Hostile Genus: An Epic Military Sci-Fi Series (Invasive Species Book 2) Ben Stevens (best contemporary novels txt) 📖

difficult to walk when he had an orange-sized chunk of rifle protruding from his hip. His hand reflexively reached down to the source of his pain and felt the embedded foreign object, surrounded by wet fabric.

That’s my blood…

He knew he had to do something. He took his hand away, and even in the dark of night, he could see the river of black pouring down his leg.

“That’s a lot of blood. Why couldn’t it hit me in the… metal one?” Carbine clamped his hand over the wound and tried to apply pressure, but the area was too big, the chunk of rifle too irregular. “Have to… make it to the supplies, have to… find a torch or…” Carbine willed himself to finish the step he started, but fell to the sloped ground below. He nearly passed out then, but managed to summon his deeply-ingrained soldier spirit and began to crawl, pulling his burnt and battered body over the mountain’s jagged rocks. He had to get just a few yards up the hill to the stash of supplies they had left when Maya, Lucy, and Ratt had departed down the hill for the city. He was pretty sure Ratt had a laser torch in there somewhere, but would it be enough to stop the bleeding?

“Someone bring whoever that was to me.” Don Luis Fernando stood and studied his serfs. A quiet had settled over the city. The battle was over. Don Luis looked down to his still mostly missing arm and watched it regrow before his eyes. He set his jaw firmly and puffed his chest up.

“No one fucks with me and gets away with it!” As he finished this proclamation, he mentally noted to find out who had conveniently been missing, only to show up with his traitorous wife. Her failed betrayal ended up being his saving grace, but the intent to mutiny was still there. They would be made examples of. But all in due time.

A dozen or so of the surviving vampires broke off from the crowd and made for the city gate. Don Luis knew that the lower creatures—the ones he’d made, as opposed to himself, made by the demon-urchin—lacked the level of powers he possessed. It might take them longer to find and capture the sniper, whoever he was, but that didn’t matter. Don Luis had seen the target get hit with his preternatural vision and knew he had nothing to fear from that one any longer. His thoughts were interrupted by a parting of the crowd. Don Luis looked up into the face of Lily Sapphire, and he grinned like a wolf licking blood off its teeth.

“You little slut.” He gestured for the men carrying her to bring her to him as he waltzed over to Lucy’s still, prone body.

“I’m gonna make you watch as I tear this one’s brains out.”

Maya made a face and whimpered, struggling in vain against her captors’ grip.

“And then I think I will give you your little wish. What was it, to be taken by me in front of everyone? Yeah, that was it. Wasn’t it?”

Maya knew that nothing she said would soothe his rage. She had already played her hand. The time for games was over. This was it. A flash of thoughts and emotions raced through her mind while she watched in slow motion as Don Luis first leered at, then bent down to Lucy. Thoughts swirled of their mission, of the little girl Wyntr, of her poor doomed guardians, Lucy, Ratt, Carbine, and Jon, the Morning Star, the Harvesters, Umbra, her late husband whom she never spoke of. Her husband… her husband…

Jon stood in place and recognized his fear. He knew he was in the presence of something truly evil, on the level of the Harvesters for sure. He focused his mind and in turn seized control of his body, as one would slowly yet confidently approach a wild horse to calm it, soothing its flight instincts, cooing to it, stroking its neck and then gently placing a bridle and reins on it. I am in charge, Jon thought to himself, and I can do this.

His meditative focus was of the little girl who had first enchanted him back in Home, had driven him to commit treason against his State, had brought him here and was even now up top risking her life to allow Jon unfettered access to the palace depths. She was no little girl, Jon reflected; she was a goddess. And he believed that he was falling in love with her.

Please, please let this work.

With that, Jon loosened his grip on the hammer's haft and let it slip down to the floor. He took one step into the darkness and could hear the hungry slithering of the needles as they shot in and out of the tubular mouths crowning the tips of each of the urchin’s hundred tentacles. He stopped where he was and removed first the poncho, then his Republic body armor, and finally his form-fitting shirt, tossing them to the side of the chamber as if he would never need them again.

If this doesn’t work the way we think it will, I won’t ever need them again.

Jon took two more determined steps. His eyes began to adjust, allowing him to see the tired, starving demon rise in anticipation of its next, much-needed meal. Jon assumed that the creature must take him for a fool and appeared in no way to be suspicious.

Perhaps, he thought, there were religious fanatics that have been here before and offered themselves so easily and willingly to this thing.

As he took one more slow step closer, the beast nearly tore some of its appendages off as it snapped at Jon, straining against the chains that bound it.

Or maybe it’s just really, really hungry.

Jon paused, as the next step would put him in range of the creature’s bite. He held his hands out to his sides, opening his chest up and creating an