there. Kyra stood in front of a holographic console, working the controls. She’d left her hair hanging long, the glorious rainbow a welcome dash of colour in the otherwise monotonous palette of the battle station. She wore armour similar to Tristan’s, only hers seemed to fit her better. It also showed plenty of scarring from their recent adventures.
Prize for most heavily-damaged outfit had to go to Sera though; the one-time Warden of Earth wore the same powerful suit she’d used when rescuing them from the Tower of Justice. Servos inside fired with tiny whirrs whenever she moved, as the all-enclosing metal plates were too heavy to do anything in without assistance. Tris sneaked a quick look at her face, checking for the madness before looking away. She seemed much more composed; her expression was neutral, almost meditative, as she gazed at the main viewscreen. Her posture was upright, her bearing regal. Her hair spilled over the collar of her armour in a cascade of luxurious black curls. She was nothing if not a contradiction; beautiful and elegant, yet utterly deadly.
And quite possibly insane.
Her daughter Àurea waited next to her, fingertips drumming impatiently on another console. She took after her mother — the visible part of her did anyway. Half her face was covered by a mask that Kreon had hurriedly fabricated on the journey here. The mask hid disfiguring scars, the legacy of the battle her parents thought had killed her. Her armour also matched Tristan’s, a testament to how heavily they were abusing the Folly’s stores. Of all of them, only Sera had escaped the Tower of Justice wearing anything more impressive than a flimsy prison-issued jumpsuit. Àurea probably missed her armour most of all; it had been a seamless black shell, custom-built for her role as Ingumen, leader of the resistance.
Àurea had the most to lose in this game; the base they were rushing to protect was her home. Not only did it house the finest warriors in her army, it also contained whatever friends she had outside of the Folly’s bridge. As well as, apparently, her daughter.
A timer in the corner of the viewscreen counted down the last few seconds before their emergence into real space.
Tris took a last look around, noting the tension in every expression and posture. He could barely remember the last time he’d seen all these people in the same room. It had been… on the ancient stone space station Homeguard, before it blew up. Before Sera had revealed her plan to end all life on Earth…
They hadn’t even known Àurea was alive at that point.
His attention snapped back to the main screen as the Folly gave a slight judder. The spooling down of the grav-drive was always noticeable, even on a ship this size. Tris focused on the screen in front of him, counting the heartbeats until the image resolved itself into a field of stars…
And ships.
Enemy ships.
The tactical overlay sprang up, a green glow superimposed over a series of views showing every angle of the space outside.
It wasn’t the best news — but it wasn’t the worst.
Two of the giant Sanctuary-class battle stations hung in orbit, exchanging a smattering of fire with the Pit’s few remaining defenders. Tiny craft flitted around, mostly resistance starfighters, while the burnt-out hulks of their larger vessels drifted lifelessly.
Askarra, the AI based on Tristan’s mother, was already taking the Folly into combat with the closest Sanctuary. She fed a more detailed analysis of their tactical situation to the screen as her scanners reported the information. It seemed like the more distant of the two Sanctuary stations was heavily damaged; still fighting, but essentially immobilised and deprived of its most potent armaments. Tris winced. Achieving such a monumental feat must have cost the Ingumend dearly.
“Firing primary weapon,” Askarra’s voice chimed from concealed speakers.
The giant beam of energy lanced out from the Folly’s enormous cannon, streaking across the gulf of space to slam into the side of the spherical Sanctuary.
Tris had only seen the weapon used once before, from the outside. This time he felt the thrum of destructive energy coursing through the battle station, the deck vibrating with barely-contained power.
The Folly had started life as a Sanctuary-class vessel, much like the one it was currently burning a hole through. But she’d sustained heavy damage in the Battle of Homeguard, and Tris’ assassin-girlfriend Ella had convinced the Ingumend resistance fighters to refit her as the mother of all Sanctuary-killers.
The joke in that was, the Folly was his mother. An artificial intelligence program modelled around his mum’s memory engram controlled every aspect of the battle station. And the opposing ships must be fully crewed; with every blast she fired, she was killing more people than Tris could manage in a month of waving his sharp-stick around.
But she was used to it; she’d been an assassin too, back when she was alive.
He shook his head. Guess my own family is kind of complicated, too.
As fire blossomed from within the other ship, Tris knew this part of the battle was already over. As for what came next…
“Missiles inbound,” Askarra warned. “Countermeasures deployed.” Her electronic voice managed to sound more tense than usual, perhaps a reaction to being fired on whilst having everyone she currently cared about still aboard.
“That’s our cue,” Kreon said, striking the deck with his staff. “Let us prepare—”
He was cut off by the sudden warble of an alarm.
“Departing vessel? But that’s not…” His forehead creased in a frown. “Wayfinder is leaving?”
“Correct,” Askarra replied. This time there was a trace of exasperation in her tone. “ALI has determined that the damaged Sanctuary-class is a more viable threat than my assessment indicates. It is possible that she is correct; the inbound missiles were launched from there. She has instigated a pre-emptory attack.”
“In my ship?” Kreon fumed. “That damned computer program took my ship without asking? We need Wayfinder if we are to reach the interior of the Pit and discover the condition of the resistance fighters inside.”
“Hey!” Tris added. “Ella is on that ship too!”
The assassin still didn’t consider herself part of Kreon’s crew, and tended to stay out of their way as much as possible. Although the real reason she’d chosen to live aboard the old Phoenix-
class ship was so that she could have a bit of privacy from Askarra when Tris came to visit…
“My apologies to both of you,” Askarra continued. “ALI did not consider those factors in her calculations.”
“Gods damnit!” Kreon’s fists were clenched. “She’s acting like an impulsive child. And she’s doing it in my ship!”
“If it is of any consolation, after the battle I can request that she remove herself from Wayfinder’s computer onto a subdirectory inside the Folly’s mainframe. But I cannot guarantee that she will comply.”
“And that,” Kreon said, “is why we don’t allow artificial intelligences to control our spaceships.” He spun on his heel, the remains of his prized trench coat swirling behind him like the ragged cloak of an undead knight. “Come. We’ll take a shuttle.”
Tris cast an apprehensive glance at Kyra as they fell in behind the Warden. “Are we gonna make it down there in a shuttle?”
Kyra raised an eyebrow. “You’re damn straight we are. I’m flying. And I’ve just done my nails.”
It took less than a minute to reach the docking bay by express elevator. The Folly had plenty of the cavernous hangars, but most had been damaged above Homeguard. Several had been torn open to space; those were thankfully now re-sealed, though with vast plates of steel which reduced them to little more than storage areas.
The last functioning shuttle bay contained their last functioning shuttle. The bay’s previous occupants had suffered a high rate of attrition; Kreon seemed to go through spaceships as the same rate most people went through socks.
Sera was the last to board, her powered armour whirring as she clomped up the ramp.
Kyra already had the engines lit. She swung the shuttle around and blasted out through the bay doors before they’d finished opening.
Tris, seated behind her, squeezed his eyes shut as the giant slabs of metal swung by with inches to spare.
Warden's Vengeance Page 2
