“Don't keep us in suspense, Oleg,” I say hotly. “What is it you’ve found?”
Oleg swallows hard and his throat makes an audible clicking noise. “The Queen,” he says. “She’s isn’t dead.”
-5-
“How's that possible? I bark, starting to feel the blood flow into my face. “You said yourself, they lured her into the open two centuries ago and killed her.”
The stern look on Oleg’s face tells me he remembers exactly what he said and has no need of being reminded. “That was what we were told.”
“It's what we were all told,” Ret adds. “Leave it to the Keepers to weave a tale that never happened.”
“Propaganda.” That's what Sneak is signing and I can see her hands ball up into tight fists as soon as she's done.
“So those Duster pussies never finished her off after all?” Bron says. “Now I’ve lost all respect for them.”
“Not killed, she was captured and imprisoned,” but even as Oleg says the words, his head shakes in disbelief.
Ret laughs, but there isn't an ounce of humor in it. “They locked her away, like some Grinder caught stealing a loaf of bread.”
“Not exactly,” Oleg corrects him. “She was driven into deepest recesses of a Duster prison and there she was sealed, presumably forever. In order to ensure she would never be disturbed or reawakened, our ancestors chose that as the very site upon which to rebuild the human race.”
Ret blinks his eyes hard. “You're saying she's locked somewhere beneath the capital?”
Oleg nods. “According to these documents, yes.”
“Well isn’t that just great,” Bron snorts, looking like a man with two dinners before him. “So, who do we go after first? Skuld or the Queen?”
“I have a feeling we won't need to choose,” I say and Oleg knows exactly what I mean.
Bron looks bewildered and ready to head butt someone else. Outside, I hear movement and realize it’s the Keeper guard waking up. He's moaning, which means he's touching his nose and trying his best to remember how it got bent so far out of shape.
“Skuld’s heading for the capital,” I say. “We knew he would, sooner or later, but what we didn't know, until now, was why.”
“Or that he’d have an army of Zees with him when he arrived.”
I glance over at Oleg and spot the concern deeply etched on his face. I ask the question, although it's clear enough he's already wondering the same thing. “What will happen if Skuld manages to kill the Queen?”
The old guy reaches down and ruffles the edges of the papers he's holding. “Then there would be nothing left to stop him, Azina, not even you.”
Oleg grabs a wad of papers in his arms and signals that he has everything he needs. One of those things is a map of the catacombs under Attica, and a tunnel that supposedly leads to the place where the Queen is being held. Which raises two disturbing questions. Rule number three of being a gun for hire is ‘never rely on outdated maps when your life is on the line.’ Those discolored papers, that Oleg’s clutching like a newborn child, are probably two centuries old. The capital city has grown a lot since then. They’ve built structures and crude plumbing and who knows how many of those tunnels are still there. But that isn’t my biggest concern. From the corner of my eye I catch Sneak watching me, and I know full well she sees the worry on my face. She knows me well enough to realize it doesn't have a thing to do with fretting about my own life. I would never have strapped myself to Skuld’s little machine if that were the case. I glance down at my inky black arms, bristling with prickly hairs, almost as if to drive the point home. Already I've attacked one member of the team and I can't fight the terror, nagging inside of me, that the closer we get to Skuld and the Queen he's so desperate to kill, the more of a danger I become.
-6-
It's dusk by the time we start heading back to the workshop, and it isn't long before the full devastating effect of Skuld’s plan, on the people of Sotercity, comes into clear focus. A woman in a shredded tunic, her face a mask of shock, wanders the streets, calling out the names of loved ones. She doesn't appear to have been bitten, but the chances are good whoever she's calling out to has, and whatever's left of them is surely heading toward Skuld’s gathering point as we speak. Her eyes spot me as we approach and the sudden change in her expression is dramatic. She thinks I'm a Zee and shrieks, searching the ground for a weapon. Doesn't seem to matter one bit that I'm surrounded by a half-dozen others. Another survivor nearby picks up on the commotion and follows suit. They're heading our way, a handful of new stragglers swelling their ranks by the time Ret raises his shotgun. “Looks like things are about to get sloppy.”
