Relic - Jaid Black Page 0,1

so rapidly that she had to glance away for the briefest of moments.

“Get ready, doc,” the leader sneered.

“But—”

“Be grateful you ain’t feeder-chow.”

Five seconds.

“Please,” the older man pleaded. “I can’t leave my wife and children behind.”

“You can and you are.” The leader grabbed him by the scruff of the neck. “Let’s go.”

Twenty-four hundred hours.

The portal swirled, switching to violet. Octavia’s musculature tensed. She heard the doctor scream as he was shoved into the portal. He disappeared, his body transported to only God knows where.

It was now or never. She couldn’t let the human collaborators follow the doctor.

Raising both hands, the commander fired her guns simultaneously and in rapid succession as she sprinted to the next row of potted plants and lunged to the ground. Her knees and elbows scraped the pavement, though she paid the pain no attention as she scrambled to a sitting position. She heard the leader mutter a curse just before he returned fire. In a matter of seconds she counted four more guns firing and knew instinctively she’d managed to take out half of them already.

Five down. Five more to go.

Turning around and crouching low, Octavia raised her weapons and killed two more men with shots to the head. Again she ran to the next set of potted plants, skidding to the unforgiving ground on already injured knees. Her breathing was heavy, her skin sweat-soaked.

Seven down. Three more to go.

“Fuck it!” she heard the leader yell. “Just move!”

She cursed under her breath. They were going for the portal. They no longer gave a shit who was firing at them so she no longer worried about giving up her position. Growling low in her throat, her green eyes narrowed as she stood up and prepared to fire both guns at the retreating figures.

Three Xenocanns materialized from seemingly out of nowhere. The feeders roared at the betrayal of the human collaborators and made short work of tearing the remaining three men to pieces. Yelling in their alien tongue, they repeatedly jabbed their serrated claws toward the portal. Octavia recalled the lone, weaponless doctor who lay in waiting on the other side of it.

“Shit,” she muttered, checking her ammo. She was down to almost nothing. She peered through the plants that provided her with cover. Her stomach muscles clenching, she watched as one of the Xenocanns walked through the portal, disappearing.

Her heart racing, Octavia determined not to let the second and third enter the gateway. She’d studied their kind for two years while imprisoned within the various encampments. From the Dallas Concentration Center to New York City to London and onward to Glasgow, one internment was no different from the rest. Where slaves were needed, slaves were sent. It was rare for an alien to get killed in the process, but she’d taken out four tonight to make it this far and knew exactly what needed done to take out two more.

Xenocanns—the scientific term for unknown or alien cannibals—had but one weakness… their hearts. She would get only one shot at each of the feeders. Her aim had to be true.

“Please God,” she begged, preparing to stand up and fire. “Help me.”

The next few heartbeats felt like they ticked by in slow motion while paradoxically being the quickest of her life. Standing up and opening fire, she killed one of the Xenocanns instantly and wounded the second. She was out of ammo.

Fuck. This is it, she thought, turning around and falling to her knees. The end of the line. Wounded or not, the alien invader’s superior weaponry would zero in on her location and sizzle her to nothingness before she could blink.

“You ain’t going down without us, boss.”

Octavia’s head whipped around. Nobody snuck up on her and lived to tell about it—never—yet two of her team had done just that. Relieved they’d made it out of their prison cells alive, she mentally blew out a breath, thankful for Jackson’s and Bellamy’s assistance. Their hands, as blood-stained as her own, told her without explanation they’d managed to overpower and kill their alien guards.

Commander Benatti threw her men the look—a signal they understood too well. Two men she’d believed long dead immediately opened fire, their bullets lodging in the heart of the wounded Xenocann. She—he—it—was dead.

The portal started up that whirring sound, forcing Octavia’s eyes to round. The gateway, she intuitively knew, was closing. “Let’s go!” she yelled to Jackson and Bellamy. “Into the portal!”

“Are you crazy?” Jackson yelled back even as he followed her up to the platform. “We can’t go