by Ken Bebelle
The Mother continued to regard him, toying with his mind. It released his face, and the putty began to shift and move, pivoting his head until he was again looking at the surgical freakshow suspended above him.
The putty on his face crept down his forehead and brushed gently against his eyelid. A gelatinous finger extended into his eye, and peeled back his right eyelid. The putty froze in place, locking his head down to the bed. Jonesy rolled his eyes, panicked, looking for the aliens. The Scientist stepped into view and grabbed the instrument from before. It swung it down to Jonesy’s face, bringing the blades into deadly focus.
From the next bed, Daina’s muffled screams drifted over to him. He wondered if she was screaming for him, or for herself. A moment later, he began to scream as well.
Six
Plans
Keenan
Hours later, Keenan tramped through central Reno, with no idea where he was going. They’d passed Circus Circus casino and at this rate, he’d probably hit the airport in another hour. his head was still buzzing with energy. Dusk had fallen as they walked, and the streets were now cast in long shadows. The night was still warm as the concrete all around them gave up its stored heat of the day into the cool of the night.
Bells kept up easily with her long strides, but he could hear her breathing more heavily than usual, as was he. Neither of them were used to moving like this in this heat. It was another sign that they were out of place. He needed to get his team out of Camp Glenn and back on the line. Back where they mattered, where they could do something.
But as he walked, his mind continued to drive circles around the image of Cam’s face on the blurry video, the color distorted, but definitely her, definitely alive. He didn’t want to wait anymore. Waiting for Phillips to move on the intel was going to take too long. The burning need for action and his impotence coiled inside him, making him feel like an overwound spring. He needed to hit something, and hit it hard.
A hand grabbed his shoulder.
“LT!”
He skidded to a stop. When had he started running? They were on the edge of the business district, edging into an area filled with warehouses. He had stopped in the shadow of one of these warehouses. His eyes scanned left to right, seeing only a deserted parking lot at the corner. He and Bells stood alone on the street.
He whirled to see Bells behind him, her face shiny with sweat. Keenan realized now in the cooling shade that sweat was running down the side of his temples. His shirt clung to his back and sweat coursed down his neck. He wobbled a bit, and leaned his back against the wall of the warehouse. He put his hands on his knees and hung his head, breathing deeply, trying to slow his racing heart. Bells squatted on the sidewalk near the curb, elbows on her knees.
She spit into the gutter. Panting, she said, “Ok, what the fuck, LT?”
Keenan wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. His breathing steadied, even as his heart kept pounding. He smiled mirthlessly. “It’s Cam.”
As he said her name, he saw Bells narrow her eyes. He saw her taking stock of him, trying to read him. She was probably trying to decide if he was going crazy. She rolled her hands, inviting him to continue.
“She--” The words stuck in his throat. If he said them aloud, it might be real. If it was real, it could be taken away. Bells kept her eyes locked on his, and for once, kept her mouth shut. “They showed me. Phillips did. When we got here.”
Bells’ eyes widened. “What? What is it?”
“She’s… she’s alive.”
Her eyes bugged, and she fell back on her ass, now sitting on the sidewalk, almost cross-legged. She looked like a little kid. A six-foot tall kid that could kick your ass. Utter shock froze her usually animated face.
Keenan nodded and hung his head again, looking at the pavement between his feet. “I know, a real kick in the junk, right?”
He looked over at her. Bells was still looking into the distance, unfocused. Her eyes snapped back to his. “She’s alive? Are there any others?”
“Jonesy, apparently. They’re getting a data feed from his eye.”
She whistled. “They know where she is? Where Jonesy is?”
“They have a good guess. They’re both in the same place.”
She stood and stretched, cat-like. She walked up to him and offered a hand, getting him back on his feet. Once he was standing, she held his gaze. “What do you want to do?”
His insides began to churn again at the question. He felt like he could ride through the turmoil now, like he had endured the worst of the rapids. Even as the energy swirled inside him, his voice was steady. “I want to go get her.”
