Tag: Action

Short Story: A New Enemy

~ S.M. Nolan ~ Leave a comment

Admiral Su Kovac was the hardest screw in the Earth Federation Fleet. With upwards of a thousand battles under her belt over the length of a forty year career, she was finest, most experienced officer Earth-Federation had ever seen. In all her years of command, she’d learned to emulate her ancestors by taking the unplanned as it came, or otherwise striking hard with superior force. The mix made her the EFF’s foremost Tactician.

She was deferred to whenever in reach, but no-one dared disturb her otherwise. Once, twenty or so years into her career, then Fleet Admiral Harding had pulled her off maneuvers for an utterly trivial task. She arrived promptly, learned of the task, and before realizing his mistake, was lambasted and humiliated him before his men and half the other Admirals. All of them seemed to recognize Kovac’s authority over his– to say nothing of the defeat of the already-crumbling “old guard.”

Shortly after, High-Command made her Fleet Admiral, consigning Harding to the annals of forgotten history. Kovac celebrated by completing maneuvers then tearing down the command structure to rebuild it. Despite making few friends among the senior officers, the reassignments tightened the Fleet enough to “plant the flotilla up a flea’s ass.”

Kovac was fond of the saying, but too often it came across as ego to those outside her command. The others took it as the ultimate compliment– especially given the inverse; “loose as an old man-whore’s ass.” A saying she was equally, if not more, fond of. Those under her disliked its implications, its terribly vivid imagery, but no-one questioned her judgment.

To say the EFF had never seen a greater Admiral would require the admission of how few there’d been. Kovac was one in a short line thus far, and though the bar was never set before her, it had damn sure been set by her.

One shining example was the battle over Dent Seven, a planet on the edge of Gliese 876. What had once been known by its host star and the appended letter “D,” was colloquially known as Dent. She knew the Eklobian Mauraders had hidden themselves through-out the system, minimizing their heat and power output to effectively mask their fleet. By doing so, they blockaded Dent, on the grounds of embargo, believing themselves to be deserving of a larger portion of the tariffs collected by them on behalf of the Federation, contractors that they were.

Kovac launched only a single, filled shuttle-carrier in response. She helmed it, taking only a skeleton crew of volunteers from her best and brightest. After a week of lying in wait in deep space, using long-range scanners to surveil, map, and observe the system, she and her crew had wired all of the shuttles for remote piloting. Then, placing herself in orbit of Gliese 876’s eponymous star to mask her emissions, she launched the shuttles one-by-one. Each one drew out Marauders moving in attack formation.

At each appearance, a single volley of the carriers cannons fired, eradicating the shuttle and the marauders. It wasn’t long before the Marauders learned of the tactic, and their losses, and withdrew.

In short, all future Admirals would be judged by Su Kovac, and with good reason; she was the best of the best, and it was doubtful anyone living could exceed her prowess.

That all came to a head the day Orion Expedition encountered trouble near Bellatrix. The O-E ships were approximately two-thirds of the way through a research and survey expedition when contact was lost. Admiral Kovac immediately launched a contingent of cruisers and scouts, herself at its head. The F-drives engaged, planting them a few, solar hours out from O-E’s last known position. The contingent’s bulk kept formation to the O-E transponder location. The scouts went ahead, scanners active, and guns at-the-ready.

Dead space greeted them. Dead space. Minor debris. A black-box transponder was the only whole-part of any of the twelve research vessels and four escort cruisers remaing. Kovac kept her guard up. The tension rose aboard each ship, felt by all from officers to ensigns, vets to greenies; something was wrong. Everyone knew it.

As if shouting into the frightening darkness around oneself, Kovac ordered a single, burst transmission to ping for any cloaked or masked vessels hiding from their aggressors.

The ping emitted silently, but every crew-member felt its electrical discharge strike their chests like a thunderbolt. In all of the years the EFF had existed, nothing ever so completely annihilated a contingent of its ships, nor with such stealth. Not a single trace of its presence was left. Even after the interminable wait, silence remained the ping’s only reply.

Kovac ordered scouting parties, sending a battleship, a pair of cruisers, and a handful of corvettes together to stand guard. Others were sent along patrols around any plausible perimeter an escape pod might be in. She kept her Dreadnought, Shepard, and the Carrier, Heinlein, at the center of the contingent’s remnants, surrounded it with EFF Destroyers, Battleships, and Cruisers, then split the remaining Corvettes into two groups. Opposing patrol routes between the rest of the ships would ensure nothing escaped visual inspection.

Shepard’s senors suddenly went out. Alarms screamed through the Dreadnought. The fleet began radioing identical issues. Comms crackled despite short distances. Kovac immediately ordered back her teams. Comms went out altogether a moment later. Screeching static stole the airwaves, most officers’ breaths. Without comms, the fleet had no way to maneuver or relay orders.

Were it not for her subordinates’ respect and her expert instruction, she might have lost complete control. Whatever had caused the issues might have struck, leaving nothing short of total chaos in result. Instead, each man and woman sat at the edge of theirs seats, waiting to enact any orders.

Centered amidShepard’s Bridge, Kovac skimmed the force-field windows and their clear, 360-degree view of open space on all sides. Nothing was amiss, aside from the obvious sensor issues. Space was peaceful, as empty as it had always been.

