Worlds collide architect.., p.27
Worlds Collide (Architects of the Apocalypse Book 2), page 27
Bruce couldn’t figure out how Etigor had betrayed them. They’d shared their plans with the other prisoners in English, and they’d decided not to involve the Jakar in their plot to avoid complications like this.
“I am sorry, Alish,” Etigor said in thickly-accented English, answering Bruce’s unspoken question. “However, you have been here for but three settings of the sun, whilst I have spent my entire life withering in this place. I could not pass up the chance to redeem myself.”
“He did the right thing,” Black-beard insisted. “How many would have died if you had succeeded with your treachery? Etigor has saved your lives. You should be thanking him.”
“And what about them?” Alice asked, gesturing to Tom and Preston, who were now being tied to big wooden logs that had been propped up on jutting rocks.
Bruce frowned at the sight, wondering what the purpose of tying them to those logs was. Six more Jakar went running out from the covered street. They helped the other four to move two big, flat rocks, uncovering shadowy circular holes in the ground. Together, all ten soldiers raised Preston’s log and dropped it into the hole. It stood thirty feet above the ground, with Preston tied to the top and his feet resting on the knotty stump of a severed branch.
Liam muttered something about savages.
“We have to help them!” Alice said as the Jakar raised Tom up beside Preston.
“How?” Axel asked.
A shrieking pterosaur cast flickering shadows as it circled high above the clearing. A moment later, it came swooping toward the Jakar. They scattered, and several of them managed to bring their spears to bear, warding the creature off at the last possible second. It twisted away from them and soared into the night once more.
The Jakar retreated swiftly to the safety of the covered street. Most of the Pterosaurs were still fighting over scraps at the base of the cliffs, but Tom and Preston were scarcely a hundred feet away from them. It wouldn’t be long before the carnivorous dinos realized they had another meal to fight over.
Bruce set his jaw, grinding his teeth. This was his fault. It had been his idea. He couldn’t have known that Etigor would overhear their plans and betray them, or that he would understand what he was hearing, but all the same, it should have been him up on one of those poles, not Tom, or Preston.
The pterosaur swooped back down, headed straight for Tom. The creature’s long, pointed beak glistened darkly in the sapphire twilight. The creature thrust out both wings and taloned feet at the last second, perching on Tom’s shoulders and pecking at his right arm with its beak. He screamed in pain, and butted it in the stomach with his head. Startled, the creature shrieked and flapped its giant wings with a loud whoosh and took flight once more.
“Let them go!” Sean screamed.
“Don’t look, honey,” Alice said, and she began pushing her way through the crowd to shield him from the horror of what was about to happen.
Bruce noticed that a few of the other winged dinosaurs had taken to the skies and were now circling above Preston and Tom. He couldn’t help but appreciate the grim irony of it: a paleontologist was about to be devoured by the subject of his studies.
Chapter 34
3:02 AM, September 29, 2069
Tom’s feet were planted precariously and painfully on a knot of wood that used to be a branch near the top of the thirty-foot tree trunk that he was tied to. His right arm and shoulders stung painfully from where that Pterosaur had dug in its talons and stabbed with its beak.
Looking up, he could clearly see six more of them circling, as deadly as any shark. They were massive creatures, with a wingspan of at least ... fifteen feet. That made them too big to be pterodactyls, but too small to be one of the larger species. Probably Pteranodons. He estimated the creature’s weight from how heavy it had felt perched on his shoulders. Maybe sixty or seventy pounds.
Tom realized what he was doing—cataloging the characteristics of these flying monsters to distract himself from the fact that he was about to be torn apart by them.
Beside him Preston cried out in terror as one of the Pteranodons dove toward him next. Its beak was extended like the point of a spear, aimed straight at his stomach. In just a few seconds, that giant flying reptile would be feasting on his entrails.
Tom winced, his eyes slamming shut to block out the sight of what was about to happen.
Another piercing shriek split the air, followed by a crack of thunder. Preston screamed again, and this time the Jakar roared with delight. Tom couldn’t keep his eyes shut. Morbid curiosity forced him to look.
