What the hell? Who wants to live forever?
For the record and in case any higher deity was listening and taking notes, he did. But he was definitely going to cut his life short if he kept rescuing his sisters. Or at the very least cut his freedom down to the size of a ten-square-foot cell.
Yeah well, at least then I’d get three meals a day instead of six a week.
Pushing that thought away, he pulled his blasters out and set them to stun to do what he did best.
Survive and escape.
“Drop your weapon!” an Enforcer shouted from his left.
Yeah, right. Like he’d ever followed orders. Caillen opened fire as he dodged into a vacant alley that was as run down as the one he’d stashed Kasen in. Their return fire and the holes it left in the walls, street and trash around him let him know fast their blasters weren’t set for stun.
They were trying to kill him.
He considered resetting his to return the favor, but he didn’t want to kill the drones out to make rent. They didn’t deserve to die for supporting a corrupt system. Even the mindless needed to eat and it took more guts than most people had to stand and fight against the League and its sycophantic governments. He wouldn’t hold their cowardice against them.
Much.
Jerking his head to the right, he felt the heat from a blast that narrowly missed his face. Strangely enough, he was completely calm as he fought. His sister Shahara called him Eritale—a Gondarion term that meant made of ice. And he was. Since the day he’d seen his father killed, he’d never panicked again in a confrontation.
No idea why. It was like the fear inside him had shattered that day and left something freakishly copacetic in its place, something that set in during a fight and left him totally rational.
He shot at three Enforcers before he holstered his right blaster and launched a grappling hook to the roof of a decaying building. The further he could get them from his sister the less likely they were to find her unconscious body and question her.
The hook caught and set.
Caillen pushed the recoil button on the hook’s handle and fired at the Enforcers with his left hand as he sped toward the roof. Return blasts came close to him, but none hit the mark as he quickly zigzagged up the chipped brick wall to the top. Thankfully none of the drones were bright enough to shoot his cord—that would have left an ugly stain on the street and ruined his already screwed up day.
At the topfontrambled over the lip, dislodged the hook, recoiled it completely, then took off running toward the river across the roofs, jumping from one to another with the grace and flexibility of a gymnast—something he trained hard every day to maintain.
The deep whirring of an engine overhead let him know air support was on its way and it was coming in low and fast. From his vantage point, he could see the number of Enforcers after him. And it was impressive. They ran on the streets below and across the rooftops, all trying to get a shot at him.
What? Was it a slow day? Didn’t this place have any real criminals?
No, let’s go after the smugglers ’cause they were so much more dangerous than, say, a rapist or murderer.
“What the hell was in your ship, Kase?”
He should have checked the manifest because this was looking bad.
Real bad.
More shots rained down as the airlift spotted him and came in as fast as it could fly. Damn the bright daylight of a double sun. It left him totally exposed without a single dark shadow to crawl into.
Ducking the door gunner’s shots, he took off at a dead run as he dodged fire.
Caillen jumped to a roof and rolled to his feet an instant before the door opened and six Enforcers spilled through, aiming and firing at him. He turned to go back, but there were more coming in behind. The gunship was on his right and about to pin him into one seriously nasty situation. Dodging left, he sucked his breath in at the distance to the next rooftop. If he missed that, it was going to hurt.
Who wants to live forever?
Ignoring his favorite motto whenever a dose of extreme stupidity was called for, he pulled his javelin off his belt and extended it so that he could use it to pole-vault over. He held his breath as he soared over the street so far below.
Thankfully years of dodging authority and living his life one half step this side of death had left him with enough skill to make it to the other side. As soon as he was safe on the rooftop, he collapsed the javelin and kept going as shots whizzed past him. Several grazed off his armored shirt and backpack, and would have brought him down but for their protection. Still, it stung like hell and a couple burned his arm.
You know, a sane man would be wetting his pants.
Good thing he was crazy as hell.
He ran to the ledge and in a well-practiced move, planted the hook into the wall. Without pausing, he jumped over the side and rappelled down to the street where he’d have some cover. He jerked the hook free and let it recoil back into the case on his forearm.