“You think you can become Death?” she asked, looking over her shoulder at the taller woman.
Guerrero flipped her hair over her shoulder and smiled.
Crawford’s hands shook, then slowly pulled into fists. “And you’re stupid enough to think a few fancy weapons can pull that off?”
Guerrero chuckled. “Not stupid. Just good enough.”
Zelenko scoffed as she tugged on her white gloves. “Sugar,” she drawled, “‘good enough’ only counts in horseshoes.”
Guerrero’s lips curved into a nasty smile. “And hand grenades!” she added brightly. Her hand shot out to open a tackle box propped up on a plastic chair. “Catch!”
The dummy grenade, a shiny steel M69, landed at Zelenko’s feet. Nightingale let out an aborted squeal and stumbled back into a display of maces. Zelenko shrieked and kicked the sphere away with one sand-colored pump. It skidded onto a patch of straw. A few seconds later, the M69 erupted with a stream of white smoke and a deafening pop.
Nightingale flinched.
Zelenko, pale and quivering, pointed a finger at Guerrero. “Bitch!”
Crawford snatched up the still-smoking husk. It rusted under her fingers then crumbled to dust. Her glare withered Guerrero’s smirk.
“You think you’re special because mankind created you on their own?” Crawford shouted. Her voice was as ragged as sandpaper. She looked down at her hand, as if weighing it, then strode forward and struck Guerrero hard. The smack was louder than Guerrero’s soft gasp. With her free hand, Crawford caught the other woman by the chin and stroked the rapidly pinkening mark on her cheek.
“It’s always the same with you,” she cooed. Her hands dug into Guerrero’s lapels. She jerked the other woman forward until the crown of her head rammed into Guerrero’s jaw.
Guerrero yelped and stumbled back, covering her mouth. “Ow! I think you knocked out a tooth.” She spat a mouthful of pink onto the straw scattered across the floor.
Zelenko swallowed a giggle.
Guerrero glowered at her and took a moment to catch her breath, then tipped her head mockingly. “Aw, baby, don’t be like that. You’ve been gettin’ awful greedy lately. Even Tweedledee and Tweedledum over there think so, don’t you?”
She winked at Nightingale, who scuffed the toe of her boot in the straw.
“Well, I mean …” Nightingale mumbled.
Guerrero chuckled, dry and raspy. Her swelling lip obscured her words like a blob of cotton beneath the tongue.
“I know ya’ll don’t appreciate my efforts, but some of us like to make sure there’s enough of a generation left to cull for the next century, you know? That’s the beauty of war. You can’t have just one.”
Nightingale tossed her hand out. “So you’re a bag of Lay’s? Man, that’s not justification for working on your own. Your job was to keep the humans in line so they didn’t wise up.”
“I got more people coming to me willingly after they’ve met you. You think I like cleaning up your messes?” Crawford added.
Guerrero sighed and dabbed at her busted lip. “I thought you’d appreciate those.”
She glanced out the open barn door.
“’Scuse me, ya’ll—gotta feed the pigs.” She hefted a pitchfork off the wall before stomping out to the yard with the others trailing behind, and kept talking.
“Look, people are always going to kill each other. They don’t need disease and hunger, and neither do I. I’m doing fine on my own these days. So maybe I skimmed a little off the top. So what? The stronger I am, the more returns you get, you shortsighted asshole. You’re starving us out—”
“Hey!” Zelenko protested.
“—leaving us the crap at the bottom of the barrel. Well, I’m tired of it. You want a good harvest, you either let me take what I need or you start withering away, too,” she finished. The hogs perked up at her arrival, crowding the fence.
“Oh, shut it. I don’t think long-term? The end goal is all I can see. It’s kind of my thing, in case you forgot,” Crawford said, raising her arms. “I’ve taken every man, king, and god since time immemorial. What makes you think you can stand against me?”
“Against us?” Zelenko added.
Nightingale shook her head sadly. “We used to be friends, man. Symbiosis and all that.”
Guerrero whirled around, her black eyes flashing in the last light of day. “Well, maybe I’m friggin’ tired of it.”