But what he saw was the Pteranodon tumbling in a free fall, its wings wrapping about its body with a sound like fluttering flags. It hit the dirt and skidded to a stop, drawing another roar from the Jakar.
They weren’t delighted; they were outraged. Their heads snapped up, scanning the sky, spears raised and bowstrings drawn, looking for who or what had just saved Preston’s life.
“What happened?” Tom shouted to Preston.
Before he could reply, the remaining Pteranodons shrieked in unison, infuriated and united by the death of one of their own. Two more of them dove sharply, their spear-like beaks extended and aimed for Preston, as if he might have somehow struck down their companion.
Both of them fell in quick succession this time, not even making a sound as they died. This time Tom saw their torsos explode and heard the echoing cracks of thunder rolling one atop the other.
It wasn’t thunder. Tom blinked in shock as the two massive beasts dug furrows into the dusty clearing.
The Jakar fled for the cover of the trees, with their taskmaster shouting, “Sound the alarm! The sky demons have come to free their people!”
Horn blasts split the air, and warriors roared, their feet hammering the dirt unison.
Tom felt a smile tugging at his mouth as he realized what must have happened. Their reinforcements had arrived.
“Hang on!” Tom shouted to Preston. “We’re going to make it out of this.”
3:07 AM, September 29, 2069
Ethan eased away from the thermal tracking sights of his LRS99, anti-material rifle. Another four soldiers were lying prone at the edge of the cliff around him, all still aiming their weapons into the canyon, making sure that nothing would happen to Preston Baylor or the other man tied up alongside him. Fortunately, Mr. Baylor was no longer at immediate risk of being picked apart by those flying monsters, but he was still tied to a wooden post in the middle of hostile territory. The remaining pterosaurs had flown off for the time being, but they would likely be back soon. That was to say nothing of the possibility that the Jakar might get fed up with waiting for nature to take its course and decide to simply fire an arrow through Preston’s heart.
“We can’t wait any longer,” Ethan decided, pulling further back onto his haunches. “We have to get down there and rescue those people.”
“Sir, Lieutenant Fox is right,” Corporal Garcia objected, peeking up from the sights of his rifle. “Tactically, we are in a bad position. We’re outnumbered, and the rovers can’t carry all of those people. Even if we do rescue them, we’ll be marching back on foot with a horde of angry barbarians chasing us. We’re talking about maybe thirty klicks over rough terrain. At minimum, that’s a twelve-hour hike, and some of those people look like they would barely make it back up to those caves, let alone all the way to our base.”
Ethan set his jaw and glared at his subordinate. “The situation doesn’t change later on, Corporal. Even if we wait for those two platoons of rangers to reinforce our position, the captives will still have to hike thirty klicks back to base.”
“Yes, sir, but by then we’ll have greater numbers, more supplies, and more guns to defend our people on the way back. Given those advantages, we won’t have to move any faster than the slowest civilian element. We can neutralize the Jakar at range, then return to the FOB at our leisure.”
Ethan sighed. “All of that makes sense, Corporal, but we’ve been waiting up here for six hours already, and the situation has changed dramatically in that time. Two of the captives are in mortal danger, and one of them is a high value asset. Mr. Baylor’s survival is imperative.”
“Because he is wealthy, sir?”
“No, because he is a genius, and a rocket scientist whose help we might need in the event that we ever get to leave this planet.”
“Our landers are both functioning optimally, Major.”
“For the moment. Do you want to gamble that they don’t suffer any critical failures between now and whenever we leave? Mr. Baylor may also be able to help us solve our comms issue and reestablish contact with Earth. This isn’t just about the survival of those two prisoners. It’s about our survival as well. Now, stow your shit, Corporal, and follow your damn orders.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Who are our best snipers?”
“Corporal Kelly and Specialist Morgan.”
“Good. We’ll leave them up here on overwatch. Assign another man to that .50 cal turret for fire support, and pull the rover up to the edge of the cliff to get eyes on the valley.”
