Chapter 22

DAY 42 – HADES – PETROVA

“I hope they figured out the message,” Omar sighed. “Do you think it was too cryptic?”

He was sitting on one of the old storage crates that filled the little concrete structure, the dust that filled the air so pervasive that Petrova had elected to keep her breathing mask on. Omar had told her that it was some old storehouse the Syndicate had used for moving stolen goods many years prior. They’d come up from beneath the floor using one of the winding tunnels that crisscrossed beneath the city like a termite nest, and they had been waiting for the better part of a day already.

“We won’t know until they arrive,” Petrova replied, leaning against the wall by the door.

She was already scouting out the room – finding the best vantage points, formulating plans, and playing them out in her mind. This was exactly what she had wanted – a small, enclosed space where she could surprise her targets and leverage her augs to tear them apart.

An XMR would kill a SWAR operative just as easily as it would an unaugmented human, but it was in CQB where her kind really shined. The fighting techniques that SWAR had developed leveraged their strength to break bone and tear flesh. Petrova could rip the throat from a person with the same ease that someone might pull apart a fresh bagel, and bone was no stronger than chalk in her hands. She and Omar had set down their XMRs some distance away, but she also had her arm-gun loaded with a single deadly round, and her wrist blade was ready to spring forth. In mere seconds, she could paint this storehouse with their blood.

She reached up to scratch her ear absent-mindedly, applying just enough pressure to start broadcasting her position from her cochlear implant. Song had orders not to intervene unless she called for help, but if something went wrong, he could drop a kill team or a bunker buster right on top of the building.

There was a sudden noise, and she turned around, glancing back at the open hole in the concrete floor where a sheet metal panel had been pushed aside. She bristled as a distinctly feline head slowly rose up from the darkness below, some kind of makeshift machine pistol clutched in its furry hands. It was the Rask – the alien scrutinizing her with its reflective, yellow eyes, those slitted pupils expanded into dark circles to take in more light. His flat brow culminated in a pink, feline nose that twitched as it sampled the air, his round ears emerging from a mop of sand-colored hair that contrasted with his tanned complexion.

It was only her training as an infiltrator that allowed her to repress her reaction. She was supposed to know this creature – the resistance viewed it as a friend. Only a couple of years prior, she had stared the same aliens down in combat, tossing grenades and firing bursts as her team swept from room to room in one of their giant desert crawlers.

The alien only grew taller and more imposing as he hauled himself out of the hole, his shoulders so wide that it was a tight squeeze. His torso seemed about as broad as two people of Petrova’s stature standing side by side. He seemed suspicious of Petrova, but when his eyes turned to Omar, they lit up.

“Omar!” the alien began in a deep, coarse voice that resonated within the confined space. “I am relieved to find you well.”

“Likewise, Doc,” Omar added with a smile as he hopped off his crate. “Thanks for coming on such short notice. I wondered if my riddle might have given you too much trouble.”

“Don’t worry – even Bill managed to figure it out,” someone grunted as he climbed up behind the Rask. He was wearing a PDF helmet, but the visor was open, and Petrova recognized him as Rivera. Good – both of the VIPs were right where she wanted them...

More Marines followed – three men keeping their weapons raised as they began to sweep the small building, checking corners and peering behind crates. It seemed that there were a couple more who had remained in the tunnel below. Probably two or three – they had brought a fireteam. Predictable...

“You are not hurt?” Ruza added, looking Omar up and down. “How did you escape capture after the battle?”

“Oh, I got captured,” he explained. “That’s where my friend here comes in,” he added with a gesture to Petrova. “The Borgs were moving us between garrisons by truck – we think to prevent you guys from keeping track of us – and Anna here managed to bust us out with her Marine karate or something.”

“Anna?” Rivera asked, sounding skeptical. The Rask picked up on his tone of voice, turning to face her.

“Private Anna Valencia, Sir,” she replied with a prim salute. “Four-hundred-and-eighth out of Quezon City.”

