“This doesn’t make any sense. A destroyed warship, dead alpha drones … what’s happening here?” Kobe questioned.
“None of this is right,” Mig said. “It was one thing to head into the dark, beating heart of the Praxis kingdom under carefully planned conditions, but this … I don’t know what this is. None of us do. As important as this mission is, I don’t think it warrants us going on a suicide run.”
Everyone was silent, letting Mig’s words float around the cockpit like a storm cloud. Kira eased the throttle, bringing the ship to coasting speed, but still angled toward Praxis’s surface and whatever was down there. She tried to think of what to do, tried to weigh her options, but there was no complexity to consider. The choice was either to stay on mission and fly into the unknown or abort. That was it, and Kira wasn’t fond of either selection.
“So … anyone want to chime in?” Mig asked. “Do we pull back?”
All eyes shifted to Kira. She was the commander, and this was her call to make. 4-Qel, she knew, was up for anything. She looked to Mig, who had fear and uncertainty in his eyes, but not defiance. And Kobe’s eyes simmered with the fire of determination. He nodded at her, dead set in the choice he’d made. And Kira agreed. They were here, knocking on Praxis’s door. It would take more than some unusual occurrences to send them running.
“We’re going in,” Kira said, and she grabbed the throttle and accelerated the ship through the planet’s atmosphere. Kira could feel everyone gripping the arms of their seats tightly. There was no turning back now; the ship was too slow to even attempt an escape, and its shields didn’t provide the protection they’d need to punch their way through any resistance they might encounter. They’d either land or die trying.
The ship cleared the layer of clouds, dropping directly over the densely clustered skyscrapers that shimmered gold, silver, and red as the planet’s star set over the horizon. Light cascaded over the buildings, giving an almost viscous sheen to their exteriors. The skyline shone brilliantly, and for a moment, Kira had to break her gaze away, as if the reflecting light was too much for her eyes. It had been a long, long time since she’d seen her home planet, and the memory of leaving was burned in her mind forever. She was just a child, alone on a starcruiser, bleeding out from the wound her own father had inflicted. The planet was radiant then, too, the buildings of its urban center glowing brightly against the nighttime sky as if in defiance of darkness. So much of the planet was eerily the same, with its tightly packed buildings scraping against one another as they stretched to the sky. Kira strangled the throttle as she pushed the ship forward in its landing approach, arcing it so she got a clear, direct view of the Praxian skyline. There, centermost of it all, was the towering Megaron, a massive edifice that gleamed gray and white and reflected light like fire in the sky. Standing head and shoulders higher than the landscape and topped with what looked like an aggressive claw reaching down, the Megaron was built as a testament to the endurance and strength of the Praxian people after they had repelled attacks from barbaric invaders who had come to seize the planet generations earlier. Kira knew how that meaning had been perverted over the years, coming to represent blind, obedient jingoism, leaving the ideal of fighting for a noble, necessary cause when called upon buried in history’s graveyard. Kira took it all in with a shudder, and the shudder carried all the way across time and space and hit her again, so many years later, as she drew closer and closer to the planet she’d vowed never to return to unless it was to burn it all down. Although she’d meant it quite literally then, her mission now was close enough. Everything Praxis had come to represent—repression, terror, hatred—would burn, and she’d make sure the entire galaxy witnessed the flames.
Unless someone else beat her to it.
Because suddenly, from the lower half of the Megaron, an explosion ripped through the exterior, sending roaring flames bursting from its side. The blast was followed by another in a nearby building, then another. Three buildings were burning, tarnishing what was once—and had been as long as Kira could remember—an unblemished skyline. The plumes of smoke rose skyward, dissipating in the atmosphere. What didn’t get lost in the air, though, was the message the blast sent:
Praxis was under attack.
“What the—what is happening?!” Mig exclaimed as he sprang from his seat.
