Chapter 12 - Blood on the Iron
The first round clipped Avery’s left shoulder guard, spinning him halfway around with a dull, concussive thud that knocked the wind from his lungs. Pain flared white-hot across his clavicle, but adrenaline kept his fingers locked onto his weapon.
“Contact! Twelve o’clock high!” Avery yelled, dropping to one knee as a heavy stream of automatic fire pinged against the steel bulkhead behind him, showering them in a fresh cascade of sparks.
Reed didn’t hesitate. Moving with the fluid, lethal grace of a veteran sniper in close quarters, he stepped out from behind the companionway frame, his carbine barking twice in rapid succession. The distinctive, suppressed thwack-thwack echoed sharply over the roar of the storm. The lead operative spun backward, his weapon clattering across the deck before sliding over the edge into the black water.
The second gunman dove behind a stack of hydraulic spares, returning fire with frantic, uncontrolled bursts that chewed deep gouges into the rusted iron.
“He’s pinned!” Reed called out, dropping behind a reinforced bitt to swap out his empty magazine with lightning speed. “Captain, your shoulder—you’re bleeding out!”
“It’s a flesh wound! Keep him busy!” Avery gritted his teeth, ignoring the warm, sticky flow soaking through his tactical undershirt. He looked back at Brock Sullivan, who was curled in a fetal position against the scupper drain, paralyzed by shock and the sheer brutality of the firefight. “Sullivan! Get up! I need eyes on that escape hatch now!”
Brock blinked, his face deathly pale, tears mixing with the rain on his cheeks. He looked like a man watching the world end in slow motion. “I can’t... Captain, my leg... I think I twisted my ankle when the deck dropped.”
“You can walk or you can drown! Choose one!” Avery snapped, reaching down and dragging the younger officer to his feet by his collar. He shoved Brock toward the narrow access hatch leading down into the ballast control room—the only dry route left to the starboard water-line exit. “Get down the ladder! Move!”
Brock scrambled frantically toward the hatch, dropping onto the rungs just as a heavy round from the remaining operative’s rifle punched clean through the steel frame inches from his head.
Avery turned his attention back to the threat. The lone gunman was attempting to flank them by utilizing the swinging crane arm as cover, pivoting his weapon toward Reed’s position.
“Reed, on three!” Avery signaled with his fingers through the driving rain. One. Two. Three.
They broke cover simultaneously. Reed laid down a heavy, blinding wall of suppression fire that forced the operative to duck behind the crane housing, while Avery sprinted in a low, diagonal slide across the slippery deck. Sliding past the stack of hydraulic spares, Avery came up directly behind the gunman, pressing the cold muzzle of his Sig Sauer against the base of the man’s skull.
“Drop it. Now,” Avery breathed, his voice dangerously low.
The operative froze, his finger still hooked around the trigger of his rifle. For a second, Avery saw the reflection of his own battered face in the man’s tactical visor—exhausted, scarred, and utterly relentless.
“You’re too late, Captain,” the man whispered, a grim smile breaking across his stubbled face. “Vance is already at the drop point. The code is out.”
Before Avery could press for details, a massive shudder ripped through the entire structure of the Orion’s Star. The ship’s bow lifted violently as the stern slammed hard against the underwater shoal, snapping the remaining keel supports with a deafening shriek of tearing metal. The sudden deceleration threw both Avery and the captive operative off balance.
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The gunman lunged sideways, reaching for a secondary comms beacon strapped to his belt. Reed, seeing the movement from across the deck, fired a single, decisive round through the man’s shoulder, dropping him instantly to the deck.
“Secure him!” Avery shouted over the deafening roar of the breaking hull. “We’re losing the ship!”
