Scavenger: A.I.: (Sand Divers, Book Two)

by Timothy C. Ward

  “I’ve caught three. You?” Carroll asked.

  He dug into another stroke as he passed the building’s corner and was struck in the windpipe. The blow tipped him back as he scrambled to get his knife from his leg. Two diver shapes descended toward him, hands stretched out to grasp his suit. One barrel rolled to its right as a third diver soared into view and drove a hard jab into Dixon’s stomach. The shot made him cough, adding to his difficulty to breathe after the neck attack.

  “Dixon?” Carroll asked, but he couldn’t respond.

  He found and gripped his knife as one of the divers kicked at his arm. He solidified sand into rock between them and around the leg of the other diver.

  The kicking diver’s foot struck the rock slab. Crack. He twisted and repelled from the blow, his ankle stuck at a wrong angle.

  The next diver wrapped his arm around a cylinder of hardened sand Dixon made around his leg. Dixon made a ledge above him, grabbed it and yanked himself out of the cylinder, kicking away from their huddle. The ledge moved and he let go. Broken ankle diver swung a knife at Dixon’s chest. Dixon coffined the sand around the diver’s wrist and squeezed. A woman’s cry shrieked in higher pitches through the sand. Bone snapped and her hand clunked off axis. She dropped her knife.

  The other two divers swam at him.

  He spun the knife sinking near the girl’s hand, wishing he had something to do other than kill, but lacking time to consider another option. He softened the sand in a path at the nearest other diver, clutched the knife in a sand drip and mentally drove it through the diver’s neck. The blade entered and the diver’s arms lowered. Shoulders slumped. Dixon lifted his hands to grab a newly formed chuck of rock shaped by his mind the size of the top diver’s torso and plunged it into the space between him and the upward swimming diver. Its edge caught the diver at the wrists hard and fast enough to jolt the knife free.

  The female diver kicked forward with her good hand extended for his throat.

  They’re controlled by W. They won’t stop until I break them free or kill them, and I don’t know how to break them free.

  Then he did.

  He jerked his head right, but the girl caught his throat. As she tightened her grip, he swung out and snatched her respirator from her mouth. He coughed his out with force to blow open a pocket in the sand between their faces. The air puffed out her cheeks. Sand carrying his saliva from when he spit his respirator shot into her open mouth and nose. In her distraction, he struck the third diver’s outstretched hand, palm to wrist. He yanked him up, tilted his head back and spit into one of the diver’s nostrils. He slammed a fist into the bridge of his nose and kneed him in the gut, the nose jab hopefully calling attention to the delivery of his nanos, with the gut shot giving them time to work.

  The diver recoiled, then swung a weak left cross that Dixon dodged.

  Dixon put his respirator back in his mouth and sucked a deep breath.

  “Risky, Dix,” Carroll said. “I’ll take the extra help, if our nanos work, but you need to move. I don’t see the computer with this group.”

  Dixon kicked behind the three divers, glancing back to see what they were doing, when the female diver’s face slowly melted, the colors of her life source replaced by the faint orange of the sand behind her.

  “It’s working!” Dixon called out.

  “Oh no.”

  “What?” The red of the building blocked his view of where Carroll might be. Only it and the faint orange of sand colored that view of the city.

  “W somehow learned my invisibility. I can’t see them. Get back inside and back to dock view.”

  Dixon swam for the western side of the roof. The divers he had to catch were either beyond or invisible. He wondered if they’d have enough air to make it to the surface, if that was their goal. What if they’d gone that way and he suffocated halfway? His suit had two tanks but no way to tell how much air he had left.

  The red-bleeding-to-orange field cornering off the roof showed no holes or movement from recent entry, though if W had utilized invisibility in his nanos, could what Dixon saw be made up of nanos hiding within a hard surface? He could swim up to it and get attacked without a chance to defend. He kept a few strokes from the edge to be safe.

  “I’m in,” Carroll said. “What’s taking so long?”

  Dixon kicked over the edge and down its side. A sharp line dug across his stomach, then around his wrists and ankles. The cords tightened and lifted him out of his momentum and up toward the roof.

