Nova (42 page)

After scouting the area, they stealthily moved forward and
found the two remaining bodies that hadn’t tumbled into the waters below when
Serros shot them. One was indeed a Grey and the other a Karukai. They had been
totally stripped of their equipment, including clothing, and left to rot where
they’d fallen.

After careful inspection, K’llan spied a shallow boot print,
heading in the same direction as Outpost J2. “I would say that there are at
least three, maybe more.”

Kneeling down next to K’llan, Avara spotted the broken thorn
of a thistle–bush and another quarter print. “I think you’re right; might be as
many as half a dozen.”

The companions then continued their journey, making their
way parallel to another, smaller river that fed into the main canyon’s
waterway, about a quarter of a mile to the west. The hour had reached somewhere
near midnight before they found a trace of the quarry again. Or more precisely,
their targets found them in the form of an ambush.

Catching the barest flicker of movement, Avara half shoved
K’llan to the left as she rolled to the right, pistol drawn mid–motion. Her
first shot chipped into the rock of the boulder–fall that the Karukai Grey who’d
just fired at them hid behind.

The second two hit another Karukai’s left gun–hand then neck.
Even as Avara’s target was tumbling to the rocky ground, K’llan’s bullets
spliced into the Karukai’s companion, another Grey. Despite the speed and skill
of the Human Quorum Shield and former Vosaia STF Agent, Avara felt like molten
lava had been sadistically dribbled onto her flesh as luck ran out, and no less
than three rounds ripped into her hip, abdomen, and shoulder with deadly
accuracy.

As an immediate reaction, she called on a K–Shield for the
second time today, this time in the form of a guardian dome. With a half–scream
of pain, Avara dropped to one knee, still holding the shield and pistol both as
she frantically searched for their adversaries. Finally, she spotted them. Four
Karukai lying in wait behind her and across from their clone comrades that
they’d just so deliberately used as expendable fodder to distract K’llan and
Avara long enough to successfully take down at least one of them.

Serros could feel her life’s blood racing down from her
stomach to her knee, soaking through fabric and dripping into the thirsty sand
below.

Fucking bastards.

They were completely protected from bullet fire behind their
natural barricade, and it would be near to impossible for her to move fast
enough to drop her shield and throw a grenade or get behind them with her
injury before being taken out by their rifles.

Suddenly, a trio of shots rang out from behind and to her
left, splattering the face of another Karukai sneaking up behind her.

“Avara,
now
!” K’llan’s cry chased her bullets and,
seeing the moment of startlement causing the other Karukai to shuffle behind
their cover, Serros knew immediately what K’llan was urging her to do. Moving
her arms with a heavy, slamming motion, Avara magnified and pushed out the kobalt
energy she’d been gathering. She dropped her shield entirely a split second
before hurling the K–Blast at their adversaries.

With a scream reminiscent of metal slats scraped against one
another by the violence of a storm, the Karukai cried out as they and the
entire rock grouping they’d been hiding behind were torn from the earth and
hurled some thirty feet through the air to land and tumble in a sickening
series of thuds.

“Avara!” K’llan was at her side in a split second, holding
onto her as she dropped to the ground. Issuing a quick survey with her CPA, the
Vosaia announced, “You have three bullets lodged within your flesh: one in your
hip, another in your shoulder, and a third in your lower abdomen. We have to
remove them immediately before you bleed out.” K’llan was already ripping open
the med–kit she carried.

“No, wait,” Avara started, her voice horse. She could hear
the bubbling sound of fluid in her throat, and didn’t need to be told what it
was. “Just… give me a shot of Adrenix and a spray of coagulant. We… have to
make sure… they’re all dead.”

“These are
all
potentially fatal wounds!” K’llan vehemently
declared, ignoring Serros as she began to get to work. “I do not give a
damn
about…”

Grabbing K’llan’s wrist, Serros barely managed to spit out
“We must be
sure
… to be safe.”

Avara could see the conflict in K’llan’s radiant purple
eyes, could feel the intense fear she felt for Serros’s safety.

“Please… trust me, K’llan.”

 Avara could feel the flare of defiant anger, but
nevertheless, K’llan quickly removed a syringe and shot a pea–sized dose of Adrenix
into Avara’s arm, followed by first sterile–wiping then spraying the wounds.
The relief was immediate and so sweet that tears gathered in the corners of
Avara’s eyes. With a ragged breath, Avara muttered, “Help me up.”

