Pull (Deep Darkness Book 1) (25 page)

Nothing happens. I don’t take a shot. A Terra Vesp wanders into the
tunnel catching the attention of the hellbeast. Several other Vesp attack it as it
rips the small creature to tiny little pieces. Purple blood leaks through the
opening above me. From the opening I watch the hellbeast scratch and tear
away at the small creatures that seem to be coming from everywhere. It
scraps itself against a wall splattering another Vesp. The hellbeast scratches
itself like a dog with fleas. They are little to no competition for the monster.

A voice in my head screams, ‘This is your chance.’ – I bust through the top of
the compartment and without hesitation begin firing on the eyes of the
hellbeast. I probably hit one in every four shots the rest tear away at its body
and wings. It begins chasing me through the tunnel somehow I thought I was
safe in here but the hellbeast defies logic - no I defy logic. My senses are shot.
I can see its back flare up as it completely ignores the Vesp. ‘Maybe this
wasn’t such a good idea,’ – I fired backwards at the monster finally making it
trip over its own body weight and fall face down into a wall.

I made my way onto the skimmer picking it up and brushing the snow off and
plugging the chord to my rifle into the hack I made. Before it started up a
Vesp jumped out of the snow and bites me on the hand. I dispatch it quick
but it still caught me off guard. The skimmer starts up. I had been luckier
then I thought the hellbeast didn’t crush it or bury it or even put a dent on it.
I have to hand it to the Skrav, their shit holds up.

The engine sputtered. Faster and faster I went sailing over the ice. I
had my rifle planted pointing over the top of the skimmer. If I had to I could
drift and turn myself all the way around and fire at it. I had no idea what was
in front of me through the dark. Small chunks of glowing waste stuck to the
front of my skimmer the unlucky insects that had wandered out into the night
wrong place and wrong time. The skimmer itself was glowing red-hot as the
engines began to overheat. I must have been going a hundred and ten maybe
a hundred twenty miles per hour. I followed the holo display on the skimmer
in the direction of the Aelita. If I was lucky I would make it there in no time
and I could take any survivors to rescue Hayden. They would have the gear
necessary to track him so long as we could locate the signal from his PDA.

The hellbeast pursued me but it wasn’t able to keep up. By the time it had
taken to the air I could see it far behind me standing on the ice still crawling
with the bodies of Terra Vesp.

My hand bled leaving a small path behind me. I was beginning to lose
blood fast. That was the least of my problems. At first I thought I must have
lost my mind. I felt shivers run down the back of my spine. Turning and
facing the setting sun I saw the Erebus itself fill the entire sky. It was coming
straight towards me falling towards the ground at sixty degree angle. They
were crashing.

It looked like they had taken more damage in the battle then I realized.
Perhaps there had been a lot more drones and Skrav up there then we
thought or what was left of the Scourge had attacked them. A small side of
the Erebus was on fire. The grey smoke stretched for miles across the horizon
as the star began to rise. Pieces of the hull fell apart as it came down from the
atmosphere faster and faster. Fragments were burning up and falling like
meteors. Suddenly there was a loud bang. I could feel the shockwave from
the impact like an earthquake. The destination had changed. The Aelita was
close but the Erebus was closer with a larger chance that there would be
survivors. The Erebus was built to survive massive impacts after all space
was full of asteroids and debris. If it could survive three hundred years of
constant abuse it could survive one crash landing.

“Purpose? Your only purpose is to serve. You were born to serve to human race,
the desire to expand and survive. Your body made you weak. You are no longer
worthy of it so I am taking it from you. “ The Valkyrie war reading my thoughts.
I could hear her draw her sword again. I could feel it. It severed the flesh from
the rest of my body. I was skinned. That was the moment of my rebirth. That was
the moment I became something more then human something more then a man.

