Cyber Viking Box Set

by Marcus Sloss

  I waited by the tailgate for Daphne. When she arrived, her top furry ears rotated to the sound of a dog barking. Aliens. “I need you to help work. Or someone who won’t get offended by the conversation inside the truck. My kind will not like to hear it, but at the same time, it is no giant secret. See this metal chain? Wrap a tree. Attach here, and then here on the truck hook. When we get back, unhook it.”

  “Is the story worth this task I could have a child do?” Daphne opined with a corner smile.

  “It is dark, morbid, and not a good story. Would you want a child to hear that?”

  “Probably not. It is good if I am seen with your mates anyway. Tribe leaders should have the strongest mates. Plus, I see you gazing at my breasts. Do you want to play with them?”

  I shrugged, avoiding an answer. I had little to say on the matter besides yes, yes I did. However, I wanted to deal with sex later in my bed with Perci, Willow, or Nancy. The ladies quieted their side chatter when we got back into the truck.

  “Summary for you too, Jill. I lost a hand to a medical accident while in prison. It was a ploy to get me into the military. It worked. I became an officer and was given a mostly ex-con unit to command in Saudi Arabia. Our peacekeeping mission went horrible in an odd turn of events. My unit was abandoned as a cover for our country’s rapid withdrawal. My commander was executed shortly thereafter. The crew, as we called ourselves, went rogue when we learned we were to be fed to the Saudis to placate their need for a scapegoat. Following me? Hold questions, please.

  “I left FOB Lister with a hundred and forty-one terrified soldiers. We were in the deep end, up shit’s creek, and we were falling without a parachute. Not literally, Daphne—merely stating to emphasize the importance of how bad our situation was. Going home was never meant to happen; it was the unwritten write-off of President Hansen’s administration. Things in Saudi were worse than they are here today. I know, it's hard to believe. Right now, we have food, clean water, and a golden portal to trade with. They had no incoming or outgoing trade. The national police and militias were rogue themselves. It was a clusterfuck. The true Wild West, with no oversight except corruption. The speed of your draw meant life or death and compassion was for suckers.

  “We blasted anyone who got in our way to the shipyard. The plan put the troops in high spirits; we would move across the country in disguise, steal a ship, and be home by Christmas 2021. Well, the shipyard was abandoned. It had also been stripped of vital parts to the big rig capable of towing our disguise. I made a mistake that cost me good troops. I showed compassion when I needed to show strength. We followed a fresh trail back to a village. I offered weapons, money, and food for the parts I was fairly certain were resting in a truck bed. I…

  “That decision to not force the parts to be given over cost us. Not only were we the enemy, now I had let people see we were the enemy. They were able to see which direction we came from and where our tracks led to. I justified it then because I was not about to kill husbands and wives, mothers and fathers, for a maybe. We returned to the shipyard that evening.

  “The siege lasted six grueling months. It is important to understand something here. The people of Saudi Arabia were desperate. Unbelievably desperate. When the local warlords, tribes, police chiefs, governors, and whatever other titles they gave themselves found out that a common enemy with supplies was nearby, they rallied together. I will never deny that a common foe crosses divides.”

  We arrived at a fresh tree. I watched Daphne bolt out, hook a tree, and return in under a minute. Damn, the crixxi were smooth.

  “When I saw the shipyard encircled from a mile out with hundreds of vehicles, I knew I had erred. Still, with every development, there is an opportunity. At least, I try to see it that way. We had supplies to last a few weeks. What better way to defeat your untrained enemy than to have them charge your well-defended position? Know thy enemy. In our case, we were facing thousands of poorly armed peasants desperate for revenge.

  “So we waited. A day became two, then four. On day six, the enemy lost their cohesion. Thousands charged the shipyard. I told the crew to wait until they were overextended. I knew the enemy would break almost immediately. They were not soldiers. Fathers brought young boys on their assault. Ten-year-olds carrying AK-47s to make their parents proud. It was mostly ordinary people, attacking for our supplies they desperately needed. When I ordered to open fire, I joined the chaos. We were perched inside the shipyard’s upper walls. Firing down upon our foes resulted in a rapid victory. Eighty-two new weapons, a bunch of worthless Saudi money, and a few trinkets went into the loot pile. We accepted no prisoners and offered a quick death to the wounded.

