Battleship Furiosa (29 page)

"It could have been a hell of a
lot worse, though."

True.
You could have joined the others
back there.

He remembered the time he and Rex
had pulled the burning bolt from the chest plate of Valentine. That
had been the first time he'd met her, and she still failed to
disappoint, but that felt a lifetime ago compared to their
predicament. He waited, his carbine to his shoulder and eyes locked
directly ahead. The open corridor was well lit, but it was the
darkened end piece that led into the bend that unnerved him. The
distance was at least twenty metres, yet under the circumstances it
felt as though the enemy could make it through with just a few
steps.

"Hold!" said Valentine,
"Do not fire until I give the order. I want fire
discipline."

Nate looked at her with admiration. She
was only a private, possibly the lowest ranked individual there,
yet somehow she'd taken command of the small unit, and based on the
number of bodies, she'd been defending here for some time. One of
the Byotai held a portable computer out for her to see. She
examined it and nodded.

"Okay, they are coming.
C
ontact in sixty seconds. Stay frosty. We
will stop them cold."

She looked to the worried looking
Byotai while one of the junior soldiers translated for the others.
They looked at least as nervous as Nate and his friends, perhaps
more so.

"Every second we stand gives time
for the General to reinforce his position. Byotai combat teams are
coming. Let's give them the time they need."

Nate was surprised to hear that.
Last he'd heard, the large number of enemy forces had taken the
defenders by surprise, killed large numbers of crew, and now
surrounded the medical, crew, and command decks. Effectively
cutting them off from the rest of the ship. More importantly, they
had cut the General and his immediate entourage from any help that
might come. Nate leaned in closer to her side and spoke
quietly.

"What about behind us?"

She glanced in the direction he was
talking about.

"That leads up to the command
deck. Honorius has fortified the area. If they get past us, they'll
have to breach the double blast doors at the top of the
ramp."

She then winked, and Nate was
reminded of his first impression of the young Private.

"We've already reinforced that part of
the ship."

"Why are you here,
then?"

Again she smiled, and Nate found
her face to be heart warming. Cassandra was often quite cold and
calculating, but Valentine was much more down to Earth. He wondered
if it might be because she was a couple of years older, or perhaps
it was her career in the Marine Corps. Either way, he loved to hear
her talk, even in the midst of what was happening.

"Because, sweetheart, we need to keep
these dogs busy. You know we're not far from the Rift, right? If we
go through and lose control of the ship, we'll be in serious
trouble. Who knows what's on the other side."

She nodded towards the ceiling.

"Under no circumstances can they
make it to the command or crew decks. All other routes have been
sealed, apart from the route up from the medical deck."

"Yeah," said Nate,
"The Sergeant has that covered. I've already
spoken with her."

Valentine chuckled.

"She is a monster. An hour ago
the medical deck was in a panic. This enemy had more than forty
people down there and were about to breach the next deck. We heard
they had convicts trying to strangle anybody they could
find."

Valentine shook her head.

"They blame the Byotai
and us for their treatment. They have been
indoctrinated into thinking we are fighting for the Biomechs as
their slaves. Or something like that. I don't really
understand."

She then chuckled.

"Reminds me of the description of the
Biomech shock troops back in the day. When they were not much more
than twisted monsters made from the flesh of the dead."

Nate shuddered.

"Yeah, I remember. Except these
are normal Anicinàbe and Byotai citizens, twisted by the preaching
zealous leaders. They spout hate of machines and of ruling elites.
They have been turned into living weapons."

Her eyes closed as though she was
trying to shake the thoughts from her mind. When they opened, her
expression had altered, and she grinned back at him.

"Then the S
ergeant arrived, and boy did they regret it!"

Nate watched her, stunned at her
transformation.

"Ten minutes later, the place was
clear, and she was retaking compartment after compartment. I tell
you, ten more like her and the ship would be ours
already."

She looked to the line and then
spoke in a calm
and steady voice. If Nate
hadn't known any better, he might have thought he was listening to
a seasoned NCO.

"Thirty seconds, people," said
Valentine,
"Be ready."

As the words were translated, two
of the soldiers began to waver. Nate could sense their fear, and as
one took a step back, he well understood their nerves. A year ago
these would all have been elite crew and warriors, but now many of
them had been transferred from other ships. It was an elite vessel,
crewed by a motley collection of veterans, cadets, and volunteers.
Shouting increased and immediately reminded Nate of his failure in
the fire shaft.

You can do better than this.

He noticed Matilda looking at him, and
he gave her a nod. She returned her gaze back into the hallway,
even as another Byotai turned to leave.

"Come on, if we leave, the ship
falls," said Billy, "You have to stand."

Once of the crewmen pushed past
Billy and headed in the direction of the command deck. Then
something happened that Nate never expected to see. Valentine spun
around and pointed her weapon at the retreating crewman.

"Stop right there!"

Whether or not he understood the
words, the tone was clear enough. He paused, looking back to see
Valentine move to the front of the group and take aim towards the
unseen enemy.

"If you won't protect your ship, then
I'll have to. The Prince is relying upon you. Do your duty!"

Two of her m
arines grunted and then moved to her flanks, their armour
pushed up against each other in a compact unit. The Byotai soldier
waited, perhaps unsure whether to continue to leave. Captain Sobiex
moved to join her and gave her a nod of acknowledgement before
speaking. His tone was guttural, and a number of the Byotai were
visibly shaken as he spoke. Another two Byotai stepped away, and
soon the line began to crumble, just as the first of the shapes
appeared from the darkness. The Captain grabbed one and dragged him
back to the line as Private Valentine yelled out,
"Fire!"

