Advance (Animus Book 4) Read online

  “Nice of them to think of us,” Kaiden grunted.

  Mack shrugged. “It comes with the territory, right?”

  “For how much I pay to come here, I would like to think we’re worth more and are less expendable than a rental guard,” Kaiden retorted.

  Mack leaned his head back in thought before he raised a finger to the ceiling and looked at Kaiden. “To be fair, that’s our contract. Someone else will pay for us and we work it off, so it’s free, in a way.”

  Kaiden waved him off. “That’s called indentured servitude, which isn’t much better. And I’ll be damned if I’ll suck up to some fat cat who thinks I’ll call him ‘sir’ for five years or something.”

  Mack laughed. “Maybe you should have given that more thought before signing up.”

  “My hindsight is exemplary, trust me. And I’m already dealing with it.”

  The large man cocked his head questioningly, but before he could say anything, Lancia held up a hand as the instructions came to an end. “You have your mission, the first of your advanced year. We wish you well. Hominum ultra.” The message ended with a click and the console disappeared in white light.

  A loadout screen appeared in front of Kaiden, and he scrolled through the options. “Will you go with heavy weapons, Mack?”

  “I am the weapon,” he stated. “As far as firearms are concerned, I’ll go with a hand cannon. A Mark Two Buster, Sigma Munitions model. I’ll add a caster attachment to my gauntlets to enable me to throw my barriers and some thermals— Wait, I guess that would be bad in enclosed spaces, huh?”

  “It usually ends in lost body parts—for you and them. Better stick with shocks,” Kaiden advised. “For your melee weapon, you should try a shock gauntlet. I hear there are some new models that will actually increase the power of shields around your hands.”

  “I already have one,” he said with mirth in his voice. “The things pack a wallop. My brother Anthony let me test one over the break.”

  Kaiden nodded approvingly. “What are your options, Ms. Negotiator?”

  “Mine are limited, as fighting isn’t my field of expertise,” she admitted. “Sidearm, melee, one gadget.”

  “Take a Servitor. It packs a punch that can shatter most low-level barriers and requires minimal charge-up. It can also fire a couple of dozen rounds before you need to vent it. As for melee, take whatever you’re comfortable with, but we’ll make sure they don’t get close enough that you have to use it— Actually, change of thought. Grab a blade.”

  “Why?” she asked.

  “From what the message hinted at, it doesn’t look like our job ends when you start yours. Something may go down, so it would be better to have more offensive options just in case. Besides, it would be more intimidating when you do start negotiations,” Kaiden offered.

  “Threatening the people I’m supposed to haggle with isn’t the friendliest display.” She sighed. “But I’ll take it into consideration.”

  “You should also grab a barrier projector and some armor,” Kaiden said. “I’m not sure if that’s normal for y’all. But in battlefields, an exposed body makes for an attractive target, particularly the head. If it’s no trouble, it would make our job easier.”

  “I have a preload for armor for most of my normal missions, but fighting isn’t usually involved,” she explained. She tapped a button on her loadout screen and a set of light armor, white with blue accents, appeared around her. “I’ll add a stealth mod.” She pressed another button and her armor changed to black as the blue accents faded.

  “Good idea. Let me finish up here.” Kaiden looked through his options. He opted to go with his normal loadout but decided to add a machine gun and scanned quickly for one in particular. Once he found it, he smiled and selected it, then added a plasma blade, shock grenades, and a serum injector for his gadgets. He closed the screen out as his choices materialized on him, slid Debonair into its holster, and checked his belt for his items.

  To test the new addition to his usual gadgets, he flicked his wrist and the hilt of the plasma blade slid from his gauntlet and appeared in his hand. He pressed the trigger and the blade released. It was smaller than his normal blade but easier to retrieve in tight situations. He held the button down and it began to glow. Despite its size, it would still cut through almost anything.

  “Nice choice, Kaiden.” Mack complimented him and examined the machine gun. “Is that a Tempest?”

