Deadly Cargo (Jake Mudd Adventures Book 1) Read online

  An earthy metallic smell overwhelmed his nose. And a charring.

  Not good.

  Then he saw the first of many. His mount nearly struck the body, but managed to leap over it.

  Jake instinctively pulled back on the neck of his crag beast. The creature slowed. He wanted to look back at the man, to see that the soldier wasn't dead. He didn't look back. He knew there was no point. The wounds were too grave. Soon he passed dozens more Waudure. All lifeless.

  "Jake!" Nadira called out to him from somewhere nearby, but he couldn't see her.

  Blasts of high-powered lasers rained down onto the battlefield, pitting the ground, as even the rock succumbed to their power.

  "Here!"

  He looked around, struggling to see her through the explosions.

  She rode toward his voice, and he saw her.

  "They knew we were coming," she said.

  "We don't stand a chance out here. Their ships are picking us off."

  Hodin appeared between the two of them on his beast. "The mountains!"

  Jake nodded to Nadira, and the two of them took off, following Hodin. They rode blind for the better part of a minute, only avoiding the fire from the Cracian ships by a hair's breadth on several occasions.

  Screams of agony rang out around them.

  Poor bastards.

  They moved into a clearing in the smoke-filled air, still riding hard for the cover of the rocks ahead. Jake saw scores of fallen Waudure that cleared the plain before him only to meet the waiting Cracian ships above them. He kicked his beast into a gallop and, Nadira at his side and Hodin just ahead, watched the enemy aircraft soar past. The fighters flew toward the remaining Waudure troops still approaching.

  "We're nearly there," he said, surmounting a large hill.

  When he moved past the crest of the hill, he yanked on the neck of his crag beast, forcing it to a stop.

  From his mount, Hodin was firing at dozens of Cracian ground troops, who were rushing toward him from fifty yards or so away. Jake grabbed his blaster and added his fire to the fight. A moment later, Nadira and Alara rode down the hill and joined in.

  The uneven terrain between them and the Cracians proved decent cover against the advancing troops. But the already overwhelming odds took a turn for the worse.

  "We have to move now!" Hodin shouted.

  Another ship flew down, hovering just ahead of the advancing Cracian ground troops. The bottom of the craft opened and black cables dropped down to within a few feet of the ground. Down the dozen cords, which hung from inside the ship's lower opening, as many Cracian soldiers slid down.

  Jake took a few more shots while Nadira and Alara rode with Hodin off toward the rocks to the right, making for better cover behind the debris piled there by the transport pod explosions.

  He glanced around. The Cracian troops shooting at them blocked the only path through the mountains. Hiding in the rocks without something to change the tide would amount to suicide, he realized.

  Screw that.

  Taking another shot just to let the enemy know he was still fighting, he looked around for another way. Then he saw it. Halfway to where Hodin and the others had ridden, a jagged path rose across the side of the mountain. It wasn't man-made — or whatever race — but it would work, he thought.

  He eyed the cliff's edge at the top of the rocky path, fifty or sixty feet up. He glanced at the ship again. It was hovering at almost the same height, slightly lower, and maybe twenty feet from that side of the mountain. He could see the pilot through an open portal on the side.

  The Cracian reinforcements sliding down the ship's cables were halfway to the ground.

  "What the hell," Jake said to himself. He kicked into the side of his crag beast, and the two of them sped up the rocky path on the side of the mountain.

  "Jake!" Nadira's voice floated toward him from the distance.

  No time to explain. Either they all died or maybe he died, maybe he didn't. With any luck, it would be the Cracians' turn.

  The crag beast, accustomed to rocks and unsure footing, leapt up the path, carrying Jake, who felt a little uneasy in his gut once they reached the top. As he and the creature turned the last cut of the path and climbed over the loose stones piled up around the edge where the rest of the mountain had been blown off, a blast struck his mount's hind leg. Jake saw that the shot hadn't come from the ship itself, but from a soldier who was making his way down one of the dangling cables.