She squinted at the blackness outside the ships’ collective field of light. Something came at her like a torpedo, rocketed toward the Bridge windows. Shepard’s shields repelled it in a shower of sparking flame.

“Cut all lighting,” Kovac ordered.

Her words echoed between various officers. The lights went out. She fished a blinding hand-lamp from a compartment beside a bulkhead, switched it on. The Bridge lit, a beacon in the night. A series of hand movements signaled in now-ancient Morse-code to a cruiser in range. The code was long out of use, but every person under Kovac’s command had learned it under her orders.

Moments later, the Cruiser’s Bridge went dark. The fleet began to shift. Kovac’s voice was a steady stream of orders. Meanwhile, her hand worked, relaying orders to the cruiser, in turn relayed to other ships in range light signal beacons. Before long the entire fleet reformed. All ships now had views of Shepard’s Bridge.

Fighters were launched, two pilots to a ship; one for flight, one for comms. Orders to sweep in formation were dispatched. Space was suddenly swarmed by the criss-crossing and swirling of a thousand and more fighters.

A Destroyer erupted. The shockwave of blue-plasma rocked the other ship’s shields. A second later, violet plasma manifested from seemingly empty space. Kovac snarled. Firing trajectories were calculated, relayed. Weapons were charged. Before the hidden ship could comprehend it, the fleet’s volley launched. Red-violet. Azure-blue. Electric greens and reds. The small streaks of proton-missiles all aimed for a single point in space. They met the hidden vessel with a mosaic of small explosions that birthed another, larger one.

In the final moments before its reactors went critical, a Dreadnought unlike any she’d ever seen appeared beneath the mosaic shroud. The EFF had not built or envisioned it. Indeed, the design was so alien Kovac doubted a human mind could have concocted it. She had no words to describe it xenoicism. Its various curves, hard angles, and exorbitant plating veined with fire. Then, post-nuclear shock-wave exploded, dissipating eon-blue and red-violet through-out space. Most of the EFF fighters were caught off-guard, lost. A small price, Kovac decided, given the alternative might have been the entire fleet.

Upon returning home, there were no medals. She wouldn’t have accepted them anyway. They were trophies, conversation pieces, thin veneers for people without true accomplishments beneath their belts. Preparation was more important than ceremony anyhow. This new enemy was smart. They’d completely eliminated an entire research party without being spotted; caught the fleet– and Kovac– off-guard, and almost wiped them out in the process. As far as the EFF was concerned, they’d declared war.

For Kovac’s part, they’d exposed critical flaws in the Fleet’s stratagem. Their possession of advanced cloaking and EMP tech meant she needed a defense. Rather than be shaken, she locked herself away to think.

This new enemy was good, but Kovac was better. She knew it. It wasn’t arrogance but discipline. Everyone else agreed. To her diligence and training were everything. She withdrew the fleet to Sol for maneuvers to test against her stratagem, then sent out patrols and scouts. She would be damned certain they were prepared for any future confrontation with this new enemy.

Energy and Matter: Part 15

~ S.M. Nolan ~ Leave a comment

15.

Nobody Bleeds in Vain

True to her word, Yaz spent the day with Elise. The briefing was simple, lasted all of five minutes. Yaz roughed out a map of the cabin and nearby woods on a white-board, and scribbled up a set of acronyms and times for scheduled patrols. A series of arrows lined the cabin’s perimeter in two different colors. Each pair took a route. Bryce and Ken were due up first. Miller’d been on rotation the night before too, was now sucking down coffee like water. Despite Elise’s skepticism, he looked as sharp as ever.

Patrols rotated every eight-hours. For sixteen of those hours, a second patrol of Seer and security unit roamed the city. Given Rachel’s injury however, Jenna Perez had been forced to run a double, roaming patrol. Elise knew these patrols were meant to feel out new Seers or leads on Hunters. She couldn’t say how. Until now, Rachel and Jenna had been splitting the patrol, Valerie otherwise occupied with Tyler.

Despite a fixed role, Valerie was always present for Yaz’s briefings. She watched from the side-lines, evaluating. Elise found today to be no exception save that Valerie also appeared unhappy with pushing Jenna so hard. All present knew there was little to be done, Jenna included.

That was, until Hailey suddenly appeared, late. Valerie’s eyes followed her skeptically.

Hailey approached Yaz, “I’m here to help.” She avoided Elise’s eyes, “Wherever you need me.”

Yaz glanced to Valerie for approval, but she and Hailey were engaged in a silent exchange of words. The latter’s choice showed on her face. The former’s sought certainty. What no one else in the room knew, though Jenna suspected, was the actual conversation taking place via the Link, succinct as it was.

“You are certain?”

“Yes.”

That was all either of them needed. Valerie gave a slight nod. Hailey turned to Yasmine. There was distinct and deliberate lack of protest to the air. It was enough.

“Alright,” Yaz said without ceremony. “You’re on first shift with Jenna and Lindsey. Jenna, get her up to speed. Ken, you’ll run second shift with Hailey. Got it?” Yaz eyed the group, reassured. “Everyone has their assignments.”

The group dispersed as Hailey followed Lindsey and Jenna from the room. The Seer was relieved not to be pulling another double shift. It showed in her round features and the sparkle of green eyes dulled by fatigue. She climbed into the rear of the pick-up top-side, helped Hailey in. They began rolling from the cabin toward Bacatta-proper.

