It was a lie. Well, it was partly true. Ender didn’t like when he beat up people they worked with regularly, but as to whether Calico was weaker than him, he didn’t know.
“Oy, that stung.” Calico clutched at his chest dramatically.
“Good!” he snapped, before sighing.
How had this thing already turned into an unbelievable clusterfuck?! They hadn’t even stepped foot on the other ship yet!
Soren thought over their current options before barking, “Saffire, go down and see what the fuck is going on with our core engine. Kore, get the boosters running. It’s time we board this bitch and a fucking half!” Clearing his throat as those two took off, Soren pressed the button on his collar to speak to the entire crew. “Boarding directive is the same. Kill the traffickers,take over the ship. With an added note…don’t shoot any damn Bureau agents unless they attack first!”
With Severo by his side, Cyrus was at the head of the group marching in through the Bureau’s breach point on the trafficker’s ship, Brick Bond. Moments before, breach jaws had shot out and ‘bitten’ through the haul of Brick Bond’s docking port. Quickly expanding and creating airtight seams around the edges, it had instantly created a doorway inside.
From there, the lengthy bridge on the jaw compacted, pulling them up alongside the other ship, until there was only a short connecting space between the Bureau’s craft and theirs.
Inside they found no one there to greet them—hostile or otherwise—though fighting could be heard elsewhere on the ship. Which wasn’t surprising as Cryptid Means had alreadybreached, and he was positive the captives had likely already been fighting the crew of Brick Bond before that.
The place in his vision had been a large cafeteria, and based on his understanding of the layout, it had to be located in the core center of the ship. He headed up the stairs, into the main level of the outer loop of the spacecraft, and as soon as he realized no one was shooting at them, Cyrus took off down a hallway that didn’t follow the curve, hoping it would lead him to Killian and Skya. Severo followed beside him, while others broke away whenever they came upon combatants, Ender’s people, and more.
While Cyrus did not slow, he stumbled slightly in shock on spotting Soren Odette, the Second in Command of Cryptid Means. Then again, it was surprising to see the Harpy there. As far as he knew, the man rarely left Earth, or Ender’s side.
Soren’s eyes narrowed on him as he passed. Cyrus was unsurprised when the Harpy started to follow, but became angry when the man stopped him.
He growled, flashing his fangs dangerously as he yanked his arm from the Harpy’s hold.
Soren scoffed, as if finding the threat laughable. “Care to explain why my boss suddenly, out of nowhere, decided to come on an expedition into space that’s been in works for fucking months, Grimm?”
“We don’t have time for questions, Soren!” Severo snapped.
“You’re going to fucking make time!”
Cyrus barely covered up his shock at that bit of information. He couldn’t even remember the last time Ender was reported to be directly involved in anything that Cryptid Means got up to in the last hundred years. The Gorgon, as far as the Bureau knew, tended to stay underground, running things in the shadows. If he was directly involved in shit, the man had managed to keep it under wraps for a long while.
Instead of giving in to the urge to just ask if the Gorgon was actually there, Cyrus answered the bird’s question, “Not particularly.”
Soren let out a clipped-sounding laugh. “Is that so? Well, since you won’t explain, let me make it fucking clear… I’d appreciate it if you and your bastard fellow Fates would keep their damn threads the fuck out of our lives, and sure as shit out of Ender’s! Your kind has done enough damage to him already, haven’t they? I honestly just want to know, how you have the fucking audacity tousehim!?” By the end of the Harpy’s rant, the man was in his face, mere inches from him.
Cyrus didn’t step back, even as he tensed at the vitriol in Soren’s questions. The urge was there to defend himself, and his family, but he wasn’t sure he could, because Soren clearly knew things that he didn’t.
“Back off, Soren,” Severo snapped, as he shoved the Harpy back. “He didn’t purposely?—”
He cut the Dweller off. “Don’t defend me. He knows as well as I do that, regardless of if I intended it or not, Ender is here when he shouldn’t be. And he has a right to ask questions, but now is not the time. When we find Killian and Skya, then he can ask.”
Cyrus didn’t wait for any agreement, he just took off running again. However, he wasn’t sure if he was running towards the love of his life, and his best friend’s child, or away from whatever Soren was going to tell him about his family.
Severo let out a frustrated growl behind him, but said nothing as he started to follow, and while the Harpy did the same, staying just as quiet while trailing behind, the hatred in his eyes spoke volumes.
Killian tackledthe trafficker down to the ground, and was almost bucked off right before he slammed the butt of the empty gun into the man’s head. But he held on, and one knock was enough to keep the trafficker down. The ones that followed splattered blood on his face and hands as he finished caving the man’s skull in. The whole time, he tried not to hear the whimpers and soft crying of the many scared children behind him.
He couldn’t take the risk that the bastard would get up. And after a few fights already, Killian didn’t trust that his own strength was enough to take down every trafficker he came across without being sneaky. He hated to admit it, but he’d let himself grow soft over the years, not training as much as he used to. Hell, he barely worked out anymore…and Killian fully regretted that now.
Taking a calming breath as soon as he heard the man’s heart stop, with his bloody gun in hand, he stood, turning to stare down into the faces of the frightened children. “It’s okay, we’re going to be okay. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
Killian would do all he could to keep that promise, even if it meant dying. They were alone now. Unfortunately, untrained captives were not the best listeners.
He looked back down the hall, and then forward. There weren’t any doors, or places to hide. Go forward or go back? He wasn’t even sure if he was going the right way now… Or if he ever was.
The problem was that the ship was so big, he hadn’t figured out, or had the time to check, what fucking model it was. As much information as he remembered about Riker off hand, he didn’t recall jack shit about the Skinwalker’s ship.
Forward—he would go forward. Mainly as Killian couldn’t trust that whoever was attacking Riker would be any more friendly than the traffickers.