“The four-oh-eight were serving on the Tirad, but I don’t remember your name,” he replied. There was a moment of tension, Petrova preparing to spring her hidden blade free, but he appeared to relax. The Rask followed suit, letting down his guard and turning back to Omar. “Thanks for keeping Omar safe,” Rivera continued. “Sorry to cut the tearful reunion short, but we need to get out of here on the double. I don’t want to test the Borgs, and if we delay too long, we’ll miss our storm window. Private – fall in with the fireteam. You can watch our six.”

“Yes, Staff Sergeant,” she confirmed.

Her heart should have been pounding and her blood should have been boiling in her veins, but she restrained herself as she watched her targets interact, waiting for an opportunity like a tiger preparing to pounce. They were so close that she could feel their breath, but she had to stay cool, as even the subtlest of signals could give her away. Body language, lingering looks – even the way she breathed could betray her intentions to a perceptive target. Anna was safe among friends, and it wasn’t enough for Petrova’s enemies to believe it – her very body had to be convinced of it too.

As Ruza and Rivera turned their backs to address Omar, she felt her heart skip a solitary beat, a little tension starting to rise as she geared up. The Rask was the biggest threat in this enclosed environment – the only serious threat. The aliens might be big and tough, but even their high-G bones were like paper to an XMR. One round from her hidden arm-gun to the back of his skull, and it would be lights-out. Rivera’s spine would be severed by her blade before the alien’s body had hit the floor, and from there, the rest of the Marines would follow in short order.

She wasn’t even hearing their conversation anymore – it had all faded into the background, blurred and indistinct like someone speaking underwater. Petrova stepped a little closer, needing to get nearer to Rivera, splaying her fingers as she prepared to bring up her gun-arm. There was a sudden interruption as Omar reached out to her, handing her an XMR. That momentary distraction was all it took.

The last thing she saw before everything went black was the back of a furry hand whipping towards her face.

Petrova awoke suddenly, feeling something foul stinging her nose. Through blurry eyes, she saw a small vial that was being waved in front of her face. It was followed by a bright light that shone in her eyes, making her blink and squint, her vision gradually clearing as she followed it back and forth.

The indistinct space around her resolved into a metal room with a single harsh light strip mounted on the ceiling. It was devoid of any furniture, save for the chair that she was sitting in. It didn’t strike her as a cell, but it was clearly being used as one, the remnants of dust on the deck suggesting that it had only recently been cleaned. Her head was pounding, and she tasted blood in her mouth. There was a numbness in her extremities, and she couldn’t move her limbs when she tried, but she couldn’t yet discern whether she was bound or not. Her clothes and mask had been removed, stripping her down to her tank top and shorts.

She lifted her eyes groggily, gritting her teeth when she saw the Rask standing in front of her. Being seated made him look even larger, the imposing alien filling her field of view, looking down at her with those piercing yellow eyes. He was holding a little vial between his padded fingers, along with a small flashlight the size of a pen to him. As she watched warily, feeling her body’s stress response start to kick in with a vengeance, he stooped to stow the items in a duffel bag that was resting on the floor at his feet.

“I wanted to make sure that you were not suffering from a concussion,” he began, his voice low and gravelly. He enunciated his words carefully and with purpose, English clearly not being his native language, rolling his Rs almost like a purring cat. “Contrary to popular belief, a loss of consciousness induced through blunt trauma to the head is not a safe and reliable way to subdue a person.”

Petrova checked for loose teeth with her tongue, then spat a glob of bloody saliva onto the floor in front of him.

“Just once during my lifetime, I would like to meet a human who does not require weeks of socialization to behave normally,” he grumbled as he glanced down at her answer with distaste.

“I know who you are,” Petrova began, glaring back at him. “You’re Ruza – they call you the Doctor.”

“Such is my profession,” he confirmed.

“You going to torture me?” Petrova demanded, glancing down at his bag. It must be full of drugs, scalpels, and who knew what other painful medical implements. “You should know that it’s pointless. SWAR don’t break – we’re trained to resist any interrogation techniques you could come up with.”

“You judge me by your own standards of conduct,” he replied with a sneer. “I regret having to strike you, but you gave me little choice.”

“I’ve fought Rask before,” she spat. “Yeah, I killed plenty of you furry fuckers on Borealis during the rebellion. You’re not so tough – you go down just the same as anyone else when I put enough tungsten in you. I know that you’re barbaric, that you’re a race of pirates and mercenaries, and that your idea of a date would get you court-martialed in civilized space.”

