OKay, innocent bystanders (aka readers), there's about three chapters to go after this one... This chapter is setting up a pair of simultaneous battles that form the planned climax. On a personal note, once in a while when I'm working, I stop for a good laugh. The end of this chapter was one of those times. See what you think...
Opening endgame
0645
Two cocooned humans, a man and a woman, screamed as the royal egg opened. The man's cries ended with a last reedy shriek when he was stung by the ectoparasitoid. The woman was still screaming when the parasitoid plunged its proboscis into her chest.
Nearby, another captive lay distended and dying, with the tails of premature parasitoids sticking out of every orifice, and from a wound in her belly. The only sign of life was a blink of her eyes, and a single tear that ran down her cheek. Suddenly, the shadow of a tall, bulky figure loomed over her. She raised her eyes. A gauntleted hand reached down and snapped her neck. Her eyes widened in surprise, and quite possibly relief, before rolling in death.
The royal ectoparasitoid, having finished feeding, turned to the third captive, the Hunter. It hesitated, and even retreated a step, as if some ancestral memory warned it of a deadly foe. But, its fear passed quickly enough. It darted toward Hunter and began to sting, or try to. Time and again, its ovipositor was stopped by Hunter's armor. It worked upward, toward the Jag ut jag's exposed neck. Just before its tail could thrust home, a concussion grenade hit the Hunter's breastplate and knocked the ectoparasitoid to the floor. It righted itself and raised its proboscis at an approaching figure. Before it could spray its acid bile, a metal tube went into its open mouth. There was a muffled bang, and its body swelled like a balloon. It darted away on violently twitching legs, belching puffs of phosphorous, to burst finally in a puff of ash.
Zaratustra stepped in front of Hunter. "If I free you," he said, "will you kill me?"
The Hunter bared his inner mouthparts and clicked his upper mandibles. "Will you kill me?" he said in a croaking voice.
"Fair enough." The cocoon broke open at a single tug.
0650
Aided by the strength of the exoskeleton, Frankepanic lifted enormous boulders from the doors and the helipad and cast them over the edge of Omega Aleph's roof. Henna, wearing the armor of the Huntress, reduced even larger boulders to manageable proportions with shots from the shoulder-mounted plasma cannon. When the last of the unliftable boulders was reduced to three modest boulders plus cobbles and gravel, Henna and Frankepanic conferred. "I can handle the rest myself," Frankepanic said. "You go back down to the hangar, and get ready to fly out of here."
"Will you fly with us?"
Frankepanic shook his head. "I think not. It is enough for me to see our triumph begun. If will be for you to see our final victories, to ensure that our people survive while the sub-men perish and then to take back the Earth from their killers."
Henna shook her head. "No, I think Zaratustra was in the right. We may outlast the untermenschen, but in the end our fate will be the same. But the souls of true men will be free, and that is all that matters."
0655
Three parasitoids sternly examined the carcass of the royal ectoparasitoid. They then "looked" to a spherical device beside it, one whose LED display had just dropped to single digits. The trio reacted instantly. One wrapped itself around the device (a large thermate charge), one began slashing and kicking at the pigs to drive them away, and the third grabbed the impregnated man and ran for safety.
The detonation of the charge turned the parasitoid holding it into an expanding cloud of flame, vapor and ash. Six pigs were enveloped, to run with their hides in flames, or scream and fall, or simply roast where they lay. Proctoids erupted from the burning carcasses.
At the door of the lab room, the pounding of besieging parasitoids at the door seemed to lessen. "I think I hear some of them leaving," said the Tick. "There might be just two of them still out there! Try scanning with the NBR again."
The scan brought three inhuman shrieks, and showed three parasitoids, two of which collapsed. The Tick opened the door, grabbed the nearest parasitoid by the tail and dashed its skull against a wall. One of the other parasitoids lunged for him. He threw the still-writhing body in his arms to pin his attacker. He then kicked its head in. By the time he turned around, the Flea had dispatched the last of the attackers.