Hailey was uncertain where to begin. She’d made her decision, and however quickly, far from lightly. The path forward had always been rather obscured, but now that she was on it, committed to it, guidance seemed at hand.

“Lost?” Jenna asked simply.

Hailey was suddenly aware she’d been staring into space. “That obvious?”

Jenna laughed, “Kind of. Don’t understand, then just ask.”

“Okay.” Hailey said, hesitating. “So, what am I supposed to do?”

“Basically, just meditate.” She crossed her legs, closed her eyes, and activated the Link. She spoke aloud rather than via the Link. “We make rounds about the city, use our empathic awareness to sense if other Seers are nearby.”

“How can you tell the difference?”

“It’s mostly opportunity. Normal seers are like psychic white-noise; they’re just there, blended with reality. Untrained and newly activated Seers give off an aura. A chaotic energy. Staggered and stress-filled waves. They can’t control their E-P yet– Empathic Projection, rather, because it’s a lot like being born, being activated, but you’re fully aware, conscious, and completely terrified in ways beyond that of a normal human.

“Feel the difference between my energy and Lindsey’s in the front seat?”

Hailey did. She felt a definite shift from the bunker’s usual atmospheric energy. The city was colder, emotionally, as if thousands of conflicting psyches had mixed into an overpoweringly bland stew. Part of that stew flowed from Lindsey in the front seat. His energy was cooler, less active, but focused– human energy. Conversely, Jenna’s energy was radiant; warm, spring sunlight inside as opposed to out.

She sensed Hailey’s understanding. “You feel it. Continuous. Persistent. A dose of warmth.” She prepped a series of E-P waves, “This is roughly what an untrained Seer feels like.”

The warmth was suddenly lava-hot. Then, space-cold. Hot again. Cold again. It sank, rocketed back up, bouncing and rebounding ceaselessly. With the bounding came extremes of emotion. Euphoria. Utter terror. Joy. Depthless grief. Back and forth until Hailey’s spine shuddered and she audibly shivered.

“You understand now. That’s how we found you. An untrained Seer’s like a beacon. One in danger, is like an atom bomb. If Rachel hadn’t had her vision, we wouldn’t have known your approximate location. Yaz we might not have found you in time.”

“So, there’s a point where the chaos becomes too much to distinguish the source?”

She nodded, “Generally speaking, extreme stress is the trigger to it. Usually female Seers have learned to control their emotions to some degree, even untrained, and are easier to find.”

“So there are other male Seers? Besides Tyler, I mean?”

Jenna sighed mournfully at the mention of Tyler. “Theoretically, yes, but I don’t know any personally.” Hailey’s confused squint begged an explanation. Jenna provided as best she could, “So far’s we can tell, there’s no specific circumstances for a Seer’s development. More than likely, it’s a combination of genetic factors. However, there’re very few instances of multiple Seers in the same family, even identical twins might differ– one is, the other isn’t. There’s still so much we don’t know about ourselves.”

“Our people,” Hailey muttered, feeling a resonance with the phrase. She re-focused, “So why’re male Seers so rare?”

Jenna’s eyes flitted behind their closed lids. “The working theory– and it is just a theory– is that male Seers beyond puberty are rarer due to societal norms. Women are placed in the role of emotional reliance. Men tend more toward emotional avoidance. We believe Tyler was activated because prepubescent humans are inherently more reliant on their emotions. Street living and his parents’ death emotionally traumatized him, that trauma activated him as your meditation did you. Unfortunately, we cannot locate inactive Seers.”

Hailey followed. “And since males tend to avoid their emotions, they aren’t activated as easily.”

“Bingo.”

Hailey shook her head, sighed, “So an unknown number of male Seers are completely oblivious to their power?”

“As best we can tell.”

Hailey was silent, wondering what it might be like to be an oblivious, inactive Seer. That she’d been one most of her life didn’t feel true anymore. To know, but remain inactive, she supposed, would be a double-edged sword. As much as one could keep themselves from being a target, so too would they be cut off from their greatness. She wasn’t sure whether she pitied or envied inactive Seers.

The next hours passed in bouts of silence. Hailey attempted to feel out the city. All around, outside the blacked-out pickup, energy swirled and thronged. The white-outline of truck and ever-shifting buildings sandwiched or encapsulated blue humans. Not a single wave of energy felt out of place the whole morning and afternoon.

When it was finally time to return to the cabin, Hailey was prepared to take over. It wasn’t nearly as difficult as she expected, and short of being attacked, she doubted it would be anything more than sitting around for eight hours while Ken drove. She hopped from the truck long enough to stretch her legs, grab some lunch, and use the bathroom then hopped back in and stuffed a comm in her ear.

Ken started for the city, radioing in, “Just hollar if you get a hit.”

“Got it,” Hailey said, scarfing down lunch as fast as possible.

The next few hours passed similarly to the first few. That was, until a sudden dread boiled up from her stomach. They’d only just passed the halfway mark of their shift. Ken had pulled into a gas station to refuel, Hailey’d waited until the coast was clear to deter suspicion, then slipped from the truck. Moments later, she was standing, stretching, when a knife stabbed her gut. She doubled over.

Ken lunged beside her, “You okay?”

She panted in pain, “Just this… feeling.”

Ken’s heart raced, his eyes wide, “What kind of feeling? Where’s it coming from?”

