For what? he wondered. Then he felt something hit him with bone-jarring force, sending him spinning out of control. As Kitai fought to regain control, he saw a massive birdlike creature—something that resembled a condor—circling around for another pass at him.
Food, Kitai thought. It thinks I’m food.
Reluctant to become a meal for the thing, Kitai pulled his arms in to his sides and pressed his legs together. The configuration allowed him to arrow through the air at top speed. But it didn’t stop the predator from slamming into him a second time, its razor-sharp talons narrowly missing his face. The air knocked out of him, Kitai lost his discipline and went into a clumsy, head-over-heels free fall. The air rushed by him so quickly that it was hard for him to breathe. He felt himself begin to lose consciousness. Darkness ate at the edges of his vision.
“Kitai!”
Cypher watched from his place in the cockpit as the vicious-looking airborne predator banked in preparation for a third attempt on Kitai’s life. He couldn’t tell if his son was still conscious. All he could see for sure, through Kitai’s camera, was that the monstrous creature was heading straight for his son, its cruelly curved beak wide open.
Irrationally, Cypher tried to get up. But he couldn’t, and the pain of his attempt forced a scream from his throat. Through his terror and his agony, he stared at the holographic screen. The creature let out a blood-chilling screech as it attacked. Then it slammed straight into Kitai’s camera, filling it with its bulk.
651 AE
Nova Prime
i
Vanessa Raige was running. She controlled her breathing and felt her leg muscles strain to gain speed. All around her, there was carnage as the Ursa carved a fresh scar onto the surface of Nova Prime. Their coming was unexpected, and their three-legged nature caught everyone by surprise. The first ones had been four-legged beasts, and this new breed appeared to be just as deadly.
None of that mattered right now.
Her naviband was vibrating on her wrist as a steady stream of messages and alerts came through.
She ignored them all.
Instead, Vanessa focused every ounce of strength she possessed on going faster, getting to the northwest medical center. Deep in her chest, she sensed that her brother needed her, and that trumped everything else. Hunter was the Prime Commander and also her twin, and either one dictated that she abandon everything to come to his aid.
She prayed she’d get there in time.
Once more the Skrel dropped three dozen Ursa on an unsuspecting populace. Once more the aliens eluded the satellite warning system and managed to deposit their payload without taking serious damage. Once more the people remained clueless as to why this was happening. All that mattered was killing them. Questions could wait.
Hunter’s beautiful wife, Jennipher, was due any day now, the next generation of Raiges to be brought into the world. Vanessa worried that Hunter’s psychic alarm was about her and not the Ursa. In the worst of all possible worlds, it would involve both. The hospital was on the lowest level of the cliff, one of the earliest structures dug out after The Arrival and considered one of the safest and most secure facilities in the city. Considering its location and lack of external activity to attract the marauding beasts, she hoped none were in her way. Still, she grasped her cutlass in her right hand, running with it like a relay racer with no one to hand it off to.
Her breath was getting ragged as the meters faded under her boots. She was in sight of the hospital entrance, but reaching it meant jumping over a trail of bodies, trying not to slip on the blood that had yet to soak into the streets. It was a sight she wanted to forget, fighting the instinct to stop and check for survivors. Her heart said to help; her mind said the Ursa never left victims alive.
The screaming made her finally slow down. It was not just a single voice but a chorus of cries, all of them filled with pain or terror, a symphony of agony.
Through it all, she heard one defiant voice.
Hunter.
Emboldened by knowing her twin was still alive, she surged ahead and flicked the stud on the cutlass, turning it into a sword that would cut right through the Ursa. When they’d first arrived just under a century ago, it had taken some genius to figure out how to weaponize the F.E.N.I.X. technology. The cutlass could alter shape in a heartbeat, becoming the most versatile killing tool ever created. Powered by quantum-trapping energies, it reconfigured thousands of filaments into whatever the programming called for, and the C-10 model was able to become flat, a blade, or a hook. She favored the blade and practiced with it endlessly.
