by Chele Cooke
“So, do you have a name, Sergeant?”
“Keiran,” he said. “Most of the guys call me Zanetti.”
Georgianna looked up from the wound across his palm—the wound she had caused—and was met by deep grey-blue eyes. Despite the slice across his hand, Keiran Zanetti was still smiling and joking even though it had been the knife in her back pocket that had opened up his palm.
“George.”
“You’re going to be a hard one to forget, George the medic,” he said, flexing his fingers. “Not many of my dates actually stab me when I try to feel them up.”
She grinned and wrapped the bandage around his hand.
“Oh, so this was a date?”
“It will be when I tell the story.”
The knife slipped from her fingers and clattered to the floor. She stared at Dhiren, unmoving, not breathing. Blood was dripping down his face and soaking into his clothes. She didn’t dare look down.
“Zanetti?”
Alec tripped across the gap and fell down to his knees. Georgianna could see him out of the corner of her eye and yet she couldn’t look. This couldn’t be happening. Ehnisque’s blood was still warm on her skin. She could still hear the scream. She couldn’t have taken an Adveni life only for Keiran to lose his.
“Come on, Zanetti…”
Dhiren looked down first and it was only as his expression broke—a deep breath snorting out through his nose—that she risked doing the same.
In the black Tsevstakre uniform, it was difficult to see how much blood was seeping from the wound, but there was nothing to hide the hole the bullet had ripped through Keiran’s shoulder. His face was screwed up tight, as pale and grey as the stones beneath him. Georgianna jumped over Ehnisque and fell to her knees beside Alec.
“Keiran?”
“Vtensu,” he muttered through gritted teeth.
Georgianna gave another nervous laugh. She hunched over him, pressing her forehead against his cheek.
“Suns.”
“What’s going on?” Wrench demanded from his place by the panel. “He alright?”
Pushing herself up, Georgianna glanced around them. They were all staring.
“He’ll be fine. Finish working,” she said. “Alec, help Wrench and Tohma get those controls in place. Dhiren, help me.”
Alec, Wrench, and Tohma sprang into action. Alec took over holding the panel in place and Wrench began fitting something in amongst the wires while Tohma went back to relaying information to Jeshrom up in the ship.
Dhiren didn’t move. He stared at Ehnisque’s body, his jaw set.
“Dhiren!” Georgianna snapped.
He shook himself off and crouched beside her.
“Hold him still. I can’t get the bullet out here. I’ll just have to dress it.”
Snatching up her knife, slick with Ehnisque’s blood, she cut through the arm of her shirt and tore it away. Keiran cried out when she pressed it down on the wound. She murmured apologies and wedged it in under the tight uniform.
“You’ll be okay.”
“George?”
Pressing down hard on the wound, she leaned over him.
“I’m here.”
“Always good to have a medic around,” he said.
He groaned and wriggled beneath her.
“Hey, Keiran,” she whispered, leaning close. “You’re not marked.”
“What?”
“The bullet, it went through the mark.”
He chuckled, his strained amusement slipping into a moan. Blood was soaking through the makeshift dressing and even as she pressed down on the linen, it slipped against his skin.
She glanced at Dhiren.
“It’s no good, I need something to hold it down.”
“No, it’s fine,” Keiran said. “Help me up.”
“You’ll never get that far.”
Dhiren already had his arm around Keiran’s lower back, helping him kneel.
“He’ll have to,” Alec said, releasing the panel. It slapped back into place. “We’ve got to go.”
Georgianna opened her mouth to argue but was cut off as Tohma spun away from the panel.
“We are not ready. We do not have remote detonation.”
“How long?” Wrench asked.
“I do not—”
The mumbling came through the headset and Tohma fell quiet. He turned back to the panel and pressed the mouthpiece closer to his lips.
