Collision of Worlds - Chapter 9

She finally allowed them to stop for rest a few hours later. Traq was exhausted, and she’d pushed them at a heavy pace. She had a headache from using her implant and it was throbbing just behind her eyes, making them water.

Using the implant wasn’t something she’d done for a while, and it was the kind of skill that faded and became more difficult over time. She remembered during her time as a Shield that she could manifest her abilities for hours before the headache set in.

She would need to remember to practice more.

She forced Traq to drink some water and eat an energy bar before he passed out, but she knew the hike was too much for him. She would need to give him a chance to recover soon for longer than a few hours. His body simply couldn’t keep up with the strain.

But they didn’t have a lot of options. The advancing army knew she was out here now. No doubt those scouts had woken up and given their reports about why they had discharged their weapons. If they considered Vivian to be even a remote threat, they would send more soldiers after her and Traq, and they would easily be able to catch up with them in any of their vehicles.

Maybe she should have killed the scouts to keep her and Traq safe, but that wasn’t a line she was willing to cross, not while she was with Traq, at least.

She didn’t want to leave Traq while he was sleeping again, but she had to get an idea of what they were facing. She searched around the nearby area for a high tree she could climb to get a better lay of the land.

She found one only half a kilometer away and scurried up it. She reached the top branches and looked out, trying to get a view of what they were facing.

She couldn’t see much because of the foliage, but she could see a large amount of smoke rising in the distance from countless campfires.

There were hundreds of them, enough for thousands of soldiers.

Probably a good thing she hadn’t killed the scouts. She had to hope that they underestimated her and wouldn’t send much of a response after them.

In any case, it was a problem she would have to face when it happened. For now, she just had to make sure Traq was doing okay and keep moving. It would take several more days even at a fast pace to get to Delphi. She just had to make sure they got there ahead of the army.

2

“I’m so tired,” Traq whined, staggering along next to her.

It wasn’t the first time he’d said it, nor even the first time this hour, but to his credit, he was complaining a lot less than Vivian expected. They were well into the next day of hiking, and they hadn’t managed to stop for a sizable break since they’d first spotted the army.

Traq plodded along beside her, eyes on the ground and unfocused. He was starting to falter in his movement, and she knew he wasn’t going to keep going much longer. He was exhausted well beyond what he could handle.

Twice, though, she’d tried to stop for a longer break than a few minutes and heard the sound of approaching vehicles behind them. They were sticking to heavily wooded areas that the vehicles couldn’t get into, and they took roundabout paths and avoided open areas so the scouts couldn’t cut them off, but the rapid pace was starting to drain Traq.

“Won’t be much longer,” Vivian said. “We can stop just around that next bend.”

“Really?” he asked, perking up and looking ahead.

“Yeah,” she said.

She was carrying both of their packs now, knowing there was no way he would be able to keep moving while carrying his modest supplies.

She was feeling it herself, too. Her legs were weak and she was mentally and physically exhausted, but she needed to keep up a tough exterior for Traq’s sake. If he thought she was struggling, then it would only be worse for him.

They kept walking, the only sound their breathing as they moved through the forested area. It had been several hours since they’d last seen any sign of the scouts, and she was getting hopeful that they’d lost them.

Vivian knew she would need to carry Traq soon if they weren’t able to rest, but hopefully they would find somewhere to stop for the night before it came to that.

“Are those people still chasing us?” he asked as they walked.

“I don’t think so,” Vivian replied. “I think we might have gotten away.”

“Why were they after us?”

“Because they are afraid we will warn Delphi that they are coming.”

He paused. “Will we?”

“I don’t think it will come to that.”

“Will they keep searching for us?”

“I hope not,” she replied.

She doubted the scouts had even reported the incident as a real threat. Considering it was a lone woman and child that had handled them so efficiently, they would probably just drop it and pretend it never happened. Admitting what had actually happened—that they were beat up by an unarmed woman and child—would make them a mockery in their camp with the other soldiers.

“You said it was just up ahead,” Traq said after another hour of walking.

“It is,” she said. “Just around that next bend.”

“That’s a different bend,” he argued.

“Well, then this is the one,” she said. “We’re almost there, I promise.”