The clatter of small arms was
deafening in such a confined area. There was little cover to be
used, and the first five enemy soldiers were cut down where they
stood. As the smoke and dust cleared, Nate could see the fallen and
grinned at spotting the other Byotai moving back into formation.
The sound of shuffling feet returned, and this time a metal object
rolled ahead of them.

"Watch your eyes!"

Most of the Byotai activated
their visors, at least those that wore helmets. The others looked
away just as the flash bomb rolled into view. Nate joined them, but
even with his eyes closed, he could still pick out the bright
staccato rhythm of flashes. It was a strobe effect. And with the
tenth and final flash, they came. This time it was a bloody and
concerted assault.

"Fire!"

All manner of guns opened up as
the crowd of enraged Byotai turncoats, agents, and ex-prisoners
surged into the corridor. Many were cut down, but others picked up
the wounded and pushed them in front as living shields.

"Give ground!"
Valentine shouted.

The two ranks of warriors stepped
back, slowly giving up ground to give them time to fight. One
Byotai soldier fell down, and another spun backwards and collapsed
to the floor. A gap opened in the line, and two prisoners attempted
to leap through. Valdis and her comrades stepped into the breach
and opened fire. One prisoner still made it and collapsed atop
Dogg. A Byotai crewman yelled something and then turned to run.
Several more followed him, and in that instant the line fell.
Valentine kicked the prisoner off Dogg, blasted him, and then
hurled a grenade into the horde. It exploded on contact and shook
the ground.

"Everybody back to the ramp. Move
it!"

The orderly retreat quickly
disintegrated, with many of the Byotai panicking and fleeing from
the fight. Valentine and her marines moved more slowly, working in
pairs to cover the others as they fell back. It was still fairly
quick, and as Nat moved, he was gladdened to find them
close.

"Nate!"

He looked back and to the ramp.
Billy and the others were already at the top, and the blast doors
were half shut. Shadows marked the fleeing Byotai as they ran
through the gap, leaving fewer and fewer to protect the
passageway.

"Come on, they'll be here soon."

Cassandra and Matilda were next, and
neither even looked back as they rushed through the gap.

"I'm coming."

He made it halfway up when he heard a
loud cry, like the groan of some great beast.

"
What
the hell is that?"

He turned around and found a
group of the largest Anicinàbe he'd ever seen. They were thickly
muscled and easily twice the mass of even Captain Sobiex. Nate had
no idea that the Anicinàbe could grow to even a fraction of this
size. They wore no clothing, save for the odd pieces of armour
scavenged from their various encounters. Each was covered in
markings and tattoos, and he assumed they must have been some kind
of violent convicts. Or at least, they had been previously. What
skin was visible was plain white and gave them a strange, ethereal
quality.

"Don't stop, get back," Valentine
screamed.

All that stood between the top of
the ramp was Nate, Valentine, and a handful of Marine and Byotai
soldiers. It was a pathetic force to match again a countless horde
that had little interest in living. Nate could not understand how a
popular revolutionary movement had taken on such a strange and
violent character. They would die for a cause, one he still didn't
actually see as real. After all, the Alliance was no friend of the
Biomechs, and even if they were, that ancient race was long gone.
Now these archenemies had found a common factor, one that united
them in the most bizarre of ways, nothing more than a simple hatred
or perhaps fear of the technologically advanced.

We call them
Techn
os, and with good
reason. They hate us, and I still don't know why.

Two more rounded the corner, and
between them they carried a large metallic device that pulsed with
coloured light
s. Nate had no idea what it
was but suspected the unit was intended to cause harm.

A bomb, it has to be!

"Hell
,
no!" Nate shouted, "You're staying right there."

Without thinking of his own life,
Nate stepped further down the ramp. Cassandra saw him go and called
out after him, but Nate's mind was focused. As he saw the
terrifying Anicinàbe rushing towards Valentine and her bodyguard,
he had just one thing on his mind.

I have to help her!

He skidded to a halt near the
bottom and took aim. For the first time since he'd stepped onto a
warship
, he actually felt like he knew
what he was doing. The gun moved to his shoulder and slid into
place. At the same time, the sights moved up to align with his eye.
He remembered everything that had been drummed into him so far, and
even the most recent words of Private Valentine.

Aim low, take your time...and pull.

This time he put the sights
squarely on the device and squeezed the trigger. The L52 coilgun
shuddered as it spat three metallic projectiles from the stubby
barrels. All three struck the object in the
centre
, and it instantly vanished in a
bright fireball. The initial blast was modest, but it was followed
by a powerful shockwave that knocked every one of them to the
ground. The two nearest Anicinàbe were killed outright, and
everybody else either stunned or knocked out cold. Nate blinked
twice and spotted the ceiling in front of him.

Uh...okay, that was...different.

He blinked again
and then remembered the drooling and psychotic
Anicinàbe that wanted to kill every one of them. Summoning all of
his mental and physical strength, he rolled to the side and spotted
Valentine climbing up as well. Her armour was burnt from the flank
to the shoulder, but she seemed unharmed. Nate tried to join her
and instead slid back to the floor. An arm grabbed him, and he
tried to struggle before spotting Valdis and Billy.

"You came back," he
muttered.

Billy's eyes drifted left. His
carbine rose and fired twice.

"Of course we did.
N
ow let's go."

Private Valentine moved up to them
while barking orders to her comrades. Nate glanced back at the
carnage inflicted by the prematurely detonated device. He thanked
his luck that none of his comrades had received more than burns,
while the enemy remained stunned and bloodied.