She stuck two fingers past her lips and let out a shrill whistle. In their pen, the hogs snorted and vibrated with nervous energy.
With a grunt, Guerrero swung around and skewered the pitchfork’s rusty tines in Zelenko’s concave gut. A shock of red stained the woman’s white blazer. Zelenko screeched, her hands immediately going to her stomach, fingers fluttering uselessly around the wound.
Tendons straining like bridge cables in her neck, Guerrero pushed Zelenko back against the chicken-wire pigpen. Zelenko’s hat sailed off her head as Guerrero gave one final heave, and the other woman toppled into the squealing, teeming mass of hogs.
The ravenous swine descended upon her. Zelenko swatted and shoved one pig away from her delicate face while forcing her heeled pump into the gut of another. Two more pigs chomped their teeth into her other calf while a third pig ripped away her shoe and worried at it like a dog. But if Zelenko knew one thing, it was all-consuming hunger. Gristle and bone were as appetizing as a five-course banquet to the starving.
And yet it was all she knew. Each slap to the hogs shriveled their muscles until their hide clung to their bones, but nothing she did could abate their hunger. The weaker and more gaunt they became, the more they wanted, and the more they took from her.
Crawford’s eyes widened, and her dark skin turned ashen. With an inhuman growl, she leaped over the fence into the pigpen and landed with her hands in the mud. The filth turned black as pitch, then boiled and popped in a wave of desecrating decay that spread over the swine from their trotters to their snouts. The swine squealed in horror as their hide sloughed off from the creeping rot that melted the flesh from their bones and tore open their insides.
The dying remains of Zelenko lay a mangled mess of gnawed bone and half-eaten flesh in the putrid muck. Crawford picked her way past the liquefied corpses of pigs to her comrade, who reached out with a shaking, skeletal hand. Her lipless mouth opened to speak, but she only managed a creaking groan. Crawford grasped Zelenko’s hand in her own and stared down at her friend, her face emotionless as Zelenko’s fingers slipped away.
In the chaos, Nightingale stood frozen, her lips parted soundlessly.
Guerrero stumbled back with the pitchfork in hand, and that, if nothing else, shook Nightingale into action. She lifted her arms just as Guerrero swung the pitchfork and grabbed the splintered wood, twisting to throw Guerrero off balance.
“Guerrero! What are you doing?” she shouted. “We were friends. We went everywhere together.”
Guerrero shifted her grip until the pitchfork hung between them. She pushed forward, slamming the handle into Nightingale’s chest and shoving her back. “Should’ve thought of that before you decided to take me on!”
Nightingale caught herself. Her face twisted into a scowl as she raised her hand.
Guerrero yelped as the skin on her forearms began to swell into angry red boils, scabbed and heavy with pus. She doubled over and dropped to one knee, gasping for air as the infection spread to her lungs.
Blood dribbled between her lips and leaked from her eyes and ears. She spat out the blood and gritted her teeth. She scooped up a clod of dirt and threw it at Nightingale’s face, obscuring the woman’s vision for just a blink—enough time to slam her into the pile of hay behind them.
Nightingale grabbed her arm, but Guerrero shoved her aside and rammed the pitchfork deep into her chest, pinning her to the pile.
Guerrero wasted no time while Nightingale struggled against the pitchfork. She felt her insides churning to mush while her body consumed itself with fever. She scrambl
ed to the barn and snatched a mason jar filled with yellowish jelly off the wall.
There was one sure way to fight pestilence. She slammed the napalm into the straw. The glass shattered on impact. Guerrero fumbled with the lighter in her pocket then tossed it into the hay.
White-hot flames exploded outward, throwing Guerrero onto her back. The fire devoured the fabric of Nightingale’s jacket, then the woman herself. Guerrero gulped down air and smiled as the other woman’s screams harmonized with the roar of the fire.
On the other side of the pigpen, Crawford looked up from Zelenko’s ragged corpse. With a wave of her hand, the flames subsided into thick, foul-smelling smoke, but Nightingale still burned. What little skin remained was nothing but weeping char.
