The concussions of explosions that he felt as much as heard.

The primal screams.

The swish and chunk of broadswords making contact with flesh and bone.

The sharp slap of pistols and bullets that sizzled through the air terrifyingly near to him.

Twice, he flinched at the metallic ping of slugs intended for his head but deflected instead into the magnetic gravity of his sword. Everson heard another sound cutting through the cacophony that he could not immediately place. It was the grinding of gears as the Marauders reversed into the transports.

Everson turned and saw many of his countrymen scrambling for the convoys. He needed no additional invitation, especially since the Manolith warmen seemed not content to accept retreat but continued to claim lives. Intent on the nearest entrance, Everson saw Javelins buzz into the opening. Then, to his horror, the iris door began to close.

Desperate to reach the transport, Everson could see another nucruit in front of him stumbling toward safety, a rabid warman close behind and closing for the kill. The nucruit whirled around with wild eyes, brandishing his broadsword. Everson was close enough to hear the sword ramping rapidly to full magnetic power.

In his panic, the nucruit had disregarded his proximity to the transport. He was jerked from his feet and propelled backward through the air by the attraction of metal hull to blade. Pinned instantly, he dangled by the hand that now could not release the weapon.

There was no time to save him. As the transport’s entry continued to close, Everson struggled forward, intent on his own salvation. Another enemy warman, blinded by bloodlust, clambered into the shrinking opening, firing his sidearm into the interior as he climbed.

The iris door sealed with finality, cutting off escape—and cutting the warman in half. Almost immediately, the transport’s propulsion engines ignited.

Everson recoiled from the thermal blast of the engines, but not before he saw the magnetically pinned nucruit blister and burn in agony. The convoy wobbled into the air, buffeted by an unabated barrage of enemy incendiary grenades. The transport accelerated skyward while a less fortunate one was pummeled over the precipice before taking off. It hurtled into the abyss, ablaze in a roiling ball of fire.

Before complete panic could take him, Everson heard the last sound he would remember from this barbaric battle. Something struck him hard in the head, but, instead of registering pain, he reeled with the crack of a massive thunderclap that seemed to emanate from within his very skull. He was pitched headlong into blackness.

* * *

Consciousness came back in flickering frames of shadow and light and, for a moment, Everson thought he was home on Indira, prone on his back on the warm ground, his eyes closed as the bright light of the suns filtered through the fluttering fronds of a tree.

And then he realized he was moving. Being dragged, actually, by his feet. Everson’s eyes fluttered open and fought to focus. Indeed, the bright suns’ light beat down on his face, but it was being intermittently blocked by the hulking silhouette of whatever was dragging him.