Sneak Peek: Ozymandias, Chapter 3 (Patreon)

The results of the polls are in: at the Lieutenant+ level, the update voted most for is a continuation of Ozmandias and at the Lieutenant Commander+ poll, there was a tie between more of The Hungry Stars and something else, with a couple requests for Cor Machina. So in the event of a tie, I cast the deciding vote, so you'll have to wait and see what the month's third update will be.

And yes, I do take bribes. :)

In the meantime, here is an excerpt from the current chapter I'm working on. Harper and Adrianna have survived the attack, but that leaves them with another situation to resolve.

~

Harper wasn’t sure how far she could move on her own. “Where are we going?” she asked.

Leblanc shone a light at a wall as she put the bags over her shoulders. “You need better night vision, agent.”

Harper’s acerbic response died in her mouth as she saw what Leblanc was highlighting. There was writing on the cave wall, faded and worn, but still legible. “What is that?”

“That,” the blue-haired woman said, “is Baheil script. We’re in an unfinished air circulation tunnel.”

“How do you know that?”

“It says the tunnel terminates here, with some kind of rating for chimney we just came down. If I had to guess, it means the vertical shaft needs to be smoothed out and reinforced.”

“You can read Baheil?”

Leblanc nodded. “I can.”

Harper almost asked how she’d gotten that information, but then remembered who she was dealing with. Before she’d arrived on Baheila Osz, the rebels had broken into secure files on multiple servers. No one had been sure what they were after, but they must have acquired a lot of research. Local Command had assured her that simple workers, less-educated rebels and partially civilized client species wouldn’t be able to understand any of it.

But the Red Queen could, couldn’t she?

A lot of other revolutionaries would have dismissed even the possibility of learning a dead language, but Harper knew her quarry. That would have piqued Leblanc’s curiousity. There’s a reason I knew she’d come here.

“Yes, you’re a clever girl.”

Harper blinked, realizing she’d said that out loud. “Fucking concussion.”

“On the plus side, your skull is still intact. But we really should be moving out now.” Leblanc approached the woozy intelligence officer, taking one of Harper’s arms and putting it over her shoulder. “Lean on me,” she said. “Put your weight on your good leg.”

“I don’t have a ‘good’ leg.”

“Then the one that’s less fucked up. Don’t be a stubborn bitch, agent. Either let me help you, or you’ll get to learn more about the feeders firsthand.”

Harper gritted her teeth but complied, hobbling along with Leblanc. “Do you have a destination in mind?”

“For starters, away from some very unhappy creatures. Ultimately? I don’t know where we are. There aren’t supposed to be any ruins in this region, let alone under a supervolcano. Survival first, everything else second.”

“At least on that,” Catros said, gritting her teeth as each step sent spikes of pain shooting up her spine, “we can agree.”