Now she was ready to slice through any creature that might stand between her and her family. If Hunter was in the hospital, Vanessa figured he was hurt. That or Jennipher had chosen a lousy time to give birth.
Slowing to assess the situation, she took in the doors torn from their hinges and the shredded smart fabric that provided power and shade. Bodies continued to litter the area, a grisly trail that pointed in the direction in which she needed to go.
As she neared it, Vanessa could start making out her brother’s words. He was alternating between shouting orders and bellowing at the Ursa. An Ursa in the hospital was an absurd notion until she considered that the sightless beasts might be drawn by all that blood. She didn’t really understand what made them work, and after the first attack the Savant’s people had had little to go on but speculation. At the moment, she could recall none of the details, and frankly, they didn’t matter. If she encountered the creature, she would stab and slash at it until the thing fell and threatened no one ever again.
Before she could enter the building, she heard additional footfalls and spared a look over her shoulder. To her surprise, eight or ten Rangers were falling into place behind her.
“Orders?” the nearest shouted.
“One stays out here to check the bodies,” she said, barely slowing. “The rest of you, cutlasses out. Protect the people!”
The Rangers let out a piercing battle cry, a unifying sound that told the world they were here. They would die performing their job, which was to protect the rest of the populace. So far she knew that nearly one-third of the Ursa had been taken down, all thanks to the cutlass.
Vanessa charged through the entrance and silently gestured for two to split off to the left and two others to go down the right corridor. The sounds indicated that the real action was directly before her, and, careless of all else, she headed for the noise. Hunter could be heard, and that was her homing beacon.
Deeper into the cliff she ran, barely registering the lack of doctors, nurses, or patients. The evacuation had been fairly complete, and a tiny portion of her mind acknowledged the lack of corpses.
Finally, she jogged to her left at a juncture, the sound drawing her closer. But as she made the turn, she skidded to a stop. Directly before her was the Ursa, its gray hide and three-legged form obscured with drying blood and viscera.
The Ursa’s stink assaulted her senses, but she blinked it away, trying to see past it. As it shifted to lunge forward, she could see Hunter, a bloody mess, trying to wave the cutlass with one arm. The other arm was missing.
“Hunter!” she called, trying to alert her brother and distract the Ursa in one word.
The beast was not dissuaded, making its leap and landing atop her brother, who cried out on impact. There was one leg pinning him to the ground; the other foreleg was raised to deliver a killing blow. The rear limb allowed it to balance with an odd grace.
Vanessa charged forward, her cutlass rearing back, and then it swung around, slicing the air before it met the rear leg joint. The blade bit deeply through the hide, and a black liquid—its blood, she hoped—seeped out. All the human sounds were drowned out by the wounded yell coming from the creature. The unearthly sound made her wince and squeeze her eyes shut. It whirled about, struggling with its balance, and opened its sharp-toothed maw wide.
The Ranger stood her ground, keeping her mind focused on the beast while her heart swit
ched signals. She knew the Ursa had mortally wounded Hunter and she could feel his suffering, but she had to ignore it. Instead, she had to kill the Ursa, the only way she could reach Hunter and try to save him.
Vanessa suspected an injured Ursa was worse than a healthy one, and so she wanted to make this kill a quick one. The width of the corridor meant the Rangers behind her could not come to her aid; instead they watched, a silent Greek chorus.
The Ursa righted itself, bellowing all the way, hurting her ears. As it positioned itself, she saw Hunter sprawled in his own blood. A red tide of anger swept over her, and she gripped the cutlass with both hands, pulling it back. Then she charged and lunged with the cutlass. For its part, the Ursa roared and tried to swat her with its right foreleg. Instead, it faltered and dipped low, letting her thrust go right behind its head, cutting deep into the body. She felt it easing through skin and veins into bone.
Bodily fluids gushed from the wound, and the Ursa dropped dead before Vanessa.
