Chaos Quarter: Imperial Ambitions Page 40

  He jerked it now and charged to his right, toward the edge of the group. His gun barked and put two shots in the chest of a warrior, and then he was among them again. Bones cracked as he barreled forward, smashing two bodies in front of him, sending them flying through the air. Bullets rained down on him as he jerked left, slashing with a bayonet at the nearest warrior. The man parried it with his gun, the blade cutting halfway through the barrel. But Rex stabbed forward with his right, punching a hole in the man’s neck.

  He moved to charge forward, but something caught his attention. To his right he saw movement—men, running in his direction. They were retreating from the spaceport, which, he could now see, was a carpet of ruined flesh and mangled bodies. But the retreating warriors were in no retiring mood. Their guns were up, ready, and pointed directly at him. He was caught between two forces, his suit hobbled and weakening.

  For a moment it was quiet, neither group firing. He half-expected them to demand his surrender. But that was just not going to happen. So he turned on the greater threat—the men retreating from the spaceport. He brought up his left arm, ready to lay waste with what grenades he had left. The warriors saw the motion and picked up speed, intending to bull rush him.

  “Come and get it then…” he said. His voice, heavy and tired.

  “Cease fire!”

  The words caught him off guard, and the warriors too. Their commanders shouted orders and they stopped, looking confused and upset. Rex didn’t know who had spoken the words, but they had been announced on an open channel, for all to hear.

  “All warriors, cease fire. Take up positions at the edge of the meadow and await further orders,” the voice continued.

  To his surprise the warriors did just that. They glared death at him, but lowered their weapons. They fell back, taking up a position in the ditch he’d just finished decimating.

  “What in the hell—”

  “Rex, stand down,” Lucius’s voice said in his ear. “Their commander has requested a truce, to speak with me.”

  “Oh, well if that’s all…” Rex muttered incredulously.

  “It’s necessary,” Lucius informed. “Trust me on this. I would recommend that you, and any other survivors you know of, start moving toward the ship. You will not be fired upon.”

  “Really? You think they’re just gonna let me waltz on through, do you?” Rex said with a sardonic chuckle.

  “I do. And I think it’s your only decent chance to get those refugees to the ship safely,” Lucius replied.

  Rex grumbled, not taking his eyes off the men. The surviving warriors from the spaceport glared at him angrily, their gun barrels never leaving him. But they did not fire.

  “Right…” Rex muttered, slowly moving toward the ship, struggling to walk with his damaged right leg. The warriors parted gradually, but kept their aim on him.

  “This is gonna work out just fine…”

  ***

  Longshot

  “All right, brother; you have your moment. What is it you wish to say?” Lucius asked. He could hear Helen breathing heavily behind him, tense, ready for it all to explode.

  “Lucius, why are you doing this?” Aetius asked, though it didn’t sound much like a question, more a disappointed sigh.

  “I think the better question is why you people are doing this,” Lucius replied. “These people were doing quite well before you showed up, weren’t hurting anybody. Then you come down and start killing people…”

  “These serfs are criminals,” Aetius replied. “Worse than the feral ones. These serfs knew the True Order and abandoned it, regressing back to an archaic state. What we do today is long overdue.”

  “Well brother, you just answered your own question with bullshit like that,” Lucius remarked.

  “Bullshit?” said Aetius, confused.

  “It means your reasoning is no more useful than a pile of cow excrement,” Lucius explained. “One of those delightful terms you learn when you ‘go Terran.’”

  “You seem to have become anarchic yourself,” Aetius replied coolly. “Look, Lucius, I cannot reason you out of something you were never reasoned in to—”

  “Likewise,” Lucius interrupted.

  “But I cannot stand by and let you die here, not like this. You were noble once. Some small piece of nobility must remain in you.”

  “Boy, I have become more ‘noble’ than any Europan will ever be,” Lucius replied. “There are a few hundred dead monsters on the tarmac who can attest to that. You fools talk of nobility, but are still too stupid to realize that it is something that has to be earned, worked for. Of course, even if you admitted that, not a damn one of you would know how to earn it, because not a damn one of you can tell good from bad!”

