The Last of the Firsts

by G J Ogden

  “Not at all, you’d make a fine ranger,” said Ethan, looking back out towards the sunset. “I bet you don’t get a view like this from inside your mountain.”

  Yuna rested her elbows on the top of the wall and drank in the view. Ethan was right; the closest they got to nature was their subterranean garden. “It’s beautiful. It almost makes you forget how dead this planet is.”

  “Not dead,” said Ethan, closing his eyes to feel the wind against his face. “This planet is a survivor, like us. All it needs is time to heal, and for us to not give up on it.”

  Yuna nodded, but then her thoughts wandered and she was reminded of Summer. In many ways, her situation mirrored that of the planet; she had been broken and pieced back together, but parts of her were still damaged. Yet, she was also still strong. Perhaps, they could still find a way to reverse the damage, not only to Summer, but to the planet as well.

  “How is Summer?” said Yuna, trying to pose the question as neutrally as possible.

  Ethan breathed in the cool air and exhaled slowly. “I haven’t seen her since last night.”

  “She’ll come around. She’s not the sort to give up easily.”

  “I hope so,” said Ethan; he was as much talking to himself as to Yuna.

  Their conversation was interrupted by an electronic bleep that seemed to be coming from somewhere within Yuna’s vast array of clothing. He watched as she pulled back the sleeve of the ranger coat to reveal a small device attached to her wrist.

  “Anything wrong?” asked Ethan. Though the device did not look like the bulkier PVSM units the UEC soldiers used, he assumed it was performing a similar function.

  “It’s an alert from one of the perimeter sensors,” Yuna replied, swiping a finger over the device to run through a sequence of different readouts. “There’s something heading this way; right for us, actually.”

  Ethan nodded. “Good, it’s about time. I’m getting tired of being cooped in here.”

  “Spoiling for a fight, eh?”

  “I just want to do something,” said Ethan, adding extra emphasis to the word, something. “It’s time we took the fight to the roamers and the maddened, instead of just hiding behind our walls and hoping they’ll leave us alone.”

  Yuna continued to study the small display panel on her wrist, but then spotted Zoie in her peripheral vision, leaving the council chambers. She stopped briefly, seeming to spot Yuna on the wall, and began jogging to the closest ladder to climb up onto the walkway.

  “Well, there are maybe thirty or more of those things approaching,” said Yuna, pulling the sleeve of her coat back over the device and returning her attention to Ethan. “Let’s see how Tyler’s new defenses shape up.”

  “I’d rather just go out there and face them,” said Ethan, gripping the cold, gray stone wall as if he was preparing to vault over it.

  Yuna checked down behind the gate, making sure that the armored crawler was still parked up, ready and waiting. The orange sunset gleamed in its panels. “Let the defenses do their job, and then we’ll go out together, okay? I wouldn’t mind a quick trip outside the walls myself, before I have to sit in decontamination and grow bored out of my mind.”

  Ethan followed the direction of Yuna’s gaze and saw the crawler. “You’re on.”

  The sound of Zoie’s boots clacking on the metal decking made them both turn to face her and she stopped a few meters short of Ethan, breathing heavily. “The perimeter alarm was tripped... there are thirty five… things… heading in this direction,” she said, between wheezy breaths.

  Yuna pulled back her sleeve and waved the wrist-mounted device at her. “I know, I’m wearing the tactical monitor that Tyler made for us.”

  Zoie looked despondent. “So, you mean I could have just talked to you over the commlink, instead of running all the way up here?”

  “The exercise will do you good.”

  Zoie frowned and coughed, while thumping her chest. “It doesn’t feel that way.”

  “Ethan and I are going to watch from up here and then test the crawler out on any that are left, once the defense systems have done their job.”

  Zoie looked out at the crimson horizon and saw the dark shapes of their enemies closing in. “Okay, I’ll monitor from the council chamber.” She wagged a finger at her sister and added, “You be careful. No risks, okay?”

  “I promise,” said Yuna, sincerely.

