by M. D. Massey
Thankfully, my serum-enhanced perception speed and reflexes were working just fine, so I took one more step back, and then flipped my left-hand sword around into a reverse grip. I rushed forward into his next attack, using the flat of the sword like a tonfa to block his weapon and allow me to get in close. I used the handle of the sword in my right hand like a fist load and punched him right in the mouth… once, twice, three times as I wrapped my left arm around his arms and stepped on his lead foot to keep him from backing up on me.
Soon he realized that this sword fight had turned into a grappling match, and he got wise and head-butted me in the face. I whipped my head sideways to take it on my skull and to avoid losing some teeth. Reynard took that opportunity to smash his shoulder into my chest and disengage from me. I took the blow and rolled away, coming up to my feet and moving my swords in circles as I sidestepped around him and watched him bleed.
The people around the circle were silent at first, and then they all let out a collective gasp. There was a sort of whispered chattering going on around us, but I blocked it out and continued to focus on the task at hand. Reynard began probing again, but more cautiously now, and I think he’d finally figured out his mistake in using a lighter weapon. Sure, it was quick, but unless he poked me in the eyes or the throat, it was fairly useless against someone who was willing to ignore its sting.
I got tired of waiting and decided the press the attack. I came in with a classic krabi-krabong double sword attack pattern, slashing first with one sword and then with the other in a left-right, right-left manner, using all my power to either break his waister or crash through his guard. He parried just as I knew he would, with a high two-handed block using the flat of the blade. As he brought his sword up again to block, I changed my attack at the last moment and struck both his wrists with a vicious forehand strike that caused him to back off quickly and roll away.
I continued to press the attack and managed to step on his sword as he dove away from me, briefly trapping his hand against the ground and bending his sword near the middle. I used that opportunity to crack him over the head with the flat of my weapon, avoiding the edge as I didn’t want to fracture his skull. In response, he launched off the ground and barreled into me, snatching my near leg with his free hand and driving his shoulder directly into my waist to lift me up and relieve the pressure from his hand. As soon as that hand was free, he released his weapon and continued to drive me forward off balance.
And then, we were wrestling again. I briefly tried to get my sword into the space between his neck and my body, in an attempt to use it for a choke, but before I knew it I was on my back and he was coming around to side control position in order to secure an armlock. I rolled to face him and covered up, and he gave up on securing the arm and started dropping knees like jackhammers to my head and body. I waited for an opening and tied up his near leg, sacrificing a rib or two in the process. We ended up in a scramble as I drove into him with my own single leg to take him down on his back. However, the sneaky bastard turned that into an almost textbook tomoe-nage throw, placing his knee on my gut and grabbing my shirt by the shoulders to throw me over him and onto my back.
I rolled with it and stood up, only to feel his hands wrap around my waist from behind. I decided to avoid using a Krav Maga technique to strike him, since I knew he’d be tossing me on my head before I could get off a decent stunning elbow to his. I based out and dropped my weight forward, capitalizing on his forward momentum as he grabbed me from behind. I continued driving forward and tucked into a Russian roll, diving for his leg between my legs as I tucked under him. This had the net effect of keeping him from doing a suplex on me, and it allowed me to go for a nasty kneebar or perhaps even a toehold at the end of the movement.
I was banking on the assumption that he hadn’t had much experience with leg locks, and I was right. As I came out of the roll, I ended up on my back with my legs wrapped around his upper thigh and his ankle behind my right shoulder. He landed face down lying in the opposite direction, and as tight as I had the lock there was no way he was getting free. I slowly began arching my back and hips and applying pressure to his knee joint.
I could hear him grunting and felt him struggling to break free, and I was afraid I was going to have to pop his knee. “I’ll break it!” I yelled in warning. “Yield! Tap you sorry bastard, or you’re going to spend the rest of the apocalypse in a knee brace!”