“Yes, sir,” Garcia said, and took off at a sprint, heading for Rover One.
Ethan touched the comms piece in his ear and contacted Lieutenant Fox back at the FOB. Their comms were being routed through one of the Eagle rockets in orbit, causing a slight delay before she answered.
“It’s good to hear from you, sir.”
“I need a favor, Fox. Things have changed, and we can’t wait for reinforcements.”
A weary sigh hissed in Ethan’s ear.
“Major, you are really determined to play the hero.”
He smiled tightly. “I’m no Fobbit, Lieutenant. But we need to move now if we’re going to save Preston Baylor. I need you to send our eVTOL for air support, just in case things get hairy.”
“Some assembly required.”
“Still?” Ethan asked.
“Yes, sir. We had a problem with a few of the components, but we’re switching them out for spares now. I’d estimate one hour. Can you wait for it to get there?”
“Negative, Lieutenant. Just send it over when you can.”
“Copy, sir.”
“White out.”
Ethan looked back to the three snipers still lying on the cliff and covering the valley. “Let’s take out the archers in those guard towers. Tag your targets. We fire on my mark.” Ethan lay back down and peered through the scope of his rifle. He adjusted the zoom wheel and panned the barrel up to find the thermal signatures at the top of the right-most guard tower. In the process he noticed that the Jakar had fled to the trees with the prisoners, making it impossible to tell friend from foe. Their thermal scopes allowed them to see human signatures through the foliage and even through thin walls, but there was no way to distinguish one human body from the next without getting closer to them. Ethan grimaced. Either the Jakar’s tactics were the result of dumb luck, or else they knew something about what they were up against.
Garcia was right, they were at a disadvantage here. The only thing that might have evened the odds was being able to take out the Jakar at extreme range, but that was no longer an option. Hopefully their tactical armor would be enough to protect them from arrows when they were in the thick of it in the valley.
Ethan scanned the tower on the right and noted the thermal signatures of two archers huddled behind wooden ramparts at the top. Little did they know, these rounds would pierce a concrete wall, let alone a flimsy wooden one. Maybe they weren’t as smart as he’d feared.
“I have tower two, on the right ... marking target.” Ethan clicked a button on his scope to tag the man under his sights.
“I’ve got tango two, tower two,” Specialist Gibbons said, and a red target box appeared around the second Jakar warrior, with Gibbons’ call sign above it.
“Tango three, tower one,” Corporal Kelly put in.
“Tango four, tower one,” Private Morgan added.
All four enemies were now highlighted with red target boxes in Ethan’s holographic overlay. “Mark!” Ethan shouted as he squeezed the trigger.
Three more bursts of sniper fire echoed around him, combining into one terrific boom. Wooden ramparts splintered under the impacts of .50 caliber rounds, and all four targets collapsed, motionless.
“Four tangos down,” Gibbons declared.
Ethan dropped his sights to scan the Jakar in the trees, searching for signs of them scattering or climbing ladders to the guard towers. But they remained exactly where they were, as if they knew the forest was the most defensible position. Ethan sighed and pulled back from his sights once more. “All right. Kelly, Morgan, keep us covered from up here. Gibbons, you’re with me, double time!”
“Yes, sir!”
Just as they sprang up from the cliffs with their sniper rifles, Corporal Garcia came roaring in with Rover One. It skidded to a stop at the edge of the cliff. Private O’Neill popped up behind the gun turret, and then Privates Clark and Meyers slid open the doors of the rover and bustled out. Meyers was a lot shorter than the rest of them, at just five foot six, and weighing in at only about a hundred and sixty pounds without her gear. She was the only female soldier of the eight of them, but she made it through the training and tests to earn her Ranger tab. Ethan knew she was no slouch.
Ethan waved them all over. “Gear up with spare carbines and mags! We’re going to arm anyone we can down there to even the odds.”