  His mount stumbled. Jake slipped to one side, though he didn't mean to do so. The side of his head hit one of the larger rocks on the precipice. He sat stunned on the beast for a split second before the creature fell on its side, badly wounded from the blast to its leg and Jake tumbled off its back and onto his own.

  Another shot from the man on the cable flew overhead. Jake scrambled to check the damage to the crag beast.

  "That won't do."

  The creature flexed its muscles, trying to stand, but it couldn't. Jake placed his hand on the animal's back and felt it breathe.

  He peered over the creature's drooping head to see if the Cracian ship had moved. It had, but now it looked even closer to the cliff than before. He could hear one of troops below yelling commands to his comrades. No doubt, they're going after Nadira and the others, Jake thought.

  "Now or never."

  He rose to his feet and looked past the edge of the cliff, guessing the distance to the ship. He put a mental bullseye on the pilot. Then he hurried several steps away from the edge of the cliff. He took a deep breath, as if it might be his last, before sprinting past the wounded crag beast and leaping off the mountain.

  When his feet left the solid ground, he had second thoughts.

  He'd achieved a fully horizontal pose, with his blaster hand leading him slightly. It must've taken no more than a second to travel the distance from the cliff to the hovering ship. Nonetheless, as is usually the case with imminent death, time slowed. Or so it seemed to Jake.

  He counted the troops on the ground, fifty feet below him. There were twenty-five. A few must've gone out of view, he decided, chasing Nadira and Alara and Hodin.

  The Cracian that had shot at him, that struck his mount, looked up at Jake as he flew across the gap. Jake, tucking his blaster hand downward and below his chest, smiled and squeezed the trigger on his weapon. The man's eyes bulged at the sight. Jake watched the soldier's hand slip from the cable as the shot hit the man.

  His aerial marksmanship took his focus off the opening on the side of the ship at precisely the wrong time. His shoulder clipped the hard metal edge of the portal, but he still somehow managed to land inside, crashing into one very surprised pilot.

  He and the pilot tumbled onto the controls of the craft. Jake's face smacked against the glass of the cockpit and the other man's knee hit Jake's back. The ship spilled forward, and Jake could once again see the soldiers beneath, many of whom had fallen from the cables. They were sprawled out on the rock below. A few still clung to the cords, but they were swinging toward the side of the mountain.

  He watched them slam into the mountainside. The ship began to fall. He shoved the pilot off him, knocking the man against the back wall of the cockpit. Without checking to see if the pilot remained a threat, Jake took the controls. He pulled them back. The nose of the ship lifted a little.

  The pilot punched Jake in his right kidney. Jake exhaled and crunched to that side. His hands still on the ship's controls, the craft darted to the right. The left wing of the craft plowed into the side of the mountain. The impact sounded with a fury of crunching metal. A small explosion went off on the left side of the craft. Jake and the pilot tumbled about the cockpit. The ship wasn't flying now. It was a burning wreck, spinning and plummeting to the ground.

  Jake watched the border between the ground and the sky flash past him three times, then he jumped. The fact that the ship fell in the opposite direction is the only reason he made it to the ground alive. He was bruised, and had what felt like a broken toe, se
veral scrapes, a gash above his left eye, and a headache for the record books.

  The rocks near the base of the mountain opposite his landing shielded him from the shockwave and fire as the ship exploded. Jake took a two-second timeout. Then he pushed himself up and stood. Only three of the Cracian soldiers were still alive and they were running away from the ball of fire and flying debris, the only remains of the ship.

  Satisfied all his parts still worked, Jake didn't bother to chase down the last three soldiers. Instead, he made his way in the direction he'd seen Nadira and the others go for cover. Ignoring his body's pleas for sympathy, he corrected a stumble and then set out at a jog.

  After a minute of negotiating the rocks on the ground, he spotted Nadira. She stood beside a boulder. She hadn't yet seen him. He watched her head dart here and there. He knew she was looking for him, for signs he'd made it. When she saw him, her face lit up without restraint.

  He wished it was his ship Sarah looking for him, but at least she was safe in orbit, for now.

