Strange Skies (24 page)

Kale’s men stuck close together in a group. They looked tense, like they were waiting for something. Probably for orders from Kale to kill us all.

An engine rumbled in the distance just as we prepared for flight. We scrambled to the window to look out while Max jumped in Markus’ pilot chair. The last Consulate ship rose in the distance over the area where we’d seen the laser blasts. Only the small lights on the wings of the ship were visible in the dark. I was glad we hadn’t lifted off yet or we would have been spotted for sure. The Consulate ship hovered a minute on the other side of the creek, then rose even higher and took off at light speed.

“Where’s it going?” Reed asked.

“Back to the Consulate, judging by the direction it’s flying,” said James. “Let’s get over there and check on our people.”

And the guns. What if they left because they killed the others and took all Dad’s weapons?
My stomach twisted at the thought. I also knew it hadn’t escaped Kale that the last Consulate ship had left, meaning that any Consulate threat had disappeared. For now, at least. Whether they had the guns or not, the Consulate troops had left to regroup. Kale and his men were ship-less, and I doubted they planned to stay that way.

Max fired up the ship and it rose into the air. James grabbed his pack and walked over to Kale. “Might as well check that leg.” He grabbed a vial and started to press it to Kale’s leg. I didn’t know what James was up to, but it had to
be an act. It felt good to be on the other side of his acting this time.

Kale grabbed his hand firmly. “No pain meds. Just antibiotics.”

“Relax, that’s what I’m giving you.” James pressed the vial into the wound.

Kale jumped. “Saddam—fuckin’—Hitler!”

Sonya tried to hold his hand, but Kale shook her off. I couldn’t remember which colors all the med vials were but hoped that whatever James was giving him was no antibiotic. Even if they were pain meds, it would help with whatever was coming next.

James brought out the electronic stitcher and closed up Kale’s wound. Kale screamed some more names that I assumed were dictators before James quickly injected another vial into his leg. “Just to be safe,” James said when Kale yelled again. “The wound looked pretty bad.”

We were already landing by the time James zipped up his bag. Max brought the ship down in the clearing where Kale’s ship had been. Markus opened the hatch, and I dashed out the door with James screaming at me to wait. I ran across the clearing. The rain had picked up again, going from a drizzle to a steady shower. I sloshed through huge puddles, and wished there was some moonlight for guidance. At least there wasn’t fire to deal with. My toe caught on one of the guns and I fell to my knees. It was so quiet. No one else was around. Where was the Resistance if the guns were still here?

James reached me and waved to Max, who flipped on the ship lights. The piles of guns surrounded me. It didn’t look like any were missing. Surely the Consulate would have taken them if they’d found them.

Kale, Sonya, and his men had joined us in the clearing. They stared from the guns to us and back again. Web, Trent, Bez, and Markus stood behind them, facing us. They looked ready to jump Kale and crew. My finger inched toward the trigger on my gun.

“James!” A man ran out from the woods, mud spraying out from his boots. “We thought it was another Consulate ship.” He called out behind him, “It’s safe.”

Others came from the woods, a few of whom I recognized from the bar.

“Hey, Ollie. Good to see you guys,” James said. “We saw the other ship take off.”

“Yeah,” one of the others said. “We got enough of their guys that I think they got scared off. It helped that they saw the other two ships crash and burn.”

There were probably ten of them in all, which would be great if they were on our side. Not so great if they were with Kale.

Kale addressed the group in a loud voice. “Good work, soldiers. You sent those pansies running for their lives. They’ll think twice before they mess with Kale Stark again.” He stumbled in a puddle and caught himself. “I’m about done with this weather.” Kale tried to bat the rain away with his gun.

I tilted my head toward James. “Pain meds?”

“Yep,” he said.

“Not bad, soldier. Not bad at all,” I whispered.

“We’ll see.” He smiled in the lights of the ship and spoke to me in a low voice. “Let’s get these guns and get out of here, minus a few passengers.”

James turned to the group by the woods. “We need to move these weapons before the Consulate comes back for them. Can you help us get them on board?”

“Sure, no problem,” said Ollie. He motioned to the others, and they began taking armfuls of guns to the ship. Markus, Bez, and Web didn’t move a muscle. I could tell they didn’t want to turn their backs on Kale. The gun by my toe caught my attention. It would be helpful to have two guns again. I leaned down and casually picked it up.

