Brigends (The Final War Series Book 1) (25 page)

His words registered. She had to trust him.

The unmistakable grumbling of inbound Alliance gunships reverberated over their heads. Out in the open and outgunned, they needed a miracle. They got one. A truck screeched around a corner and came to a grinding halt meters away from where they were standing.

Tank leaned out from the covered truck-bed. “What are you waiting for? Let’s go!”

Her and Pavel climbed into the cab next to Minsk while the Bandit’s crew got in the back. The Chief gunned the vehicle through the front gate seconds before the gunships appeared over the new day skyline.

He drove the cluttered streets, scattering trash everywhere. “Where do we go?”

“Back to the dock.” Emil said. To Zoe, “How do we get to the South Side Dock?”

“Take the bridge. Turn here.”

Minsk drove the truck around a hairpin turn, causing the tires to squeal. The momentum shoved her into Emil.

“Can you not do that again?” she yelled.

“Shut up. I do best I can.” he yelled back.

Emil looked out the window at the Spire towering over the Lo-5 landscape. “We’re not going to make it.”

“We’ll make it.” she promised. “Turn left up ahead.”

Minsk cut the corner like he had with the previous turn. The gunships were still out of weapons’ range, but closing the gap. The truck raced over the crumbling Brooklyn Bridge, missing holes that could have plunged it to the choppy waters below.

When their target disappeared inside the borough, the tailing gunships veered off to avoid colliding with buildings in their flight paths.

Minsk hit the accelerator and the truck rammed through the gate at full speed. Dock workers ran. The truck came to a hard stop near the Bandit’s pad and the crew jumped off.

Emil hopped from the cab. “Get her running, Chief.”

Minsk bounced up the gangplank with the crew. Tank stayed with Zoe to help the General defend the dock against the garrison troopers stationed there. The gunships arrived, delivering several squads of reinforcements by way of fast-cables.

“Stop where you are!” an Alliance officer demanded. “Surrender!”

Tank shoved Zoe and Emil. “Get out of here! I’ll deal with them!”

He didn’t wait for her to argue as he stampeded into the midst of the enemy ranks. His diversion worked; the cyborgs were too preoccupied with him to chase after anyone else. Emil boarded quickly, but Zoe held her ground. Ricocheting shots reminded her of her purpose and she finally boarded the ship.

The mooring clamps disengaged. The powerful engines snarled and the Bandit rocketed from the dock.

Exhausted, Tank surrendered to the surviving troopers. Fear had no hold on him. By her escape, he had just paid back his debt. As he braced for death, a thundering clamor distracted the Vityaz. It grew louder until a tsunami of trucks flooded the dock, unloading hundreds of brigends. An unstoppable momentum of steel and flesh washed the foreign soldiers from the platform.

Jessup found Tank. “Sorry about being late. I promise it won’t happen again.”

The veterans raised their weapons and shouted victory. The umber giant got to his feet and welcomed his saviors. He hadn’t seen a demonstration like this in a long time; his countrymen were standing in solidarity.

He looked up and saw the specks of the Crimson Bandit’s engines fading into the dark clouds off in the distance. “Give ‘em hell, Chica.”

The devil’s due

A security contingent met the shuttle as it touched down inside the Spire’s landing bay. The dark pair disembarked and used the path laid out before them. The troopers kept a safe but quick reactionary distance. Kroll regarded the lax reception as odd; his master by now should have been aware of Isoles’s murder. Perhaps Malus didn’t consider him a threat. The assassin smiled. He would play along with the elder’s false sense of protection.

As the stomping cadence of boots tapered, Max lowered from the gear well to the deck. Dinx slipped and dropped face first onto the hard surface. Caring more about the commotion caused by the accident than his friend’s sore face, he peeked to see if anyone had heard the noise. Yanking on Dinx’s sleeve, they crept after Marta.

Kroll and his disciple boarded a lift-car. The doors closed and it disappeared inside the tube. The security detail divided, sending most of the squad elsewhere while leaving a small team behind to guard the lift-tubes.

