There were three children, staked upside down in positions of agony so real, I knew they’d died in the air, lashed to crosses with their feet to the sky, their shattered arms dangling. Their fingers were gone, their tongues as well. They were untouched by animals, their bodies blackened by the sun. The smell was a nightmare, the sight a horror like hell itself. There were two girls and a boy, and they had all been younger than Natif. Blood pooled beneath each in a rusty stain, and the pall of evil hung over the entire place in a suffocating cloak. I fought the urge to vomit right there. Mira did, wiping her mouth and spitting onto the sand, naked fury on her face.
“What the fuck kind of animal could do this to a child?” Silk asked in a stricken whisper.
I swallowed my hate, letting it burn all the way down. “You know, I was going to spare the guards. I was going to give them all a quick death with the bullet. But now?” I shook my head in such disgust I had to fight the urge to scream at the stars. “We’re not using guns on anyone. I’m going to use my hands on every last one of them, and I’m going to go slow.”
“Jack,” Mira whispered.
“What?” I tore my eyes away to see tears sliding down her face.
She drew her knife, gleaming in the final glow of the sun. “Save some for us.”
35
The blood chickens were delicious, but I picked at mine in a careless way, haunted by the sights from the hidden caravan. It was a silent meal, save for the natural chatter of Natif, who was nervous about the coming fight but excited to be a part of it.
When the fire died, and Natif slumped to one side, sleeping, I motioned that we put him on a blanket under the trees, safely tucked away from our discussion.
“They will be here in the morning, or before dawn if I’m any judge of their tactics. I’m too pissed to sleep, but you all need to rest. Our plan was going to be rings of defense in depth, but there’s no need, not now,” I said.
“We still snipe at a distance?” Mira asked. She was an excellent shot, and her aim would be welcome.
“I don’t know how common guns are, so your goal is simple. If they have a gun in the open, take them out. If they don’t, leave them alone. We want to spare the blood of the slaves, and we can’t do that turning the western approach into a killing ground,” I said.
“Jack, what if they run?” Silk asked. Lasser grunted at that, having thought the same thing.
“I’ll catch them.” I looked at the rippling muscles on my augmented legs and knew that no wagon could outrun me.
“And then?” Silk asked. It was a short question but loaded with meaning. She wanted to know if we were going to torture Taksa and Senet to death in the open air, close to the place where we would build our new world.
“Guards first, guns first, then we open the Black Room, but only after Taksa and Senet are down. They’re brutes and cowards. They’ll have a failsafe of some kind, and it’s up to us to get behind them and stop that. You’ll all attack from the front, and so will I—but I’m going to break off, circle around, and close off their escape,” I said. “When that happens, the real fight will begin.”
“Won’t they be helpless then?” Mira asked.
“I doubt it. They’re animals. They won’t surrender, and I wouldn’t accept their surrender even if they offered it,” I said.
“Good,” Silk hissed.
“That doesn’t mean I won’t have...questions,” I said.
“Even better,” Silk agreed. “You’re not sleeping at all?”
“I’ve slept for two thousand years. I’m done sleeping for now. You all get some rest. I’ll wake you before dawn, and we can eat and drink. We’ll need it,” I said.
There was no argument, and Lasser went to lie near Natif after a fatherly check of the boy. Silk and Mira unrolled blankets near the fire, curling up with their faces to the last coals. Above, the stars watched over us as I planned, fumed, and wondered if this world could be saved.
36
I crouched near the most distant sapling of any size, letting the light desert wind blow over my skin. It was cool and dry, and the horizon began to turn iron gray, shade by shade.
I walked to Silk and Mira, reaching down to shake their shoulders and rouse them for the fight.
My hand stopped as the scent reached my nose. It was something you never forget, a stench so cruel that to smell it once means you would never send soldiers to fight again. Death. It filled my senses, rotten and vile, carried to us on the wind from the west like a messenger crying out the Black Room was coming.
Mira’s eyes opened, her nose lifting like hound. “I smell it,” she whispered.
