Worlds Collide (Architects of the Apocalypse Book 2), page 33
Bruce shot a bemused look at each of them. Axel just shook his head, as if to say, not now. Preston and Tom looked equally confused, but Alice was too busy soothing her son to notice much of what was going on.
Whoever he was, that human flashlight seemed to have a significant influence over the Jakar. They obeyed his command that they let the prisoners go and leave them for the Guardians to deal with. But Bruce wasn’t sure how long that would last. Those soldiers had slaughtered a lot of people. Sooner or later, the Jakar were bound to seek revenge for their deaths. They’d only killed a handful of villagers when Alice had released that T-Rex in their mountain village, and the Jakar had mustered an army to the ruins for revenge. But here ... it was a massacre.
Bruce looked to the soldiers: Major White and Private Meyers, and another man, who they’d called Corporal Garcia, lying down on the raft with an arrow sticking out of his side. The two uninjured ones were holding long wooden oars that they were using to push off against the riverbed and get them away from the shore as quickly as possible. They reached the middle of the river and the current took over for them, carrying the raft swiftly downstream.
In the distance up ahead, Bruce spied the stone wall that guarded Hagroth from the larger predators beyond the canyon. For a moment Bruce was afraid that they’d reach that wall and get stuck, but then he spotted a tall gap with an archway over it in the middle of the wall. To the right of that vertical opening, the wall looked like it had been smashed by a giant’s fists. That must be where the stone blocks they’d been cutting were being put to use.
Up ahead, two other rafts were filled to overflowing with escaping prisoners. Fully half of them looked like they were abductees from New York, but the other half were obviously locals from other tribes. There was no sign of Etigor, the weaselly old man who’d betrayed them, but he’d been accepted by the Jakar now, so he probably wouldn’t have fled with the other prisoners.
Within just a few minutes, they would reach the wall. Bruce became aware of racing shadows pacing them on the shore of the river. He realized they were Jakar archers and sighed. It was a heavy burden—being right all the time. Bruce smiled bitterly to himself.
“What are you smiling about?” Tom asked.
He pointed to the Jakar running alongside them. “So much for a clean getaway.” He yanked his rifle up and checked through the light amplifying scope. Sure enough, he saw Jakar warriors, dozens of them, running through the trees and down the covered pathways through the village.
“I see them,” Major White said.
Alice and Tom raised their weapons now, too, tracking the horde.
“Save your ammo. We don’t have a clear line of fire,” the major said.
“What are they planning to do?” Alice asked.
“They’re going to shut the river gate,” Axel replied.
“The what?” Preston cried. “They have a gate?”
Axel arched an eyebrow at him. “You think they went to all the trouble of building a wall, and then they left a big gaping hole in it where boats could come and go as they please?”
“The wall is to keep people out?” Alice asked. “I thought it was for dinosaurs.”
“Both,” Axel said. “And they still need a gate to block the river if they want to keep big predators out. Plenty of them know how to swim, and the river’s probably not even that deep.”
“He’s right,” Tom said. “T-Rex was a fantastic swimmer.”
“How the hell would you know that?” Bruce demanded.
“Hollow bones connected to air sacs,” Tom explained. “Just like birds. T-Rex would float without even having to wiggle his stubby arms.”
“Fantastic,” Bruce muttered. “So if the Jakar don’t get us, the dinos will.”
“Can the chatter,” Major White snapped. “We’re coming up on the wall. I think we’re going to make it, but it’s going to be close.”
He was right. The current sped up as they approached the gap in the wall, making their rafts pull ahead of the Jakar running along the shore. But Bruce spotted something else as they drew near: wooden docks with actual boats moored to them. A few canoes, and more rafts like theirs, but there were also two sleek-looking sailboats with dozens of oars that Bruce would have put good money on in a race against their overladen rafts. He estimated that each of those boats would hold at least twenty people, and all of them would be rowing, which would make it easy to catch up.
Bruce pointed to the boats and looked to the pair of soldiers. “You see that?”