Finally, he slapped the ground forcefully and calmly exclaimed, “Yield, I yield!” I turned him loose and rolled away, ready for another attack should he be the dirty-fighting kind. He wasn’t. He turned over on his back, flexed his knee a few times, and then stood up with a grin on his face. With a shrug, he walked over to me and extended his hand in congratulations.
I looked at his hand with caution, then shook it. He cracked an even wider grin and spat some blood out to the side. “Thought I had you when you gave me your back. Was sure it was going to be lights out once I got you in the air.”
I laughed. “I knew what was coming and didn’t like the idea of getting a rapid neck adjustment. Besides, concussions aren’t my thing. Good fight.”
He nodded and grabbed my wrist, then turned us to face the dais, where Dame Sweetlove was looking on in shock and amusement. Reynard growled the outcome as he raised my hand into the air. “Sir Scratch wins by submission, and by rights is absolved of his offense!”
The boys and Bobby went nuts, shouting and cheering. Gabby, not so much. Within seconds, the boys had stormed the ring, and a few even made an attempt to lift me on their shoulders, but I turned out to be too heavy for them. So, they satisfied themselves with crowding us both and peppering us with commentary and questions for the next fifteen minutes. Eventually, Dame Sweetlove called an end to it and announced that we’d all eat a meal together before we’d be allowed to depart in peace.
As we walked back into the castle house, she leaned over and whispered in my ear. “I didn’t think you could beat Reynard. He’s proven himself to be unstoppable for the last eight years.”
I merely shrugged. “I guess it was just my lucky day.”
10
REVELERS
After the excitement had died down from the match, we all went back inside and enjoyed a feast with Dame Sweetlove and her subjects. The food was pretty good; roast wild pig, fresh tomatoes and other garden veggies, and some candy bars that someone had been hoarding for just such an occasion. I guess they were pulling out all the stops, being as they didn’t normally get friendly guests, and also because I didn’t kill their best fighter. It had been an honorably-fought match, and he acquitted himself well, so I guess everyone saw it as a win all the way around.
Later after the meal, Anna’s boys took Bobby and Gabby outside for a friendly archery contest. Gabby beat their best archer, the chubby kid with the sour face who’d had to haul all my gear back. His name was Christopher, and he turned out to be an okay kid. After she had beaten him, I think him and half the LARPer’s wild boys ended up even more in love with her than they were before. Which I had mixed feelings about, but then again there wasn’t much about the sort of father-daughter relationship I was developing with Gabby that wasn’t perplexing these days.
After watching the kids play for a bit, Anna, Reynard, Tuck and I went back inside to discuss adult matters. Anna was interested in what I could tell her about things outside of the Corridor, and Reynard and Tuck expressed an interest in where we were from and how the hell we expected to take out the Corridor pack.
We sat down at what was once the kitchen table to enjoy some cheap but very serviceable Scotch, and then we got down to brass tacks. Anna spoke up first. “Scratch, tell me about the settlements, and this place you say you’re heading to after you get your people back.”
I cleared my throat and sat up a little straighter. “Well, before the werewolves came, we had a good thing going. In fact, I wished I had appreciated it a lot more back then.” I explained about how the wolves had attacked our sett
lement, and the relative peace and quiet we’d had before they came.
Reynard chimed in. “Sounds inviting—almost like a normal life.”
I nodded. “It was, and frankly I miss it. Used to bitch about being around all those people all the time, and couldn’t wait to get back to the Badlands when I was there. But now if I had it to do all over again, I think I’d just have settled down and stopped hunting entirely.”
Reynard nodded. “Anna filled us in on your story last night. Sorry to hear about your wife.”
I winced at that. “Well, she isn’t my wife—not exactly. But we’re the closest thing to it, I suppose. The way we argue, well, you wouldn’t know the difference.”
Tuck sipped his drink and nodded. “My wife and I used to argue like cats and dogs. What I wouldn’t give for just one more spat like that.”
That elicited more than a mild reaction from Anna and Reynard. Anna was first to the trigger. “You never told us you had a wife, Tuck.”