I woke Silk, who wrinkled her nose, ever delicate. “They’re here?”
“They’re coming,” I said, slipping away to wake Lasser and Natif.
In seconds, we were chewing cold blood chicken and swigging water, eyes all cut to the west in a fevered state.
“Weapons?” I asked, knowing the answer.
“Ready,” came the chorus. There was no need for talking. I touched Natif on the shoulder and pointed to a tall oak. “Climb that. Kill anyone who tries to hurt you. Stay safe.”
“I will, Jack.” He hugged me, light as a feather against my side, then pelted away to begin climbing the tree in silence.
“You’re our second set of eyes,” I told Lasser. “You know what to do.”
“I’ll protect him if things go wrong. If things fall completely apart, I’ll take them with me when they come,” Lasser said and I believed him.
“Good luck,” I said, squeezing his arm. He smiled, grim but determined. “With me to our spots,” I said with a wave. Silk and Mira fell in, guns out and eyes focused on the silent desert.
“Use your vision and give us a heading,” Mira said, settling on a rock, her rifle pointed to the growing dawn.
With a calming breath, I let my eyes focus into the distance, fighting a cringe at the rising smell of corruption. There. Three shapes. Three columns, and then the hint of a sound, metallic and fighting to be heard over the breeze. “Hear them? Chains.”
“I hear it,” Mira said. “I see them now too. Silk, over there. Ogres.”
“Got ‘em,” Silk replied. The day grew brighter as the ogres came closer, their long strides slow but steady. “Look behind them.”
Mira’s rifle cracked, startling us all. “One guard down.” She paused a beat, and her rifle spoke again. “Make that two. Where are the rest of them?”
“The guards? There were supposed to be at least ten,” I said, doing a quick count. The ogres hadn’t slowed at all despite the rifle fire. Behind them, the first wagon loomed over the rise, a dark smear on the sands.
“I make six. Two are down. I count sixty ogres,” Silk said.
“Make that eighty ogres. There’s a rear guard. There’s—oh, shit. There it is,” I said as the Black Room came into sight. “Six wagons. One torture chamber. There was an open flatbed with bundles and—is that a kitchen?” I asked. The second wagon was open air like a primitive field kitchen. It made sense, given the amount of humans and ogres. There were water barrels on the flat wagon, alongside a stove and bales of dry goods, wrapped against the elements. “Do you see—”
A bullet flew past me to vanish through the garden. “Down. Now! Mira, do you have him? Top of the Black Room, behind some kind of railing.” The wagons were four hundred meters out and closing. I only saw a few guards, and the ogres made no sign they knew we were there.
“I have him,” Mira said. Her rifle cracked again. The sniper screamed, then fell forward to be crushed under the slow, heavy wheels. The ogres were chained together around the chest, pulling hard against the combined weight of their malignant convoy.
“How many more guards?” I asked. I stepped forward in a low crouch, unsheathing my blades.
“Three. Some must be in the wagon with Taksa and Senet,” Silk said over the barrel of her gun.
“You know what to do. Hold here. I’m going out,” I said, sliding back toward
the heavier tree growth of the inner garden.
“Jack,” Silk said.
“I know. Eyes open,” I said. I moved off in a blur, feeling muscles come to life as I drew on my new body for speed I’d never known before. I cut hard right, going out into the sands in a looping arc that brought me to the rear of the last wagon, a large, square structure that was smaller than the next three in line. A single guard looked around, his feet moving side to side with nervous energy as he balanced on top of the rocking wagon.
I threw a blade at him with ferocious speed, the point driving into his ribs with a hiss. As he collapsed, I leapt onto the wagon, breaking his neck with one hand and retrieving my bloody knife with the other. “No guns for you boys. We’re doing this the personal way.”
His answer was the thud he made when he fell to the sand, his body rolling away as the column went on. I tore the back door open, diving inside with my blade ready to cut. Light flooded the dark interior to reveal a stunned man holding a pistol.
“Good morning,” he growled, firing at my head as I dodged left. The round went wide as I struck low, my fist coming up to crush his gut with a punishing blow. I felt ribs go to powder as he slammed into the wall with savage force.
