“What?”
“This may be nothing, but there’s a ship seemingly on an intercept course with us.”
“Really? What can you tell me about it?”
“It’s nothing I’ve ever seen as far as ships are concerned. I’m not getting an ident on it either.”
“Well, if it’s got you stumped, I’m a little concerned.”
“I agree.”
“How far out is it?” Dah asked, his brow furrowing.
“Several miles at this point,” Kay replied, working the console.
“Keep me posted. If it does anything to draw your attention, let me know.”
“You mean like, for instance, if it were to arm its weapons?” Kay asked.
“Um, yeah, that would be a very good reason,” Dah said, arming his weapons and raising his shields. “Brix, secure everything back there and buckle up! We’re in for some chop!”
“I’m on it!”
“The ship is picking up speed. I’m getting the impression that they’re coming for us,” Kay said sarcastically.
“Let him come!” Dah gloated. “We’ll have a few surprises for him!” Dah veered off course and started heading straight for the ship. “Puar, the minute you get a target lock, fire.”
“We’re not waiting for a hail or anything?” Puar asked.
“No, coming straight at us with shields and weapons up is enough for me to blow them out of the sky. Your brother’s security has more leaks than a thousand-year-old wooden ship!”
“He did give us Khai’s location, just for the record.”
“I know, but someone clearly tipped someone off,” Dah shot back.
“Right. Firing missiles!”
The missiles launched from beneath the wings of the Bucket and streaked out toward the ship. At the last possible second, it went evasive and dropped several flares as countermeasures. The missiles missed their mark and exploded harmlessly. The enemy returned fire with forward-mounted cannons. The energy splashed across the Bucket’s shields but did no real damage. Then the ship flashed by.
“Shields holding,” Puar announced.
“Take him down with the turret!” Dah shouted.
“Already a step ahead of you,” Puar said, using a joystick to track the ship’s movement.
The heavy cannon panned to the left, locked on and fired. The blast connected and the ship listed to the left.
“Direct hit!” Puar shouted. “I’m reading that his shields are at half power!”
“Keep it up!”
Puar continued to fire at the ship, it would go evasive and lose ground and then speed up to get closer. There was a cool-down period between shots of about five seconds to keep the cannon from overheating. Suddenly, in that five-second period, the enemy ship hit some kind of afterburner and zipped up close enough to touch them. It opened up with the cannons, pelting the Bucket’s shields.
Dah knew he had him. He pulled back on the throttle, the pursuing ship soared past and then Dah punched it coming up behind it. Puar was working to get another missile lock. To Puar’s surprise, when he had a lock, the ship didn’t go evasive at all. Warning bells were going off in all their heads. Puar fired the missiles just as a turret dropped down from the belly of the ship. Dah cringed, knowing he had just bitten on the bait. Attached to that turret was a Mark V “Ship Buster,” a powerful, highly expensive, highly illegal weapon mounted on only a handful of starships in the Seryys Navy and designed to take down capital ships. Its beam emitter warmed up and fired before Dah could fully evade the blast.
Sparks flew across the cockpit and the ship rumbled. Dah only peripherally noted that the other ship also took a direct hit from the two missiles that were launched. It was a risk, but a calculated one, and it paid off because the Bolt Bucket was going down!
“I have no control!” Dah shouted over the roar of ship falling out of the sky.
“I’m trying to reroute power from rear shields to the hoverpads, but there are so many damaged systems, I’m having trouble finding a path,” Kay shouted.
“I think at this point we’re screwed. I have an idea though,” Dah said.
He pushed the ship to full throttle and instead of the ship diving in a near freefall, their descent leveled out slightly. Dah pulled back on the yoke as far as it would go, but they were falling nonetheless. The prairie ground ahead loomed up fast. Dah watched the altimeter; at roughly twenty feet, he hit the breaking thrusters. They were all jerked into the crash restraints and the ship dropped to the ground in a heap of wreckage.