  “Carroll!” Dixon shouted. The tightness on the cords arched his back. His hands and feet compressed into its middle. No sign of divers, though he was lifted by the strength of at least two.

  How much air was left in his tank? Did they care if he suffocated? You better hope I do, W.

  He pictured spinning sand blades above his hands and wrists, expelling EM tingling through his scalp, but whoever carried him jerked him left and right. Either the blades were not sharp enough, or he was missing.

  “Dixon?” Carroll asked. “Where are you?”

  The orange square of the rooftop slowly lost its red color as his captor carried him higher.

  “They caught me. Rising.” He tried lunging arms and legs forward, using EM to harden the sand above and loosen that below, but his momentum upward barely slowed, and his arms and legs remained arch-bound. “Damnit. I couldn’t see them.”

  “Damnit, Dix. I don’t have time to…fine, give me a minute.”

  A rumbling thunder spun Dixon as fast as a rock in a twister. Tracers of green circled within a beige world. His fighting muscles burned at the tug near to tearing in five pieces. An involuntary shout loosed his respirator. He reached out but lost it in the spinning.

  Now he’d watch the race between severing limbs or suffocation as his end.

  His speed slowed, easing the pain in his muscles for a two count before his tether pulled him upward. His respirator tube hung in the lower corner of his vision. He focused EM to push a wide swath of hardened sand from his neck up. The respirator tube lifted closer to his mouth. He maneuvered the sand comb and tube until the latter was close enough to snatch between his teeth. He chewed and worked its end into his mouth and inhaled a deep, chalky breath. The sand down his throat made him cough, but he held onto the respirator in his mouth, forming an air pocket between it and his lips.

  “Dixon. You still there?” Carroll shrieked and her comms cut out.

  “Carroll?”

  No response.

  52 - Dixon (6:32 am)

  Dixon swung toward a light green cylinder stacked by suits spaced ten yards apart, stretching down toward where the roof of the Republic Plaza might be. The shimmering green field brightened as closed to within arm’s reach.

  The field blinked in rapid pulses of green and black. His captors swung him through on a green blink. Purple air flowed into the tunnel surrounded by green. A cool breeze against the sweat on his face made his skin pucker and a shiver course down his shoulders. He switched to dock view and dropped the respirator from his lips. A red wave of dive light shook inside the dark space as he swung toward a wall, halted before smacking his face, and swung back. His knees hit and scraped wall as his body dropped.

  The slack on his tether caught quickly. He spun, bumped back into wall, and twisted with the rotation from the cords.

  “Hey cock-a-roach from Fort Pope!” Marco shouted from ten feet above him.

  Dixon tilted his head back but couldn’t see him.

  Metal jingled above. Clicked. Someone whistled. Dixon dropped, his heart catching in his throat. The tether caught, and he swung to the other side of the well. He slowly rose.

  “You and your squish girl lost that battle, but the next is soon to come.” Marco’s voice remained the same distance above, and directly overhead, likely meaning they rose together. “The Gov doesn’t know his son is dead, or that he unleashed the M-MANs that live in our blood. Warren, which is what you’ll call him in front of others, is offering a truc
e in return for your silence and cooperation. It will be the only way you and your wife survive.”

  “What happened to her?”

  “We have her. That simple. And the pellets Warren charged you with bringing in the first place. And her suit. You have no more leverage. Only a decision that keeps her and maybe the other members of your party alive. W has already claimed a few. But he is willing to hold off on any more if you cooperate immediately.”

  “Which ones?”

  “Tell me you will relent and obey W again.”

  Carroll, please, speak and free me from this path.

  She didn’t, and he continued to rise, leaving darkness below as a carriage of red lifted him to a bright-blind sky.

  “Tell me or Cool is the first!”

  “What guarantee do I have that W will do any of that?”

  “You and Carroll have been captured. W can do whatever he wants in Denver. Your only hope that he’ll resist creating nightmares out of your loved one and friends is to obey. Don’t and you’ll have your guarantee.”

  Dixon hated to admit it, but Marco’s words rang as true as he feared them to be. “What does W want me to do?”

