The Heirs of Earth

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

Emet stood in the Jerusalem's hold, Thunder in hand, as the scorpions swarmed into the starship.

"Fire!" Emet shouted and pulled his trigger.

Across the hold, his fifty warriors fired their own weapons.

The drills had left gaping holes in the floor and ceiling, revealing the enemy's boarding vessels. The scorpions leaped through the holes into the oncoming bullets.

Blood filled the Jerusalem.

Humans and scorpions died.

Railguns pounded the enemy. Claws tore through flesh.

Here were the best warriors in the Heirs of Earth. They fired railguns, powerful weapons that knocked the scorpions back. One man lost a leg but still fought, roaring for Earth as he fired two pistols. A woman lost an arm to a pincer, but still she swung an electric blade, slicing through scorpions. Several men raised flamethrowers and filled the enemy's boarding vessels with flame, roasting the scorpions still inside.

Emet stood with his back to the bulkhead, firing his rifle, knocking back scorpions with his mighty two-barreled assault. The creatures pounced toward him. He stood, firing again and again, tearing them down. When Thunder ran out of bullets, he fired his pistol. When his pistol too ran out, he knelt, grabbed a magazine from a dead Inheritor, and kept fighting. Scorpion corpses piled up at his feet.

"This is the flagship of the Heirs of Earth!" he said. "You will not take it."

Another scorpion bounded toward him. Emet fired his rifle, blowing off the beast's head.

As he fought in the hold, the Jerusalem was still battling the enemy's warships. Duncan was still on the bridge, piloting the ship. Rowan was still firing the cannons, pounding the enemy forces. The Jerusalem kept swerving, jostling as the cannons boomed. Emet couldn't see the battle from here, but he could imagine thousands of starships still careening over Akraba, battling for dominance.

The last scorpion in the hold scuttled toward him, and Emet slew the beast with a single bullet.

He spat.

He looked across the hold. Thirty Inheritors had survived the battle and stood over dead scorpions. The enemy's boarding vessels were still attached to the hull like leeches.

"Get more flamethrowers," Emet said. "Fill their vessels with fire. There might be more scorpions inside."

His men nodded, grabbed flamethrowers, and aimed into the holes in the hull.

They filled the boarding vessels with liquid death.

Inside, scorpions—perhaps the pilots of the vessels—screamed and fell through the fire, burning.

Inside one vessel, laughter rose.

Emet frowned.

He stared at a hole on the ceiling, which a boarding vessel had drilled. The laughter came from inside. An Inheritor stood below, pumping the enemy vessel full of flame, but the laughter continued.

Blue and white flashed.

A creature leaped down through the hole, passed through the fire, and landed atop the Inheritor with the flamethrower. Claws lashed. The Inheritor's severed limbs slapped onto the floor.

Emet fired his railgun.

His bullets hit a fiery demon, but the creature still laughed. The demon advanced toward him, ablaze, arms outstretched. Emet fired bullet after bullet. The other Inheritors were firing on the flaming beast too, doing no harm.

"Hello, Emet!" she cried, emerging from the fire.

A woman with glimmering alabaster skin—skin like a scorpion's exoskeleton. With implants on her head. The fire had burned her clothes and hair away, but Emet recognized her.

"Jade," he said.

The Inheritors charged toward her with blades and clubs.

Jade laughed and leaped into the air.

She moved like lightning. She rebounded off the ceiling, off the walls, her claws lashing. She dodged every blade, every electric prod. Her claws tore through Inheritors, severing limbs and heads, ripping torsos open.

Warriors screamed.

Some tried to flee into the burnt-out boarding vessels, others onto the bridge.

Jade reached them all, ripping them apart, laughing as their blood splattered.

"For Earth!" they cried as they died.

Jade bit out a man's throat, then spat out flesh. She looked up at Emet, licked the blood off her lips, and smiled.

There is nowhere to hide, Emet knew. If I die, I die fighting.

He roared and lunged toward her.

He swung Thunder into her head. The blow knocked Jade's head back; it should have cracked her skull. But Jade merely straightened her neck with a creak and smiled.

Emet swung the rifle again, slamming the wooden stock into her temple. The wood shattered. Jade laughed.

Emet sneered, aimed the muzzle at her face, and pulled the trigger.

She yanked the barrel aside and the bullet flew and slammed into the bulkhead.

"Naughty human," she hissed, then slammed her palm into his chest.

Emet flew through the hull, hit into a bulkhead, and slumped to the floor. He lay, gasping for breath, finding no air. Corpses spread around him.

Jade walked toward him, smiling crookedly. She placed a foot on his chest, pinning him down.

Emet looked up into her green eyes.

"Who are you?" he whispered.

"Your nemesis," she said. "Your death. The death of humanity."

Jade knelt, grabbed his throat, and began to squeeze.

As Emet lay on the floor, slowly dying, he realized that the ship's cannons had stopped firing. The hull was eerily quiet.

A voice, high and timid, pierced the silence.

"Jade?"

Jade looked up, then released Emet's throat and took a step back. Eyes fluttering, barely clinging to consciousness, Emet tilted his head back and saw Rowan step into the hold.