“Well, we can’t go that way,” Max said.

Dinx thought of an alternative. “I’ll find one.”

He found a wall terminal. While he synced his data-plate into the Spire’s schematics, Max kept lookout. It didn’t take him long to browse through the floor plans.

“Okay, got it. This way.”

He led them to a spiral walkway that twisted and ascended to the upper levels. He pointed at the ramp and flashed thumbs-up.

“Are you sure?”

Dinx pondered the same question. “Ah, yeah. Ninety percent.” He rethought the odds. “Maybe seventy.”

Max wasn’t comfortable trusting someone else’s recklessness.

Kroll and Marta entered the ascension chamber’s control room. The confused technicians watched the couple strut by. Upon seeing the demons, Orock hid in the corner.

The supervisor held his arms out to intercept them. “I’m sorry, eminence, but you can’t be in here. The emitter is —”

Kroll shoved the man and the sentries reacted to defend the door. With a hand flick, the cyborgs aimed their guns at one another and fired. The horrified humans tried to flee.

“Remain at your stations,” he ordered. “Remain at your stations. Continue with the sequence.”

He stepped up to the door, but it didn’t open.

“You can’t go in there,” the supervisor warned. “You could destabilize —"

“Open it or I will cut off your hand and do it myself.”

The terrified human laid his shaking hand on the biometric pad. The door opened, spilling out a resonating hum and bright light. They proceeded into the chamber.

Malus stood with his consciousness immersed within the aura of the crystals. He kept his back to them. Only when their intrusion disturbed the link, did he react.

“Did you believe you could hide from me?”

“Yes, I believed I could, and I did so successfully.”

“Foolish conceit.” Malus strolled among the Six, not once looking at the trespassers. “You murdered Isoles.”

Kroll tossed the hag’s ora rings at the elder’s feet. They clang as they bounced. Malus showed no fright, but his spirit screamed with it.

“You sent the serpent to kill me.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“You know the answer to that question.”

“Have I not been loyal to you? Loyal to our cause?”

“In the beginning, you were.”

“I have sacrificed everything for you. Is this how you repay me? By casting me out, condemning me?”

“Your accusations are puerile. You come here with treachery in your heart and dare to question why?”

“Why?”

“In spite of your mongrel upbringing, I had pity on you — you, the son of an aberration. Indifferent to your disadvantage, I chose to nurture you. Kroll, you are a means to an end, an animal. You are incapable of ascension.”

“You are wrong. I am more than you will admit.”

He shifted to reveal the girl who wore Isoles’s bloodied garb. For the first time in generations, he faced a byproduct of his past. The inevitability of his demise stripped him of regality. Even with the youthful rejuvenation, he shrank like the old man he was, breaking away from the energy field.

“I should have foreseen this turn of events.”

“Yes, you should have known this would happen. For this fact alone, you are not fit to rule.”

“Impetuous child, you lack the ability to guide this world to greatness.”

“We are meant to rule, not play messiahs to pathetic creatures.”

The pulsating hum slowed and the energy verged on discharge. Marta removed her cloak and stepped onto the pad.

“The time is at hand,” Malus exhaled, presenting his back to Kroll. “Do what is in your nature to do, mongrel.”

The dagger pierced layers of tissues until the tip nicked his heart. Malus dropped to all fours with his blood staining his white skin.

“You... will bring destruction,” he cautioned.

“Deal with these imposters,” Kroll told Marta.

The last image the ancient Zolarian’s brain processed was of the girl killing the Six. Sparks bloomed and their bodies convulsed, then became lifeless. Kroll removed the bloody blade. Malus drew his last breath.

The assassin wiped the blade on the body. There was no remorse or regret. His mentor had shunned him. The only emotion he had as he looked down at the corpse was anger. He fought to subdue the hate eating at him, but the bitterness only worsened. Malus’s last insults rang in his ears.

