Inherited War 3: Retaliation (2 page)

“What the fuck? I thought we were allies? Why are you pointing that rifle at Cole?” the leader of the group said.

“Calm down, West, we are having a discussion. No need to up the tension level. You may also want to notice that Cole has a hostage of his own and doesn’t seem to be making any sense at the moment.” Thalo pitched his voice as low as he could when he spoke to the human.

“I don’t give a shit if he has my mom as a hostage right now,” West said. “Tell big boy to point that cannon somewhere else. This can end a few ways. Cole dying isn’t one of them. Put. It. Down.”

“Do it, Jeth. Lower your weapon.” That came from Sky. “Please.”

“Sorry, Sky, but my answer is no,” Jeth rumbled in his deep basso.

“There you see,” Cole spoke up. “Another who would sacrifice humans to save others. Surrounded on all sides, traitors everywhere.”

“What’s going on, Cole? The AI said you needed me down here for security. I thought we were all friends?” West asked, never removing his eyes form his target. Before Cole could answer, the door to the hanger opened a second time. In walked Gavreal. He strode the length of the hanger. Walked past the humans between Sky and the Worlders and stopped in front of Cole.

The two beings locked stares. The shining cloth of the angelic beings robes illuminated the small section of hanger floor. It cast an eerie light onto Cole and Snow. Gavreal spread his wings to full extension and blocked the view of all those behind him. Thalo noticed what the kin did, slowly brought his hand to his shoulder and grabbed the barrel of Jeth’s rifle, and placed his other on Jeth’s trigger hand.

“Gavreal will not let him hurt her, brother.”
Thalo sent the quick message to Jeth telepathically.

“I know,”
Jeth responded and finished lowering his rifle.

“Well shit,” West said. “I’m catholic so there is no way in hell I’m shooting near the angel. Lower the weapons, boys.” West led the way, lowing his rifle and rising to his feet. “Now what?” he asked to everyone in the room. No one had an answer, so they all turned their attention to Gavreal.

“Creator,” the Kin said. “I can see that you are hurting and confused, let me aid you.” Without waiting for an answer, Gavreal slowly reached his hands forward and placed them on either side of Cole’s face. He smiled at Cole and closed his eyes. Gavreal’s body went suddenly ridged and his wings fluttered slightly. He held that pose for what seemed like forever before suddenly releasing his hold on Cole and dropping his hands to his sides. The Kin was breathing heavy and a slight sheen of sweat covered his smooth golden skin.

“I cannot help him. This is his battle to win.” He turned and faced the others. “And if he loses, so do we all.” With those ominous words proceeding him, he drew his wings back tight to his body and walked between the silent beings who watched him go. The tension in the room slowly built as they turned their attention once again to Cole and Snow.

Cole turned his head and spat like he was trying to get rid of a bad taste in his mouth. His grip on Snow once again relaxed. Sky moved before anyone could stop her. She glided forward and kneeled in front of Cole.

“You are right, Cole. It is my fault we are here. What has happened to you your whole life was my fault, and I offer no excuses. Punish me, but let my sister go. I will willingly take her place.” She looked him in the eyes as she finished her speech. She caught his eyes with hers and made him look at her. She poured all the love and adoration she had for him into that look and hoped that in the end he would take her instead. As close as she was now, she could see the storm raging on his face, but more importantly, in his eyes. Everyone held their breath and waited for his response.

For a long time the two beings stared at one another. Finally the lack of sleep and the stress of the last few months broke the strange spell Cole was under. His face contorted from anger to confusion in a heartbeat. He shook his head and blinked his eyes like he had been woken from a deep sleep. Then he noticed where he was and who was around him. Then he looked down and gasped. Snow, beaten, bloody, and trussed up for execution. Her blood-matted hair clenched in his fist and in his other hand, the executioners blade.