“I see them,” Major White replied. “Meyers, let’s frag those boats!”
“Copy, sir.”
Both soldiers lowered their rifles and pulled grenades from their belts. Bruce heard the pins jingle, and then they cocked their arms back and threw.
Two grenades sailed through the air ...
One landed right in the middle of a sailboat. The other splashed down in the water beside it. They exploded with a loud pop and a geyer of water.
“You think that did it?” Bruce asked.
“I don’t know,” the major replied.
A hail of arrows answered from the riverbank, but they were too far away, and the angles were wrong. That volley missed and splashed into the water around the raft.
Then the river sucked them through the gap in the wall, and they were free, racing down a broad, gleaming blue ribbon with trees and flowing grass on either side.
Layla’s eyes were on the sky, tracking something that only she could see.
“What is it?” Bruce asked her.
“I killed that Architect,” she said slowly.
“So? What’s your point?”
“So, shouldn’t there be a fleet of harvesters descending on us to avenge its death?”
Bruce frowned and joined Layla in scanning the sky. All this time he’d been focused on the Jakar; he hadn’t even considered the possibility that they might not be the biggest threat.
“Forget about the Architects,” Tom snapped. “Here come the Jakar!”
Bruce spun around, nearly losing his balance and falling into the river.
Major White caught him by the arm. “Careful.”
“Thanks,” Bruce said. He saw what Tom was talking about. One of those sailboats was already racing after them, the oars on both sides moving in perfect unison.
“Someone, grab these oars!” Major White said. “I can’t aim and steer at the same time.”
Two burly prisoners shouldered through to get the oars from him and Private Meyers. Bruce recognized one of them as the giant man with long brown hair who’d shown them to the glowworm chamber up in the caves.
The boat following them rolled its sail down from the top of its mast, and the wind quickly filled it. Between the wind and those oars, they didn’t stand a chance.
Major White raised his voice, “Anyone who has a firearm, make a line with me at the back of the raft! We need to hold them off until our air support gets here!”
“Air support?” Preston asked hopefully.
“Don’t get too excited,” the major replied. “It’s a two-man eVTOL. No one’s getting air-lifted out of here, but if we’re lucky, the belly cannon will be able to punch a few holes in those boats.”
Bruce nodded grimly and raised his rifle to his shoulder, taking aim. The Jakar were gaining ground fast.
A second sailboat appeared behind the first, proving that the frag grenade hadn’t been enough to sink it.
“Get ready ...” Major White said.
A familiar, one-armed man appeared standing in the bow of the lead ship. He held a spear high like a torch and shouted something as he thrust it in the direction of their rafts. The oars stopped moving and the rowers stood up suddenly. Bruce frowned, squinting through his scope to see what they were doing. He saw bows with arrows drawn, and panic gripped his heart.
“Fire!” Major White said.
Even as he gave the order, a whispering rain of arrows came slicing through the night. People screamed, and hot fire sliced through Bruce’s shoulder. His rifle dropped from suddenly nerveless fingers, and he blinked in shock at the sight of an arrow sticking out below his clavicle.
Chapter 43
4:12 AM, September 29, 2069
Ethan fired back at the Jakar along with Meyers. Only two of the civilians they’d armed seemed to have got the memo. The others were either too slow, or had been hit by that first volley of arrows.
And the Jakar were smart. They ducked back out of sight so fast that Ethan was only able to confirm one kill. Unfortunately, it wasn’t their one-armed leader.
Then they were back on the oars again, pulling ever-closer to the escaping rafts.
Meyers continued shooting in sporadic bursts for suppressive fire.
“Save your ammo,” he said.
She gave up and cursed in frustration after just two more bursts. “Too late, sir. I’m out. No spare mags left, either.”
Ethan grimaced. He was down to his last magazine as well, and a quick look at the digital display on the back told him he had just five rounds left. He glanced back to see how Corporal Garcia was doing, but he was sprawled out on the raft and not moving. He must have lost consciousness.
