"Help," Petty whispered. "Help me. I don't know what I am. Help me, Ben-Ari. Please . . ."
The flames consumed her, and her bones burned.
From the tunnel behind, the burrows they had crawled through, rose the shrieks of many creatures.
"More scum approaching, masters!" said Osiris.
"Run into the opposite tunnel!" said Ben-Ari. "Kemi, lead the way! Run!"
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Kemi ran into the tunnel and the others followed, leaving Singh's ravaged body behind. Last in line, Marco glimpsed scum entering the hall of the queen—hundreds of them. He unhooked a grenade, rolled it backward, and felt the impact against his spine. He hurled another grenade back toward the hall, and the tunnel collapsed behind him. The soldiers ran onward.
"This way!" Kemi shouted. "There's another lift cage only a couple kilometers away!"
They ran, firing their guns, tearing down any creature that approached—scum and hybrids alike. They ran upward through the tunnels, ran through metal mines, ran along the tracks, ran from all the horrors of the cosmos, ran from death, from nightmare, from pain, from visions they knew they would never forget, from trauma they knew would forever haunt them. They were running from Hell, Lailani would say. They ran until they reached another shaft, and there! Marco saw it. Another lift cage!
They ran inside. They rose together, higher and higher, as scum squealed below and leaped up the shaft.
As Addy and Elvis spun the winch, Marco dropped grenades down the shaft. Explosions rocked the mines, rocked the cage, belched up fire. Shrapnel peppered the bottom of the cage lift. The scum below screamed, kept surging upward, a gushing torrent, and Marco dropped more grenades, and fire roared and stones and metal flew.
Marco tossed their last grenade with still a hundred feet of shaft above them.
The scum still shrieked below, scurrying up the shaft walls.
"Anyone have any bullets?" he shouted.
"We're down to two magazines, but we need them for the run to the ship!" Ben-Ari replied.
Addy grumbled, snapping on a bayonet. "Blade time."
Marco attached his own bayonet, as did Lailani and Elvis. Kemi had no bayonet but took a combat knife from Addy.
The scum leaped from below, grabbing the cage bars. The soldiers stabbed, trying to reach between the segments of hard exoskeleton, to cut the flesh within. One centipede tumbled down, stabbed below the head, nearly yanking the rifle from Marco's hand. Another bent the cage bars and made it inside, only for Lailani and Addy to crack it open with their bayonets.
Finally the soldiers reached the top. They raced out of the cage, emerging back into the ruined city. The abandoned towers rose around them, jagged and dark. The red surface of Indrani roiled above, hiding nearly all the sky. The scum were everywhere. They crawled on the walls and roofs, scuttled along the streets, emerged from sewers.
"Run!" Ben-Ari shouted.
The others needed no encouragement. They raced through the city, firing their last few bullets, knocking back scum. The ruins shook. Walls collapsed. A tower cracked and fell, belching out clouds of dust, crushing buildings beneath it. With the queen dead, the thousands of centipedes were emerging from underground, burying the city. Corpus was falling apart.
Falling bricks pelted the soldiers, banging against their helmets, cracking against their shoulders. Lailani cried out and fell, and bricks pelted her, and a scum grabbed her leg. Marco stabbed the creature, then lifted Lailani and slung her across his shoulders. He ran, following the others, whipping from side to side as the buildings crumbled around him. Cracks opened in the streets, exposing more creatures within. Marco leaped over them. He ran onward, clinging to Lailani, not even knowing if she still lived.
By the time they emerged onto the hills, they had fired their last bullet. The scum swarmed behind them, racing across the black soil.
Ahead they saw it—the HDFS Miyari.
The engine casing was reattached but still dark and cold. Without the azoth heart, which Marco carried in his backpack, the ship wasn't going anywhere.
The Miyari's back hatch slid open, and a ramp slammed down onto the ground. Major Mwarabu stood at the entrance, holding a grenade launcher. Two of his crew members emerged around him, holding their own RPGs. All three fired. Grenades soared, arched over the running soldiers, and slammed onto the pursuing scum. Explosions rocked the hills. Shards of exoskeleton flew. Marco screamed as hot, sharp pieces cut his back. He nearly fell but kept running, holding Lailani, and behind him rose the screeches of thousands of scum. Sergeant Stumpy ran beside him, a bleeding gash on his side.