“Then you know very little,” he replied. He was so calm and detached – it was starting to get on her nerves.

“How did you figure it out?” she asked, cocking her head. “I had you exactly where I wanted you. One more second, and I would have painted your brains all over the room.”

“Do you think that my ears cannot discern the whine of electric motors, even beneath all your clothing?” he replied. “Can I not hear the mechanisms of your hidden weapons engaging? Do you think that I do not recognize the scent of polymer, metal, and hot electronics? I can hear your heartbeat,” he added, his massive head seeming to float down towards her as he leaned closer. She recoiled, but with the backrest of the chair behind her, there was nowhere to go. “I can smell the stress hormones seeping from your pores even now.”

“Like I said – court-martial,” she grumbled, fighting the impulse to headbutt him in his stupid cat nose. Unfortunately, his skull was a lot harder than hers, and she’d had quite enough head injuries for one day.

“You might know these things had you interacted with aliens more frequently,” he continued as he rose up to his full eight-foot height again. “There is a reason that so many Polars are being recruited by UNNI.”

“What do you know about UNNI?” Petrova demanded. “Just who the fuck are you, anyway? Why are you here alone? You work for Vos, don’t you? He sent you here, didn’t he?”

“I seem to know a great deal more than you do,” the alien replied evasively.

“What did you do to my augs?” she added, glancing down at her limbs. They were still attached – her pale skin giving way to black polymer at her thighs and shoulders, but there was only tingling static beyond. There was a belt around her midriff that secured her to the chair, but her limbs were not bound. They simply hung limp like dead weight, unable to respond to the signals from her brain. “Did you break them, you oaf?”

“I deactivated them,” he explained. “It was a simple matter of disconnecting the neural interfaces from their replaceable batteries. One needs only to pull out a few wires – it has not damaged them. I will reconnect your limbs to their power sources when I see fit.”

“How would you know how to do that?” Petrova asked, narrowing her eyes at him. “You’re a Rask – your species hasn’t even developed the semiconductor yet. Have you been pulling them off dead agents?”

“I have a great deal of experience with repairing and servicing SWAR prosthetics,” he replied. “Both on and off the battlefield.”

“What the hell do you want from me anyway? You killed all of the other agents you came across in cold blood, so why am I tied to this chair? Why have you kept me alive? You have to know that I won’t give you any information, and the Commander doesn’t negotiate with terrorists. You can’t trade me for one of your pals.”

“Perhaps I am a terrorist,” the alien mused. “I am using the application of violence to enact political change, after all. I have fought against the UNN before, I have killed with smuggled weapons, and I have employed improvised explosives to demolish skyscrapers. Most of my own kind would consider me insane for the choices I have made.”

“You’re a fucking butcher,” she snapped, leaning towards him as she bared her teeth in a snarl. “You’ve murdered my friends – you’re the cause of all this.”

“I have never raised my hand against someone who was not threatening my life or those of my friends,” he replied, unfazed. “Not on this planet, at least.”

“They were good, loyal soldiers.”

“They were tyrants,” he growled, exposing teeth that were a lot larger and sharper than hers as he leaned in. “This has been a difficult lesson for you – a correction. Your people came here to impose your will on others through violence, but I am more skilled in violence, I assure you. Those who think as you do will run roughshod over your innocent victims until you hit a wall and bloody your noses. We are that wall.”

“You don’t scare me,” she said with a derisive laugh. “I’ve faced down Warriors with claws that could shear a man in half and melt flesh off the bone. I went toe-to-toe with a Krell. You’re low on the list.”

“I have known people like you,” he continued. “Fanatics with misplaced loyalty, valued only for their usefulness to the cause. Nothing that you can do will ever meet their standards. You will never be enough, and when you are no longer useful, you will be discarded like a spent magazine.”

“You like to talk a lot of shit, Koshak, ” Petrova scoffed. “By all means, keep running your mouth. The longer I keep you talking, the more time it gives the strike teams that are on their way right now to get here. Let’s see if you’re more skilled in violence than a team of PCEs rocking heavy XMRs when they knock down your door.”