To all sides of him, wounded civilians were screaming and moaning from arrows that had struck them down. Fully half of the odd twenty escaped prisoners on his raft were sitting or lying on the ground, either dead or wounded. Bruce, the climatologist, was swaying visibly on his feet with an arrow sticking out of his shoulder. He looked like he was about to make a faceplant in the river.
“Meyers, see what you can do for our wounded,” Ethan said.
“Yes, sir!”
“Everyone else, stay down!” Ethan shouted to be heard above the collective misery of the wounded and the dying.
Meyers forced Bruce to sit and the one who’d shot the Watcher took off her coat and used it to staunch the blood, revealing a vaguely bulging abdomen. Ethan grimaced. Just what they needed. A pregnant woman.
He activated his comms to contact Lieutenant Fox. According to the time on his smart watch, their air support should have been here already.
“Sir, what’s your status?” Fox asked him.
“Alive, for now. We escaped the city, busy floating downriver on rafts. What’s the ETA on that air support?”
“Ten minutes, max, sir. The eVTOL is inbound hot to your location.”
Ethan knew the pilot would be homing in on their locator beacons, so at least finding them wouldn’t be an issue, but by the time that eVTOL arrived, it would be too late.
“Ten minutes is gonna be nine minutes too late, Lieutenant. Any way to speed that up?”
“No, sir.”
Ethan sighed. “Okay, we’ll find a way to hold out until then. What about our ground teams? How far away are they?”
“A little over ten klicks at the moment, sir. I sent two more platoons your way when you asked me to, but they’re still at least ninety minutes out.”
“Okay, well, if we get captured, at least they’ll be able to spring us free.”
“It’s that bad, sir?” Fox asked.
“It sure as hell isn’t good. Keep me posted, Fox. White out.”
Ethan peered into the boat behind them. After trading fire briefly, the Jakar hadn’t popped back up, so he still didn’t have a clear line of fire to the rowers or their one-armed leader. They were within spitting distance now. It seemed like their plan was to board the raft and re-capture the prisoners, or maybe just to slaughter them in close combat.
The eVTOL was their best bet. They had to find some way to hold out until it arrived. The second sailboat pulled out from behind the first, pulling even with it and doubling the size of the forces arrayed against them. The two vessels followed them steadily for a moment, and then split off in opposite directions, angling to pull along either side of their raft.
“Meyers, get up here!” Ethan yelled.
“Sir?” she appeared beside him, her hands slick with blood, which she quickly wiped off on her chest rig. He nodded to the frag grenades on her belt.
“You think you can lob one over there?”
Meyers grinned. “Hell, yeah.”
Ethan shouldered his rifle and yanked the last frag grenade from his belt. “You go left, I’ll go right,” he said.
“Copy that.”
They each pulled the pins.
“Frag out!” Ethan cried.
The grenades sailed over, one for each boat. Ethan’s fell short, landing with a splash and drawing a harmless fountain of water from the river.
But Meyers’ grenade landed smack in the middle of the second boat, and exploded, drawing screams from its occupants. The rowers stopped rowing. A handful of them jumped up, their bowstrings drawn.
“Take cover!” Ethan cried.
Arrows whistled out, and Meyers took one straight through the neck. Her eyes went big and round as she clamped both hands around her throat to staunch the gushing torrent of blood.
“Meyers!” Ethan screamed as she toppled over the edge of the raft with a splash.
The one-armed leader appeared once more as his boat pulled alongside their raft. He thrust his spear threateningly at them, and someone jumped across with a rope. Ethan spun on the spot and shot the man in the chest.
Just four rounds left in his magazine. Three more warriors landed behind the first, and more gunfire cut them down; this time the roar of rifles was joined by the softer pops of sidearms.
Arrows flew again, at point-blank range, drawing more screams from Ethan’s raft. One of the projectiles glanced off Ethan’s body armor, and he fired back, taking out two archers before his weapon clicked dry.
