Freedom

Chapter 31

You know what I was doing this time last month? I was flying from Vancouver to L.A. for a fighting games tournament. I remember the people at the airport giving me a hard time with my fight stick – but I was able, eventually, to convince them it wasn't a bomb. Some acquaintances of mine met me when I landed, and we got dinner at a restaurant I'd never been to before. It was great. Then back at the hotel, we played Street Fighter for far too long, because we were almost late for our pool in the morning.

I stayed in through the first bracket, but got sent to losers by a lawyer playing Dan. Then some spastic Yang eliminated me. Once I was out, I had time to hunt down some of my friends and get lunch before the Marvel brackets opened. I did a little better there, but you know it's only a matter of time until you run into someone with a little skill, a lot of luck, and Phoenix on his team.

But it didn't matter that I didn't even make top 32. It had been fun – every minute of it. Well, I'd been a little salty after my losses in Marvel, but it wasn't enough to spoil the weekend. I hadn't expected to last as long as I had, and I was pleased on the whole. I stuck around for the rest of the tournament; top eight was hype for both games. It was great.

Now bullets were whizzing everywhere, and I was dropping with dizzying speed toward water which I knew would have been hazardous even if my hands feet weren't bound. It beat the alternative, of course – from this height, the water was the only place I wouldn't break my neck.

The chain jerked to an abrupt stop yet again, and I wasn't sure whether my head or my ankles hurt more. The others still hung above; only I had been affected. I could see a beam up there, halfway bent. I tried not to move, but gravity was doing its job. The metal was ready to give at any moment.

The Merc had stopped firing his AWM; he was probably out of ammunition. Now he had his UMP out, and he was firing on semi. I was swinging dangerously now, and I could feel minute changes in tension in the chain binding my ankles. I didn't have long; this wasn't going to hold.

There was only one thing to do. It was just like being on the swings in elementary school, except nobody called me slanty, and nobody pushed me off. The beam gave even sooner than I thought, but I was lucky. I hit the grating and slid, but managed to stay dry. I struggled onto my back, hoping to do something with the tape and the rough metal I was lying on – but there was a guy in a hood right there, and he had a knife.

Velvet appeared out of nowhere, put a gun to his head, and pulled the trigger. I managed to close my eyes, but I felt a couple drops of blood spatter my face. When I opened them, Velvet was nowhere to be seen, and the body was right there, staring at me with a big hole in his head. Gross. She could have at least paused long enough to help get me free – or at least into cover.

I looked up to see that the others were still up there. Sagaris had dropped a little, but his support was still solidly connected enough to revolve on the crane track. So he swung in a lazy circle, eyes squeezed shut, and I wondered what sorts of thoughts he was having. He'd already been hit once, and though the armor had stopped it, that's never good for someone's mood.

It occurred to me that one hanging figure was missing. The Biker. That son of a bitch – he'd gotten free, but hadn't paused to help anybody else. If I got out of this next five minutes alive, I was going to knock him out.

The hooded folks were finally starting to run out of people. There must have been thirty of them on the ship – thirty people, and we'd thought we were alone. There should be a limit to creepiness. At least I knew the figures I'd seen on deck hadn't been my imagination. That was a cheery thought.

The tape tore, and my hands were free. The right one immediately began to throb – and I was starting to understand why. I rolled aside as a couple of bullets smacked into the grating where I'd been lying. I struggled into the shadows, and a third round hit me squarely in the back. It didn't penetrate my armor, but still drove me to the ground. I wrested the knife from the warm hand of the body beside me and rolled back over only for the guy to fire yet again, hitting me a second time. He was on the walkway across the water, one level up, taking measured shots with a snub-nosed revolver.

I forced myself up, transferring the knife to my right hand and throwing it with everything I had. I don't think I wounded him mortally, but he fell back out of sight, and that was good enough. I leaned forward and reached for the chains around my ankles. I started to struggle with them as the Biker's Pernach opened up somewhere nearby. Somebody – not anybody I knew – screamed, and the tortured metal of the hull gave an extra loud wail, which echoed around the cargo bay. A hot shell casing from who knew where bounced off my forehead.

"Watch it!" I shouted without looking up from my work, but my voice was drowned out by gunfire. I close to getting my right foot free.

There was the Biker – now he was out on the catwalk that led to Sagaris and the girls, clearly intending to free them. Someone below fired at him, and he absently pointed the Pernach down and fired a burst.

Velvet was actually rather close to me, and covered in blood. I was momentarily frozen, because it wasn't clear how much of it was hers. I opened my mouth to call to her, but she dragged herself out of sight. This wasn't going well. I hadn't heard anything from the Merc lately, either. They needed my help.

My right hand, already pulsing, tightened on the chains. The metal began to strain. I noticed that blood had run from the corpse of the man Velvet had executed, and was dribbling into the water.

The entire ship shuddered, and everyone on their feet staggered, like in Star Trek when the bridge takes a hit. I didn't know what had caused that, but it made me to slide down the grating, closer to the hole in the deck. I turned to scramble away, but I wasn't getting much purchase, and a length of my chain was already in the water, weighing me down.

Something moved overhead, and I looked up. On the highest catwalk, far above the fighting, a figure in a long coat was walking. He didn't stop, didn't pay attention to anything that was going on – he just strolled through like he owned the place. Sparks from a ricochet rained on his shoulders, but he didn't even flinch. Then he was lost in the shadows, and the shooting resumed in earnest. The remaining cultists were giving it everything they had – which wasn't much – but even with their ranks devastated, they still outnumbered Velvet, the Merc, and the Biker.

I looked up to check on the Biker. He was lowering Tyrian, and shielding her with his body from the shooters below. But he wasn't alone. There was someone else up there with him – not the man in the coat – he had been tall and thin. This was someone new. I squinted in the poor light. The figure behind the Biker was dressed as a stalker, but very short for one – and slender as well. I opened my eyes to shout a warning to the Biker that there was someone behind him – but the figure had vanished. I rubbed my eyes and looked again, but it was really gone.

My right hand had begun to tremble. I almost pulled off my glove to look – but I was afraid of what I might see. I grabbed the chains around my ankles and pulled. A link cracked. I pulled harder, wondering where this power was coming from.

There was another impact, this one much harder than the first. The entire cargo ship wailed under the blow, and bulkhead seals burst all over. The Biker had both girls down, and was clinging to the railing to keep from being thrown off, but Sagaris was swinging out of control – I saw him hit a loose beam with a terribly final sound. It was the same beam I was attached to. It plummeted into the water, throwing up a foamy spray. And my chain went after it, jerked away from my hands and dragging me toward the edge.