  Kaiden nodded and held it up, “I’ve played around with some fun things too. I bought one for myself and a couple of mods to go with it. It cost me a lot in cred but made up for itself quickly.”

  “I would hope so.” The vanguard chuckled. “There’s no fun in dropping a lot of creds on something that you’re only gonna use at the range.” They looked at Lancia who finished making her choices.

  She closed her screen out as a rounded helmet appeared on her head. “I’m ready to go when you two are.”

  “Let’s get to it,” Mack declared and thumped his chest. “Don’t worry about a thing. Nothing will touch you before we get on that ship.”

  “Afterwards, however, it’s completely possible,” Kaiden scoffed as he moved to the door.

  The large man rubbed the back of his head. “He’s joking, of course.”

  “I know I’m in good hands. You seem rather confident and him…” She looked at Kaiden for a moment. “I know what he’s capable of. Everyone from last year does by now.”

  “No kidding. You should have seen him during the Death Match,” Mack confided and drew a deep breath. “Of course, I helped him out at the beginning and destroyed a Goliath class droid.”

  “Impressive.” She smiled. “As much as I would like to see you in action, I’d be happy to not run into a Goliath during this mission.”

  “Shame. It could make for some good action.” The vanguard sounded disappointed.

  “As much as I would like to sit around and hear you two talk about how great I am, we should move. I didn’t have much for breakfast because I didn’t expect to get my happy ass tossed back in so quickly, so let’s do this. I get grumpy when I’m peckish,” Kaiden ordered.

  Mack nodded, and he and Lancia joined him at the door. The ace pushed the switch to open the doors, his gun at the ready. A dark tunnel yawned ahead of them. They looked out in confusion before glow strips illuminated the ground and portions of the ceiling. The lights snaked through the tunnel and split into multiple paths as the rest of the room appeared. They stared at a winding trail of halls and paths across a vast space.

  “I can barely see a thing,” Lancia gasped.

  “Have your EI adjust the light sensitivity in your visors,” Kaiden suggested. “It’ll make it easier, but I hope no one has any flashbangs.”

  “So we gotta make our way to the shuttle and take out potential hostiles without being able to see them coming?” Mack questioned.

  “I’m sure they’ll be as blind as we are. Plus, the glow strips will light our path,” Kaiden stated and put his gun away. “What’s wrong, Mack, scared of things that go bump in the dark?”

  The vanguard slammed his fists together and his armor surged with energy as his barriers activated. “Heh, hell no. They’re scared of me.”

  Chapter Six

  The group made their way along the illumined paths with the amber light of the glow strips their only means of navigation. They reached a split in the path where one direction continued ahead and the other led them to the left. Lancia stopped them, pointed down the left hallway, and beckoned them to follow.

  “Do you have a map?” Kaiden whispered over their comm link.

  “No, but I was given a compass that provides directions to the port,” she explained. “It was loaded in with my objective.”

  “That’s handy,” Mack stated. “What exactly do you have to do once we get to this meeting place?”

  “Right now, my only objectives are ‘get to the shuttle’ and ‘don’t die’ once we arrive. I’ll inform you of the rest when I get
them,” she promised. Kaiden looked around for enemies, cameras, turrets, or anything that could be a potential danger as they moved on. So far, nothing seemed remotely threatening. All he saw were the pathways and the low lights of the glow strips.

  “I don’t like this. I know it’s cliché and everything, but it’s too damn quiet,” Chief grunted, and his eye looked around in Kaiden’s HUD as if scanning the surroundings.

  “Do you think they will port the hostiles in like they did during the Death Match?” Kaiden asked aloud.

  “Maybe. At least it would be something,” Mack huffed. “There’s something creepy about walking around in an empty terminal. I guess I’m used to them being so busy that to see it this uninhabited is kind of unnerving.”

  Lancia lifted her hand to stroke the top of her opposite arm. “It’s eerie, I’ll admit, but it’s better than laser fire and bullets coming at you from all sides.”

  “That’s actually more of our native element,” Mack jested.