“Don't hurt them,” I say. How can I possibly blame these people, after what they've gone through? If the tables were turned, I’d probably be leading the charge. I'm a monster. On the outside, at the very least, and perhaps shortly on the inside too. Sneak’s tapping a finger on the hilt of one of her twin blades and I know for a fact if they get too close – even wielding makeshift weapons – she won't hesitate to kill them all. She would lay down her life trying to protect me. I spot an intersecting street and we turn down it. The detour will add a few minutes to the journey, but it isn't worth risking any more bloodshed.
The mob is far behind when we make it back to the workshop and the sound of hammering. “They should be burying the dead,” Bron says. “Instead of making trouble for the rest of us, who risked our skins trying to stop Skuld.”
Oleg’s staring into his hands as though he were reading something terrible etched into the grooves of his flesh. “Sotercity’s been reduced to a mob of lowly Grinders.” The elitist old bastard looks positively beside himself. I'm the one that crowd would hang from the city walls, not them. Shouldn’t I be the one in despair? If anyone ever needed more proof the world's a screwed up place, this is it.
The hammering stops and Dhal glances up from a pair of gleaming metal arms he's got laid out before him. The kid’s face is a patchwork of grease stains and sweat. These new arms are bigger than Bron’s broken ones, and a universe apart from the comical looking spatulas he's wearing now. Not surprisingly, the big guy looks positively elated.
He nods in their direction “For me?”
Oh boy, now he’s a child opening gifts on the Winter Solstice.
“They were meant for the son of a high-ranking Keeper,” Dhal says. “Only other pair in existence.” The kid says, nodding to what remains of Bron’s shattered arms beside him. “I salvaged as much as I could from the old units, but you have to understand, they were so badly damaged…” Bron’s only half listening. Details like how and why roll off of him like water off a feathered back. “Get these things off me, would ya?” he snaps.
Dhal shrugs and begins loosening the bolts to remove the makeshift arms. The boy pauses and winks at me. “You know,” he says pensively. “Maybe I shouldn't, I mean, I could get in a lot of trouble giving these away. That Keeper paid a lot of money for these arms.”
“Never mind any of that,” Bron barks. “That crusty old Keeper and his snot-nosed kid are either dead or new members of Skuld’s new shitbag army. Get moving.”
It takes Dhal nearly 30 minutes to make the final attachment of Bron’s new and improved killing machines. The big guy stands and holds one in the air, rotating his wrist, flexing the fingers into a fist. He almost reminds me of a woman trying on the new pair of gloves.
“Whaddyathink?” he asks, knowing full well they’re an impressive spectacle by any measure. He snatches a three inch metal bar off the workbench and bends it as easily as a child might bend a piece of tall grass.
“They’re certainly shiny,” I tell him.
Ret’s shaking his head. “Zees’ll see us coming from miles away now.”
“So, you like them then?” Dhal asks and despite the boy’s phenomenal expertise, his adolescent insecurities are hard to ignore.
“Like them?” Bron bellows, snatching those flimsy temporary arms and crumpling them into a
mangled ball of steel. “I'd marry them, if I could.”
Dhal smiles. “Wait till you see what else they can do. I know you recently lost your demolitions expert, Jinx, so I've added a 40mm grenade launcher to your left arm.” Dhal holds up what looks like a child's marble. “Might not look impressive, but they pack as much power as a full-sized grenade. Tilt that arm into the air and you become a one-man mortar team.”
Ret's got his head buried in his hands and I know just what he’s thinking. If Bron’s ego wasn't overinflated before, it sure as hell will be once the kid’s done explaining these upgrades.
“What about my old firepower?”
“All there. And, like the grenades, I transitioned your arms to fire slightly smaller shells. Just as powerful but you can carry more ammo.”
“Good, but will they be as loud? I mean, I'll be disappointed if everyone's ears aren't ringing after I lay down a barrage.” Bron’s famous brown-toothed smile is back in full force.
“Guaranteed to deafen within a dozen yards.”
Bron thinks he's being funny, but those guns of his have already impacted my hearing by at least 30%.
