Orion Colony Complete Series Boxed Set J.N. Chaney (books for new readers .txt) 📖

was our love for weapons and warfare. Most of us have implants enhancing our fighting ability. Dean, I should also apologize to you.”

“Me?” I asked, placing my empty plate on the table. “Why?”

“When we first met, you tried to grab me. I defeated you and injured your shoulder when it was all over,” Sulk said, shaking his head. “I know how fragile your species is. I shouldn’t have been so hard on you.”

I blinked a few times, trying to figure out if this guy was messing with me. I decided to err on the side of caution and figured he was probably dead serious.

“We took you down,” I told him. “No reason to be sorry.”

“Yes, but the way you screamed like an infant when three of you had to restrain me and I crushed your shoulder.” Sulk looked at me with unblinking eyes and a deadpan stare. “That had to be painful.”

“Like an infant?” I asked incredulously. “Listen, gecko, I—”

My next words were cut off as a siren blared through the room, causing me to jump. Shouting from the outer room could be heard.

“They come!” Dama said, running for the door. “We must brace the gate!”

11

Thoughts of food and verbally sparring with Sulk fled my mind as we hurried after Dama. Along with the alarm blaring overhead and the shouting, a heavy clanging and pounding could be heard, as if someone was taking a battering ram to a steel door.

We crossed the large open room where the standing army held position. On the opposite side, a large hall opened up to a set of steel double doors, which had been barricaded with everything from large containers to weapons wedged with one end on the door and the other in the ground. A dozen Rung were leaning against it, bracing it for impact as something large struck it from the opposite side. They were doing a great job of holding off whatever it was for the moment, but who knew how long they would be able to keep it at bay?

“Legion has overtaken a large part of our underground network,” Dama explained. “He’s been trying to break down these doors for the last few days with no luck. I fear his frustration will lead him to do something rash very soon.”

The booming from the other end of the door sent my sternum quivering in my chest as my heart slammed against it.

“What’s on the other end hitting it so hard?” John asked. “They have a vehicle or something?”

“We’re not sure,” Dama said, shaking her head. “The door has been holding, but how long it will hold is another question. Every few hours, Legion takes a new approach to getting in. He is patient and persistent if nothing else. Sooner or later, he will find a way inside.”

“Then we have to make our move before he does,” I said. “What’s the plan?”

A smile tugged at Dama’s lips. She waved us over back the way we came to the room with the screen and food.

She placed a hand on the screen and an aerial view of a diagram appeared. It showed our chamber, the adjacent larger room, and the hall leading to the closed doors.

“This is where we currently are.” Dama pointed to our section of the underground base. She moved her hand through the closed doors in the hall and down toward another chamber on a different level. “And this is where our power armor is waiting for us.”

I was still trying to get my head wrapped around how large the place was. The underground bunker was massive and that was putting it lightly. Levels upon levels of the place opened into long halls and sprawling passageways. They had to easily house thousands of Rung here, maybe more.

“How many warriors do you still have?” Stacy asked.

“The ones you see in this outer chamber are all we have left,” Dama said, clearing her throat with a sad expression on her face. “Forty combatants and another ten if you include our children who have taken shelter with us here.”

“Children?” I repeated the word as if it were the first time I was hearing it. “You make your children fight?”

“If it is fighting or death, I would see that our children make account of themselves.” Dama answered as if that were the most logical line of reasoning. “I would rather have them die on their feet than cowering in a corner.”

“Forty soldiers, plus us,” Tong mused out loud. “What is this power armor you speak of?”

Dama adjusted the screen in front of us so it moved to show exactly what I imagined. A bulky suit of armor appeared as if it stood eight to ten feet tall. It was armed on the outside, complete with weapons on its forearms and backs.

“You created these weapons to fight us, didn’t you?” Tong asked.

“We did, but history has united us and we have a common enemy now,” Dama said, not missing a beat. “We will pilot them together against Legion and usher in a new era for our people. This is not the time to argue over the past. After we defeat our common enemy, we will engage in peace talks.”

“How far is it from us to the power armor?” I asked. “I’m bad with telling distances on maps.”

“What would be your equivalent to two kilometers if I understand the way you judge distance,” Dama said. “Two kilometers and a level down.”

Two kilometers doesn’t sound like a whole heck of a lot, but when you have infected breathing down your neck, it might as well be a world away, I thought to myself. It’s going to be one heck of a fight.

“How many infected do you think are between us and the power armor?” Tong asked.

“Hundreds, at least,” Sulk said with a wide grin. “It will be a chance at a glorious death.”

We all looked at him sideways. He sure loved the thought of death in battle, and although I wanted him to fulfill