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  “No more games,” Maksim said, shaking his head in vehement denial. “No more agendas or room for hate. This is about survival. This is about justice.”

  “Survival?” I asked incredulously. A wave of heat hit my face, which I was sure was turning a fiery shade of red. Anger erupted inside of me and I had to take deep breaths. I pressed my weapon to his forehead. “Justice? You want justice? This is justice. Your brain spattered against the doors behind you is justice.”

  “We fought Legion together in the forest and we survived,” Maksim said, looking up at me despite the barrel of my weapon on his forehead. It was as if it wasn’t there or maybe he didn’t believe I would actually kill him. “If we want to live, it’ll take us doing the same one more time.”

  “Please remove the barrel of your weapon from his head,” Dama directed me. I felt a nudge on my shoulder as she pointed her own blaster at me.

  A second later, weapons were pointed in every direction. John held his rifle pointed at a Rung, who aimed at him right back. Tong had Sulk dead to rights. Stacy held two weapons, one in each hand. One was aimed at Dama and the other at one of Sulk’s assassins. In turn the Rung pointed their weapons at us. If it all wasn’t so potentially deadly, it would have been somewhat comical.

  “No one has to die here,” Dama continued. “Whatever hate you hold for this man, it is nothing compared to that which we have for Legion. We need as many infection free fighters as we can get. One more on our side means one less for him. Please lower your weapon.”

  “Do it,” Maksim said, closing his eyes. He pressed his head harder into the barrel of the Dragon’s Breath in my hands. Apparently, he didn’t mean for me to remove the weapon as Dama did. “Do it. Free me, brother.”

  My hands shook as I weighed what I knew I should do against what I knew Maksim deserved.

  “Dean,” Stacy said from behind me. “Maksim will pay, just not right now. We have a mission to finish. It doesn’t mean we have to like it. We just have to do what’s best for everyone right now.”

  I swallowed hard, reluctantly lowering the weapon from Maksim’s forehead. Stacy had become my frequent voice of reason, saving me from making bad decisions in the moment.

  “We’re not done with this conversation,” I told Maksim. “Not by a long shot.”

  “Our time will come in this life or the next,” Maksim said with a heavy sigh as if he were almost disappointed I hadn’t killed him.

  Better luck next time, I thought.

  “Lower your weapons,” Dama ordered her Rung.

  They complied, allowing Stacy, John, and Tong to do the same.

  “What’s with the change of heart?” John asked Maksim. “One second you hate us, and now you’re trying to help the Rung?”

  “I was forced to trade one abomination for the other,” Maksim said with a noticeable wince of pain as he pressed his bloody hand deeper into his side to stop the bleeding. “I know what Legion wants. Legion is going to consume this planet then head off-world in search of ours. I can’t allow that to happen. If there is even the slightest chance he can find Earth, I have to prevent it.”

  “It’s so disturbing to hear you speak like you care about anything besides murdering people,” Stacy said in disgust.

  Maksim looked at her, seeming genuinely puzzled by her inflammatory words. “People change,” he started to inform her until Tong interrupted.

  “Wait, how do you know Legion wants to head off-world?” Tong asked, worried. “How would you know that?”

  “It’s what I would do,” Maksim said. “The way Legion secured the hangar bay is another point of proof. I went down there. He—it is doing system checks and working on ways to improve the design to take it off-world.”

  My heart sank in my chest as I was forced to consider that Maksim might be telling the truth. The odds were stacked astronomically high against Legion ever being able to find Earth. Still, what if he were to find another inhabited planet? His reign of terror would continue, spreading from one innocent world to the next. We really had to stop this poisonous leech.

  “He’s right about one thing. We can’t let Legion get off-world,” Stacy said to us before directing her next words at Maksim. “Although, granted, it’s a leap of faith that what you’re saying is the truth.”

  “I have no reason to lie,” Maksim said, shaking his head in denial. “Not now, not anymore.”

