Animus Complete Series Omnibus, page 228
He spat the puddle of blood out quickly and startled when something clanged noisily on the floor at his feet. Unbelievably, his knife had fallen beside him and more blood dripped from it. He frowned when he realized that the drips came from above it.
Shaking, he raised the arm slowly and recoiled when he saw that the hand that had held the blade was gone, replaced by a bloody stump that appeared to have been cut clean through by a razor. Before his mind could make sense of it, he collapsed and fell hard chest-down but flipped quickly to see both legs gone, severed above the knee.
Now in a full-blown panic, he used his one remaining arm to drag himself along. A trail of blood spurted from his lost legs. When he felt something behind him, he looked up at the assassin, who smiled.
“You know, I was having such a pleasant day up until now,” he murmured before he kicked the once defiant man away. He recovered and attempted to crawl away. While he didn't understand what was happening, this man had to be the reason and he had never feared anyone or anything as much before.
Dario walked beside him for a while and simply observed before he drove his boot into the man's hand and stopped him. His victim shrieked a garbled cry before he caught his breath and looked slowly at his assailant. The assassin knelt, removed his foot from the pitiful man's hand, and gave him a slow, devilish smile.
“You may be right, one day, on the whole having to answer for my crimes and all that. But for now, all you have accomplished is to make me waste two hundred and seventy-eight nanos.”
He raised a finger with a glowing orb at the tip and settled it next to the man’s ear before he stood and walked over to the console. Casually, he slid a device into one of the slots and began to type.
“I killed many of your friends, you say? I’ve killed many people’s friends. I’ve actually wondered if I should keep a separate tally for that category,” he mused as he pressed one last key and the console began to upload. “As for the World Council, I’m not the one with the issues against it. That would be my boss, who is much more proactive than I am. In another life, he might have been a great council member.” The man could barely hear him now, having lost too much blood.
“At this point, what happens next isn’t up to me anymore,” he admitted as he knelt beside the man and smiled once again as he raised his hand with his thumb pressed against his middle finger. “No more than living is your choice now.” He snapped his fingers and the man’s eyes rolled into the back of his head.
The assassin stood and sighed. He had been somewhat dramatic, he acknowledged. Not to mention that, while normally two hundred and seventy-eight nanos was close to nothing, he had used them rather liberally since the attack and was out of spares. He needed to be more conservative until he returned to his ship. The thought brought a frown. Holding back was not his favorite necessity.
He received another warning on his tablet. Two more battleships had arrived. Thus far, the ships had dispatched troops to assist with the fight on the ground. They would grow tired of this tactic soon enough and would decide that a building—and the people within—could be replaced and therefore sacrificed to repel the invaders. He did not intend to be around once that particular decision was made but he would speed the process up.
The upload had finished, and Dario watched the orb inside the machine begin to descend into the depths. It would still take several hours before everything would be in place. He’d stick around until then, but he would be sure to get out when the time came and find a suitable viewing point.
He wanted to see what it looked like when a cloud city was forced back to Earth.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“We made it,” Izzy shouted as the group of Nexus students and faculty saw the double doors at the end of the tunnel.
“We should still be ready,” Julius warned as he and Otto helped officer Malcolm to increase the pace. “The attacks seem focused on the Academy, but I’m sure they wouldn’t leave the city undisturbed.”
“We haven’t heard anything from the police force.” Malcolm grunted and nodded to Otto and Julius to let him stand on his own. “Try to reach them on the terminal at the door first. We don’t want to rush into the waiting arms of those things after we managed to escape them.”
Indre nodded. She, Izzy, and a handful of students approached the terminal and she glanced over her shoulder as she activated it and selected the comms channel to the Bellingham police department.
Several seconds passed with no reply before the connection died. Murmurs of unease rippled through the group until a messenger popped up.
Standby, doors will open shortly.
“They didn’t answer the call,” Indre commented and prepared her weapon. “Could this be a trap?”
“Maybe their commlink is down,” a student suggested. “All of ours were until a few moments ago.”
“Everyone, stand back,” Malcolm ordered as the latches on the door slid back. “The doors are opening.”
The group took several steps away from the exit, hopeful but hesitant as the doors began to open. Light poured in from the other side where several figures stood waiting for them.
All wore police and medic uniforms.
“We have another arrival from Nexus,” one of the cops said into a comm as the group helped to usher the Nexus students into the emergency shelter.
“It’s good to see someone friendly after all this.” Indre sighed as she walked in to take a seat on one of the benches.
“I wouldn’t get too relaxed,” a medic replied as she bent to examine the agent. “There’s fighting going on above in town.”
“How bad is it?” Otto asked. “Many of us are in shape to fight if you can provide weapons.”
“That’s not the protocol,” one of the officers replied.
“This isn’t really normal circumstances,” Izzy countered and refused to relinquish the pistol she had when one of the officers looked at it. Fortunately, the man stepped away quickly to indicate that he wouldn’t attempt to disarm her.
