Spectres (Æthyrium Rising - Spectres Book 1)

by Zachariah Dracoulis

  To me the choice was simple, so I pulled the small laser pistol out from the compartment behind my chair, which was barely the size of a bar of soap and would do little more than knock someone out, but I wasn’t quite comfortable going out unarmed.

  There’d been some chatter over the open channel about a rescue crew from a medical frigate Eir, as well as something about someone else going on a rescue mission into the city.

  Thinking that it would be obvious who I was, given my flight jumpsuit and Commonwealth patches, I decided the city would be my best bet to find someone to steal a uniform off of and get a ride with the survivor.

  It took a few sweltering seconds, but I eventually managed to override the bomber’s security protocols and forced the hard-glass shroud open.

  Once I was out I quickly discovered what had been damaged in the attack, shrapnel having completely torn through most of the tail as well as a whole mess of fire damage. I chalked that all up to occupational hazards though and pressed into the forest.

  I was jumpy, not going to lie, and every time there was even the slightest sound I’d spin around looking for whatever it was that was lurking around me. It wasn’t soldiers I was worried about though, no, it was what else had been let loose on the city that scared me.

  I hadn’t heard much on it beyond the fact that there were definitely more ships in the Gregor, and most of them were transports. Some of which were for infantry, one of which I was pretty sure I saw Kevin and Ryoku Cho boarding all decked out in Spider-Trooper gear. I’d have asked, but it was made pretty clear that we weren’t to converse with the others on the ship.

  And no, it wasn’t Kevin or Ryoku who scared me, but the other transports that had had large crates of unknown somethings loaded in, the kind of thing I’d seen used to transport horses back home, only bigger, and I had no doubt that they’d have moved to the surrounding forest that I was in pretty damn quickly.

  Luckily my fear proved to be useful, the sound of a breath somewhere to my right alerting me of the young Feddie soldier hiding behind a tree.

  I went to make a move for him, but I stepped on something that went crunch and he bolted, and I almost let him get away too, but then I saw he was about my height and started chasing immediately.

  He was terrified, which was good because it made him make mistakes, but bad because it meant I couldn’t shoot at him. With his erratic jumping and tripping I’d have surely lit up the forest with flashes of blue that would’ve brought everyone’s attention to me.

  As far as I knew everyone other than the guy I was chasing thought I was dead, and I wanted to keep it that way.

  Suddenly there was a roar from somewhere up ahead and instead of turning tail I ran harder, clotheslining the young soldier as he ran blindly from the sound that was obviously a good few klicks away, to me anyway, before stunning him with a quick blast to the head.

  I quickly took off his clothes, leaving him in his black briefs, before stripping down and putting on his blue and grey fatigues which, though painful as it is for me to admit, I did lose a few times in the dark.

  After I was more or less uniformed I went to leave the soldier in the dirt, but something, probably guilt… definitely guilt, overtook me, and I turned back, dressed him in my flight suit, and hid him under a pile of leaves.

  With my karma slightly stacked back up in my favour, I made a break for the city and found a road that led to a tunnel which was probably once lit but was completely bathed in darkness since I’d dropped my bombs.

  No other option appeared to be viable at the time so with great caution I started my slow trek into the tunnel, sticking to sides as best as I could as to avoid any survivors that may have questioned why I was going in the wrong direction.

  It occurs to me now that I probably could’ve just said I got turned around, but I don’t regret my decision. If I’d have done anything any other way I’d have never met… well, you’ll see.

  The trip through the tunnel was harrowing to say the least, I was constantly waiting for something to jump out and grab me, but I made the effort to not look the least bit scared even though there was no possible way anyone could see me.

  Once I was out and into the city I immediately started ducking and weaving through the city streets, sticking to the shadows and making sure that if anyone did happen to find me I simply looked lost. It seemed that there wasn’t a soul left in the city, not until I heard a groaning somewhere nearby as I sat crouched in what was once a coffee shop.

  I peeked out into the street and saw a group of people, two of them arguing about something, as well as a building that had fallen over the street and was being held at an angle above it by trees and the building across the road.

  A few seconds passed and the young woman in the argument went into the building toward the sound of the groaning person.

  ‘Just walk away,’ I said to myself, ‘you’re not the sheriff anymore, just walk away.’ But I simply couldn’t, I couldn’t watch someone who was clearly injured go into a precarious pile of rubble solo.

  I quickly found a route into the base of the building that avoided the prying eyes of the people the woman had left behind and started my ascent, climbing through the building’s stairways and caved in office floors until I reached the storey that the groaning and the young woman shoutings were coming from.

  That’s also about the time when I started to hear the building’s structural trees cracking.

  Heroes

  “We have to go!” I shouted as I ran toward the woman, the Private who was trapped under a pile of metal she was trying to save only coming into view as I got to within ten feet of them.

  “I can’t,” she shouted, turning to face me as she did, showing she was definitely a Kaltjarnan native with her skin colour and Nordic facial structure, “there’s someone trapped here, and I ain’t leaving without him!”