In shock, he dropped the knife, let go of her hair, and tried to step backwards. Sky lunged forward to grab her sister and lowered her to the ground. She didn’t try to stop Cole. Unfortunately for Cole, the only thing behind him was the atmospheric shield and matter could pass through it just fine. Cole didn’t have on his skin suit. He had taken it off before his walk that evening, and was wearing normal clothes. He took another step backwards and kept on going right out into space. His eyes widened as he realized what was about to happen. Liam, one of the soldiers who had come with West, reacted first. He went from motionless to sprinting in a heartbeat and jumped out the hanger door. As soon as his suit detected vacuum, it extended the helmet over his head, increased the suit temp, and began to feed him oxygen.

Liam slammed into Cole, wrapping his arms around Cole’s waist. He used the combat suits inertial jets to halt his progress and without turning around, reversed. In all told, Cole had been out for less than fifteen seconds, but it took a toll. Once he broke the plane of the hanger’s edge and came through the shield, they both collapsed into a heap as the bases gravity took hold.

Sky was there in an instant. She had her portable nano communicator out and pressed up against Cole’s temple. Seeing he would be ok, she nodded to Liam and told him to take Cole back to his quarters. She turned back to her sister to find Jeth had picked her up and was cradling her in his massive arms. Snow’s own nanites were well on their way to fixing her, the blood was from wounds that had already closed. Still on her knees, she sat back on her feet and watched as the human soldiers lifted Cole gently and carried him out of the hanger.

She felt a hand rest gently on her shoulder. She looked up at Thalo, placed her hand on his, and gave him a gentle squeeze.

Thalo knelt next to her and placed his arm around her shoulders. He didn’t say anything to her. What was there to say? Nothing that could comfort her. Nothing that could erase what they all just witnessed.

“We should go,” she said quietly. Jeth had already risen and still gently cradling Snow in his massive arms, was turning to go.

“Wait, a moment.” He gently restrained Sky from leaving. They both waited and watched as Jeth slowly walked out of the hanger. He was taking great care not to jostle or disturb Snow at all. Moments later, they were alone in the hanger. Thalo let a slow breath whistle out from between clenched teeth.

“I don’t want to hear it,” Sky said to Thalo.

“What? You can’t possibly know what I was going to say after all of that,” Thalo shot back.

“Yes, I do. You want me gone, and my sister gone. Gone from this place, and back to anywhere—anywhere but within his reach,” she said.

“Damn, you are good. And yes, I was going to suggest that, at first. But as soon as I thought it, I changed my mind. You brought him back somehow. I couldn’t, Gavreal couldn’t, but you did. We need you close, but never alone with him.” Thalo was being serious. When Thalo was serious, other beings should be nervous. “Not to change the point, but what has he told you about what happened to him on Esii?”

“Not much. He hasn’t been ready to talk about it. Why? Has he said something to you?” she asked.

“Yes and no. He did tell me that what they did to him was bad, real bad. Physical and mental, but mostly mental. He told me that he was worried that some of the stuff that got put in his head was trying to take over and displace the real Cole.  This may be what he was talking about.” He paused for a moment before continuing. “Tell me about Gavreal. He helped you, didn’t he?”

“Yes, he helped get my mind back together when I had lost all hope of seeing Cole again. He entered my mind. He spent time with me in my own head and helped me sort through some things. He came to see me every night there for a while, until I felt more in control. It’s weird. I couldn’t lie when he was with me in my head. He cut through all the unimportant stuff and forced me to talk to him about what really mattered. When I saw him come in, all I could think was he could fix whatever was wrong with Cole.” She stopped and took a deep breath. “I am not going to let Cole down again. I will stay and help him through this. But my sister should go. It is up to her, though.”

Thalo grabbed her arm and turned her towards the door. “Let’s go check on him and find out where the hell Hal is.”

Thalo was right. Hal had been suspiciously absent from the whole meeting. He definitely had some explaining to do.

