The 6th of Six (The Legend of Kimraig Llu) (34 page)

Hugging the walls of the stairs as they steadily climbed, their constant vigilance began to take its toll on nerves all around. The large broken window at the landing glared down and passed judgment; it would withdraw its light at the turn.

They moved up to the first switch back in utter silence. All were sure of the direction but the clouds fought them, obscuring the light from outside. The angle going up was completely wrong, the sun shined down the steps they had just climbed then went gray—more clouds.

At the next level, Hunter Curtis passed the door without checking and it burst open, pinning him to the stairwell wall.

Bubbles poured out, down, and up as an ocean sweeping across dikes in the outer harbor during a hurricane. The froth did not have spears, yet LaJay caught three separate thrusts against her short fiber shield before she could free a throwing knife and whip it into the mass.

They were gone almost as quickly as they came, no pile of rags this time.

The door closed slowly to reveal a crumpled and dazed Hunter Curtis. Luna forced her way to the front and slapped a patch on the door. With a puff of smoke, the door fused to the housing.

“No LaJay, leave him be.” Kimraig grunted and found he was incapable of shouting just this short distance. He would have been lying there if he had not been too weak to lead.

“I will take care of this before this puke kills us all,” she whispered, holding the blow that would finish Hunter Curtis

“Hunter Curtis, take the center of the column until you regain your senses.” Kimraig told himself he was cutting the boy some slack since he was Leader Breen’s son. He was not sure that was the reason. Was it because this boy-man was part of him or the normal reaction of a Training Instructor giving a new Trooper the benefit of the doubt?

Luna had moved in front of LaJay, taking lead. Rat between him and Curtis was good. What remained? What was nipping around the edges of the inner sense that had never let him down? It was probably just worry at splitting his forces.

No, take some insurance—now.

He touched Marta’s shoulder. When she turned, he eased his lips near her ear and gave explicit instructions in a soft voice. Not a whisper, a whisper might seem strange to the rest of his troops especially since the pummeling of Hunter Curtis.

She nodded once, signaling she understood. She moved to Luna, spoke softly, and they both turned around and moved to the center of the column. In passing, she explained the situation to Rat and motioned for her to replace LaJay as lead.

Kimraig indicated Rat should lead their column up the stairs. They needed momentum to clear them away from Marta and Luna who were exchanging heated gestures with Hunter Curtis. They moved just past the landing, Rat climbing only two steps.

Now, just a short nap should do the trick.
Kimraig crumpled on the steps before he knew what was happening.

Despite the embarrassment when he woke, it was clear their measured assent up the stairs would have been final. When the concrete fell from the landing above, they remained clustered around him just two steps up the stairs. Most of the chunks missed them. Without him passing out, all of them would have been in the middle of the next switchback with the concrete smashing them.

Most of the missiles, went clanging against the metal railings and on down the opening between the flights. Still, it brought yells and grunts from all around. Their voices masked his moan as a small chip sheared off by impact caught him between his lungs.

The rest of the afternoon became images floating in heavy mist.

Rat, half lifting him to his feet.

Stumbling up endless stairs—wrapped in soft layers of gray.

A big ‘6’ on the wall, a door opened and they were in a long, high hallway with huge broken windows at each end allowing the wind to whip fresh air around them.
Too much light in here for Ergots to visit he hoped.
He knew there could not be a party, but everyone except LaJay went running off to the opposite end of the hall to join in.
Bring me cake
. Okay, this floor is comfortable. Nap time again as he realized he was still on the stair landing, without Hunter Curtis.

* * *

Hunter Curtis felt like a child sent to his mother for punishment. Yes, he was following Kimraig’s orders, retreating down the stairs they had just climbed to the first floor, then following his mother’s footsteps up the set of stairs she had taken. Well, he was almost to the bottom floor.

By now, it was clear to him that he could not stomp holes in any concrete stair tread. He would have kept trying except for those two Crosser women—Marta and Luna.

They had given him no choice. He had to leave his sulk on that last tread or risk them taking all the glory. If, in some wild quirk of the world, Kimraig had called this right, and his mother was actually climbing into a trap, he would stay with those two. He just knew the old man was chewing too many leaves to have good judgment.

It was obvious to him that with Brody-1 leading his mother’s Battle Group, there was no way they could be surprised as he had been. He could not see how any old rag-tag collection of Outsiders and Ergot bubbles could beat her.

His Mother’s attack was not in danger.

Hunter Curtis’ white-hot anger started to eat at him halfway up the stairs, fueled by the memory of the bubbles bursting the hallway door down, trapping him underneath. The fact that Kimraig ordered him to take the protected spot in the middle of the column—questioned his ability—stoked his anger. That swinging door had overpowered him; who expected bubbles anyway? As far as he was concerned this was not inattention to duty at all, just superior force by an army.

It was for him to lead, not that old, decrepit Hunter. His mother, Leader Breen, was in command of this entire building. It mattered little that she had assigned him to Kimraig’s command. He was born to lead. She had told him so.

The elevators where this dumb plan had started were well behind them. One last bit of memory stirred up his anger. Kimraig had not bothered to come to him with the order; he had sent the two Crossers. Well, as soon as he got to his mother, he would make sure they all suffered for these slights.

As they slid to a stop at the second set of stairs where Leader Breen had begun her assault, two spear points forced him against the wall.

“Move quietly up the stairs boy,” the one called Marta hissed in his right ear.

