Finn: Scifi Alien Invasion Romance (Hell Squad Book 10) (13 page)

“A bit more,” Finn called out. “We need enough room to get that jet out.”

He reached up to cut the highest parts, finally completing a large, rectangular shape. Then Finn stepped back, planted his boot against the wall, and kicked. The piece of wall they’d cut fell outward. Beyond it, lay the cool darkness.

“Let’s put the amplifier in the jet,” Marcus said. He looked at Finn and Lia. “Anything else you guys need? I’d prefer you get the jet ready in here, while it’s still in cover.”

Lia stepped forward, holding up a large tube with a pointed end. “I need to get all the tires coated with this synthetic rubber, and then we’ll see if we can get this baby fired up.”

Gabe worked with Reed to fit the amplifier into the small cargo area beneath the jet. Lia moved around the jet, spraying the black coating over the tires. Once she was done, she climbed up the small ladder into the cockpit, blinking at the old-school dashboard. The navigator’s seat was behind the pilot’s, and space was tight. She quickly settled in, and got to work, plugging in her comp to give her access to the controls and the powerpack Noah had given her. It would provide the fuel for the supersonic engines.

She tapped in some commands and waited. Her heart skipped a beat.
Come on, baby, wake up.

Lights flared to life on the cockpit controls. She grinned. “She’s operational.”

“Woot!” Finn called out. “Nice work.”

Lia went over all the controls. The jet might be old, but Lia was a pilot, and this was a plane…there were some things that would always be familiar. She started her checks.

Finn climbed up the ladder. “Ready?”

She took a deep breath. “Ready. Your seat is in back.” She jerked a thumb behind her. “It’s going to be a tight fit for that long body of yours. Back when this baby came out, pilots had to be a lot shorter than you.”

“I’ll fit,” he said with a smile. He climbed in.

Suddenly, there were deep shouts from outside. Lia’s hands froze on the controls

“Marcus.” Elle’s voice came over the comm. “You have raptors incoming! I repeat, raptors incoming, and there are a lot of them. Looks like a patrol has picked up your activity in the area. You only have one patrol heading toward you right now, but they’ve called in reinforcements. There’s a large convoy coming in from the direction of the factories.”

“Let’s move, people,” Marcus called out.

Gabe and Reed moved outside, firing their carbines. Laser fire lit up the night.

“You two, get that jet ready,” Marcus bellowed. The rest of Hell Squad moved through the gap.

Lia forced herself to focus on the controls and getting the jet ready. She couldn’t think about the aliens. All she had to do was get this jet in the sky.

That was when she felt the ground rumble beneath her.

She frowned.
What the hell was that?

“Rex incoming!” Cruz’s shout echoed back from outside.

Marcus appeared beside the jet, coming part way up the ladder. “Listen up. We’ll get this raptor patrol down, and then get you guys out on the runway. It’s going to be hot, but you need to get in the air before the raptor reinforcements arrive. Got it?”

Lia nodded. “Got it.”

Marcus reached up and touched her shoulder. “Good luck.” He reached back and shook Finn’s hand.

Then he was gone, striding out to join his squad.

“Hell Squad, ready to go to hell?” Marcus shouted.

“Hell, yeah,” the rest of his team called back. “The devil needs an ass-kicking.”

Carbine fire whizzed through the air. The team moved out in unison, as a smooth, well-oiled machine, engaging the raptors.

“How are the checks?” Finn said, jolting her back to the task at hand.

“Fine. Starting engines now.” She pressed the buttons in sequence. She pressed the final button. Nothing happened. Her stomach dropped. She pressed it again

“Lia?”

“Hang on.” She typed in some more commands.
Come on, girl, don’t fail me now.

As if the aircraft heard her, the engines roared to life.

“Yeah!” Finn called back. “Amplifier is safely aboard and engines are hot. Anything else you need me to do?”

“Here, take this.” She handed him a comp tablet back. “You’re my navigator.”

“Lia! Time to move,” Marcus shouted from outside.

She set the aircraft in motion. The jet rolled forward, and they moved through the gap in the wall, bumping roughly over the uneven ground.

Outside, she could see the dark sky was beginning to lighten. Dawn wouldn’t be far away. God, they needed to get out of here before daylight hit. She spotted Cruz waving them onto the runway.

