by Finn Gray
Rory and Marson had abandoned their rifles and now carried only their sidearms and a few grenades. Neither had cared for the idea but Oates had insisted that bringing the rifles along would make them stand out should they encounter the wrong person.
The first person they encountered was a man with an enhanced eye. Unlike some people whose ocular implants could not be detected without a scan, his eye was obviously mechanical—silver with a glassy lens that whirred as he examined the tablet he held.
“Salute,” Oates whispered.
The three snapped to attention but the man didn’t acknowledge them as he passed. His attention remained focused on his tablet. That made it easy for Oates to slip around behind him. The old veteran moved with surprising quickness, clamped his hand over the man’s mouth, and drove his knife at a forty-five degree angle into the flesh just below the base of the skull. While Marson and Rory stared in shock at the ferocity and quickness of his attack, Oates dragged the man away, returning a minute later.
“We needed this.” Oates held up a small silver button, a touch of blood smearing its surface.
“What’s that for?” Rory asked.
“It will open doors for us. Literally. All the Memnons wear them. It’s not bio-mechanical and isn’t coded to the individual. It’s just an added security measure, very basic, in case any of the lab subjects try to escape.”
“Did you have one?” Rory asked. “You know, when you got away?”
Oates nodded. “Becca gave me hers. Said she would tell them I took it when I overpowered her and tied her up.” He let out a long, slow breath. “Gods, I hope they believed her. Leaving her behind was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. If I had it to do over again, I’d never have let her stay.” He stood there silent for a moment, then gave his head a shake as if to erase the memories. “Let’s move. Stay close to me so we can all slip through the doorways together. I don’t know if we’ll have the chance to steal another of these.”
He led them to an unmarked door which unlocked with an audible click as soon as Oates touched the handle. It swung back to reveal a well-lit stairwell.
“For emergencies, but no one uses them, so tread softly.”
Rory’s heart thrummed, his ears roared, as they slowly climbed the stairs. He wasn’t afraid, not exactly, but incredibly tense, like a coiled spring. He had been nervous during their final training exercise, but by the time they had realized things had become real, they were already deep in shit and there had been no time for nerves. But now, creeping slowly, steadily into the heart of a Memnon base, he had all the time in the world to think about what lay above them.
Doctors, he told himself. Doctors and human victims being treated as lab rats. We’ll be fine.
But when they reached the landing two floors up, his gut was churning. Don’t throw up, he told himself. You’re doing this for Jemma and for your friends. The thought didn’t exactly calm him down, but it focused his thoughts, which amounted to the same thing. Calmer now, he resisted the urge to draw his weapon as he stepped through the door and out into the corridor.
They passed two people who were deep in conversation. Neither spared a glance at the three men. They were discussing the uprising.
“We’ll need to replace the food production from Koruza. It’s been virtually obliterated,” one of them said.
Rory’s knees buckled and he steadied himself against the wall. Koruza was home. He’d been holding onto a faint hope that his family lived, but now he knew his hope was in vain. He felt a hand grip his shoulder. He turned to see Oates gazing at him with real sympathy in his eyes.
“That’s some shit news, I know. But you can’t get revenge if the Memnons catch us standing here like we’re lost. We’ve got to move.”
Rory nodded, blinked the mist from his eyes, and began walking again. It took all he had not to break into a run. But not from fear. He was in a hurry to kill every gods damned Memnon in the world, starting with these assholes who had turned his fellow Aquarians into subjects for their sick experiments. Following Oates’ whispered directions, he stalked the hallways, burning with rage, until they arrived at a pair of double doors.
“There’s an anteroom between these doors and the lab, with a guard posted there.” Oates said. “Rory, you help me subdue him. Do not lose your shit.” He poked Rory in the chest as he said the last. “Marson, have your weapon at the ready in case we get into trouble. Here we go.” He drew his knife and shoved the doors open.
Rory moved in alongside him, his own blade at the ready. The guard was leaning against the wall, watching a live vidstream. She looked up just in time to register the fact she was in trouble.
Oates opened her throat with a vicious slash, while Rory ripped the rifle from her hands, reversed it, and drove the butt into her temple. She slumped to the floor, her hands clutching her throat in a futile attempt to hold her life’s blood in. Still, fury raged inside him. He raised the rifle for another blow but Oates brought him up short with a sharp command.
“Stand down, marine!” The words, though spoken softly, struck him like the crack of a whip.
“Keep it together. We’re a long way from being out of here.”
Rory nodded. Breathing hard, he lowered the rifle. “I’m all right.”
“Bullshit. You’re a hair’s breadth from a nuclear meltdown. There will be time enough for that to happen when you’re out of here. Now, let’s see if we can find a doc. There shouldn’t be any armed personnel in here, but we can’t know for certain.”
Rory and Marson raised their weapons and nodded. Oates opened the door.
It swung back to reveal a long, narrow room, brightly lit. An antiseptic smell hung in the air. A row of beds lined the walls to their left and right. In each a person lay strapped down. Sensors connected to their heads and tubes ran from their arms up to robotic looking machines that stood beside each bed. Down the center ran a long metal table topped by a variety of instruments—computers, monitors, glass vials connected by a confusion of pipes.