“Sit down and strap in,” Kira commanded as she pushed the throttle down, narrowing the ship’s trajectory to the surface. Landing became less important than getting a closer look that, Kira hoped, would provide an answer to Mig’s question. Because right now, she had no clue what was happening. Ships were destroyed; stations were abandoned; buildings were burning. It was a battle, that much had become clear. But waged by whom? That was the question that occupied Kira’s mind as she accelerated the ship toward the Megaron.
“That appears to be blaster fire on the ground,” 4-Qel said, making the most of his advanced optics. “A lot of blaster fire.”
“It might be time to reconsider our strategy,” Kobe said, getting up from his seat. “Civil war, coup—whatever this is, we’re not prepared to be in the middle of it.”
Kira gritted her teeth and contemplated pulling rank. She knew Mig shared Kobe’s urging for caution, and looking at 4-Qel, she sensed he did as well. While the throttle was hers to control and rank gave her authority to follow whatever course of action she damn well pleased, Kira knew Kobe was right. It stung her right in her heart to be this close and be forced to fall back, but anything less than at least rerouting their course was flirting too closely with death or at least capture. She was close enough to see the surface now, and there, she spotted the blaster fire bolts that were being exchanged over the entire area, blanketing it in warfare. Kira was made jealous by it, but not enough for her to compromise her first rule as a commanding officer: Never unnecessarily risk the lives of your squad. And she wouldn’t. Kira pulled the stick back and turned the ship starboard, getting them away from the action below.
But it was too late.
An alarm rang out, a long, incessant wailing that was different from the normal alert. Kira knew this type of alarm because she had it on her own ship. It was reserved for special occasions.
It was reserved for when you were truly screwed.
“Qel!” Kira yelled. “Give me a status report!”
“Ground-to-air missile,” 4-Qel responded. “Bearing on us at an increasing rate.”
“An increasing—damn these sensors! How much time until impact?”
Kira looked up at 4-Qel, and while she knew it was impossible for him, as a drone, to have an expression, she swore she detected fear in his bulbous eyes. It was the last thing she saw before their ship was hammered.
“None,” 4-Qel said.
For a moment, there was darkness. When Kira opened her eyes, she couldn’t hear a thing, though she knew everything around her was screaming. All she could feel was the violent motion of their lousy Praxian ship spinning and bucking as it roared toward the ground. Kira blinked hard, then wiped her eyes. The backs of her hands came back bloody, and suddenly Kira became aware of the pain in her head—a gash on her forehead that was oozing blood. She felt light-headed from the wound, disoriented from the turbulence, but her wits were still with her. They were crashing, hard and fast. The missile that had struck the ship shredded its port wing, that much she knew. Escape was impossible, and stabilizing the ship enough to execute something that resembled a landing was equally out of the question. Her only chance was to do whatever she could to minimize casualties.
“Four-Qel!” Kira yelled. “Four-Qel, are you with me?”
Though Kira felt like she was catching 4-Qel with her head dunked underwater, she still could hear the drone’s tinny voice as he called out his confirmation.
“All right, listen,” Kira said, taking hold of the stick even though it was trying its hardest to dance out of her grip. More blood flowed into her eyes, but she didn’t have time to wipe it away. “Shoot all the power to the ship�
��s front engine. Any power we have, you plug it into that engine. I don’t care if it comes from the toaster—send it.
“Mig, Kobe,” Kira said as she shot her head around the cockpit, ensuring they were still alive and with her. “Hang on for dear life. We’re going down, and it isn’t going to be pretty.”
Kira turned back, and she could feel the stick beginning to fight her less. That was the good news. The bad news? They were seconds—precious seconds—from their inevitable union with the surface. And while there was no chance of it being a happy one, at least they had the saving grace of being pointed away from the skyline and toward the adjoining docks. If there was one thing that could complicate the situation, it would be gigantic buildings standing in their way.
With all power diverted to the front engine, Kira was able to do the one and only thing she could: prevent them from crashing nose-first. That’s how people got decapitated.