There was no sign of the raptor patrol. She did a quick scan, and spotted multiple alien bodies on the ground.

But then, she saw Shaw go down on one knee. He was looking through his sniper scope. A second later, he started firing. “Incoming!”

Lia looked to the south, and everything in her went solid. Like her chest had suddenly filled with concrete.

Heading toward them was a giant beast. A rex.

It was surrounded by raptor vehicles.
So many
. Lia’s breath caught in her throat.

The rex lifted its head and roared.

***

“Lia, go!” Finn called out. “We need to get airborne.” He wanted them far away from the rex.

Hell Squad was firing, and Marcus was waving wildly at Finn and Lia. “Go,” he said with a roar.

They bumped their way out onto the runway, and Lia turned them away from the oncoming aliens. When they reached the end of the runway she turned the plane around, then stopped to check everything was okay. “Closing canopy,” she said.

Good
. He was ready to get this show on the road.

Suddenly, a shadow moved just outside the jet. A body leaped up and slammed into the still-open cockpit. The damn thing landed in Lia’s lap.

Lia screamed. Finn stared at the alien creature. It lifted its head and stared straight at him with burning red eyes.

It wasn’t a raptor or a canid. It was something smaller, and a lot more agile.

The thing reached forward and grabbed Lia. It grunted, and then yanked her out of the cockpit, kicking and screaming.

“Lia!” Finn yanked off the harness he’d just fastened and leaped out of the jet.

He landed in a crouch, pulling out his laser pistol.

The creature was tossing Lia around like a ragdoll. It looked up, and he got a better view of it in the murky light. It looked like a reptilian gorilla, with a sharp set of spikes along its back.

“Hey.” Finn lifted the pistol and fired.

The thing dropped Lia and she landed in a sprawl on the ground.

The creature roared at Finn and as it came his way, Finn kept his finger on the trigger and kept shooting at it.

Lia got back up and tried to run.

But the creature spun and did a giant leap, flying through the air, and landing on her back. He slammed her down hard into the ground.

“Get off her.” Finn readjusted his aim, running toward her, and firing again.

Lia managed to turn underneath the beast’s large powerful body. She rammed her hand up, and jammed her fingers hard into the creature’s eyes.

It stumbled back, roaring again. The deep, resonant sound rolled over the other sounds of battle.

Finn ducked in, and grabbed Lia. “Back in the jet.” He kept firing, pulling her backward, toward the aircraft. The creature bounded up, looked at them, and then turned and ran off toward the nearby buildings.

At the jet, Finn pushed Lia ahead of him and shoved her into the jet. Finn climbed in, lifting his head to scan around them. He didn’t want that thing making a second attempt.

Instead, he saw something far worse.

There were more of them.

He could see shadows moving near one of the abandoned hangars. He looked to the next one, and everything inside him went cold. There were even more shadows moving—and all of them had the same powerful shape as the gorilla-thing. God, there must be packs of the things.

“We have to go. Now!”

Suddenly, the rex at the end of the runway roared. Shit. It was damn close to stepping onto the runway.

Lia yanked her harness on and started touching the buttons.

As soon as Finn was in his seat, the canopy started closing again. As soon as it was shut, Finn released a long breath.

Lia sent more power to the engines, getting ready for takeoff. She looked up and he followed her gaze.

He could see the green laser fire.

“What about Hell Squad?” she asked. “There are too many aliens.”

Finn wanted to worry about his friends, but he knew right now he couldn’t. “They’ve escaped worse. Best thing we can do is get out of here, and then they can, too.”

Lia nodded. “Okay. We’re all set.”

“Great. Go!”

They started rolling down the runway. Finn turned and looked back behind them. He could see a group of the alien gorillas racing toward them. His jaw locked. He decided not to tell Lia.

“Oh, God!”

Her cry made him look back. She was staring straight ahead.

Finn saw the rex stomping toward them, and he cursed. Holy hell, that thing was huge. “You can do it, Lia. Get us up.”

“The rex will get us.” Her hands were shaking as she moved them over the controls.

“Just focus on your flying. You don’t want me at the controls, do you?”

“Hell, no.” Determination spiked in her voice.