  “We’ll get you patched up,” Dama said, nodding to a Rung who came over with some kind of medical pack. “You said you scouted the other ways down to the lower level?”

  “That’s right.” Maksim winced as his wound was treated. “Like I said, Legion knows what we want. He’s blocked every way down. The best chance we have is this stairwell. There can’t be more than a dozen infected he has assigned to guard the entry point. As far as he knows, it’s just me down here. Together, we can fight our way through.”

  I looked over at Stacy, each of us cocking an eyebrow at the other. We were both thinking the same thing. What were the odds that our maniac friend here was lying out of his freaking teeth? Fifty-fifty at best.

  “A dozen? Only a dozen?” Sulk said with a tone of glee in his voice. “Dama, we can take that many without sustaining any casualties. We can.”

  Dama stood quiet. Her head moved from the door to her warriors, trying to assess the situation to make the best decision possible without losing her army and her people. She couldn’t afford any more loss.

  “He could be lying,” Stacy countered. “It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  Maksim was about to say something but was cut off by a deep inhale of pain as the Rung medic closed his wound.

  I had to say I didn’t hate the idea that Maksim was feeling some of the same pain he had caused so many before.

  “We will breach the door,” Dama finally decided.

  “Great choice,” Maksim said as he struggled to his feet. An angry burn on his right side showed where his wound had been cauterized. “I’ll need a weapon.”

  “You will get a blade and you’ll be going through the door first,” Dama advised him.

  14

  The sly grin on his face disappeared at once.

  “A blade? I’ll need a blaster at the very least. Didn’t you hear me? There are at least a dozen of them on the other side of those doors.” Maksim looked at me like I was going to give him some help. I fought down the smirk that was threatening to bubble up. Now was not the time to be so petty. “At least arm me.”

  “You’re more than enough to handle with a blade. I’m not about to give you anything else to use against us,” I told him. “If everything you say is true and you’re on our side in this, then prove it.”

  The look Maksim gave me could have melted steel. He opened his right hand and extended it toward Dama, who put a long, thick blade in it.

  “I’m on the side of the non-infected,” Maksim said, taking in a large breath. “So be it. I’ll lead the way down to the next level. Stay close. There are only a dozen in the stairwell, but there are more in the lower levels.” He swung the blade a bit to test it out. Satisfied, he was prepared to bring us to our first hurdle in getting past the infected.

  Maksim turned back to the closed door jamming his knife in the wedge where the doors came together. He grunted, slowly prying the doors apart.

  The sounds of scratching from the other side stopped altogether.

  “Firing lines,” Dama told her warriors.

  As one, the twenty Rung soldiers formed two lines, one in front of the other. The first line knelt at the ready, aiming their blasters at the door. The second line stood behind the first, also lifting their weapons to fire.

  Maksim stood alone, slowly forcing the doors forward. Sweat dampened his brow as his already weakened body tried to force the doors open. He didn’t make much progress.

  “Oh, for crying out loud,” I said, going over to him and placing my finger in the opening space between the door. “I can’t believe I’m helping you.”


  “Broth—”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know,” I said, shaking my head and rolling my eyes. “Brother, two swords facing away from each other and all that. “Come on, let’s get these doors open and get the heck out of the way before we’re turned into Swiss cheese by those Rung blasters.”

  Maksim nodded, forcing his fingers into the tiny opening.

  “One,” I said, bracing my feet on the ground.

  “Two,” Maksim said above the returning sounds of the infected scratching at the opposite sides of the door.

  “Three!” I yelled as I threw my weight into the doors.

  My muscles burned from my shoulders to my back. The steel doors opened slowly but steadily. Almost instantly, macabre thoughts of clammy infected hands reaching around the door and pulling me inside played through my mind, but I ignored them.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Stacy, John, and Tong take up a position to the left of Dama’s firing line. This gave them an angle view into the stairwell so they’d be able to cover me as I retreated. If the infected came at me, they couldn’t see my team, who would then be able to counterattack.