Z’arr did not protest this time, but the firm grasp she had
about Serros’s waist radiated both protection and a certain sense of
possessiveness.

“Let’s go.”

The thirty foot trek was anything but easy, each step a low
burn of agony despite the numbing agent in her meds, and she leaned heavily on K’llan
for support. Though it felt like forever, Serros knew that they had reached the
location in a relatively short period of time. Sure enough, the final three
Karukai lay bloody and broken on the ground, two entirely crushed under the rocks
that had sailed with them. The third lay a short distance away, covered in
earth and pebbles, one leg bent at an entirely unnatural angle and her right
arm a crushed pulp of flesh, bone, and sinew. She was wheezing loudly.

Summoning a last reserve of strength fueled more by stubborn
determination than Arca enhanced power or constitution, Avara released her hold
on K’llan and slowly moved forward, studying the Karukai as she did. She was of
medium height and had a strong build. Her eyes were a bright, cinnamon tone,
and her paper–white skin was thoroughly smudged with dirt and grime that blended
with her natural red markings. She was also dressed as a Senior Karukai Officer
in travel worn, red–accented black.

Carefully kneeling down next to the wounded Karukai, Avara asked
in a low voice “Are you the last from the pods?”

Coughing, the Karukai shifted defiant, muted red eyes to
Avara. “Why should I tell you,
lassar
?”

Avara fought down a surge of anger at the term. In the
Karukai dialect, the word roughly meant both ‘lesser being’ and ‘desirable
sustenance source’ at the same time. It was a deliberate insult. “You are
dying. Think about your options.”

The Karukai laughed, bloody froth staining her lips. “Why
don’t you think about your options, Human? You use that med–kit I know you are
carrying, and I will be gracious enough to take you as my Concubine. I can
tell,” she said with a sneering half–smile as her eyes roved Serros’s face and
more, attempted to catch glimpses of her very soul, “that you would be… very sweet.”

The Karukai’s hunger was a living thing, her desire to Feed
driven by a sense of personal right, cultural imperative, and the injuries that
were draining the very life from her.

Avara could sense the rush of white hot rage that suffused
K’llan’s entire being at the Karukai’s mocking invitation, and the muzzle of the
Vosaia’s pistol appeared directly before the Karukai’s head as if conjured by
magic.

Feeling her flesh and soul crawl from the exchange, Avara
shook her head at Z’arr, a silent command to hold off. “Are you the last?” An
image of all the dead aboard the
TS Ardent
swam to the forefront of
Avara’s vision as she waited for an answer that did not come.

When only continued silence and that same sneering smile
greeted her repeated question, Avara calmly placed her right knee on the
woman’s chest and removed her knife hilt. With her left hand, Serros activated
the micro–assembler, durexium blade flash–forged before her eyes. Serros then
took the pommel of the hilt and quite deliberately, started crushing the fleshy
mass of the Karukai’s ruined right arm, slowly creating more and more force.

Even when the woman began screaming, left arm futilely
flailing at Avara’s right shoulder, Avara continued to inexorably increase the
pressure. Soon the Karukai Officer began sobbing in pain and crying out for
Serros to stop, her whole body heaving to escape the Captain’s body–weight and
her suffering.

Minutes slipped by before Captain Serros finally released
the pressure, and then with her face and eyes set into a cold mask, she softly asked
again, “Are there any more Karukai from the life–pods?”

“No, no, no,
please
, no….” The pale woman cried,
tears trailing down her face and snot slipping from her nose. “We were the
last… we lost two to the jakhri, and the others you slew.”

“Are we likely to run into patrols from Outpost J2?”

After the barest hesitation, the Karukai answered “No.”

“Tell me about Outpost J2.”

“I… I cannot. I gave a soldier’s oath. I cannot.” The
Karukai responded, bald head sheened in sweat that dripped down her face to
mingle with tears, mucus, and blood. “Please… I swore.”

“If my companion and I were taken by you and your soldiers,
what would you do?” Avara asked in a dangerously reasonable voice. Something
about her tone convinced the Karukai to answer, and answer truthfully.

“We would… imprison you, and though you would be
interrogated, you would not be permanently damaged. You would be enslaved… made
an Officer’s prize. You, and your Vosaia, would be very valued as such.”