She spoke through her teeth, “Dread. I don’t know.”

“Feel it out, Hailey. This is important.”

She did her best to focus through the pain, shut off her senses. The Link activated. Waves emanated outward from somewhere nearby. She pointed aimlessly, teeth grit, “There.”

Ken spied a four-way stop-light, empty of all but one car. “Right there?” She grunted, clutched her head. “C’mon!” He yanked the fuel nozzle out. “In front. Now.”

Hailey groped her way to the passenger door. The light changed. A red, four-door sedan made a gentle right-turn. Truck tires spun on asphalt, peeled away. Smoke trailed behind them. The truck hopped the curb toward the intersection, caught air, crashed down.

“Is it moving? Is it them!?”

Hailey bit her lip, grabbed hold of the pain mentally, and forced it part-way out. “Yes. Ahead.”

“It’s them,” Ken fumbled with a radio. “Patrol two to base. Come in base.”

Valerie replied. “Go ahead, Patrol two.”

“We’ve got eyes on a target.”

Valerie audibly stiffened, “Take them out. Recover anything possible.”

“Copy.” He tossed the radio aside.

Hailey’s stomach bubbled acid at her throat. “What’re … you going to do.”

He answered with action. The truck’s engine groaned. They lurched forward. The transmission whined, bucked between gears. The road-gap to the Hunters closed. A mere second passed. They were on the Hunters’ bumper. The car lurched forward this time, gained speed.

“You’re not getting off that easy you bastards!”

The car swerved around stopped traffic to pull away. The truck followed, lost speed. Gained again. Slammed bumpers. The car fishtailed. The driver rode a screaming turn across pavement and sidewalk. The angle was too wide. The car side-swiped another sedan, rebounded toward a line of buildings. Bodies dove this way and that along the sidewalk to avoid being hit. The truck surged forward, on its tail.

Hailey lolled in her seat, jarred by the truck’s movements. She was near to fainting. Agony scorched her guts. It spread in waves to her extremities. The car careened right, into an alley, galloped forward. The truck slowed for the turn, raged back toward top-speed. Hailey winced, looked out; the Hunters were too far ahead. If they reached the Alley’s end, they’d be into traffic and gone.

Her mind worked reflexively. The Link activated. Needles stabbed her fingers. Fire cooked her gut. Phantom compression pulsed at her temples. She smack a mental hand clasped at something in the distance. It was vaguely heavy, ahead of the Hunters. A two-ton dumpster flew into their path. The car struck at full-speed. The front end crumpled, a tin can to a foot. The truck skidded to a screeching stop, and the molten knife slipped from Hailey’s gut.

“C’mon!” Ken jumped out, pistol in-hand.

Hailey fell out, to her feet, gasping for breath. She stumbled toward the car, raising her P-90. Ken directed her to its trunk. He inched forward. From the angle, even Hailey could see both driver and passenger were dead. One was splayed over the dash. The other had taken some part of the car and the steering wheel to the torso, but their body and her visual angle obscured it. If she had to guess, the guy’s ribcage was pulverized, his heart pierced by bone and vehicle.

She winced at the thought, at the pain, but kept her gun up, trained through the back window. Still-smoking engine-oil and antifreeze wafted back on a breeze with hints of gasoline. It smacked Hailey, full-force, in the face. She focused on Ken’s careful approach. He hesitated with a second glance, then busted the cracked driver’s window with the butt of his pistol. Its barrel smacked away large shards of glass, and he reached a hand in to feel around.

Hailey felt sick: Ken’s hand emerged, covered in blood and gripping a cell phone. He thumbed it, ensured it still worked. Sirens screamed nearby. He hustled back, gestured Hailey along to the truck. Moments later, they were sailing toward the bunker, Hailey’s mind still in the alley.

“We may’ve just gotten the biggest break we could ever hope for,” Ken said, toweling his bloody hand.

The thought of anything verging on happiness made Hailey sick. “What!? How can you be pleased?”

Ken’s eyes darted over and back, “It’s a smartphone, Hailey. Smartphone’s have GPS trackers. Long-term contracts. Serial numbers. Ip addresses. At least one of those things will be traceable.”

She finally managed to still her rising bile. “You think we can track the Hunters?”

He nodded, “It’ll lead us straight to them.”

Energy and Matter: Part 13

~ S.M. Nolan ~ Leave a comment

13.

Paradigm Shift

Hailey handed her mother a glass of water across the kitchen bar. Elise still lie in the training room, catatonic. She’d collapsed there. Hailey offered to stay, but Yaz sent her away. Even now she cradled Elise, awaiting news of Rachel’s injuries. Both Miller and Valerie tended to Rachel in a vacant bedroom they’d converted for triage. The extent of the damage, and the length of time for her recovery, was anyone’s guess.

Personally, Hailey was more consumed by issues she could actually address. Fearing for Rachel was inevitable. Grieving for Elise equally so, but she could do nothing productive in either of those instances.

Her mother took the cup of water with a quiet, “thank you.” Hailey sought the best way to explain. Her mother sipped. Her father stared, utterly lost. Hailey sympathized. So much had happened so fast, it was hard not to be lost. Her training was the only thing keeping her on an even-keel. In light of that, she mustered her wits and courage.

“I know you have questions. But listen now. I want you to know why I disappeared. Anything I don’t cover, ask when I’m done, okay?”