The Rangers behind her let out a singular whoop and then began moving toward her. Vanessa, though, leaped over her kill and dropped to her knees before Hunter’s body.
She was too late. Her brother had stopped breathing some time before, and his eyes were fixed; his expression was one of unimaginable pain.
Hot tears fell from her face, rolling down her cheeks and dripping onto his body, merging with the blood that covered the Ranger emblem. Before she could decide what to do next, she caught a fresh sound. It was weak, more a whimper than anything else, and was detectable only because all the other screaming finally had ceased. She held up a hand, putting her fellow Rangers on hold as she concentrated. It came from beyond her brother’s body, in one of the patient rooms: someone who had not been evacuated.
Once again, her body told her what she feared to know.
Hunter was here for Jennipher.
She rushed forward and walked into the first room on the left to find a mess. Jennipher, still linked to various monitors, was on the floor, covered in blood and other fluids. She arched her back as a contraction convulsed her body.
She was alive!
Labor meant the baby was also still alive and ready to enter the world. Part of Vanessa wished the baby would stay in the womb, where it would be safe and warm, protected and loved.
The baby, though, had other ideas and was coming. As Vanessa moved toward the feet, she could see the baby’s shape, well into the birth canal.
“Jennipher, it’s Vanessa! Talk to me!”
Jennipher didn’t respond. At best, she was unconscious. At worst, the Ursa had gotten to her and she was dying.
A Ranger’s field training did not include anything about delivering babies, and so Vanessa had to go with whatever she had learned from her mother, Paige. Looking about frantically, she spotted some blankets and what looked like the remains of a towel. They would have to do.
“Hey, you!” she shouted at the first Ranger looming awkwardly in the doorway. “Go find me clean blankets or cloths or something sterile.”
At the man behind him she shouted, “And you, go find a doctor or a nurse or both. Now!”
She turned her attention to Jennipher, who was having another contraction already. They were coming fast, which meant the birth, already in progress, could not be delayed. Carefully, she spread the blanket under Jennipher’s head, then took the cleanest towel to try to rub her hands clean of blood and gore.
“Push, Jennipher,” she called. There was no response. Without the mother intentionally pushing, the birth was going to be more complicated.
“Come on, baby; come to your aunt Vanessa,” she cooed, regardless of how silly she sounded to herself. “Keep pushing, Jennipher. If you can hear me at all, keep pushing and let’s get your son into the world.”
There has to be a doctor nearby. Where is he?
A shrill sound alerted her to a new problem. She glanced over her shoulder, and her eyes went wide as she saw the mother’s respiration rate and blood pressure dropping with every beep. Jennipher was dying.
A secondary system monitoring the baby also had shifted from green to red, indicating that the baby was now in distress.
Without proper medical training she had no choice but to try to save the baby any way possible. Her head swiveled around the small, blood-spattered room to try to see where there might be tools. Panic was welling up within her as the enormity of the situation was becoming evident. Hunter dead. Jennipher dead. The Ursa dead. She’d be damned if the baby joined the list.
Just then, a hand reached over her shoulder and gave her a blade. She looked up and saw one of the remaining Rangers, a woman she didn’t know. Vanessa nodded and took a deep breath.
“There’s a holographic display over the bed. Turn it on,” she commanded.
The other Ranger complied, and then Vanessa called out, “Display cesarian section protocols.” Obediently, the hologram appeared over her sister-in-law’s body and step by step showed Vanessa where to cut and how to deliver the baby. The first Ranger returned with a meter’s worth of towels and blankets. The female Ranger grabbed a few and went to work, assisting Vanessa.
No one said a word, and so the only sounds were from the displays and the gentle, slightly accented voice of the computer.
With every centimeter, Vanessa kept waiting for a doctor or nurse to walk in and take over. Instead, she had to keep raising her eyes to follow the holographic tutorial. This was no way to bring new life into the world, but she continued as cautiously as she could. It felt horribly disrespectful to be slicing into her sister-in-law and then reaching into the body, but really, what choice did she have? Her nephew needed to be saved, and she’d be damned if she’d fail again.