“Copy, sir!” Gibbons and Clark both said in unison. They dashed around the back of the rover where the supplies were stored. Ethan hurried after them to get a spare XR12 carbine for himself. Garcia jumped out of the driver’s seat and fell in behind them. Rounding the back of the rover, Ethan found Specialist Gibbons busy slotting a magazine into an XR12, then picking frag and stun grenades for his belt and tucking spare mags into pouches.
“Here you are, sir,” Private Clark said, handing Ethan a rifle with the magazine already loaded.
Ethan laid his LRS99 in the back of the rover, then yanked on the charging handle of the XR12 to arm it, and slung it across his back. He picked a second rifle, six spare mags, and six grenades—two stun, two smokes, and two frags—and added them to the two frags already on his belt.
Whatever resistance they ran into from the Jakar in the valley, it wasn’t going to be any match for six Rangers armed to the gills.
But that thought brought in a trickle of doubt. The alien that they’d seen emerge from that structure in the river still hadn’t returned to its vehicle. If it did, now, in the middle of the fight, how formidable would it be? Would it join the fight, or flee? That alien element was an utterly unknown variable.
But then, they had anti-material rifles and the rover’s cannon up here on the cliff. Surely those high-powered weapons would make short work of one alien asset?
He considered launching a pre-emptive strike on it now, while it was still unmanned. But if he did, then who, or what, would he be declaring war on?
“Sir, we’re good to go,” Garcia announced.
“Let’s move out,” Ethan said and set a brisk pace toward the rickety wooden elevator along the cliffs. He was tempted several times along the way to order Kelly and Morgan to take out that alien vehicle. But something stopped him each time.
They’d been warned in advance about the so-called Watchers or Architects who’d built this Planet and the one hundred and nineteen others that orbited the black hole. The Watchers were in control of Planet B and its myriad drone defenses, so if that’s what this tentacled creature was, then he couldn’t afford to anger it. He’d just have to hope that it wouldn’t come to the defense of the Jakar.
They reached the elevator and crowded onto the wooden platform. It was huge and could easily have transported twenty of them.
“Gibbons, Clark, get eyes on the valley,” Ethan ordered.
“Copy,” Gibbons said.
Garcia went straight to the winch and began turning it to lower them.
Ethan crossed to the other side of the platform and aimed his XR12 over the railing, looking down to the dusty ledge where the Jakar’s captives had emerged from their caves six hours ago.
“What’s it look like down there, boys?” Ethan asked.
“Same old,” Gibbons reported. “Got about twenty Jakar warriors in the trees with the prisoners. Hostage situation. No sign of enemy reinforcements yet.”
“Copy. Keep them in sight, Corporal. We don’t want any surprises.”
“Yes, sir.”
No enemy soldiers waited directly below them—at least, not that Ethan could see. They could easily be waiting in ambush positions in the caves.
Ethan touched the comm piece in his ear to activate it. “Overwatch, sitrep.”
“No change, sir,” Corporal Kelly said.
“Any sign of alien activity around the river facility?”
“None, sir.”
“Good. Let me know the instant that changes.”
“Copy, sir.”
Ethan steeled himself for the bloodshed to come. The closer the Jakar got to them, the more dangerous they would be.
If this was going to work, then they needed to keep those barbarians at range.
“What’s our plan, Major?” Garcia grunted from the winch.
“A precision strike on the Jakar hiding in the trees. Lead the captives back to this elevator, then ferry them up on this platform, group by group, while we cover their extraction.”
“Easy peasy,” Gibbons quipped.
“No plan survives contact with the enemy,” Ethan replied, quoting an old military adage.
“So we improvise,” Gibbons replied with a shrug. “It’s what we do best.”
“Stow the chatter,” Ethan whispered. “We’re almost there.”
Chapter 35
1:03 PM, March 27th, 2070
Layla woke up from her nap feeling bewildered. For a moment, she couldn’t remember where she was. Shafts of sunlight snuck through the heavy curtains. She sat up and kneaded her fists into her eye sockets. Her belly hung slightly over the waistband of her sweatpants. It looked even larger when she was seated than when she was standing up.