“No, Jesh…”
He said more in his own tongue and when the mumbling came back through the earpiece, he rubbed his hand roughly over his face. “Jesh…”
Keiran staggered to his feet, his good arm draped heavily around Dhiren’s shoulders. Sweat rolled in rivers from his forehead and down his cheeks and neck. He stared at Tohma.
“What is it?” he whispered.
Tohma smashed his fist against the screen. It smacked into the pillar. He turned away from the Mykahnol.
“Jesh has set the shields. We have fifteen minutes.”
“Can she get down that fast?” Wrench asked.
“She is not coming.”
“What?”
“She is staying to set the shields solid. She says we need to move.”
Georgianna grabbed Tohma’s arm as he moved to pass her out into the corridor.
“We can’t leave her!”
“She is not coming,” he said again. “We must go.”
Wrench joined Alec at the front of the group as they ascended the stairs. Dhiren and Tohma wrapped their arms around Keiran’s waist, half-carrying him. Georgianna brought up the rear, her gun in one hand, knife in the other.
They paused in the stairwell and Alec checked they were ready.
“Dhiren, take the front,” Keiran said.
“What?” Dhiren raised an eyebrow and tightened his grip on Keiran’s waist.
“The uniform,” he said. “You’re wearing the uniform.”
Dhiren looked down at the altered Tsevstakre uniform. He nodded and waved for Wrench to take his place but Keiran shook his head.
“No, I can… I can do it.”
Keiran brought his arm from around Tohma’s shoulders and took a deep breath, straightening up.
“Head for the tunnels,” he said.
Alec stepped out of the way, allowing Dhiren to take the lead. Georgianna had to admit that Dhiren, with his murderous determination, looked the most Adveni of all of them, even without the uniform. He grabbed the door and shoved it open as if he’d walked the halls a hundred times, striding out into the lobby of the building.
He had taken half a dozen steps, just as Georgianna slipped around the edge of the door, when the first Adveni noticed something wasn’t right. He looked, turned away, and looked again. His hand drifted towards a copaq at his hip.
Georgianna didn’t wait. She was the first to raise a weapon.
She missed and the bullet hit the wall a few inches to the right of the soldier. The crack was not missed by anyone. Before the echo of her shot had even faded away, three more blasts had been fired, this time at them.
All too fast, the open space in front of the main doors was closing up. Ehnisque’s orders had called more soldiers to their location and they were running up the steps to confront them.
Georgianna didn’t look at where or whom she was shooting. She just aimed away from their little group. They needed to hold the Adveni back. Even Dhiren had abandoned his knife and was firing indiscriminately at the oncoming troops.
As the soldiers advanced, other Adveni were running away, diving behind furniture or simply dropping to the floor. They were all trained, but most probably hadn’t served in the military for some time. She spun and fired two shots behind her, holding them off.
Keiran fired using his uninjured arm. Alec was caught between two soldiers, gun in each hand. Dhiren bobbed and weaved in amongst all of them, always driving forwards. Georgianna reached for one of the extra clips of bullets she had brought along.
A lightning bolt, hotter and
more painful than a cinystalq charge, seared into Georgianna’s back. She hit the floor with a scream, head smacking the cold stone, blood seeping into her hair. She shook until she thought her bones might snap. The gel instantly burned in blemishes like the Nsiloq and began spreading over her body.
She shook and screamed, clawing at the gel splattered across her lower back. Above her she could hear shouts. Waves of screaming rolled and crashed through her head, thunder to the lightning’s pain.
Rolling over, limbs jerking aimlessly, she saw the Adveni standing above her. He didn’t look like a soldier. The copaq hung from his hand, gel dripping from the barrel.
He pressed his foot down on her neck, the treads biting into her skin. She couldn’t breathe. Even as she grabbed at his leg, the lightning just kept on shooting through her.
He aimed the copaq at her face, a sneer curling his lip and wrinkling his nose.
The bullet tore out half his neck as it hit. He was dead before he could react, landing on top of her. Georgianna did the screaming for him.
Dhiren was there in an instant, grabbing her around the chest and hauling her out from underneath the Adveni.
