Hell Divers (29 page)

There was no pain at first. That was good—it meant that the layered suit had protected him from the brunt of the electricity. The burning didn't start for another five thousand feet. It began under his skin and spread from his toes to his face. His entire body felt as if it had been burned from within. His insides felt as if they were melting. The raw burn worked its way into his bones, the pain shooting through his skeleton.

Distant voices called out. Or maybe it was the thunder; he wasn't sure anymore. His body had caught fire, and he imagined flames consuming him as he climbed higher into the storm.

You're not dead, Rick. You're not dead …

But he sure felt as though he was
going
to die. He repeated the mantra through the grid work of electricity, his body hanging limp in his harness. He was aware that he was holding on to a toggle, but his hand wouldn't respond to any mental command.

Below, Weaver caught a glimpse of Magnolia and Katrina. They vanished in the clouds a moment later. Lightning cut through their flight path. He sucked in a breath, holding it in his chest. Their balloons remerged a moment later, and he exhaled the air from his burning lungs.

A wall of red crept into both sides of his vision. The deep burning continued to rip and boil through him. He closed his eyes and chomped down on his mouth guard in response to the pain. The burn slowly faded away into numbness, and a moment later, yellow light washed over the red in his vision. But this light was different. Through his thin eyelids, he could see a golden glow.

He snapped his eyes back open and looked skyward. Rays of light penetrated the thick clouds above.

But that had to be an illusion. Or perhaps he was just dead.

Weaver's balloon pulled him out of the darkness, and he looked down to see the churning storm clouds below his feet. He spit out his mouth guard in shock. He had made it through the Sirens and the storm. He had actually made it through!

When he looked back up, he was surrounded by puffy white clouds. At first, he thought maybe Jones had been right about heaven. Maybe he was dead. Maybe this
was
heaven. He blinked the final bits of red away as the yellow light strengthened. He fought to raise a hand and shield his eyes from the golden glow.

Blinking rapidly, he tried to focus on the sphere of crimson in the center of the light. It was so intense he could see only the radiant edges of the flaming ball. There was something else up there, too. A single black dot crossed the horizon. He squinted into the light, and the sleek, beetlelike outline of an airship came into focus.

What he was seeing was impossible.
Wasn't it?

The voices were back again. But he couldn't tell whether it was one of the other divers or himself talking. He forced his rattled brain to concentrate, finally realizing it was neither. They were the words of his wife, Jennifer.

You're almost there, Rick. You're almost safe.

Warm tears streaked down his face, and he sobbed like a child as the
Hive
came into focus. The ship looked so much like
Ares
that for a moment, he thought he was staring at his home. And then it hit him. Yes, he was staring at his new home.

As the ship grew bigger, it blocked out the sun. The light danced around the metal edges as the flames had around
Ares
when it crashed. But the
Hive
wasn't burning. It was basking in the glow of the sun.

A pair of doors under the hull parted and opened, revealing the inside of the unfamiliar ship. Part of him wanted to pull away, to fall back to the surface and join his family. He wasn't sure he could make a new life without Jennifer and the girls. Instead, he let go of his toggles and stretched his numb arms to embrace the final ascent.

He let out a laugh that sounded a bit unhinged, even to himself. But that was okay. Maybe he was a bit crazy now—crazy, burnt, and …

Alive.

The balloon pulled him into the recovery bay a moment later. Katrina vaulted through the doors, doing a quick somersault to burn off her momentum. She hung on to the rungs of a ladder, her helmet still searching the clouds below. Magnolia entered less than a minute later. Weaver could see the tears streaming down her cheeks through her visor. She trembled as she hung there, her gaze examining Weaver's face and his tears. He touched her on the shoulder.

“It's okay, kid,” he said, remembering X's words. “You're home now.”

Sunlight greeted Ash when she arrived at the launch bay. She hurried toward a crowd of yellow suits swarming around the plastic dome that covered the reentry bay. Tin was with her, his hand clasped in hers.

“Is X back?” he asked.