Bells didn’t say anything for an eternity. The unspoken question hung in the air between them, heavy in its ramifications. Keenan knew what he was asking of her. If this had been their mission from Phillips, there would be no hesitation. Bells did her job. But Keenan was asking something else entirely. He was asking her to go off the books and risk her standing with the Dubs for him.
When Bells started to nod her head, her dark curls bobbing, Keenan felt his shoulders begin to droop in relief. She clapped him on the back, her solid smack reassuring him. And when she spoke next, her words bolstered him.
“All right then. Let’s go get her.”
As he had suspected, saying it out loud, the truth of Cam’s situation, solidified it in his mind, but it remained a fragile thing. His mind rapidly made and discarded plans, some impossible, some just outright ludicrous.
Bells walked beside him, quietly listing names of those they might be able to enlist. He stayed wrapped up in his own thoughts so, locked down so deep he didn’t hear when she stopped talking and fell behind. He breath exploded out of his mouth as Bells hit him from behind like a football lineman, driving him across the sidewalk and into the doorway of a market. The two of them tore the door off its moorings and crashed to the tile floor in a tangle of limbs and shattered safety glass.
Keenan coughed and sputtered, “What th---”
Bells’ muscular form pushed him into the floor. “Stay down!”
A thunderous boom filled the world and Keenan felt the floor beneath him buck up and kick him in the chin. He felt himself thrown upwards as the concussion wave passed through the store. The picture windows on the front of the store blew inwards, showering them with shrapnel. Sharp, acrid smoke began to pour into the store front.
Keenan couldn’t hear shit and his vision blurred when he tried to focus. A line of hot wetness ran down the left side of his face. He heard the muted wail of car alarms and fire suppression systems, the wails and screams of civilians. He rolled onto his side. Bells lay next to him, just coming to. Fine gray dust coated her from tip to toe, residue from the explosion, making her eyes stand out against her now pale skin. A bloody gash sliced across one cheek where she must have caught some shrapnel. Her eyes were glazed over, unfocused.
“Bells. Bells!” Fuck, he could barely hear himself talk.
He crawled to her and gripped her arm. They would have to settle for hand signals. He got close to her and patted her cheek gently. Her eyes fluttered and seemed to focus on him. He held up an OK sign.
Bells’ eyes tracked around the room now, seeming to gain focus. She started to move and now it was Keenan holding her down. Every nerve in his body was screaming at him -- get up and move! -- but they had to get their heads on straight. Who knew what was waiting for them outside? His mind only conjured up horrific scenarios. He scanned the shattered doorway and saw nothing but thick plumes of gray-white smoke.
He felt Bells moving again. This time she gently pulled herself out from under him, and remained in a tight crouch. She signaled that she was ok, and ran a hand across her cheek. She winced and her hand left a bloody smear across her face. She wiped her hand on her pants and looked to Keenan, a question in her eyes.
Keenan pointed to the back of the store. There had to be a service entrance. The back of the building had been shielded from the explosion, so they might have eyes out b
ack. Staying low, Bells led the way, keeping her arms out, tracing the rows of shelving, and then the walls. They passed several civilians, all unconscious or semi-conscious. Keenan hated to move past them, but the local first responders would do the job. He had a feeling that before long, he and Bells would be called upon to do their jobs, too.
They made their way to the rear of the store. His hearing wasn’t coming back fast enough, and he tottered into the door frame, still woozy from the explosion. Keenan leaned on the door, slamming his shoulder into it when he realized it was stuck in the frame. The door popped open, spilling him into the service alley. The alley was deserted, save for several upended garbage bins. He picked his way carefully to the mouth of the alley, Bells following close behind. As he neared the edge of the building he pressed himself to the wall and peered around the corner.