“Well, I’m going to just sit here and think about having sex with you. Your husky little cries, your sweet, honey taste—”

“What?” She choked out the word on a shocked breath.

“Beats thinking about the aliens.”

Finn saw Lia’s shaking hands steady. Looked like his little distraction was working. But he was grateful she couldn’t see his face. Because looking at the enormous, approaching rex was a fucking nightmare.

The aircraft lifted off the ground.

The rex got closer.

“Oh, God.” Lia turned them sharply to the left in a steep climb.

The rex roared, snapping its jaws in their direction.

Finn’s eyes widened. He saw the red eye of the creature through the glass of the cockpit canopy, just a few meters away.

Then they were past it.

As they soared into the air, he let out a breath. He heard Lia do the same. She turned the jet east, and he saw the rising sun was turning the sky from black to blue.

“We made it.” She turned in her seat with a whoop. “We made it.”

Finn reached out and touched her face. “Never doubted it for a second.”

Chapter Thirteen

Lia pulled in a few deep breaths, a wide smile on her face. They were in the air, the day dawning around them, the aliens behind them.

“The supersonic systems will take a minute to come online.” She saw the sixty-second countdown flash up on the screen and start ticking down.

“I’ve looked at the map, and we’re a little too far south,” Finn said. “You’ll need to adjust course. Sending you corrections now.”

“You’re a pretty good navigator for a flyboy.”

He leaned forward and tugged on her hair. “I prefer the pilot seat, baby.”

She smiled again and opened a comms line. “This is Supersonic One to the Enclave.”

“Hi, Supersonic One, this is Elle. How’s the ocean?”

“Blue. And not an alien in sight. We are on track to go to supersonic speed in less than one minute. After that, we won’t be able to communicate.”

“Acknowledged. Hell Squad said you got away.”

“They okay?”

“Still fighting their way out, but they’ll be fine.” Elle’s voice was matter-of-fact. “Good luck, Lia. See you when you two get home.”

“Thanks, Elle.” Lia closed the comm line, and her elated feeling from their escape and takeoff dissolved. “You really think Hell Squad is okay?”

“Yes,” Finn replied.

Just one simple word. His strong, sure tone made her believe it. She knew that the squad had been through so much, and even when they got knocked down or battered, they kept getting back up again. They kept fighting.

Suddenly, an alarm sounded. It was loud in the tight confines of the cockpit. It was coming from both her controls and Finn’s tablet.

He cursed. “Pteros incoming.”

Lia glanced at the countdown. “There are still sixteen seconds to supersonic speed.”

“They’re coming in fast.”

“We don’t have any weapons.” Lia dragged her hand across her mouth.

“We can evade them, Lia. Pretend we’re a drone. Pretend you’re outrunning that drone killer bird that was taking down your drones.”

Lia’s focus narrowed. Finn’s words reverberated in her head. Letting herself relax, she put the jet into evasive maneuvers. Finn kept speaking in easy, confident tones, giving her encouragement.

As the first ptero reached them, she pushed the jet into a wild turnaway. For a second, they were upside down, then they leveled out.

Finn called out. “Nice move!”

She saw more pteros coming. Raptor poison spewed through the air. No! There was no way this jet could withstand the tiniest bit of poison. She spun the jet to the right.

Ten seconds to supersonic.

Nine. Eight. Seven.

Each second felt like an eternity. She pulled up into a steep climb. A ptero whizzed past.

Six. Five. Four.

She turned again. The world turned upside-down, and became a whirl. Even though she knew she was putting the old jet through its paces, it responded like a superstar.

Then Finn cursed. “Heat-seeking missile incoming. Goddammit.”

Lia stayed calm. She levelled them out, putting the jewel-blue ocean beneath them.

Three. Two. One.

They hit supersonic speed.

In a flash, the pteros and the missile were gone, and there was just blue sky around them. She sat back in her seat.

“Nice work, flygirl.” Finn’s hands squeezed her shoulders.

“Thanks. We’ll be over the drop zone in about thirty minutes,” she said.

“So, we’ll drop this amplifier and then we head back. Easy.”

Lia checked her controls. She had to admit it was nice to be supersonic, with a jet under her control. She was flying free, not trapped underground, not being hunted by the aliens.