Her parents eyed her. Their skepticism said there was nothing to make sense of the chaos they’d seen. The confusion they felt. Most of all, how Hailey had seemingly already processed it all.

She sighed, knowing the look. She’d received it the first time she’d been caught with a joint. It said “Explain yourself,” simultaneously admitting there was way to.

Still, she had to try. She cleared her throat. “It started with a book. A couple weeks ago.”

With that, Hailey began to explain everything that had happened. Her parents’ disbelief was obvious. It was understandable. Hailey saw the insanity in it too. Their daughter had disappeared without a trace for weeks. Then, suddenly showed up dressed like a soldier, toting a gun, and forcing them to uproot without explanation. It warranted some incredulity.

But the chaos should’ve have imparted the dire reality of things.

She hoped they were still in shock. After all, four people had just died in front of them. Two were people they knew well. Between Elise’s parents and the Hunters, enough blood had been spilled that the truth should’ve been obvious.

It wasn’t. While they hadn’t learned or felt what Hailey and Elise had, reconciling their lack of faith was difficult. Hailey had learned that somethings needed to be taken on faith. Apart from being truths difficult to understand, they were also less satisfying.

Hailey finished, bracing against the sink to await questions. Her father sank back in his seat, pressing his temples, as was usual when mentally taxed. Likewise, her mother’s shoulders sank.

“This is insane,” her father finally said.

“Alex.”

“No.” He slid from his stool, pacing the room. He whipped ’round across it. “Don’t you see what’s going on here? Our daughter’s been brain-wash–”

“I haven’t—”

“By this… cult! They’ve trained her to kill, and they’re–”

“Alex, stop!” She shouted, verging on tears.

“Dad. Seriously.” Hailey was both disgusted and disappointed. He was ready to argue, but she cut him off. “These people saved my life. If it weren’t for Yasmine and Bryce, Elise and I would’ve been killed– or worse! They were protecting me. Now they’re protecting you!”

“Protection? You think that’s what this is?” He scoffed. “The only people protecting you are your mother and I– how d’you know they didn’t send those people after you?”

“Why would they send people after me then kill them?” She asked with a harsh discordance.

The empathic projection hit his chest like a bolt of ice. It spread through his veins. Froze his blood. Staggered him. He swallowed hard, instantly terrified.

Hailey clenched her jaw, eyes seemingly afire. “You can’t protect me from them, Dad. I’m sorry that hurts your ego, but we have bigger problems. All of us. You cannot leave this place. Whether you make the best of it or not’s your choice. But you are. Not. Leaving.”

His mouth wished to squirm in anger, but the ice wouldn’t allow it. Instead, her mother cut in, “Hailey, try to see this from our perspective.”

She sighed, hand to her forehead. “I have, Mom. But you have to accept there are things bigger than you going on. And I’m involved. Whether we like it or not.” She glanced between her parents, “This place… it isn’t so bad. And these are good people. Friends. They’re as much forced to be here as us. Their lives are in danger simply because they exist.”

“But why are we here?” Dad asked, trying for calm for fear of another ice-bolt. “We’re not… Seers, or whatever. Right?”

She took his calm as a peace offering, matched it. “No. You’re not. But you are the parents of a Seer. You’re valuable. A bargaining chip. If the Hunters had gotten to you before us, you’d have been used as bait to draw the rest of us in.”

“Why? What do they want?” Her mother asked, doing her best to mediate the situation.

Hailey explained as best she could, “The power I have makes me immune to using it. Other people, normal people, can have the power too but it’s like a drug for them. They become addicted. Hollow. They’re mindless husks with no free-will. Seers aren’t like that. The Hunters want us alive. To study, experiment on. But they’ll kill us if we fight back hard enough. But they can’t do that if we’re in hiding. You were targeted to draw us out. Elise’s parents too.”

Her dad threw his head into a disbelieving shake but her mother remained passive. “So Elise is… not a Seer?” Hailey affirmed with a look. “And they want her because she knows you are?”

“Yes. They would’ve hoped going after Elise’s parents would draw us both out.”

“But now they’re…”

“Dead.” Hailey’s heart sank. She hesitated with a breath, then, “Look, the point is, you’re not safe anywhere else. You have to be here. For all of our sakes. If you’re caught, the Hunters will use you to get to me.” She looked explicitly to her father, “Even if you don’t believe this, you have to trust me. Being here is the right thing to do.”

“What about the police or–”

“There’s no guarantee they’ll be able to handle these people,” Hailey said sincerely. “Besides, if they even believed us, keeping a low profile is important unless more groups decide to come after us. The fewer people aware of Seers, the better. We can’t exactly follow the law. And I don’t even want to think about a witch hunt.”

Her mother and father exchanged a look. The former spoke. “So, what are we supposed to do? Just sit here? Honey, we have jobs, and bills, and–”

Hailey took a breath, they still weren’t getting it. “This is more important, Mom. This is life or death. Those things can be fixed later. You can’t fix being dead.”

The words echoed in Hailey’s head longer than she liked. Her body and mind were running on pure adrenaline. Her patience was waning. She’d been exhausted before Yaz had torn her from bed. Now, she’d passed the point where sleep might be possible, much less restful. The entire night had been a clusterfuck. Rachel was wounded. Elise’s parents were dead. Hers were in shock. And everything felt like her fault. She couldn’t handle it. Not if forced to coddle her parents too.