  Ethan smiled at Zoie and added, “Don’t worry, we’ll be cautious.” Zoie nodded and then jogged back along the walkway, at a far more leisurely pace than before. Ethan was aware of the clack of Zoie’s boots on the metal deck, but then the sound of her footsteps were suddenly drowned out by the vibrant hum of the two enormous turrets at the corners of the settlement walls, like sleeping guardians that had just been awakened and were yawning vociferously. Moments later there was another hum from above him, and Ethan peered up to see one of the GARDs hovering about ten meters above his head. The combination of all three powerful weapons saturated the air with an ominous, low throb that Ethan could feel reverberating through the deck plates and inside his chest, and despite knowing that these devices were on his side, he couldn’t help but feel intimidated by them.

  “They’re coming…” said Yuna, ominously.

  Ethan concentrated back on the grounds in front of the settlement and saw their adversaries approaching, some emerging from the small pockets of woodland, others from over the tops of the rolling hills that surrounded the settlement, and some rising directly from the valley where the broken city still sat, smoldering in the distance like an angry volcano. All of them moved low and fast and with the unmistakable, inhuman gait of the maddened. Not long ago the sight of so many of these creatures bearing down on Forest Gate would have saturated his body with terror; but not this time. This time Ethan felt a rush, not of excitement, exactly; more like a powerful sense of anticipation.

  Ethan watched with interest as the figures swarmed closer, huddled into small clusters of four or five, but with no apparent co-ordination or communication between them. The nearest cluster charged down the hill to his right and Ethan could feel his heart thump harder, and his instincts told him to run. But then the turret swung in the direction of the approaching enemies and its low hum, which had been consistent up to that point, began to climb, growing louder and stronger, shaking the deck plates until the barrel of the cannon glowed blue, and five bolts of energy sped towards the creatures in such rapid succession that Ethan was forced to squint to shield his eyes against the blinding brilliance of the searing blue light. When he opened them fully again a cluster of bodies lay sprawled on the yellow-green grass, smoke rising from deep, blackened craters in their chests.

  There was no let up as the GARD darted towards the pack in the center, moving so quickly that Ethan struggled to follow its sharp, perfectly straight motions. The flash of its weapons reached Ethan’s eyes, though the sound was lost, overpowered by a rising resonating pulse as the second turret jolted into action, firing the same, searing blue bolts of energy out towards the tree line. Ethan couldn’t see the intended targets, but instantly the trees exploded into flame, as if struck by some ethereal force. The turrets and GARD continued to unleash their electrical fury at each oncoming wave and then, as quickly as the maelstrom of energy bolts had begun, the GARD swooped back to its invisible perch above Ethan’s head, and the menacing hum from the two turrets diminished, their smoking barrels swinging back to their prior positions, aimed towards the city.

  Yuna checked her tactical monitor. “Twenty-nine down, the rest seem to have turned back, through the trees.” She pointed over to the small wooded area, part of which was on fire.

  “I’ve never seen one of those things turn tail and run before,” said Ethan, feeling his pulse begin to slow.

  “First time for everything!” said Yuna who, unlike Ethan, seemed to have found the entire event thrilling, rather than alarming. “What do you say we take the crawler out and finish them off?”

  �
�Are you sure you’re not secretly some sort of elite UEC soldier?” said Ethan, envying Yuna’s apparent fearlessness. Or, perhaps, she just trusted their new allies more than Ethan; to him, this was all new and very strange.

  “Come on, before we lose them,” Yuna called out; she was already half-way down the ladder to the settlement square. Ethan followed and joined her in the crawler, climbing into the rear compartment. There were two bolt-throwers stashed in a rack; Ethan grabbed one and powered it on.

  Yuna activated the crawler’s motors, which hummed serenely in comparison to the mighty turrets, and then hit the commlink . “Zoie, some of them got away so we’re going to pursue. Send the GARD to monitor and transmit their location back to the crawler.”

  The commlink crackled on. “Understood. I’m sending the second GARD to watch over you. Don’t do anything stupid.”

  “Stop fussing!” snapped Yuna, though it was more playful than snippy. “I’ll be careful, don’t worry.” Then she clicked off the commlink and hit another button; a second later, the gate began to swing open.