"All right, here's how we do it," the Flea said. "We all get Maria to an operating room. Then the two of us go see where the rest of the critters went!"
0700
In the conning tower, Ndoka examined the contents of Ling's brief case. "Well, there is about 10,000 Euros here," he said. He stuffed the majority of the bills in his breast pocket. He frowned and held up a grenade launcher. "You were not by any chance hoping to get this, were you?"
"I didn't expect that you would overlook it," Ling said.
Ndoka spent a moment frowning in thought. "I suppose you kept your end. Now what do you want?"
"I would enjoy a cigarette, and a lighter."
Ndoka smirked. "Do you think I've never seen a James Bond movie?"
Frankepanic's voice came from the loudspeaker: "Ndoka, prepare to open the doors."
In the hangar, the lift rose, with the light helicopter on it. Henna was at the controls, while Haig, still more or less comatose, was strapped in beside her. The lift stopped just after it rose out of sight. There was a rubbery smacking sound as pressure seals activated around the elevator.
On the roof, the lift doors retracted to half their length, then swung up and slid down. Before the elevator could restart, Frankepanic shouted, "Abort! Shut the doors!"
Out of sight, but clearly very near, the sound of an approaching helicopter could be heard. Frankepanic disappeared in a crackle of energy as Princip's dubiously appropriated Cyrano flew overhead.
"Set me down on the pad," Princip said as the copter doubled back. "Wait for my signal before you drop off the others." He leaped from the bomb rack as the craft made its second pass and tumbled to a stop on the helipad.
"No response," he said as he unlimbered a rifle. "Preparing to make an NBR sweep." At that moment, a large rock rose from the pad and smashed against the back of his helmet. He fell face-first to the deck, his dropped rifle sliding away from him.
"No response from Princip," the pilot said.
"Then do another pass to establish his status!" Potok said irritably. The helicopter did just that, moving slower than before. As it went over the pad a second time, a figure appeared out of nowhere, and fired a plasma bolt from torus mounted on one shoulder. The Cyrano's tail was nearly severed, and the craft went tumbling into the ground.
Frankepanic returned to invisibility. (His exoskeleton was fitted with an extra generator that provided power for the cloaking device and plasma torus, but not both at the same time.) He tossed the rifle over the side, and kicked Princip twice for good measure, knocking off his helmet. "Ndoka! Open the doors! Ndoka! Ndoka!... Henna, you're going to have to get out of the helicopter and go up to the conning tower. Ndoka is not responding."
Ndoka was, in fact, dead. His throat was torn out, courtesy of Dr. Krnabeg, who was currently feeding on his body. Dr. Ling had so far been ignored. He scooted closer. Krnabeg looked up, just in time to catch a kick full in the face. He lurched back, but did not fall. He lunged at ling with the speed and ferocity of a panther. The doctor rolled on his back and kicked up with both legs, to catch the berserker's neck between his feet. He then swung him sideways, slamming his head against a console and twisting his neck. Krnabeg's lifeless body fell on top of his victim.
Ling rolled back, swinging his cuffed hands under his own backside. Krnabeg seemed to stir, though the way his head lulled left no doubt of his state. Tiny hands slid out from under him, followed by the head of a miniature parasitoid. Ling stuck a tiny blob of putty on the cuffs and thrust out his hands as far as he could. The putty ignited with a flash and a shower of sparks. The handcuff chain and one of the cuffs broke apart from the head. Some of the sparks hit Ndoka's shirt, setting the fabric on fire. The parasitoid freed itself to the waist with a lunge, and snapped its jaws and proboscis at Ling. Ling dived behind his briefcase, just as the flames reached Ndoka's breast pocket.
In the hangar below, the queen clawed at the metal floors in anxiety. "It would appear, your majesty, that your helpers are running into some trouble," Nibeaux said. "Perhaps some of them are having doubts." The queen turned her head and made a long, elaborate, frothing hiss right in his face.
"As much as I can appreciate the sentiment," Zaratustra said, "I must ask that you back away from my employer."