  “I used that night to get a thorough recon of our enemy. The siege had broken and a tent city had popped up not far from the shipyard by a freshwater source we called the Raa River. We went upstream, filled our empty water supplies, and then shit in the water. I ordered the enemy’s dead to be staked outside the stronghold. The enemy realized we had brazenly snuck out during the night to get water. Whoever held the rest of the coalition together encircled us again.”

  My Gpad chimed with an incoming call. “Go for Cap,” I said.

  “Family of four coming through the gate soon. I approved them. Boulder had a rough set of portals this go-around. After defending against the XLroaches, they faced some armored sixty-foot scaled aliens that walked like an ape but were lizard-y. They were smashing through Boulder’s defenses with ease. The call to retreat—to anywhere else—was made. Most went for Aspen. These ones were going to live in a tent in the woods. The Kravitz family. When I offered the rules, they were hesitant. I said running water, warm food, and a roof with veteran soldiers. Well, that sealed the deal, at least for tonight. However, now we have to consider bringing anti-tank weapons on our pillaging of Denver tomorrow.”

  “Were the XLroaches fighting the apesauri?”

  “Umm. The big creatures were eating the roaches with glee. Apesaurus works. Divine-apes was the term Kravitz used, said the creatures named themselves that. They were warned for living too close to the Xgate. Kravitz said they were actually not bad to interact with despite being incredibly intimidating. It was also mentioned that they love the roaches and were gobbling them up. Maybe they’ll get rid of the rest in Denver. They said the road trip here was eerily quiet. Only a few roadblocks that were easily bypassed. Any questions?”

  “Nope, thanks for the update. I am just hauling pines with your truck. Currently retelling the escape of Saudi for the ladies. Welcome to join us. I can pop the center console up and we can get snuggly in a truck, just like old times,” I said to my best friend with a tease. There were a few times we crammed into vehicles uncomfortably.

  “Hard pass. DD out.”

  We rolled past the gate. Jevon was standing there waving us through. He was probably waiting to inspect the new arrivals.

  “Where was I? Ah, the stalemate, as we called it. We immediately went to rationing. Six days for our first fight. We were ready to last another few weeks without getting desperate. There was the option of breaking the siege and powering through. The problem was, unless we won at the shipyard decisively, we would be hounded. I gamed out the scenarios a lot. Fighting a running battle meant we had one tire pop and either leave troops behind or set up defense somewhere not as awesome as the shipyard. So we waited. With the country in turmoil, if we made a clean break, we had the best chance of reaching the west coast.

  “The thing about sieging forces and those inside the siege is we had cover. They had nothing besides their vehicles. The other big difference was we had night vision. Our nightly raids were not what you would expect. We killed, looted, and collected. The desecration of bodies became our standard. Everything I instilled in my soldiers was that we needed our enemy to tremble at the mere thought of us.

  “So I was wrong in my rationalization of the enemy. I thought they would eventually see the error of giving us more food, water, gas, and munitions. But Cousin Mohammed talked to
Neighbor Mohammed who talked to his friend Warlord Mohammed. I swear, the go-to answer when we interrogated someone was always Mohammed.

  “We kept uploading to Gtube during this time. Bonnet and I got a kick—the puns!—out of kicking the baddies we captured to a short drop and sudden stop. I lost my soul in the shipyard. Honestly, I should have sacrificed it in that village. By month three, the small army gathered around us grew. It's like the Saudi citizens were some breed of cockroach. They built up that small city to the point it was beyond what we could topple.

  “The shit they spewed into that water was nasty. We would go north, find clear blue during the night, and return home. They would drink the brownest of brown funk. Our saving grace was we never once assailed that city. Six months of hard fighting, I never attacked Rabeed, as they called it. We termed it Rabid. Well, our situation was not sustainable. I finally had a suicide that pushed me into action. Enough was enough.