For a few tense moments, there was silence. Only the sounds of sparking wires filled the cockpit. Eventually, Dah stirred. His head spun as he looked over at his copilot, Puar. He was out cold.
“Dack?” a weak voice called from behind him. It was Kay.
“You still with me back there?” Dah asked.
“More or less,” Kay grumbled. “How’s Puar?”
“He’s out, but I think he’s alive. Can you go back and check on Brix?”
“Yeah, give me minute.”
After getting her wits about her, she unbuckled her restraints and stumbled back to the main hold.
Dah untangled himself and leaned in toward Puar. He leaned his ear close to Puar’s mouth to listen for breathing.
“Are you gonna kiss me next?” Puar whispered into Dah’s ear.
“Nope. But if you were dead I was going to take your stuff,” Dah said with as much humor as he could muster.
“Good to know,” Puar growled as he freed himself from his restraints.
Suddenly Kay was in the cockpit and when she spoke, she prompted a startled jump from the others. “Brix is fine. He was commenting on your landing.”
Dah muttered something unintelligible under his breath and moved to the back. In short order, they gathered their stuff and exited the ship from the airlock. According to Kay’s micro-comp, they undershot the facility by a few miles.
“Well, this complicates things,” Puar said sarcastically.
“We’ll just have to improvise,” Dah shot back. “There has to be a ship or shuttle there we can steal once we have Khai.”
“If Khai is still alive,” Brix added.
“If my brother said he’s alive, he’s alive,” Puar snapped back angrily.
“Well, let’s get a move on. Daylight’s wasting,” Kay interjected.
As they started heading off in the direction of the underground facility, the high-pitched whine of ship engines crept up on them. Suddenly they were running for their lives and trying to find anything for cover as bullets rained down on them from the sky. The pursuing ship had taken some damage but obviously was still operational. As the ship swung around to make another pass, Brix boldly stepped out from his cover and took aim.
“Brix, you idiot!” Dah yelled. “What are you doing?”
Brix simply opened fire with his dual-mag machine gun. Bullets rained down around him while he pelted the ship as it came in. The ship’s shields were clearly down as the bullets started riddling the ship with pockmarks. Suddenly, as the ship passed overhead, it started spewing black smoke and veered off to the east. The ship struggled to make another pass and as it straightened out for an attack, the nose dipped and it started going down.
Brix looked back at everyone with a cocky grin as the ship crashed to the ground in a fireball.
They all stepped up next to him, looking slack-jawed at the plume of smoke billowing into the air and mixing with the smoke coming off the Bucket’s remains.
“I’ll be damned,” Puar breathed.
“Nice shooting!” Dah laughed, slapping Brix’s back.
“I like this gun,” Brix said with a grin, patting his gun.
As they made a short celebration out of it, Kay spotted something on the horizon in the direction of the crash.
“What is that?” she asked, point in that direction.
Without a set of working binoculars, they couldn’t tell. Whatever it was, it was moving toward them. They sat for m
oment, waiting to see what it did. The closer it got, the more it looked like a person running.
“You don’t think that’s the pilot of the ship, do you?” Dah asked, more hopefully than definitively.
“With you,” Kay said, “anything is possible.”
“Puar, if you wouldn’t mind,” Dah implied.
“You got it, boss.” Puar waited a few more moments until he was sure the pilot was in range and launched a grenade. A few agonizing seconds ticked by and then the grenade found its mark, throwing up dirt and rocks. When the dirt settled, there no was pilot.
“Done!” Puar sang.
“I wouldn’t be too sure,” Dah warned. “This guy appeared to be quite resourceful. Everyone stay frosty.” He got nods from his soldiers. “Good. Let’s move out.”
They started walking.
It was nearly nightfall by the time the facility came into view. Without binoculars, they couldn’t really see what kind of resistance they were up against. There were definitely two guards, posing as utility workers, posted at the entrance to the shack. Obviously, the shack was only a façade designed to not draw attention. Dah expected not to meet much resistance on the outside. Posting a bunch of guards outside would more than definitely draw attention to this lonely, random shack out in the middle of nowhere.