  “There is no need to blaspheme,” Aetius replied. Lucius only half-paid him attention, turning his gaze to the holograms. Most of the refugees trickling in from the south were onboard. Rex was moving slowly across the tarmac, in full sight of the enemy. From the flanks he saw two groups. One, slightly closer, was Keith’s, coming from the east. From the west, at a slower pace, came Kate and the refugees. They would need more time.

  “Do not pretend you are one of them, Lucius,” Aetius said. “You are not a Terran. You have known the True Order; you know that the words you say, the words they say, are nonsense.”

  “Nonsense? I know the serf ‘animals’ that made it here built a better world than anything I saw in the empire,” said Lucius. “I know I’d be willing to die to protect these people. Are you willing to die to enslave them, Aetius?”

  “They are not slaves. They are not True People deprived of their station. They are serfs. God has placed them where they are, and it is not our, or their, place to challenge that,” Aetius explained. “Truly, brother, do not the truths mean anything to you anymore? Have you excised common sense completely from your troubled mind?”

  “Have you never thought for yourself? About anything you have learned? About anything you have blindly assumed to be true?” Lucius countered.

  “What good is it to question what has long been proven? God’s True Servants have decreed this wisdom. If the emperor—”

  “The emperor knows no more of God than a dead rat,” Lucius snapped.

  Several deep breaths came over the line, Aetius restraining his temper. Lucius smiled a bit at that, surprised that even at seventeen he was just as easy to bait as he had been in his younger years. Always a hothead, Aetius. He figured it was his parentage. Emperor’s sons didn’t take kindly to being challenged, much less having their parentage smeared. But Lucius figured if anybody deserved smearing, it was the Cheseworth dynasty.

  “The emperor is his instrument in this universe,” Aetius seethed. “His will is not to be questioned.”

  “Only God’s will is not to be questioned,” Lucius replied. “And God made men to be free.”

  “You are only making it worse for yourself, brother,” Aetius declared. “That torment you will be made to suffer, before Gnaeus kills you, will only be multiplied by what you say here.”

  “If that is that case, then please let your Exalted Half-Brother, God’s True Servant, know that as of today, I am passing sentence on him,” Lucius said, his smile growing. “For the crimes of rape, mass murder, assault, enslavement, and attempted genocide, I do hereby sentence Gnaeus III Cheseworth to death by whatever means are at my disposal. Should he come across my path, I will send him to hell, along with any other noble motherfuckers in his vicinity.”

  More silence, more heavy breaths.

  “You will die for this,” Aetius said simply.

  “Well, I’m already under sentence of death. It was so nice of your late father to make that clear to all. I figure I might as well extend Gnaeus the same courtesy. I would hate for him to go to his grave unprepared,” Lucius remarked.

  “You blaspheme!” roared Aetius. “To speak ill of God’s True Servant is death and torment in the seven hells! And to imply that his lesser servants lie with their mothers—”<
br />
  “Oh, right. ‘Motherfucker’ is another one of those lovely Terran expressions. It doesn’t actually mean—”

  “Be quiet!” Aetius screamed.

  “Hey, you wanted to talk. Now you don’t. You’re being maddeningly inconsist—”

  “You are a fool, brother! A stupid, serf-loving fool! I had meant to offer you a chance to die honorably—to surrender to me and return to the empire to meet your fate as a repentant! To reclaim some small part of your lost birthright in death!” bellowed Aetius.

  “That was your plan?” scoffed Lucius. “To offer me death? I suppose it’s a good thing you’re not a trueborn heir. God forbid what would happen to the empire if somebody with such a mind was running things.”

  “I am revoking my offer,” Aetius growled. “You will die as so many of these serfs have died, as an animal, rotting in a ditch.”

  “If so, then I’ll die in good company,” Lucius declared.