  I understood what she was talking about, leaving a man behind wasn’t even an option as far as I was concerned, but instead of telling her I meant the both of them I just ran over, crouched down, grabbed the metal and said “On three.”

  She seemed surprised by what I was doing, but got into position to lift anyway, “One.”

  “Two.”

  “Three!” we growled simultaneously as we both used all of our strength to lift the surprisingly heavy metal mesh.

  “Hurry up and grab him!” I barked, the metal slipping from my fingers with each passing second, “This whole place is about fifteen seconds from being on our heads!”

  “We can’t just move him! We could kill him!” the woman said as compassionately as she could with the weight she was holding.

  I gave her a serious look that she missed before locking my eyes shut almost involuntarily, “If we leave him he’s dead anyway,” I groaned, the ability to yell long gone, “along with the both of us.”

  That’s when the Private on the ground made the decision for us, “Just… just get me out of here… I can move my toes now…” he said weakly before passing out.

  The Kaltjarnan made a disappointed sounding grunt in response before letting me take the weight, which I was only just barely holding when there was the two of us, before pulling the Private to safety.

  I let the metal go and, after assuring myself that I hadn’t pulled something in such a way that I couldn’t walk, helped the woman pick up the Private under his arm.

  “Which way?” she asked, looking around wearily.

  “The way I was going,” I said as I started on the slight incline, “follow me.”

  We got a few feet from where we were before the woman started a line of conversation, “What’s your name?” she asked in attempt to either keep herself conscious or simply trying to be polite, either way, it was distracting.

  I thought for a second and, not wanting to give her my real one, said “Private Xiang.” It was something similar enough to Xiao that I could say it easily, but different enough that it detached the name from me.

  I was slightly conc
erned that she’d picked up on the fact that I was lying, but then she went on talking like nothing had happened, “Nice to meet you, I’m Cadet Nokri, Freyja Nokri. Friends call me Frey for short.”

  “That’s all well and good,” I said as nicely as I could, trying to hide the fact that I really didn’t want to have a ‘get-to-know-you’ with the enemy in a death-trap, “but can we do our introductions when we’re out of the building? We’re running out of time.”

  I half expected her to get angry, but instead the ground beneath our feet started to move and she said “I think… we just did.”

  Without wasting a second we put the Private on the ground and created a human shield above him as the building crumbled and fell, the noise alone making me want to cover my head, but before long we were on the ground.

  I thought we were safe, but right as I went to lift myself up the sound of cracking road came with more falling as the building’s weight broke the ground beneath us and made us fall into a cavern below.

  By the time it was all over I’d been winded by the force and utterly coated in dust, dirt, and small pieces of rubble.

  Freyja was the first one moving, I could hear her shuffling around, but I was perfectly fine with staying on the ground a little while longer, just until my breathing normalised.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  I tried to respond verbally, but I still wasn’t quite there yet, so I settled for a nod while the Private next to me simply groaned, the fall having apparently woken him up.

  “Good… good. That’s good.” she mumbled as she groggily got to her feet, and I was right about ready to start getting up when I heard her say “Hi.” to someone in the hole who’d called something to us, the dirt in my ears making hearing not exactly an option, before she fell forward.

  I only just managed to catch her so that she didn’t fall face first on a pile of broken bits and pieces, the weird little leap I did causing me to fall flat on a chunk of concrete and letting Freyja fall on her side. I’d have felt worse about it if I hadn’t have been busy coughing up a basement’s worth of dust as I slowly got to my feet.

  Luckily I hadn’t felt any surges of pain so far, and everything appeared to be in working order. I stood there a little while, looking at the two people in front of me before finally hooking the Private under his arms and starting my attempt to drag him out.

  Then I heard a creaking.

  The building was getting ready to collapse on itself and Freyja was still out for the count. Deciding to be a hero again, like an idiot, I set down the Private and, with a great amount of difficulty, slung Freyja over my shoulder before, again, like an idiot, started dragging the Private out again.

  The weight was certainly easier than the metal, but my lungs still felt more than a little dysfunctional, so moving came at a pace of five feet every three seconds.

  I could’ve dropped either one of them, saved one no problem, the thought of leaving them both not even occurring to me for a second, but even as large chunks of concrete and other debris fell around me I dragged.

  Summoning all my strength, I pulled all three of us through a crack in the wall, only just making it as the space we had just been occupying turned into a pile of rubble.

  I unceremoniously dropped the Private to the ground before letting Freyja slowly fall off my arm and land softly on the ground as I fell into a seated position.

  After a good deal of shaking my head around and clearing out my ears I noticed something on either side of me. They were a bit on broken side of things, like something had ground them down a bit, but clear as day there were train tracks, and once I saw them I started hearing voices from behind me.

  I turned around slowly and with a shocked smile started to wave at the subway car not fifteen feet from me, a group of people huddled together inside while a few brave souls ventured out to give me a hand.

  Gods only know what they would’ve done if they’d known who I was and what I’d done.

  Lie to Me

  After I got everyone out of the tunnel we’d found the people Freyja was with on the street. Luckily they knew where we were going and, with a whole lot more luck, we all made it to the evac point where shuttles were waiting to take us up to the medical frigate Eir.