“We’ll wait ’til the sun goes down. Then we’ll make our move. Getting in isn’t going to be the problem; finding Khai and getting out—that will be the challenge.”
It only took a few moments for the sun to set, splashing brilliant shades of pink and orange and blue across the evening sky. As Dah checked his machine gun, he heard the faintest tink, as something metallic hit the ground near him. His eyes darted in the direction from which the sound came and his stomach knotted up.
“Grenade!” he shouted, running for cover.
The others reacted as he did… except for Kay. She pulled her sword as she ran up to the grenade, kicked the grenade up and batted it away with her sword. It exploded harmlessly out of range. However, the explosion did get the attention of the guards.
“Great!”
Chapter Nineteen
Seryyk knew that his targets thought he was dead. He stalked his prey silently, deftly. He knew that if he could catch them off guard, he would have the advantage and may take some of them out in the process. He waited for nightfall. Once the deadly sun dipped below the horizon, he shed the constrictive insulated suit that protected him from the sun’s harmful rays. The suit had another function, and provided that function by stopping the bullets that made their way through the ship’s fuselage and found their mark. Though the bullets didn’t rip through him, they did leave him bruised.
The time was now! He pulled the pin on a grenade and lobbed it in Dah’s direction.
“Grenade!” Dah shouted, running for cover. The others followed suit… except for one, a girl in a black flight suit. She pulled a Kit’Ra and used it to bat the grenade away. The grenade went off far away enough to not harm him, but still a little too close for comfort.
An Agent. Interesting, he mused.
“Great!” Dah growled.
Seryyk looked past them trying to find the reason for Dah’s remark. It didn’t take long to see the two guards that were standing outside the shack coming toward them. This is going to complicate things, he realized. Thinking quickly, he pulled another grenade off his bandoleer and threw it in the direction of the two guards. Seconds later, the grenade went off and the two guards were dead. Now he could focus on his actual targets.
He moved in, firing a submachine gun with one hand and throwing a concussion grenade with the other. The effects of the grenade took their toll on two of the four companions; the man who scored a lucky shot on his ship and the other who launched a grenade at him earlier. The other two, however, were unaffected. They must be tougher than they look. Bullets splashed across Dah’s chest armor but he shunted the pain and brought his gun to bear.
With those two effectively out of the fight for now, he focused on the Agent and Captain Dah. As he moved in, he finally recognized the face of the Agent. Kay’Lah Kayward! She is the Agent who aided General Khail in rescuing Prime Minister Puar! His intel could have been better. At this point, he realized he may be outmatched. But, as a Vyysarri, he would never admit defeat, so he charged in.
He ducked under Kay’s attack and rolled to his left to avoid being shot by Dah. As soon as he got to his feet he threw a knife and stuck it into Dah’s shoulder issuing a grunt of pain. Seryyk grinned with the small victory, maybe I will make it out of this fight alive. Kay swiped her blade horizontally at him; the blade dug deep into his padded armor but did no real damage. Taking Kay’s stunned surprise to his advantage, he bashed her in the side of the head with his foot and continued after Dah, firing away. Dah rolled out of the way and avoided the barrage. As Dah got to his feet, he removed the knife from his shoulder and flicked it at him. His own knife buried itself all the way to the hilt into his forearm, which was protecting his face. He was taken aback by Dah’s strength, belatedly remembering that Dah did have military training on what was once Vyysar.
Dah caught him dazed for that second and cracked him on the chin with an uppercut that sent him sprawling to his back seeing stars. Though he was stunned, he certainly wasn’t out of this fight yet. He sprang to his feet and fired his gun again at Dah. The bullets splashed across Dah’s chest and one in particular caught him in the knife wound inflicted earlier. His gun ran out of ammo and he simply dropped it. Dah growled with pain, dropping to one knee and clutching the wound. Seryyk knew an opportunity when he saw one and pushed the attack. He bashed Dah in the face with his knee, sending him flipping to his back. Seryyk pulled the knife from his forearm and moved to make the killing blow. He knew that all he had to do is kill the leader and the rest would retreat, but he was blindsided by a flying sidekick that sent him tumbling into some brush.
