Sunlord (42 page)

Shaun ducked away, slipping through a clear space
seconds before the warbot swirled, upper leg mechanisms retracting
in a quick scissoring motion that sliced the air behind him. Shaun
threw himself away, clearing the underside of the machine just as
it crashed sideways into the wall. Metal buckled, the sound was as
if two high speed cars had just collided head on. Shaun caught a
split second glimpse of the comm lab door giving way, smashing
inwards like eggshell as mountings tore apart.

The warbot recovered instantly, raising itself from
the twisted frame of the door Matt black armour glistened like a
hardy cannonball. Scanning the large gash in the door to the comm
lab Shaun judged that the gap would be big enough to squeeze
through. A wry grin flickered across his face, amazed his ploy had
succeeded. Now all that remained was to take care of the
warbot.

His moment of respite was all the warbot needed to
cover the ground separating them. It caught Shaun by surprise. He
threw himself away but this time the warbot was quicker, a steel
bolt catching and spinning him roughly. The air was crushed from
his lungs as he was pushed savagely against the wall, feet leaving
the ground as something hard and heavy pushed against his right
shoulder. Mind spinning with panic he didn't know what had hit him
until seconds later, his eyes glazed with pain. The warbot had him
pinned.

Shaun couldn't move as the intense pulsing tendrils
of agony wrenched and stretched at his mind as if it were a lump of
dough. He struggled to draw breath but it seemed a great weights
were pinned against his efforts. He was painfully aware that his
lungs were empty and already white spots flashed before his eyes.
His shoulder ached with sudden pain and a gush of blood spread over
the warbot's javelin-like arm. It had him held like a butterfly,
pinned to the wall through the flesh of his shoulder, holding him
there. The rod had caught him high, just below the collarbone, the
cold steel wedging itself tight between his flesh. Shaun tried to
pull away but froze as electric bolts of agony shot the length of
his arm, the pain almost paralysing him. Shaun heard Myshia wildly
screaming his name but it seemed somehow distant. All of a sudden
the only thing that mattered in the world was the pain, the pain
that washed over his brain, driving the strength from his limbs.
The heavy feeling of fear was in his gut, rising in his throat,
primitive instincts crying out to run, to hide.

A feeble light shone in Shaun's eyes as he opened
them, raising his head, a small cry escaping his lips, watching
helplessly as the warbot prepared the death blow.

* * *

The steady, rhythmic pulsing of drum beats echoed
down the long stone corridors, thumping eerily, quiet with
distance. Footsoldier Crane dropped his tube of synthi-drink, his
ears prickling.

"What is it?"

Crane pivoted, turning to see his mess officer had
spoken.

"Can't you hear it?" replied footsoldier Crane.
"Sounds like...drums."

The mess officer's heavy brows furrowed. He made a
sudden movement to clip fasten the front of his helicasuit. "You're
right."

Footsoldier Crane picked up his rifle that lay
propped up against the wall and bolted outside, jiggling his pack
over one shoulder. His heavy GP boots thumped on the narrow stone
stairs as he climbed, cursing the shallowness of the staircase.
Under the light of a few makeshift fluorescent that hung from the
walls like hollow insects he made his way to the top and leant
against a heavy wooden door. He burst into the orange light of
evening, the air cool against his cheeks.

He stood for a moment, poised, listening. The sound
was louder here, more distinct. It was definitely the beating of
many drums in the distance. It had alerted a score of other
footsoliders too. They cast confused looks at each other as they
emerged from the rooms of the currach building.

The small courtyard they stood in had once been
filled with currach but the Hartrias had claimed it as their own.
As instructed by Avatar they had established as a makeshift mess
hall in the old stone building. Footsoldier Crane had helped set up
the cooking machines in the ancient primitive rooms, where enough
rations would be produced to feed the nearby legions of soldiers.
Their domination of the city had been effortless - no Hartrias
casualties had been reported and the surviving currach were rounded
up and locked into great rectangular transport cells that had been
dropped in by Haulers. The transport cells were twenty metres in
cross section and fifty metres long - a polished silver containment
vessel that fitted to the underside of the workhorse craft of the
Hartrias army: the Haulers. Used extensively in construction and
transport the Haulers were the heavy freight vehicles of the Urisa.
The natives were to be kept sealed in the transport cells
indefinitely, not that anyone particularly cared about them.