Hazy smoke choked the street and fuzzed the streetlamps into haloes. Silhouettes of staggering figures faded out of the gloom, stumbling to the south. More explosions sounded in the distance, rocking the sidewalk under him. What the holy hell is going on?
Keenan crouched and tapped his gauntlet to raise someone back on base. He tried Gunny. Nothing. Then Kekoa. Nothing. Finally he tried the secure base line. A tense moment later a static-garbled signal came through, muffled through what felt like cotton balls in his ears.
“--zzt---entify yourse--”
Keenan identified himself. Halfway through his security clearance another warbling squawk of static burst from his communicator. More shapes solidified in the gloom, now moving faster to the south. Keenan struggled to make sense through the static and his muffled hearing. His nose was filled with acrid smoke and the sour stink of his own nervous sweat.
Bells pressed in behind him. “Everyone’s going south.” She sounded strangely distant, but was standing behind him now, with her sidearm drawn, covering his rear. Her eyes tracked slowly across the dusty street. Sirens wailed thinly in the distance.
He wasn’t going to get any orders from base. His communicator’s screen showed no connection to any networks. Keenan gave up and lowered his wrist to draw his own sidearm. He got to his feet and looked south. People streamed southward. “Right. So we go the other way. We get what intel we can and get the hell back to base.”
Bells nodded and edged around him, leaning out into the street. At his nod she stepped out and they began to make their way north. They stayed close to the buildings, boots crunching on shattered glass across every store front. Clumps of panicked civilians continued to run south, towards base.
Something cracked loudly under his boot, and Keenan stooped to see what it was. His insides dropped to zero when the smoke eddied away and he saw the shattered ice beneath his boot. A chill wind gusted by them, carrying the smell of diesel and crisper scents he associated with the Yukon. They were back in front of the store Bells had pushed them into.
What the hell is going on? He picked up a jagged shard of ice. Bells squatted at the corner of the building, looking a question back at him. Keenan hustled up to her and hunkered down.
“Ringheads.”
Bells’s eyes widened. “Seriously? Here?”
“There’s ice on the sidewalk. I think they’re dropping iceboxes on us. It also explains the comms.”
“Shit.” She looked at her sidearm. “I am not dressed for this kind of party.”
Keenan grinned at her. “At least you have sensible shoes on.”
She snorted in response, but Bells had a fair point. They were not geared for Ringhead combat. He thought about what they would find if they kept going north. Something like Segovia, a ring of iceboxes jutting out of the ground, chilling everything around it into an arctic playground for Ringheads to romp through.
Their options were to head west, back to Camp Glenn and hope the Ringheads didn’t get to them first or to head east to the airport and find a ham radio. Keenan sighed and wondered if he could remember his Morse code. Either way, they were going to need a ride. None of the auto cabs would work with the grid down. Keenan and Bells were going to need to find an old model vehicle that he could commandeer. This would be fun.
Seven
ThreatCon Delta
Sasha
Sasha trotted down the wide corridor, her boots pounding on the dark gray floor plates. Phillips’s Scotch still burned in her throat, fumes tickling her nose. God damn, but that was some good shit. She was going to have to find some more of that. The echoes of her footfalls rang through the hallways and she forced herself to slow down. Jesus, she was practically skipping like some giddy schoolgirl.
She settled at a deliberate pace. No need to rush, Ace wasn’t going to be far away from his new girl. Despite her slow strides, her heart raced. Sasha followed orders, but sometimes reluctantly. She’d seen her share of chin-scratching graybeards, more interested in protocols and CYA bullshit than getting in the trenches and doing work.
The Colonel though, he knew which end was up. He knew to keep the soldiers priority number one, and backburner all the red tape and window dressing. Plus, Sasha sensed the Colonel still had a ready killer instinct. Something in the eyes, and the way he held his arms, hinted at some brutal menace, just beneath the surface. She’d asked, before, but no one would talk about it. Not much. Still, she could read between the lines.