  “Bonnet snuck into Rabeed dressed like a Muslim woman. She fit the profile perfectly, even was carrying a local water jug. She dumped the contents into the stored water they purified. Apparently they weren’t complete idiots and were cleaning their water. The next night we stormed the defenses by driving looted trucks we meant to trash. This is where things get dark.

  “It was an ‘us or them’ scenario, I tell myself that a lot. However, we could have looted and left. Most of the city was dead or gravely ill. We shot everyone. I filmed the massacre with glee. The cackling madness consumed me and my troops. We killed them all. Antifreeze. She poured antifreeze into every water source she could find. Six months penned into the shipyard. I did not stop there, though.

  “We set up checkpoints for those returning to the city. We disguised as resident guards. When a new truck would show up we would stop them and let the snipers get target practice in. We were ruthless. A week later we were fat again on all the looted food. I, however, was still missing a part for the hauling machine in the shipyard.

  “That little village was raided at night. We gathered the citizens up while demanding the parts. We started killing the men. No one cared. The mothers, defiant. The moment they saw our resolve when we lined up the children the parts were delivered. A custom starter had been used to start a well pump. After it was pulled out of the well I had them all tossed into a building we sped away from. I contemplated setting them on fire. Probably my lowest point.

  “I felt like doing it to cover my trails, or maybe because I was evil. Deep down I felt like they fucking deserved a punishment for my dead soldiers. I regret my thoughts. I regret my decisions in Rabeed. I should have simply surrendered and been executed. All it took was one glance at the troops around me to harden my resolve. We would make it home.

  “There was no going back after Rabeed. Scorched earth was in full effect. We were so filthy. I remember glancing over my troops, dressed so akin to the locals I could almost not tell a difference. We learned to speak Arabic well enough that I felt we could blend in. Our whiteness was gone, replaced with that dirty tanned appearance. Bonnet was perfect in her meek Arabic. She tortured women to get the sounds just right. Even though I was somewhat proficient in Arabic, my accent gave me away. Harvard, that meek brainiac, was the absolute best. He played my role as the shipyard magnate perfectly. It was kind of nice being a regular guard when we sat down with local warlords to bribe our way past their territory.”

  We paused at the gate while an old white Ford Bronco rumbled into Stronghold Mansion. I had ripped down another tree. Daphne was a professional. She would quietly slip out to work the tree, then dart back in.

  “The cleansing around the shipyard left a mark on my soul. I could not get over my fellow dead soldiers. The ones who fought so hard to get home only to die because I had shown compassion. We left a few days after installing the starter on the big rig. I told myself another week and we would be out of Saudi Arabia. Nope. Downhill, the hauler moved at five miles per hour. The idea of disguising our movement with a chunk of a prebuilt ship heading to port actually worked.

  “Harvard got us past a few checkpoints. We were loaded with Saudi money. The stuff was worthless to us. To the locals, it somehow still held value. So, we bribed everyone we could. A week passed by in a hurry. I was starting to think the month-long journey to the West Coast would be easy. We had spare cash, a low profile, and were living the easy life on our slow progress. The crew, by no means, became complacent.

  “That saved our lives. Jevon went to shit off the back of the ship. A groaning complaint triggered when he released his poop. We killed the intruder. Yup, his stealth was spoiled by a random shit. He poisoned the majority of our water. With… antifreeze. The attempt was fitting, really. We would have died. Two things turned our world upside down. One, we needed water desperately. Two, this man had identification paperwork on him. A new set recently made by a new government. Yup, he was a Southern Saudi Coalition (SSC) member. We probably killed his family or something.

  “When I think back on the guards over that first week, I think they wanted us to be in the middle of nowhere. That is where we found ourselves that very night we killed the saboteur. The nearest town was through twenty miles of desert. I am talking about dunes you cannot drive. And we were almost out of water. We had enough stolen tents, food, and water if we camped during the day. We drove our vehicles to the sand dunes with all haste. When they spun sand endlessly we popped the tires and went on foot.