Unable to suffer the offense any longer, he shrieked and kicked the body over the edge. Far from quelling his tantrum, he lifted the six corpses with his ora and condemned them to the same grave. The rage subsided, leaving him depleted, yet with renewed determination.

The pulsating ended and the crystal nodules flared with divine radiance. The Spire shaft vibrated as the emitter fired a beam straight up the axis of the chamber.

Marta raised her arms and merged with the field. A cocoon of light encased her naked body, elevating her high above the platform. She became one with everyone and everything linked to the Spire. Millions of minds formed to one collective — hers. She projected swirling images of Alliance ships and global weapon systems onto the milky haze filling the chamber.

Kroll touched the field surrounding her. His mind couldn’t integrate the sheer might and the overload drove him to remove his hand. She floated easily in the epicenter, absorbing what Kroll was incapable of surviving. She was indeed a divinity and her powers were even beyond his scope. He understood why Malus feared a being like her.

His inadequacies in contrast to the girl bared his maligned hubris. Such knowledge should have humbled him, but he was never one for humility. No. The greatest entity was his slave to command and by proxy that made him the greatest being alive. He accepted the newfound authority with no shame.

Studying the imageries projected in the ether, his malevolent intent captured the opportunity. “It is time we put these humans to good use.”

Cry havoc

Zoe sidestepped the crew as they busied themselves for battle. Even after a couple of awkward encounters, the crew went about their duties with a polite tolerance to her intrusiveness.

The Crimson Bandit drifted inside a cluster of storm clouds thirty kilometers from the city. The erratic electrical discharge offered a decent cloak for which to hide from Alliance lidar scans. The only drawback, the iron ship’s power grid fluctuated with each lightning strike. It was a nominal side-effect, but a nuisance to the already overburdened skeleton crew nonetheless.

Having nothing to occupy her wait, discouragement settled and she mused dark what-ifs.
What if Max is already dead
?
If he’s alive, will I make it to him in time
?
What if I die before I can tell him the truth
?

The anxiety was killing her.

An enlisted man skirted by and bumped her against a charged bulkhead. The jolt was strong enough to clear her mind. Not wanting another hit, she sought out the closest ladder and returned to the less traveled lower level.

Stepping off the last rung, she heard Emil’s voice migrating along the axial passage. She found him near engineering, receiving reports from Minsk and Tullia. No longer in the soiled Hi-riser clothes, he now wore an old set of combat fatigues more suited to his character.

She had trouble hearing what was being said, but telling by the seriousness, the news wasn’t good.

“I can get the inter-cooling manifold patched, but don’t give me too many bumps,” Tullia said.

“I can’t give you promises,” he responded, rubbing the bridge of his nose.

“I afraid there is more bad news,” Minsk added. “We did not repair all damage made by sandstorm.”

“Why not, Chief?”

“On account of being captured, put in prison, and tortured,” he frowned.

“You two are killing me,” Emil sighed. “It will have to do. Serov’s ships won’t wait. Alright, get back to work.”

The frustrated officers returned to their duties.

Zoe caught him before he could disappear. “General?”

“Not now, Captain. I’m trying to get my ship ready for battle with only a quarter of the people I started with.”

“This can’t wait.”

He wasn’t in the mood for her persistence, but he also wasn’t insensitive to her plight. His daughter was down there too and Max was in harm’s way trying to save her. This commonality made them kindred.

He patted her shoulder. “Don’t worry. I’ve been thinking about it and I have an idea.”

They worked their way to the lowest section of the ship, the bomb bay. Only two bombardiers were working in the tight confines of the oblong compartment, prepping missiles and various weapons systems. He squeezed between them to get to the aft bulkhead. Flipping a switch, two narrow flaps opened in the deck, revealing the shallow well underneath. The exterior flaps to the outside remained closed. The space was big enough for a large bomb, or a small woman.

He picked up a parachute pack and tossed it to her. She caught it and examined the rigging. Realizing where he was heading with his idea, she shook her head. “You got to be kidding?”

“Yeah, it’s not the best plan in the world, but how else do I get you close enough to the Spire? You haven’t heard the worst part.”