CHAPTER 2

If I were sitting in front of an Army head shrink right now, he would be diagnosing me with PTSD. Easy call for him. Planet destroyed, fought and killed in battle, captured, tortured and finally responsible for the eventual destruction of a whole race. Trouble sleeping, paranoia, lashing out. (And if my nanites didn’t do such a good job clearing out my system, I would be a heavy drinker…naw never a big fan of booze.)  In any other situation, that Army Doc would be right. What makes me so different from the average person is that I am not average. Death doesn’t scare me. Growing up in group homes and with the foster parents I had, death always seemed like an escape. Torture? Bah, I spent the first fifteen years of my life being tortured. Starved, beaten, and locked in closets. The Esii were masters, granted, but I survived. The best thing I have going for me right now is indifference. I just don’t care. As far as the Esii going extinct, wish it would happen faster, to be frank. It would give me one less thing to worry about. Lashing out at my friends? Well, some friends. They left me to rot on that planet and they suffer the consequences. I told Thalo that I was afraid I was losing myself, that what the Esii had put in my head was taking over. I now believe that it is revealing the man who is going to live the rest of my life. I have a clarity now that I lacked before. I have goals that I can achieve without help and a people to save. My ancestors made the mistake of relying on too many other non-humans, and I made that same mistake. Hal warned me way back when. “Leave the Nixa,” he said to me. “They can’t be trusted,” he warned me, and I ignored him. I heed his warning now, nearly too late. I have paid the price for my ignorance. I will pay it no more.

Thalo and Sky left the hanger and both saw the squad of humans outside Cole’s door. The leader, West, was quietly talking to his men as they walked the dozen or so feet to his doorway.

“Do you need something?” West asked as they drew to a halt.

“We would like to check in on Cole, I didn’t realize we needed permission,” Thalo said with a hint of sarcasm.

West looked at the man to his right. “Let me ask you a question there, Liam. We just saw these two, umm beings, with our boss cornered and under the sights of a pretty large piece of hardware.” Liam was shaking his head in agreement. “Now I don’t know where you are from, but in my book, you don’t let the same dog bite twice. So what do you think, we let em in?”

“Shit no, Sergeant Major, don’t think I like that Idea at all,” Liam responded.

“Well there you go, turn and bun,” the Sergeant Major said and shooed them off with his hands.

“You listen here—” Sky started to say when she was interrupted by West.

“Sergeant Major,” he said, cutting her off.

“What?” Sky looked baffled.

“You can disagree and yell all you like, but you will call me Sergeant Major while you are doing it. I more than earned the rank, and besides, Cole gave it to me himself. See, he wanted to make me an officer but officers, in my experience, are pussies. They end up in the way and tend to get shot in the back when things go wrong. So I said make me a Sergeant Major, all the respect, none of the BS. Now buzz off.”

“Fine,” Thalo said, “You want to pull out ranks. I order you to let us by. I am a Captain and outrank you.”

“Ha ha, there are so many things wrong with what you just said. First,” West jabbed one finger in front of Thalo’s face, “you’re Navy and we are Army. Your rank don’t mean shit to me and my boys here. Second, you don’t hold rank in our military anymore. Cole rescinded all commissions for alien crewmembers. Third, as I said before, you drew down on the Boss, you aren’t going near him.” West crossed his arms and smiled at Thalo, daring him to escalate the discussion to something more violent.

Thalo started to step forward and open his mouth when Sky grabbed him by the arm. She gave it a sharp tug, which brought him up short. “Come on, Thalo. We are not wanted here. Let’s go check on Snow.”

Thalo glared at the grinning human. “Yeah, go check on the albino chick. She seemed pretty worn out,” one of the soldiers said. They all got a chuckle out of that. Before Sky had Thalo free of the confrontation, Thalo asked one more question.

“Tell me, Sergeant Major, why do you suddenly hate us so much? We fought side by side in the skies above my home and chewed the same dirt on that rock the Esii hid under. Now a sudden change of heart. What has changed?” The hall grew suddenly silent as Thalo finished talking.