  They reached another break in the path, but Lancia continued directly ahead, and the others followed. “I can certainly appreciate your bravery, but the less of a mess this is, the quicker we can finish and the higher the score.”

  “While we’re on the subject, what happens when we get to the shuttle?” Kaiden asked.

  “What do you mean? It’s pretty self-explanatory,” Mack stated.

  “Can either of you fly it?” he reasoned. “Unless there’s an EI pilot on board, that’s something we might wanna worry about now instead of later.”

  “I figured you could.” Mack shrugged. “You seem like you would know how to work any number of vehicles.”

  “That’s a potentially costly assumption.” Kaiden chuckled. “I’ve flown a few ships, but nothing past basic level and certainly not in space.”

  “You think we’re in space?” Mack questioned. “What makes you think that?”

  “The window,” Kaiden answered and pointed a finger to his left. Lancia and Mack walked to the side of the hallway and pressed against the glass. They peered out and looked into a darkened room. A line of windows directly below the ceiling showed a darker abyss outside, and the white light of distant stars shimmered in the void. “Either that’s space or it’s a damn dark night.”

  “Oh, well, that’s different. I don’t think I’ve done a mission in space yet,” Mack said cheerfully. “A new first.”

  “If there is an auto-pilot feature on the ship, I can access it,” Chief interjected. “It’ll at least get us out of here.”

  “Most shuttles do have one, but what about after?” Kaiden asked.

  “I hear humans like praying when no other options are available,” the EI chirped.

  “Aren’t you helpful—”

  “Relax. As long as there is auto-pilot I can get us to wherever…as long as we have a destination and as long as we don’t get shot down,” Chief promised.

  “Well, I got us a pilot, with some caveats. But we should be good,” Kaiden announced. “Let’s keep mov— Mack, get ready.”

  “What is it?” the vanguard asked and grasped his hand cannon as his barriers flared.

  Kaiden readied his machine gun. “A couple of stories up, I saw flickering along the glow strips like something moved past them. We have company headed our way.”

  “Should we run or wait to engage?” Mack asked. His cheerful and boisterous demeanor switched quickly to a serious one as his training kicked in.

  “Let’s leg it. We can cover more ground while we aren’t under fire and make it as close to the shuttle as we can. If we have to fight the rest of the way there, so be it, but it’s better to increase our chances as much as possible.”

  The vanguard nodded. “All right, I’ll take point. Lancia, tell me the directions over comms.”

  “A-all right,” she stammered, and her voice betrayed her lack of combat experience.

  Kaiden placed a hand reassuringly on her shoulder. “We’ll be fine. You made it through the Death Match so you’ll make it through this.”

  “Truth be told, I didn’t do much fighting during the test. My team and I were able to find a delegate station in the first few hours, and I spent most of my time away from the…violence.”

  “Well, that’s a rather impressive feat on its own,” the ace reminded her. He gripped his weapon in both hands and held it to his chest. “Double time!”

  They raced down the hall. Mack moved much faster than his size suggested he would, and Lancia provided directions. Kaiden heard the boot stomps above them. Whoever or whatever they were seemed to be closing in. The team turned into another hall which led down and away from the approaching enemy. That, at least, seemed like a small blessing.

  They reached a pair of doors and Mack slammed the switch to open them. When they found four Havoc droids on the other side, Kaiden felt that God was laughing.

  “Get behind me!” Mack shouted. The droids’ chain guns began to spin as the vanguard activated a large rectangular barrier. The bullets impacted the shield and ripples of energy surged across the surface.

  “Can I fire through it?” Kaiden shouted.

  “I have something better,” the vanguard declared. “Watch this.” He held his gauntlet up, which hummed with energy, and smashed his fist into the barrier. It hurtled forward and seemed to solidify as it moved to knock the droids back. They crashed into the far wall. “Now fire,” Mack said and readied his hand cannon.

  He laid down a barrage of ballistic rounds while Kaiden fired volleys of laser fire. One of the droids tried to stand but its head exploded with a shot from Mack. “Are we good?” he asked.

