Syn-En: Plague World: The Founders War Begins (13 page)

“Oh!” Nell stumbled forward.

Bei caught the front of the lad’s vest and hauled him back to firm ground. With a frown, her husband pointed to the boy then the path.

Red darkened the boy’s cheeks, and he studied his bare feet.

Bei tousled the nubby dreadlocks on his head before marching onward.

Nell kissed Bei’s shoulder blade. He would make a wonderful father. Once all the refugees were safely aboard.

He cleared his throat. “You are still transmitting in the WA.”

Richmond giggled.

Doc huffed. “I did not mess with her hormones, Admiral. You can check her medical records yourself.”

Glancing over her shoulder, Nell glared at Doc. “Oh, for pity’s sake, I’m perfectly normal.”

Except that she glowed in the dark.

And was the oldest living human.

And could change to a silver color.

And...

Apollie snorted. “Warriors always have heightened libidos, even the inferior males. Nell Stafford’s appetites are in keeping with a leader of her standing. The Admiral should give her a least a dozen off-spring. Strong females for battle, and a few males to strengthen the bonds with our females.”

Heat prickled Nell’s face. This was so not how she pictured this first contact going. “Maybe we could focus on our mission and not my sex life. I don’t think any of us want to wake up dead tomorrow.”

Apollie’s beads clacked together. “I do not believe these Humans mean us harm. In fact, I believe we are being welcomed with a feast.”

Nell’s nostrils quivered and her stomach rumbled. The fermented scent of baking bread and roasting fish tickled her senses.

“Admiral.” At the front of their line, Brooklyn broke his silence. “I’m detecting dwellings at nine o’clock.”

Nell peered through the tree trunks. Mud colored cliff walls met her gaze. The stone path turned into packed dirt. Rosemary, thyme, and sage bushes grew in patches of sunlight. Rocks hemmed in rectangles of peppermint. Peach, apricot, and apple trees sprouted in a fruit cocktail orchard. The path curved around an almond tree and the valley opened up.

A meadow of wild roses lapped at the base of another cliff. In a niche, twenty feet off the ground the refugees lived in adobe buildings.

Blinking, Nell swayed on her feet. “They’re indians. Sinaqua indians.” She latched onto Bei’s arm. “Do you speak Anasazi?”

His almond-shaped eyes darkened as he searched the CIC.

Apollie’s pale nostrils flared. “That is not Anasazi. We had control of Earth then.”

Nell bit her lip. She wouldn’t ask if they’d taken the Southwest Indian tribe. She’d learned her lesson about questions she really didn’t want answers to.

White-beard beckoned from the threshold of a suspension bridge. Water sluiced around the narrow channel and white foamed in holding pools underneath the hanging wooden planks.

Bei closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, his sclera had returned to its normal white color. “The Anasazi are on a Skaperian world.”

Brooklyn headed for the bridge. “It would help if they spoke.”

Apollie walked beside the medic. “Or if their hand signals conformed to the known sign languages.”

The bridge swayed as the old man reached the halfway point. He see-sawed left and right, grabbing the rope bannister.

Nell’s stomach pitched; bile burned her throat. Perhaps she could wade across the stream. Water frothed against the pristine boulders. A leaf raced by on the current before dissolving in front of her eyes.

Bei shifted his rifle to the front. Crouching, he cupped one hand as a stirrup beside his thigh. “I’ll carry you.”

“You’ll be too heavy. We’ll fall through.” She swallowed the lump in her throat. Just because she suffered from car sickness didn’t mean she’d get sick on the bridge. She hadn’t been sick on the spaceships. Of course, she’d either been afraid for her life or it had been smooth sailing.

Bei’s eyes widened. “If I have to carry you, then my hands won’t be free.”

Brooklyn stepped onto the bridge. Without grasping the side rails, he raced across the planks. “Hey! Wait! Stop!”

Nell’s attention flew toward the camp.

Two men balanced on an oak ladder and pulled reed baskets from a niche. A naked toddler played in a mud puddle directly under the ledge. The ladder swayed to the right, lifting one leg from the stone perch.

“He’s going to fall.” Bei sprinted for the bridge. His arms pumped in a blur. He zigged to the left of the bridge entrance, covering the promontory in two strides. Then he leapt over the water, clearing the fifteen feet with a few feet to spare. He overtook Brooklyn and passed him.

“I’ve got to get me new upgrades.” Doc reached the bridge.

