Warriors of Risnar 4

by Tracy St. John

  The tunnel stretched before him, dark and echoing with his pounding footsteps. Nothing moved in the beam of his light. She had to be down there. She had to be alive.

  “Selena! Can you hear me?”

  His words bounced off the ceiling and walls, mocking him with their desperate cries.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Arga skidded to a halt. His illumination beam bounced off a stone wall of rubble and drone parts. He stared in open-mouthed shock at the devastation.

  Selena.

  The tunnel was completely blocked. His hearts racing and mouth dry, he approached the cave-in, sweeping his beam over the obstruction.

  Rocks of every shape and size, from pebbles to boulders, gray sedimentary and mirrored black vulcanized stones. The tiny, fragile limbs of drones. Their bulbous heads with black eyes turned milky white.

  His throat tight, Arga examined the wall minutely, terrified of what he might discover. At one point, when he thought he saw a human leg, he almost screamed. But it was only a horrific quirk of his light and the shadows, corrected when the illuminator jerked.

  Arga’s breath was harsh, echoing in the tunnel. He didn’t want to look. He was afraid he’d find her crushed or in pieces.

  He kept examining the wall anyway. After a few moments, he could breathe easier. There was no sign of any living—or formerly living—creature. He had hope. With hope came the strength to call out.

  “Selena! Selena, where are you?”

  No answer. Without a body, without proof she’d been buried in the rockslide, he could cling to courage that beyond the wall, she lived.

  Arga moved along the cave-in, calling her name, his ears cupped to catch any distant sound of her voice. He searched the rubble more carefully than before, examining it for some opening, testing its strength in a few places. Plucking free stones here and there higher up. Watching for a gap in the wall that would give him access beyond the devastation. He worked steadily, refusing to give up while the minutes flew by with no response from the woman he had begun to love.

  She’s here, somewhere. I’ll find her. No matter what, I’ll find her.

  “Selena! Yell or bang on the walls if you can hear me!”

  Instead of a reply, footfalls thudded behind him. Running feet. Not drones tapping his way. Arga hoped that boded well for the fight he’d left in the temple.

  Kren appeared, following the bobbing illumination beam he carried. Anneliese, Nex, and Jape were on his heels. Arga’s best friend jerked a nod at his questioning gaze. “The rest of the warriors are mopping up, extracting our people from those bore machines. There’s sporadic fighting outside the temple, but for all intents and purposes, the drones are done and Yitrow is safe again.”

  Anneliese had only eyes for the cave-in. “Sweet Creator, look at this. Must have been fifty drones that came after her. Is Boom Boom—?” She stopped herself. “Did you locate her, Arga?”

  “No. She must be somewhere behind this wall. Selena! Answer me!”

  * * * *

  The bright blur over which a hectic but heatless sun had presided had disappeared. Selena wasn’t sure when the dark had descended. Minutes had ceased to exist. Seconds slipped by without notice. Only a perpetual, vague now was present, an eternal moment held in suspension.

  Being shut in wasn’t as bad as she remembered. Instead of pressing upon her, instead of feeling it as an oppressive weight, it wrapped around her in a comforting cocoon. She drifted sleepily.

  The air is running out. I should try to stay awake. She didn’t want to. Fighting seemed ridiculous when she felt safe in the cool and quiet. It was nice. Soothing. As final exits went, it was better than what most could hope for.

  The sole concern keeping her from drifting contentedly into the darkness was wondering what had happened to Arga. Had he realized she wasn’t coming out? Or had he been captured?

  Poor Arga. He’d learned to put his hearts on the line for someone again, and she wasn’t going to be around after all. At least he hadn’t had long to become attached to her. Maybe he’d be okay.

  She could have loved Arga. Maybe she already did. That made her happy in her last moments, despite the regret no more would come of it. Him and his gator-wrestling tail. And amazing body. His sense of duty and honor.

  “Marry me,” Selena mumbled. “For better or worse, sicker or poorer, two tails or none.”