  He heard her rejoice. It was a gasp that tightened to a short chirp. He liked that.

  Hodin and Alara stepped out from behind the boulder. Hodin waved to Jake. Moments later they all stood together.

  Hodin shook his head. "You're one…"

  "Crazy bastard," Jake said. "Remind me not to listen to myself." He rubbed the side of his head, wincing when he inadvertently touched the cut on his cheek.

  Nadira hugged him.

  He stood there, not sure what to do. But he didn't stop her.

  "You two are sweet," Alara said.

  Nadira, still holding him, turned her head toward Alara. "Shut up." Jake noticed she said it without malice.

  She let go of him and took a step back, glancing at Hodin. He was looking across the battlefield. The mass of Waudure forces, those that hadn't been killed by the Cracian ships, were gathering before the passage blown through the mountains.

  "Do you want me to tend to those?" Alara pointed to the more obvious of Jake's many wounds.

  "Maybe later," he said, adrenaline still rushing through his body.

  "They're advancing," Hodin said. "The anti-ship units are getting into place. They'll be able to hold the Cracians back, and with any luck, push through the pass."

  "Where's Brun," Jake asked, "and Hanlan?"

  "You didn't think you were the only one with a hare-brained plan, did you?" Nadira tipped her head to the side as she stepped toward Hodin and Alara. "Come on. We're not going that way."

  Before he took the last few steps over the ridge of the mountain, Jake turned to survey the battlefield behind him. The wind blew strong against his face. He shielded his eyes with his hands. A whistling passed over his ears. A few more ships flew toward the mass of Waudure and Cracian ground troops. He pulled out the viewing goggles Hodin had given him and peered through them.

  He spotted an anti-ship unit setting up their gear amidst smoke and laser blasts. He watched them perform with a precision that comes from rigorous training. One of the men knelt beside the tripod structure they'd erected. He turned a large gear on the side of the equipment, adjusting the angle of the central cylinder that sat affixed to the mid-point where the legs joined.

  The man raised his hand from the gear and held his arm up, signaling one of the other men of the team with a clenched fist. The other man responded by dropping what appeared to be a ball of mud into the cylinder. Whatever he actually fed into the pipe launched right back out of it with an explosive force.

  Jake could barely follow the projectile as it flew skyward toward one of the Cracian ships. The mud, lit with a tinge of glowing embers, or maybe a crackling of fire or sparks of some kind, spread out as it rose. When it struck the hull of the ship a second later, the substance splattered across the bottom of the craft and clung to it.

  He watched the glowing mud burn through the metal. A moment later, a ten-foot diameter circular section of the underneath of the ship fell to the ground. The crew of the ship plummeted down behind the pieces of metal. Then the empty craft rolled to one side and veered downward, before crashing into the ground in a fiery heap of destruction.

  Jake swept the battlefield with his goggles, taking in the scene. Hundreds of Waudure survived the initial strikes by the Cracian ships. Now, across the land, as far as he could see, skirmishes raged between the two sides. A large contingent of Waudure troops, joined by transport vehicles for cover, were making their way into the newly formed pass through the mountain defenses. There was resistance, but they looked to be pushing Kharn's forces back.

  He clipped the binoculars onto his belt and headed over the ridge to join Nadira and the others.

  They sat on a grouping of rocks twenty feet below. Nadira drank from a flask, then wiped her brow. Alara applied a salve to a cut on Hodin's arm.

  Jake maneuvered down the slope of the mountain, managing not to fall from the gravel, though he had to run the last few steps to stay upright.

  "I see why Nadira insisted on you joining our unit," Hodin said.

  Jake walked over to the group. "How far to the other side?"

  "If Hanlan's right," Hodin tapped a small piece of equipment strung from his ear, "we can make it through within the hour. He and Brun have been clearing a path."

  "Through mountains?" Jake spoke with incredulity.

  Nadira hopped from her seat on a large rock. "Brun and his toys."

  "Right," Jake said. "He did take a lot of those explosives."

