Page 66 of Alien Prince’s Fake Bride (The Tentacle Throne #1)
- Mareliux -
“Careful, sir!” Sergeant Gramjeon yells.
I swing Bellatriz, cutting down two Vyrpy enemies that come charging with their spears held out in front of them, one on the ceiling and one along the wall. It should be confusing, but I’m used to fighting them now.
They both drop to the floor, and Gramjeon slits both their throats in one swing of his titanium sword with its tungsten edge. He’s been detached to be my aide, but he behaves mostly like Caret’ax would have.
“Not many left,” I comment, shaking ice cold Vyrpy blood off my hand. “They should attack all at the same time, not in pairs.”
Gramjeon goes ahead of me to the next door in the Vyrpy ship. “They should, sir. I’m not about to tell them. But I’m grateful they activated the gravity in their ship. I never liked being weightless.”
“Take a break,” I order him. “Before we move further into the ship. Something about this whole thing feels off.”
The Vyrpy ambush was finally sprung on us, but it was a pitiful attempt.
Eleven ships attacked our ships from the side, shooting their guns from a long range and mostly missing.
It was easy for us to shoot back, destroy half of the Vyrpy attackers, and then board the largest of the ships, hoping to find information about their battle plans.
But we’ve fought our way through nearly the whole ship now, and we’ve found nothing of interest. The Vyrpy destroyed their control room before we could get there, and now we’re looking for any information we can find.
“Yes, sir. Spreading their forces out like this is dumber than the Vyrpy usually act.”
“Either they just want to slow us down,” I ponder. “Or their fleet is much smaller than we thought. Or it’s a trap that hasn’t sprung yet.”
“My bet is on the latter,” Gramjeon mutters as he cleans his sword. “There’s something we haven’t thought of, sir. There must be.”
More of our legionnaires come into the room, ready to go on.
“I think you may be right,” I agree as I look down on the dead Vyrpy. “It is very nice of the Vyrpy to turn the gravity on in their ships. As if for our convenience. They themselves prefer to fight while weightless.”
“They wanted us to attack and to spend time in here,” the sergeant suggests. “If there had been no gravity, we wouldn’t have gone this deep into it. They want us to waste time.”
“Or,” I ponder, “it’s for the benefit of someone else. Ready?”
“Yes, sir.” Gramjeon takes up his station next to me, sword drawn back and ready to strike.
I place a shielded explosive charge on the door and detonate it. The shielding holds and keeps the effect of the device inside it, so that the energy is expended on the door and not on us. The door explodes into the next room and makes hard clangs as it bounces around in there before settling down.
The legionnaires charge in, shields first, in a carefully drilled attack that they have perfected, their deafening battle yell echoing from the walls. There are some noises of battle, but it seems the resistance is no longer worth our efforts.
I replace Bellatriz in her scabbard. “I suppose there’s not much more going on here, Sergeant. Let’s return to the Gladiux ? — ”
There’s a great crash as the ceiling breaks open. A big shape falls down among the debris and dust.
“Enemy!” Gramjeon yells as he lunges to get between me and the new danger.
For a moment I’m stunned. I expected Vyrpy, but that’s not what this is.
This looks more like a gigantic insect, with a hard, black shell, long antennas, spikes and long, segmented legs with knife-sharp edges.
A pair of wickedly curved scythes extend from its forearms instead of hands.
Its head is a nightmare of faceted eyes which swivel with unnerving speed.
The barbed tail twitches and curves up and over the monster, pointing straight at me.
Gramjeon swings his sword, but the steel bounces off the enemy’s shell.
I draw Bellatriz and hold her in front of me as I change my position. “Keep your distance, Sergeant!”
The new enemy swings its scythes at me, forcing me to parry. Blue sparks fly at the impact, and the force of it rattles my arm
I check for any chance to retreat. Fighting this thing is going to be hard in these close quarters, with all kinds of debris and wreckage strewn around.
The monster doesn’t give me time to think.
It slashes both its scythes at me, as well as thrusting with its dagger-tipped tail.
I have to pick one of them to parry, and it’s the tail.
Bellatriz goes right through it and cuts off the last hand-breadth of it, then continues to the nearest scythe, knocking it away from its deadly swing.
But the second one grazes my other arm, leaving a trail of intense pain.
The legionnaires that just left the room charge right back.
“Take this, sir!” One of them tosses me his shield, and that saves my life.
The next attack from the monster is much faster and would have taken my head off if I hadn’t lifted the shield and blocked it.
My soldiers shoot and hack at the monster. It rears its deadly body as hundreds of bullets hit it and sharp blades bounce off its hard shell.
They’re not making much of an impression on it, and their guns are not loaded with armor-piercing bullets. Nobody expected to fight armored enemies inside the Vyrpy ship.
The deadly scythes shoot around in a semicircle, making a thin whistling sound before they cut down two of my men.
I furiously lunge closer to the thing to get inside its reach. Bellatriz slides through its head and cuts it completely in half, the upper half of the head dropping to the ground.
The monster is still alive, slashing its scythes and stabbing furiously with its tail. But there’s less control now, and it hits only the air, as if fighting blind.
I go in close again, avoiding its limbs, then thrust Bellatriz into the back part of the monster’s head. Its front collapses to the ground, but the rear legs are still gouging grooves in the floor as they thrash wildly, but without any plan.
A legionnaire runs up to the enemy and slaps an explosive on its carapace before he dives away. “Take cover!”
We throw ourselves down. The explosion shakes the room, and pieces of alien monster splat off the walls.
I get to my feet, sword held ready. The monster has been split into three pieces, and now all three are changing to a new shape. They look more like us now, with two legs and two arms, but otherwise they’re still very much like bugs. One of them has lost his head.
“Phrexz,” I suddenly realize. “Shapeshifters working together.”
“I didn’t know they could do that, sir,” Gramjeon says. “Three of them coming together to make a whole new beast.”
“Better than having to bring an armored vehicle,” I comment, genuinely shaken by the fight. “If you have two buddies, you can just jump on their shoulders and you’ll all transform into a tank.”
One of the Phrexz twitches, then goes still like the two others. Dark green blood pools under them, starting to smoke.
“It was effective,” Gramjeon says. “I’ve never seen anything like it.” He sends me a glance. “And it got you, sir.”
I look down on my left arm, where the blood is running down my forearm and dripping from my fingers. “So it seems. Well, one more scar won’t kill me.”
“ But more of those things might,” Bellatriz says. “ Have you thought about the consequences of finding Phrexz inside a Vyrpy ship, Prince?”
“I have,” I state grimly. “This was a trap. The Vyrpy are dragging us away from Khav, because our planet is about to be attacked by Phrexz. They’re working together now.
They must have an alliance against us. Sergeant, we must get back to the Gladiux .
Then we’ll set a course home and stretch our engines to the limit. ”
A spear of ice goes through my stomach. Sweet gods. I left her on Khav. Now the Phrexz are coming, an enemy that’s mostly known from old legends. “Come on. Everyone out. Signal all ships. Return to Khav. Prepare for battle. And signal Khav itself and warn the forces there.”
Umbra is there. Alone.
I start to run through the corridors of the broken Vyrpy ship.
“Sir, you’re making it hard to protect you,” Gramjeon protests from behind me.
“I must signal Colonel Grast,” I yell. “There may still be time to activate the extraction plan!”