“I hope so,” Ash replied.

As they walked, Tin scanned the porthole windows, his eyes wide with awe. Normally, the sight would have mesmerized her, too, but she didn't have time to stop and stare. Halfway across the room, she noticed something else.

“Where's your hat?” she asked Tin.

“I don't need it anymore,” he said. “Hell Divers don't wear hats.”

“Hell Divers?”

He looked away from the windows and found her eyes. She saw strength there beyond his ten years.

“I don't want to be an engineer anymore,” Tin said. “I want to be a Hell Diver, like X and my dad.”

She smiled and squeezed his hand.

“Captain,” a voice called out. Jordan came running from the crowd of technicians. He slid to a stop a few feet in front of Ash, his boots squeaking across the floor. “We recovered the crate and three divers.”

“Just three?” Ash said, dread rising in her voice.

“Afraid so,” Jordan replied. He glanced back at the dome. Ty motioned for the technicians to step back and yelled, “Repressurizing!”

A hiss sounded as air flooded the reentry bay.

“Sterilizing for contaminants,” Ty said.

Mist filled the inside of the dome, swirling and churning like the storm over Hades. Ash tightened her grip on Tin's hand. Finally, the plastic clicked and unsealed, and a grappling hook pulled the dome away.

Floor vents sucked away the white cloud, and three divers staggered out. One of them dropped to both knees, dented armor shining in the sunlight. The other two stood, their visors roving this way and that as if they couldn't believe they were indeed back on the ship. It took only a moment to see that X wasn't among the group.

Tin pulled away from Ash's grip. “Where's—where's X?”

The diver on the ground removed his helmet, and a man Ash didn't recognize looked up. He wore green armor, and his layered suit was subtly different from those her own divers wore.

“Where's X?” Tin asked again, his voice cracking.

“I'm sorry, kid, but he didn't make it,” the man said. “Bravest damn diver I ever saw, though. What he did for Magnolia …” He shook his head and pushed himself to his feet. Extending a trembling hand, he said, “Captain Ash, I presume. I'm Commander Rick Weaver from
Ares
.”

Ash didn't know what to say, so instead of saying anything, she shook his hand. Then she grabbed Tin's hand again. She looked to the other divers as they removed their helmets. Katrina and Magnolia, their faces streaked with tears, wrapped their arms around each other.

“What do you mean, ‘he didn't make it'?” Tin asked. “He promised he would come back.” Ash squeezed his hand, but he pulled away. “Where is he?”

Katrina shook her head. “He's gone, Tin. I'm so sorry.”

Tin glanced back at Ash. “We have to go back for him!”

Magnolia cupped a hand over her mouth and sobbed.

“I'm sorry, Tin, but X is …” Ash considered her words, then said, “He's dead, Tin. We can't do anything for him now. I'm sorry.”

“Captain,” Jordan said.

Ash turned and saw the look on her XO's face. They were out of time. They needed to move the ship. She nodded, feeling her heart break, and Jordan hurried away.

“No!” Tin said. “We can't leave without X!”

“We have to, Tin,” Ash said. “I'm sorry, but X would want this. He gave his life so you and everyone else could be safe.” She grabbed Tin and pulled him close as Samson and his men entered the room. The engineer nodded at Ash and motioned his team of blue suits to the crate. They rummaged through the contents for the power cells and valves that so many Hell Divers had died for.

“X said he would come back,” Tin sobbed. “He promised he would do everything to return.”

“He sacrificed himself so that you and everyone else could live,” Ash said. Her voice was low and soothing. “He wanted you to grow up. He wanted you to become an engineer.”

Tin tilted his head back and wiped a string of snot from his nose. “He promised he would take care of me.”

Ash hesitated, considering her next words carefully. Thoughts of Mark, her cancer, her duty to the
Hive,
and her dream of finding them all a new home surfaced in her thoughts. It was overwhelming, but she was Captain Maria Ash. She was a fighter and always would be. She could still fight her cancer, pursue her dream of finding a home, and look after Tin with what time she had left.