Dhal taps a compartment at the base of Bron’s right palm. “Right below your blade ejection port I added something special. Go on, give it a try.”
Oleg and the others hurry out of the way just in time. Bron aims his palm at a thick wood beam and fires a spear point across the room. It thuds into the solid oak, trailing a thin cord behind it.
“The cable has a tensile strength greater than steel. Oh yeah, there's one last thing that I added and I think you're really gonna to love this one.”
“A built-in toilet roll dispenser that wipes his backside for him?” Ret asks. Bron flicks him a look that says ‘why you trying to ruin my birthday party?’
Dhal flips a switch on Bron’s left arm, revealing a nozzle.
“I hope that's not for moonshine,” I say, only half joking. “Bron after a few drinks isn’t pretty.”
Ret concurs. “Once, after six shots of something called Grinder’s Delight, Bron ripped out the entire bar and sent it through the window.”
Dhal suddenly looks like he isn’t so sure arming Bron to the teeth was a good idea.
Bron taps the nozzle. “Never mind them, what does it do?”
Dhal swallows hard. “It's a flamethrower that fires something Dusters used to call napalm. A combustible gel that burns at over 2000 degrees Fahrenheit. Doesn’t matter if they’re human or Zee, whatever you point this at stops living. There ain’t much in there, so use it sparingly.”
Tears form at the corners of Bron’s eyes. The thought of that much death and destruction always makes him emotional.
Oleg’s been patiently listening to all this and now stands to speak. “As impressive as this is, let me remind you even the mighty Bron is no match for the sheer number of Zees Skuld is drawing to him. An army is forming and we don't have anything powerful enough to throw at them.”
“What about Azina?” Ret says. “You saw how she made those Zees tear the Hive leader to pieces.”
“I did,” Oleg concedes. “What remains to be seen is how she will fare when she enters Skuld’s effective zone of control. Who are the Zees likely to follow?”
“That’s a question none of us can answer,” I say. “Not until we're there.”
Oleg’s brow ruffles like one of those cranky Keeper professors. “Is that the kind of plan in which the future of the human race will depend on Azina? Let's wait-and-see?”
As always, I'd love to crack Oleg in the head, but I can't deny the sour old bastard does have a point. We're gonna need more than wishful thinking if we want any chance of stopping Skuld from enslaving humanity or worse, driving them to extinction. Dhal’s got his hand propped in the air again like a schoolboy.
“What is it?” I ask, hoping to hell it isn't another fun fact about Bron’s arms.
“I know what we can do,” he says.
-7-
“We need to go to White Rock,” Dhal says and pauses, as though any of us have a clue what he’s talking about.
Ret’s still nodding, waiting for the rest to spill out, when Oleg pipes up. “The testing ground, you've been there?”
“Of course,” Dhal replies.
Now I'm really starting to get pissed. “You wanna fill the rest of us in on this private conversation you two are having?”
Oleg clears his throat. “Any new tech recovered by the Prospectors is first sent to White Rock for secret testing and implementation.”
“Goliath,” Ret blurts out as the pieces of the puzzle begin fitting together.
“But I destroyed that worthless hunk of metal,” Bron offers proudly.
Ret tsks. “You hurt Goliath. Technically, it was Azina who killed it by shoving Dhal’s hat down its exhaust pipe.”
Almost on cue, Dhal’s hand pats the top of his head. “I miss that hat.”
“It's still there, if you want it,” Bron offers, a mouthful of rotting teeth winking back at the boy. “Might be a touch dirty, but anything is better than looking at that mop you call hair.”
I cut through the chatter and address Dhal directly. “What’s at White Rock?”
“The Titans,” Dhal says. “Goliath’s prototypes.” And that’s when it begins to make sense. Even a genius like Master Lund didn’t get it right the first time.
Ret doesn’t seem convinced. “So we’re gonna risk our lives over two heaps of scrap metal?”
Dhal shakes impatiently. “Goliath’s predecessors aren’t scrap. With each generation we made improvements, until we arrived at exactly what Skuld was after: The ultimate killing machine.”
Sneak starts signing and she raises a good point. I translate for the others. “But can you get the Titans working?”