  She was woozy from the loss of oxygen. Her mind was everywhere, coming up with the craziest visions and sounds. Faraway voices. Rocks falling. Great, another cave-in. Selena was surprised there hadn’t been several, but after the initial blast, all had been quiet.

  Not so quiet any longer. The voices were growing louder. Closer.

  “The last words should be mine,” she reprimanded them. “Nobody asked the hallucinations to speak. Hold on, let me figure out something appropriate for the occasion.”

  “Geo scan says a pocket is here.”

  “I think we’ve found it”.

  “Selena! Selena, are you in there?”

  That last was Arga, followed by the racket of tumbling rocks. She tried to yell a warning, but could barely hear herself any longer. “Look out, Arga. It’s coming down. Run. Run.”

  Light burst over her. It grew more intense, and voices rang out, jumbling together, making little sense. The illumination hurt after being so long in the dark. Selena closed her eyes.

  “Tone it down, would you? I know, streets of gold and all that, but I can’t see paradise if you’re blinding me.” Death was making her grumpy. How did the angels stand the brightness?

  “That’s her! She’s in here!”

  “Oxygen! Someone, run to the medical dome and bring a portable unit immediately!”

  “Selena! Selena, can you hear me?”

  She fought to open her eyes, to discover a path through all the radiance to return to him. Unless he was dead too?

  Selena blinked and focused on the many faces staring from on high. Arga’s was closest, his silver eyes wide and streaming. He was crying? But why?

  “It’s okay, Arga. Look! Heaven is full of striped people.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Less than a week after the drones’ attack on Yitrow, Arga’s warriors and the forces of Hahz and Cas headed over the mountains to avenge their dead. Selena sat on Arga’s lap, enjoying herself despite the dangerous mission ahead. Swooping in her lover’s dartwing over the stunning mountain range, the peaks glistening with snow, was an exhilarating experience. The fact she was alive and with Arga for any reason, even that of exacting vengeance, was a victory in and of itself.

  The coming assault on the Monsudan hive wasn’t officially an act of revenge. Arga had broached it to the Assembly as a test strike against their despised enemy, to make sure the coordinated attacks on the other hives could be carried out successfully. However, Selena knew he and the other warriors were looking to avenge those who’d died in Yitrow. She didn’t blame them. The town had been hit hard, leaving lives shattered.

  Other large villages had begun reporting seismic activity in their areas. Geological surveys showed fissures opening up from the directions of nearby hives. While the Risnarish had been planning an assault on the hives, the Monsuda were pursuing their own strikes. The Assembly had advanced battle plans, with Yitrow’s attacker the first scheduled to fall. Once they finished this mission and used it to finalize the remaining raids, the Risnarish would go on an all-out blitz of the rest of the hives, initially targeting those closest to villages. With a large number of drones out of the hives themselves, the Monsudan strongholds were figured to fall easily. The Risnarish could then cut all power to the drones bent on invasion.

  The dartwings were a cloud over the hive’s entrance, and the front line broadcasted jamming frequencies against the barrier fields protecting it. Immediately afterward, the warriors shot a barrage against the drones spilling out to defend their masters within. Minutes later, too many of the enemy robots were heaped before the hive’s opening for more to come
out and return fire. The dartwings dropped from the sky, landing in a swath of metal shining coldly under the sun.

  Boom cannons cleared the hive’s access of the broken, burning drones and anything still functioning beyond them. With Selena in the middle of the first squad, the Risnarish war party plunged inside.

  Arga gave his orders. “First, ninth and tenth squad, hold this area. Second through eighth squads, sweep the top level. Clean it out.”

  The boom cannons made quick work of the top level of the mazelike hive. Selena had learned that there were three levels to a hive, each burrowing deeper into the earth. All three were similar in layout, with main throughways from which several other tunnels branched. The top level was where much of the drone storage and auxiliary functions of the hive were carried out. The second level was taken up by laboratories, the power center, and the massive portal chamber. The lowest level was the lair of the Monsuda themselves, the deepest room belonging to the queen.

