37. The Last Barricade
THIRTY-SEVEN
THE LAST BARRICADE
Syasku
“Syasku, duck!” Kyle yells.
The soldiers continue firing, and I drop. Pain bursts across my back and tail. Gritting my teeth, I retreat and hide behind a display.
Kyle appears several displays down from me and to my left. He dodges around the corner, fires off his weapon, and ducks back behind one of the displays. Catching my gaze through the smoky darkness, he waves for me to stay put as he dodges between the rest, slowly heading my way.
His tenacity startles me.
When he makes it to me, his back hits the display and he slides down into a crouch. “We need to get past them.” He replaces a part of his weapon while indicating the staircase. “The entrance to Port B is up there along with the pathway to the upper caste housing sectors.” He rises and shoots off his weapon towards it then ducks back down. “If we can hold them off long enough, Omari and the others will eventually catch up. They’ll provide enough of a distraction for us to get through.”
I growl, clenching my fists trying to ignore the pain spreading out from my bullet wounds. “I have waited long enough!” But as I peer over the side, more and more of Volp’s soldiers gather at the top of the stairs, further barricading the way forward. “Is there no other route?”
“We disabled the other routes. We could try climbing the elevator shafts.”
I shake my head. “Then I will have to be fasssst.” I spring from my hiding spot and head for the closest soldier, grabbing him and using him as another shield. He struggles until the first bullets hit, and his body jerks, easing the tension in his limbs.
Now dead, I lift him higher.
I launch up the staircase and into the first line of soldiers. They fall while others trip. When I throw the corpse at the ones to my left, two soldiers tackle me from my right, another at my front. I swing my tail and push them away, knocking more of them over.
More enter the fray as I throw another off me and down the stairs. Taking bullets to my back, I swing my tail, scattering the next wave. Some fall and do not get back up.
One dives onto my tail, another on my back. I grab and throw the second forward, sinking my claws into his shoulders and dropping him on the soldier at my tail. A blade sinks into my shoulder, and I spin, shaking off the bodies to grab it and pull it out. Dropping the blade, I head for the soldier who stabbed me. Lifting him over my head, I throw him at those between me and the way forward. Blood fills and groans fill my ears, and I lick my lips.
Bleeding profusely, I slip in my own blood.
Using another corpse as a shield, I barrel into the last group shooting at me, crushing them under my weight.
The rest slowly back away. One drops his weapon and raises his hands in submission.
Straightening to my full height, I bare my fangs and spew venom. A soldier to my right bends over and vomits while another flees into the passage where the soldiers have been coming from.
He stops dead in his path, his body jerking several times before dropping where it stands. Trying to see into the dark passage beyond, I am only met with shadows.
Then Omari appears. Armed humans from the Dregs rush around her on either side and into the atrium, shooting the few soldiers left alive.
She shouts at her men to open the doors as she waltzes toward me. Following behind her are her people, clutching their belongings, their clan members, and their children. They begin to file into the room en masse, ushered around by those who are guarding their passage.
Omari’s males surround me, eyeing me with suspicion.
She stops before me just as Kyle appears at the top of the steps, briefly eyeing the corpses around me. “You are an effective killer, naga.” She waves her males away, and they lower their weapons. “But can you open those doors for us too?” She indicates the large ones shut tightly behind me.
I growl and hiss, facing the doors, which are wide and high enough to allow many through at once when open. Approaching them, I search for a mechanism, finding nothing except smooth steel. Without another recourse, I dig my fingers into the small slit between them, and with adrenaline and bloodlust empowering me, I force them open. When there is enough space to fit my hand through the gap, I grip each side and shove. The doors slide into the walls.
Smoke billows in my face as Omari’s males rush forward.
Darker and smaller than the previous space, I enter a smokey deluge, with columns and an even larger checkpoint than the last situated on the far side. People coming from passages on my left and right flee toward it, intermingling with Omari’s armed males. Besides them, the space is mostly clear except for a few remaining soldiers yelling at everyone to return to their homes.
Being quickly overtaken, they die where they stand, picked off by the others around me.
Searching for my next ascent, I shove past the few humans in my path and into the room, blinking rapidly to clear the smoke from my eyes. Besides the atrium at my back, and the two passages on either side, the only other way forward is through the port, straight ahead.
Kyle’s wheezing form once again appears at my side. “Right. We need to head to the right to access the upper levels.” He throws his arm out to point at the passage next to us where I can hear shouting from within.
Turning for it, I wipe the blood off my brow that is dripping into my eyes, and take a moment to dig my fingers into my shoulder to remove a bullet.
“Please, Asera ? —”
As I am about to leave, my ears prick.
“Ursssula will know what to do. She is smart. She will be here soon.”
My head snaps around to look behind me and at the left wall. Murky shadows and fleeing humans distort my view.
“Syasku?” Kyle says my name in question when I do not move.
“By the time she gets here, if she gets here, it’ll be too late!”
Across the smaller atrium and in a dark alcove between two pillars are Asera and…
I blink, unsure if what I am seeing is due to blood loss. Focusing on the second, smaller form, a cloud of familiar curls appears.
Tensing, my throat closes as I coil my rent tail inward, and a furious hiss builds in my chest.
It’s Vivian.
Kyle steps forward. “Is that… another fucking naga?”
I lunge for them, rushing through the smoke. Grabbing the back of Asera’s head, I yank him off my female and slam his body into the floor, smashing his face into it.