Brigends (The Final War Series Book 1) (26 page)

The assassin had no lofty goals of paradise, only aspirations of supremacy. Under Kroll’s new world order, there would always be a need for a man such as himself — a man not afraid to grab hold of opportunities when presented to him.

But, he was also no fool. He knew, regardless of the mutually beneficial nature of their partnership, Kroll was someone to whom he should never turn his back on. After decades of dealing with Zolarians, he learned to have a backup plan or two handy, just in case.

While the Zolarian technicians were integrating the hybrid with the Leviathan’s network, he had surreptitiously imported an override — three small lines of redundant code buried within the matrix. If activated, the failsafe would render the hybrid inert.

Serov was smug. He would play his new master’s game, for now.

The other two ships in his flotilla, the Akula and Pantera, reported battle ready. Without his input, the ships staged, waiting for orders from the Spire.

He strode from the view-port and across the bridge, inspecting both crew and workstations. Each person he approached stiffened, hoping not to attract his unwanted scrutiny. Little did they know, he was impassive and never bothered to actually pay attention to the petty details. All the same, they assumed otherwise and acted in accordance.

A monitor flashed. He rushed over. “Report.”

The officer deciphered the readout on her screen. “Sir, there is an unidentified target bearing two — zero. Range seven kilometers. Three hundred knots closure.”

“It’s Pavel. Lock in a firing solution —"

“Sir, the hybrid is already executing a firing solution.”

While the hybrid initiated an attack pattern, the bridge crew sat back and watched the computer do the work. Serov hated not being in command of his own flagship.

The Akula and the Pantera assumed combat formation alongside the Leviathan. Seconds later, the three ships opened up with a barrage of missiles at the incoming threat. Smoke trails outlined their trajectories along the path toward the smaller ship.

An alarm warned of the inbound missiles.

“General, we must energize hull.” Minsk sounded worried.

“Not yet,” Emil shouted back. “Not until Chacon makes the drop. Open the bomb bay doors and stand by.”

The outer doors swung out, exposing Zoe to the outside. A gale force pressed her against the locked inner flaps. Far below, the harbor’s restless waters blurred as the Bandit streaked over at top speed.

Emil checked his chair’s small viewer. The incoming blips were traveling too fast and the ship wasn’t yet over the mark. He was used to cutting things close, but this one was going to set a personal record.

Minsk wrapped his hands around his seat’s armrests and dug his thick fingers into the worn cushions. At the last possible moment, a buzzer sounded, indicating they were over the drop zone.

“Bombs away!” Emil ordered.

The Chief pounded the jettison control. “Bombs away!”

“Energize the hull!”

The hull plating energized just before the missiles struck the electrical fortification, exploding without causing much damage. The crew held on as the ship was rocked by shockwaves.

Zoe streaked past the exploding flak, barely avoiding the molten fragments. The Spire shaft grew larger beneath her. She stretched out her arms, veering enough to avoid splattering against the superstructure.

Deploying the canopy, she slowed to a glide around the shaft. The wrist computer locked its altimeter on a potential landing spot. The device vibrated, indicating maximum drop speed. She yanked on the shrouds, reducing her momentum and landing hard on the observation deck. Her bones ached from the rough touchdown, but she was in one piece.

After doffing the harness, she wrapped up the fabric and stowed it in the pack with one sequential motion. She left it on the deck beside the entry. A quick check of her tel-link confirmed it was working.

“Crimson actual, Crimson-two. Boots on the ground,” she said into the microphone, letting Emil know she was safe. There was no waiting for a reply; the Bandit had its hands busy dealing with the ships.

Zoe checked her gun as she entered the Spire.

The Bandit flew between the Alliance vessels, evading most of the fire lobbed at her and returning an equal salvo of her own. The ordinance that made it past her defenses pounded the hull, driving her farther into the lower cityscape and between the gaps of the old city. The enemy ships broke off their attack when the Bandit disappeared off their scopes.

On the Leviathan’s bridge, Serov slammed his fist on a console. “Why have we stopped?”

“Sir, the hybrid refuses to continue the pursuit without visual confirmation.”

The machine’s audacity in letting Pavel escape infuriated him. He pounded his hands and cursed obscenities.

Zoe raced through the endless spiraling corridors, spot clearing threats one sector at a time. The measured pace worsened the ever widening gulf of time keeping her from finding Max. It reminded her of a bad dream where the more she tried to reach the end of a hallway, the more the end expanded.

Rounding a corner, she bumped against Orock, knocking him to the floor. He jumped up to run, but she snatched his scruff and slammed him against a wall.

“Not so fast, Mr. President,” she objected sardonically. “I need your help.”

“You can’t use me as a hostage. I’m nothing to them. They won’t hesitate to kill me to get to you.”

“Wow, what amazing friends you have — sir.”

“Please, let me go?” he begged. “Have mercy on me?”

The pitiful pleads from the man responsible for selling out America filled her with bloodlust. She wanted to snuff him. The desire coursed hard inside her heart with each frenetic pulse. But, somewhere among the odium, the thought of why she was there resurfaced.

She twisted Orock and positioned him out in front. Pressing the gun’s muzzle to the posterior of his head, she offered, “Here’s the deal, Mr. President. Do exactly as I tell you or I tap your brains all over this nice clean deck. Sound good to you?”

He bawled and mucus flung from his nose. She waited for his answer and when he didn’t give it, she thumped his head with the gun’s business end. It didn’t have the desired motivation. The blubbering politician fell to his knees and lost bladder control.

Zoe lowered her gun out of disgust. “Get up.”

The President stood, afraid of what she would do to him next. “I’m sorry,” he stammered.