  Alara put her first-aid supplies away. "Hanlan has been scouting this area for weeks — he and the others."

  "Others?" Jake asked.

  "Snipers." Hodin said. "They stick together even though they do their thing solo." Hodin rose to his feet and repositioned his gear, straightening his belt and checking to be sure all was secured in its place. "They're the only ones that can elude the Cracian patrols."

  Hodin helped Alara get her pack onto her back. "The location targeted by the transport pods was chosen based on the proximity to this weakness in the mountain defenses. We're heading toward the narrowest point of the range."

  She shrugged her pack higher onto her back and drew the cinching strap tighter across her chest. "Brun should be in position by now to take out the last section of rock blocking us from Cracian land. That part of mountain is too high and treacherous to scale, but there's a cave that cuts into it far enough that we think it's possible to blast through to the other side."

  "You must be kidding," Jake said. "So, we're heading into a cave, beneath hundreds of tons of rock, and we're going to set off a bunch of explosives in there."

  "Sorry I didn't tell you before," Hodin said. "I had to be sure about you. Too much at stake."

  Jake nodded.

  Nadira walked past Jake, slapping him on his stomach as she did. "Exactly."

  He looked at Alara and Hodin. "You two think this is a good idea?"

  "You just jumped off a cliff into an enemy ship and crashed it," Hodin said.

  Alara moved her hands apart, extending her fingers as she did. "Boom."

  Jake raised his brow and sighed. "Just checking."

  Hodin shuffled past the others and into the lead, heading down the path. "Come on. We still have a job to do."

  Nadira and Alara fell in behind him.

  Jake brought up the tail of the group. "I need a vacation."

  CHAPTER 28

  K harn, with his back to his administrator, stood before a shelf of glass figures of Cracians, Waudure, and several other races. The man had just informed Kharn of the initial results of the Waudure assault on the mountain defenses, and of the losses the Cracian side suffered.

  Kharn stayed silent. He stared at the foot-high figures in front of him, his record of the failed attempts at the augmentation process. Each figure represented hundreds of attempts. Only he, so far, had survived it.

  The administrator raised his hand, extending a shaky finger to make his next comment. "We've held them off, my lord."

  Kharn, hi
s back still to the man, quietly replied, "Have we?"

  "Yes. We've lost a few ships, but the Waudure have been unable to penetrate the mountains."

  "Oh," Kharn said, "this is good news."

  "Y-yes." The administrator’s stutter was more pronounced in front of Kharn.

  The man waited for a response. For several seconds, there was no reply.

  Kharn lashed out with his arm, striking the figures on the shelf before him, smashing them as he flung them across the room in one move.

  "Good news?" he screamed.

  He turned to face the administrator, who shook and cowered.

  Kharn yelled at the man. "The resistance forces pound at our gate, our ships have been destroyed, and this is good news?"

  "They have been unable—"

  "They should never have tried!"

  Kharn stormed over to the man, whose body quivered. Then, lowering his voice, said, "The threat is not from the weapons they fire at us."

  He leaned in close to the man and shook his head, coaxing the man to shake his own to signify understanding. The administrator did so, though his face looked bewildered.

  "The threat," Kharn said, "is that they dared to attack in the first place."

  "Yes, Lord Kharn," the man said, his words weak and muttering.

  "I want every Cracian soldier moved into the pass. No Waudure in sight is to be left standing. If the bodies pile too high, tell them to climb over them and continue attacking."

  "Yes, Lord Kharn."

  "Tell your security counterpart that if he doesn't crush the assault by nightfall, I'll tie his body to the head of his ship and send it crashing into the Waudure's front line. Maybe that will do the job."

  The administrator, as if his neck could barely comply with his will, nodded slowly as he spoke. "Yes, Lord Kharn. I will give him the message."

  Kharn raised the back of his hand to strike the man's face, but then lowered it without doing so. He turned away. "Leave me now."

  The administrator lowered his head and gave a short bow. Then took a few steps backward toward the door, before turning and leaving, picking up speed with each foot closer to the door.