Crawford and Guerrero exchanged glances. Guerrero grinned with bloody teeth and darted into the barn. Crawford slipped over the fence, but paused as an ungodly rumble shook the ground under her feet. She shielded her eyes with one hand. A beat later, the barn doors splintered like cheap plywood beneath the treads of Guerrero’s T-90.
The tank rolled by, kicking up a spray of mud that splattered Crawford’s black coat. Crawford rushed forward, but not in time to stop the T-90 from tearing down the driveway and crunching Crawford’s Magnum. The screech of metal on metal rent the evening, and a moment later the T-90 doubled back, trailed by a cloud of dust.
Crawford stared at the wreckage.
The sight of her mangled car, illuminated by the fading light of day, stirred something in her. Her lips twitched at one corner as she stared ahead, until they pulled into a wide grin.
“Well, praise the Lord and pass the ammunition.”
The T-90’s cannon groaned as it rotated. Crawford’s gun had yet to clear its leather before there was a flash of light. An earsplitting boom knocked her to her knees as a shell rocketed from the turret. The pigpen behind her went up a blast of smoke and mud. A moment later, the machine gun started up.
Crawford covered her head as the rounds rained destruction around her, shredding the fence of the pigpen into scrap. Crawford gritted her teeth, and with each blink, she disappeared and materialized closer and closer, until she was dangling from the white cannon and staring into the gun.
The barrel rusted and crumbled underneath her hands. “Hey,” said Crawford. “I broke your unicorn.”
Guerrero didn’t hesitate to fire again.
The round ripped past Crawford’s face just as she dropped to the ground. First the skin, then the muscle, flayed from her cheek to reveal grinning white teeth. Crawford scrambled to her feet and up the side of the hull as the tank rushed over her. The hatch warped and cracked at her touch, dropping pieces on Guerrero’s head.
Crawford reached into the cab of the tank and grasped the woman by her neck. She lifted Guerrero out and heaved her to the ground.
“I’m not done with you yet,” she said, joining the woman in the dust.
Guerrero slammed her boot into Crawford’s shin, pulled herself to her feet, staggered into the barn, and snatched a rusty old rifle off the wall.
Crawford ducked and rushed Guerrero before the woman could adjust her aim. A quick hook of her arm had both woman and gun in a lock, and a kick deep into the back of her knee brought them to the ground.
Guerrero reversed the hold and tossed her boss over her shoulder into the dusty straw. The rifle clattered to the floor in the struggle.
Guerrero let it go and scampered to her old, trusty standbys mounted on the wall: a heater shield and long sword. She whirled. Crawford met her thrust with a parry from a flanged mace. The head of the mace smashed into her shield, knocking it to the floor.
“Dammit!” Guerrero spat. She moved to slice between Crawford’s ribs, but Crawford danced out of the way and grabbed Guerrero’s forearm, yanking her forward and twisting her wrist until the sword dropped to the floor. She kicked it aside.
Guerrero retaliated with an elbow to the jaw, pushing Crawford away. She didn’t give the woman a chance to recover before she charged her, knocking them both to the straw-covered wooden floor. Guerrero straddled the other woman and pounded her palm into Crawford’s windpipe once before Crawford caught Guerrero’s fist in her own.
Crawford bucked her hips, throwing Guerrero on her back. Guerrero sprawled out gracelessly, her plaid shirt spreading around her.
Crawford was on top of her. She grabbed a fistful of dark hair and yanked the other woman’s head forward. Their lips met in a crushing kiss. Guerrero gasped as the older woman pulled the last bit of precious air from her lungs and held her thrashing body in place. It was always a struggle with Guerrero. Eventually, she stilled.
Crawford rolled off the corpse and landed on her back in the dust.
Time passed. The sun sank lower until the air cooled and the insects slowed to a sleepy buzz.
Crawford sighed and drank deeply from a flask off her hip. She exhaled with a grimace, then sat up and surveyed the destruction that smoldered around her. She smiled with grim pleasure, then chuckled to herself and staggered to her feet. Her boots dragged in the dust as she made a circle around the impromptu battlefield to each of her fallen comrades, offering a few drops of liquor to their ruins to revive them.
Zelenko and Nightingale found each other and huddled together in the smoldering hay, their faces streaked with ash and grime, hands clutched tight.