“I'll take care of you, Tin,” she said. “You can stay with Mark and me. How would you like that?”

The boy glanced up and met her eyes but didn't say a word. Nothing she could say would make Tin understand why X had given his life—at least, not right now. All she could do was console him. She pulled his head to her chest and patted his back. “You can even sit in my captain's chair if you want.”

Tin snorted—a cross between a grim laugh and a sob. He nodded, and hugged her. A tense silence followed the heartbreaking moment, and everyone in the launch bay worked quietly. Medics attended to Weaver, Katrina, and Magnolia while Samson's engineers unloaded crates and whisked the precious cells and valves away.

Ash considered making a statement—something that would honor the sacrifices that X and the other Hell Divers had made on this day. But there was still work to do, and she knew that any words she said would ring hollow. Everyone in this room—everyone aboard the
Hive
—would know the names of the divers who had saved them. But first, Ash had to save their ship.

* * * * *

X opened his eyes to red-hued darkness. That was the first surprise. He wasn't dead, but his entire body hurt—every muscle and bone and nerve. And he was cold—colder even than he had been without his heat pads. He knew that the chill came from loss of blood.

Even now, when facing certain death, he fought. He struggled to sit up, and when he couldn't do that, he squirmed from side to side. The snow had hardened around him.

First things first. You have to get free.

X inhaled a raspy breath, trying to focus. He blinked heavy eyelids until his vision had cleared enough to see that it was a Siren's wings, not snow, that had him trapped. The leathery shrouds covered him from neck to feet. Now he knew how he had survived the fall back to Hades: the creature that had tried to kill him had ended up padding his fall.

If he had survived, then maybe the Siren had, too. The realization filled him with energy that he didn't know he had left. He wiggled and used his arms to push the tangled wings off him. When he was free, he scrambled across the snow, right into another dead Siren. He climbed over it and saw another. There were three—all limp and unmoving, riddled with bullet holes. These were the creatures the divers had killed before they deployed their boosters.

The smoke from the burning ITC building filled the horizon to the west. He smacked his helmet on one side until the flickering HUD solidified. The nav marker for the crate was gone, but he still remembered where it had been. If he could get to the supplies he had dumped, maybe he could use one of the extra boosters to get back to the
Hive—
if it was even still there.

The harnesses attached to his balloon pulled him back when he crawled away from the bodies. He reached for his knife, which wasn't there. Then he remembered plunging it into the Siren.

Pushing himself to his feet, he gritted his teeth in anticipation of the wave of dizziness he knew was coming. Darkness washed over him, and he collapsed back onto the snow. The worst of the pain seemed to be coming from his stomach. He pulled a slimy hand away from his gut, warm blood steaming off his fingers. The wound was bad, but the threat of radiation poisoning was worse.

He had to get moving. The
Hive
wouldn't wait forever. He doubted it was still up there even now, but he clung to the spark of hope. The spark grew as he pushed himself to his feet and worked his way carefully back to the first Siren. It lay on its back, wings outstretched. A halo of frozen blood surrounded the knife hilt protruding from its rib cage. He watched its chest for any hint of breath, but the bloody flesh was still.

X took a guarded step toward the monster. Certain it was dead, he bent down and plucked his knife from its chest. He staggered backward as a coarse tongue plopped out of its open mouth.

With one eye on the creature, he reached over his shoulder and cut the harnesses away. Then he yanked the useless booster from the slot in his armor and dropped it in the snow.

Ignoring every stab of pain tormenting his body, he struggled to a trot. He stumbled after a few strides, nearly toppling over in the snow. The crackle from his raspy breathing echoed in his helmet.

In an out, X. Focus. You can do this.

The eerie call of a Siren broke his concentration. Two others immediately answered its call. These screeches weren't coming from the sky. They were coming from the ground. He didn't need to turn to see the monsters advancing across the snowy landscape.