I swerved to the right and then to the left. Pieces of the Erebus, some
as large as a dropship were falling all around me turning the ground to
glass.The sky itself looked like it was on fire. The hellbeast followed my scent.
It was making its way around the falling debris a lot easier and quicker then I
could. I guess that was the difference between the natural wonders of the
world and improvised technology. We could copy and paste the best parts of
nature but never mimic its grace. The skimmer I had picked up was fast but it
couldn’t move the way that monster could. By the time I had dodged the fifth
and sixth piece of debris the hellbeast was less than thirty yards behind me;
so close I could see parts of its face burned and charred from where I had
shot it and the blood of the unlucky Terra Vesp had covered the white of its
teeth. I could see the reflection of the skimmer on the once below. I was
hovering over a lake now. Ahead of me water shot up of the cracks like small
geysers. I drifted through one - felt the hot water burn the exposed parts of
my skin. I watched water turn to vapor as it dissolved away. I ignored the
pain imagining that from far away I must have looked like I was on fire.

A piece of the Erebus no larger then one of our freighters fell in front of
me/ I had no time to react. The engine of the skimmer was already burning
red when it hit sending me sideways into the air and onto the ground. Luckily
I had made my way across the geysers and the lake. My legs were facing the
direction I had been going. My body must have flipped several times over and
over. The fingers on my frostbitten hand were broken. I didn’t even bother
sitting up before pulling and twisting them back into place. Pain was nothing
to me now. I felt like I was popping my knuckles, only the joint of my hand
seemed to sting a little. At least I knew I wouldn’t have to worry long; the
hellbeast was already investigating the crash and it wouldn’t be long before it
found the place in which I had fallen. I turned my head to the side to see it
sniffing the ground its massive black wings no longer flailed; the beast was
smart enough to know that I was no longer a threat.

I had nothing but the knife I had claimed as my own from the body of
the dead scourge. My rifle had landed several yards away buried beneath the
snow. I began to wonder if maybe that knife had been cursed… then again it
was probably just my bad luck.

Closer and closer the hellbeast came. It would all be over soon. Quick I
hoped. It would bite me several times, sever the major arteries and I would
bleed out instantly into a red silhouette across the snow. I couldn’t think
about it anymore. If I was going to die I wanted my last thoughts to of
everything and everyone I loved. I didn’t want to think of the Erebus, the
nexus, or this journey into oblivion the human race has been struggling with
for the last three hundred years. I wanted to think of Hayden, the paladins of
First Descent all of whom I hope and pray still live. I wanted to think of the
fallen; my mother, Aira, Dom, the friends I will see when I cross to the other
side. I can see them now, Duv’Mir would probably find some infinite battle
for us to fight once I was there. Each of us falling into line joining the ranks
of the fallen heroes the moment we pass. The only thing I regretted now was I
hadn’t spend enough time with Hera.

She was for me when I was at my worst and yet I have only known her
for such a short time. The Erebus being so small we should have met a long
time ago but even with a thousand living souls it was still too hard to
remember every face and every name. The day and night cycle, the rules and
regulations of the ship, the way the guard did its very best to keep users from
sharing their vision - all of it had done its job for keeping us apart. I think the
elders and then of course Balkava didn’t want us sharing information with
one another, they were afraid of something. The Erebus had so many dark
secrets.

Where is Sev?
Hera’s voice. She is talking to Trevor onboard the Erebus.
One of the shards in my arm must have broken free. Perfect. My last few
moments alive and I have lost my sense of self. At least there was no sense of
drowning. Born a user die a user.