  The ace heard the horde behind them closing in.

  “Find them.” The guttural command was followed quickly by, “Kill them!” as the enemy neared.

  “It depends on your viewpoint, I guess,” Kaiden muttered. “Keep going,” he ordered and punched the console. Using Debonair, he shot the keypad as he slipped between the closing doors.

  “How much farther?” he asked.

  “I’m not sure. It doesn’t give a total distance, only to the next path,” Lancia clarified.

  “How far to that?”

  “Two hundred meters down the right hall.”

  “Then we’ll take this section by section. Let’s go!” he shouted. Speaking quietly over the comms seemed pointless now.

  They continued their trek although it seemed they constantly zig-zagged and made little progress. Kaiden wondered if the directions Lancia was given were corrupted or simply another part of the stupid test. They entered a hallway that now seemed to run alongside the enclosed areas.

  “There,” Mack called. The ace looked through the outer windows at a hangar bay below with a shuttle parked in the middle.

  The craft was surrounded by mercs.

  “Seriously? Is this normal in a diplomat’s life?” he asked.

  “Danger is expected, but normally, it’s an assassination attempt and more subtle. This would cause a scene.”

  “You can’t cause a scene in an empty terminal,” the vanguard reasoned. “Kaiden, I have an idea.”

  “What are you thinking?” he asked, “And before you try any self-sacrifice bullshit, I can already tell you that there are other options.”

  “I ain’t gonna kill myself with this. It’s way too painful when I get out of the pod,” Mack assured him, his voice eager yet ragged from their sprint. “Besides, why do something like that when I can do something cool.”

  “Out of curiosity, is this a proven method or are you winging it?” Kaiden asked. “Not that I have room to talk, but this doesn’t seem like the time to try to do something you saw in a vid once.”

  “Trust me, this’ll be good,” he promised. “It probably won’t take them all out, but it’ll damn sure even the odds.”

  “What have you got?”

  “You have shock grenades too, right?” he asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Let me have them.”

  Kaiden handed hi
s container of shocks to Mack. “Do you still have yours? Are you gonna toss them all out?”

  “That might work on the grunts and the lightly armored bastards, but it won’t work on the heavies. I’m gonna give them some juice.”

  Kaiden cocked his head questioningly as Lancia pointed and shouted, “There’s the elevator.”

  They stopped, and Kaiden eyed it warily. “That’s basically boxing ourselves up and asking them to shoot us.”

  “We don’t need to go down that way anyhow,” Mack said, as he held up Kaiden’s container of shock grenades in one hand and his own in the other. “Do me a couple of favors, would ya?”

  “What do you need?”

  “Take my gun and fire when I tell you to.” He primed his shock gauntlet. “Hey, Buddy. Overcharge my barrier, I’m gonna nova!”

  “What…what do I press?” Lancia asked.

  “Huh? Oh, no, Buddy is my EI. But don’t worry, we can be buddies too.”

  “You’re going to nova? Doesn’t that drain the rest of your barrier? You’ll be exposed,” Kaiden pointed out.

  “Pshh, come on, man. I still have heavy armor here,” he bellowed. “Besides, this’ll be worth it.”

  Kaiden eyed him skeptically but took the hand cannon from the vanguard’s holster. “Godspeed, you crazy bastard.”

  “You should check if you two are related sometime.” Chief snickered. “But I see what he’s doing. This’ll be a show.”

  “Do you wanna fill me in? I have a crisis of faith here,” the ace muttered.

  “Well, he’s about to take a leap of one. Watch, this’ll be good.”

  Kaiden sighed as he heard a ding. Mack had punched the elevator button and the doors opened. “What are you doing?”

  “Shoot out the back of the elevator,” the vanguard demanded.

  “What?”

  “Shoot! Did you forget how?”

  He grimaced, aimed, and fired a ballistic round. The rear shattered, and the lights dimmed. The large group of mercs below uttered surprised cries at the loud whirr as the elevator shut down.