Page 27

AXXOL

R ed wanted to rip my fucking head off. Fire burned in his eyes that had nothing to do with his heat sensors. Shifting back to my rex, I held his gaze. Waiting for the truth to settle in his head.

This had nothing to do with my ego or whose dick was bigger, and everything to do with strategy.

He’d grown a lot as a mated Tri-R but I still possessed alpha programming that he didn’t.

I knew our squad’s weaknesses and strengths as if they were my own skills.

How best to deploy each player to win, regardless of how badly we were outnumbered or incapacitated.

The youngling ran to him, curling her tail and smaller limbs around his lower leg. Immediately, the rage in his eyes burned hotter—but not at me. He gave me an expectant look, head cocked, waiting for his orders.

:Testing, one, two, three,: Rizan’s voice crackled over the grid. :We’re back, baby. Improving connection speed and stability.:

:Jam their fucking signals,: I ordered. :How badly are you injured?:

:Working on it. Lost some tail feathers but I’m good.:

I detected some falsehood in that reply but without the medic handy, there wasn’t much we could do anyway.

:I still can’t reach Natalie.: Kroktl kept his emotions tightly under control with his youngling listening.

:Signal’s jammed,: Rizan replied. :She’s not…: His words fell off into silence.

We didn’t need his words. Not when we could see for our own damned selves that she wasn’t pinging at the house. The second squad’s pilot had snatched her.

Akylla peeped softly. :Mama’s gone.:

I’d never seen a raptor cry before. Fucking hell. Not even BGR+s were immune to youngling tears.

Kroktl scooped her up so she could nuzzle up beneath his chin. :Don’t you worry, baby girl. We’ll get Mama back, and Lohr and Snryx will keep her safe.:

Assuming they’re still alive. I couldn’t censor that thought—but hopefully it didn’t echo on the grid. The rest of the squad knew the two dyni would be immediately incapacitated by DSC.

Akylla whimpered again. :She doesn’t have sharp teeth or claws like us.:

:She’s got something better,: Kroktl replied lightly. :The biggest heart full of courage and love. She jumped out of a helicopter once. Did I tell you that story?:

:Later,: I interrupted, earning a hiss. A multi-dimensional game board hovered in my head, displaying where the enemy squads were positioned. But there were two large threats I couldn’t identify. :Riz, what’re those incoming pings?:

:One’s the Balaenoptera pod carrying Myrm,: Riz replied.

:The other is the hurricane, though there’s something else wrapped in rain.

Something huge. Biologic, I think, but unlike anything I’ve seen before.

I don’t think it’s a human-made ship or tanker, even if they had one that could travel so fast.:

:The whales are already here?: Surprise echoed in Kroktl’s voice. :I didn’t think they’d be here for hours yet.:

:I’m no xenobiologist but yeah, they covered an astonishing distance in a short amount of time. I’m trying to get a better read on whatever’s in the hurricane. Do we know of any species that travel in storms or water like this?:

:Fine fucking time to lose our XNT,: I muttered. :See if you can access his databanks.:

:I can, it’ll just take me longer than it would for him because he’d be able to start whittling down by genus. Damn, whatever this thing is it’s over one-hundred meters long.:

Typical Dynosauros strategies played out in my head rapid fire.

HQ would expect us to eliminate the other alphas first to strand the rest of the squad planet side.

Then we could pick them off one by one—like they’d intended to do to our squad when they’d captured me.

Despite jumping Natalie to an unknown location, the other alpha was still pinging here. Stationary.

Which told me a great deal about what HQ planned—and what they weren’t willing to allow.

They could have jumped her straight into a HQ lab shielded in tungsten or to an infinite number of holding locations that would take us forever to track.

The alpha was still here, so we had a chance to get her.

He had to be holding locations together in the same jump.

Surprising, because I didn’t think most BGRs had enough juice to manage it.

As long as he was actively holding the jump, if we killed him…

The jump would fail Natalie right back to us.

Which made the rest of his squad expendable. DSC didn’t give two shits about what happened to them, or they would’ve passed through the ring already to safety.

:Let’s see if this alpha’s good enough to command his squad and hold a jump at the same time. Red, slip back to the house without engaging the rest of this squad. Start picking them off one by one and see if their alpha notices.:

Without a word, Kroktl disappeared into the brush, carrying the youngling. I wasn’t sure what he’d do to protect her, but I left the decision up to him.