  While the war party fended off the drones racing from the lower levels, the squads tasked with sweeping the top level went to work. Thompson, Nex, and Kren were part of that group. Units led by Arga, Jape and Bej blocked the entrance, keeping drones from closing in at the rear of those sweeping the first level. Selena was part of Arga’s group, though her main objective wasn’t to fight. Her priorities lay elsewhere.

  The boom cannons leveled everything in their path. The steady thuds of their fire grew distant, then ended altogether. Within ten minutes, Kren and Jape led the squads back to the main group.

  “We’re clear!” Jape’s deep voice damned near shook the tunnel walls, the same vulcanized rock the bore machines had created leading into Yitrow.

  “Let’s move on to the second level. Squads Nine and Ten, you have the entrance. Let nothing out.” Arga was already on the march, and the rest fell in.

  Selena had only reports of previous hive invasions to compare this to, but she judged the plan to be proceeding splendidly. Tidro and his guild had manufactured enough boom cannon power packs and ammo to take out two hives’ worth of enemies. The Risnarish advanced quickly through the second level. The shooters came into play to provide cover for those operating the big guns, which mowed down the drones by the dozens. It soon became obvious the drones were shrinking in number, because the big bugs came out to fight.

  Selena had never been bothered by insects or spiders. However, the Monsuda gave her a severe case of the crawlies. What appeared to be giant mantises, with bristle-haired pincers scuttling forward to shoot at the Risnarish, was straight out of a nightmare. Thompson had told her of being held helpless on a laboratory table, enduring unthinkable experimentation under the scrutiny of the monstrosities. Even as tough as Thompson was, Selena couldn’t imagine how she’d held onto her sanity. Being locked in the Box for six weeks sounded like an amusement park ride in comparison.

  Looming seven to eight feet in height, the Monsuda towered over their drones. But they were not automatons that rushed mindlessly into the fight. The insectile horrors picked their targets and evaded fire with alarming efficiency, sometimes even drawing the Risnarish into cramped areas where they could shoot their adversaries, with little danger to themselves.

  Selena found herself in such a spot, Arga’s group having been lured into a chamber by three Monsuda, only to be attacked by a dozen others that swept in behind them. Trapped, the Risnarish unit headed by Arga fought desperately for several minutes that stretched for an eternity. The steady whistle and thuds of scattershot came with machine gun rapidity. Selena’s vision filled with blinding fireworks as their containment fields bloomed with multiple hits.

  Had it not been for the belts that provided the protective barriers, they would have been dead within seconds. The boom cannons roared, drowning out the blatting of scatter-shot and setting off a high-pitched ringing in Selena’s ears. She winced but crouched down low behind Arga, adding a spray of pulse bullets from between his wide-set legs.

  They fought their way out of the trap and continued to destroy the Monsuda. They fought and fought and inched their way down to the third level, where the battle was even wilder.

  The tunnels in the deepest part of the hive were narrower than those above. Selena’s claustrophobia asserted itself as the air filled with more projectiles. The tunnels drew in on her as the Risnarish pressed their advance. Containment belts were showing red, and she and others with steady force fields hurried to replace those of the boom cannon operators. As she raced to keep the warriors safe, her own containment splashed hectic flares from the nonstop scatter-shot that hit it. She strapped a new belt on Arga’s waist as he sent thunderous death to the enemy. She got through it by concentrating on her breathing, rather than the battle itself.

  The incoming fire began to slow as insectile bodies fell before the Risnarish onslaught. Selena shuddered as her unit drove past the tangle of slender limbs and segmented bodies into tunnel after tunnel, chamber after chamber, her lungs constricting as they pushed farther in.

  They reached the rearmost space in the third level, where the final two dozen Monsuda delivered a headlong attack in a desperate rush. The cannons lived up to their names, booming a massive volley and taking the creatures down.