Richmond quickly followed. When one stepped left, the other stepped right. The bridge rippled under their assault but didn’t sway.

In the village, the ladder leg slammed to the ground.

Dodging around Apollie, Nell ran after the Syn-En.

The basket slipped from one man’s grip. Holding the ladder in one hand, he lunged for it. The basket slipped through his hand, heading directly to the toddler underneath. The ladder over balanced. One man grabbed for the ledge. He dangled there for a moment. Then the niche crumbled and he plummeted toward the ground. The other man listed to the right. His arms flapped and he shouted.

Nell hit the bridge. On her second step, she pitched to the right. The handrail cut across her breasts.

“Every other foot.” Apollie stood behind her. “You step with your left, when I say.”

Flinging her arm over, she teetered between the two handrails.

“Right. Left.” Apollie called like a professional drill sergeant.

Nell obeyed. She eyed the horizon. There was a sickening crunch as the basket hit. Bei disappeared behind a beehive oven. Brooklyn lagged ten feet behind.

Bone snapped and a man screamed.

Doc and Richmond sprinted faster.

Bei leapt into the air. He clawed for the last man and hooked his shirt. Fabric tore and they both disappeared from sight.

A sickening thud followed.

The bridge bucked under Nell’s feet, then she was on terra firma.
Please be alright. Please be alright.

Apollie sprinted past. Her backward leg joints flexed deeper with each step until she sprung ten feet at a time.

Nell gasped for breath. Why couldn’t speed have been one of her freakish powers? She passed a hut. Metates dusted with powdered corn. Pottery filled with alcohol. A pile of wood. Heat blasted her near the beehive oven.

Doc and Brooklyn spoke soothingly. Men moaned.

She rounded the oven.

A green beam shot out of Doc’s wrist, swept over the man in front of him. Richmond removed items from her medic belt.

Bei and Brooklyn crouched by the second man.

The man gurgled and tried to rise despite the bone sticking out of his pant leg.

Apollie keened softly and dusted corn kernels from a small, still form. A muddy foot lay near the remnants of the basket.

“No. No!” Nell cut a straight-line to the child.

Bei’s head snapped up. “Nell. Don’t.”

Dropping to her knees, she slid on the ground the rest of the way, coming to a stop inches from the child.

His brown eyes stared unseeing at the blue sky.

Apollie straightened his neck.

“Don’t be dead. Don’t be dead.” Tears burned Nell’s eyes and stung her nose. These refugees didn’t deserve to have their day of liberation marked by tragedy. She set her hand on his narrow chest, willed him to breathe. “Please. Please.”

“Nell.”

She opened her first aid programming. “I need…I need a diagnostic kit. Get one from Doc. He always has a spare.”

Apollie wiped her nose. “Nell.”

“Just do it.”

“Nell.”

“Don’t Nell me.” Her blood heated and her skin tightened. Why wouldn’t someone just once do as she asked? “Just do it.”

Shock blazed in Apollie’s red eyes and her face paled.

Nell sucked in a deep breath. Man, she was so angry she felt like she was on fire. “Fine. I’ll do it myself.”

Her body wouldn’t obey her commands. She glanced down.

White light pulsed from her fingertips. It crept like vines up the boy’s chest and circled his neck.

Footsteps pounded behind her. Hundreds of them. No one said anything.

A scream locked in Nell’s throat. What was happening to her?

The glow seeped into the boy’s neck. A second later, he inhaled sharply and blinked. Then he began to cry.

Nell yanked her hands away. “Ohmygodohmygodohmygod.” A shadow cut across her and she looked up. “Bei, I—”

The silhouette of a woman faced the crowd. “Today is truly a day of celebration. Praise the Meek! Our brothers and sisters have been restored to us.”

Health alarms flared in Bei’s head—low power in auxiliary systems, spiking fear pushing through toward anger, and imminent forced reboot. Bei quickly scanned his body for trauma. The tattered sleeves of his uniform knit together over his healing NDA skin. Anesthetic reduced the rock rash on his back to a distant ache. He opened a diag box. It must be a fermite-induced malfunction. Unless...

His head snapped up and his cardiac program misfired. Nell!

His wife stood ten meters away. With her fists digging into her hips, she faced the crowd of biologic refugees. “I can’t believe you people speak English.”

Opening the WA, Bei tapped into her health monitors. Oxygen saturation, heart rate and respiratory rates dropped to critical levels. How the hell did she remain standing?