“One outburst and we will spit you, and roast you,” Luna whispered in his other ear.

We will see who roasts who when we get to Leader Breen.

He only nodded his understanding.

“Now up you go. Point man always gets killed first.”

They shared a private grunt as he jerked the stairwell door open and started up. As the steel slab closed, he had trouble focusing his night vision. Memory would guide him until the blue lights chose to join him. All Troopers trained on stairs in every available building. Overall, stairs were much the same.

Training helped shut out his anger. Blue squiggles of his night vision clicked in.

His armor and long shield led the way. Now he understood; they would use him to blunt any attack in the narrow confines of the stairwell. Their short spears and small fiber shields would protect his exposed ribs as he thrust with his longer spear and blocked with his shield. Smart, they had done this before.

Half way up the first set of treads, the din of battle filtered down the stairs. Picking up speed, he turned the corner and bubbles smothered over him. Startled, he missed half a step and two clamping hands kept him upright.

“Easy, you are not dead so they will not feed on you.”

Was that Marta?

“Stab forward with your spear. Make sure they are not covering for an attack by Outsiders.”

The other one, Luna, he thought.

Satisfied they were not food, the bubbles flowed back up the stairs.

Hunter Curtis charged up the cleared steps to the next landing where three Outsiders were jammed in the doorway. They must have run down the steps. He managed to spear the last one, forcing his body to block the closing door. Marta and Luna were through the doorway in pursuit of the other two.

The froth of bubbles poured down once again, sucking then tearing at the rags. In seconds, they flowed out the open door into the hallway, giving chase to Marta and Luna. Only rags remained at his feet.

He shuddered and then glanced up the stairs. Wait! Wait for their support. The two Crossers quickly joined him. Fresh blood dripped from their short spears. He looked past them waiting for those things to return.

“Do not give them a thought. They took the elevator,” the two of them grunted together.

That must be their creepy laugh.

He started to question them about that, and then decided there was no need for an answer. The sound of the continuing battle above forced him rapidly up the two flights of stairs to the next landing. Carnage met his entrance.

With her huge shoulder jammed against the open hallway door, Brody-1 lay in a heap half on the bottom tread of the stair leading up to the next floor. In front of and around her were several piles of rags and a like number of useless spears. Midway up the stairs were two splayed piles of Trooper’s uniforms. Almost as if each person had discarded them on the way to a quick dip in a pond.

“Hallway is empty, just a couple piles of rags. Big female must have stuck them bad and they crawled out there.”

Luna paused a minute then nodded toward Brody-1. “Want help getting her comfortable?”

“She will be fine just like that. We must get to Leader Breen.”

He started up the stairs and then stopped. No, Brody-1 would have led going up the stairs. Her position here on the landing meant she was attacking down the stairwell not protecting someone going up. A trap had cut their force in half. How did that old Hunter know?

“Marta, check that hallway again, both ways. The rest of her Troopers must be down their somewhere. I am going up...” Before he could start Luna was halfway to the second level.

“She meant no offense young Hunter. You are bigger, she is faster,” Marta smiled as she turned out the door to the hallway.

Since they were taking point, he would make sure Brody-1 had a little comfort. No one had salvaged the small device at the bottom of the door that could hold it open. He hit the slide with his toe and wedged the panel against the wall.

She was dead weight. Somehow, he managed to get her flat with an empty uniform blouse supporting her wounded head. As always, the froth of bubbles had sealed the deep wound in her forehead and the extra deep gash along her right side. Then, work to do.

From the stairs, he retrieved spears, short swords and knives from the piles of Trooper uniforms. He did the same in the hallway where Marta had disappeared. The spears were stacked against the wall closest to the stairwell leading down. The knives and short swords were near Brody-1.

He was ready to defend the stairwell landing. Spears or knifes could be thrown up, or down the stairs from here. The hallway would be another matter. He could shut the door but then he would have to rely on his blue light to see in the dark, and he could not hear Marta’s return.
What you have is always enough,
he remembered that command from his training ground. He would remember it again in the future and recall hearing it on this landing.

“Kimraig is coming down the long hallway to us,” Luna shouted down the stairwell. “It will take a couple of minutes. He is not moving very fast.”

She was just as quickly gone.

Hunter Curtis smiled, served the old Hunter right. He hoped the pain lasted a very long time.

Not two minutes later, he heard Marta shouting from the far hallway.

“Hunter Curtis, Marta coming your way.”

Good thinking on her part, she would not want to run into range of these spears. Now he was a little more impressed with these Crossers, more so than this morning.

“Marta coming through the door,” and she edged around the doorframe.

“What did you find,” he asked.

“No sign of the remainder of Brody-1’s battle group. I did find Breen down the far end of the building near the other set of stairs. Looks like that Outsider Bradley tried to carry her away.”

Marta edged over to the stairs and sat, breathing hard.

“I will go get her.” He started out the door.

“Wait. Need a stretcher to move her. That Bradley is dead. Breathed his last when I ran up, she cut his throat good.”

After all the talk, Marta took several deep breaths.

“We must get to her, now.”
No, that cannot be coming from me. I know better.

Whether he liked it or not, he had to give Kimraig his due. He had guessed—known somehow—what would happen to his mother in this stairwell. Both of them waiting here was good defense. Protect the whole. His first decision would leave their flank open and prove he was not ready to lead.

“That will not work. Marta, you know where Leader Breen is, please return and stay with her. She must be safe.”