Would? Should. The move should have tumbled Penn.
What happened instead was that the skin and flesh of his arm moved around something hard inside, the meat sloughing off in her hands. She caught sight of something inside that didn’t look like the bones of a human arm. It didn’t look human at all. It looked like a thick, chitinous structure. El held up her hands, then looked at Penn. Glimpsed his face, or what was left of it.
His eyes were missing — just gone. His skull was distorted outward, and his jaw was distended. It looked like he was trying to speak again, and El could see his jaw wasn’t meeting in the middle. The bone was … moving inside his skin, but like two separate pieces of bone. Like mandibles, trying to break free.
Then Penn stopped moving. His body froze, then jerked in a spasm. Blood and gore fountained from his chest, covering El, and she screamed, closing her eyes. She fell to the deck, hand up above her head, tasting blood — Penn’s blood — in her mouth. She wiped her eyes clear, looking up. Penn was jerking and spasming, but it didn’t look like a thing he wanted to do. With a sound like a claw popping under a lobster cracker, his ribcage opened, a heavy piece of metal pushing through. The body kept jerking, until it split up the middle as the metal dragged through.
Penn’s body fell in two pieces. There was a massive silhouette behind him. The silhouette reached a hand toward El.
“You have got to tell me what I missed,” said October Kohl, dropping the metal bar to the deck as he lifted her up. He looked at Penn’s body. “Been wanting to do that since I met that asshole.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
When the bugs came for Nate, he wanted to panic.
Like, panicking would be a good thing that would free him from the rational part of his mind that was saying shoot low, less armor there or don’t hit Grace. It’d release him from those sorts of concerns. He’d be able to spray plasma everywhere, go down in a hail of fire, or maybe just a frenzy of torn limbs.
The problem was, Nate was sure that these Ezeroc assholes didn’t kill you. They plugged you into a wall, stuffed tentacles down your throat, and fed on you. Fed on your body, and your mind. That experience sure as shit would alter his perception of reality.
To be fair, he also wanted to panic because one of these crabs — just one — had almost turned him inside out. His shoulder was a wreck, his ribs hurt, and he was still dizzy. The good news, as near as there could be any good news in a situation like this, was that his plasma rifle was charged, and already pointed in the room. There was Grace, right of center. Two bugs, giant Ezeroc crab things, flanking her. And the … locust? … left of center. He had a full battery, and a clear shot at any of the four. Or three, because despite Grace talking like a crazy person, and possibly being infected by space insects, he liked her. Despite her lying to him, right from the start, he liked the way she lied. She was his kind of pirate.
It’s not being outnumbered. It’s having a wider selection of targets.
Nate followed the line of his rifle’s barrel, still held at his hip. It was pointed at the … locust? Really, what the fuck was that thing? An armored locust? How did it get around with legs that small? Pulsating lines of the tentacles fed into it, anchoring it.
“Queen,” said Grace, “together.”
Queen, huh. Nate pulled the trigger. The weapon cycled, a brief whine and then the harsh snap and crackle of the plasma discharge.
The twin bolts of plasma hit the … locust — just call it a Queen, everyone else seems to — Queen, blowing a chunk out of the thing’s side. A great shower of ichor ruptured forth, and it screamed, and tried to tear itself away from those tentacles anchoring it to the floor.
Grace was knocked sideways, out of Nate’s line of sight. The two massive Ezeroc crabs seemed to stumble, and then one of them turned in a circle like a broken robot, just clattering and skittering in rotation, big claws snicking at the air. The other one rambled sideways, crushing a desk and console under its bulk, then colliding with the wall of the tower. It backed up, then hit the wall sideways again. The wall cracked, opened to the night sky, and the Ezeroc was gone, tumbling down into the dark.
Take a note, Nate: check the door before you exit the ground floor. That might have turned into pulp, or it might have turned angrier or crazier.
He looked at his rifle again. Definitely a better effect than he’d been hoping for. What the hell. He pulled the trigger again. A cycle, whine, and then two more bolts of plasma hit the Queen. The force blew more chunks off it, tearing it free of the tentacles at its base.
Tentacles. Now there’s a word that never comes with happy thoughts. ’Pulsating’ is another word like that.
“How you like them fucking apples?” said Nate, right before he was knocked off his feet. He landed hard, rifle pinned to the ground by his body. He tried to roll, managed to flop onto his back, and saw what had hit him. An Ezeroc warrior drone — smaller than the crab fuckers, but still lots of sharp edges — reared above him. It stabbed down with those fore claws. He rolled, the claws hitting the floor where he’d been, bits of ceramicrete chipping away. It reared, trying to nail him again, and he rolled once more. Bring the rifle up. He hauled the rifle up — a bad, bad weapon at close range, on account of being too big, and thus too slow — and was rewarded for his efforts by the warrior drone knocking it away with one of its legs. The rifle spun into the stairwell. It clattered and skipped as it fell down into the gloom.
The Ezeroc stamped down with a leg, pinning Nate. It didn’t pierce his suit — thank God for good Old Empire weave — but the force of it hurt about the same as being hit with a bat. The Ezeroc probably weighed 300 kilos, and it leaned on him. Holding him still. It bent forward, saliva — sure, let’s call it that, that’s fine — dripping from its maw to spatter against Nate’s visor. Those fore claws clicked and clattered as it brought them back for the killing strike.
There was a snicka-pop, and one of those claws came free, followed by the thing’s head, which bounced on the ground next to Nate. The Ezeroc’s body shuddered, then the weight pinning him relaxed as the warrior drone’s body followed his rifle down the stairwell. He looked up at Grace Gushiken, her hair hiding her face, his sword held low in her hands. That sword was held firm and strong; there was a perfect line made by the sword, and her arm, right up to her shoulder. She was ready to strike again. He couldn’t see her face. He couldn’t tell what she wanted to strike.
“Hi,” said Nate. “Uh. What kept you?”
She shook her head, pushing her hair back from her face, and the illusion of the masked assassin fell away to reveal Grace — just Grace. Face grey with exhaustion and fear. She held a hand out to him. He took it, letting himself be pulled to his feet. “I … went away,” she said.
“Cool story,” said Nate. “Save it for later.” He unholstered his blaster from his hip, pointed it in the room — no sign of the Queen, but let’s not get complacent, hey? — and fired a couple blasts in there. The Ezeroc that was turning in a circle didn’t even notice. It kept on turning. Weird, but okay, sure. “You good to go?”