Really? I mean, REALLY? Of all the macho bullshit. This time, I did drive my elbow into Mack’s gut...and then I stamped down hard on his foot. The elbow did about as much as I expected it to, and so did the foot.
Mack was fully armored and unamused.
“Do you mind?” he demanded.
“There are more arach,” I growled, having watched several of the spider warriors emerge from the base of another building.
The arach king had come to play, and I wondered what was so important about taking this world that he would risk himself in battle. From what I could gather, his sole purpose was to attract a queen and perpetuate his line. For him to be out here on the field meant there was something in the rebel command center we didn’t want them to have.
Mack and the wolf turned, just as the ants swept around us, the vespis flying top cover for the attack. Seeing them close on the arach, I wondered where they’d come from. Tens had teleported the mercenaries out.
“They have their own agenda and they’re not done yet”, Mack informed me, and I froze.
“The rebels?”
“Yup”. I felt his arms ease from around me. “Try to stop them before they reach the rebel command center. I need the king alive.”
“Alive, but...”
“You heard me, Cutter...”
“Ugh. FINE...”
I bolted forward, heard him hesitate, and then follow., and knew he was right on my heels.
I wondered what was happening with the fleet, and heard Mack’s voice echo over the comms
“Tens...”
Silence followed.
“Tens. Come in Tens... Come in the Shady. Goddammit! Someone talk to me!”
More silence followed, and then Rohan replied, “Bridge was taken. Tens was taken.”
The boy hesitated, his next words coming as I ducked under the gleaming belly of one of the ants.
Funny, I didn’t remember them being this big.
“Coming through!” I yelled.
I would say I was hoping it would be enough to stop them from skewering me as I emerged from under their jaws, but I don’t think I’d thought it through that far. I just wanted them to know I was there and get the hell out of the way. The chance of getting eaten didn’t cross my mind.
“How?” Mack snapped, talking to Rohan.
“Teleport,” the boy whispered, “—and they’re breaking through.”
There was a ragged edge to his tone, and I remembered the state he’d been in after the last time he’d been captured by wolves.
“How long?” I demanded, dodging the reflexive swipe from the ant’s jaws.
I slapped them with the flat of my free hand, no longer thinking about what happened next. I was going to kill arach...or I was going to kill whatever else stood in my way. I needed the king and I needed to get to him fast.
Tens needed me to end this, Rohan, too. The boy was in danger.
“I need you to end this fast,” Mack told me, and I almost missed his next words. “And I need you to stay alive.”
“Stay alive? Well that was going to complicate things... Besides, what made him think I wouldn’t?”
Clear of the ants and faced with three meters of open ground between me and the arach surrounding Barangail, I raised my blaster and started firing.
Shoot the arach. Leave the king alive. I got it...or, at least, I thought I did.
Tens had loaded me for bear, and the solids tore holes in the arach warrior standing in the front rank. He blew apart and pieces of him showered the king and his companions. They all looked toward me.
The king started shouting and pointing in my direction, but the arach were already moving to close up the gap left by their fallen comrade. They were also shifting.
Heedless of the impact it would have on the king’s support to see them in their true form, the spider warriors dropped their humanoid forms, their bodies rippling and expanding to take up six times the space as they advanced.
I watched the king’s mouth move, heard the shouted commands flow past me, over me...through me. What he said was no longer important. Only the eight-legged nightmares slamming into the ants on either side of me were important. Only the warrior filling my vision with a flurry of legs had any meaning.
I brought my blaster to bear, but the solids hammered into a field of gray and dropped harmlessly to the ground.
Like that, was it?
I let the blasters fall and pulled the twin blades I carried over my shoulders. It was more of a match for the sharp-edged ridges along the creature’s legs than the blaster was, anyhow. While the solids were deadly at a close range, the blaster did nothing to deflect a well-placed bite or slash...
...and I couldn’t ram it down a spider’s throat.
“Cutter!” Mack’s voice rolled across the battlefield.
Now, what did he want? I wondered, my arms moving to block the first foreleg strike.
“Activate the blade!” Stepyan’s order followed, and I resisted the urge to roll my eyes.
What was it with all the men in my life? Didn’t they realize I knew how to fight? Activate the... Oh...
I thumbed the control stud and watched as the blade hummed to life.
Vibro... and las! Now, how in all the stars had Stepyan managed to combine the two of them into a single weapon.
“Bring me the king’s head and I might tell you,” Stepyan replied.
My cheerful “okay!” coincided with Mack’s shout of denial.
“Oops,” Stepyan commented, not sounding the slightest bit sorry.
I kicked off my back foot, dropped to my knees and slid under the arach’s cephalothorax, dropping one of my blades and using two hands to hold the other over my head and drive it up as I reached my opponent’s abdomen.
“Not so well-armored here, are you?” I demanded, and spat ichor as the blade split the softer carapace of its tail end.
The arach screamed.
I lifted a knee and drove my foot into the ground, propelling myself to my