He howled as a knife slashed across his back and Georgianna hit the ground. Before he could turn, a bullet hit his Adveni assailant in the back and he tumbled, his face hitting the floor with a sickening crack. Dhiren wrapped his arm around her back.
“Cop… Copaq,” she cried.
He lifted her, hooking one arm underneath her knees and hauling her up against his chest. She continued to fire at the soldiers, sending them leaping out of the way, but couldn’t see if she was actually hitting anything. The copaq gel fired jolts through her nerves, sparking across her eyes. Her skin burned and sweat soaked through her clothes.
Dhiren broke into a run and Georgianna bounced in his arms as he made for a gap between the soldiers. No matter how much she screamed or begged him to stop, he didn’t. He kept on running, jumping down the steps and sprinting along the road without a backwards glance.
Georgianna couldn’t see if any of the others were following them.
“Dhiren, put me down.”
He had slowed to a jog, his breath fast and uneven. He was soaked with sweat and had turned a pale shade of green. He didn’t stop to even speak.
“Put – me – down!”
With a reluctant glare, Dhiren stopped and lowered her legs. He kept his arm around her back as her shaking feet found the ground. With a heavy breath, he touched his back and brought his fingers away dripping with blood.
“We have to go back,” she said.
“No.”
“Dhiren…”
“No, George. We’re not going back!” he said, pulling away from her. She trembled under her own weight and staggered to the nearest building, steadying herself against the wall.
“The others—”
“Would do exactly the same. We don’t have time. If they’re not already out, they’re gone. You have to accept that.”
“But—”
“No!” He groaned as he leaned forwards, once again touching the slash across his back. “Now, come on.”
He waved her back over to him. Staggering, Georgianna shook her head as he moved to lift her up.
“Just get this shit off me.”
Dhiren’s knife was sticky with blood. He used the blunt edge to scrape as much of the gel from her skin as he could. When he flicked the knife, blue gel and blood splattered the pavement.
He set off slow but within a dozen steps he was running again. She ran as best as could behind him, stumbling with every other step. The entrance to the tunnel came into sight around the corner. She could have cried at the sight of Wrench standing at the top of the steps. He waved them over.
“Suns, guys, you scared us,” he said, turning to look down the tunnel. “They’re here!”
Georgianna gripped Dhiren’s arm as they descended the steps into the gloom of the tunnels. Wrench waved them on and there was no pause to gather her breath or steady herself. Tohma had fished a light from his multitude of devices, joining Alec at the front of the group and leading them along. Keiran fell in behind them. His breath came as a constant moan forced out of his body with every step. Wrench wrapped his arm tight around Keiran’s waist and helped him along.
“We need to keep heading south,” Dhiren said.
“The Belsa tunnels will lead us southwest,” Alec shouted back. “And without Adveni.”
Tohma’s wrist cuff flashed almost as bright as the lamp he held. He shoved the lamp into Alec’s side and handed it off, stumbling when he tried to enter something into the cuff as he ran.
They were approaching a split. One path would lead them south, the other towards the camps through the Belsa tunnels.
Blood dripped down Georgianna’s temple and across her eye. Wiping it with the back of her hand, she grimaced at the tacky smear across her skin, a mixture of her own blood, Keiran’s, and Ehnisque’s.
“The Belsa tunnels are smaller,” she said. “If anything happens when it goes off, we’ll be trapped.”
“Risk it!” Wrench shouted. “The other goes through the Rion district and too many Adveni. We can handle rocks. We can’t go another round with Adveni like this.”
She didn’t argue as Alec glanced over his shoulder and nodded, veering off into the right hand tunnel.
Wrench was right about one thing. In their state, they wouldn’t last five minutes in another fight with the Adveni. It was a miracle they were able to run at all. Keiran looked ready to drop at any second. Georgianna’s vision was blurring and her entire left side shuddered with each step. Wrench’s fingers were bent at a strange angle and blood was trickling down Alec’s leg. Dhiren hadn’t complained, but Georgianna could see the blood soaking through the back of the Tsevstakre uniform, and wasn’t sure how he was still running. Tohma alone seemed to have avoided injury, though with the way he wobbled, she couldn’t be sure.