  The door finally gave way and swung open with a resounding boom that echoed through the quiet hall. Maksim and I ran back to our lines, expecting a rush of infected. What we got was a dark, ominous room we couldn’t see more than a few feet into.

  “Lights,” Dama said, motioning with her own weapon.

  Dozens of lights pierced the darkness, and with them came a nightmare, the likes of which I hoped never to encounter again.

  There was more than a dozen infected in the stairwell. Ten times more.

  They came at us in a sprint, most carrying some kind of blunt or bladed weapon. A few of them even carried blasters. They were all infected Rung, their alien bodies covered with mechanical enhancements, from steel tails to metal hands.

  Coupled with their augmentations was the black liquid characteristic of the infected that oozed from their eyes, noses, ears, and mouths. I thought I knew horror, but right now, I was reminded of what a true nightmare Legion really was.

  It seemed I wasn’t the only one caught off guard.

  Dama hesitated for the slightest second. “Fire!” she finally screamed, recovering from her initial shock.

  The wide wall lit up with weapon fire coming from the Rung firing lines. Maksim was on the left with the rest of the group from the Orion colony. I was on the right. As one, we let them have it, full blast, with all we had.

  The Dragon’s Breath in my hands went off with heavy thuds that rocked my arms and threatened to force me back every time I pulled the trigger. The weapon was a piece of art. Red fiery blasts of pellets shredded the Rung rushing forward, practically exploding them into bits wherever they were hit.

  Those that did get shots off with their blasters were sporadic at best. In true Legion fashion, he’d relied on his numbers instead of tactics. His army was not trained and was very disorganized. The scene was a light show as our blasters cut through the darkness, piling up the Rung dead.

  “A dozen, huh!?” I heard John yell at Maksim over the sounds of the fight.

  I wanted to say the same thing, but I was too busy with my Dragon’s Breath. The Rung dead piled so high in front of us, those still coming out were having a hard time climbing over them. They would scramble clumsily over their fallen brethren, then attempt to fire on us with limited success.

  Part of me felt sorry for them. These Rung were infected and controlled by Legion. If we could kill him, then we could free these creatures from his hold. The only problem was the armor we needed to kill Legion was below and these poor souls stood in our way.

  “Cease fire!” Dama yelled to her soldiers.

  As one, we let up, taking in heavy breaths. The Dragon’s Breath felt hot in my hands. The barrel of my weapon smoked, sending curling tendrils up to the ceiling.

  “Is everyone whole?” Sulk asked, looking around at the Rung soldiers first and then to us.

  “We’re good,” I said.

  “I think you need to relearn how to count.” Stacy fixed Maksim with a glare. “A dozen, huh? There has to be triple that.”

  “They must have called in more. How was I supposed to know that?” Maksim swallowed hard. “I don’t know how he knew.”

  “Well, it’s done now, and he knows exactly where we are,” Dama said looking to one of her Rung soldiers. “Let’s hurry up and get down to the lower stairwell and—”

  Loud blaster fire cut her off. The Rung that Dama was speaking with took a round to the face. His skull exploded, pieces of brain and bone showering Dama as he was taken off his feet. Dama looked on in shock and horror, but quickly recovered.

  A round slammed square into my chest, causing me to lose balance and fall onto my back on the floor. The air was forced out of my lungs with a whoosh. Still, somehow, I managed to inhale and coughed. My head had been slammed against the floor, but thanks to my helmet I avoided any serious head injury, though my ribs felt like I had taken a straight kick to the torso. I lay there as I caught my breath and gained my bearings.

  “Dean!” I heard Stacy yell over the new blaster fire that erupted between the two factions. I wanted to yell that I was okay, but I was still somewhat breathless.

  “More, deeper into the stairwell!” Sulk roared.

  “Let them have it, now!” Dama ordered. The Rung let loose with a volley from their blasters.

  “We can’t see them back there!” Tong added, panic rising in his voice.