Heat from the beehive ovens on her right caused the air to scintillate. Fermites dove into her skin. Pops of light sparkled like stars against her black uniform. The damn things weren’t healing her. Pushing to his feet, Bei slid his Torp-SK7 from its holster.

Human refugees in red, blue, green, and yellow cotton garments crowded closer to his wife. Spilled corn kernels crunched under their bare feet. On the ground nearby, Paladin Apollie yanked the shattered woven basket and shielded her feather-headed self from Nell.

The boy on the ground between Apollie and Nell rubbed his eyes. Tears made tracks in the corn dust lightening his tan cheeks. “Papa!”

The injured Human male behind Bei groaned.

Brooklyn shushed him. “Lay still. You have internal injuries.”

Bei clenched his fists as he strode to his wife’s side. His rescue of the man hadn’t gone as planned. Bei had grabbed the man’s shirt, wrapped his arm around his waist, then twisted his body to take the brunt of the landing. Unfortunately, he hadn’t mitigated the strength of his tenth-generation upgrades and had snapped two of the man’s ribs, piercing his lung.

Still holding the broken basket, Apollie jogged over to Bei. Her pale skin resembled white chalk, her red eyes were bright behind a curtain of braids. “That boy was dead. I know it. I checked.”

“Help Brooklyn, so his father survives.” Bei jerked his chin toward the injured biologic.

She opened her mouth before snapping it closed. A moment later, she hustled toward the medic. Dropping onto the rocky ground, she opened the medic kit. “Tell me what to do.”

Tuning them out, Bei focused on his wife. He thumbed his Torp-SK7 to its lowest setting.

She swayed on her feet, but didn’t retreat from her confrontation with the speaker. “Well? Don’t you realize how badly this first contact could have gone? Your people could have been wounded because they refused to speak.”

A lithe woman with skin the color of poured caramel faced Nell. Inky black robes glittered with fermites. When she tilted her head, ebony curls bounced around her round face. Chocolate diamond eyes sparkled above her wide cheekbones. “I do not know this English. We speak the language of the Meek.”

“Your people didn’t speak at all when they came out to greet us. Ask Gandalf, if you don’t believe me.” Nell raised her arm and pointed at the white bearded man who had guided them to the village. The motion required the last of her energy reserves. Her eyes fluttered and her knees buckled.

Dropping to the ground, Bei caught her in his arms. NDA flaked off her chin. Her skin paled. Without power, her Neo-Dynamic Armor would lose cohesion. She could bleed out. Or worse.

The female speaker lunged forward and reached out. “Sister!”

Silver light arced off Nell, hitting the woman’s fingers. Electricity crackled, and the biologic yanked her hand back. The crowd retreated.

A woman gasped. “Come, Zaresh.”

Zaresh, the boy Nell had saved, stuffed a grubby fist in his mouth but otherwise didn’t move.

Shunting his emotions to the recycle bin, Bei set the muzzle of the Torp against his wife’s side. He double-checked to ensure it was on its lowest setting. “I’m sorry, Nell. I have to do this. I have to recharge you.”

The biologic’s leader sidled closer. Black scorched her tapered fingers. “What must you do?”

Bei squeezed the trigger of his energy weapon.

Nell’s body arched. Blue light danced across her gritted teeth. Her hand flopped to the smooth stone ground. Scabs of NDA fluttered around her.

“What are you doing?” The leader pursed her full lips and narrowed her eyes.

“Saving my wife.” He opened a cyber door and slipped inside Nell’s cerebral interface. Her energy levels remained critical. The damn shot had done nothing. Nothing. Sweat broke out across his skin. He couldn’t lose Nell. He wouldn’t. He kicked up the discharge strength of his Torp and fired again.

Nell’s muscles seized. Her fingers curled and her hair crackled. Blue light moved like a sidewinder across her skin. Fermites burst from her like confetti. Her reserves hit nil. Her heart stopped, and her skin split. Blood oozed between the crevices.

Damn it. The atomic pests were absorbing all the energy. Bei thumbed up the charge of his weapon. He’d overload their atomic circuits in one blast.

Nell was dying.

Boots pounded the ground. A shadow slanted across her. Bei shifted the muzzle between his wife’s shoulder blades where her energy cells resided.

“Admiral, don’t.” Doc cleared his throat. “Excuse me, ma’am.”

The leader eyed Doc’s hand on her forearm. Her brown eyes widened and her lips parted.