They got a lucky break about twenty minutes later when she spotted some ruins up ahead. With the blistering pace they been making for the last day, it looked like they’d found the abandoned city after all. She didn’t have time to worry about whether or not Traq shouldn’t see something like this now. She was just hoping they might find shelter.

Funny how the threat of death took away such trivial concerns.

She was certain they would find somewhere to lie low in there. With any luck, they could at least rest for a couple of hours before they had to move again. Enough time to catch their breath and take in a good meal.

They kept moving, and it took about another half hour of walking to actually reach the city. This was where Delphi used to be located, she knew, but after the last war, the cost of rebuilding the city had been too great and they had elected to move it. Now, it was just abandoned and neglected.

It was bigger than she’d expected, stretching into the distance with the skeletons of buildings and toppled structures lying on the ground. It looked like skyscrapers had been torn down in explosions, leaving nothing but devastation in their wake.

“We’ll find somewhere in here to rest for the night,” she explained.

Traq nodded but was too tired to respond by this point. He was panting and his legs were shaking, but he wasn’t complaining. He was barely able to keep moving, and she was impressed with his tenacity.

They moved through the city streets and the structures, shifting around the rubble and wreckage. The city had been destroyed and abandoned twenty years ago, forgotten by the people who once lived here.

Eldun was an interesting planet because they had dangerous modern weaponry purchased from planets like Jaril, yet their politics and attitudes reflected more primitive societies engaged in isolationist politics and warfare that was all but eliminated from larger worlds.

Those advanced weapons they acquired could cause considerably more damage than they would have been able to if they had been left to their own devices.

In the Republic, a planet like Eldun would have been forbidden from purchasing or using weapons like this. The heavy hand of the First Citizen would have forced peace on Eldun years ago. It might not have solved the root problems, but it would have saved many lives.

Sure, the Republic had its own problems, especially where the Ministry was concerned, but at least they wouldn’t allow a planet to simply murder poor civilians the way planets in the Indeil kingdom could.

“Here we go,” she said, steering Traq toward a relatively intact structure a decent ways off of the main roads. It looked to have once been an underground facility for ground vehicles, though much of it had collapsed in the preceding years.

Somewhere deeper in the structure, she heard the dripping sound of water, but she didn’t think exploring would be a good idea. It looked stable enough to offer shelter around the edges, but not sturdy enough to trust near the interior. Plus, they had plenty of water in their supplies for a few more days.

Traq collapsed to the ground just inside, leaning against a wall and taking deep breaths. He closed his eyes and laid his head back against the cement.

“I’m dizzy.”

“It’ll pass. How do you feel?”

“I hurt.”

“That’s good. It means your body is trying to heal itself back up,” she said. “We’ll rest here for a while, so get some sleep.”

Vivian sat near the entrance, keeping one eye on her young charge and the other on the street outside.

She doubted the army would come through here. It would be difficult to get jeeps or vehicles over the rough terrain, and it wouldn’t cost them a lot of time to simply pass around the city. She figured they were still a ways ahead of the army, maybe a day or two, but that meant the scouts wouldn’t be far behind.

The sun slipped down below the horizon, making it difficult to see very far in any direction. There were no lights this far away from Delphi, and on a cloudy night like this, it turned pitch black. She closed her eyes, focusing on the sounds of the night and listening for any approaching footsteps.

3

Vivian was more exhausted than she’d realized because at some point she started dozing off. Her head dipped down to her chest, and she fell asleep.

She felt a tapping on her shoulder and reached up sharply, grabbing the finger touching her. Her other hand slid to the gun at her hip and began drawing it out.

She relaxed when she realized it was Traq.

“What? What is it?”

He winced and held a finger to his lips, then he pointed toward the exit of the parking structure. It took a second and then she heard the scuffing sound of a boot. It was a long way off, barely noticeable, but now that she was listening for it, she could hear a group of approaching soldiers somewhere outside in the abandoned streets.

Traq had a frightened expression on his face. She reached out and gently squeezed his shoulder, nodding at him to let him know things would be okay, and then slowly climbed to her feet. Her body was exhausted and stiff, but she was used to the feeling and knew how to force herself past the strain.