:Riz, you and I are going to take out this TMS first. He’s their biggest threat.:

:Got it.: Already picking up what I wanted him to do, Riz laughed. :I love playing chicken.:

Weaving up and down through the trees, Riz worked his way around to where the TMS had ducked back into the canopy.

The rest of the squad had taken up defensive positions around the TMS. With his bulk, he couldn’t slip through the jungle easily, and they still wanted a chance to fry our circuits.

They needed a direct hit, which Riz wouldn’t give with his bobbing flight pattern.

He locked in visuals on the others, updating the grid with designations and weaponry.

Another comms specialist on a Ceratops base with a huge armored frill and heavy skull.

Looked to be an updated Titan class after they’d failed with the regular CEOT last time.

Idiots. Another heavy, ponderous beast unable to move his bulk in the jungle without knocking down trees.

They thought they needed size and power to take me out, but that only slowed them down.

HQ had provided them with a SPR like ours. Not to keep the squad alive with a medic—but to incapacitate a human woman and her youngling and keep them alive.

My lips curled away from my teeth in a silent snarl. Not one of those tentacles is going to touch our mate.

Not a single fucking one.

RIZAN

Popping up and down through the canopy strained my damaged wing and kept the wound on my side torn open. I wasn’t in danger of bleeding out, and the scent of blood would play to our advantage. They knew they’d injured one of us, and they’d be hungry for more.

The alpha had taken a bite out of my flank, but I left a good long scrape down his thick shoulder.

When I spun aside, my wing smacked into a thorny trunk that tore through feathers and ligaments both.

Maybe broke a couple of phalanges too from the ache.

Though a wounded wing played to my advantage too.

Axxol wanted me to fly at the TMS and keep its focus on me, while he snuck in for the kill. If I stayed close, the TMS wouldn’t be able to fire at me, but I didn’t want the rest of his squad to gang up on me either. So I played up the injury, making it look like I’d be an easy kill.

I deliberately favored the injured wing, my flight unbalanced and awkward. I struggled my way up out of the branches, beating my wings, legs dangling. Even hopping from branch to branch, as if I needed a breather.

It certainly made for a good show, if I did say so myself.

The TMS extended its telescoping neck as high as possible, trying to get leverage over the playing field.

His head swung side to side, searching through the trees for another threat.

But he didn’t have Kroktl’s heat sensors or my echolocation.

As far as I was concerned, I’d never understand why HQ would send a squad out blind like this.

At least the other squad had two pterons in the air.

:Keep an eye on them in case they decide to work together,: Axxol warned me.

:They’re attacking the Balaenoptera,: I replied. :My guess is their orders is to keep the pod from reaching Natalie.:

He grunted sourly. :It’s a bloodbath.:

Screeches echoed through the rising winds. The pod never stood a chance. Balaenoptera didn’t have any defenses, especially against dyni.

:Almost in position,: Axxol said.

Evidently, we were both going to play chicken. He’d have to get through the Ceratops to reach the TMS. Nice.

:Engage,: Axxol ordered.

I flapped my wings loudly, seemingly struggling to gain speed and altitude over the canopy. Making myself a target.

The TMS zeroed in on me, his silver eyes glowing, already fully charged. Though he was reluctant to blow his whole wad on just me. It’d take him too long to recharge, and our alpha was still on the loose. He’d want to deliver as much damage as possible to maximize his threat.

I flew a standard evade flight pattern, zigzagging back and forth in his field of vision.

Still selling the injury but now adding desperation.

Fury. I screeched at him, clacking my beak, lifting my legs up closer to my body with talons forward and extended.

But now I added some speed, closing in much faster than he expected.

A millisecond before he fired his tasers, I rolled to my good side, using my injured wing to slice in a hard dive.

As I hoped, he overshot, expecting me to favor the injury.

I felt the crackle of electromagnetic energy buzzing past but I was too close for the stream to widen enough to zap my systems. Interference and static buzzed through the grid but without a direct hit, our internal network held.

Raking talons down his neck, I used the sharp tip of my beak to dig into his flesh, looking for an artery. Cause as much damage as possible. Keep him occupied. While the Big Rig did his work.

The ceratops bellowed. Trees crashed and swayed below.