  “Are you ready back there?” shouted Yuna, arching her neck to check on Ethan. She had lowered the rear glass partition of the crawler’s cabin so they could still talk.

  Ethan twisted the dial on the side of the bolt-thrower to maximum and felt its power vibrating though his hands and arms. The first GARD zipped over his head and into the center of the settlement where it dropped into its re-charging pod, while the second shot up and took its place. Ethan waited for the metal guardian to assume its position and then looked back at Yuna, giving her a thumbs up. “Okay, let’s go.”

  Yuna accelerated out of the gates so rapidly that had Ethan not been holding on to the guard rail, he would probably have sailed straight off the back of the crawler. The GARD flew on ahead and climbed higher, while Yuna steered the crawler towards the smoldering trees a few hundred meters ahead. Ethan peered back towards the settlement, which was vanishing into the distance with alarming rapidity, and then ducked lower inside the armored rear compartment to shield himself from the buffeting of the wind. The trees sped past to Ethan’s left, and then they climbed a steep slope, veering left to cut through a rocky area, until they broke over the top of a hill and sped on through rugged moorland on the other side. Ethan realized that he had not ventured out in this direction before, since the boggy terrain was too dangerous to traverse on foot. In contrast, the multi-tracked crawler was having no difficulty at all.

  He tightened his grip on the guard rail and stood up, feeling the full force of the air rushing past his face. He could see the GARD, perhaps a hundred meters ahead, unleashing bolts of blue energy toward the ground, though the targets were out of view, below the line of the horizon. Suddenly, the GARD stopped firing, and Yuna eased back, maneuvering the crawler towards where the GARD was silently hovering.

  “I think it beat us to them!” Yuna shouted back to Ethan. “But let’s take a look anyway; there’s a hollow ahead, in the direction they were heading.”

  Ethan nodded and Yuna focused ahead again. Despite the protection of the GARD and their armed and armored crawler, there was something about being in unfamiliar terrain that Ethan found disquieting. The moorlands had never been off-limits, but no scouting parties ever ventured into them. One reason was that the terrain was dangerous and unpredictable; fogs could sweep in without warning and there had been times when inexperienced rangers had been either lost or fallen into bogs, and in some cases had died of exposure to the elements, long before being found. Since there were few useful resources out there, and scarcely any animal sightings, it wasn’t worth the risk and the region had been left alone.

  Yuna again dialed back the speed of the crawler as they drew closer to the GARD. The device was hovering, in the way it usually did when just monitoring, but its array of lights were still red, alerting them to potential dangers nearby. Ethan felt a tingle flow down his spine.

  “Yuna, take it slow, I have a bad feeling about this,” he said, tightening his hold on the bolt-thrower’s cold metal handle.

  Yuna kept her eyes front, but waved a hand to indicate she had heard Ethan, then the crawler decelerated. They trundled to the edge of the moorland, before the upland terrain fell away into a vast hollow that snaked between the hills, following the path of a wide, fast-moving river, the banks of which appeared to be teeming with wildlife, moving in the direction of the river’s flow. But then Ethan remembered the GARD and its red lights and his stomach twisted into a knot. He peered up at the spherical drone, which was hovering overhead and glowing red, then stared down into the valley.

  “Yuna, can your sensors see into the valley?” he asked.

  Yuna stood up in her seat and twisted her body around to face him; Ethan’s face was white and his body was rigid. It frightened her. “Ethan, what’s wrong?”

  Ethan’s eyes flicked to her, but his body remained fixed, as if frozen. “The movement down in the valley, Yuna, can you scan it? Can you read what they are?”

  Yuna frowned. “Yes, but what…”

  “Do it, please. And do it quickly.”

  Ethan’s manner had really scared her; she dropped back into the seat and entered a sequence of commands into the crawler’s console. Instantly, the GARD darted in an arrow-straight line towards the river, accelerating so rapidly that it was a mere dot in the distance in a matter of seconds. Ethan and Yuna waited in silence, Yuna tapping the dashboard nervously with her fingers, until the console bleeped.

  “I can bring up a holo feed from the GARD,” she said, without turning around. She tapped another sequence into the console and a live holo feed from the GARD hovering above the river bank filled the glass windshield.

