Hunter (17 page)

Nova breathed
a sigh of relief and leant back against the box .

Her heart
leapt into her throat when her shirt beeped and a bright red light
flashed on her chest.

"Grishnak!"
she swore as she stood, eliminated.

She strode to
the sideline and glared around through the darkness for her
attacker. She couldn't see anything but the tell-tale squeak of
wheels said that her assailant had been at the far end of the
arena. She would have had no chance of seeing or hearing
it.

Nova was the
fourth last to be killed. It didn't take long for the rest to be
eliminated, with all of the trainer-bots looking for
them.

The winner
was a young man with a wide grin spread across his face. His fellow
officers slapped him on the back as the lights came on. Nova hoped
he would survive long enough to enjoy his pay rise.

The training
continued late into the night. By the end, most of them could
survive adequately in the dark; at least enough to know if someone
was standing right next to them.

It would have
to be enough.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

The Wharves. 11pm. Be there or more will
die.

The note was
scrawled in red ink across a scrap of paper. Neither the
handwriting nor paper gave any clue to where the note had come
from. It was delivered with a collection of other mail,
untraceable.

Nova and
Briggles looked down at the note, both of their brows furrowed.
Standing outside the police station, they had been on the way to
get lunch and relieve some of the stress of the investigation. Now
they were plunged into a whole new wave of worry.

Nova wanted
to curl the piece of paper in her fist, stomp on it and set it on
fire. Instead, she let Briggles hold it, whilst she tucked her
hands firmly behind her back. Her nostrils flared as she re-read
the words. The nerve of these lecheons! If she could get her hands
on Corvus, she would strangle him until his eyes popped.

She forced
herself to breathe slower; to assess the situation. The note was
infuriating, but what did it actually mean?

"It could be
a hoax," Nova said. "A lot of people saw the killing
yesterday."

"It might
be," Briggles agreed, looking at Nova with red eyes. "Or it might
not be."

"Let's meet
them there. We'll have lights set up, plenty of time to prepare.
And we know they won't be there until night-time. They've
practically handed us the wooden bullets to kill them
with."

"We're not
supposed to kill them, we're trying to catch them," Briggles said
with a sigh.

"Do those
rules still apply?" Nova said. "What if it's their lives or ours?
We may not have a choice."

Briggles
didn't reply. He held the note in his thick fingers and his eyes
ran over the words again.

Nova couldn't
stomach the waiting, there was nothing worse. She tapped her foot
on the cement, but when it was clear Briggles wasn't going to say
anything more she stepped in.

"I'm taking a
contingent down to prepare. Are you coming or not?" she said,
staring directly at him.

"Yes,"
Briggles said with a sigh.

"Good." Nova
nodded and stalked back into the police station. She paused at the
top of the steps and looked back at Briggles. "How do the lecheon
leaders respond to their kind killing ours?"

Briggles
shrugged. "Some of them are against it, and some of them are for
it. Most think it's a bad idea because of the bad trade
implications."

"Okay," Nova
said as she stormed through the doorway.

***

Shipping
containers spread across the yard, their rusted metal casings
reflecting none of the orange glow of the setting sun. They sat in
forlorn clumps, with white and faded numbers painted on their
sides.

Large carrier
spaceships parked off to the side, slow moving but unstoppable.
They chugged through space carrying things from one galaxy to the
next, delivering coal and steel from the Resources District into
the inner galaxies. Boullion Five had only a small shipping yard
compared to some planets, because it was halfway between the inner
and outer galaxies. It was a rest point in the typically long
journey.

Nova lay on
her stomach on top of a corroded container. The rust flaked off the
metal and coated her arms and clothes where they rested against it.
She'd spent the day working with Briggles and the officers to set
up the perfect scenario. When the creatures showed their faces,
they wouldn't know which way was up.

Even if she'd
still had it, her normal plasma pistol was useless against the
lecheons, so Nova had taken up an ancient weapon from her arsenal.
In the more secret cupboards of Crusader she had whole stacks of
weapons; this was one of the oldest. It was a weapon from
old-Earth, a bow with a quiver of twelve arrows that bristled out
of her back. Four sharpened pieces of wood and a wooden knife with
metal edging lay in a row by her side. Sparse weapons in any other
fight, but the best against a coven of lecheons.

Nova glanced
over her shoulder at the sun; it would be at least another half an
hour before it dipped below the horizon. Then they would be plunged
into darkness to await the enemy. The officers were spaced out
around the containers. Mostly they lay on top, keeping an eye on
all of the entry points, ready to sound the alarm; others were
spaced out on the ground. These were the keenest shooters, ready to
fire at a moment's notice.

Inspector
Briggles lay one container over on Nova's left, ready to issue
commands via a radio earpiece that connected him to the other
officers. He gripped an ancient pistol in his hands, his knuckles
white; it had been specially modified to carry wooden bullets. He
glared at the ground, his face red, as if daring the lecheons to
appear before him.

Nova forced
herself to focus. The sun was warm on her neck, a nice relief from
the chilling cold which was sure to descend with nightfall.
Boullion Five was much colder than many of the planets she'd
visited. She wore her jacket but she didn't want to risk any more
layers, as anything which limited her movement could mean certain
death. Better to be a little cold above ground than a lot cold six
feet under.