  “I shudder thinking of that march. Sand to your knees with every step. Falling every third step. The movies make it look so easy. We only made it seven miles before we stopped after sunrise. Two died before we made it to the little village. The moment we were on solid ground again, we rested, so weak from dehydration. When night fell again we snuck into the village. Bonnet was another woman fetching water for her family. Lavaun too. We kept the tall women like Slister away. Peterson went for some also. I remember being so grateful for a single drink. I pissed blood when the water washed through my system.

  “There were a hundred and twenty-two of us when we arrived in the Date village. We called it that because the small commune was a farming outpost. Sure enough, every citizen had the new SSC paperwork. We confined the population after raiding the town the next morning. I tried to keep us in one place but the enemy was tracking our location from the stolen Gpads and Isquares. We smashed those, stole every vehicle we could, and became a roving vehicle gang. The SSC set perimeters for us, trying to block our attempts to leave the country. They did not expect me to go to the capital of Wadi.

  “On the drive into the interior, we stumbled upon a hidden outpost. A slavers paradise. Women forced to dance in cages. Men raping with glee, and booze flowing freely. The Date village was so scarce on vehicles we had been seeking more. The problem was, we needed to escape unnoticed this time. As in, no witnesses. We approached at night. I think now that a day raid would have been better, merely because there would have been more sleeping, which would have left less screaming. We lined up the innocent women, I pulled the trigger. Hardest thing I ever did. If I didn’t, one of them would have talked. This was a chance at our clean break. These slavers were rich. They had paintings, cash, gold, silver—even a fucking tiger. We arrived in Wadi with Harvard doing all the negotiating.

  “My plan was to blend in, rent a warehouse, and hide for a month while we made a new and improved plan. Harvard used our money to buy a palace. Not rent, buy—which emphasizes how rich we were with that loot. Apparently, expensive, large homes are hard to maintain and the old Saudi population had an excess of them. When I look at our mansion I see some of that old palace. Six months we stayed. We were not idle. We hit a few military depots, police stations, and killed wealthy people when we could. Not exactly the best way to stay low but our hits were never tracked back to our palace and were always done at night. We didn’t have a choice, we had to prepare for the last leg of the journey. At this point, between the six-plus months at the shipyard, a half a month to reach the capital, and then six mont
hs there, we were at over a year. We even made friends.

  “Actual friends. Sure, we bought their friendship with business dealings. They actually thought we were mercenaries hired by the SSC to calm any sudden rebellion. It was a decent cover story. The thought that Americans still roamed the area was forgotten. The new Saudi governments were doing okay. Not great, but the worst was over. The country was finally healing after its long bout with a horrid post-war. I had gone dark on my Gtube and people figured I was dead, even back home.

  “We left late one night for the local dealership. Dumb man lived with his family on the lot. He was not willing to hand over the keys, so we made him—well, Bonnet did. We drove out in new trucks with a limo in the middle. Those police stations we had smashed while we planned had sirens. When we hit checkpoints we never slowed down with horns blaring and lights flashing. If they refused to stand aside, we killed them. There was no talking or slowing our retreat. Finally, we made progress. All under the false cover of escorting a VIP.

  “At some point, the word spread to let the VIP through or face the consequences. The mission succeeded with a smooth arrival to Jazan. Those friends we made in Wadi knew a cousin Mohammed in Jazan. I kid you not. Mohammed worked at the Jazan port. We stuck with our disguise: we were escorting a VIP. It was Bonnet, who was playing a pretend princess of one of the SSC leaders. If Mohammed saved her by helping us locate a long-ranged ship to get her to America, well, he would be handsomely rewarded. So well, he could even guard the princess while getting a bonus. She was known to converse with her guards. Dumbass bought it hook, line, and sinker. We picked a repurposed oil tanker—Holy Bastion—owned by some Save Somalia group. They were running water from one desert to another. But… it could make a much longer voyage. We would merely need to pay the port manager Abdul a bribe. He would top the tanks off and not say a word. This took two weeks to organize. As much as I wanted it to happen overnight, that was not how the Saudi Southern Coalition worked. Trust me, I bitched and moaned, but it got me nowhere.