“To be Fed on?” Avara asked, her tone as chill and measured as
ice.

Coughing again, the dying Karukai nodded weakly, looking
from Avara, to K’llan, then back to the Human. “Like I said, you both are great
prizes. You would have the honor of being made Concubines rather than labor or a
basic Feeding source. In time, if you took the Oath, you would be released and
granted full Karukai citizenship status.”

Serros nodded once in affirmation of the expected answer,
even as she felt K’llan’s soul shriek with a combination of anger and loathing.
“What is your name, Karukai?”

“Sub–Lieutenant Icha Hyre.” The Karukai responded, a small
sliver of weary hope fluttering in her eyes.

Avara nodded again, then stood without taking her gaze from
the Karukai woman’s. Pressure entirely released, the Karukai whimpered, sucking
air into demanding lungs.

“For your honesty, Sub–Lieutenant Icha Hyre, I respect your
soldier’s oath, and I will show you the honor we would wish for if in your
place.”

With a single, fluid movement, Avara drew and fired her
pistol, the shot cracking through the night and striking dead center in Icha
Hyre’s forehead to carve a quarter–sized hole though skin, bone, and brain,
killing the woman instantly.

CHAPTER 22

After Sub–Lieutenant Hyre slumped lifelessly to the ground,
Avara turned to K’llan and hoarsely proclaimed “We need to strip them of any
useful gear.”

With a single sympathetic squeeze of Avara’s arm, K’llan replied,
“Yes. I will do it. You rest.”

With help, Avara shuffled a few paces away and leaned
against one of the upturned rocks she had sent flying through the air, focusing
all her effort on breathing and keeping the pain in check. Unable to use
Synergy to heal before the bullets were removed, every moment was a never
ending agony.

She waited as patiently as she could as K’llan made quick
work of the task. Z’arr returned to Avara with three pistols, two rifles, a
bunch of CDs, two med kits, another bedroll, a second portable generator, and
four canteens in tow. Two were filled to the brim with consolidated hydro–fluid,
the others empty. K’llan peered closely at Avara, then asserted “We should stay.”

Shaking her head, Avara replied, “We need to leave here
before the jakhri come; the scent of blood will draw them.”

Somewhat reluctantly, K’llan nodded then reached out to
steady Serros as the two of them began their trek, keeping the stream to their
left.  The going was painfully slow, each step a journey in excruciation. They
stopped only once, to administer another dose of Adrenix, then continued on.
Despite the chill evening air, Avara’s skin glistened with perspiration and she
could feel her short locks sticking to her forehead. Every breath was a ragged
song. Finally, after having traveled about three miles away from the dead
Karukai and quarter of a mile from the rivulet, with a half stumble, Avara
called a halt. She was simply unable to move any further.

With the Captain resting against a low lying boulder in a
half–sit up position atop the new bedroll, K’llan set about placing their
security nodes in record time, then used Arca speed to travel to the stream and
back for two water–filled canteens. Serros didn’t need to ask to know she had
inserted purification tabs into the procured river water.

Despite her exquisite gentleness, Avara still gasped in pain
as the Vosaia carefully removed the Shield’s Karukai jacket and Ministry
standard issue tank top, leaving Avara bare–chested. She also slid Serros’s
trousers below her left hip to her pelvic bone to reveal the final injury. The
air caused Avara’s skin to prickle with cold and she involuntarily shifted,
then cried out in pain with the movement. She could feel the spill of warm
fluid as her abdomen and hip wounds were fully reopened and began to once more weep
blood.

With her face set into an almost marble–like mask of cool
professionalism, despite the thrill of worry Serros sensed bubble forth, K’llan
fell into her training and carefully reexamined the wounds with both her naked
eye and CPA. She then took out a med–wipe and swabbed each injured portion of
flesh. After, she shot Avara with a third dose of Adrenix that made the
Captain’s heart pound with muted adrenaline and pain–inhibiting, half–lucid
euphoria. Z’arr then prepared surgical tweezers and a medical derma–laser.
Using her CPA to exactly paint the proper point, K’llan positioned the slender,
retractable tweezers and sought out the hip bullet. Even with Adrenix coursing
through her system, Avara could feel the questing prongs, like a worm
attempting to bore into her flesh. Though water filled her eyes and coursed
down her cheeks, the Captain stymied the impulse to move so as not to distract K’llan
from her delicate work.