The minutes
ticked slowly by. She pulled an arrow from the quiver and notched
it into the bowstring. She had practiced with the weapon before,
but she would have felt more comfortable with her plasma pistol. It
would slow the lecheons down if she was forced to fire it, but it
wouldn't stop them. She didn't let fear enter her mind. There was
no room for it.

A small part
of her said that she could leave. She was just a hired mercenary
and she could go without pay; no harm done. But she knew she
couldn't. She'd promised to help Briggles and his forces and she'd
be damned if she was caught lying. Besides, what were a few
lecheons? Nothing. She'd faced far worse; that was for sure. Her
mind traced back over her time as a bounty hunter. There were
definitely tighter situations she'd managed to get out
of.

"Nearly
there," Briggles said into his radio. His voice travelled through
the air to Nova's ears and she nodded. The sun was almost gone; its
last light glinting at the very edges of the containers, taking any
warmth along with it.

Nova shivered
and cursed. If there was anything she needed it was a steady hand.
She forced her arms to stabilise, resting them on the shipping
container where she could. The arrow was still relaxed in the
bowstring. Nearly time.

As the last
of the light disappeared, the area exploded with a terrible
screeching. It echoed from every corner of the yard; yelling,
squealing, screaming. These were alien noises but all too soon they
were joined by human screams.

"Lights!"
Briggles yelled.

At his
command massive searchlights were flung on and they flooded the
yard with light. More screams.

They weren't
supposed to come until eleven; it was only seven at the latest.
Nova cursed. Of course they knew that the police force would be
there early. It was a surprise attack. She just hoped that the
officers on the ground weren't too shocked and were holding their
guns at the ready.

Nova's eyes
roved around the area. Three containers away she caught sight of a
lecheon. It was scratching at its eyes and stumbling away from the
searchlights. In its blindness it ran into the side of a container.
It screamed as its fingers curled into claws and clutched at its
face.

Nova grabbed
a firm hold of her arrow and pulled it back. The string went
taught. She levelled the shaft against her cheek and looked down
its length, targeting the creature's back.

She let
fly.

The wooden
arrow screamed as the wind blew past its flight feathers and
thudded into the lecheon's back.

The bowstring
twanged back into place as the lecheon fell forward. He writhed on
the ground, kicking and screaming. His back arched as he tried to
reach around, to pull the arrow out, but his arms couldn't make it.
His head and neck twisted to breaking point as he
screamed.

Nova couldn't
help but watch. The creature writhed on the ground for what felt
like hours. The gravel beneath him became covered in blood, not
just from the wound in his back but also from the cuts and grazes
on his arms and chin as he thrashed around. His face scraped along
the gravel leaving behind streams of skin.

He convulsed
a final time, before collapsing into stillness. Dead.

Nova tore her
eyes away and surveyed the rest of the scene. Her stomach sunk. She
had expected to see more lecheons cowering away towards the
darkness, easy targets. Instead she was confronted with at least
twenty of them marching directly towards her. They were wearing
tinted goggles. Their entire bodies were covered with long sleeves,
gloves and hoods, so that not an inch of skin was exposed to the
bright lights.

Her heart
pumped faster in her chest. Of course they'd come prepared. They
had chosen this place for a reason, even if Nova hadn't figured
that reason out yet. They had attacked early, knowing that the
police force would be there. They had equipment to protect them
against bright lights. She and Briggles had been stupid in their
preparations. They had underestimated the lecheons and it could
prove fatal.

"Take out the
ones with goggles," Briggles roared into his radio.

In response,
guns fired from the tops of containers, shots echoing. Wooden
bullets whizzed through the air. The lecheon at the end of the
approaching group collapsed. The others stepped over his body and
kept walking.

Nova pulled
an arrow from behind her back, stringed it and pulled it to her
cheek. She aimed at the approaching lecheons and let fly. The arrow
flew true and lodged into the chest of the centre lecheon. He
clutched at it, but didn't have the strength or the time to pull it
out before he collapsed to the ground; another corpse.

The lecheons
advanced.

"Grishnak!"
Nova cursed.

She was
beginning to see why they'd chosen the container yard. The big
metal boxes made it impossible to keep the group in her sights. The
lecheons disappeared in and out of the rows of containers, creating
a constant source of cover from almost all angles. She got off a
few more lucky shots but by then they were close. Too
close.

"Briggles, we
have to—" Nova began. She slammed her mouth shut when a spotlight
flicked off and plunged the yard into darkness.

She whirled
around to the closest spotlight. While they had been focusing on
the approaching group, other lecheons had come around the sides.
They clambered up to the spotlights and smashed them with pieces of
piping.

Crash.

Another light
went out and hurled another section into darkness.

Nova whipped
an arrow out and aimed it at the lecheon about to destroy the light
closest to her. She didn't have time to aim properly but she
released the arrow anyway. It sailed through the air and struck the
lecheon in his forearm. He howled and whipped his head
up.

He glared at
her with eyeless hatred, his goggles hiding his real features. He
gnashed his teeth at her and ripped the arrow out of his arm. It
left a tear in his long sleave. He tossed the arrow over the side
of his container and stared at Nova the whole time, as he lifted
his metal pipe and smashed it into the light.

He was
suddenly shrouded in darkness.

Nova's mind
raced. He would be coming for her, no doubt about it. He would want
her death as his revenge. Only two spotlights still lit the scene
and they were far from her. As her eyes adjusted she found she
could just make out the shape of the container she was lying on.
The lecheon approaching her would be able to see much
more.

Or would
he?