They needed to run faster. What if they didn’t reach the barrier in time? Jeshrom and Tohma had been clear. After fifteen minutes the barrier would be impassable. They would be trapped inside the shield when the Mykahnol went off, destroying everything it touched.
Georgianna had seen the devastation a Mykahnol could leave. Nyvalau had been reduced to a crater. There wasn’t even any hint of the buildings that had once stood there. Everything had been destroyed, rock and ash left to the elements.
As they ran, she couldn’t see a glimpse of the shield’s shimmer. She couldn’t remember if it only glowed ever so slightly blue in the sunlight. What if they were heading in the wrong direction? The tunnels twisted and turned underground and while Tohma was keeping an eye on the cuff on his wrist, he could only lead them in the general direction. They couldn’t run through rock if the tunnels forced them away from the southwest.
Keiran was flagging at the back of the group. Wrench was helping as best he could to support Keiran’s weight, but it was taking its toll. When Georgianna dared to glance away from her feet, Keiran looked like he was about to be sick. The tunnel down here was too narrow for two people to carry him. Wrench was already falling behind them, pressing his hands against Keiran’s back and pushing him along where the tunnel became too thin to walk two abreast.
Alec skidded to a stop, bringing them all to a halt.
“It’s there!” he said, spinning around. “I felt it.”
Peering through the gloom, Georgianna couldn’t see anything different about the patch of ground where Alec was pointing. Tohma stepped forwards and ran his hand through the air.
“He is correct,” he said. He walked through without hesitation.
Dhiren paused before he stepped forwards. As he passed through, Georgianna realised that she could see it—his skin tinting blue, the light rippling across his body. He took another step and as she looked to the others, the blue began to glow brighter.
“Quick!” she cried. She reached for Keiran’s hand and jumped forwards.
An uncomfo
rtable ripple of static ran through her body. She lifted her foot and found the shield was harder to penetrate than it had been up at Nyquonat Lake. It pulled and stuck, but her body glowed as she passed through, bright as the summer sky.
Wrenching her foot free, Georgianna stumbled into Alec’s waiting arms. She turned away, plunging her hand into the shield to grab Keiran’s arm.
Keiran heaved himself through, his skin shockingly pale. He shoved and grunted his way towards them.
“It’s like mud.”
“Get through, come on!”
Air rippled through the tunnel, and it sounded as if he were pulling his body from glue. The shield was darkening. Neon deepened to dark water.
“Wrench?”
She could barely see Wrench on the other side now. Shadows smothered his features, his outline blurring behind the barrier. Before any of them could stop him, Keiran launched himself back at the shield. He hit it like running into a wall.
Keiran froze, his hand pressed against the solid blue.
“ELI!”
“ELI! COME ON!”
Keiran pounded on the shield, now as black as the night sky. The sound of his fists hitting the solid barrier reverberated in the tunnel. Alec joined him, shoving against the shield with his shoulder.
“Come on!” Keiran cried again. “You can get through. Push!”
“It is too late,” Tohma said, his voice quiet and nervous. “It is solid. There is no changing it.”
A murmur broke through them. This time it did not come from Tohma’s headset in some undecipherable tongue; it came from the shield.
“Run.”
Keiran and Alec froze and leaned close to the shield.
“Run!”
Slamming his hand down on the black shield, Keiran’s voice cracked and broke apart.
“No, I’m not going!”
“Wrench, we’re not leaving you!” Alec shouted.
Georgianna looked back at Tohma to find him shaking his head. From what she had seen, Wrench had been closer to Tohma than any of them. He was the one who had introduced him to them, who discussed technology with him. Taking a step further away, Tohma glanced at Dhiren.
