Star Brigade: The Supremacy (SB3) (42 page)

Later, the Inuu contingent began their parting gestures, swinging both arms slowly in a wide circle before both hands met clasped together in front of their chests. Taorr caught Ghuj’aega expertly returning their gestures. The six Inuu strode to a nearby boat hewn of wood and vines, pushing it out into the water before hopping in to paddle away from the mainland. Taorr watched them go, hollowed out.

“Soon…everything will be right again,” Ghuj’aega stated. The moon hung high in the night skies, casting a wash of red light over the shoreline. “I will miss our talks, youngling.”

The odd words caught Taorr’s ear. He turned to face his captor, who gazed up at the burning moon contentedly. The sight of this murderer so proud of himself sent venomous hate coursing through Taorr’s veins. But he was also so weary of this nonstop hatred, of constantly being disappointed.

So Taorr indulged the Ghebrekh’s words. “Why?” he replied.

Ghuj’aega turned to stare at Taorr, making the latter recoil. The Ghebrekh leader’s baleful eyes glittered against the night with assured triumph. “Because, Taorr…before tomorrow ends, this world will become your grave.”

Mhir’ujiid saw and heard death coming from every direction.

The Farooqua girl sat crouched underneath the ruined vehicle once considered a safe haven. Beside her lay the unconscious Star Brigadier called Khal. Despite the cacophony of roars and pulse weapons firing, he stirred not. Mhir’ujiid could barely see anyone, other than Khrome hurtling back and forth in silvery streaks, beneath the hailstorm of jusha beasts charging, snarling, or falling dead.

Bones shattering, ferocious roaring, the bark of pulse weapons, and the strident death cries of jusha beasts—all overlapped like a jarringly macabre symphony. Snarling attackers came from all sides.

Suddenly Habraum Nwosu dominated her line of sight. Firing bright blasts of crimson energy from his fists, Nwosu’s attacks cast a red glow on his squinted gaze and bald head. He ducked and dodged with surprising agility despite his size to avoid the jushas’ teeth and claws. Mhir’ujiid was enthralled. No wonder she knew of him all the way in rural Faroor. He was a warrior in every sense.

A large screeching beast pounced at him, its nasty rows of teeth snapping at his throat. Nwosu calmly swung a fist up and snapped its jaw shut with a glowing uppercut, following up with a thick biokinetic blast. The thrashing beast fell—minus its head.

Nwosu shouted something, but Mhir’ujiid couldn’t hear. She did see his mouth voice, “HOLD the LINE!” The whole time Nwosu always kept his eye on those under his command.

Further away, that skinny healer Cortes had taken a knee with her fingers pointed like a gun, shooting off shimmering white waves of sound. Mhir’ujiid had no clue the healer fought too. Any beast in her crosshairs burst in messy gushes of blood, guts, and carapace fragments. Cortes was scared—Mhir’ujiid saw it in her eyes. But the healer never let that terror paralyze her.

In her wake, V’Korram mauled any beast Cortes missed, his tawny blur of feral Kintarian ferocity hacking away with razor-sharp scaphe daggers. He frightened Mhir’ujiid almost as much as Uyull, grinning savagely while viciously stabbing any jusha beast he encountered, every strike a killing blow. This one enjoyed killing far too much for Mhir’ujiid’s tastes.

From above Khrome was a flying battering ram barreling into jusha beasts or scooping them into the air to toss them up wherever he fancied. The Farooqua barely glimpsed Tyris over the growing stacks of dead jusha beasts and the nonstop barrage of live ones barreling forward, but the Tanoeen’s high-pitched cold voice and the bark from his pulse rifle gauntlet could be heard.

Under the protection of the ruined transport, no jusha beasts had gone near Mhir’ujiid or Khal yet. Still, she clutched her pulse pistol like a lifeline. If only she could be of more use.

The cyborg Marguliese weaved swiftly through the jusha with that double-ended energy blade, her face always expressionless—looking almost bored. Even over the raucous din, her shimmering blade’s
hiss-slish
was endless. For Mhir’ujiid, the statuesque warrior was amidst a magnificent dance of death, every implausibly quick and graceful motion slashing her attackers to pieces. Nwosu fired off a few shots at her attackers when possible, but clearly Marguliese could handle herself.

The TerraTroopers also worked effectively and seamlessly with whichever Brigadier they paired with, blistering flashes from their repeater rifles briefly freeze-framing instants of the dark, bloody chaos—a ghastly picture show. Corporal Uyull roared in defiance, peppering any beast he targeted with blistering, blinding volleys. Brutish as the massive Nirandian was, Mhir’ujiid grudgingly admired his battle prowess.