He reached for his weapons, but his hand came up empty. He had lost both the rifle and the blaster in the fall. There was only one thing to do: run—and pray that he reached the supplies in time. Pain shot up his legs and burned through his gut as he fell into a jog.

The sight of Sirens loping across the snow energized him. All at once, their screeches seemed to collide in a wavering, electronic-sounding whine that shocked him into motion. He could see still more of them behind the first wave, fighting through gusts of snow in the distance. They rushed toward him, closing in from all directions. He pushed harder through the deep drifts, gasping for air, running on adrenaline and little else.

The supplies weren't far now. He could see them just a few yards away—boosters, weapons, boxes of extra ammunition—lying in the snow, where he had tossed them to make room in the crate.

X launched himself in a headlong dive for the gear. The uncontrolled slide ripped at the wound and packed it with dirty, radioactive snow so cold it ached. Swallowing the pain, he searched frantically for a weapon beneath the light coat of powder that had fallen.

He gripped the stock of a blaster and brought it up to meet the four Sirens galloping in from the north.

Without thinking, he fired a flare at the cluster. A split second later, he realized his mistake. As the flare exploded in the snow between the creatures, he chinned the pad to shut off his night-vision optics. The Sirens squawked away, darting off into the gusting snow.

X scooped up a new booster, slid it into the slot on the back of his armor, and secured it with a click. Then he grabbed one of the assault rifles and turned to see two dozen Sirens stalking him.

He could power down and pull his battery unit, but he would never survive the trip back without the heating pads in his suit. His only option was to fight.

X planted his boots in the snow and struggled to shoulder his rifle. His arms shook as he raised the weapon. The crack of his own gunfire was a welcome sound, blotting out the encroaching wails. He fired in short bursts that punched through leathery skin and shattered bone. Four bodies pitched into the snow. He killed three more before ejecting the empty magazine and shoving in another. Smoke curled from the muzzle as he trained it on the six Sirens drawing closer. He squeezed the trigger, moving his sights from target to target.

Between the cracks of gunfire came a shrill cry above. He looked up to see three Sirens cutting through the sky in a nosedive. Swinging his rifle skyward, he fired single shots into the mass. One of the creatures veered away, wounded, but the other shots went wide as panic threw off his aim.

X concentrated this time, aiming with greater precision, knowing that each round was precious. He closed his eyes and flinched as the two Sirens crashed headfirst into the snow around him, sending up a cloud of white. He didn't check to see if they were dead. Now was his chance to escape. He changed out his magazine, then reached over his shoulder to hit the booster. The balloon shot out of the pack and launched him skyward.

Two converging Sirens bashed into each other right where he had stood a moment before, throwing up more snow. He angled the muzzle toward the ground as soon as he was in the air. Ten of the creatures writhed just under his feet, their eyeless faces turning this way and that, as if confused by the cloud of snow.

Not wanting to waste the stolen moment, X squeezed the trigger at one of the monsters as it looked skyward. Several of the rounds punched through its skull, spraying the others with fresh blood and sending them into a frenzy.

One down.

The next shot left another flopping spastically in the snow, with a shattered leg.

Two down.

He mowed down three more with a single controlled burst, but the rifle's recoil pushed him higher into the air in erratic jerks.

The remaining Sirens locked on to his position from the ground, squawking furiously. He dropped three more with calculated shots before the final two got airborne.

X centered the weapon on them, but the stock felt light in his hands, and when he went to squeeze the trigger he realized his fingers were almost completely numb. His entire body shuddered. Shock and blood loss were taking a toll. The wind whistled over his armor as he rose toward the clouds.

Even with numb fingers, he managed to fire off another volley, ripping through the wings of the Siren to his left. It tumbled away before smashing into the ground. He focused on the other now, holding the rifle as steady as he could.

The monster soared through the sky. It was almost elegant, the way it caught the air currents. Even as it closed on him, X found himself marveling that somehow these creatures had survived in this harsh environment. Maybe it was the next step in evolution on earth. Maybe humans' time was indeed over.