A middle-aged woman in a lab coat and a navy jumpsuit stood at the foot of the closest bed. She turned at the sound of the doors opening. Her eyes fell on them and the tablet she held fell to the floor.
Oates froze, took a step back. “Oh my gods!”
Chapter 29
Southgull Island, Hyperion
All was quiet on Southgull Island. Only the rustle of the wind in the leaves and the distant thrum of explosions broke the silence. No one was about. Jude wondered, not for the first time since they’d escaped their flat, if perhaps only a skeleton staff were responsible for this site. After all, it was of no strategic importance as far as he knew, and the Memnons were busy with their uprising. That was fine by him.
They’d encountered only one person since leaving their quarters—a young woman in a lab coat who had immediately noticed their athletic attire and pointed them in the direction of the fitness center. Storen’s cybernetic eye had literally been the key they needed in order to move freely through the complex. The place was built for luxury, not security. There were no walls or fences, not even any security guards as far as he could tell.
“I feel like I’m a pet being kept inside a fancy kennel,” Magda said as they followed a cobblestone path that wended its way through a dense grove of palms. “It’s like one of those fancy resorts where pets stay when their masters are on holiday. Everything is nice, but it’s not home and you can’t leave.”
“Is that what we are now? Pets? I suppose that’s an apt analogy. It’s a place where potentially useful people can be stashed away until they’re needed.”
Up ahead, a faux-bamboo fence barred their way. A wooden sign read OUTDOOR POOL. The gate was locked.
“Do you think the eye will work?” Magda asked.
“Probably, but I think we’d do better to circle around. I’m sure there are security cameras in the pool area. Not that anyone seems to be watching at the moment.”
They slipped into the cover of the trees and
worked their way around to the far side of the swimming area and up to the low-lying fence that encircled the tiny skyport.
“This is where they brought us in,” Magda said.
“Yes, and unless I miss my guess, that is the hangar over there.” He pointed to a blocky building set against the inside of the volcano wall. It was constructed of natural rock from the island. The dark stone gave it the aura of an evil sorcerer’s castle. But Jude had stopped believing in fairy tales when he was a very small child.
“Where’s the gate?” she asked.
“You’re wearing your track suit. Jump the fence.”
“You think I can’t?” Magda winked, then vaulted the low fence with the grace of a gymnast. Jude didn’t bother trying to match her feat. Instead, he settled for slipping over it without falling.
They crossed the sturdy landing pad. Like the rest of the island, the skyport was eerily quiet, empty. Still, out in the open, Jude felt as though a bullseye was painted on his back. The soft footfalls of his trainers sounded like drumbeats to his ears. He quickened his pace, figuring their presence here made it obvious that they were not out for a casual stroll.
The hangar was unlocked. Straining, he slid one of the big doors to the side. The interior was dark, but the light from outside was sufficient to reveal that the interior, large enough to house a pair of transports, was empty.
The place was clean and kept in good order. Jude wandered over to a tall, rolling toolbox and opened a door at random. He withdrew what looked like a toy pistol with two needle-like protrusions at the end of the barrel.
“Is that a gun?” Magda asked.
“Plasma welder. It’s for very fine spot welds in circuitry. The science is difficult to explain.”
“And I’m not interested. It’s enough for me to know that it works.” She rested her hands on her hips and let out an impatient huff of breath. “What’s our play? Perhaps we could hide here until a shuttle returns and then steal it.”
“When they find Storen’s body, they’ll realize we’re making a run for it and that the skyport is the place we’re most likely to head.”
“There has to be another way out of here. Senators built this place, which means nobles who grossly overestimate their own value. They’d have a backup plan for getting off the island in case something happened to the skyport.”
“Perhaps there was a marina down at the water’s edge. If so, it’s unlikely to have survived the tsunamis.”
“It won’t hurt to try and find our way down and investigate.”
“Agreed,” Jude said. He was disappointed, but still confident that they’d find a way out of here. And once that was accomplished, he had several ideas as to how they could get off the planet.
His eyes lit on a door in the corner. The sign above it read AUXILIARY PAD. “Now, that sounds like just the ticket!”
Before they could investigate, something appeared at the corner of his vision. He turned to see a drone zoom in through the open hangar door. It was the basic security model: four props, a camera on each of its four sides, and a sensor at the front of the chassis. It swept across the hangar and came to hover a meter in front of them.
“Oh my gods!” Magda whispered.
“It’s not going to hurt us,” Jude said. “See the blinking yellow light below the sensor? It’s giving us a caution.” He paused, licked his lips. “And reporting our location.”
“If hiding wasn’t off the table before, it is now.”
A man’s voice, firm but polite, spoke from the drone. “You have entered a restricted zone. Please present your chips for scanning.”
“We don’t have chips. I guess they were planning to implant those later,” Magda whispered.
