Edge of Redemption (A Star Too Far Book 3) (16 page)

Bark nodded. “It’s close, just behind.” Her shoulders were tense and the bulge from her sidearm obvious through the rain slicked jacket.

The wide doors of the elevator cracked open and slid aside.

“And here it is,” Ambassador Myint said, smiling. He looked to Natyasha with sparkling eyes and stepped ahead of the human mass around him.

The first thing that stepped out of the elevator was massive, like an oversized hairless ape. The shoulders were as wide as a truck with heavy armor plate wrapped on it like iron kettles. The thumbless hands gripped steel gray autocannons with stripes of ammunition running behind it. Helmet of gray blocked out the face, a face that on the edge looked human, but distorted and odd. But most of all, it was the height. Four meters. Four meters of mass, intensity, and plodding determination. More marched behind it.

“See?” Ambassador Myint said over the dropping noise of the crowd. He walked between the first pair of the giants and disappeared into the elevator.

The crowd didn’t seem to know what to do. They gawked at the monsters that stood in the rain. The giants spread out until a dozen stood shoulder to shoulder. Behind them even more milled inside of the cargo elevator. Orders from the militia echoed out over the humming of the crowd.

“Bark? What the fuck is this?” Natyasha asked as she pushed her way through the crowd.

Garth pressed through the back and shoved Natyasha out of the way. He snapped his head around and glared at her. “What have you done? You foul, foul woman!”

Natyasha ignored the remark and followed as closely behind Bark as she could. She could feel the crowd spreading, edging away, preparing to fly. She could hear the voices ordering them to cover, move away, quit fucking off. But the giants, she thought, good god, what
were
they? She turned to look and saw Garth break through the front row of the crowd. She stopped.

“Move!” Bark yelled and yanked at Natyasha’s wrist.

“Send out the Ambassador! We will not have foreign troops armed on our planet!” Garth shouted above the din of the crowd. He stopped midway between the shifting militia and the line of Hun giants.

“Get in!” Bark hissed.

“Wait,” Natyasha whispered. She stared over the scrambling troops and felt it in the air: violence. “Wait.”

The militia sought cover. Troops sprinted across the rain slicked concrete and tucked behind containers. The giants looked down at Garth. Autocannons scanned the crowd while rain streamed out of the flame suppressors.

Garth stood alone. His hair pressed down tightly on his scalp. He thrust his chin out. “Drop your weapons!”

Natyasha could see it coming. A part of her envied Garth, to be making a stand. To be the one who stood with total conviction. A patriot. The truest sort. But the fear inside of her, the fear that kept her in power so long, told her better.

“We need to go!” Bark yelled in Natyasha’s ear.

Natyasha pushed Bark’s metal hand off her shoulder and watched. She needed to see it. It wouldn’t be long, she could feel it.

The rain stopped with only a drizzle of mist hissing against the black of the elevator ribbon. The militia was as hidden as they could be behind containers and concrete organizers. The facility wasn’t designed for combat but for commerce.

Garth took a single step closer.

One of the giants leveled the muzzle of the autocannon in Garth’s direction and pulled the trigger. Rounds erupted like a steady drumbeat. In a moment he was nothing but a pile of meat.

Bark threw her arm around Natyasha’s neck and dragged her into the back of the car. Natyasha was silent as if in shock.

“Go, go!” Bark yelled to the driver. She threw herself across the seat and covered Natyasha’s body. Broken glass sprayed over them. A ricochet blasted the upper window support.

The Hun line took a single step forward in unison. The opening gap allowed more of the giants to draw weapons through the breach and use the armored bodies before them as cover. As each stopped, they opened fire and raked the containers and cover around them.

Heavy slugs punched through alloy containers and perforated concrete sorting walls. The militia seemed unsure of what to do. The look of triumph was gone and replaced with a shock. The celebration and jubilance disappeared, now only a realization that the freedom would be bought with blood.

Natyasha pushed Bark off her and felt the vehicle accelerating away. Her ears rang and she looked upward through the gash in the roof. Then it felt different, she could feel it deep inside of her. The shockwave hit a second later and her stomach felt like someone kicked it with an iron boot. Then the darkness came.