Finally, Crawford came to Guerrero’s corpse and emptied the rest of the bottle over the woman’s face.
“Get up, ladies,” she said. “There’s no rest for the wicked. We’ve got work to do.”
About the Authors
Emily Godhand is a supernatural thriller author whose works tend to focus on an exploration of violence, immortality, and human consciousness. She lives in Denver with her seven rats, who revere her as their divine queen.
JS Bennett is a Tennessee native and romantic suspense author. In her spare time, she catches up on her history and watches bad movies with her two dogs.
The Trade
Raphyel M. Jordan
It was always cold in the caves, and even worse on the dark side of Europa. Almost forty degrees Kelvin at the poles. At least acclimating body temp is one of the perks bioengineered humans have. It’s decent enough, I guess, though I think the scientists should’ve implemented more uni traits in us when colonizing the moon proved more difficult than anticipated. I, for one, would’ve preferred having a single horn that fired laser beams. That could’ve been helpful right about now, but that might be the soldier in me talking.
I looked through the icicle prison bars of my cage, noting a subtle presence on the other side. I was trained to take note of slight ripples against the ice that seemed … off. Sure sign of a uni’s camo. The tales moms once told daughters on Earth concerning unicorns is a far cry from the truth—a uni’s camouflage being one of key items never mentioned. Knowing the monsters were capable of that trick could’ve saved a lot of lives during their initial strike twenty years ago.
I scooted closer to my sister, Amy, when another coughing attack interrupted her sleep. I rubbed her back, hoping it would ease the episode. It did, a little. Her wheezing was getting worse. Unis had raided our town during my leave a while back, and she had leaped in front of me when one of them had me in its sights. She took the beam in the right shoulder, not far from the lung.
I moved Amy as gently as I could onto her side. The wound had cauterized, but keeping it clean in a prison cell, even one made of ice, was hard to do. If she had been any younger than twelve, I doubt she would’ve held out this long, though I now feared she didn’t have much fight left.
Please, just hold on.
I brushed back the blue hair streaked on her face, rubbing the thick strands between my fingers. Her head was still oily, of course—just another way to keep the body from wasting too much heat. Amy used to imagine having brown curly hair and olive skin, like the lady we descended from did centuries ago. Mom had a hologram of her in our hut before the unicorns attacked.
&n
bsp; The creature opposite of our bars publicized its presence with a sniff. Steam fumed from its nostrils, forming crystals. I’d heard that Earthlings called it pixie dust, the fools.
I arose and stood in front of Amy. If it didn’t leave her alone, honest to God, I’d kill it with my bare hands. I’m a soldier. I killed my first uni two years ago when I was fifteen.
The unicorn unveiled itself. Like me, its silvered skin glistened as ice; we’d altered ours to account for radiation two centuries ago. It leaned against the cage, a spiraling pearl horn half a meter long piercing between one of the openings. The bars creaked as he applied more pressure.
“Timmy?”
Dammit. Why couldn’t she be allowed to dream a bit longer?
Amy went from being in a daze to eyes the size of fists in less than a second.
“Don’t move, Amy,” I told her. “It’s okay.”
The uni’s blackened stare shot through me as if I were nothing. It snorted as it backed up and lowered its head. Mind your place, human.
I eased away from the bars. The uni’s mental projection of a voice sounded male. Telepaths. I still found it weird, their lips not having to move in order to communicate. They must’ve thought us so inferior. And to think we thought it a great idea to experiment on them after first contact.
The uni fired two blue beams from his horn, melting the bottom of three bars before he swatted the rest away. I am Zupho. The Alpha wants to see you.
Amy grabbed my right leg with her one good arm and shook her head. Her grip was so weak.
“I won’t leave my sister,” I told the monster. “Her wound is draining her.”
You don’t make demands. The Alpha says to move, and you will do so. Now, come.
I wouldn’t be any good to Amy if the uni dropped me, so I turned and crouched down to her. “I have to see what this is about.”
“Timmy—please—don’t leave me here! You—” Her coughing cut her off. The attack was so fierce, it made her eyes water.
A Game of Horns: A Red Unicorn Anthology Page 21