Specialist Byzlar’s body language completely hardened in battle, be it the expressionless glare on his stony face or how steady he grew when taking aim. Byzlar didn’t fire as often, choosing his shots surgically—possibly because his partner Tyris kept killing jusha before the Aesonite could even find them. But when Byzlar fired, he rarely missed.

Nwosu’s partner, Sergeant Fiyan, with only light armor and a quartet of automatic pulse pistols, was taking down just as many jusha beasts as Nwosu. Her four arms whipped about in deadly swipes, spraying shots at any jusha beast that tried to slide past Habraum’s blind spots.

…And three more jusha beasts leaped over a fresh carcass at Nwosu with sharp teeth bared. He calmly swung his left arm quickly in a backwards sweeping arc with a wide biokinetic blast, slicing the trio in half at the midsection. Before the severed bodies hit the ground, Mhir’ujiid saw Nwosu scanning the battlefield again—not just to watch his team, but clearly searching for some escape. But hundreds of jusha beasts kept charging out of what seemed to be thin air, as if the Zenith Point had sentenced them to death.

Mhir’ujiid watched, feeling useless. She knew how these jusha beasts in their massive packs didn’t stop until their prey was absolutely devoured…

“Unless…” The idea had Mhir’ujiid on her feet before she thought to stand up. But Nwosu had ordered her to guard Khal. She stared at his motionless form. “I can
save
us all,” Mhir’ujiid hissed, torn on what to do. Leave one life to save many, or save one life and leave the many to their eventual doom.

Out of the chaos, Corporal Uyull backed up in Mhir’ujiid’s direction with gauntlets barking madly.

A jusha beast jumped onto his back and neck. Uyull reflexively grabbed at the beast and pitched it over his shoulder. That was all the distraction the other beasts needed, and four more creatures tackled Uyull to the ground. Dazzling pulse bursts ripped through the beasts’ frames, but the firepower did not deter their attack. Soon the Nirandian’s howls went from defiant to agonized. From where she sat, Mhir’ujiid now heard the familiar sounds of armor cracking and flesh shredding. Unable to watch any longer, the young Farooqua lifted her pulse pistol with both hands and took aim.

As if sensing impending danger, one of the jusha beasts on Uyull whipped its knotted head in her direction, its teeth dripping with inky Nirandian blood. Staring at the creature was like looking into a vacant hut—no soul behind those eyes. To the jusha, Mhir’ujiid was another meal. Without much deliberation the creature charged.

Mhir’ujiid fired once at the beast’s leg, the kick of the pulse pistol staggering her back. The beast stumbled as the shot hit true, but kept limply galloping onward. She centered her body better to fire twice at its shoulders, puncturing the carapace and drawing trickles of blood. That barely slowed the creature’s breakneck charge. Soon the jusha was almost on her, hot stinky breath wafting against Mhir’ujiid’s face. She struggled to swallow her fear and shoot the creature between its eyes, but her arms kept shaking.

The jusha’s maw filled her vision, opened wide to devour her face...

SHKK! SHKK! SHKK! SHLLCK!  
Four jagged pieces of hull from the downed transport leaped off the ground, whistling through the air.

Two shards impaled the beast’s left flank, another speared the left hind leg, and the last one went straight through its neck. The jusha beast toppled over in mid-charge, sliding to a halt at Mhir’ujiid’s feet. Years of hunting experience told her the beast was dead.
But how?
The Farooqua whirled about to see Khal propped up on an elbow. He held his right hand in front of him, eyes alert and fixed on the downed beast.

The realization hit Mhir’ujiid. “You’re a mind mover,” she exclaimed.

Khal smirked. “Is that what you cool kids on Faroor call it?” This human’s accent differed from Dr. Cortes and Nwosu’s. He looked around at the battleground and gawked. “What the hell?”

Mhir’ujiid dropped the pulse pistol as if it had burned her fingers. “Ghuj’aega ambushed our transport. The jusha beasts overtook us…and I was tasked with guarding you. Are you alright?”

Khal pulled himself up to a crouch using the ruined transport and winced. “Getting there…”

With Khal awake, Mhir’ujiid’s thoughts returned to surviving this battle. She scanned the bloody bedlam and saw her target: the most massive jusha beast, carapace notched and grizzled, spikes along its backside. This pack’s alpha sat outside the fray on its haunches, its teeth-studded maw open and howling horridly at its underlings. “I can finish this,” she said to Khal

The human’s face frowned at her earnestness. “Then finish it,” he shouted over the din.