With the buildings shimmering and racing past Kira’s port side and the docks coming on fast, Kira pulled back the throttle with all her might. They were spinning less and the bucking had been subdued, but the only thing that mattered was getting the ship angled so its rear took the brunt of the crash. Kira couldn’t have cared less about what direction they were facing when that happened.
“I might not have always shown it,” Kobe yelled over the ship’s howling metal, “but I enjoyed being part of the same fight with you guys. You’re all crazy. I mean, you’re seriously out of your minds!”
“Save the eulogies,” Kira said through her clenched jaw. “Something stupid will probably kill us all, but this won’t be it.”
Kira screamed, bringing the nose up as much as she could before the inevitable occurred: impact. The ship pounded into the concrete surface, but it did so leading with its tail. Metal screeched and shredded as the ship’s exterior was ripped apart, and the angle of the crash propelled it into a mighty bounce. They landed flat on the ground, hard, but the worst of the crash had been absorbed by that first hit. Now, it was just a matter of physics taking over to slow the ship down and eventually bring it to a stop. And though they’d undoubtedly be battered and bruised, they’d survive. That’s all Kira cared about.
As the ship dug in and scraped against the pavement, Kira allowed herself a moment to take her hands off the controls and wipe the blood from her eyes. She’d gone through the crash in near blindness—not that it mattered—and when she regained her vision, she wished she hadn’t. Because the first thing she saw was where the ship was taking them, and it was nowhere good; their direction of spin had sent them on a course toward the buildings. In fact, they were skittering between them at the moment and heading right toward the mouth of a glass-and-steel building directly ahead. All Kira could think about were civilians, and she hoped, desperately, that whatever fighting was taking place all around had cleared out the premises.
“I’m detecting no life-forms ahead,” 4-Qel said as if reading Kira’s mind. She looked at him and smiled, and before she could turn back around, glass exploded all around the ship. The steel frame was pulverized, and for a moment, Kira was hit with the horrible fear that the building was crashing down on the ship and was burying it. Assuming the ship held and they survived, they’d be trapped in their own grave beneath however many metric tons of building materials.
But that didn’t happen. Instead, at last, the ship lurched to a stop right before they smashed through the building’s other side. Kira held tightly to her harness, afraid to exhale for fear that the entire ship would fall apart all around them. Mig and Kobe must have felt the same, because neither of them said a word. It was 4-Qel who broke the silence.
“Well,” he said, unstrapping himself, “that wasn’t so bad.”
Before Kira could question which part of their near-death experience wasn’t so bad, before she could even peel herself out of her seat, an explosion rang throughout the cockpit. Kira’s heart leapt up into her throat, and she wasted no time throwing off her harness and pushing herself from her seat. In all the ship’s tumult, a sidewinder had somehow found its way to the floor just a few feet in front of her, but by the time she noticed it, it was too late.
The door to the cockpit blew off its hinges, the solid hunk of metal spinning right past Kira’s head. She whipped around to see it race by her, and when she turned back around, a trio of soldiers armed with A-10 automatic blasters were storming the cockpit. Kira eyed the sidewinder in front of her, considering her odds of diving for it and getting a shot or two off before her guests could return fire. Her odds weren’t good. But still, it was the only play she had.
“Don’t even think about it,” the commander said as Kira angled her body maybe an inch forward. “Don’t.”
Kira pulled back and could only watch as the lead soldier stayed positioned in the center, his gun trained on her head, and the other two soldiers covered the flanks.
“Wait,” Kira said. “Just wait.”
But there was no waiting to be had.
“Good-bye, warlords of Praxis,” the commander said, and then a shot echoed throughout the cockpit.
CHAPTER SIX
“Battlefields drenched in blood. Wars for conquest and for sport waged across the galaxy. An entire world of barbarians born and raised for the sole purpose of battle. You want to know what the real legacy of Wu-Xia is? That’s it.”