She snapped her eyes open and felt a raw scraping on her back. The edges of sound, clipped and muffled, began to return. Small arms fire, rapid thuds of heavier weapons, and something large, something booming. She looked up to find Bark pulling her.

“I can walk,” she whispered.

Bark snapped her head back and helped Natyasha to her feet. The pair huddled against a concrete wall. Behind them the smoking wreckage of the touring car lay mangled with the nose punched out by a heavy slug. Gunfire raged with the sing of ricochets whining through the air.

Bark looked relaxed, downright placid. Her arms rested on her hips, the dull alloy offset by the black trousers.

Natyasha looked down the line and felt anger mixed with despair. She snapped her head and looked across the wide concrete pad. She followed groups of militia sprinting away, sprinting without weapons or order. It was a rout and it hit her, right in the gut. “Bark, what are we doing?”

Bark glanced over her shoulder. “Waiting for another transport.”

“Can we wait somewhere else?”

“You pay me to keep you out of trouble, that’s what we’re doing here.”

“Helluva job.”

“I didn’t invite them down with a troopship.”

Natyasha remained silent. Her insides ached, like she’d just gotten kicked in the chest. Every breath reminded her that something bad was happening.

She wondered if they would shoot the leaders. Everyone? There must be some value to a person in charge. Or maybe they wanted a fresh start and she’d be shot on sight. She’d not only misplayed her cards, she knew she hadn’t even been playing with the right deck.

Autocannon rounds smacked into the heavy concrete embankment behind Bark and Natyasha spraying chips of rock and grit into the air.

Bark flinched and tucked her head down. “We need to move,” she said.

Natyasha snapped her head to the other side and saw nothing. “Where?”

“Somewhere else!” Bark hissed and grabbed onto Natyasha’s hand.

Natyasha found herself drug behind with the cold alloy grip squeezing tighter than she’d like. She wanted to cry out, to tell her to stop, but knew better. Not now, not here. Get out alive.

They passed the wreckage of the transport and crouched behind the crumpled front end. The smell of burning plastic and torched resin was overpowering. The rapid sound of small arms fire drifted away while occasional thumps still echoed out.

“Wait,” Bark shook her head at Natyasha. “They’re looking our way.”

“How do you know?” Natyasha turned her head and looked over her shoulder. She couldn’t see anything beyond the rising smoke.

“I’ve got a sniper observing,” Bark mumbled and leaned forward.

“Why isn’t he shooting them?”

Bark leaned back. “It wasn’t doing anything, he’s more valuable keeping an eye out for us.”

Natyasha felt even more helpless. They couldn’t touch the giants, what military force she had was scattered. Only the thugs and police remained. Her thugs, and her police, she thought. “Can he see the Ambassador?”

Bark spoke low into her mic and shook her head. “Negative. There’s another elevator car coming down.”

“We need to get out of here!” Natyasha said.

“I’m working on it!”

The sounds of the Hun giants echoed through the containers. Each step like an elephant with the clanging of armor. The pace was slow, steady, unnerving in its tone. Each step was just far enough apart that it seemed as if they stopped, only to start once more a split second later.

“The Ambassador is out.”

“Shoot him,” Natyasha growled.

Bark called it in and the sound of a single shot cracked through the air. She clicked her teeth and looked at Natyasha. “We’ve got to go.”

Natyasha looked at Bark angrily and heard the sound of the approaching attackers. “What? What the fuck? Did he miss?”

“They’ve got a grav shield down there,” Bark said. She crawled to the front of the wreckage. “Can you run?”

“Yes.”

“We’re going to have a distraction, get to the next line of cargo containers, I’ll be right behind you. Got it?”

Natyasha nodded quickly and trembled with fear. Fear like she hadn’t known in a very long time. Her skin tingled and her mouth tasted like steel. The feeling of soreness disappeared and she edged next to Bark. She glanced over and saw how small Bark was, all muscle and alloy, and not much else.

Bark nodded at Natyasha. “Go!”

The pair broke out from behind the cover of the wreck. Legs pumped and arms swung as feet slammed down into puddles of dirt and concrete rubble. A wall of gunfire erupted from the edge of elevator complex. The troops who had fled now had positions far away and were laying down what fire they could. The crack of nanite rounds was interspersed with the boom of conventional gunpowder.

