Emergence by Chris Harris (ebook reader for surface pro .txt) 📖

“And the best-case?” Fairns asked, voice wavering.

“A few minor earthquakes.” The Irinian smiled as he said so, as if he had delivered good news.

Trexor grabbed the Irinian by the throat and raised him off the ground. The other two retreated to the side. “Wipe that smile off your face, you little shit. Even one quake could level this city; those skyscrapers were built for convenience, not to withstand disaster.” The Irinian fell to the ground, clutching his throat as Trexor released him. “Fairns, what do we do?” Trexor's face fell, eyes and mouth drooping as he realised the hopelessness of the situation.

“More evacuations seems like the only cause of action.” Fairns cracked his knuckles again, wincing this time. “But we don't have the resources.”

“Then the people will have to make do with an old method.” Trexor marched out of the small room and into the bustling command hub. Clapping his hands to get attention, he roared to the crowd, “You lot! Get your arses in gear! Sound the alarms, we need everyone evacuated and onto the farms outside the city! We have reports that the buildings could collapse at any point; we need to save as many people as possible. Now, go!”

*

The alarms rang and rang and rang through the day. Soldiers ran, kicking doors down and dragging families from their homes, seeming to the unwitting eye like the invaders that had doomed their planet. Trexor jogged towards a skyscraper unscathed by the Xaosian attack; it was at the furthest northern edge of the city. All around, curses and slurs were written boldly in once-bright paint; a stain on even this part of the city. As his eyes darted subconsciously around, he remembered the last time he had been this far north. He rubbed a hand over his back and winced; the pain had never went away and never will: part of the knife's blade was jammed into his right lung; removing it could kill him. Instead, Trexor adopted to have an artificial expansion to his lung, effectively replacing the damaged section. He hated this place. Glass cracked underfoot, bricks clattered away from his footfalls and the needles and knives strewn around would have pierced his foot, had it not been for the steel-soled boots.

One of those boots sent the atrium door of its hinges, and it clattered to the floor. Inside, there was no light; the power for this district was probably knocked out, or rerouted to the military-base. “Torches on.” he said to the five other soldiers with him. “Spread out; I'll take this floor, you can take the others.” The ground floor was always the heaviest populated; to give the skyscrapers some sort of stability, the ground floor acted as a large base for the spire to sit atop. Once the others had gone into the elevator shaft, Trexor heard them activate their climbing gear; elevator shaft was the only way up.

Knocking on the first door, Trexor heard no reply. “Anyone home?” No reply still, but a scratching sound instead. Frowning, Trexor went to knock on the door again, and it fell backwards and onto the ground with a dull thud, throwing up a small dust cloud. The torchlight helped to illuminate a path ahead of him, and he saw a pile of boxes stacked in a corner. Making sure no-one was looking, he inched ever-closer to them; something about them felt wrong to him. After clipping his torch onto his shoulder, he pulled the top one off of the pile and opened it. Dozens of bags of white powder were inside, each marked with a red feather. “Bloodhawks...” Trexor muttered to himself; whoever lived there was evidently a high-ranking member of the Bloodhawks, one of the three major gangs that operated in the North.

Thud.

Trexor turned abruptly, drawing his pistol from its holster, setting it to stun; no need for more killing today. “I know you're there, now come on out.” He saw something shine in the kitchen-doorway and lurched back just in time for a knife to slam into one of the boxes, spilling the powder over the floor. Trexor backed behind a chair and kept his gun pointed at the doorway.

“My quarrel is not with you.” His attacker spoke in a soft voice. “In fact, all I have done is get rid of a criminal; you should be thanking me.”

Trexor turned his light onto the speaker; tall, slim, bald, but there was a faint scar which arced from his left ear to his nose. He stood, and looked at the man. “Remember me?”

The man cocked his head and smiled. “Ah, General. I never forget a face, and you put up...” he paused and stroked his scar, “more of a fight than others.”

“And you failed your mission.” Trexor said bluntly; this man, Trexor found out months after his attack, was a member of the Assassins: a group of mercenaries for silent murders. This man was Trem Naylar, one of the lower echelon members. “I still have part of your knife in my shoulder, you know?”

Trem smirked and exhaled as if amused. “I don't like an unfinished job.” He drew a small pistol from a holster on his thigh and fired at Trexor.

The bullet barely missed Trexor's head as he jerked to the side. Growling, Trexor drew his own sidearm and took a shot at where Trem was, but he had vanished. Trexor cursed; letting an assassin out of your sight was tantamount to suicide. Deciding it was useless, Trexor put his gun away and drew his sword instead; a better defence against a close-range attack, as there would be no point trying to defend against a gunshot he can't hear. “What now?” Trexor called, walking over to the door. “I could just walk away right now.”

