Kilo and Riann’s comms are dead too.
Fuck.
I need tools, so I trudge back to my bike. The standard kit we keep on them should be enough.
But tools aren’t what I need when I take my first step back toward the wreckage.
It didn’t trigger my visor’s warning sensors. I didn’t hear it, but a cavrinskh stands between me and the backup data storage.
Something dark and wet hangs from its mouth, and it spits it out on the ground before making a low sound and stalking toward me.
Claws digging into the metal pieces it climbs over, I don’t look at them as they screech and puncture with ugly pops.
When I drop the tools, it pounces. My gun is only halfway up when it hits, and I don’t get a shot off.
The cavrinskh flails wildly, claws tearing through metal and skimming across my skin, tearing long lines in my suit and down my ribs.
The sting of it makes me flinch, and I have to get my feet under me—to keep it from dragging me further away.
All I succeed in doing is getting my arm caught in its beak a moment before it flings me away.
It was the wrong choice. Before I’m up off the ground, I have my gun leveled at it.
My first shot hits it in a shoulder.
The second it dodges completely, rolling away.
I don’t get off a third.
Breakerthrowshimself at the cavrinskh, and in a sparking flash, it drops to the snow and the scent of burning hair hits me.
“So,” Breaker says, breathing heavily and pushing himself up to standing. “That was almost really shitty for you.”
“Yeah, it was. Thanks. I don’t know how it snuck up on me.”
“It’s been a long time since you’ve gotten hit.” Breaker looks at me like he’s never seen Sian blood before. “Can you make it home on your own?”
“It’s not that bad. I just need to grab something before I go.”
“Not ours to take,” he says, but he doesn’t try to stop me nor ask what it is. He just gets to work cleaning up the carcass.
I snatch up the tool kit from where I dropped it and scan the area again… not that it helped last time.
Touching my ribs, I look at the metal its claws tore open.
It wasn’t here to kill me.
One of the cube-like canisters is leaking sludgy fuel. That should have burned off in the…
I see the dark, wet bundle a moment before I register the puddle it’s sitting in.
“Get back!”
The words are barely out of my mouth before it explodes.
The force of it throws me back into the snow and knocks all the air from my lungs.
“Fuuuuck,” Breaker groans when the echo of the blast has finally quieted.
