Drifter

Kolache faded into the trees, firing the weapon on his wrist at the police officers as he did so. The officers leapt down and took off after him, one of them had been enveloped by the strange red glow.

Shots rang out, the sound coming from within the trees. Eli couldn’t see Kolache, but one of the officers was hit none the less, the same one that had been hit by the weird weapon. Superheated tissue exploded out of his chest, as if he had been hit with a ray gun. This was in spite of the fact that he wore a shield projector on his duty belt.

The surviving officers disappeared into the trees. Eli stood there, watching, analyzing. The sounds of energy weapons being rapidly discharged were frequently drowned out by shouts of pain and terror. The occasional stray shot busts out of the trees.

An officer stumbled into view. That same red glow had enveloped his body. He marveled at his hand, followed the light up his arm. He looked himself over, tried to brush it away. Out of nowhere, with no discernable cause, his head fell off. Blood sprayed as it rolled away. The body crumbled to the ground. The strange glow vanished.

“How many charges does that shield have?” one of the officers shouted, before screaming in agony.

The leader bolted out of the tree line, the terrible glow enveloping his entire body, shouting at the top of his lungs, “No! No! God, please no!”

There were two simultaneous explosions. One was well back inside of the trees. The other was the officer. He wasn’t hit by a munition. An explosive didn’t go off on or near him. He simply exploded.

The sounds of battle and slaughter waned. Eli undid the tattered cloak, letting it fall to the ground. The sawed-off sat in a bulky holster on his left side. He unclipped the SMGs and jumped down into the foliage. He strode forward, finding his opponent leaning up against a tree, injecting the wound on his leg with an Iredell. He had one of the fallen officer’s sidearms tucked under his arm.

The trees swayed in the breeze, artificial wind for an artificial forest. There was a sharp drop off nearby. The sound of a gentle stream could be heard coming from it. A few flying animals chirped but could not be seen.

“I know the secret of your power,” Eli taunted, “I know a lot of things about you.”

Kolache said nothing. He spun in the bounty hunter’s direction, throwing a long knife.

Eli dodged the attack, “You murdered a woman on your home world, fled into space, took whatever jobs you could find to get by. One of the freighters that you were serving aboard took a short cut through poorly charted space. They found a derelict Talgar vessel. You took things from that wreck.”

“I didn’t touch the drones!” he shouted, “I’d never do that! I left the war drones alone” he sounded desperate, like he was pleading.

“Maybe that’s true. But you did take things. You made a fortune off of that salvage. And let’s not forget the device on your wrist, the one that entangles things on the quantum level. You can make it so that two objects are joined. What effects one effects the other.”

The killer smirked as he stepped backward into a patch of tall, leafy plants. Eli followed him into the thick foliage.

“That’s how you were able to kill your victims without leaving behind a trace!” Eli called out, “You didn’t need to be in the same room as them. You were able to torture and kill at your leisure. You even used it to keep them from screaming.”

Pure venom in the killer’s voice, “Nothing’s going to stop you from screaming!”

It sounded like he was right on top of Eli. He opened fire, peppering the foliage. He kept firing until the guns went dry. Then he dropped them, drawing the sawed-off and the biomechanical pistol he had taken off the body of a Sad’Daki officer he had killed.

A bolt of light struck the side of his head, his shield absorbed it. He turned but saw no sign of his quarry. Another pulse of pure death hit the shield. This time it came from a different direction. This could not continue. His shield would run out of charges.

Eli hunkered down low, called out into the trees, “I gotta say, your taste in women sucks!”

The verbal attack must have flustered him. Eli detected a rustling sound. He didn’t even look, discharging both barrels in the direction of the noise. Without hesitation, he sprang forward, hoping to finish his prey off.

A branch was shaking violently. It was enveloped in the glow caused by the Talgar device. Realizing that he had been baited, Eli whirled around, desperately searching for his opponent.

The thing that gave Kolache away was that his weapon was glowing. Eli managed to duck out of the way as he swung a sturdy looking tree branch. The other branch moved in time with it, slapping against the nearby plants as Kolache mounted a savage assault. Kolache used the entanglement device on Eli. The branches lost their glow. Now the bounty hunter was enveloped by it.

Eli tried to bring his weapon to bare. Kolache dropped the branch and pulled a blade, moved in close. Eli was able to grab hold of the knife hand. Now the pair wrestled. The tip of the blade came perilously close to Eli’s throat. He used the strength of his prosthetic, slowly pushing the knife back. Seeing that the effort was futile, Kolache swept Eli’s legs. The bounty hunter ended up on the ground.

Kolache kicked him as he tried to get up. The killer moved away. He shot a nearby boulder with the entanglement device, binding it to his opponent. It was way too far away for Eli to reach it in time.

“You’re finished!” Kolache snarled, priming a grenade.

“You might want to check where all of the things that you entangled are,” Eli said, grinning wickedly, “Be a shame if you were bitten by your own pet.”

This made him pause. Kolache noticed that he could see reflections of the glow coming from behind him. He slowly turned; the glow moved with him. He reached behind his back, fumbled around until he found the Sad’Daki pistol Eli had tucked into his belt while they were locked in hand to hand combat. By the time he had found the gun and tossed it away, Eli had gotten up and closed the distance. The flying tackle sent them over the edge of the drop-off.

Eli clawed at the edge of the drop. His natural hand slipped, slid down the length of a root before he was able to gain purchase. With a series of determined grunts, he hauled himself up and over the edge using the strength of his robotic arm.

Kolache landed in a patch of deep mud. The grenade plopped down beside him. He raised his muck caked face, grimaced when he saw how it had fouled his suit. Then his expression turned to pure terror when he spotted the grenade. It went off, bringing an end to the murderer.

Eli got up. The glow had ceased. He retrieved his weapons, pondering what he would spend the reward money on. Then he found a way down to the creek bed. The entanglement device had been caught in the blast, reduced to tiny pieces of smoldering scrap. He decided that he would spend his earnings on a new and improved sensor system for his ship.