Helix: Episode 9 (Countervail) by Nathan M Farrugia

Author:Nathan M Farrugia [Farrugia, Nathan M]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Anomaly Press
Published: 2020-08-31T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Three

Nexus, Praha 1

Olesya opened her eyes. She’d blacked out, but for how long, she had no idea.

An alarm was wailing through the building, echoing down the nexus. She didn’t know who had triggered it, her own team or Zakhar, but either way it meant Purity reinforcements would be coming for them.

‘I’m confused,’ Zakhar was saying, his voice raised over the alarm. ‘You said yourself that you wanted to stop Purity. Was that a lie as well?’

Olesya sat upright and blinked. His bandaged face came into focus.

‘You want to kill everyone with an implanted chip,’ she said. ‘How is that saving them?’

‘I never said I wanted to save them. Because we can’t,’ Zakhar said, pacing the catwalk that wrapped around the Spear’s antenna, keeping between her and the transmitter controls. ‘They chose those implants, they chose the mark of the beast. We can’t save them, but we can save the world, together.’

Even with his bandaged eyes, she knew he was looking at her. Or through her. She didn’t know how exactly he was perceiving things, but he tracked her as she got to her feet and stepped forward.

‘I can’t let you come any closer,’ he said. ‘Not yet.’

‘And I can’t let you stop me.’

He kicked out at her leg, but she shifted her weight in time to sidestep him, only for his fist to whip into her ribs, knocking the breath from her. Her back hit the handrail and she clung to it.

‘I won’t use a weapon,’ Zakhar said. ‘Not on you.’

Olesya coughed. ‘Forget about Purity. What do you really want?’

‘Just my sister back.’

He struck again, but this time she deflected the blow and his fist hit the handrail. He roared in pain as she held his wrist and rammed her forearm through his elbow. Bone snapped and his yell became a shriek.

She drove her fist into his neck; he rolled his shoulder and her knuckles glanced his cheek before he seized her arm and gripped tight. He stumbled over a dead soldier, regained his footing and grinned.

An electric current surged from Zakhar’s fingers through Olesya.

She stood on the spot, fists clenched, unable to move.

Fresh blood seeped from his bandages. ‘Is this what you want?’

He plunged his knee into her stomach.

Her liquid body armor took some of the impact, but it was enough to send her into the air and down, sprawling across metal. She came to rest with her head and shoulder off the edge of the catwalk, the deep chasm below. Across from her, Zakhar gripped a handrail.

The electric current went through the catwalk—and through her again. She couldn’t breathe. Under her coat, her NetGun was holstered on her hip, but her hands were still tightly clenched from his electric current. She couldn’t grab her concealed weapon.

Zakhar released his grip on the handrail and the electric current stopped. Olesya tried to force her hands open, but they remained balled up tight.

His footsteps echoed on metal as he approached.

‘Please,’ he said. ‘I’m here to save you.’

He was almost at her feet.

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