When Piper discovers she has hidden cybernetic implants, she is inducted into the secretive AmpCore Academy to master incredible gifts, in a place where the impossible and possible collide...
*
|| WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOU WEREN'T SUPPOSED TO EXIST...
Delgado turned, and sank to one knee, revolver held shakily in one hand. Two corporate troopers led the way, rifles raised for the kill, but confined by the narrow alley, they were easy targets for an experienced marksman, even in her current state.
She emptied the rest of the clip. The trooper out in front fired a split second later, but one of her shots smacked into his shoulder guard. The impact whipped him sideways, dragging the trajectory of his shooting in a wild arc that tore through two innocent bystanders behind Delgado.
All hell broke loose.
Vehicles swerved and crashed as bullets spattered into the street. People started running in all directions as panic took hold. Delgado stuffed the empty revolver awkwardly back into its holster and shambled her way into the crush, slithering over the bonnet of a parked car and almost collapsing.
The loading yard was just behind the next line of buildings. If she could get there, she just might have a chance.
Keep going, Chloe, she urged herself. No freebees for the fucking corps.
The longer she kept them busy, the longer Kirk and Arden had to get away; to use what they'd found so far.
The next narrow alleyway swallowed her up. She slipped; almost fell. Blood was running into her boot. Dimly, she wondered how much blood she'd already lost.
A wrenching, scream of breaking metal jolted her ears and she looked back. A pair of cars flipped simultaneously to the left and right, flying end over end before smashing back down onto the road. Through the gap stalked the AmpCore agent, his face set with sheer fury. His wand snapped out and she felt her legs yanked from under her, slamming front first down onto the pavement with a gasp of shock.
"Fucking freak!" someone screamed.
"CORPS OUT, CORPS OUT!"
A fresh hail of bullets crackled through the street.
The operative's face flickered with frustration and she saw the tiny flares of orange where shots melted against whatever shield the bastard had. More gunfire swelled; she saw ragged-robed figures firing on the corporate thug squad, spilling out of a rickety looking converted half track.
Dock gangers, maybe? Hard to tell from this distance, but they seemed better equipped than your average citizen of Hadrian. She could make out rifles and shotguns alongside an eclectic array of smaller sidearms.
The corporate guards returned fire – better armoured and better armed. Their bullets carved through the newcomers and more bodies fell on the street.
Delgado didn't waste the chance. She didn't know, and frankly didn't care who had been stupid enough to engage the corps in a full on gun battle. It simply meant that she had a lifeline. Struggling upright, she hobbled towards the clang and clatter of the loading yard, the stink of gasoline and hot metal filling her nostrils as she drew closer.
She emerged from the alley into a narrow street, and on the other side of it was a rusting chain fence that ringed the local loading yard. Big dark shapes of cargo haulers idled in the gloom beneath the swinging arms of massive cranes. Cargo crates the size of buses flew like airborne whales, brought in from the barges on the docks and transferred here to be freighted north.
It took a few precious seconds for Delgado to locate her target, but eventually she spotted it – the logo – an orange globe and red set against a spherical fiery background.
Prometheus Haulage. She recognised the great tracked behemoth. It was a heavy freight auto-liner, easily fifteen carriages long with each one rising twenty feet high, wrapped in brass metal.
Growling in pain with every step, Delgado stumbled to the fence. With a screech of pain and effort that left her throat raw, she hauled herself up and over the barrier, slamming to the ground on the other side. Agony pulsed through her leg and shoulder; she could taste more blood and felt light-headed.
Just a little longer, just a little longer.
Squeezing her eyes shut for a moment to get a grip on the pain, she slowly levered herself up right once more, finally taking a moment to glance down at her leg. The bullet had punched through her outer right thigh – hopefully that meant it had missed anything too vital. Feeling around, gingerly, she found an exit wound, slick with blood.
At least the bullet wasn't still in her. Corps were a victim of their own hardware sometimes.
"Some fucking luck," she chuckled hoarsely, shaking her head in amazement at her own bar for 'good news'. Sucking deep breaths through gritted teeth, she shuffled on towards the open hatch in the flank of the hauler's rear compartment, where creaking crane arms were still shovelling cargo inside. The disinterested operators of the loading station wouldn't be paying much attention – she was will to bet her life on that.
Clutching her side and feeling blood leaking between her fingers, she struggled on. The gunfire behind her died out, and she knew that meant she only had moments.
Ducking low, and moving as stealthily as someone in her condition could really manage, she crunched her way across the gravelly concourse of the loading yard, keeping to the shadows until she reached the vast bulk of the hauler.
Chancing a backward glance, she saw the AmpCore agent come storming out of the alley, without so much as a scratch to show for the altercation. He didn't even break stride, flicking his wand at the fence. It peeled open like paper and he stepped through, guards fanning out behind him.
Narrowly avoiding being crushed by the last of the titanic cargo crates, Delgado made an undignified sight as she squirmed and wriggled her way up into the open loading bay, rolling inside and leaving a trail of crimson in her wake.
A deep boom echoed through the compartment as the final crate slammed into place several meters above her head. On the bottom level, she half-crawled, half-rolled until she could prop herself into a sitting position against one of the metal hulks.
"All personnel," a toneless woman's voice blared. "Please stand clear. Loading complete – outer doors will seal in five..."
The countdown began, and only when the automated announcement rang through the yard did the AmpCore agent finally spot her, twisting towards the hauler, eyes wide with outrage. Just before the loading door boomed shut, she mustered the energy to raise her middle finger to him. Then the door closed and darkness enveloped her.
As the huge machine's engine thundered into life, Chloe closed her eyes, and promptly passed out.
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