“I’m going to check in with Markus and tell him the plan,” I said, steering wide of Kale’s group. Sonya eyed me and stepped in my direction.

“We’ll help too,” Kale’s pilot said. He and another of Kale’s men walked toward James and the weapons.

I froze, unsure what to do next.

James raised his gun at them. “That won’t be necessary. We have this.”

“What’s with the lack of hospitality?” Kale asked, his words slurring together. “My men offered their assistance and that’s how you treat them. Haven’t I taught you better than that, soldier?”

My eyes were still focused on Kale’s men when Markus yelled for me to watch out. Sonya whirled and had her arm around my neck and her gun pointed at my head. “You weren’t thinking of leaving here without us, were you?” she asked, ice in her voice.

“Of course not,” I said. “We just have to get the guns first.”

She pressed her gun into my temple and wrenched mine from my hands. “Liar. And I know James didn’t give him antibiotics either.” She tossed the gun to Kale. Good thing the guns were still keyed to my vibration—and James’—or we’d all be dead.

I glanced up. Markus and James had their guns aimed at Sonya; Kale’s men had their guns aimed at James; Web, Bez, and Trent had their weapons aimed at Kale; and Kale looked bewildered. If it stayed like this, it would be a bloodbath.

Sonya pressed my head downward with her weapon, right as a raindrop hit the center of a puddle underneath my feet.

I watched it splash onto the soaked ground.

Unless
.

“Okay, you win,” I said. “We’ll take you all with us.”

Kale laughed harshly. “I’m not sure we want to take you with us anymore, not with the way you’ve acted.” He swayed, waving his gun around. “I’ve about had it with you, little Miss I-have-my-daddy’s-guns-and-no-one-else-can-have-them. Fuck that.”

He punched one of his men in the arm. “Let’s do this already.”

“James, shoot!” I yelled.

Kale’s men opened fire and Sonya pushed the trigger button on the gun against my skull. The gun made a whirring sound but nothing happened. Sonya managed to say “Huh?” before she landed dead at my feet. The only laser that fired was from my dad’s gun in James’ hand, and it had hit Sonya square in the forehead. Kale and his men stared in disbelief at their guns and pressed the trigger buttons harder.

Markus shook his gun as he tried to get it to work.

“They’re waterlogged,” I yelled as James fired and took down two more of Kale’s men, saying a mental thank-you to Dad. I don’t know how he’d managed to test that out with the limited water supply on Earth but his hours of experimenting in his study totally paid off.

Markus shrugged and tossed his gun. He turned toward Kale, but Kale’s pilot jumped on him from behind. Markus threw him down and they exchanged punches, and Bez and Trent joined in the pile, while I fished Trigger from my waistband and frantically worked to untangle her from the drawstring. I powered her up and aimed at the last of Kale’s men, who had moved away toward the perimeter. Right as I fired at him and took him down, a knife whizzed by me and hit James.

I screamed and ran to him. Blood oozed from the side of his chest where the knife was embedded. Kale would
have hit his heart if not for the med overdose.

In my peripheral vision, I saw Kale scoop up the super-weapon that Sonya had tossed to him and run into the woods. He must have had the knife in his pant leg. James pushed his weapon into my hand and stared into the trees. “Get him,” he said, breathing heavily. “You can’t let him get away with those guns.”

Markus and Web ran toward us as Markus shouted. “Go, Tora! We’ve got James. Our guns won’t work, but you can take him down. Get that burner for me.”

I raced into the woods but felt ill about leaving James. How was I supposed to find Kale in the dark? He might be injured and doped up, but he still had the ability to hit James with a knife from a distance. Hopefully, that had been the only knife he had.

The woods were even darker than the clearing and the ground was just as muddy. Other than the light rain splattering the leaves, there was silence. A faint smoky smell lingered in the air from the fire but the trees here remained unscathed. I ran about twenty paces then stopped to listen. I’d been faster than him earlier when we’d run from the fire and crossed the creek. The pain meds might help him ignore the pain, but he’d still swayed and stumbled in the clearing.

If only my ankle would hold.

A crunch of leaves came from somewhere to my right.
Please let that be Kale and not a meat monster
. I tried to keep my breathing as quiet as possible. There it was. Another
light crunch of leaves. I stepped carefully in the direction of the noise and kept my guns raised, Trigger in one hand, James’ gun in the other.