The lead officer helped Julius take Malcolm to one of the beds. “It’s weird to say it like this but compared to the Academy, the fighting here has been almost pedestrian considering the initial strike on the island we saw.”
“It looked like you would be obliterated almost immediately,” Indre’s medic added and handed her an energy tab. “Those pods—we thought they were bombs for a minute there. The police force scrambled to go and assist but then we came under attack only a few minutes after you did.”
“We feared the worst when our messages didn’t go through and the tunnels wouldn’t open,” the lead officer explained. “We now have confirmation that they have all activated again, so more of the staff and student body should be able to make it through.”
“It depends on how many survived the attack,” Malcolm reminded them as he eased himself onto the bed. “And the tunnels will automatically lock if unregistered forces try to enter. The idea was for evacuation before an attack could happen, not hours into one.”
“It’s what we trained for,” Julius pointed out, although he grimaced after a moment. “Most of us, anyway. I worry about the first years.”
“Did anyone see what’s going on with that ship?” Otto asked and glanced at the ceiling of the shelter as if he could see the vessel through it. “Getting off the island is one thing, but we aren’t exactly safe as long as a colossus hovers above us.”
The lead officer frowned. “We’re preparing shuttles and carriers for evac, as many as we can muster. The ship seems to have powered down slightly and some of the sections have deactivated. We haven’t been able to determine why yet but we won’t simply stand around and hope they have somehow hobbled themselves.”
The security officer leaned up on his elbows and looked at the officer. “We have many more shuttles and ships to spare at Nexus, but I’m not sure if anyone has been able to reach them.”
“Are we ready to go?” Eckles asked Haldt as they approached the elevator.
“I made contact with Corrin. She was able to find some of the other pilot students and teachers and they tried to make their way over here themselves but were pinned down at the observation center,” he explained. “I contacted HQ as well. They still have any number of fires to put out but were able to get some of the other officers with pilot experience or talents into the tunnels. They should arrive here shortly.”
“Are we going to help Corrin and the pilots?”
Haldt nodded as he walked to the left of what remained of the elevator they rode down on. He pressed a switch and a ladder descended. “We’d be more useful that way than simply standing around here. The others will get the ships ready and be on guard in case any of those droids come through.”
His teammate nodded and grasped the ladder as the other man ascended. “Remember to keep your head down. We don’t have shields for another fifteen minutes.”
As the security officers continued their climb, Kaiden stepped out of the shuttle he had primed in the hangar. Another officer climbed into the next vessel and the entire group bustled frantically to prepare the ships as quickly as they could.
He folded his arms as Chiyo stepped out of the shuttle next to his and approached him. “Is something wrong?” she asked when she saw his disgruntled expression.
“I’m only impatient.” He sighed. “I know we can’t get into the sky until more pilots arrive or we risk making the hangar a primary target, but at least a few of us here can fly. I feel we should be airborne already and helping the others.”
“That’s not the only thing, is it?” she pressed. He turned slowly to face her. “You’re trying to come to terms with the fact that we have to evacuate.”
He leaned against the side of the shuttle. “Evacuate, retreat, run away—I’m not saying I haven’t had to make that choice in the past, but it never sat well with me. And this time? Shit, I see what we’re up against and…” He trailed off, seemingly unable to get his words together, and she raised a hand and placed it against his cheek.
“I know you’ll come back and I can tell you that I’m almost certain we’ll come back. We won’t let Nexus remain in their hands. And we will make them regret their actions.”
Kaiden smiled and took her hand as he nodded and chuckled. “I guess I have something to look forward to now— after we get everyone out.”
“Friends! I have almost completed my section!” Genos called from across the hangar.
The ace grinned at him with a mixture of surprise and respect on his face. “Jesus. We only started about ten minutes ago.”
“I wanted to tell you that I saw a few more ships in this chamber off to the side of the hangar,” the Tsuna engineer informed them.
“That’s where they handle repairs,” one of the guards shouted. “There might be a couple ready to go in there, but the rest probably won’t be in the best shape.”
“I’ll take a look,” Kaiden offered and glanced at Chiyo. “Do you think you can get the others ready?”
“Of course.” She nodded and he returned it before he ran over to Genos.
“Where did you say it was, Genos?”
The Tsuna scrambled out of his shuttle and pointed. “In this direction. There are a couple more shuttles in there that I have yet to inspect, but there was also another ship.”
“Different than a shuttle?” he asked.
Genos nodded as they entered the repairs bay. “Certainly. This one actually has weapons and it seemed familiar. Maybe you can recall from where for me?”
The ace gaped and stopped in his tracks. It was indeed very familiar. He smiled as he clapped his friend on the shoulder. “Nice find, Genos, but I call dibs.”
Chapter Thirty
Lena puffed her cheeks out while she studied the readouts, something Nolan took notice of. He gestured to an officer to keep watch and walked down to the technician to lean over her shoulder. “Is something wrong?”