“Probably, but that isn’t our biggest problem,” Dhal says, wiping a smear of grease from his hand. “White Rock is heavily defended.”
Oleg straightens his robes. “One thing you must remember, White Rock is the storehouse for the very technology Skuld has sought to keep from the general population. You won’t find Wardens there. The men who guard White Rock aren’t conscripted, they’re born in White Rock and that’s where they die.”
“An elite force, cut off from the outside world, that shoots first and doesn’t bother asking any questions,” I say. “This keeps getting better by the second.” And even as the words come rolling off my tongue, I feel that strange sensation wash over me again. A tingling that courses through my body. I glance down and see those sharpened hairs on my arms standing on end, as though an electric current is running through every fiber of my being. That’s when the deep timbre of a man’s voice calls out to me. It’s Skuld, I’m sure of it and he’s trying to get inside my head and make me do things. From a great distance, I hear Oleg say, “cut off and likely unaware the Zees are about to destroy what’s left of the human race.”
Then Ret speaks and it sounds like he’s talking through an old tin can: “All the more reason we’ll need to convince them.”
Oleg’s about to say something else, when that pulse firing through my body becomes too strong to resist. Sneak is the first to realize there’s a problem, followed by Ret; but, by then, it’s already too late.
It doesn’t matter that my hands are clasped together as tightly as I can squeeze them. My right whips out and hits Oleg square on the chest, knocking him across the room like a child’s doll. My own strength, after the transformation, is unbelievable and I’m doing everything I can to regain control, but already I know deep down it isn’t going to be enough. The tingling is surging even stronger and there isn’t any doubt: unless I can stop it, whatever’s inside me doing this is about to kill everyone around me.
-8-
Ret doesn’t get a single step closer before I snatch him by his ammo vest, raise him two feet off the ground, his legs kicking wildly in mid-air, and fling him over the workshop repair table. The sound of clanking tools fills the room as he rolls over bits of
pipe and copper shavings before hitting the ground. Dhal might be next, but the kid’s already gone, probably learned his lesson after I tried to crush his throat.
To my left, Bron raises one of his arms, intent on frying me to a crisp, when Sneak snap-kicks his wrist. An orange gout of flame spews from the nozzle and douses the workshop ceiling. Sneak only meant to stop him from killing me but, with no way to tell him that, it’s clear Bron thinks Sneak and I are the enemy. The big guy’s about a second away from opening up with both his 20mm guns and tearing this place and everyone in it to shreds. Already I can feel Skuld’s grip weakening, but the damage is done. My choices are clear and each one is worse than the last. Either plead with Bron and risk being blasted into mush, or stand and fight. I’ve never been one to beg and, with that, I lunge across the room, reaching him in a single powerful leap, grabbing hold of his thick metal wrists as he opens fire. My hands vibrate wildly as shells tear past my head. He’s so incredibly strong I won’t be able to hold him for long. Both blades eject from his palms and now I know I’m in trouble. Sneak’s trying to get between us, desperate to stop this before one of us is hurt or killed, and her concern might just have something to do with the fact that the roof’s on fire. Before Sneak can do much, Bron sends the heel of his boot into my stomach, knocking me backward. I reach for my Katana, just as I spot one of his blades slicing toward my head. The Katana gets there just in time and the force of it nearly knocks the sword from my hand. I realize then that I’ll never have enough time to recover before the next strike and, as I see it coming, all I can do is hope the end is quick.
The loud clang beside my head makes my ears ring. I open my eyes to find that Sneak’s blade deflected Bron’s killing blow. Both of us take a half step back and I know right away she’s in trouble. Bron goes at her, swinging madly, and with unmatched grace she dodges his vicious attacks as he first chops the workbench in half and then cleaves a solid Oak chair in two. Wrenches and screwdrivers scatter. The bloodlust in his eyes tells me he won’t stop till we’re dead. I move behind Bron and swing the tip of my boot up between his legs. My foot connects and almost at once Bron doubles over in pain, moaning. I use the narrow window of time to gather my things and burst out of the front door, running as fast as I can down the street.
Hive III Page 2
