Edge of Redemption (A Star Too Far Book 3) (18 page)

“Well shit, I knew Klaus,” the blond man said.

“Hey, hey!” the man in the construction helmet yelled. “Focus!”

“Name’s Duma,” the blond said, smiling. He turned and hefted himself onto a set of containers.

Emilie looked down the road and had no idea where to go next. Behind her were the invaders. All around were razor drones. She figured she’d stick near the people with guns, at least for now. She squatted near the edge of the container and waited.

“Get ready!” a raw voice bellowed.

The fire coming from the spaceport had mostly died away. The steady fire of the autocannons continued, but the intensity had dropped. The heavy whine droned on with the crunch of concrete pulsing through the air. More screams came from farther inside of the city. Men on the containers turned and glanced behind them.

“Fire!”

A chorus of gunfire ripped through the drizzly air. The militia fired with everything they had. Casings rained onto the ground in a steady roar of pinging brass. The tut-tut of the autocannons roared back to life. Rounds seared through the heavy concrete wall and slammed into the cargo containers. Then the concrete crushing noise stopped.

Emilie felt it before she even knew it fired. A ripple inside of her rose and oscillated. The feeling was like being thrashed about without knowing it was going to stop. The sky tumbled into darkness and a roar assaulted her. Then she was on the ground coughing on concrete grit. She tried to stand and fell forward. Her lungs burned, her eyes were filled with chalky grit.

“Get up!” Duma yelled in her ear. He wrenched her up and helped her stand. “C’mon!”

She followed as quickly as she could. Her breath came in ragged gasps as she spat up a mix of grit and spittle. She closed her mouth a moment and could feel it on her teeth and against her gums. She turned and looked behind her.

A massive gap was ripped through the concrete wall. The cargo container she’d huddled next to was split open at the seams and rolled over. Bodies littered the ground.

“Keep moving!” Duma said loudly, but it sounded muffled, distant.

The sound came into her ears slowly. A ringing sound pulsed up and down, ranging from one tone to the next. She looked down at herself and saw nothing more serious than a few scrapes. “Thanks.”

Duma said nothing and led her away from the complex. They ran past a woman in a yellow jacket, sprawled out and eviscerated. More bodies were scattered around her. The civilians were sprawled out as if running from something, each farther than the next. Emilie snapped her head away from the corpses and focused on staying on her feet.

The gunfire died away to almost nothing before only the wind sang through the streets. An occasional crack and boom signaled that someone was still fighting. The pair ran to the edge of the docks and passed below a mass of stained tubing. Farther along the rising distillation towers continued to spew steam.

Duma stopped beneath a maze of piping and pushed his back against a damp wall. His eyes scanned from one side to the next. He let out a deep sigh and slowly shook his head.

“Thank you,” Emilie said, sliding up next to him.

The wind rose slowly and the mist pushed back. A light patter of rain dropped onto the pipes. A stray gunshot rang out, followed by screams.

Emilie looked up to the sky and caught a glimpse of silver darting through the mist. “Hey,” she said pointing up.

A drone clattered onto the pipes and was still. Legs ticked with each step as it gently made its way above them. The sensor package scanned from side to side. It seemed oblivious to the pair huddled below.

Emilie held her breath. Her eyes focused on the razor sharp legs and mandibles hanging underneath the drone. She willed herself to be small, to be quiet, to be invisible. The pistol felt close, so close, but she didn’t dare pull it out.

It sprang onto an orange stained valve and hung in place as it swung its head from side to side. The sensor pack stopped and the entire body was rigid, silent.

Duma stared up at the creature with his rifle tight in his hands. His dark knuckles were white with tension. A nervous tick made one eyebrow dance on his face. She looked back up and it was gone, as silently as it arrived.

“Wow,” she whispered.

Duma raised the rifle and pointed it at Emilie. The muzzle was shrouded in shadow.

She looked back at the man and saw his eyes unfocus. It was if he was staring through her. “What are you doing?” she asked, afraid. Then she realized he wasn’t pointing at her, but at something behind her. With every muscle tense, she slowly turned and saw the razor drone perched behind her, half hidden behind a set of conduit.