  The staff there quickly discovered that I wasn’t injured in any way that needed extended treatment, so I was sent without so much as a wipe down to the Captain of the ship, a brusque man in his sixties named Zephyr.

  “So,” he said in his deep voice as we stood at one of the ships viewing platforms, “Private Xiang, is it?”

  ‘Damn,’ I thought, ‘they’re already onto me.’

  “Yes sir.”

  He continued looking out at the stars, “What was it that you were doing in Urbetes? Most of the others we’ve pulled have been Kaltjarnan, or at least from this quadrant.”

  “I am sir, Kaltjarnan that is. Adopted by a family when I was young after a Commonwealth Spider-Trooper unit killed everyone in my village.”

  The Captain laughed under his breath and shook his head, “You’re full of shit Private, been around for long enough to know a thing or two about liars. Listen, I’m the Captain of a medical frigate, not a battleship or anything else, which means you’re a hero as far as I’m concerned.” he paused and looked back out to the void of space, “You saved lives today, and that earns you a pass from me. The others though? Well… let’s just say it’d be best if you got out of here before anyone else figured it out. You got a ship Private?”

  I was pretty damn sure I was having a heart attack, but I still managed a nod before blurting out, “It wasn’t me.”

  Zephyr turned his head and looked at me confusedly, “What was that?”

  “It wasn’t me, the one who saved those people. It was Freyja, she was the one who did all the hard work, I just got her over the finish line.”

  That apparently earned me a smile, “I’ll be sure to let someone know. Now, about this ship of yours, is it going to attack us?”

  Some part of me wanted to try and lie again, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to manage it, so I simply shook my head and waited.

  Zephyr sighed gratefully, “Good. There’s a loading bay, bay seven on the starboard side, the doors are the weakest on the ship and have been known to get easily hacked. You followin’ me so far?”

  I felt it best that I didn’t say anything and stuck to my simple head movements, so I nodded.

  “Fantastic, there’s also a communications room near there, attached to the bay actually, and the place is always left unlocked and unguarded. If a ship happened to be close by and following a tracker, well, let’s just say it’d be strong enough to get a signal to them. You’re gonna wanna hurry though, Federation’ll wanna see their soldiers soon, and it’d be in both of our best interests if you weren’t here when they arrived.”

  I didn’t even bother to stop and thank him before bolting toward the loading bays. He was definitely more Federation than Commonwealth, but he’d stuck his neck out to try and help me which stuck the idea in my head that maybe not all Feddies were bad.

  I told myself that there’d be more time to think about that stuff later as I found a ship map next to one of the elevators. It only took me few seconds to memorise the layout I needed to use in order to escape.

  “Where’s the fire?” a Feddie soldier asked with a laugh as I nearly ran into him.

  I’d have stopped to talk and explain myself with some lie or another, but I could feel the minutes ticking away until I was picked up and taken as a POW.

  For a little while after that I expected to hear sirens blaring and the classic ‘Intruder Alert!’ alarm, instead though I heard him call me a rude bitch and continue on with his day as I entered the elevator that had the quickest route to loading bay seven.

  The tension within me was so high I could’ve been used to play a tune, though as I passed through the ship I came to realise that no one was actually chasing me and, other than the obvious looming threat, I was relat
ively safe.

  I eventually found the communications room Zephyr had been talking about and discovered that it was actually properly attached to the loading bay, it being a room that’s walls were made of hard-glass with the exception of the one that was attached to the hall I’d just been in.

  I looked into the loading bay and sighed with relief, it was completely empty and the blast doors were obviously due for an upgrade, even by Commonwealth standards.

  After a lot of thinking, I finally made the decision to go on the open channel, “Alby?” I asked the open air after deciding that real names would be best left unsaid, “Loading bay seven. Quickly as you can if you don’t mind.”

  That’s when the sirens started to go off, but I didn’t let that stop me, and it certainly didn’t stop Jurol from working his magic.

  A few tense seconds passed by and the blast doors collapsed away and I was greeted by the gorgeous sight of my ship flying in at full speed, coming about at the last second and started hovering on the spot, the Eir’s shields barely keeping the room habitable.

  I went for the door, but discovered that there were a whole lotta Feddie’s waiting for me just outside. By sheer dumb luck I looked at the ground in frustration and found a hatch that I promptly opened and found a ladder on the other side.

  Right as I started to descend the Feddies broke in, guns blazing, and I knew I had all of two seconds before they’d just start firing down the hatch. I grabbed either side of the ladder and, doing something I’d only ever seen firefighters do, slid down with my feet outside the rungs.

  I swear the experience almost gave me a heart attack, but it got me to the ground safely and only sprained my left ankle a lot. I started my running limp toward Alby and smiled when I saw Xario and Juno, still in their flight suits and both standing at the foot of the stairs that were a good five feet from the ground, and waving for me to hurry up, each of them holding pistols and firing at the top of the ladder, effectively discouraging any potential pursuers.