Kay didn’t let up and charged after him, blood trickling form the corner of her eye. Before she could get to him, he threw another concussion grenade that she easily batted away. She was not tricked at all as she then batted away another two bullets from his sidearm. Seryyk rolled backward to his feet and continued to fire at the approaching Agent. She batted the bullets away one at a time.
As Seryyk backpedaled firing away, he was stopped by a wall. That wall was Brix, towering over the lone Vyysarri. Seryyk moved quickly and struck Brix in the stomach with a lightning punch that took him completely by surprise. Before Seryyk could fully evade the hulking man, Puar started peppering him with bullets from his machine gun. Many bullets found their marks and Seryyk was forced to retreat behind a mound of dirt to rethink his strategy. He was holding his own against two adversaries, but taking on four enemies of this caliber was beyond his abilities.
Before he could really get a working exit strategy together, a colossal hand drug him from his cover spot. Brix had him. Though Vyysarri are stronger than most Seryysans, Brix was a rare specimen. Seryyk tried to get free but couldn’t, due in part to the injuries he had received. With a powerful twist, Seryyk felt something pop and was dropped.
For a paralyzing second, he thought that he may be useless as he lay in a heap at Brix’s feet. His vision narrowed, he actually felt his heart stop. He grinned, knowing that he was given a clean death, the death of a warrior.
“Check him,” Dah said. Brix knelt down and checked for a pulse. He looked up at Dah and shook his head. This mysterious Vyysarri was dead and they would never know why he was after them. It was no matter, though. “Let’s get this over with. It’s a sure bet they know we’re here.”
They gathered their gear and headed out.
Suddenly the sound of his heart filled his ears, one pump at a time, slowly. With each pump his head cleared, his vision sharpened. Eventually, he was able to get to all fours. At that point, he realized where he was and why he was there, that he failed in his mission and that Stiprox was going to be very angry. He started to crawl, relieved that he w
as able to feel anything from his neck down. Within the hour, he was able to get to his feet and walk. Of course he could! He was a Vyysarri Warrior. He was Seryyk!
Chapter Twenty
Getting in was the easy part. With the guards dead, killed by that Vyysarri’s grenade, the card key in their possession, it was like stealing candy from a baby. However, what he was not expecting was the complete lack of resistance once they got inside.
“Hmph,” Dah growled.
“What’s wrong, cap’n?” Puar asked.
“I just expected, especially with the racket we made outside, to have more resistance,” Dah answered uneasily.
“Maybe, for once, things are going according to plan,” Brix offered.
“Maybe…” Dah said, but inwardly thought, maybe not.
They ventured deeper into the facility. Most of the rooms were vacant and showed no signs of use in a long time. The air within the facility was damp and stale. Though, Dah thought, it still smelled of death.
Dah was leading the way when he shot up his fist, signaling everyone to halt. They complied. Dah peaked around the corner and signaled that there were two guards standing at a door on the right side of the corridor. He pointed at Kay and ran his thumb across his neck. Kay instantly understood and nodded. Dah counted down on his fingers from five and at zero they both moved in quickly and quietly. Kay, being faster instantly went for the farthest one. At the same time, to the guards’ surprise, blades found their throats and they were unable to scream for help.
As the bodies fell, Dah and Kay caught them and dragged them into the room they were guarding. What they found made their jaws drop. It was Sibrex! He was alive!
“I thought…” Kay gasped. “I saw it on the news…”
“I know, but here he is,” Dah murmured.
Kay walked over to the gurney and read the chart. “He’s in a coma caused by his injuries. Some brain swelling, but he appears to be responding well to treatment.”
“Will he recover?” Dah asked.
The Seryys Chronicles: Of Nightmares Page 13