It sprang and Emilie dropped to the ground. It clattered through the conduit and fought to free itself. Duma fired once and tumbled it back against the wall. Emilie struggled to tear the pistol out from her waist and pulled the trigger aimlessly. Rounds impacted against the alloy tubing and smacked against the wall.

She stopped when she saw that it was dead. One set of limbs danced and tapped on the ground while the others folded in and out. The sensor bank was dim and half torn away. They were above her, around her, and she had no way of knowing. The foreboding terror came to her like only prey can feel. “Can we get somewhere safe?”

Duma lowered the rifle to his waist and pressed himself against the wall. “Where?”

“Inside?”

Duma’s eyes danced wildly through the conduit.

Emilie saw him losing his edge, falling under the pressure. Fuck, she thought. “Duma, you need to get us out of here. You can do this, but don’t fall apart on me.”

Duma snapped his eyes to her and squinted. “Who are you? To come here and fucking order me around? I don’t owe you shit. Your old man owed me money.” Duma stepped closer and loomed over Emilie.

“You’re pissed about money when there’s razor drones around?”

Duma shook his head and stood his ground. “Where we gonna go? Get away from this? This,” he said, gesturing all around them, “is the new reality. It’s all gone
. Gone
.”

“Just like that? Someone comes in and pushes you, and you fucking buckle?”

Duma slapped her with the back of his hand. He looked away and took a deep breath.

Emilie licked her lip and felt it growing thicker. Her mouth tasted of blood. “We can’t stay here,” she said, knowing she’d pushed the wrong way. “I need your help.”

A transport pulled along the edge of the port, three hundred meters away, and stopped abruptly. A single soldier dropped down in a suit of blocky pattern armor. His weapon was stubby and short. He raised thermal binoculars to his face and scanned around.

“We need to go,” Emilie said. The troops were hidden from view, but something had caught their attention. She glanced at the dying drone and knew they had to move and now. “Like now.” The additive cell, she had a location, if she could get there she’d be safe, at least for a short time. “I know where we can go.”

Duma redirected his gaze from the troops to Emilie. “Where?”

“There’s a Core facility down the shore, a couple of kilometers, we can make it,” she said quickly. She stepped closer and grabbed Duma by the arm.

“Core?” Duma spat. “Core? You’re one of
them
.”

Emilie released his arm and stood back. “No. No, I’m not, I bought the facility to come back here.”

Duma focused his eyes and cocked his head. He looked to the troops spreading away from the transport and back to Emilie. He took a cautious step back and raised his rifle.

Emilie watched the muzzle rise again and point at her. This time his eyes were focused on hers. Not like this, she thought. “Duma, we can go, we can do this.”

Duma shook his head slowly. “They’ll want you. They’ll leave me alone.”

“No Duma, they won’t.”

He stepped back and raised the rifle up. “Stop!”

She focused her eyes on his and took another step. Her hands stretched out to the sides with palms outward. “You’ll have to shoot me, Duma.”

His feet slid back on the crusty ground and he stopped against the ragged edges of alloy. His eyes were wild and spittle ran down one side of his face. “Stop!” he yelled.

A slight metallic sound clicked and tapped. A razor drone clacked from inside of the piping and punched spikes out.

Duma spun with his rifle and jammed the muzzle downward. He fired once and drilled the drone into the ground. The razor drone righted itself and struggled to get through the conduit. Shouts echoed from behind them, the Hun troops were coming. He turned quickly with the barrel of the rifle following.

Emilie held the pistol before her and looked into Duma’s eyes and pulled the trigger. His head snapped back against the piping with a dull thud and he crumpled onto the ground.

The moment was on her and she was locked in place. A thin snake of smoke rose up from the action of the pistol. It felt warm in her hands. She’d never killed anyone, the adrenaline dropped away and a sickness welled up inside of her. Go, she thought. Run. Run away. But she couldn’t move, her eyes locked onto Duma’s. He looked almost normal, like he could rise, except for a small ragged star shaped flap on his cheek.

“Fuck,” Emilie whispered and choked on a mouthful of bile. She spat onto the ground and left the dead man behind.

The Hun troops spread out and advanced with weapons at ready. The lead trooper held his blocky weapon tight to his shoulder and sighted down the barrel as he stepped closer. His face was mostly obscured behind a mask, but his eyes were bright white.

