High Flyer - Michelle Diener Page 0,60
on Iver.
The woman had a SAL, and she was trying to get a clear shot at Roj as he rolled around with Luki. She was shouting at Luki to move, but he seemed not to hear her.
The man turned briefly as she screamed Luki's name but then swung straight back to focus on Iver.
The shouting seemed to be the final straw for Lia. Iver saw her burst out of her hiding place with a shout of her own.
She had nothing but a thick stick in her hand, raised above her head and she took a swing at the man who had started in Iver's direction.
He wasn't looking her way, his focus was fully on Iver, and the stick connected against the side of his head with a crack.
He went down without a sound, and Lia turned in a single, smooth move and brought the stick down again, this time on Luki's back.
He roared in pain and fury, striking back at her with one arm and kicking out with his closest foot.
The move lifted him off Roj, who used the brief reprieve to pull something out of the side pocket in his military pants. As Luki turned back to him, Roj stabbed upward.
Luki bellowed in pain again, and Roj heaved him off.
As soon as he was free of Luki, the woman used her clear shot, and Roj looked down with a frown at the SAL dart sticking out just below his collarbone.
“Shit.” He coughed as he looked over at the woman, seeing her for the first time, and then fell back down, and lay still.
The woman was breathing hard, and she sneezed as the after-burn irritated her nasal passages. She turned the SAL on Lia, but Lia was already moving, stick raised up, and the camp guard missed as she was forced to leap back and shoot at the same time.
“That's got, what? One or two more darts?” Lia swung the stick again, leaning forward to extend her reach.
The stick struck the woman's hand, and the SAL flew out of her grip and landed amongst the tree roots, near Iver's feet.
He scrambled over and picked it up, saw neither woman had noticed him yet.
Lia was swinging the stick again, the camp guard dancing out of reach with the hand that had been hit tucked up against her stomach.
Enough of this.
Iver stepped out of the copse and shot Lia in the back.
For a moment she went still, then tried to look over her shoulder before she fell face first onto the ground.
The woman from the camp stared at Lia in shock, unsure what had happened, and then finally lifted her gaze and saw him.
“Who are--?”
Iver shot her as well.
He checked the SAL as she collapsed. Lia had been right. There were no darts left.
Someone made an animalistic sound, and Iver turned to find Luki staring at him, both hands at the wound in his side.
As Iver took a step toward him, Luki started to cough, a heaving, hacking sound, and then he passed out.
Iver started coughing himself.
TellTale after-burn was foul.
It should be banned.
Iver decided it would be banned. As soon as he got back to his job of running the fucking planet.
Which these fuckers had tried to stop him from doing.
He vaguely realized he was about to kick Luki, that his boot was going back so he could really put one in, and he stumbled away, back into the trees and turned from the clearing, breathing the clearer air.
Then he staggered to the path and stood for a few minutes taking deep lungfuls, head bent, hands on his knees.
There was something in the after-burn chemicals that triggered violence.
He had never heard of that before, and it made him wonder who knew about it.
His list of wrongs to right was getting longer.
“Well, well, well. Who do we have here?”
Iver slowly lifted his gaze, and then straightened up. He still had the SAL in his hand but given that two other SALs were being leveled at him, and he knew his was out of darts, he dropped it to the ground.
“Wise choice.” Bret looked at him intently, and then swore.
“What, boss?” The man beside the camp leader was tall, thin and twitchy, as if he was out of his element.
“Iver Sugotti.” Bret swore again, and then kicked out at a stone near his foot.
“Turns out, I'm difficult to kill.” Iver lifted his hands and shoulders. “Before we go on about me and how much of a bastard I am, one of your guards has