"Come on, come on!" Mwarabu shouted, waving them toward him.
Ben-Ari reached the ship first, grabbed a handgun from Mwarabu, and knelt, firing bullets toward the scum. One bullet whistled by Marco's ear, and he screamed, and when he touched his ear, he felt blood. He kept running, reached the ramp, and entered the ship's hangar. He laid Lailani down on the floor. She was still alive, bleeding from several cuts. The other survivors of the mission—Kemi, Addy, Osiris, and Elvis—ran up the ramp too, and Sergeant Stumpy entered last, barking.
The ramp began to rise. A few scum managed to grab its rim and spilled into the hangar as the ramp closed. Mwarabu and his crew fired bullets, killing a few of the creatures. One scum leaped onto Mwarabu and shoved its claws into his chest. The major, commander of the Miyari, screamed and fell as the scum tore out his heart. Other scum leaped onto his crew members, cracking them open, and blood splashed the hangar. Marco and the others fired their guns, tearing into the scum in the hangar, and chunks of the creatures flew. The hull dented as scum leaped against it—only a handful at first, then hundreds, then thousands. The Miyari rocked.
"Fuck, the scum already got the wounded we left here!" Addy shouted, emerging back into the hangar from a corridor. "They were fighting all the while we were gone."
"We got no pilots!" Marco shouted, looking at the corpses of Mwarabu and his crew.
"I can fly the ship, master," said Osiris. "May I have the azoth heart?"
Marco nodded, pulled the heart out of his pack, but hesitated. For an instant, he wondered if Osiris was the saboteur who had shattered the original heart. He remembered Ben-Ari's words in the hall of the queen.
The high command knew about this place, Marco thought. They must have if it's been going on for years. They let it happen. This isn't just the work of scum. Does Osiris know more than she reveals?
But Marco had to trust the android now. What other chance did they have? He handed Osiris the heart.
"Osiris, fix the engine, then get us off this moon," Ben-Ari said. "As fast as you can. The hull won't shield us for much longer. Everyone else, follow me to the gun turrets. We'll hold off the scum while Osiris is working."
They all ran out of the hangar. Lailani was able to limp while leaning against Marco, and Stumpy ran behind them. While Osiris hurried down into the engine room with the heart, Ben-Ari and the other warriors ran upward. As they raced through the ship's dark halls, the Miyari kept rocking, and the scum kept screeching outside. The hull dented as the aliens slammed against it.
"Up this ladder, then branch out," Ben-Ari said. "There are six gun turrets atop the Miyari, bulging out like six eyes."
Six gun turrets. Six surviving soldiers. They climbed the ladder, emerging into the attic of the ship, where glassy tunnels branched into six paths like a candelabrum. Ben-Ari, Kemi, and Lailani raced to the left. Marco, Elvis, and Addy ran into the three right tunnels.
The Miyari began to rumble. The power was coming back on, lights flickering across the tunnels. The engines coughed and growled.
Marco reached a transparent silica dome that bulged out from the hull. A cannon thrust out, attached to a two-pronged handle inside the dome. He grabbed the prongs, pulled hard right, and aimed the cannon at scum that were racing up from below. Through the silica, he could see Addy and Elvis emerging into their own turrets. The scum were everywhere, thousands swarming f
rom the ruined city like rats from a drowning ship.
As the Miyari rattled, Marco fired the cannon.
Bolts of plasma blasted out, slamming into the ground. Scum flew, torn apart, their claws peppering the ship and denting the hull. The cannons boomed across the ship, ripping holes into Corpus, sending creatures flying. But more kept racing forward and climbing the hull. A few scuttled up toward the turret, and their claws slammed into the silica. A hairline crack appeared in front of Marco.
The engine's grumble grew to a growl.
The ship began to rise, belching out dust and smoke and steam.
Fire blazed.
The Miyari soared.
Flames roared and dusty air streamed across the turret. The scum tore free and tumbled into the fire. Across the hull, the aliens slid down, claws making last, desperate attempts to cling on, then tore off and fell toward the moon.
The ship rattled as they rose higher through the atmosphere. The hairline crack grew on the turret's cockpit. From up here, the ruins seemed so small, the towers mere needles, the swarm of scum a mere puddle. Finally they emerged from the atmosphere into space. Corpus, a rocky moon, and Indrani, a swirling red gas giant, filled nearly the entire view, but in the distance, Marco could just make out a sliver of stars in the black. He breathed out in relief.