Mhir’ujiid nodded appreciatively and snatched up a spear-like piece of shrapnel from the downed transport. “Uyull needs help.” Mhir’ujiid gestured toward the three jusha beasts piled atop the fallen soldier. The only sounds coming from his direction were rips and crunches. Ignoring this, Mhir’ujiid dashed toward the pack leader.

Lily fired off concussive sound waves at a charging jusha beast, blowing it apart in a gooey burst of blood, carapace fragments, and innards. Another beast sprang, and she struck it dead on with a sonic blast, causing it to erupt in the same manner. She pointed and fired at a third in mid-spring, blowing it apart like the others.

Another jusha attacked, blown to a gooey pulp. The onslaught never stopped. How much longer could she withstand this? Her shoulders burned with fatigue, her pace slowing. But the jusha beasts weren’t stopping. The more she killed, the more ferocious the remaining beasts became.

V’Korram, however, drank up the carnage. Drenched in blood not his own, the Kintarian snarled and spit, pouncing with scaphes drawn, every lithe muscle taut and bulging. He kept his fighting brusque and brutal, either slashing bellies open with his scaphes or ripping their throats out with his own claws. For Liliana, watching V’Korram cut through the enemy was a surprisingly beautiful thing—when she wasn’t fending off jusha beasts of her own.

Then one beast finally caught V’Korram unawares, tackling him from behind. Liliana, assigned to watch his back and him to hers, gasped. Furious with herself for missing this, she aimed for the assailant. Before the doctor could fire, V’Korram twisted about to face the jusha beast. He plunged both scaphes deep into the creature’s chest—so deep that his wrists disappeared into the puncture wounds. A roaring V’Korram lifted the dying beast off the ground with ease, tossing it aside.

The doctor heard the barking of pulse rifles and repeaters, the shouting of orders and battle cries occasionally overcoming the roaring symphony of jusha beasts. But aside from Khrome plowing back and forth and of course V’Korram, Liliana had lost sight of the rest of CT-1 in the barrage of jusha beasts either charging or dying.

Panic tied her stomach into knots.
Who is still alive?
But she barely had time to process this thought before another jusha beast lunged. She pointed and fired, disintegrating it with ease.

Suddenly, an unevenly matched skirmish off to the side caught Liliana’s eye. Mhir’ujiid, armed with only a makeshift spear, was facing the largest jusha beast she’d ever seen, a gnarled and savage-looking specimen.
Why isn’t she watching Khal?
Lily frowned, eyeing the ruined transport.

Flashing pulse weapons and Captain Nwosu’s bright crimson biokinetic blasts, along with the oddly burning moon above, served as poor lighting. But Khal stood wide awake, hurling jusha beasts aside with sharp hand gestures. Feeling slight relief, the doctor’s gaze was drawn back to Mhir’ujiid and her opponent. This massive creature snapped its jaws and dove several times at the willowy Farooqua, who blithely danced away while attempting to stab at the creature’s vulnerable belly. But the alpha beast defensively slapped away her spear with its massive front paws. Then it hit Liliana:
that has to be the alpha all the other jusha followed
. Mhir’ujiid was attempting to kill the leader and save everyone!

Liliana pointed her fingers and fired at the alpha. A smaller beast threw itself in front of the sound wave and exploded into gooey pieces. In the distance, Mhir’ujiid had mounted the massive beast’s spike-studded back, stabbing her spear at its head. Lily dropped to one knee and fired again.

Yet another beast leaped in her way, its lower body violently liquefied. “Dammit!” she exclaimed. The alpha’s minions were protecting it, dying for it. Taking out the alpha male would have to happen at close range—

“CRESCENDO!”

A sudden stink worse than imagined filled Lily’s nostrils, almost making her gag. She turned to her right and saw a frenzied beast practically on top of her, its teeth barely an inch from her throat.

And in a heartbeat, it was violently rammed aside. It took a nanoclic for Liliana to realize that V’Korram had launched himself at the beast, grappling and rolling around with it, jockeying for dominance in a flurry of movement too quick for Lily’s human eyes. In the moments that followed, the Kintarian had pinned the thrashing beast on its back. V’Korram’s green-flecked eyes lit up sadistically as he slashed his claws repeatedly into the beast’s exposed torso—spraying blood everywhere in grisly arcs.

No sooner than the beast lay dead did V’Korram get in Liliana’s face, barking furiously, “Watch your own surroundings—”