He scowled. “Hell, Anna, you can just call me Mickey. No need to keep up the show here among friends. And I think I might have mentioned it once, but we were trying to avoid getting killed by a herd of shamblers at the time, as I recall. It wouldn’t surprise me if that small bit of info slipped your mind.”
Reynard sat back and nodded in silence. “Well, since we’re all about transparency here—” He held out his hand to me across the table. “Name’s Colin. Reynard was just my reenactment stage name.”
I shook his hand again. “I wasn’t always Scratch. My folks called me Aidan.”
He laughed. “Well, that’s a good Irish name if ever I heard one. How’d a dark-skinned beauty like yourself end up with a Mick name like that?”
I shrugged. “Half-Mexican on my mom’s side.”
“Damn it if that don’t beat all. You speak it?” I nodded in the affirmative. “Well hell, ain’t that something.” He paused and sipped his drink again. “Well, I for one am glad to know you. Ain’t that right, Mickey?”
Mickey tipped an imaginary hat at me. “Indeed, I am. And if there are any single women in that group of settlers you’re heading off to rescue, I might just go with you.”
Anna placed the back of her hand on her forehead and pretended to swoon. “Oh, I do declare, Mickey, you do so wound my heart!”
He smirked at her. “Yeah, well, I think Colin and I both figured a long time ago that neither one of us was your dream date.”
Colin sat back and crossed his arms, and as he did, I noticed they were scarred up something fierce. “Hey, speak for yourself, Merlin. I’m still hopeful.” He winked at Anna, but based on her facial expression I was pretty sure he was barking up the wrong tree. Still, you can’t fault a guy for trying.
Anna piped up with a little too much squeak in her voice. “So, Scratch, you were going to tell us about this safe house you have?”
I decided to rescue her and go with it. “Well, it’s not a safe house—it’s more like a massive extended bomb shelter. Think ‘Cheyenne Mountain’ but Texas style. I can’t say more right now because honestly there’s a lot more riding on us making it back than our health and safety.”
Mickey leaned in with a twinkle in his eyes. “You sound like you’re talking fate of the world stuff.”
I pursed my lips and exhaled with force. “Well… Alright, I’ll tell you. But don’t be mad at me for cheating, Colin. I didn’t exactly beat you fair and square.”
He tipped his chair back on two legs and crossed his arms. “You a ’thrope?”
“No, not exactly.” I pulled up my sleeve and showed them the Z-venom lines. Anna’s jaw about hit the table, while Colin nearly fell out of his chair, and Mickey looked like he was going to shit a brick.
Mickey spoke up first. “You’re infected. How are you not shuffling into walls and craving brains?”
“Well, it’s complicated.”
“Uncomplicate it,” Anna responded.
So, I told them the story of how I met the Doc and Gabby and Bobby, and how I had gotten captured by the militia, and how I’d gotten infected. Then I told them how Bobby saved me, and how the Doc’s witchery saved me even more, and then some. “But, it’s still affecting me. Feels like I’m getting better all the time, but I also don’t think I’m completely out of the woods, either.”
Colin just sat back and rubbed his chin during the whole telling of our tale, while Mickey and Anna would interject a question or two here or there to clarify a minor detail. When I finished, I slapped my hands on the table. “So, that’s the story.”
Colin grunted. “So, you say this super-serum stuff can make humans like Them, but without wanting to drink blood or eat human flesh?”
“Yeah, more or less. As far as I can gather, it affects different people in different ways. Gabby has quite a bit more spunk than me, but she had the treatments when she was just a young girl. I’ve only had it working in me for a matter of days, and most of that I think has been spent on keeping me from going deader.”
He tapped his fingers on the table, beating out a rapid rhythm that reminded me of a TV show, but I couldn’t remember which one. “What you’re saying is, if you survive the infection you could end up just as resilient and quick as a vamp or a ’thrope.”
“So they tell me.”