I'm alive. Addy is alive. Lailani is alive. Kemi is alive. He found himself shaking. Some of us made it out. We survived.
He was about to leave the turret when Osiris's voice emerged from speakers, booming across the ship.
"We've got trouble, masters!" said the android. "Enemy ships flying in from every side."
Damn.
Marco saw them. Purple, fleshy spheres rising from the planet, built not of metal but of the hard, organic material the scum could spew, design, shape. If humans were masters of synthetics, the scolopendra titania were lords of bioengineering, building even their starships from flesh and hardened bone and shell, living vessels, veined and pulsing and wreathed in fire.
Marco pulled the trigger. His cannon roared out plasma. The scum ships ahead scattered. Marco yanked the cannon sideways, raised the muzzle, fired again. The cockpit shook and the handles thrummed in his hands as the plasma spurted, an expanding torrent. A scum ship tried to flee but the flames caught it. It expanded, cracked, and another bolt of plasma shattered it. Centipedes spilled out and floated across space. The Miyari banked and spun in the sky, revealing a view of a dozen more scum ships flying toward them. The cannons blasted, shooting streamers of plasma across the sky, hitting enemy vessels. Shards of scum exoskeletons and ships showered through space, pelting the Miyari. From across the ship, Marco could hear Addy whooping in triumph.
More scum ships emerged, screaming forth. The cannons blasted. One enemy pod zipped across space, dodging the cannon fire, and slammed into the Miyari. The starship shook so madly Marco nearly fell. Scum spilled out of the cracked pod, slamming their claws against the hull. Marco lowered his cannon as far as it would go and sprayed plasma, burning off the creatures. The Miyari jolted as another scum ship slammed into it. Smoke and fire filled the Miyari. Marco kept firing, blasting incoming pods, and again the ship rattled.
Three more scum ships remained. A blast from Addy's cannon took out one. Two more swarmed forth, zipping around the plasma. The Miyari rose higher, dipped, and flipped over. The surface of Corpus now spread above Marco's head, and the red storms of Indrani swirled below. The two scum ships streamed toward him.
He fired. A scum vessel burst, its fragments slamming into the other pod. Streams from three cannons blasted out, and the Miyari swerved, and the plasma formed a ring of fire through space. The last scum pod tried to reach them, passed through the plasma, and melted. It hit the hull of the Miyari with a thousand hot pieces.
The Miyari floated through space.
The last of the centipedes floated around them, then sank back toward Corpus.
Marco exhaled in relief.
He left the turret, climbed down the ladder, and met his comrades in a white corridor. They looked at him. His friends. Survivors. Bloody, bandaged, covered in filth, their uniforms tattered. Six survivors—seven if you counted Osiris down on the bridge. Marco stepped toward his comrades, and they embraced one another, laughing, crying, holding on for long moments. They were no longer a lieutenant and her soldiers. They were barely soldiers at all. They were humans. They were alive. They had survived where two hundred had fallen.
Ben-Ari inhaled deeply. "We're light-years away from any HDF command center," she said. "As the highest-ranking soldier on board, I'm authorizing the discontinuation of Corpus City's mining operations. In other words, we're nuking the whole damn place. Osiris, do you copy?"
"Yes, ma'am," replied the android through the speakers.
Marco and his friends limped along the corridor until they found a viewport. They stood together, staring out into space, watching as streams of light flared down from the Miyari toward the surface of Corpus. Clouds of light spread over the ruins of the city like lightning within clouds, like watercolor stains, almost beautiful from up here. One blast. A second. A third. Ten, one after another, pulsing, lighting the moon before fading. And the city was gone. And the scum were gone. And the pain, the monsters, the evil below—gone.
But not what remains inside us, Marco thought, turning away from the view. Not the nightmares. Not the memories. Those will always remain.
He held his friends close again. They stood together in the corridor as the Miyari floated above the devastation.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
They lay in the infirmary, six warriors, six survivors—the last of their company. The company medic had died on the surface of Corpus, along with nearly two hundred other soldiers, and so these six survivors tended to themselves, cleaning wounds, bandaging, even stitching the deeper cuts. Six among two hundred. The six who lived.