  “I will make sure all know the dishonor you spewed—”

  The words were cut off by the sound of gunfire. Lucius’s eyes shot to the image from the rear-gun camera. Warriors were firing, at Rex and the surviving freed serfs. Lucius did not wait a moment more. The rear gun was already locked on the building that sheltered Aetius. Without a shred of remorse, he squeezed down hard on the trigger.

  ***

  Valley Town

  “I will make sure all know the dishonor you spewed here tonight,” Aetius declared, only for gunfire to drown out his words. He glanced up from his position behind the fireplace at the other warriors taking shelter in the house.

  “Who fired? I gave orders to—”

  A deafening explosion filled his ears, the house disintegrating into a maelstrom of shattered glass and splintered wood. Booming shrieks filled the air. Aetius was knocked backward by a hail of flying studs.

  He hit hard, but his suit absorbed the impact. He lifted his head up, trying to get a grasp of the situation. Instead he saw a blur of red bricks as the chimney collapsed on top of him. Then he saw blackness.

  ***

  Rex didn’t see who opened fire. It had come somewhere from the east, from the direction of Keith’s people as they skirted the tarmac. From the sound of it, it had clearly been a Europan gun, but within a second, rifles of both sides let loose, the roar of battle filling the air.

  A half-dozen rounds struck Rex as he straggled across the tarmac. Just when he thought he’d be able to make it to the ship, entertained the whole way by Lucius putting his baby bro in his place…

  He spun as quickly as his damaged leg would allow, bringing up his arms to confront the enemy. As he did Longshot’s guns came back to life, dissolving a house across the meadow into a shattered pile of wood and brick.

  The warriors emerged, streaming out of their positions. A quick glance in each direction confirmed what Rex already knew, that the little parley between Lucius and his brother hadn’t bought enough time. To his right came Kate and her refugees; to his left were forty-odd survivors of Keith’s force. A few hundred yards separated them from the ship, and two hundred yards separated them from the warriors. They were all in the open, exposed.

  So he planted himself and aimed for the nearest wave of approaching warriors. Before he could fire, a short burst from Longshot’s rail-guns streaked over his head, dissolving the wave. He jerked left, pumping out quick bursts of fifty cal. One went down, and then another.

  He heard footsteps to his left and saw a familiar face. Kate and her six remaining men moved behind him, and then stretched out into a line on his right. It was a thin barrier, but it put a line of fire between the advancing Europans and the refugees. The later scurried behind them, making straight for the ship.

  Their little line opened fire, cutting into a wave of Europans three times their number as they charged. Rex hammered home with his fifty cal, cutting up half the wave by his lonesome. He held off the grenades, waiting until they got closer, not wanting to waste one of the few he had left.

  A screaming roar came from his left. He glanced away momentarily, seeing a force of Europan soldiers approaching on his flank. They dissolved under the fire of the ship’s guns, two-thirds of them being torn to bloody shreds in as much time as it took to glance. Then abruptly, the shrieking stopped. The big gun went silent.

  Empty!

  It was a cold realization, but one he should have expected. They were all running low on ammo. Longshot would be no exception, especially considering how many dead Europans littered the meadow and tarmac.

  Yet a third of the Europan flankers still lived, ten in all. And they were closing on the refugees.

  “I got flank!” he bellowed and wrenched himself around. He got his left arm up just in time, blasting away with grenades just as the first of the flankers opened fire. His rounds hit home, spraying flame and metal across the warriors as they sprinted. Half of them went down instantly. The others straggled, injured. Two brought their weapons up on him, spraying fire at his chest. Bursts of lead hit him hard. He felt a sharp pang on his left side, in his ribs. He ignored it, picking off the survivors with his fifty cal. He’d nearly completed the job when a loud roar filled his ears. He hurled forward, slamming hard onto the tarmac. His faceplate cracked, blurring his HUD. Pain wracked his back, his computers warning him of serious damage at a half-dozen points. It all came together in his mind.

  Grenade!