She shook her head and switched over to a screen showing the EIs’ code. “No, it’ll be fine. It’s definitely complex and I would be shocked if any of your people could crack the EI. The professor certainly pulled out all the flash to make this one.”
“And yet you sound disappointed,” he stated as he straightened and took hold of her seat. “I thought you enjoyed a challenge, Lena.”
“Oh, I do,” she admitted, and her artificial eye dimmed slightly. “It’s only that…I had really hoped we would get the special EI Sir Merrick has talked about all this time.”
“I thought you had been briefed that it is no longer a primary target.”
She nodded and drew her legs under the seat. “I was. Merrick told me it would probably take far longer and that I wouldn’t need to crack it as he planned to simply extract it when he had the chance. Still, I kind of hoped all this fighting would bring it out of hiding.”
Hiding? The general doubted that its user was hiding. Hell, for someone in obvious danger, this Kaiden Jericho almost seemed suicidal with how much he had poked the nest over the last couple of years. He had no doubt that the ace was down there somewhere. Lena and Merrick would eventually have their little pet project but for now, however, they needed the ship back at full capacity.
“Not to deprive you of your fun, Lena, but we need the ship to have an EI as soon as possible,” he stated and tapped her shoulder. “We devised this plan because we had hoped to strip the professor of his EI to provide us with a better one and thus put them at an additional disadvantage. If this ship remains neutral for much longer—”
Lena held a hand up and nodded. She stood and retrieved the small glowing cube she had arrived with. “I’ll head to the main lab. Cut all unnecessary power outputs and close any extraneous comm lines or linked devices. I’ll bring the EI under our control soon.”
Nolan watched her go and smirked as he moved to take his place in his seat. As he sat, he felt content—not safe or victorious, but he could see the pieces finally falling into place to build a path there. Lena would bring the EI to heel, and he would make sure that Nexus would follow suit.
Sasha lowered himself slowly down the side of the Animus Center, found one of the many broken windows on the third floor, and swung himself in. He retracted his grapple deftly and snuck into the hallway. When the enemy troops had arrived, most had simply fanned out and joined the carnage—except for this small group of six who moved immediately to the AC. He tailed them and fired at soldiers and arbiter droids along the way when he could do so without revealing his position.
Of course, he should focus on the defense of the Academy and the evacuation. That was his responsibility as chancellor now, but his instincts told him that this group wanted something in particular. A feeling of dread settled on him when he imagined them getting it, although he had little idea of what it was and what they planned to do with it.
He reached the middle of the hall and leaned over the edge to look at the lobby, where the group huddled around a holographic map. The commander used the zoom on his oculars to see where they were headed and grimaced when he realized that it was the mainframe. It should have been obvious as that would be one of the only places where they could plunder something useful. But even with that destination, he couldn’t think of what they intended to take.
One of the soldiers looked around casually and the commander hunkered down to avoid notice. He had Isaac open the directory in his HUD. There were currently twenty-two people still in the building, although a few of them had darkened names, which indicated that they could not be reached by comms or that they were simply dead.
He heard the soldiers move out below and wondered if he should take the shot and end them there. Instead, he decided to follow. He needed to see what they wanted. If they were forced to leave the Academy in their hands, he intended to at least take whatever they were after with him.
He instructed Isaac to send a message to everyone in the vicinity to evacuate as hostiles were moving through the building. Although the fact that he had yet to see any droids or bodies indicated that this might, in fact, be one of the safest places currently on the island, it wouldn’t remain that way for long once he eliminated these invaders.
“The first group of pilots is arriving,” Cameron called into the hangar.
“That means we will head out soon,” Jaxon told Genos, who nodded and made his way to one of the shuttles closest to the hangar bay doors.
“Are you set to go, Kaiden?” Chiyo asked over the comms as she walked to the back of the hangar. The pilots filed in and she motioned them toward the readied ships while she and one of the officers took control of the main terminal.
“Yeah, soon enough. Chief’s looking for Wolfson’s signature.”
“I found him northwest of us. I think he’s actually on his way to the armory like you thought,” the EI confirmed. “I can’t get through to him, though. I think his comm is damaged as I only get static.”
“I’m sure he’ll see us coming when we fly in.” The ace chuckled as he settled the ship into a hover before he eased it toward the gates. “We are in his ship, after all.”
“The pilots are in position,” Jaxon advised. “The first group is ready to go—eleven shuttles and two water carriers.”
“Haldt and Eckles sent orders to clear the harbor for the water carriers,” Kaiden informed them. “Still, watch yourselves.”
“We’ll be fine,” one of the pilots interjected. “We’re in our element now.”
“Thanks for getting them warm for us and clearing the way,” another added. “It’s time to use what we’ve learned over the last couple of years.”
“Haldt gave me the code to activate the Academy’s main guns,” Chiyo reported. “Those should help keep the sky clear if they send fighters out to intercept. If they don’t, we’ll focus on eliminating the mechs.”
“We’d appreciate it. Even first-year Nexus pilots can make these shuttles dance, but they don’t have any weapons, unfortunately.”