Lieutenant Ben-Ari, her blond hair stained with blood, her eyes haunted. Private Benny "Elvis" Ray, the song gone from his lips. Cadet Kemi Abasi, still wrapped in a blanket, her body bruised where the scums' tubes had pierced her. Addy "Maple" Linden, once brusque and loud, now silent, her head lowered, her eyes red. Lailani "Tiny" de la Rosa, the girl who had lived through one hell, only to survive another.
And me, Marco thought. Of all the two hundred, me—the son of a librarian, here among the survivors. Why do I deserve life when so many others fell?
Bandaged, he looked out the viewport of the infirmary. The HDFS Miyari was orbiting the gas giant Indrani, waiting for its hyperdrive engine to warm up. The red storms of Indrani swirled outside, tainted with orange and yellow—a planet twice the size of Jupiter, lacking a solid surface. A red god. So small from here, a mere black marble, the moon Corpus floated languidly across the red spacescape.
This place will always haunt me, Marco thought. We can never forget what happened here. What we saw here. Who we lost here.
Osiris's voice emerged from the ship's speakers, breaking the silence in the infirmary. "One hour to hyperspace jump. Estimated length of trip to Nightwall Outpost on the frontier: Eighteen days, three hours."
Elvis sat on an infirmary bed, staring out the viewport. "Well, I for one cannot wait to blast away from this hellhole and never see it again."
"Let's never come back," Addy said.
As Osiris counted down the minutes through the speakers, Kemi rose from her bed. Wrapped in a blanket, she walked toward the viewport, placed her hand against the silica, and stared out at the storming gas giant. The planet painted her red. Slowly, she turned around and faced them, her eyes gazing at a different world.
"We can't leave," Kemi whispered.
"What?" Elvis leaped off the bed. "We can't leave fast enough, you mean."
A tear shone on Kemi's cheek. "Our war here isn't done. He waits." Her voice dropped to a trembling whisper. "He watches."
Marco approached her. She barely seemed to see him.
"Who, Kemi?" he said. "Who watches us?"
She turned back toward the viewport. "He lurks within the storm. On the planet of Indrani. When I was trapped in the dreamworld, connected to the hive, I saw him. I floated through the minds of his children, and he watched over us. He watches us still." She reached out and grabbed Marco, clutching his arms, digging her fingernails into him. "We killed his children, Marco. We killed his bride. He plans his revenge now against the world. If we do not stop him, he will release his evil, release Hell itself into the cosmos."
"Who is he, Kemi?" Marco whispered, a shiver running through him.
A chaotic smile touched her lips. "A scum hive has more than a queen. It also has a king." She pointed at the gas giant outside. "And there he lies in wait, there in the storm he plans his revenge." Her voice cracked, and terror flooded her eyes. "He is evil itself. He is pure malice. We must kill him." Her voice grew stronger. "We cannot leave while he lives. We must kill him, or he will forever hunt us."
They were all silent for long moments, staring at one another. A collective shiver seemed to pass through the infirmary. Even Ben-Ari looked disturbed.
Finally Elvis cleared his throat. "All right! Fine. Fine, no problem. So, we fly a little closer to Indrani, we wait to see the scum king flying around, and we nuke the son of a bitch. Shouldn't take more than an hour, right? And then we can fly on. No more mines or anything, are there?"
Lieutenant Ben-Ari approached the cadet, her uniform in tatters, her limbs bandaged, her plasma gun slung across her back. "Kemi, we came here on a rescue mission. We came because of a distress call. But we were too late. We lost so many. Facing a scum king is not our mission." She stared out the viewport, at Corpus floating across the gas giant, and her voice was haunted. "I should never have brought you here."
"Einav," Kemi said softly, breaking protocol and addressing the lieutenant by her first name. "We have but one mission. To face the scum everywhere. To kill them everywhere." Her fists clenched, and her voice shook. "You, none of you, can ever know how evil they truly are. Their brains fester with it. They breathe it, nurse it as maggots—evil in its purest form, existing for no purpose but to hurt others." Blood dripped from her palms where she dug her fingernails into the skin. "The creature on this planet . . . he is not the emperor, not the supreme leader of the scum empire. But he was the king of the hive we destroyed, and his wrath knows no bounds. Left here, he would spawn a new bride from his own flesh, rebuild his army, and seek vengeance against Earth. But now he is weak. Now we can exterminate him."
Earth Lost (Earthrise Book 2) Page 20