He threw his hands up in the air. “Well shit on a stick in winter and call it a fudgesickle—what the hell are we waiting for? I’ve been training those boys in my fian to be silent death since—” Colin paused for a moment, and a tormented look briefly crossed his face. “Well, since things went sideways on us. Can you imagine what they’d be like if they had superpowers? We’d be unstoppable.”
Anna didn’t look as convinced. “What about the girl, Gabby? She seems a little maladjusted to me. Is that a side effect of the serum?”
I chuckled. “Aw, hell no. That’s just puberty, I assure you. But don’t tell her I said that. No, that kid is as human as a child can be, after having been raised among all this crap. I mean, look at the boys in your merry band—do you think anyone would consider them well-adjusted if we wound the clock back ten years?”
She grimaced and looked down at her hands, which I noticed had been doing a fair bit of fiddling and wringing. “No, I suppose not. What about the boy, Bobby?”
Not wanting to give away secrets that weren’t mine to share, I shook my head. “He—hasn’t been through the treatment yet.”
Mickey whistled sharply and smiled. “Hey, I’d do it. Maybe for once I’d be more than just the brains of this outfit.”
I held a hand up as if to placate him and shrugged. “Nothing wrong with being the smart one. Lord knows the world’s short of those types these days.”
Mickey screwed his face up and squinted with one eye. “Yeah, but a fat lot of good that does when you’re fighting werewolves. And, I can foresee a time in the very near future when that could be the case. That is, if you fail in your venture, of course.”
I sighed and held up both hands. “Well, I’m not taking offense. I have a plan, but I didn’t say it was a good one. My primary goal is to ensure that those kids make it back alive. Then it’s saving the settlers. Because the truth is, the settlers chose to live in danger. These kids, they’re just tagging along because they have no one else to follow.”
It was Anna’s turn to pat my hand this time. “I know the feeling. It’s a big responsibility, is it not? But I suspect that if you tried to leave them behind, they’d be hot on your heels the minute you were out the door.”
“You got that right. I already tried it, and it didn’t stick.” I swiveled my head and took them all in, one at a time. “Tell me, how do you guys do it?”
Colin spoke up first. “What else are we going to do? Go out and become slavers? I for one would rather try to preserve some of what’s left of humanity, and look toward the coming of a better day.”
Mickey raised a finger off the table. “Ditto that.”
Anna lifted her Scotch halfway to her mouth and then though
t better of it. “Personally, every time I look at one of those kids I see my little brother. No way I could leave them alone in this mess if there’s hope for something better. No way, no how.”
I took a deep breath and looked each of them in the eye. “Then you’re just the type of people I want with us, helping to force these sons of bitches out of Texas so we can build a new world. You can bet your asses that I’m going to be back through here to take you to meet the Doc. And believe me, she’ll be thrilled to have more subjects—I mean, people—to juice with her supernatural serum.”
They all looked at each other, and something passed between them. Anna nodded and slapped her hand on mine. “Count us in.”
11
MAN
Despite the urgency of the situation, we decided to stay one more night to rest up before the big push into north central Austin. Also, to be fair, we wanted to give Anna’s guys some time to prepare. She’d offered to loan us two scouts to guide us through the city into the werewolves’ territory, at least as close as they thought would be safe for them to go. At first I’d refused, but Anna insisted that it would be a good experience for the boys, and Colin agreed, so that settled it.
As it turned out, they had a couple of kids who served as their weaponsmith and armorer. I spent some time in the shop with them, repairing the handle on the katana I’d found at the pawn shop, rigging the sheath for shoulder carry, and honing the blade until it would shave the hair off a gnat’s ass.
Their weaponsmith helped with the work, and when we finished it, he wrapped the cast aluminum handles in leather and wire, securing it to ensure that the blade wouldn’t come loose. I spent some extra time gluing it all together with epoxy and sealing the space between the blade and the crossguard to make sure no blood would get inside the handle and rust it up. A blade like that wasn’t likely to come along again any time soon, so I wanted to be certain it was serviceable and ready for action.