Cade kept his gaze fixed on the Rubicon’s viewport. The opening displayed nothing but a distorted view of the stars streaking past as they made yet another mass jump, but Cade preferred looking at that rather than having to look at Percival. It’d been a tense trip to wherever they were going. Cade didn’t know. Nor did he know why they were going there—not exactly—or what they were supposed to do once they arrived. This was the type of game Percival liked to play, hoarding and controlling knowledge like it was currency. To him, it was, Cade realized. It gave him leverage and power, two things Cade was certain Percival found essential in his war against Praxis. Though Cade was loath to admit it, information could be a powerful tool of control and survival. And like Percival had told him time and time again, if they were going to defeat Praxis, they would have to use every tool in their arsenal. Cade just had a strong distaste for those tools being used against him. He’d pressed Percival for insight into their journey, but the responses he’d received from the burned-out ex-Paragon were cryptic at best and usually colored with ominous foreboding.
“We’re going to a place we’re not supposed to be,” Percival had said when Cade questioned him about their destination during one of their meditation sessions. “It isn’t going to be easy, and I have a feeling we’re both going to learn things we might not want to know.”
The time to pull back the veil, apparently, began now. Percival had called Cade to the cockpit, and Cade was still amazed that Kira had put her prized ship out on loan. Percival vowed not to get a scratch on it, and he’d better not. Whatever damage the Rubicon suffered, Cade knew his punishment would be tenfold. Cade wondered if Percival was having trouble navigating the ship. After all, he’d grown accustomed to flying his Boxer, a forgotten relic of the Quarrian War. Twice their arrival coordinates didn’t match their plotted coordinates, and Cade felt compelled to remind Percival that accuracy in space travel was pretty important. There was a lot of junk floating around out there, so it was best to stick to the points that were known to be clear. Otherwise, you might find yourself jumped into, say, the heart of a star. Or rammed into an asteroid. Or dropped into dark space, where no one really knew what happened. Percival waved off Cade’s concerns, and all Cade could do was give him the finger when he wasn’t looking. Cold comfort, but at least it was something.
With Cade situated at Percival’s side in the cockpit, he finally began to open up. The jump they were in the middle of, Percival explained, would finally get them to their destination. But before they arrived, Cade needed to better understand what he was getting into. Specifically, he needed to know the truth about Wu-Xia; he needed to know that the ma
n who’d forged the Rokura wasn’t the peaceful warrior that everyone in the galaxy knew him to be. Wu-Xia, if Percival was to be believed, was a dangerous, violent warlord.
And all Cade could say to that was, “Botho. Dung.”
“Oh, really, Cade? So you believe the fairy tale that Wu-Xia was this sweet little monk who looked around a war-torn galaxy and said, ‘You know what? Praying is nice, but how I can really fix the galaxy is by forging an all-powerful, terrifying weapon that’ll utterly decimate anything that stands in the way of my quest for peace.’”
Now, it was Cade’s turn to scoff. “I’m not sure either one of us is in a position to question the degree of ridiculousness associated with the Rokura.”
“I’ll give you that,” Percival said, “but the weapon had to come from somewhere, and the story we’ve been told doesn’t make the slightest bit of sense.”
“You’re right, it doesn’t,” Cade said, folding his arms tightly against his chest. “Unfortunately, I have my hands full trying to figure out where you’re taking me, so I really can’t add another riddle to my plate.”
Percival continued, undeterred. “And isn’t it odd that Wu-Xia, according to legend, forged the Rokura on Quarry, when just one glance at any depiction of him tells you he’s clearly not a Quarr—”
“Cut the mysteries, Percival. Okay? Just—enough. You know something about Wu-Xia that no one else does. Great. Either tell me what it is and why it’s important without a dozen questions leading me to what you want me to know, or turn this piece of junk around and bring me back to my friends.”
“Listen, you think—” Percival started in a scalding tone before catching himself. He slumped and ran his hand through his thinning gray hair before taking a deep breath and starting over. “Being … candid isn’t an easy thing for me. I’ve learned some hard lessons over the years. Very hard, and I guess I’m just used to having to play things close to the chest.”
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