Hera looks so beautiful.
Her hair is cut in a bob, short and black. She is wearing a body suit
colored in red and white holding her custom M7 rifle - one of the new
prototypes nicknamed ‘the Ripper’ - and wearing a breather wrapped around
her face. Things on the Erebus must be bad. If she is armed they might even
be boarded or worst dealing with resistance inside the ship.
Think…
Who’s body is this?
Whose eyes?
This is recent. I can tell that much. This is the battle we just fought. This
could even be present. Trevor is wearing the same gear he was in when we
flew out together only now it looks damaged. He must have taken a few hits
inside his cockpit or made a crash landing getting back inside the Erebus.
“He was with Hayden on the Skrav ship when I had to pull out,” Trevor
said, “I’m sorry but if anyone can survive it would be the two of them. They
could have ditched and gone down to the surface if things started getting too
hot, I doubt the Skrav could match their flying skills .”
The words strike Hera like a knife to the heart. Tears fall from her eyes
and for the first time I really see how much she cares for me… except its
more then that; she doesn’t just care for me - - she loves me.
Love is such a trivial thing in the darkness of space. Meaningless. We are
born, we live, we die and while we are alive we serve the greater good
keeping our species alive, making sure the gene pool is clean and healthy. We
survive so humanity can prosper another day. Humans had lived this way for
decades. I remember my mother use to talk about love, that feeling of
imprinting on someone else. She use to say it was a fantasy, a fairy tale - at
the same time she spoke of it in full. Telling me she loved my father before he
passed, that she loved me, that love was the driving force for humanity; the
only reason even worth surviving.

“If we do not have love we do not survive,” my mother once said.
I wanted to scream. I wanted to scream to Hera that I AM ALIVE.
I wanted to scream that I loved her too.

I am in the body of a young soldier about the same age as me. A man
named Talon, a paladin of Echo Squad. From what I know about huim he has
lived on the Erebus his entire life and never known anything but fighting and
discipline. These are just guesses of course… a small bit of intuition that
comes with seeing through so many eyes. The way he holds himself shows
who he is. I can remember meeting him a few times here and there. Catching
him in the simulators playing superhero stories. Aside from that he served
Echo Squad as their youngest member. That was public knowledge. They
were meant to act as protectors of the elders. A kind of elite guard. Now that
Balkava was the only elder though they were nothing more then grunts
running around the ship doing errands under her command. Surely most of
them felt replaced or resentment but they knew their place. Talon was only
listening in overhearing Hera’s conversation. He was actually there to retrieve
her and bring her back to blockade A. The inside of Erebus had fallen into
chaos. The Skrav concentrated on blowing out sections of the ship that were
nesting grounds for antliods forcing them to flee and move around the vents
and shafts leading them to the areas we had fought so hard to once defend.

Talon was good at his job. He and Hera made their way past the hangar
using a picker. It was a small hover vehicle capable of light travel with three
to four people. It was slow but it was easier then walking. Most pickers ran
on battery power captured from solar cells. Most pickers were used sparingly
given the Erebus was never usually close enough to a star to collect sufficient
solar power. None of that mattered now. This was our final stand and we
were going to use everything at our disposal to survive. Trevor disappeared
away from them. Apparently Hera had sough him out hoping to learn what
had become of me. It wasn’t fair that I was alive my consciousness right there
by her side.

Balkava had promoted Hera to Echo Squad and given certain experiences
she had while inside the nexus. It was better then going into stasis since she
was no longer a user she was no longer useful onboard the ship (aside form
genetic purposes). I’m sure if she had said no they would have found
something else for her to do. There was still R&D and certain levels of
maintenance that needed living humans to perform sanctioned tasks. She was
a fighter though and she was more then capable of taking care of herself. She
would never be anything but. During the first wave of attacks by the antliods
Hera had been one of the few going in and rescuing people trapped inside
quarantined areas and venues of the ship. She was small and could crawl
easily through most vents unnoticed and unlock sealed doors without any
trouble.

Near the blockage of the barricade the antliods thrashed at metal barriers
we had built to keep them away. Turrets fired pulse after pulse into the mass
of blackness. Echo Squad including Talon and Hera made their stand behind
a barricade that sat four feet off the ground. They aimed through portholes at
the monsters with precision from their hiding place. The battle outside the
Erebus seemed to rage on as the hull shook again and again. At times even
the floor below seemed to turn as the gravity field fell into flux. Sometimes
Talon’s body felt lighter then air, other times it felt like he had gained several
hundred. We had been trained to handle this in simulations but actually
feeling your weight shift minute to minute was enough to make even the best
fall sick with vertigo and nausea. Several people three up and others seemed
to cough blood as if their insides were collapsing and breaking apart with
each forced shift.