She pinched the corners of her eyes, “Just relax, okay? Too much has happened to figure everything out now. I’ll get you a room and we’ll talk tomorrow. I need to see Elise.”

With that she strolled away, unwilling to allow any further arguments. A definite paradigm shift had occurred. She suddenly understood parenthood better. The pseudo-parental figure she’d been forced to become required she watch her parents as if infants. In a way, they were. Overgrown children, more stubborn and combative than infants could ever dream of. Ultimately each child knew, their parents were the overlords. Parents too, knew children were their charges. The family “chain of command” put them at the top.

That chain was now broken, re-fused, Hailey at its apex. It didn’t take a brain surgeon to recognize how difficult the shift could make things. Hailey couldn’t help but think of Yaz, her seemingly effortless sway over her subordinates. The chain was reversed for her too. The difference was, the people below recognized her authority.

That must’ve been nice.

She found the training room door half-open, peered in. Elise sat against a wall, staring into unreality with wet eyes. Her face remained as empty as in the truck. Grief poured from her in an invisible geyser formed within that burst continuously. Its contents became tidal waves that drowned reality, stung Hailey’s heart. Needles stabbed her throat and extremities. Valerie was right; genuine grief ran deep, yet this went even deeper.

She entered the room as quietly as possible. Yaz knelt beside Elise, a hand on her shoulder. Hailey ambled over, lost for words or action. She’d never been good with grief. Never even experienced a distant relative’s death. Even as a Seer, proper sentiment was beyond her. Thus, she stood before Elise, head hung and hands wrung with guilt. She felt Elise’s pain, and beneath it, her own sympathy.

“I’m sorry… about your parents. Elise, I didn’t… I didn’t see the Hunters ‘til it was too late. Everything happened so fast.” Elise’s empty eyes rose to meet hers. A vague twitch in one’s corner forced Hailey’s head to hang again. “I know there’s nothing to say to… I just want you to know, I’m here. It probably doesn’t help, but…”

She trailed off. Her eyes wandered up again– caught Elise lunging. Time slowed. Her muscles engaged. They were too late. She was on the floor. Elise straddled her chest. Her newly strengthened hands clasped Hailey’s throat. They squeezed like hydraulic vises.

“I’ll kill you!” Elise screamed. Yaz was up, moving. “I’ll kill you, bitch!”

Yaz’s tiny figure pried Elise off in a yank. She locked Elise in a full-nelson. Hailey skittered away, coughing and writhing with renewed air.

Elise rasped in fury, deranged. “I’ll cut your fucking heart out. You bitch! You did this! It’s your fault! You–”

Yaz covered her mouth with a hand, threw her around. In a flash, she had Elise against a wall, forearm at her throat. Elise’s throat scratched for air. Her face was beet-read. Purple veins bulged around her neck and temples.

“This isn’t helping!” Yaz barked at nose-length.

Hailey drug herself toward the opposite wall, catching only bits of air. Elise kicked and struggled, a rabid animal chained to a post.

“What the fuck’re you thinking!?” She slammed Elise against the wall, stunned her, released her to a dazed heap. “Never use what I teach you on one of us. I don’t give a fuck if she just stabbed you in the gut. You. Don’t. Fight.” She shoved Elise’s torso back with a foot, fixed their eyes together. “I am God here. Almighty Zeus. My word is law! Violation means death. No matter how good of friends we are, this isn’t a fucking fight club. Act like a rabid dog, I put you down. Got it?”

Elise’s daze was wearing thin, but still thick enough that she could only half-nod in reply.

“Good.” Yaz stepped toward Hailey, who’d balled up across the room. “And you–” Hailey looked up, her coughs beginning to subside. “Are you injured?”

“I don’t… think so,” Hailey said, drawing sharp breaths.

“Then get lost, I don’t need you.”

Hailey rasped a breath, “I came to–”

Yaz’s eyes were fire again. “I don’t care if you came with a million fucking dollars. Get. Lost!”

Hailey fought her way up, then staggered from the room. The door shut. Yasmine put a hand to her forehead that fell back to her side with a shoulder-slumping defeat. She stared forward, hand on her hip, trying to work out what the hell’d just happened– and whether or not she would have to put Elise down.

Elise’s voice crackled, wet and rasping. “It’s her fault, Yaz. None of this… It wouldn’t have happened if she’d stayed away. If she’d’ve kept her stupid mouth shut–”

Yaz snapped, “You’re wrong, Elise. You know that. Inside.”

“Hailey’s power started all of it.”

Yaz’s irritation seeped through, “And you know damned well the moment you learned it, you were as fucked as she was.”

“That’s not–”

“Shut up!” She about-faced, planted firm steps toward Elise with a stiff spine. “I swear to you, Elise, if you ever pull that kind of shit again on anyone here, I won’t hesitate. I don’t care who’s just died, or who’s at fault, you never use what I’ve taught you on one of us. Never. Am I clear?”

Elise nodded silently, eyes averted in shame. Yaz sighed and softened. She sank beside Elise to sit on the floor, her back against a wall. “I didn’t mean to hurt you, but…”

“It’s okay,” Elise moused, wincing. “I earned it.”