  “For now, keep your mouth shut. They’ll tie you up, but we’ll be around, so if you try and spread your nanos we’ll know, and we’ll hurt Carroll.”

  He had to find a way out before that. W had controlled him for long enough, and he’d pay for every second.

  Dixon’s slow rise toward sunlight met with an aroma of roasted meat. His mouth watered as his drained body ached for replenishment. He would obey W’s request at least long enough to rest, but it would be more difficult if they tempted him with food. The plasma depleted far more than the burst of strength it gave.

  His rise halted and he swayed into the wall. A few muffled pats and scuffling above led to bits of rock raining on his hands and back.

  “Is that him?” an unfamiliar woman asked, her voice strained and angry.

  “Yeah,” Marco said. He leaned down and patted his suit’s pockets, finding both pistols and his knife. He took them with a wink and rose.

  They lifted Dixon soon after.

  “When I’m done with you,” the woman said between pulls, “you’re gonna wish I’d let you drop from here.”

  Marco’s warning to shut his mouth kept him from a worthless retort.

  The lip of the well came into view below a ring of legs and sand divers armed with AKs. Light blue kers covered the bottom half of their faces as they watched him through reflective goggles. Wind rustled their hair and the bottom of their kers.

  A strong pull lifted him up over the ridge, flying sideways. He skidded on his shoulder, then stomach and chin to a stop.

  A yank on his hands lifted his face long enough to absorb a jarring blow.

  “Kelly, wait,” Marco said.

  His face dropped back into the dirt. He squinted at feet to his right. His cheek swelled with throbbing pain, and he figured that was only the beginning.

  “He killed my sister,” she growled. “I’m a cut `m deep. Move or your next.”

  “Not yet. He knows how to get to Fort Pope.”

  Dixon twisted to see Marco holding back a woman a few inches taller with a packed frame and jaw clenched as she stared hate behind reflective goggles.

  “You can help interrogate him,” Marco said, “but he has to be able to go back down and lead us to Fort Pope.”

  Sand speckled blonde hair draped over both sides of her tanned face. Her thin nose and lips were exposed above her light blue ker, which was tucked around her chin and set on her zipped up dive suit. Her cheekbones and long face reminded him of the girl diver he turned with a spit of sand. Would telling Kelly he didn’t kill her sister help his escape?

  “I’ll get you your answers,” Kelly told Marco, “but I’m coming with, and once we find Fort Pope, he’s mine.”

  “Fine,” Marco said.

  Kelly shoved him out of her way and straddled Dixon, a shining steel knife poised at his face.

  “Kelly…” Marco started.

  “Relax, I heard you the first time,” she said. “What’s your name, asshole?”

  “If your sister’s dead, it wasn’t me.”

  “What?” Kelly pushed his head into the ground. “You said she was dead.”

  “I saw him attack her,” Marco said. “Her life source… I would—”

  “He saw nothing,” Dixon said. Marco’s threats be damned, he was done waiting. “She’s alive down there. I only disabled her.”

  “If he’s telling the truth, Marco…”

  “He’s not. He’s lying to get out of interrogation.” Marco’s footsteps packed sand on Dixon’s left side. “His next comment will be to let him take you to her. Don’t let him play you like this. The Gov will be here soon. If he’s not here when he arrives, or escapes because you let him go back down, it won’t go well for you.”

  “I have,” Dixon said. “And will—”

  A hard shot to the back of his head cut him off. He closed his eyes and rested his face on the hot sand, then collected spit in his mouth and let it leak out.

  “I told you to keep your mouth shut, Springston.” Marco sawed the ropes holding Dixon’s legs up. The cords snapped and his legs fell like two stumps to the ground. His thighs pulsed through knots as blood flowed into his feet. “Now, get up.” Marco scanned the crowd as he lifted Dixon under his arm.

  Dixon’s stomach rose from the ground. He swung a foot forward and almost buckled under his weight.

  Marco guided his staggered steps to a part in the circle of divers armed for war. Beyond their huddle stretched a village of tents, well over a hundred, with a few tenants watching from opened doorways. Docked sarfers pointed a line down the makeshift village’s eastern side. Wind buffeted their sails in their north-south parking, meant to shield blown sand from burying their settlement.