This was the sort of conditions she had been trained to fight in as a young girl. She was taught to battle and kill, especially when her body was weak and broken and she felt helpless. Her teachers would beat her and push her past the breaking point and still expect her to fight back.

This was what her mentors had prepared her for, and as the danger intensified, the adrenaline brought her back to those experiences as a little girl.

She tested her implant and drew in a steadying breath. Her first headache hadn’t gone away from using the implant a few days earlier, but it wasn’t enough to hinder her. She crouched near the entrance to their little hiding place and waited, listening.

No doubt whoever was approaching would have night vision technology—something she hadn’t thought would be necessary in this little excursion—which gave them an upper hand. She would need to hit them hard and fast.

She listened and estimated that there were four soldiers at least. A difficult, but not insurmountable, group.

She reached into her backpack as quietly as she could and removed a flare. There was a chance their night vision goggles would protect them against sudden bright flashes with flare compensation, but that was a risk she would need to take. In either case, she wouldn’t be able to take them on in the dark, and she could at least even the playing field.

The footsteps drew closer and she held her breath, waiting for them to either notice her and Traq inside the structure or move past. She felt the hairs standing up on her neck, and her muscles clenched, ready to spring into motion.

A long few seconds passed and then the footsteps passed beyond the building. They hadn’t bothered to check inside and had no idea that anyone was hiding out. Vivian waited until they were a decent ways off before allowing herself to breathe once more. She turned to Traq.

“Stay here,” she whispered. “Out of sight.”

Then she slipped out of the structure and onto the street. Her eyes had adjusted fairly well to the night, and she could see enough to spot the moving shapes up ahead. She crept along behind them, finally catching up with the soldiers after a few minutes.

She stayed behind rubble and debris and trailed them. There were five of them, but she couldn’t tell if it was that same first group of scouts plus a few more or an entirely different team. They weren’t very attentive, never giving any structure more than a cursory glance, but they were armed and armored in fairly extensive gear.

She followed them for another ten minutes until they made their way out of the city and disappeared back into the woods. She was surprised, though, that they headed toward Delphi instead of back toward the army from Briden’s Ward. These weren’t advance scouts for the army but rather scouts for Delphi.

Which meant they must know about the approaching army. She had been hoping to make it back inside the city before they upped their defenses, but it looked like that was going to be more difficult now.

She had more pressing matters to worry about just now, though. That meant the scouts from Briden’s Ward were still out there. She headed back and found Traq in the shelter. He was huddled up and waiting for her.

“Are they gone?” he asked after a minute, chewing.

“Yes,” she said. “They left. We’re really close to Delphi now, so we should be there by tomorrow or the next day at the latest.”

“Okay,” he said.

She took some food out of her pack, and she started eating: peanut protein bars that were slimy and tasted stale. It looked like the General hadn’t stocked her the freshest of rations.

“We need to eat,” she said. “Keep up our strength. Here.”

She handed him another of the protein bars.

“I hate those.”

“You need to eat.”

He sighed and accepted the offered bar, taking a small bite of it the way a bird might. Then he scrunched up his face in exaggeration and made gagging noises.

She ignored him, knowing he was only doing it to get a response.

“Good thing you heard them,” she said instead.

He shook his head. “I didn’t hear them.”

“Then how did you know they were out there?”

He shrugged. “I woke up, and I had a feeling. It was...I just knew they were out there.”

She hesitated. “Just knew?”

“Yeah,” he said. “It’s like I could feel them.”

She chewed quietly on her food, trying to decide what that meant. She knew a lot of people from the Ordo Mens Rea who could sense others like Traq was describing from her years spent at the Ministry and with the Shields. Wade had been able to do it a little bit, and some of the other Shields had been considerably more adept at it.

She’d never been able to do anything like that. Her powers stemmed more toward telekinesis and fighting. So did Traq’s, she had assumed, since she saw him throw a kid through the air a few years earlier.

The thing was, very few members of the Ordo Mens Rea could handle one ability effectively, let alone multiple, and the idea that Traq could manifest two completely different powers without an implant was unthinkable.

But maybe not for Traq, she decided. He hadn’t ceased to amaze her yet, so why should this be any different?

“Get some sleep,” she said. “As soon as it’s light enough, we’re going to keep moving.”