In response the Hun troops leveled more fire. The rattle of the autocannons reflected off the low cloud cover, making it sound like twice as many were firing. Then a new sound came. A heavy whine with a screeching and crunching of concrete behind it.

Natyasha turned her head to look and stumbled. Bark snatched her arm and caught her before she sprawled out. She could see a pair of the Hun giants firing away from them. She wanted to ask Bark what the noise was but didn’t have enough breath.

“Go!” Bark yelled. Her alloy hand pushed Natyasha forward.

The new sound paused and then a rumbling boom shattered through the air. The concussion was massive, deep, penetrating. Nearby puddles shuddered and shook with dancing ripples bouncing in the center.

Natyasha stumbled again at the sound and felt the fear rising. Almost, she thought. Almost. Her feet pounded against the rough concrete. Her lungs burned, it was a ripping and tearing feeling with each sucking breath. There it was, so close, another fifty meters to cover.

Silhouettes of militia appeared through the haze. Bursts of gunfire zinged by and then the whining crunching sound started again.

She saw the next shot out of the corner of her eye. Fear rose like nothing she’d felt before, an animal fear.

It was a massive concussion that shocked the edge of the complex. Air rippled and steel buckled. The immense roar slammed into them a second later and Bark tumbled and rolled. Natyasha wasn’t as graceful and crashed forward into a heap. One of the giants turned and swung the tree trunk barrel sideways and poured rapid fire at the containers before them.

“Get up!” Bark yelled. She sprinted and grabbed onto Natyasha’s arm.

Natyasha rolled and looked up into the sky. She shrieked as rounds skipped nearby. She knew she had to stand and run, she knew if she stayed she’d die. But she couldn’t do it. The fear was so deep, so tight, like a net that held her down. All she wanted to do was crawl and curl into a ball. She could feel the gravel against her cheek as she turned her head towards the pair of giants.

One continued to level fire at the edges of the terminal. The other held his barrel slightly higher and raked streams of autocannon rounds above her head. The muzzle flashed and a moment later the sound reached them. Then the tank crunched around the corner..

It had a set of four tracks, each independent from the rest. The upper chassis was low, slender, and drooped inside of the tracks. On the top a bulbous blister grew out with a rectangular barrel a few meters long. The barrel was massively thick with a cloud of steam rising from the end. It stopped, the turret turned slightly, and fired once more.

Natyasha cried out in pain. The concussion was amazing, the force of the blow beyond anything she’d ever felt. She looked and saw the tangled steel and tumbled containers. They had no chance. She could see it. How could they fight that? Far above she saw motion, something in the mist, and decided now was the time to stop.

“Bark. Stand me up,” Natyasha said, trying to stand. The fear was gone and now something else came—a sense of inevitability.

She loved Winterthur, she loved the people. To see them slaughtered like this was too much. Her plan had fallen apart into so many pieces of broken glass.

“We’ve got to go now!” Bark yelled. She hunched and tugged on Natyasha’s arm.

“Go,” Natyasha said, stripping her arm away from the alloy grip. “Go.”

Bark spun and tumbled backward rolling herself and covering the gap between her and the concrete wall. Her face was tight with pain and bore a hurt look.

Natyasha felt the ground shift and sway beneath her feet. The first step would be the hardest. She willed one step and felt her toes crunch as they came down. It was as if a weight was lifted, just by one step. The second step came easier.

The giant continued to rake fire above her. It seemed oblivious to her stumbling ahead.

She raised both hands above her and showed her palms, wide open and empty. It was like this, or die trying. Her hair blasted back as the cannon fired once more. The concussion made her stumble , but she caught herself and dropped to a knee. The raw pain of the concrete cutting through snapped her awake again.

“Move,” she said through gritted teeth and stood herself up again. She locked eyes with the giant and stepped closer.

The giant’s visor was almost totally dark but a set of deep eyes, like whales eyes stared back through it. It was human, or at least human derived. The proportions were close, but everything was off a bit. The shoulders slumped oddly, the angles of the arms off, while the steps were awkward.

The sight of the hands shook her. They had no opposable thumbs. She saw the features and knew it was not natural.