She held Elise’s hand in both of hers, eyed her with sympathy. “No, it isn’t. None of it is. It’s not okay we were too late. It’s not okay the Hunters got the drop. It’s not okay your parents are dead. It’s not okay we’re losing this war. None of this is okay.” Elise was about to speak. Yaz stayed her. “If anyone is to blame, Elise, it’s me. Not Hailey. She may be the only reason we’re alive. If she hadn’t sensed those Hunters, we might all be dead.”

“What’re you trying to say?”

Yaz looked at their hands, searching for proper words to explain her thoughts. She gave up, went with her gut, “Hailey is as much a victim as you are. More even. The Seers are just… products of Human evolution. Hunters force them into hiding simply for existing. In the meantime, they threaten them. Everyone they love. Everyone they care about. And if they have the chance, they use or kill them.

“You’re part of that. But Hailey, the others, they shoulder the greatest burden. Fearing for their lives simply by existing. Fearing for, and remaining the cause of, so many others’ suffering.

“But it doesn’t make it their fault, Elise. None of it. Being angry at Hailey isn’t going to help. In the end, it hurts more than you or her. If there’s anything I’ve learned here, it’s that you shouldn’t blame anyone for what happens. Instead, cherish them all the more because they could be gone in a heart-beat.”

Her words rang into silence with a soft breath.

Elise knew she was right, but found it difficult to put aside her own feelings. Blaming Hailey was a defense mechanism. A result of being so lost. Maybe it was rightful in some ways. Maybe it was completely and totally unfair and childish. Neither case changed her parents death. Then again, her wounds couldn’t heal overnight, if ever fully. At the very least, she knew Yaz was right, however unwilling she was to accept it yet.

She sank against Yaz’s shoulder, utterly dejected and defeated, body long exhausted by grief and pain. With a resignation to let things rest for the night, she nuzzled Yaz’s shoulder and tightened her fingers around Yaz’s hand.

Short Story: Ghosted

~ S.M. Nolan ~ Leave a comment

Lighting flashed. Seconds later, thunder cracked. Timing said the strike was close. Somewhere inside the city. The power’d already been out twenty minutes. Sooner or later people would get suspicious. Problem was, they had every right to be. First Trust Banking was about to have near a billion credits stolen, a little suspicion was healthy.

Widow wasn’t the type to do anything half-assed. But something wasn’t sitting right with her. Between her, Wraith, and Alina Cardona running surveillance off-site, they had more than enough skill to do the job. Problem was, so far they hadn’t needed any. It was as if the block outage Cardona’d caused had fried the bank’s back-up systems too. Impossible. More impossible; Widow expected to enter via roof ventilation, emerge in a systems room for halls full of active cams, roving guards.

Instead, Wraith dropped in ahead of her. He ghosted to a door, hesitated, then moved. That was how Wraith worked. He didn’t need words. Especially on a job. He was former counter-terrorism task force, CTTF, a hard-core spec-ops type from a time before corp governments and privatized military and police.

Widow’d learned long ago that he expected absolute adherence to his ways on jobs. They’d had a tech-head along on a job once. He was meant to crack some over-priced laser gear they weren’t in on. The job went fine ‘til the kid triggered a back-up alarm by mistake. Corp-sec swarmed them like flies on fresh shit. The pissant was obviously terrified. More than likely too, prepped to give everyone up.

Wraith didn’t hesitate. He gutted the kid. Like a fish. In front of the crew. A roomful of corp-sec. And he did it with with the same detachment as a worker in a fish-packing warehouse. It wasn’t mean. It wasn’t malicious. It wasn’t cold. Rather, indifferent. Purposeful. Habitual. Widow’d hammered nails with more sympathy.

She later learned the kid had done a nickel in a corp black-site prison. He was supposed to do a dime. His time was reduced for cracking en-route. How he’d survived, Widow couldn’t fathom. He was a coward at the best of times. Wraith didn’t care. He didn’t give the kid a chance to talk.

Wraith’s seeming brutality was the momentary distraction that allowed them to gain the advantage. Wraith tossed an EMP stunner, frying corp-sec comms and helmets. By the time their gear normalized, Widow’d disappeared into a utility shaft behind Wraith. Two years later, here they were.

Since then, Widow’d become convinced there was no-one better to have on a job than Wraith and Alina. They were brawn and brains. Widow was heart– an ice-cold, black-blooded heart of pure adrenaline, but a heart nonetheless. Plus, she had the contacts, the bright ideas. Widow planned and plotted. Even if the others brought her something, she took over from there. There was no reason to do things otherwise. Tried and true was gold. They weren’t about to start fixing unbroken shit or breaking it trying to.

Even still, Widow couldn’t help but feel the same suspicions she expected were tingling on the under-sacks of First Trust’s execs. She ghosted along behind Wraith, two hunters more than ever feeling like prey. It wasn’t sitting right. She suspected Wraith felt the same way, but he’d have never said it. He didn’t need to anyhow. The air did.

The monochrome stainless and granite lobby was too vacant, too quiet. Granted, it was roughly 21:50 zed, someone was bound to be around– janitors, security, the odd boot-licking wage-slave– someone. There was no-one. Darkness. Silence. Emptiness. All the way from the dark upper-floors, down along the stairwells, through the darkened lobby, to the darkened vault-entrance.