“Good morning yourself, fucker. Taksa, I presume?” I asked, tearing the pistol away and putting a foot on his chest. He wheezed in agony, his black eyes burning with hate beneath a strong brow and shaven head.
That was when I noticed the girl.
She was olive-skinned, young, and once she had been beautiful, but now she was still and dead. Her hands were tied, her fingers broken, her small breasts bare to the world. She’d been savaged in every way, blood slick on her legs and neck. The torrent stained sheets of raw cotton, and tools of evil were strewn across the bed next to a decanter of wine and a sodden gag. There were teeth in the gag from where it was jammed into her mouth with brutal force. She’d been a toy, a thing for this man who sniveled up at me, his chest heaving as he fought to keep his lungs from filling with blood.
“You cowardly fuck. I knew you would—"
His hand came up impossibly fast, the small knife driving into my leg to tear upward with cruel efficiency. I punched down, my fist meeting the crown of his head with a thud. Taksa, the great tormentor and would-be god, fell still.
With a curse of pain, I pulled his knife out. I tore the only clean part of his bed sheet and wrapped it tightly around the cut, giving my leg a flex to see if I’d lost any mobility. It hurt like hell, but it didn’t bleed as heavily as it could’ve. I’d live with it.
Time was of the essence, so I unbound the girl with a muttered word of apology, then slipped the bindings over Taksa’s limp arms. “I’ll handle you later, asshole. Our day is just getting started.”
Gunfire erupted ahead in the column, so I climbed to the wagon top with both blades out, flashing in the morning sun. Two wagons ahead, a pair of guards fired away at Silk and Mira, their motion calm and methodical. Return fire struck the left guard, a great spurt of blood erupting from his neck as he spun to the ground with a mortal shriek. The other guard whirled, his weapon rising to greet me, but I jumped even while throwing a knife at him in a glittering whirl.
The blade missed, but the handle struck home on his collar bone, turning his body enough to give me time to close. I kicked his knee into pieces, folding him forward even as I wrenched his rifle away to spin into the sand ten meters away.
“Quick and dirty,” I told him, snapping his neck with a fast turn. He didn’t even have time to protest, slumping into a boneless mass that I let fall without a second thought. I waved my hands overhead, letting Mira and Silk know to stop firing and approach to help free the ogres. The beasts milled about in confusion and fright, a chorus of hoots and grunts from their lines. Silk and Mira bounded over the sand, weapons up, Lasser directly behind them. He held a pair of bolt cutters, going to work immediately on the lead ogres. They stood dumbly still as he began to break their bonds, then Silk urged them forward to safety, pushing at their meaty haunches to direct them into the garden.
Beneath my feet, a scream of primal rage pierced the morning air as a bullet shattered the wood near my foot. Splinters flew up and out, and I knew standing there would be hazardous to my health. There were no windows on the enormous wagon, but there was a door. Good enough for me. I jumped to the rear platform just as the wagon came to a stop, kicking inward with power I’d never imagined. My ‘bots were humming at full tilt, a song of rage in my ears as I shattered the door into kindling, the pieces flying inside the Black Room like shrapnel.
Sunlight scalded the horror show inside, and I stopped to stare at the gun pointed toward my heart.
“Meat,” said the skinny, tall, and pure poisonous woman in her third decade, with skin so pale as to be translucent. Fine blue veins crossed the skin of her chest, visible above a smock of white fabric that was stained with gore of every imaginable hue. Her teeth were small, even, and white, her lips parted in a sneer of giddy madness, and her tongue running around the outside of her mouth in nervous circles.
She lifted her free hand to pull at a black curl, gray eyes flashing with the kind of feral hatred that only pure insanity can bring. There was fresh blood on her hand, and then on her bottom teeth. She spat something on the floor of the wagon. An ear, small and pale. It was then that I looked behind her on the hideous wall crowded with chains.
People—or what was left of them.