Footsoldier Crane studied the horizon, finally
shaking his head in defeat. He could make out where the drums were
coming from, and how far away they were. It was a spooky sound, a
sound that made the short hairs on the nape of his muscled neck
stand on end.

The mess officer had come up behind him.

"Frug'n natives. Looks like they're having some sort
of festival."

Footsoldier Crane turned. "Shall I report it to
Avatar, sir?"

The mess officer shook his head, and pointed down
from their vantage point. Looking closely, Crane made out a
movement in the shadows of evening moving swiftly away from
them.

"Looks like a squad has already been sent. Come on
boy, the droids have to be activated before 1900 hours."

Footsoldier Crane watched the fast moving block of
shadow disappear into the distance, his narrow eyes glazed with
thought. As he turned away his gaze caught on sudden movement
flowing between the shadows. He watched in mute awe as a cloud of
green gas spread, pooling about the base of stone pillars like
wisps of coiling water. He moved away quickly, opening his mouth to
shout a warning, but all of a sudden he started wrenching, gasping
and clawing at his throat. It was as it his oesophagus had burst
into flame, a flame that twisted and burnt from the inside out.

The nearby mess officer saw Crane double over, and
moved quickly to snap his mask over his face.

"Respirator's on!" the mess officer bawled.

It was too late for Crane. Without being aware of it,
he had hit the ground. Even now he seemed to be drawing away,
feeling distant from the raging fire in his throat. Silently, in
the panic of his mind, he cursed his stupidity. Avatar had
instructed them to wear their respirators, but the air on the
planet was perfectly breathable, and he had worked up such a sweat
moving the cooking machines around the masks had been an
inconvenience. Now, fumbling with the straps of his mask, he wished
he had listened to the computer.

The mess officer studied the cloud of advancing gas.
It had seemingly sprung from nowhere, as if the drums had been to
lure them out into the ambush.

"Load your weapons," instructed the officer to the
four other footsoliders. He noticed out of the corner of his eye
that they had hurriedly fastened their respirator's as soon as they
had seen Crane fall.

The officer withdrew his pistol from a boot holster.
"Get back against the wall," he instructed, eyes moving through the
smeared plastic faceplate of the respirator, looking for any signs
of the enemy. He backed up slowly, watching in morbid fascination
as the cloud of gas spread and bunched up at his feet, coiling
tendrils spiralling as the green mist thickened. He was confident
that with his faceplate he was impermeable to the gas.

He found out he was wrong only when it was too
late.

"It's skin sensitive!" he shrieked into the comm
link. He hastily wrenched at the gloves that hung by fastenings
from his belt and pulled them on. He sealed the black gloves about
the wrists of his helicasuit to form an airtight seal, already
moving to buckle tight the neck seal. Hurry, his mind thought
urgently as the first twinges of pain shot the length of his arm.
In his mind he saw the skin along his forearm blacked and burst
into a craterous mass of sores, the sensation of heat prickling his
flesh. He coughed, shaking his head savagely as if this would clear
it of the leaden sensation that had suddenly descended. He slung
the strap of his rifle over the shoulder armplate, freeing a hand
that allowed him to switch the comm link open.

"Officer 5476," he snapped. "Some sort of gas here.
Don't know what...it's burning my skin." He stumbled backwards,
feeling the hard surface of the wall against his flesh, his fingers
clawing at the air. Burning, his mind yelled.

"Officer five-four-seventy-six report," snapped the
voice in his earset.

The mess officer opened his mouth, forcing the air
from his lungs with visible effort to try and speak. But he
couldn't. Something was happening inside, his guts were turning
into a melting pot of pain.

"G...gas," he managed to whisper hoarsely a moment
before falling limply to the flagstones, his vision hazy, his mind
a twisted knot.

The surrounding footsoliders stepped back a pace,
watching open mouthed as the mess officer convulsed, scratching his
helicasuit, the plastic front of the respirator mask thumping dully
against the stones as his head jolted forward. Their attention was
distracted, and did not see the flicker of movement in the shadows
behind them.