No answer.

Trexor pushed the door closed. “But now we can't.”

“It's like you want me to finish the job.” Trem's voice echoed round the room. “But I would like my blade back.”

A shadow leapt at Trexor, but he put his sword up in the way, and forced Trem back, before kicking his feet out from beneath him. Trem slashed with the knife, but it caught on Trexor's armour. Trexor stamped on Trem's wrist, and the knife dropped to the ground. Pinning him to the cold floor, Trexor hissed in his ear, “You want your damn blade back?” Trem struggled, but Trexor twisted his arm around until he gasped in pain. Sheathing his sword, Trexor used his now-free hand to pick up the dropped knife. “A fine blade.” The handle was golden – too heavy for real gold – and had indents in for each of Trem's fingers. The silver spike emerging from the handle was long and thin like a needle, and almost identical to the one still inside Trexor.

Trem twisted his head around and saw Trexor examining the blade. “What are you doing? If you're going to kill me, get on with it!”

Trexor poked Trem's shoulder with the tip of the blade, nicking the skin slightly. A circle of red slowly formed where the skin was cracked. “I won't kill you, you're defenceless.”

Trem smiled. “Even after I try and kill you twice, your honour stops you? That is why we win, General; no regrets.”

“I said I wouldn't kill you.” Trexor slowly eased the blade into Trem's shoulder. Blood began to build up, and Trem's eyes widened.

“General, no. Please.”

Trem screamed in pain as the blade stopped, hitting bone. Trexor hit the blade with the side of his hand, snapping it in two. “Now you can live as I have.” Discarding the knife, Trexor left the room and felt nothing but a dullness within; none of the satisfaction he thought that he would have after dealing with his demon.

A grating sound came from beneath him, and Trexor was thrown to the floor. “Damn...” he muttered. A shelf dropped off of the wall behind him, its contents clattering to the ground. Glass shattered a photoframe fell from its hook. Trexor got up and ran outside, calling for backup.

As he got outside, the grating sound echoed through the area once again, and he flailed his arms to stay upright, but to no avail. When he stood, he looked up to the sky and saw windows shattering, falling glass shards. He dove out of the way, flinging his arms over his head. Moving further away from the skyscraper, he saw that the very top was rocking from side to side. “Get out of the building!” he yelled into his com.

Bricks tumbled down from the building, shattering into dust and clay as they met the floor. Smoke poured out of the ground floor as damaged electric cables met burst gas pipes.

And amidst the smoke and debris, a dust cloud arose as the skyscraper came rushing down to earth.

The quakes had begun.

Streaks of light dart across his vision, before a bang sounds and he is thrown backwards. Darkness. Specks of light in the distance. So cold. So far away. Darkness. Blurred vision in a busy street, faceless men and women watch him.

He jolted upright as he woke. It was warm here, and the dreams were the only reminder of what cold was to him. His head felt strange, as if he'd been drugged again. Shaking his head, his vision cleared a little and his head felt a bit better. Groaning, he put his head in his hands, before running them through his long blonde mane; it was short before, but his Masters preferred the feral look.

“You okay?”

He looked over to see a slim red-skinned humanoid in the corner of the room, leaning on the sand-brown wall, right next to the iron bars that kept them in their cell.

He sighed, before answering, “Yeah, I'm alright Carnat. Just the dreams again.”

He had never seen another like Carnat or at least, he didn't remember them; all of those in his dreams were white or black skinned humans. But Carnat was no human.

“You should ignore the dreams, Ash.” Carnat stood and walked over to the food tray and ate a pinkish protein square. “Your memory ain't coming back without a good trigger, the last guy said. And that trigger ain't on Rat'hak.”

“I don't want to ignore the dreams; they're my memories.” Ash said, his face falling as he did so. “My memories from before. Otherwise my first memory would be watching the last guy – what was his name again? – fight.”

“Diin. Curious guy. Got a portion of his memory back; we called him Diin anyways, apparently it weren't his real name. Confronted the guards, demanded to speak to the Masters. So they made him fight that...thing. And...well, you saw what happened to him.” Carnat looked haunted at the memory.

“Did you ever have the dreams?”

“No.” Carnat answered firmly. “I've always known my past, and I know how to survive in this place. You do what I say, and you end up living.”

Ash had to agree with him; so far, he had managed to avoid fighting in the pits by sticking exactly to Carnat's orders. And they were orders, not requests; Carnat would fight with him, but he had no intention of doing so. “You'll get us killed,” he'd said, “I'll teach you how to fight.” And he did; Ash was now trained