  “Oh no…”

  Ethan’s view was obscured so he jumped out of the rear compartment and swung into the seat beside Yuna, who was fixated on the holo feed, a hand clasped over her mouth. Ethan didn’t need to look to confirm what he already suspected; the creatures that were moving along the banks of the river were not animals, but the maddened. Ethan stood again and followed the path of the river in the opposite direction, down the valley, until it banked out of view, obscured by a craggy headland, beyond which rose a plume of dark smoke.

  “The city…” said Ethan. “They are following the river that runs along the outskirts of the city.”

  “But, Ethan, there are thousands of them!” said Yuna, reading the data feed from the GARD’s sensors. “We couldn’t hope to kill more than a small fraction of that number, even with a dozen more GARDs.”

  Ethan bowed his head and combed his fingers through his hair, scratching the back of his head with his fingertips in an attempt to bring some life back to his addled mind.

  “Where does this river lead?” asked Yuna.

  Ethan knew the answer. While the river wasn’t important to life at Forest Gate, owing to a natural spring that provided their source of water, most of the other settlements relied on the rivers and the lakes in order to survive. And while there were many smaller rivers and brooks spanning the terrain that encompassed the known settlements, there was only one river the size of the one he was looking at now. It cut its way through the lowland areas and out towards the sea, far further than Ethan had ever had cause to venture. But he knew the settlement locations, and he knew that perhaps as many as two thirds of them bordered this mighty waterway. The river was an artery that had allowed a tiny slice of the life that had once existed on the planet to survive and grow. Now, instead of life, it would feed these settlements with death.

  “We have to get back!” said Ethan. “We have to find the hermit; he’s our only hope now.”

  “But, what if he’s no different to you?” said Yuna, and for the first time since Ethan had met her, she looked visibly rattled. Yuna had seemed unflappable, and had taken in her stride events that would have scared even an experienced ranger. Not even Kurren’s soldiers, or the maddened that had poured into the underground city beyond her subterranean complex had caused her to waver.
But, though she was brave she was not reckless and she was also no fool. She knew the grave threat that such a huge number of these creatures posed, and she was scared, just as he was.

  “Ethan, what if his blood can’t help to find a way to defeat these things? We don’t have a chance against these numbers.”

  Ethan watched the stream of corrupted bodies swarm along the river bank. Who knew how many had already passed through, and how many had already spread out in other directions. Even if they could find or build more GARDs, crawlers and turrets, the maddened would have reached the other settlements and killed everyone long before they could hope to even dent their progress.

  “We have to find a way,” Ethan said, his voice hollow. “Because if we don’t, we will fall for a second time. And we will never get back up.”

  Chapter 17

  Yuna steered the crawler into line with the gate and hit a button on the console to trigger the mechanism to open. Their journey back across the moorlands had been steady and silent, other than the sound of the wind whipping through the cabin and the reassuring thrum of the GARD overhead, matching their course and speed precisely. Since leaving the moorlands, the lights on the GARD had switched from red to blue, but Ethan and Yuna knew that the danger had not gone away; it had merely passed out of sight.

  Ethan stared out of the cabin window, which he had wound down as they approached the settlement to allow the cold air to flow past his face. The processed environment of the crawler’s cabin, like the subterranean engineering complex and the UEC base, seemed stifling and claustrophobic by comparison, and he wondered how people could live, day in, day out, without the feel of the wind on their skin. As the gate opened, he looked idly out towards his tree on the mound outside the walls, and was surprised to see a GARD hovering above it. He sat up, alert to the potential danger, and it was then that he noticed that someone was on the mound, resting back against the ancient tree. The late morning light broke through the clouds and picked out the shimmering red hair of Summer, blowing gently in the breeze. His first instinct was to alert Yuna and to drive over and get her, but then he stopped himself and stayed silent. He checked the GARD above them, which was still humming gently, its light blue, and then observed that its counterpart appeared to be similarly passive, though he couldn’t quite make out the color of its lights. Ethan remembered how that spot had always brought him great comfort and perhaps, he hoped, it might bring some comfort to Summer too.