  Avery had mentioned a frenzy of brigands near Denver, which was why they took the tunnel through the mountains to reach Fort Pope, and then more tunnels to get to Denver. Dixon wondered how well they got along, and if he could use The Gov’s absence to evoke turmoil enough to break free. Marco’s grip on his arm and hurried pace over and around tent pegs suggested urgency. For what? To be done with him so he could get back to W’s business? He said The Gov would be here soon. What would that mean?

  Kelly and two other blue-kerred divers strode after them. The group and the hole they’d guarded were hidden behind tent peaks and the commotion of passersby.

  His ankle hit something as he glanced back, and he tumbled forward.

  Marco caught him with an arm across his chest. Thump. Marco coughed. His body and grip sloughed off. Behind his unconscious, falling form, someone adjusted to swing a bow in a sideways arc at one of the blue kers.

  Dixon fell on top of Marco, hands still tied behind his back. Wood thwacked muscle and metal behind him. In front, four assailants in sand brown kers and surface fatigues streamed out of the tent across from the aisle.

  Kelly jabbed a short staff into the meat between shoulder and chest, halting an assailant’s swinging machete a breath before she planted a dagger center mass. Blood stained the front of his garb, darker as she ripped her blade free as she twisted his body into the path of the next attacker.

  Her knife reminded him of the pocket where Marco had put Dixon’s knife and pistols. He turned onto his back and patted Marco’s leg for the pocket.

  Kelly lunged in for her second kill strike. The bow wielder turned from a disabled blue ker on the ground, swinging his stick into Kelly’s wrist. He windmilled the bow to slash across her face, torqued it half a rotation back and jabbed it into her gut. Up to chin. Across the nose.

  Dixon found the knife. The pistols were gone. Crap.

  He dug his elbow into Marco for a better angle into the pocket.

  Kelly caught Bow’s wrist, yanked him off balance and threw his face into her knee. She shoved him over and retreated for her knife. He swept her feet off the grou
nd then flung her knife with the end of his staff, sending the blade behind a nearby tent.

  Dixon had the knife pointed tip out of Marco’s pocket, its hilt pinned between Marco’s leg and Dixon’s hip. His weight held the blade steady as he ripped its edges into the rope between his wrists.

  Kelly ducked under Bow’s staff, popped the dive button on her suit and adjusted her visor as she rose.

  Bow jabbed Kelly in the ribs, knocking her onto her back. He advanced into a pillar of sand shot up into his gut. He coughed, staggering back.

  Dixon broke through the bonds on his wrists and grabbed the knife.

  A crowd watching the violence clogged the aisle between tents. He lunged for it anyway, knife out as he stumbled into speed. The group closed tighter, locking arms. His momentum was too great. The tents made jumping left or right unhelpful. You’re gonna make it hard on me? Take this.

  He licked the tip of his blade and dove into the crowd. As they wrapped arms around him, he stabbed the blade into the thickest portion of flesh he could find. A man grunted and pulled back. Dixon’s hilt stuck out of someone’s hip. The same owner’s fist blurred into sight and struck Dixon’s eye. He fell with the weight of two or three men, his arms again bound, his head throbbing, and one more escape thwarted.

  His only hope rested in his nanos having enough plasma power to replicate in the stabbed man’s hip.

  What sounded like Kelly’s voice shouted behind him in a losing battle of frustration.

  Cloth covered Dixon’s head in darkness as his body was lifted by many hands and whisked off at a serpent’s pace.

  53 - Dixon (7:16 am)

  Dixon’s new captors carried him long enough to take him deep into the tent village, binding his hands and wrapping a burlap sack over his head. The loss of a breeze added to the stench of scavengers long from their last bath made his dehydrated body curdle with nausea.

  “I call dibs when you take that hood off, Swanson,” one said.

  Cloth flapped open as he passed into a thicker concentration of hot air. The two sets of hands carrying him lifted him back to head over hips and he was set in a chair, hands fit around its back. His hood ripped off, but the tent’s stagnant air offered little relief.