* * *

Priar slumped into the corner of the room, his vision
already blurring. He raised his thin currach hand to brush the
beading sweat from his brow. His wide insect eyes wandered weakly
down and a thin smile stretched across his lips. He looked at the
broken canister in his hands, triangular shards of broken glass
scattered about nearby. He found it hard to keep his mind focused -
the gas seemed to be pulling and wrenching at his mind, pulling it
away from reason.

Priar was a member of the League of Steel.
Infiltrating into the city had been child's play, he mused idly. He
had been one of the currach who had designed the drainage system
and it had been easy to place himself atop the building. The
reality of what he was about to do only really occurred to him when
the drums had sounded. The drums were the signal, and it was then
Priar realised it was all a very serious matter.

Of course it was a suicide mission. No-one could
break open the canister's of Shata-Bera's deadly gas and then run
for safety. No, Shata had asked for volunteers, and Priar had been
one. Watching the dark green gas dissipate into the evening air he
felt of sudden weariness shackled him to the spot. There was no use
running. Instead he just sat back, waiting for death.

The burning fire of pain ran up his skin, making it
crawl and blister painfully. A small sound escaped Priar's throat
as he tried, unsuccessfully, to block out the pain. It would not be
long now, he thought. It wouldn't be long until it was all
over.

Before he dropped unconscious he heard the guttural
shouts of the Sunlords as they spotted the gas, the heavy thumping
of their boots and the slamming of doors.

His last thought was not the satisfaction of
revenge.

The small huddle of tents lay banked up against the
steep slope sheltered from sight behind a bank of soil, the fabric
of the tent camouflaged with brown dyes. From his vantage point
Shata-Bera could see the city small with distance, the orange ball
of the sun setting behind the silhouettes of towers and buildings,
faint lights flickering briefly between buildings as Sunlord's went
about their tasks. A crescent formation of mountains surrounded the
city which from this distance looking like a pair of sheltering
arms with numerous streams running off the mountains and pooling
together like a network of veins to form a wide, slow moving river
that running directly through the middle of the city.

Shata-Bera squinted into the sun and made out
movement on the two-hundred metre stretch of plainland that
separated the mountains and the city. Cover was sparse there and
the group of fifty currach moved swiftly from one hollow to
another.

Shata shifted his weight and glanced at the shadow
laying concealed behind the ridge beside him.

"They're on their way," he said. He smiled, one
corner of his mouth lifting, the other side a mass of rippled scar
tissue.

The white of teeth flashed in the shadows as Mosata
grinned and nodded eagerly. "You have trained them well, my
lord."

"We'll take back the city," muttered Shata under his
breath.

He spun as the snorting of a tosutri sounded behind
him.

Shata stood and examined the figure that dismounted
from the orange skinned horse-like beast. "Parshan. What news?"

The rider, Parshan, bowed briskly. He wore a heavy
black leather vest and a tight fitting mask pulled over his head
with only eye holes punctured into it. At his belt were four
knives, of varying sizes, in crudely made leather sheaths. One of
the Sunlord's fire weapons hung over Parshan's shoulder, the dulled
silver surface of the sleek rifle dangling close to his four
fingered right hand, ready. Parshan pulled the mask from his head
to reveal the currach's angular features and dark green eyes. "The
Jargoon group are moving in," he reported.

"I saw them," replied Shata. "Concealment on that
plain is difficult."

"The gas should distract the Sunlords long enough,"
said Parshan. "From all reports I gather that Priar and Croix made
it to their positions."

Shata nodded slowly. The task of infiltrating into
the city to break open the canisters of gas was crucial if Shata's
hastily constructed plan was to succeed. Priar would break the
first canister in the heart of the Sunlords encampment, and Criox's
duty was to take out the Sunlords that guarded the city gates. From
there the bulk of the Leagues' attack force, the Jargoon group,
would enter once the deadly gas had dissipated to finish off what
remained of the enemy defences. Time had been short and preparation
hasty. They had barely enough time to pack their weapons after the
boy had arrived at their camp with the news the city had been
taken. On the way Shata briefed his band of less than one hundred
fighters.