She found Ace where she expected, up to his elbows underneath the Raven’s skirts. Ace was in the cockpit, on his back underneath the instrument panel. She crouched next to his legs and gently squeezed his knee. He flinched, and she got a satisfying bang from inside the panel, followed by a volley of colorful cursing. She laughed and sat on the deck of the bird, feeling some of the tension leave her shoulders.
“Damnit, Tiny!”
To her disappointment, he didn’t crawl out.
Sasha leaned over, peering under the panel. “You know, for someone who likes to play the field, you seem to be settling down with this new girl real quick.”
That pulled him out. Ace squirmed out, glaring at her. He had an angry red mark on his forehead, above his right eyebrow. He flipped her a rude gesture that started her laughter up all over again, and then she was curled up, holding her sides, trying to get herself under control. She sat up, cheeks wet with tears, fisting away the moisture from her eyes.
“Done?”
She hiccoughed, nodded.
“Alright, help me get this download finished and we can get out of here.” He pointed behind her. “Pass me that data cable.”
She reached up and passed the cable to him. He wriggled back under the instrument panel, grumbling while he worked.
“I can’t believe anyone could be this paranoid, to build a bird that doesn’t transmit any telemetry data. Every time we bring this girl in it’s going to be this same bullshit song and dance to move the data to the servers.”
Sasha grunted in agreement. This wasn’t really her forte anyway, so she kept her mouth shut. Despite his griping, she knew Ace was happy. A grounded pilot was a grumpy pilot. Get them in the cockpit, and they were happy. A moment later Ace re-emerged and popped the optical data cube off the other end of the cable. “You comin’? I gotta hoof this down to CentCom.”
Sasha hopped up and followed him off the Raven. As they walked back through base, she quickly filled him in on her debrief. Ace nodded and smiled in all the right parts, but Sasha had a feeling his head was still underneath the Raven.
The quickest route to the command building took them outside and across a large swath of tarmac. The low afternoon sun beat steadily down on them as they crossed the parade grounds. Sasha began to loosen and remove segments of her armor as they walked. Really should have taken all this shit off before seeing the Colonel.
She was dancing out of her pelvic shield when her foot hitched and she rolled to the asphalt in a tumble of gear. “Grr, fuck!” She hit the dirt and rolled, paying with the skin off one elbow. Ace turned, chuckling at the wide sprawl of chaos.
“Serious--” He stopped as the drum beat of a massive impact
rolled across the open grounds.
Sasha froze, scanning the horizon. Two more low thuds in rapid succession. Sasha felt the impacts through her abraded palms on the asphalt. Ace looked towards Reno, his hand shielding the sun from his eyes. She turned just in time to see a brilliant white flare streak down from the sky and land somewhere in town. She felt the impact through her hands again a split second before the basso rumble reached her ears. A mushroom cloud of dust and debris rose in the distance.
Another impact, but she didn’t see this one. She got up to her feet and collected her gear. Ace continued checking the skies. She smacked him on the shoulder to get his attention. At the same time, the base alarm klaxons began to wail. ThreatCon Delta. In the distance she heard doors slamming open and pounding boots. Their eyes locked and she saw in his face the same mix of alarm and anticipation that she felt. They turned and ran to the command building.
The command center was a flurry of activity. Everyone seemed to be on comms, alternating between barking orders and pleading with whoever was one the other end. The big board at the front of the room showed a microsat view of Camp Glenn and its surroundings, showing most of Reno. Someone had overlaid a handful of red circles on the map. The marks sketched a rough perimeter around base, and passed through a sizeable portion of the city.
Across the back of the room, Sasha could see through to the other section where the drone warfare room operated. Better than half of the drone pods were closed, dark outlines of the vid jockeys visible through the smoked glass. More jocks poured in from the other side of the building, heading straight to the vacant pods.
Techs and analysts manned every workstation, and every monitor and holo flickered with footage of the impact sites or blinding data streams.