Wraith took a position to guard the path they’d come from. Widow knelt beside the massive vault door. It looked like something from the old heist-flicks; big, metal, brash, like the people employing it. Unfortunately, it was also totally fucking impenetrable without power.

Widow dug through her pack, produced a cylindrical power source like a giant AA battery. Alkaline was obsolete nowadays, but the resemblance stuck. Incidentally, this produced somewhere near a million times more power than those batteries. She set it down beside a single-use plaz-torch, a kit of pliers and cutters. The torch lopped off the bolts holding the vault’s access panel together, and a moment later she was stripping and cutting wires. A full minute after, the power source was connected, fueling the vault panel. All they needed now was a spark of the right wires. The locks would release. Everything from there was man-power.

She prepped the wires, holding them apart, but hesitated. Wraith caught it with glance back.

She breathed, “You smell it, too?” His eyes said yes. “Something in the air.”

Alina piped in over their bone-mics, “Corp-sec piping something in?”

“Not literally, Ali,” Widow replied.

There was a silence. All three knew something was about to go down. Their only hope was that they’d get in, get the routing codes and key-drives, and get out anyhow.

Wraith leaned into his rifle. Widow sparked the wires. Ozone nipped at their nostrils. All at once, the dozen bolts spaced along the vault door thunked from gravity’s pull. The door came loose. Good ol’ man-power and perseverance pushed it open. Widow slipped in alone. SOP; always leave one-man outside in case things went sideways. She couldn’t help feeling it wouldn’t matter this time.

She hurried through the vault for the carts of various bit-currency repositories. They were like old-era hard-drives, but bigger, more sophisticated, and built stronger than black-boxes. They had to be; they read, wrote, re-read, and re-wrote data a billion and more times each day, storing transaction lists, balances, routing and account numbers for near-on every First Trust member in the world. At last count, that was something four-hundred million people. A large percentage were multiple-account holders. An insignificant percentage stored more than the rest combined.

Something like twenty trillion credits existed in the world. Half of that was within First Trust’s vaults. The total value of Widow’s vault was said to be a few hundred billion. Taking them all wasn’t an option. It would’ve taken a crew of ten with a pair of troop carriers.

She kept on-mission, located the target cart, grabbed at it. The plan was to wheel the thing straight to the employee entrance at the lobby’s rear. They were risking exposure, sure, but by then the job would be near enough to done that there was no going back.

The cart slid back, around, angled for the door. The lights flared on. The vault door went into lock-down. It slammed closed with an earthquake. The bolts fired into place. Wraith dove out, away, only barely avoided being crushed. Everything happened so fast Widow was stunned. Before she could react, she was locked in the vault.

A voice sounded somewhere overhead, “Send your Doe my regards in hell.”

“What the fuck!?”

Smoke began pouring in. Acrid. Sulfur. Mixed with something like cyanide. Filling the room. Yellow. Stinking like hell.

“Shit.” She took a deeper breath, rubbernecked the vault. “Shit.”

Alina radioed in, “Wraith’s working on the door. You’ve got 30 seconds before the air’s too toxic to breathe. Get low. Slow your heart. Deep breaths. We’re getting you out.”

Widow was already coughing. Sulfur stung her eyes and nose. Cyanide burned her skin and lips. A slow, rolling laughter sounded above. Reality dimmed. Widow wanted to breathe, knew she was better off suffocating. Seconds passed like hours. She fought to push the cart to the vault door, almost completely unaware of it.

The world spun. She couldn’t help it now. She coughed, choked for air. Her breaths were fiery knives. Her eyes were blind from acid-tears streaming agony down her face. She stumbled, slumped against the cart.

Reality flashed past:

The vault door, open. She writhed, floating. Metal-panels. Ceilings. Rolled past. Gunfire echoed nearby. Casings bounced off her boots, stung through her pants. She choked on sweet air, but reality still faded. The last thing she saw before losing total consciousness was the hovering flit of shadows.

She awoke to find Wraith standing over her, arms crossed. Alina’s bright eyes were dark beneath their sockets, but wide in relief.

“She’s up!”

Widow didn’t need Wraith to speak to hear his, “no shit.”

“Hey. You alright?”

Wraith started shining a light in her eyes. She smacked it away, “Get that fuckin’ thing outta’ my face–”

“She’s fine.”

“I know who you are,” Widow said, finding herself inexplicably pissed. “The fuck happened?”

“Doe screwed us,” Alina said. The “no shit” air returned. Ali headed it off. “Sent us in figuring we wouldn’t have a hope in hell. Then hoped if we did, we’d still hand over the data.”

“And? Did we get it?” Widow asked easing herself up.

She found herself home, at the divest of dives, something they called The Grobe. It was like if someone built a hotel to be condemned, never got around to finishing it, then by some quirk of fate, it ended up that anyhow.

Wraith smiled, “Yeah, but we didn’t hand it over.”

“What!? Why?” Widow choked, fearing for their reputation.

“Fuck ‘im. Tried to play us with bad intel. No crew worth their salt would blame us.”

Alina added, “And it’s a message to the other Does that we won’t take being screwed.”

The room slid into silence. Widow slowly tried to reconcile facts, that against all odds, she was alive. She shook off the last of her fatigue and sat up on the edge of her bed. “So what happened to the creds?”

More silence. This time Alina and Wraith share a wickedly smug grin. Suddenly, she knew why.

And she grinned too.