She snapped her eyes back and forth. The pistol was heavy in her hand and she glanced at it for a moment. The feeling of sickness was heavy inside of her. She dropped the pistol with a clatter and pushed herself into the shadows.

A single gunshot rang out and the lead trooper crumbled into a heap. Voices called out angrily and the Hun troops sprinted for cover. A round sang out and the Hun retreated farther back.

Emilie ducked into the piping and squatted in the shadows. She eyed a narrow passage leading down to the shore.

“Move it!” a voice hissed from the darkness.

She almost fell backwards with fear. “Who is it?”

“Shut the fuck up and get in here!” the voice said again. “We ain’t got all day, lady.”

She glanced behind her and could see the Hun troops hunched against hard surfaces. A second Hun trooper lay dead not far from the first. She stepped into the deeper darkness and felt a cold hand on her elbow. “Who are you?”

“The dumb one,” the man’s voice replied as he pulled her through the shadows. Her escort was silent the entire way. All she could hear was the flapping of a jacket.

The smell of metal came on strong and they dropped down onto the edge of the shore. Heaps of corroded waste lay strewn in front of them. Clouds of steam danced in the wind and obscured the upper reaches of the wall. The man was wrapped in a heavy jacket that reached down to his knees. One hand was a heavy alloy augmetic. His face was scarred, rough, and speckled in a layer of chalky stubble. A slender black oxide barrel peaked out from the bottom of his jacket. He leaned against a rust stained pillar and caught his breath.

“Who are you?” Emilie asked.

“Emmet,” the man said, breathing heavily. He reached into his jacket and pulled out a slender comm clip. “We’re clear.”

“Are you militia?”

Emmet looked to her and shook his head. “I ain’t with those clowns.”

“Then why did you help me?”

“It’s my job.”

“What?”

“It’s me and Kari, she’s the one with the sniper drone.”

Emilie blinked and wiped the condensing mist off her face. “But the militia doesn’t have sniper drones.”

Emmet looked to Emilie. “You’re slow for a smart person. We’re not militia, we’re Core. Or we were until you bought it.”

“How did you—”

“Find you?” He pointed to the small bag clinging to her side. “Your data tablet is keyed in the Core system.”

She glanced down at the bag and patted it gently. The only thing she had, the only thing she owned, was the Core assets. Most importantly, the library. A complete collection of Core items on the open market. If it could be bought and sold, she had a license to make it. Each license fed an additive cell. Each cell was a self-standing collection of material aggregators capable of making anything. Or at least anything that it was programmed for.

Emilie hoped more Core personnel would have stayed behind, but at this moment she was happy with whatever she could get.

“We’re secured for now,” Emmet said, nodding down the shore. “But we’ve got to move.”

“Lead the way.”

Emmet glanced back and smiled. “So this isn’t a good time to ask for a raise?”

Emilie looked back and shook her head slowly. The feeling of wanting to vomit had finally passed and the look on her face didn’t show much relief.

“Uh yeah, I’ll ask later.” Emmet picked his way onto the first piece of heaped stone. He looked down and held out a hand. “So what now?”

Guns, she thought, people always need more guns. Thoughts of the rounds bouncing off the armor of the brutes came back to her. Bigger guns.

Behind her screams and gunfire proved the point. She needed to cement her position, and she could feel it in her heart. Aimless and lost was not how she planned to go through life. “We’re going to make guns. Lots of guns. Big guns.”

Emmet grinned and helped her onto the stone. “I’m going to like you.”

––––––––

T
he brutes smelled like a mix of swamphole tucked next to a burning tractor tire. They stood in a ragged line. Battered armor stripped and bare to the elements. Each bore wounds, puncture holes, and bits of shrapnel. One particularly savage looking beast sat on the ground with blood pouring out of a ragged wound.

Troops came with a transport truck hooked up to a tanker-trailer. At the first brute they clamped a bracelet of tubing onto its wrist and started a loud pump. It clanged and shuddered. A moment later two Hun soldiers in brown waterproof suits sprayed a stream of icy water onto its body. Steam rose in sheets and the creature bawled.