  Then there was one. Selena forgot her claustrophobia as she stared at the horror that was the Monsudan queen. Easily eight-and-a-half feet tall, her forelimbs bristling with wiry feelers, her segmented carapace puke-green and shining like cheap plastic, the creature’s appearance pushed the limits of a sound mind. Selena wanted to scream at the mere sight of the creature, though it cringed helpless in a corner before the warriors. A single glimpse of the monstrosity left her with no sympathy for its cowering as death marched up to it.

  Selena couldn’t stop from lurching backward when the cornered queen rushed the Risnarish attackers in a final show of bravado. The cannons disintegrated the horrific creature, sending vile green chunks and black liquid splashing the shining vulcanized wall behind it.

  Selena went boneless from relief. She’d seen some bad shit in her day, but the encounter with the Monsuda had ranked up there with the worst.

  As soon as the vile denizens of the lowest level were confirmed destroyed, Arga radioed those left on upper floors. “Second level sentries, report.”

  “We’ve still got a few pockets of drones resisting in the deeper reaches of the corridors. We’re going through each and every chamber to clean them out. The main concourse is safe for use.”

  “Excellent. Send in the scientists to the portal chamber as soon as you’ve finished. First level sentries, report.”

  “We are clear of all hostiles.”

  “Acknowledged. Third level is also cleaned out.” He clicked off. “Selena, you’re up.”

  With her own squad of ready defenders, Arga included, Selena ascended to the second level. They moved through a side corridor into a room. A tunnel had been bored from that point, the start of the drone invasion’s journey to Yitrow.

  Selena rigged explosives, setting them in protective cases before attaching them to the tunnel’s opening, and for half a mile beyond. She was not to blow the charges, at least not yet. It was a defensive measure only, to shut down that access to Yitrow should the Monsuda ever regain control of the hive.

  For the present, it would provide a conduit for the Risnarish to transport machinery into and out of the former Monsudan stronghold. It would also allow for Yitrow’s evacuation, should the couple of remaining hives within tunneling distance of the town attempt the same method of attack. The Risnarish were already putting the bore machines to use by digging a warren of escape routes for such an emergency.

  Selena finished her setup and gave it a last check to make sure she’d placed her explosives at the correct points. As she strolled unhurriedly on her way back to the vanquished hive, Arga and her protectors in tow, she smiled to herself.

  “What?” Arga asked, catching the amusement.

  “I’m in a tunnel, surrounded by rock walls, with tons of e
arth sitting over my head. It was freaky during the fighting, but now? Not one twinge of claustrophobia. Not after seeing that nasty Monsudan queen and knowing what real fear is.”

  “You’re okay?”

  “I’m great. I’d thank the creepy-crawly bitch for the giving me something else to be terrified of, but she’s dead.”

  They reached the mouth of the tunnel. The sounds of masculine laughter, the victorious war party joyously performing their duties, reached them. Selena gave the explosives in the opening a final inspection and nodded her approval.

  “It’s set. Just a push of the button, and it’s done.”

  Arga looked at her with an expression of pride. “From the way this operation went, we probably won’t need it until the portals are destroyed.”

  Kren walked in as he spoke. Arga’s best buddy said, “The hive sent the main part of their drone force into Yitrow, and we anticipated the lower numbers here. However, I noticed there seemed to be less resistance than we expected. I’ve asked for a specific count, but I’m certain the numbers were fewer than anticipated.”

  “You’re right. This might have been a fluke. We’d better include that in our report to the other villages. Something else bothering you?” Arga’s ears perked forward as he studied his frowning compatriot.

  “It wasn’t just the small number of drones. I’d swear there were far fewer Monsuda here than at the hive outside of Hahz. Strange, considering this is a larger installation.” Kren seemed contemplative about the issue.

  Arga considered and slowly nodded. “You know, it was the same for Cas hive. Far more Monsuda infested that than here—and the size of this place makes me think it should have had double what we did in Hahz.”