“Where’s your boss?” she asked politely, cranking his arm.

“Boss? What boss?”

Applying more torque on his joints changed his tune. “He’s in the room at the top.”

“What about the man in black — his enforcer? Where’s he?”

“With Malus.”

“Does he have a girl with him?”

“Yes.”             

“Alright, after you, sir.” She bumped Orock in motion. By her guess, if Marta was there, then that’s where Max was heading.

Max and Dinx reached the end of the walkway. They thought they were in the clear until they almost ran headlong into a small patrol. Ducking behind a corner, they waited for the soldiers to move. No such luck. After several minutes, it was obvious the squad wasn’t planning to carry on.

“Muck. Now what?”

Dinx browsed the schematics on his plate, looking for an alternative. He found one. “This way.”

They went back to an area with a narrow access between two dividers. Measuring a half meter wide at the threshold, it could only take one person at a time. Dinx went first, then Max, who scuttled sideways to fit.

Ten meters in, they came to a door. Dinx tapped a code on the panel and it opened. It was the bowel of a vertical shaft. On the wall, a fixed ladder ascended all the way to the summit.

Max craned his neck. “You got to be joking.”

“If I’m right, we can avoid getting spotted this way.”

“You couldn’t find something easier?”

“Sure,” he retorted, offering the plate. “Next time why don’t you read the map if you don’t like what I come up with.”

“Okay, okay. Calm down.”

The heights didn’t thrill him, but he swallowed hard and climbed the railing with a lump in his belly.

Dinx confidently scaled the rungs. “Hey, how do you know where she is?”

He didn’t know, but he had a gut feeling. It was a premonition telling him where Kroll had taken her. “I don’t.”

“We could be going the wrong way.”

He stopped and looked down at his buddy. “I can’t explain it. I just know — okay?”

“I hope you’re right.”

Max was thinking the same thing.

“Hey, what are we going to do when you find her? Do you have a plan?”

“No, I’m just gonna wing it.”

“Great. Like that’s ever worked for you before.”

He ignored the honest assessment and kept climbing.

Halfway up, Dinx ran out of steam. His sedentary lifestyle never prepared him for these physical demands.

“What’s wrong?”

“I gotta stop.”

“We can’t. Keep going.”

The skinny boy rested his head on the cool rail. While they held fast, a rumbling traveled up the shaft, threatening to shake them from their perches.

“What was that?”

“I don’t know, but whatever it was, it probably ain’t good. Move it.”

Whether Dinx was going to keep up or not, Max pushed on. They climbed ten more meters before feeling the air becoming unbearably hot. Max, who was no stranger to physical exertion, sweated profusely. He stopped to wipe his face on his sleeve.

The humid air added slick condensation to the ladder and their feet slipped, creating high pitch squeaks when the rubber on their boots hydroplaned off the rungs. Warm droplets rained on them without letup.

They made it to the top, but a sealed circular hatch blocked their way. Max strained several times, but failed to turn its wheel. There was no going back. Wrapping his legs around the slippery ladder, he used every ounce of his strength to twist the wheel and push the hatch up. A blinding light smacked him hard and a dry blast of hot air poured into the shaft.

Undeterred, he hollered down. “Keep going!”

The boys clambered onto a catwalk just beneath the ascension chamber. Max stripped off his jacket and held it up to blot out some of the intense light generated by the beam.

“This ain’t good,” Dinx whined.

Max could sense he was where he needed to be. He didn’t know why, but he felt as if someone had summoned him to this place.

Their eyes adjusted to the intensity. Dropping his jacket to the deck, he carefully repositioned to get a better look at the platform above.

“You are full of surprises, Mr. Zander.” Kroll’s voice was everywhere.

Believing the villain could see them, they darted to find cover.

“Regretfully, your noble efforts are in vain.”

Convinced of the Zolarian’s blind perception, they stopped and waited for his next move. Max removed the ora from his pocket and held it close to his chest. “I hope the old man is right about this.”

“I sense the crystal. Bring it to me and I will let you live.”

Dinx skedaddled to the hatch, but Max jerked him back.

“Well, Mr. Zander?”

Dinx looked to his friend and mouthed,
now what
. It was the point of no return. There was only one thing left to do.

Max eased onto the platform, carrying the bundled jacket tucked under his arm. Marta, cloaked in her cocoon, gave him no notice. The assassin appeared oblivious. Max crept silent and slow.

Kroll spun around. “Did you believe you could catch me unaware?”

“You know me; I had to give it a shot.”

“Hand over the ora and live.” He moved closer.

Max held the wadded jacket over the edge. “Back off. I mean it! Back off or —"

“Or what? You will drop it? Go ahead. It will be recovered.”

Max held the bundle a little further out over the gulf. The edge of the assassin’s mouth curled to form a smile. The jacket fell to the pit.

“Brave, yet foolish.”

Kroll seized control of the boy’s body and forced him to the deck. Acid ran throughout every nerve ending, impressing on Max the sensation of electrocution. Each time he resisted, the pain intensified. To lessen it, he surrendered.

“Valor is an absurdity, created by the human failure to reconcile a deluded morality in relation to instincts. Your kind pretends to advocate courage against what is your truer temperament.”

Max glanced up at Marta in her bubble.

“Do not bother swaying her. She has been liberated from the human condition.”

“She’s your slave. How’s that liberated? She didn’t choose this.”

“Choose? The ability to choose is an illusion. There is no free will. Take me for example; I am a result of a random set of events. The experiences in my life molded me into the being I have become. I am a force doing what is in my nature to do. As a human, Marta could not grasp this deterministic maxim. I showed her the reality that is, not the illusion concealing it.”