  Shouts arose behind him, a woman’s voice. Turning over he saw Kate, standing in front of him, firing at a group of four warriors as they closed. The image swam as he shook off the daze. One of the approaching warriors went down with a bullet in his neck. Then another fell, a small hole appearing in his forehead. Kate turned to the third.

  Then she lurched backward, a half-dozen shots ringing out loud. She sprawled out beside him, gasping for breath. Rex blinked, his vision still blurry and doubled. He wrenched up his right arm, his arms and the suit’s electroactive fibers slow to respond. The two surviving warriors shifted their guns to him, ten feet away.

  He fired first, the big fifty cal rounds sending one man flying backward. The other peppered Rex’s chest with shots, sending new alarms ringing in his helmet. A quick jerk right and he fired again, taking the man’s head half off with a pair of slugs. He jerked himself up to his knees, painfully.

  Kate lay flat on her back, coughing blood. Her eyes were glazed but still moving, searching. One of her militia darted over, the youngster Dan. He looked terrified, glancing nervously from his wounded commander to the advancing warriors. Rex did another quick scan. The refugees were sprinting up the ramp, into the ship. Fire from the barricade inside was slowing the warriors, but not stopping them. Keith’s people were shooting as they ran, still twenty yards from the ramp.

  “We need more time,” he said to himself. With a scowl he turned, finding Dan.

  “Get her onto the ship,” Rex said. “I’ll do what I can.”

  “W-what?” stammered Dan.

  “Just go dammit! I’ll provide cover!”

  Rex lurched upward, metal screeching on metal as the damaged suit struggled to respond to his commands. Slowly he sidestepped right, blasting away with his remaining grenades at the charging warriors. Shouts behind him signified that the militia was moving. A scream of pain interrupted the din of gunfire—the scream of a militiaman getting cut down. But he couldn’t spare a second to sympathize. He just kept firing, kept sidestepping, the bulk of the ship rising behind him. Rounds hit home against his chest, more and more. The figures that blinked in his visor told the tale—chest integrity, 11 percent, legs at 17.

  He fired his last grenade. A pair of warriors flew through the air, slamming down to the ground. He had twenty rounds left in his fifty cal, and tried to bring it up. As it traversed its arc, a hail of bullets stuck his visor. The force jerked his head back. His computers flashed, and then the HUD vanished. He fell backward, the powered armor no longer responding to his commands.

  He slammed hard on the ground once more, the
victorious shouts of the warriors filling his ears.

  ***

  Longshot

  A cracking sound filled the sick bay. Vermella’s head perked up from her spot against one of the exam tables. A few feet away Calidus sat, his hands cuffed to the table legs like hers. She wondered idly what made the sound. It had been somewhat audible, not muffled like the gunfire outside.

  Calidus was grimacing. Vermella cocked her head quizzically, and then looked down to his hand. The man’s left thumb was in an unnatural place, pushed toward his palm, almost completely beneath his middle finger. The Europan awkwardly positioned his feet, placing his heels on the handcuffs. With a grimace he kicked downward, hard.

  He hand was free. Without losing a beat, he smashed his hand on the floor, forcing his thumb back into position. He pulled the cuff around the table leg, the useless shackle hanging of his right wrist.

  “What are you doing?” she asked, worry flashing through her mind.

  “Do not speak,” Calidus grumbled, getting to his feet. The man’s eyes scanned the sick bay, looking for some sort of a weapon. Vermella tensed.

  “You’re not going to take the ship,” she said as if lecturing a child. “You’re outnumbered, and they have a robot.”

  “I said, be silent!” snapped Calidus.

  Vermella sighed and shook her head.

  “They can see you, you know,” she remarked. “You’re not going anywhere.”

  “In moments this ship will be swarming with my people,” Calidus proclaimed, rummaging through drawers. He removed a scalpel from one, tearing off the protective plastic. “All these Terran filth, and you, will be in the hands of His Eminence’s Intelligence Ministry.”

  He turned, smirking triumphantly at her.

  “The emperor will be most interested in seeing if your skills can be domesticated…and passed down,” Calidus said with a dark laugh.