There! The baby could be safely lifted upward, the umbilical cord trailing back into the womb. The tiny figure was covered in white and blue and red stuff she couldn’t name, but it had yet to cry. Hell, if it were her, she’d be wailing the moment she felt the cool air.
A fresh pair of shears was placed in her hand, and she cut the cord and then wrapped the baby tight. Peering into the tiny face, Vanessa willed it to breathe, to cry, to show some sign of life. One eye opened, unfocused, and then the other. The mouth parted, and first there was a gasp of air and then a whimper. The whimper repeated and turned into the cry she expected.
Fresh tears obscured her vision, and the other Ranger carefully took the baby from her and brought it to the nearby diagnostic monitor.
The baby was born: an orphan in a world still at war.
ii
General Gustav Hawkins was looking forward to retirement. He had done his service to the Rangers and was ready to go fishing with his grandchildren. He last saw action over a decade before, earning him a promotion and the post of overseeing the Rangers in the twin city. He was capable and maintained readiness, taking pride in exceeding his recruitment numbers every year. When he woke up that morning, he found himself dreading putting on his uniform and traveling from New Earth City across the desert to Nova Prime City.
That morning, for the first time in memory, Nova Prime was absent leadership.
The minute Hawkins heard PC Hunter Raige was killed, he knew that the job was his if he wanted it, and deep down he knew he didn’t want it. If offered, he’d have little choice but to accept so he strode into the great hall for the emergency session with one mission in mind: Find someone else to take the post.
What he didn’t anticipate was the total vacuum that awaited him, with all three world leaders now dead. Instead of meeting with Primus Ione Kincaid and Savant Sinead O’Brien, he was seated opposite the Primus’s second in command, Crucible Maria Pryor, and the Savant’s number two, Tribune Suraj Gurang. They looked as bewildered and lost as he felt and clearly were not prepared for the meeting. He couldn’t blame them; they were younger and less experienced and were still mourning their superiors.
The Crucible opened the meeting with a prayer and a short memorial to the Primus, then took her seat and gazed at the tab
letop. Hawkins at least had had the foresight to have his own number two prepare a rough agenda.
Gurang, thirtyish, with dark hair and brooding eyes, had been working as the Savant’s Tribune for two years, and Hawkins recalled seeing his name on numerous reports. He had been a physicist, working on improvements to the cutlass, and so he showed sympathy for the Rangers’ needs. That was a good thing.
Crucible Pryor, though, was also nearing retirement and was clearly there to serve the Primus, not succeed her.
With Hunter dead, that left Vanessa, but she had been a Ranger for just eight years. Was that enough to elevate her to such a role? He barely knew the woman, having met her only at a handful of functions. Still, she had a reputation, including that of killing the Ursa that had murdered her brother and then delivering her nephew. Pretty gutsy in Hawkins’s estimation, but that was during a crisis. What about during peacetime? Of course, the lack of leadership was a different sort of crisis, so maybe this was her time after all.
“Nature abhors a vacuum,” Gurang said, causing Hawkins to inwardly wince at the reminder, “and our own committee is reviewing suitable candidates to replace our Savant.”
“No obvious candidates? She was running that place for nearly thirty years, so somebody had to pop up,” Hawkins said.
Gurang stared at the tabletop. “We didn’t anticipate needing to replace her so quickly.”
Hawkins swiveled about, facing the Crucible. “And what about your team? After Primus Bernardo made it to 101, Kincaid decided to go for the shortest record?”
Pryor didn’t meet his gaze and quietly answered, “She was focused on fighting Ressler’s Disease and as such did not like to dwell on life after her passing.”
“So she just left you high and dry?”
Pryor stiffened at Hawkins’s casual approach toward the holy order. She refused to look his way and was acting a little too high and mighty for his taste.