Kale took off again, a rapid succession of twigs breaking as he ran. I went after him, no longer trying to mask the sounds of my running.

“That you, Tora?” he called out. “You’re no match for me, with or without a gun.”

“Then why are you running?” I shouted back.

He didn’t answer. His footsteps got louder and I knew I was gaining ground on him. I ignored the branches that scraped my arms and face. One branch caught my hair and I cursed softly under my breath. I reached up and tore my hair from the tree before moving on. A minute later, the footsteps ceased.

Maybe Kale was tired and thought he’d hide. I took another step. The sound of his ragged breathing broke the silence of the forest. My own breath came in jagged bursts, and I’m sure he could hear me as well as I heard him. His breathing turned into a chuckle. I aimed Trigger where I thought he was and fired. Lasers lit up a tree and everything went dark again.

I listened for his breathing and he launched himself at me. His body flew into mine, knocking us both to the ground. James’ gun flew out of my left hand. Kale had me pinned underneath him in the mud and his hands closed around my neck. He must have left Dad’s super-gun in the trees. My right hand held Trigger but it was pinned under
my own leg and the weight of Kale’s body. I tried to wiggle my hand free but it wouldn’t budge, so I punched at his arm with my left hand. His laughter told me my blows had no effect and he tightened his grip around my neck.

Things started to go black and I saw spots behind my eyes. I couldn’t die like this. Not with James down. With my whole family dead. With Kale getting away with Dad’s weapons. It had to end here.

“Think you’re so tough now, soldier?” Kale asked. “I’m not sure what I’ll do without you and James to fire the guns, but I’m sure as hell safer without you two traitors.” He shifted his weight to bear fully down on my neck.

My lungs screamed for air. The pressure around my throat was unbearable. I made one last attempt to yank Trigger out from under me. It moved a little but I couldn’t entirely free my hand. Though Kale had shifted his weight, it wasn’t enough. Everything faded. As my consciousness drained away, I pushed Trigger up at the highest angle I could manage against my thigh and fired through my own leg.

Kale screamed and rolled off of me. I couldn’t get in enough air to scream myself, though the pain that tore through the laser blast in my leg was excruciating. Air rushed into my lungs and I gasped and rolled onto my side, clutching at my throat. My vision started to clear a few seconds later, but my focus was on inhaling and exhaling. Kale’s yelling continued, and I tried to focus in the dark. At least I knew I’d hit him. If I had to shoot myself, I hoped I’d
been able to turn Trigger enough that it would be a straight shot through him too.

I pushed my hand into the mud and tried to sit myself up. Searing pain shot through my right thigh. Hopefully I hadn’t shot through a major artery, or I’d bleed out pretty fast. My leg wouldn’t hold my weight when I tried to put pressure on it. There was no way I could stand. For all I knew, there wasn’t much left to stand on. I couldn’t think about that now.

Kale stopped screaming. It sounded like he was crawling away, his labored breathing punctuated only by the occasional curse word. Maybe I’d taken out a good part of his leg too.

I flipped over on my belly and bit my tongue to keep from screaming. The taste of my own blood nauseated me, but I dug my elbows into the mud and dragged myself toward Kale. The rain had almost stopped and a small sliver of moonlight came through the trees.

Kale’s form moved about five yards in front of me. He called me names I’d never heard before but I was sure they weren’t complimentary. He left a wide trail of blood behind him as he clawed at the ground in his effort to get away. He wasn’t moving very fast.

My throat burned when I called out, “Where you goin’, soldier?” I coughed hard into the ground. “I’m going to make sure you never kill anyone’s father or girlfriend, again, you burner.”

He turned around, a look of surprise on his face. With great effort, I gritted my teeth and brought Trigger up to aim at him. He tried to scramble faster on his hands and knees to get to the nearest tree, blood pouring out with every move. My finger hovered over the trigger panel when I saw the eyes.

Red eyes just beyond Kale in the trees.
Crap
. Alec had said they were attracted to blood, and between Kale and me, there was an overwhelming stench of the stuff in the air. Kale looked up as the meat monster pounced. He lifted his arm to shield himself and the animal tore into his arm. It came away with a chunk of Kale in its teeth and went back for more. Kale yelled at the animal while yet more blood drained from his arm. There was nothing that Kale deserved more than getting eaten alive by one of those things.