“Here goes nothing.” Jude fished Storen’s cybernetic eye out of his pocket and held it up. The drone scanned it and the light flashed green. He relaxed, but only for a moment. The drone pivoted a few degrees so that it faced Magda, and repeated its warning.
“What do I do?”
“Here.” He handed her the eye and she held it up as he had done. The drone scanned it, but the yellow light flashed again.
The drone issued its warning again. This time the words were accompanied by a small swivel weapon dropping down from the bottom of the drone and taking aim at Magda.
“What is that?”
“Stun weapon,” Jude said. “I thought it would only tattle on us, but our little friend here is equipped to detain.”
“I’d expect a bit more urgency from you considering this thing is pointing a weapon at your wife.”
“Try the eye again.” Thinking fast, Jude turned back to the toolbox. Perhaps someone had left a visitor’s badge behind. Something they could use to turn the drone away. Behind him, the mechanical sentinel issued its “final warning.” Jude’s gaze landed on the plasma welder. He snatched it, thumbed it on, whirled, jammed the tines of the welder against the drone’s weapon, and pulled the trigger.
The flash blinded him, but when his sight returned, the drone was lying on the ground. It spoke words at random, and the light at its front flashed green, yellow, then red over and over in an unending loop. But the rotors no longer whirred and it had retracted its weapon.
Jude took Magda’s hand. “Come on. Let’s try this way.” Heading out at a fast trot, they ran to the door marked AUXILARY PAD and opened it to find a brightly lit stairwell leading down into the depths.
“I don’t know what’s down there,” he said, “but I doubt it’s any worse than what waits for us up here.” Hand in hand, they began their descent.
“That was a nice bit of flying, Captain.” Vera mopped the sweat from her brow and took a moment to catch her breath. Damned fool. He’d almost killed them with his reluctance, but in the end, his skill as a pilot had saved their asses. The missile had damaged their craft, how much they didn’t yet know.
The Mongoose hesitated and shuddered as Hunter brought it in low, hovered over the coast of a solitary island. Nestled in the mouth of a dormant volcano, this place had been spared the wrath of the tsunamis that had flooded most of the islands in the region.
“Do we really want to land in the middle of that without knowing who’s in charge?” she asked.
“No, which is why we’re not going to land there.”
“I don’t see anywhere else. If there was a beach before today, it’s under water now. She looked down and watched the churning waves collide with the black walls of stone. It was a dizzying sight.
“See that shelf down there?” Hunter pointed to a rocky ledge jutting out from the side of the sheer face.”
“You can’t land there, Hunter.” The space was so small she wasn’t sure the Mongoose would fit were a giant to pick it up and place it there. And Hunter wanted to land on it with one engine malfunctioning.
“How much you want to bet I can land on it?” Hunter said, already easing the ship close to the cliff face.
“Nothing, because if I lose the bet, I won’t live to collect my winnings.”
“All right, Ensign. Where do you suggest I land? And make it quick. The engine could ignite at any moment.”
Vera closed her eyes. “Fine. Just make it quick and don’t make me regret this.”
Hunter barked a sharp laugh. “Trust me.”
Vera felt every jolt, every dip and sway. Each time a stuff gust of wind banged the Mongoose into the side of the volcano, she clenched her fists a little tighter. Slowly, slowly, another thump.
What in the hells was taking so long?
She heard a thunk and a hiss, then humid sea air filled the cabin. She inhaled deeply, then opened her eyes. Hunter had done it!
“Good thing we didn’t bet,” Vera said. “What can I do?”
“Grab the toolbox from the back. I see what needs to be done. Shouldn’t take but a few minutes.”
Vera retrieved the box and climbed out into the gray day. She was surprised to see a tunnel or passageway of some sort leading back into the side of the mountain. She’d b
elieved they were landing on an isolated ledge. Hopefully, no Memnon would pop out.
Hunter was lying on his back inspecting the damage. He clambered out when she set the toolbox on the ground.
“Thank the gods it’s a quick fix,” he said as he opened box and selected the tools he needed.
“And that we didn’t burn up before we landed.”
Hunter looked up, blinked, and then laughed. “I lied about that.”
Vera drew back her foot to give him a swift kick in the ass but he rolled back underneath the Mongoose. “Screw you, Hunter. I’m going to stand sentry at the mouth of this cave, just to be safe.”
“Stand sentry? Is that what they called it in your day?”
Vera shook her head. The captain had never revealed this side of his personality in her presence before. Hells, she hadn’t exactly maintained decorum either. Did protocol matter all that much when it was the end of the world?
She moved to the edge of the passageway, stopped, and listened. Between the roll of the surf, the distant bombardment of Crab Island, and the clanks and curses spewing forth from Hunter’s repair project, she couldn’t hear a thing.
She moved a few paces deeper inside. Then a few more.
Nothing.
And then she heard footsteps. Someone was coming, and they were trying to creep. She drew her sidearm, armed it, and dropped to one knee, and raised her weapon. Was this it? Had she avoided the nuclear holocaust only to die now?
“Come on you son of a bitch,” she whispered. “Show yourself.”
Chapter 30
Stone Mountain Base, Soria