“My subjects,” she said, her voice a silken purr. I expected the voice of evil, but she sounded sane, even coy. I fought the urge to puke at her feet, seeing the open chests and twitching feet of her victims. They were alive. Their tongues were gone, eyes begging for a stroke of mercy from my knife. From anyone at all. Three children, a man, and a woman. All wore similar blue tunics. A family and she was in the process of cutting them apart for reason of purest evil.
Her gun barked, the bullet smashing into my chest as white stars streaked my vision and the bloody floor came up to greet me. Air whistled through the hole in my lung, so I reached up in a daze, sliding my thumb to block the sucking wound. The pain hit like a hammer, then icy numbness and heat braided together in an unholy assault on my mind. Anyone who says getting shot doesn’t hurt is an idiot or lying. It hurts like hell.
Senet’s face hovered over me, the gun dangling at her side. She aimed and fired again, the bullet passing through my right arm. Her smile was childlike, even if her eyes were as dead as stone. “So many questions. You have answers, man from the past? You’re from the tube, trapped in time and only now finding out what it means to be marooned in a world where fear of the Black Room rules all. They think I’m a witch, but I’m far, far worse than that. I read of your witches. Cruel old women who pretended to be evil for profit, or scare children with tales of monsters under their bed.”
She laughed like we shared a joke, her eyes narrowing to regard me with curious lust. Leaning closer, I could smell the copper tang of blood on her breath, and I knew what she would say next. “I am the monster under their bed, and their fear lets me live like a queen, free from the rules of Kassos. The Empty is my toy, the people my fuel. I open them up for their secrets, even though I already know the answers are in places your old military left toys of such grand design. I will find them all, and I will live forever, just like your scientists wanted. Oh, don’t look so surprised, Jack. I know you. Our boy told us of the scavenger girls decanting you like a fine wine. So many secrets in you; I can’t wait to drink them.”
“You’re not drinking anything of mine, you crazy snatch,” I spat. My body roared with hate at her cool, dispassionate words. I wanted her guts on a stick and she knew it.
“You speak my tongue? Like magic. Of course, magic isn’t real. This is.” She raised her gun again, leaning forward this time while trailing the barrel over my balls. I had to admit, her flair for drama was impressive.
But something was happening in my body. Circuits connected. Messages were sent and received, both organic
and machine and the power of everything the world had lost, flared to reality, flared in my blood like avenging angels. I closed my eyes, drawing a breath as my face went slack in preparation of what my body would do. Muscles twitched. My arteries cooked with potential, rage replaced with a strength beyond anything a normal human could ever know.
My hand flickered forward like a ghost, grabbing the gun and holding it to one side. She pulled the trigger twice, both rounds slamming into the floor with deafening effect. Her eyes went round with fear as I lifted my blade, blood running freely down my arm, but slowing, much faster than it should have. The ‘bots had come out to play, and their show was in full effect.
“You heal,” Senet said, and the terror in her voice was sweeter than honey. I looked over her shoulder at the people hanging in chains, their feeble kicks ending as they died like cooling embers.
I reached my decision.
There would be no mercy, but I wouldn’t become what she was. I could not lead a free people without my humanity.
I stabbed her through the gut, my blade sliding through her lungs and stopping in her throat. A twist of my wrist and her eyes bulged, blood spurting from her mouth in a scarlet fountain as she hiccupped, spraying her last wet breath out in a mist that soaked my face, hot and foul. The blade slid free as her corpse hit the planks with a satisfying thump.
I rose to my knees, then my feet, wobbly but gaining strength with each passing second. My wounds were serious but not fatal, thanks to the ‘bots. Score one for the good guys, I thought, thanking Marsten, even though his lies had cost me twenty centuries. Staggering toward the fresh air of the door, I heard a noise both sweet and harsh all at once.
An engine roared to life.
“What the—a car?” I asked the air around me, but no one answered. The sound of a rumbling engine ripped through my senses, and it came from the wagon ahead of me. Doors swung open, and someone pushed a metal ramp out in jerking motions, the bright grating landing on the heated sands with a silver flash.
Future Reborn Box Set Page 22