The boat where Meyers’ grenade had landed was busy veering in from the other side, a handful of oarsmen still pulling hard. It came alongside them, and then the Jakar’s one-armed leader popped up and screamed something about sky demons and a blood price. Warriors leaped across from both sides, landing on the edges of their raft.
Ethan deflected the point of a spear with his rifle and swung the butt like a club into the side of the man’s head, sending him splashing into the river.
Beside him, the woman with short blonde hair and an alien energy rifle stunned two more warriors before her weapon beeped and hissed sullenly, the charge apparently flat.
A few more pops issued from Axel’s sidearm, giving the Jakar something to think about and sending one of them splashing into the river. Alice was still standing and firing her rifle at the Jakar. She took out one more, but then mysteriously stopped. The big African-american man was also holding his fire. Ethan saw why as he fell back toward the center of the raft with them: the glowing displays on the backs of their rifles both showed zeroes. They huddled together in the center of the raft, aiming their guns out threateningly, an empty threat, as the Jakar encircled them with spears and shields raised. Just six of them were still standing. Eight if he counted Dr. Rice’s son and husband who were huddled between them. Everyone else was either dead or wounded with arrows sticking out of them.
The one-armed leader of the Jakar jumped across to their raft.
“Now what will you do, sky demons?” he asked, speaking in a language that Ethan was still surprised to find that he understood. “Lower your weapons and kneel before the children of Agama, or you will be slain.”
Ethan ground his teeth, considering his options. He could toss a flash-bang in their midst, but at this range it would affect him just as badly as it would the Jakar.
“Do it,” Ethan snapped at the others, thinking that his air support couldn’t be far off now. They just needed to buy a few more minutes. He slowly laid his rifle down.
Axel and Dr. Rice’s husband both hesitated before following his lead and setting their pistols on the raft. The blond-haired woman and Dr. Rice went next.
Axel whispered to Ethan as he straightened, “They’re not taking prisoners this time. They’re going to sacrifice us.”
Ethan nodded as if that were an acceptable outcome. “Not today, son.”
“I hope you’re right,” Axel muttered back.
Chapter 44
4:25 AM, September 29, 2069
Layla held both hands protectively over her abdomen as the Jakar warriors forced them roughly to their knees. Their one-armed leader appeared to notice her, and his eyes widened swiftly in recognition. A gleeful grin curved his lips.
“You!” he cried. “Agama truly smiles upon me! He has delivered to me my most hated enemies—the witch’s apprentice, and the witch herself!” The blond-bearded man glanced at Alice as he said that. Then he came stomping through the carpet of wounded prisoners, heedlessly stepping on their outstretched arms and legs. Bruce’s arm snapped out and grabbed his ankle to trip him, but the man spun around and thrust the point of his spear straight through Bruce’s forearm, pinning it to the deck of the raft. Bruce screamed in agony, and the one-armed man laughed heartily before yanking his spear out and continuing on his way.
Two more warriors joined him, and the blond-bearded leader stopped in front of Layla.
“Translator!” their leader shouted.
She noticed a wizened old man with wispy white hair being pushed toward them by two spearmen. The larger one, a black-bearded man with a leather whip trailing from his belt, grabbed the old man by the arm and roughly dragged him forward.
“Etigor!” Alice cried, sounding outraged to see him.
“Translate this for me,” the one-armed man intoned as Etigor stopped beside him with darting eyes, looking as nervous as a caged rat. “I want to make sure that the sky demons understand what I say next.”
Layla lifted her chin defiantly.
“Hold out your right arm,” their leader said.
“He wants you to extend your arm,” the old man said in a wavering voice.
Layla blinked in horror, making no move to obey. She had cut off their leader’s arm the last time they’d met, and apparently, now he was determined to return the favor.
“Hold her arm out to me!” he shouted, and the warrior with the black beard and the whip grabbed her arm roughly by the wrist and elbow, holding it toward the Jakar’s one-armed leader.
