Resolution (101 page)

It seems that time slows down as a soft bronze glimmer in the Enemy craft accompanies the resonance cavities’ excitation and the graser beams about to
—

Subnuclear forces tear the air apart as Axolon unleashes his defences. The Enemy craft explodes.

Tom flung himself into the command centre and was in the thick of it.

Scarlet uniforms of the Anomalous forces were everywhere, roiling through the chamber in hand-to-hand fighting. Old General Ygran knocked an Enemy soldier onto the table where he sprawled amid tactical holos then brought his graser to bear on Ygran.

A carl’s morphblade severed the Enemy soldier’s hand above the wrist and arterial blood spurted as bright and scarlet as the invaders’ uniforms.

‘Elva!’

Fighting men and women stumbled close and Tom whipped out a raking blow that destroyed an Enemy fighter’s eyes. The maelstrom of struggling bodies was everywhere.

‘Tom!’

He saw Elva then, fists flashing polished brass -
knuckledusters? -
as she pummelled the man in front of her. Fighting figures obscured the view, then rolled past. Behind Elva, Jissie stood with a short dagger held point-up, ready for an upward thrust.

Fate. She’s a child.

A boiling mass of Enemy fighters surrounded Elva, a pandemonium of limbs and torsos, and Jissie was blotted from Tom’s sight once more.

With a roar Tom struck out, elbowed a face, spun around another man’s back, clawed his way through a third man’s guard, rotated another’s shoulder to push two men into each other’s way, and made a direct line towards Elva and Jissie.

A fist from nowhere snapped against the side of Tom’s jaw.

Tom spun and lashed back with a hammer-fist of his own and then leaped high, knee into the larynx, and the man was down and choking his final breath.

Elva!

Too late.

The Enemy were upon her and Jissie screamed and Tom threw off someone who tried to grab but he could
not
get there in time. A black-bronze creature was rising, its wings spreading as its rows of pitted eyes focused on Elva. It paused, poised to fall upon her.

That was its mistake.

Tom stopped in the midst of battle, statue-still as Chaos rolled past on every side, a screaming melee and the stench of fear and blood. Blue flames flickered as Tom lowered his head and Saw into the alien creature -
inside its skull -
and when Tom stretched his hand out to squeeze the hand was enveloped in a blaze of sapphire blue and the creature threw back its head and howled.

Good.

Tom squeezed harder.

The great bulk stumbled as Elva threw four men aside in a massive adrenaline rage and turned both fists towards the creature. Parallel graser beams ripped out of the brass devices that were more than knuckledusters, and cut the thing’s head away from its torso.

Then Elva turned the beams upon the men who had cut Jissie but failed to kill her and butchered their bodies into smoking offal.

Tom’s bodyguard, the enraged carls, howled their berserker roar and the Enemy fell back. Between Tom and the carls stood the bulk of the Enemy. Whatever Tom’s fighting skills had been it was time to transcend them now.

He spun and his right heel hooked into the first man’s temple; then he used the momentum transfer to reverse his spin, twist his torso the other way and thrust out his left leg, to target another’s lower ribs. He heard the crunch. Something arced towards Tom’s head and he dropped, palm on the floor as he spun and scissored someone’s leg, snapping their kneecap onto the deck and clawing at their eyes as he rose, still twisting, and was on his feet once more.

A scarlet-uniformed woman was swinging a graser pistol towards Tom and his foot was closest so he used a crescent kick then the edge of his hand to snap her collarbone -
speed up -
and hit her three times, fast, and she was down.

Two men came at Tom together
- faster
- and he went for the nerve-points and they died without a sound as he used a fallen body as a stepping-stone to leap high, into the heart of the Enemy force, a thrusting kick with the blade edge of his foot snapping a neck before he landed and pivoted and accelerated again.

The warrior who grabbed him from behind was as big as a carl but Tom’s head snapped back and he twisted, and butted twice from side to side. Tom slid down the big man’s torso, hooked his arm under the groin and launched himself upwards.

The big man’s bulk flew against his comrades and Tom snapped out a low kick to split someone’s knee, then a whipping kick, shin against thigh to paralyse the nerve, and two more were down. Another was close and Tom whipped his elbow in hard and followed with the knee and that was another to his tally but he should
not
congratulate himself because danger was everywhere.

Tom struck again and a soldier screamed but suddenly strong hands had hold of Tom and the chamber spun as the man threw Tom over his outstretched leg
- faster -
but Tom twisted in the air, landing crouched on his feet instead of on his head and then he sprang up with his hips to execute a counter-throw.

Had he held the man’s tunic it would not have done serious damage but Tom’s grip was around the man’s neck and as he fell Tom ripped back -
crack -
and the body that hit the floor was dead.

Something touched Tom from behind and he spun with hand upraised
-faster
- but it was a carl whose blood-lust was as great as Tom’s own and then he realized.

‘It’s done, Warlord.’

Blood rushed in Tom’s ears and yellow fluorescence edged his vision and he wanted only to fight but -
no
- he had to stop now -
calm down -
and he was panting and glistening beneath a sheet of sweat -
calm -
and slowly he brought himself back to a point where he could begin to process rational thought.

There were bodies strewn everywhere, great sucking chest wounds and severed torsos and those who whimpered and those who howled in the face of death.

Bodies of friends. Bodies of the Enemy: scarlet uniforms soaked with scarlet blood that splashed across the chamber.

But the only sign of movement among those who wore scarlet was the twitch of the mortally wounded and the sudden shudder as Jissie delivered a
coup de grace
and despatched a dying man.

‘We’ve won. For now, we’ve beaten them off

‘Aye, Warlord.’

But now the Anomaly knows where we are.

In the corner, Elva placed her hand on Jissie’s shoulder, looked up at Tom, wiped blood from her face. And gave a tiny smile.

Tom closed his eyes, collecting his thoughts.

Avernon.

He opened his eyes, dug out the crystal from his waistband: the crystal that the young soldier, Pentor Vize, had thrown to him.

Chaos ...

It was the wrong one. Tom had wanted the violet crystal that might allow him to contact the Grey Shadows and the Crystal Lady once more. But he had no rational reason to suppose that they would answer the call again, or that they could redouble their efforts inside Nulapeiron in any way.

What Tom was holding was a blank crystal, its internal lattice neatly reset to the original configuration, all record of its tales of Pilots and Zajinets and mu-space wiped clean.

Useless.

‘Pilots…’

The crystal was useless. But perhaps it was the idea, not the medium, that was important.

‘What, Tom?’ It was Elva. ‘Are you hurt?’

‘No.’

His black tunic was wet with blood, but none of it was his.

‘I’ve looked at the tac displays,’ said Elva. ‘Ninety-seven of our terraformers have been destroyed.’

‘Fate.’

‘Things are going badly down inside the remaining free sectors. There’s no point in even trying to coordinate things. It’s too messy, and everything’s a rout.’

Tom looked at General Ygran, who was leaning against the conference table, his face ashen, his left arm tucked inside his belt: broken, for sure.

‘Do the best you can.’

Then he turned to the remaining carls.

‘You’re with me.’

Young Pentor Vize was still in the chamber, and he jerked his rifle up when Tom came in.

‘Relax. We’re safe for now.’

‘Sir.’

Inside one holo, a bulkhead was visible, and the edge of a man’s arm.

‘Do you have contact with the shuttle, Pentor?’

‘Yes, Warlord.’

‘Good man. Let me sit there.’

Tom took his place, and called into the holo: ‘Avernon. Are you there?’