Chapter 11
Alice
The cold wasn't bothering her as much anymore, and neither was the salt. Though her skin still did smart from them, they no longer threatened to send her back into blissful unconsciousness.
Her body was regaining the energy that had been ripped form it by the transporter beam. She would not be back to her usual cynical and paranoid self until she could get inside one of the blocks, but she could survive out here.
Could being the operative word. Because at that exact moment she snapped her head around. The sound of a security transport humming overhead momentarily blasted over the roar of the wind.
She looked up to see the black behemoth descend from above. Security robots were lining up just inside the slowly-opening hanger-bay door, getting ready to jump down and apprehend her.
The blast from the transport’s engines flattened against her, tugging at her remaining clothes, almost threatening to yank them right off her.
Huddling against the downdraft, she brought her arms over her head. Her hair whipped around her face, slapping into her nose and cheeks, but not once did it pull the hood from over her head.
Nothing but her own hands could do that.
‘By the moons of Orion,’ she snapped.
This was not good.
But if she was lucky, and she timed it right, she could still get out of here. The transport above would not have a human pilot; the conditions of the planet were so inhospitable to life that there was little point in risking a biological when you could just send a hunk of metal controlled by the ICN to do your dirty work for you.
Which meant there would be no one up there to stop Alice from taking control. Though she was perilously low on energy, she was desperate. She'd use what little juice she had to hack right into the ICN and give her control of the transport, disabling the security bots as she did. Then she'd . . . figure out a way to somehow get off the ship and back to safety.
She was going to have to come up with a plan on the fly. But first things first.
Alice closed her eyes, ignoring the growing, deafening hum of the engines above her.
She tried to concentrate long enough to access the ICN, forcing whatever circuits that ran through the barren snow and salt-covered ground below her to redirect, latch hold of her message, and propagate it through the system.
But Alice did not get the chance to finish the job.
The transport still had not landed and would take another 30 seconds before it could touch down close enough for the security bots to jump out.
But something did land, right beside her.
She snapped her eyes open in time to see a transport beam slice out of the sky.
She just had time to crumple her arms over her head, fearing the beam would latch onto her again and suck the rest of her life form her bones.
It didn't happen.
What happened instead was a man - covered in particularly sophisticated-looking black and grey armor - rematerialized a meter form her side.
With one hand planted on the ground, his head momentarily dropped between his shoulders, he snapped it up in an instant.
John Doe, it just had to be.
Alice whirled on her foot, getting ready to run.
He jumped from behind her - she could hear the wind buffet into his armor.
He landed in front of her. ‘We're here to help,’ his voice sounded out loud and clear, the roar of the wind nothing against the boosted audio his armor gave him.
No, he really wasn't.
Alice lashed out at him.
She usually never fought. Not unless she absolutely had to. Defend herself, yes; she did that all the time. But fighting made her sick to her stomach.
She did not have any other option.
She flung her arm towards him, redirecting her energy until it made her skin and muscle as strong as smart concrete.
For a second he did nothing. Maybe he wasn't expecting it. Maybe he had expected, upon his offer to help, that Alice would collapse in his arms again and let the hero save her for the second time that day.
She couldn't be caught. Not by him.
Her arm connected. As it did, she put as much of her energy as she could afford into the move.
And John went flying. There was a cracking, resounding thud as she collected her arm across his torso, and the force of the blow sent John up into the air a good two meters. He crashed into the snow to her left.
Alice didn't wait to see him stumble to his feet. Which he no doubt would do. Though her blow had been strong, it would be nowhere near enough to fell someone in armor that sophisticated. In fact, now the armor had withstood such a blow, it would adapt, recalibrating the plating across its surface so that further blows like that would glance off.
In other words, she wouldn't get another chance like that. She also didn't have the energy; the move almost sent her reeling back to her knees.
She didn't have the luxury of falling unconscious here though.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw the transport beside her finally land. The hanger door lay open and ten or so security bots, their silver bodies glinting in whatever sun managed to push its way through the constantly swirling clouds of the planet.
Stumbling, heaving her legs forward with all her might, Alice ran for the transport.
She didn't get there.
Something grabbed her. Arms lacing around her middle, grip tighter than anything she could fight, John Doe lifted her off the ground.
‘Stop fighting, it's okay. We've got you,’ he said, his voice stiff, obviously being pushed through locked and clenched teeth.
Alice did not stop fighting. In fact in that moment she thrashed harder, her eyes growing wide with genuine fright. She started to shake, her previously frozen body surging with heat and becoming plastered with sweat.
She couldn't be caught, she couldn't be caught.
‘You'll be fine. The cold causes delirium. Stop fighting,’ John kept speaking from behind her, his grip never wavering.
No matter how hard she tried to break free, Alice just didn't have the energy.
Desperation started to kick in, but there was nothing she could do about it.
She had allowed the unimaginable to occur. She'd been caught by the Union Forces. And worse than that. The man who currently had her locked firmly in his arms would know in an instant what she was. All it would take was a single complete bio scan.
She was done for.