“What?”

“You’ll have to drop when we’re going four hundred knots.”

Her shoulders slumped at the prospect. “You’re mucking with me?”

“Do you have a better idea?”

She dropped the pack. “Nope. When do we do this?”

“As soon as we’re ready.” He saw in her the familiar jitters that overcome a warrior just before the fighting commences. “Come with me.”

He ushered her into his cabin and made her sit on the bunk. Removing the bottle of whiskey from the desk, he poured a few fingers in a cup and handed it to her. She accepted it graciously, remembering how Patti favored the drink’s ability to both tranquilize and invigorate the nerves at the same time.

“Thanks.”

Emil sat in the chair and waited for her to swallow a few sips before taking the cup back so he could partake. He had a nagging question. “Did you tell him?”

“No. I didn’t get a chance to. Remember?”

He got the gist of her remark. “I’m sorry.”

She grabbed the cup. “No problem. I don’t think it would have gone over all that well anyhow. Besides, it wasn’t the right time.”

“That doesn’t matter. You should tell him.”

“Yeah... if we live.”

“You will live to tell him.”

“You’re sure a bundle of optimism all of a sudden.”

“I have to be.”

“Why?”

“Because I have to believe there is something worth living for and that some good will come from this. I’m a general. If I walk around believing anything else, then good people die.”

She sipped from the cup. “What about you? Isn’t Marta worth living for? Don’t you want to see her again?”

He looked off to the side, imagining the opportunity. He grabbed the mug and gulped what was left. As he put the bottle to the cup for a refill, the intercom squawked.

“General, come to the bridge,” Minsk announced. “You must see this.”

Emil and Zoe arrived and saw through the forward view-port an effervescent beam burning the clouds.

“What is that?” he asked.

“A transmission from the Spire. That is all we know.”

He looked at Zoe. Their chances of success had just dropped significantly. “Captain, get ready.”

The signal traveled to a waiting satellite in geostationary orbit above the city. From there, it branched out to dozens of other satellites transfixed across the globe. At each juncture, the beam split into three more beams of exact frequencies. Within minutes, the Spire had networked to every relay station on Earth. Aboard every Alliance ship and war machine, the hybrid systems came online with flawless transitions.

In Asia, the remnants of the Asian Defense League, under the command of the infamous Hei Qi Yun, could not hold back the Alliance’s resurgence into China. The hybrid controlled forces remained one step ahead of the dwindling but determined legions of Black Flag fighters. The only thing keeping the invaders from absolute victory was the widespread absence of Asians with ora starbursts.

Each meter of ground won was costly to the Alliance.

In Western Europe, the raids of Great Britain, Ireland, Norway, and Spain were victories. The beleaguered rebels of those regions lost in the opening minutes of the campaign.

Without a viable Alliance stronghold in the Southern Hemisphere, the tranced were the next best thing in absence of heavily armed warships. In Brazil and Peru, they ran berserker throughout the cities, leaving devastation and countless deaths in their wakes.

The horde at the Spire turned unified and marched over the bridge leading into Brooklyn. In concurrence, the tranced in the Hi-8 shuffled toward every access channel leading down to the lower city.

Any unsuspecting Zolarian, believing their individualities were immune to assimilation under Malus’s utopia, were defenseless and lost their minds within Kroll’s dominion.

The Bandit held position. Twenty minutes had transpired since the Spire activated the signal. Preliminary reports from international channels flooded across Minsk’s station. He conveyed the information to his commander.

Emil sat in his chair, waiting for the go-signs from the department heads. Engineering and tactical were yet to report in. Only when their lights on the status board turned from red to green could he begin the assault.

He keyed a button on his chair and called to Zoe, “Are you in position?”

“Good to go,” she annoyingly reported.

It was the fifth time he had radioed since she crammed herself inside the bomb well. Her protective Trimar/Kevlar jumpsuit and encapsulating black helmet worked in tandem with the sealed compartment’s pitch-blackness to induce claustrophobia. She never liked airborne operations for this reason. But back in the day, drop-tubes weren’t as confining as this shallow grave.