  I heard and processed all of this activity as I struggled up to my hands and knees. Oxygen was finally being allowed back into my lungs, and consequently, my brain. I looked down at the Remboshi armor, saying a silent prayer of thanks, remembering Lou’s simple words as he led us in prayer. The blaster hadn’t penetrated the armor. While the injury definitely sucked, it could have been a lot worse.

  “Dean,” Stacy said by my side a minute later. She half dragged half carried me behind the firing line of the Rung warriors. “Dean, are you hurt?”

  “Bruised a little, but it didn’t get through the armor,” I wheezed, finding my first long breath. “Ribs ache, but I’ll be fine.”

  “We can’t see anything, it’s too dark!” John bellowed. ‘We either have to go in or retreat.”

  “Follow me!” Maksim said.

  I looked up in time to see the crazy son of a gun rush into the dark room, and I wondered if everyone would listen to him. How he didn’t get hit by either the rounds from the Rung or the infected inside was a true miracle in my eyes. The guy was like a cockroach.

  The next second, he was gone, having disappeared into the stairwell. Sounds of fighting could be heard a second later. Everyone that was remaining waited for Dama to give the next directive.

  “Cease fire!” Dama ordered. “Blades!”

  The Rung warriors obeyed, holstering their weapons. Dama was the first to charge the stairwell, followed by Sulk, who wielded his blade above his head, clicking madly, and his band of assassins. The rest of the Rung warriors came next, right on their heels.

  “These Rung are crazy,” John said under his breath as he and Tong jogged over to help me. “Dean, you good?”

  “I’ll live,” I said, regaining my feet as they reached down, extended their hands, and hoisted me up as an assist. I went over and picked up my weapon.

  “Let’s get in there and help them,” Stacy said, reaching for the Remboshi light blade that was called a ray. “Blades only. We don’t want to hit one of our own.”

  I slung the Dragon’s Breath over my shoulder and grabbed the Skull Splitter.

  The weight and grip of the weapon felt right in my hands, as if we were meant for each other. Grunts and screams and thuds could be heard from the darkened stairwell.

  We rushed in, stepping carefully over the first wave of the dead infected that littered the ground like so many discarded peanut shells.

  My heart rate doubled in speed again as we observed the battle taking place in the
dark between the Rung and infected. The stairwell was a large room with steps going up on one side and down on the other.

  Flashlights were on again as the combatants sought to outmaneuver and disable one another. The beams of light flashed and scattered around on the action, giving the area a surreal appearance as the Rung diced and sliced their way through the infected, felling more than falling themselves.

  “Dean, keep on moving down to the next level!” Dama yelled from somewhere near the front of the pack. We were making progress through, and that was reassuring.

  “Stay close!” I yelled to Stacy, John, and Tong. “We have to hurry. The longer we take to get to the armor, the more time Legion has to get more infected to our location.”

  “Warriors!” Dama said, hearing my warning. “Forward as fast as you can!”

  The Rung warriors turned into a meat grinder. Our columns moved forward, continuing to slice their way through the infected horde like a bulldozer pushing through piles of dirt.

  I moved to the center of the pack, striking out with my hammer at whatever poor soul was unlucky enough to live past the initial lines of the Rung powerhouse.

  I didn’t think about what I was doing. I couldn’t think about it, or even process the sound or sight of what I was seeing and hearing. Slicing through meat and crushing skulls was not something I ever wanted to do again, but if we didn’t make it to that armor, we were all dead. Not just us. If Legion got off planet, how many more innocent beings could be lost?

  I took my thoughts out of my actions and simply reacted on instinct, swinging back and forth through the horde with my Skull Splitter, which was certainly living up to its name.

  We paid for every step we took. As the Rung in the front lines tired, we relieved them, and they retreated to the back for a few minutes’ respite. At one point, I found myself fighting with Tong on my left and Maksim on the right. There was no time for talking as we pushed forward, hacking, kicking out, and always moving forward.

  There wasn’t a single one of us not covered in the black substance that was a part of Legion. We pressed forward to the bottom of the stairwell and to the next level below.