Chapter 32 #2
We started looking, but the ship was small and only had so many compartments. A scream sounded near the hole in the ship and I reflexively covered my head while Jaron crouched low next to me.
Further out, a guttural roar of pain shook me to my bones. Fear for Arrazyl raised its head, but I forced it down. He’d made his choice. Now it was time to make mine. And this time I would protect Jaron and Tatiana.
I found a laser torch. Worth a shot. I took it to the wall of the ship. The heat was almost unbearable, despite the four-foot length of the nozzle keeping it away. Even at that, the wall was painfully slow to respond to the blast of direct laser heat. A shield made from the ship wouldn’t work.
“Jac!” At Jaron’s call, I turned the torch off and pivoted to see what had him so alarmed.
A woman with a rifle had hopped into the ship. “Juliet and Jaron Monroe? Tatiana Hall?” She didn’t wait for us to respond. “I’m lieutenant Dunn and part of the rescue team. I’m here to get you to safety.”
I stared at her in disbelief. “The people who shot down the ship we were on are claiming to be here to rescue us?”
“We had to neutralize all the vorpyr before they realized what was happening.” She said impatiently. “Let’s move.”
“To where?” Jaron held a hand up in a stop motion. “We need to know where we’re going. What if we get separated from you?”
“There’s a shuttle to take you to the main ship half a klick to the northwest of here in a clearing.”
Relief swelled on Tatiana and Jaron’s faces, but all I felt was sick.
“What’s happening out there?” I asked. It was a stupid question, but my brain was trying to process the horrifying event and right now I just couldn’t.
Her patience snapped when a thud sounded against the outside of the ship and a man dropped like a ragdoll in front of the opening, dead. She grabbed hold of Tatiana and tugged. “Shut up and come with me or take your chances with those monsters.” She jumped through the opening.
We ran after her.
“Stay low.” Jaron hissed at me as we followed the lieutenant. Fear made my legs tremble, but I forced myself forward, trying to keep up with the long strides of Jaron and the lieutenant. Tatiana was all but clinging to the woman’s side. I wanted to tell her again that I was so sorry. For all of it.
A plas grenade landed too close for comfort, and dirt and foliage were blown all over me.
I wiped dirt from my eyes and glanced to the side, toward the fighting, just in time to see a big man racing away from the fight, barreling towards us, slapping his rifle.
He kept looking back. Pyravor was chasing him, pain and rage written across his face, and he wasn’t using his wings to propel him.
All of this only took a second to process, but alarm coursed through me.
The man was on a collision course with Jaron and he wasn’t paying attention to where he was running.
Reacting on instinct, I changed course, running to intercept the man.
I had meant to push him so he didn’t crash into Jaron, but he jerked the rifle up and I shied away.
My foot hit something and my ankle gave out.
He bowled into me and we both crashed into a tree.
My head bounced off the trunk and my vision blurred.
I blinked, trying to orient myself. Everyone was fighting. Why was I here in the middle of all this madness?
Agony shot through my side, but I was too out of breath to scream. I tumbled into an uncoordinated roll, trying to get away from the danger, from the pain. I smashed into another tree and my breath whooshed out of me. Forcing air into my lungs, I struggled to stand.
“Jacqueline, wake up!” The shout over the horrible sounds of battle and dying, flesh tearing and the shrill sound of the laser weapons, had me looking around in confusion.
There, about seven yards away, a woman was looking straight at me, gesturing wildly for me to come to her. She seemed familiar.
Jaron. She was the one who was taking us to the ship.
Jaron and Tatiana were nowhere in sight.
I crawled in her direction, too dizzy to stand.
I wanted out. Away from here. To forget this nightmare.
I wanted to hide. Every sense of self-preservation had my nerves alight, looking for an escape. And she would give me one.
Nearly halfway to her I used a tree trunk to help me get to my feet. Oddly, I couldn’t feel the pain that I had noticed earlier in my side. I kept my gaze fixed on the woman. She’d get me to safety. A man joined her, saying something and pointing. I needed to get to them.
Someone swooped down from above and a spray of blood colored everything around the woman. She gaped in horror as the man next to her was killed, and fled. I gasped and stumbled back, pitching to the ground as my muscles gave out. Nothing was working, why was nothing working?
The killer turned, emerald eyes blazing. They locked with mine and he came toward me. No, no, no.
With the last bit of strength in my body, I pushed myself backwards, away from him. He stopped and ever so slowly lowered into a crouch so I wasn’t craning my neck to see him.
His lips parted, and he said something. What did he say? I struggled to comprehend the words. He held my gaze, but his eyes flickered ever so slightly. That, along with the hair standing on the back of my neck, told me I had to get out of there. Now.
Someone came in behind me and I wasn’t fast enough to roll away. A prick in my neck was the last thing I felt.