On the bridge, Emil’s leg fidgeted. Those lights were still red on the board.

“Do you think the woman will make it?” Minsk asked.

His leg stopped bouncing and he pivoted to the Chief. “Yes, I do.”

“What makes you sure?”

“Because, I just do.”

“You trust Americans too much.”

He smiled. “Not all, but some. You don’t give them enough credit, old friend. They are vulgar — ignorant — and yes uncivilized, but they are also resourceful, tenacious, and relentless. If we win this war, it will be because they played a part in it.”

The stout Russian jeered. He didn’t share his commander’s faith.

The board lit green for tactical. A minute later, engineering signaled green. Emil felt the spike in adrenaline and the quick freefall from the rush. He switched on the ship’s main comm circuit and held the microphone to his mouth. He paused to gather his words.

When he was ready, he spoke in Romanian. “Listen up. As your commander, I have pledged myself to your loyalty and service. Each of us is here for the same reason. Our homeland was destroyed. Our way of life erased. Our families murdered.”

In engineering, Tullia and her team listened to the speech. For the robust woman, his words held meaning.

“The younger members of our crew have grown to adulthood not knowing the loved ones who were taken from them.”

Elsewhere in the ship, the older members bowed their heads.

“For the rest of us, we remember too vividly the faces of those we lost.”

On the bridge, Cob and the officers listened.

“Now, we have a chance to bring justice to those responsible. I will not lie to you, this could be the last sunrise we’ll ever see. But, if today is our day to die, then by God, we will do our duty and fight to our last breath. Never give up. Do not fail me! Do not fail our people!”

The crew jumped to their feet and chanted
Haiduc
, loud and strong. Some cried. Others called out with righteous frenzy.

The crew throughout the ship pounded on bulkheads and carried on the chants of
Haiduc
with electrifying timbre.

Zoe heard the speech through her helmet’s earpiece. She didn’t have to understand the language to interpret his pep talk. It was too rehearsed and too well executed. Had he been saving this speech, she wondered. The answer wasn’t important. What mattered was the reality behind his intent. General Emil Pavel didn’t mean to survive this battle.

She switched channels on the helmet’s comm from the main circuit to tac-one. She saw no good in keeping tabs on her friend’s suicide run.

Back on the bridge, the crew waited with blood still burning from the declaration of war. Everyone that is except for Cob who sat disillusioned at the helm. Adi’s death was to blame.

Emil went to him and placed his hands on the man’s shoulders. Leaning in, he whispered, “Don’t forget, Adi can see us. Honor her. Make her proud, son.”

He kissed the top of Cob’s head and returned to the conn. There was nothing else to say. All the kid needed was to hear that simple reminder of his foster sister’s pride, and the reassurance of the man he regarded as a father.

Emil allowed himself a brief meditation. Balanced and ready, he nodded to Minsk.

The Russian tightened his chair’s safety harness. “Helm, dive forty degrees. Heading one — six — zero. Attack speed.”

Cob pushed the helm control forward. “Dive forty degrees. Heading one — six — zero. Attack speed. Aye.”

Serov stared out the main view-port of the Leviathan’s bridge. On the distant horizon, storm clouds obscured the sun’s rise. It was dawn, but without those rays, the sky was in twilight.

Somewhere out there was the Crimson Bandit, waiting for its opportunity. He knew from the report of the prison break, that once again, his reviled enemy had eluded death. He was furious. However, he expected Pavel to come for him. The notion made him smirk.

Pavel, it will do you no good
.
These three ships are the best in my armada, and more than a match for your puny der’mo of a ship
.

Come and die
.

This was indeed a day to remember. Up until now, his secret arrangement with Kroll had proven superior to the one he previously held with Malus. The old Zolarian had been stringing him along, promising wealth and power in the new order, but he saw through the ruse. He suspected that once Malus obtained his cherished utopia, he would cease living up to his end of the treaty.