Mobius

by Garon Whited

  “You owe me a case,” Talbot told BT.

  BT took it out on the first bulker in the doorway. He aimed for the leg and made echoes I did not appreciate as his big-bore weapon thundered out. The leg took it worse than I did. Whatever he was firing chewed through in a second or two. The leg cracked and split, breaking sideways under the weight of meat above it. The bulker fell, partly blocking the doorway, but another one was standing right behind the downed one. We took it as a sign to be somewhere else.

  “Inside, let’s go!” Talbot shouted, in case anyone missed it. I drew Firebrand and stood by the weight-room door as they hustled past. The last thing we needed was a sprinter zipping in and dividing us. Talbot glanced at me as he went by, eyebrows climbing at the sight of me holding Firebrand, but he didn’t say anything.

  From inside, I heard a scream. I glanced in. Gary was covered in a fine, white powder and surrounded by the remains of a fallen ceiling tile. I gauged the incoming bulkers, squeezing in one at a time and slipping on the slick floor. Yeah, it was time to be out of their line of sight. I slipped inside, last man in, and Winters pulled the door shut, bolting it. I looked at the deadbolt and then at Winters. He grimaced, recognizing the pointlessness.

  “Is this asbestos?” Gary screamed, brushing madly at the dust.

  “It’s alright man.” BT helped wipe the stuff off. “You’re fine, just a regular panel, polystyrene, just polystyrene.” I had my doubts. Polystyrene doesn’t turn to dust. It sheds little round bits you never manage to vacuum up. My bet was asbestos. The school was old enough.

  “How bad is it? Tell me!” Gary pleaded.

  BT looked at Talbot, a dark look, clearly asking if all Talbots were insane. I could tell, and I don’t even know these people. Houseplants could have interpreted the look. Talbot clearly understood it.

  “It’s a resin, a foam or something, it’s fine,” BT kept telling Gary. They finally calmed him down.

  I paid more attention to the bulkers coming into the gym. I didn’t see a shrieker anywhere. Maybe they were being careful—and smart.

  Firebrand?

  Yo.

  Can we fake being a shrieker?

  You mean sound like one?

  They seem to be the brains of the outfit. Can we act like we’re the brains?

  Not touching that one, Boss. But you mean, can we fool the big guys into doing what we want?

  Yes. Maybe send the bulkers up into the stands?

  Dunno. Want to try?

  You take the one in the lead and I’ll aim for the one behind.

  What about the crawling one?

  Maybe he’ll follow the other two. I don’t know how long it’ll take them to get through the last door.

  I writhed tendrils through the wall, feeling my way into the head of a bulker thudding across the floor. The slickness worked in our favor, now, as they advanced more carefully. I touched a zombie brain and thought of the stands, of climbing the steps, of getting up there.

  It slowed, paused, turned. The thing was as close to mindless as it was possible to get without being a plant. Any thought entering its head was basically the only thing it could think. The third one, the one with a ruined leg, continued to crawl toward the weight-room door. I didn’t mind that. It wasn’t going to get a running start, and lying on the floor, pounding on the door with one meaty fist—well, it wasn’t getting through to us in time.

  Firebrand and I diverted the other two toward the side of the gym nearest the searchlight and, hopefully, the upcoming explosions. If nothing else, maybe they would make decent meat shields in a game of Catch the Shrapnel.

  “Mr. T, drone is here,” Tommy reported from somewhere behind me. I heard a high-pitched whine, presumably the engine. At last, some good timing. Sort of.

  The first missile was bang on target. Light, fire, and concussion filled the world, at least as far as my personal zombie was concerned. I withdrew from its head as the gym windows turned to shattered glass. In the weight room, everything bounced and rattled. Ceiling tiles rained down, doubtless disturbing Gary to no end. I slapped my visor shut to cut down on the sound because I recalled the drone was carrying Hellfires. Plural. One was bad enough. The second missile was no more fun than the first. I gritted my teeth and waited for the thunder in my ears to die down.

  I waited expectantly with everyone else for another missile hit. We waited for what seemed quite a long time, a suspicion confirmed by Talbot.

  “What the hell is taking so long?” Talbot asked.

  “Hear that?” BT whispered. I heard it for some time—a high-pitched whine, growing louder. I presumed it was the drone.

  “Get down, get down!” Winters yelled. “Drone engine is failing!”

  Ah. So that’s not what a drone engine is supposed to sound like. Now I know.

  The machine blasted into the gym. I heard two explosions right on top of the crash, so close as to be almost the same event. I’m guessing this Verdan person tried to fire off his last two missiles rather than waste them in the crash, despite dropping them way too close to the gym. The floor bucked, people rattled like dice in a cup, and free weights tumbled and clanged about. I put a hand on one wall, ran tendrils into everything, and stood there as though mounted, which I kind of was. We waited until it all settled down.

  “Verdan really hates you, man,” were the first words after the rubble settled. I smelled smoke. Not surprisingly, something was burning in the gym. Probably the wooden floor, but the smells of charring meat and what might be jet fuel were also present. I was fine with burning zombie, but a flaming gym could be a problem. Win some, lose some.

  BT grunted as he stood up. I helped people to their feet and cleared away a weight bench to provide more room to stand. I quietly broke the neck of my captive shrieker, just to avoid potential complications. Talbot helped, giving orders to organize everyone.

  “The door, BT. Get it open. I’ll cover you.”

  He grabbed the handle.

  “It’s warm,” he noted. I doubted the fire was close enough to the door. The wire-glass window in the metal door was covered in dust and char, so it was probably only warm from a splash of fuel or something, now burned out. If there was an ongoing fire, the light would still shine through. Unless a wave of rubble was blocking it…

  BT tried harder, slamming his shoulder against the door.

  “Not moving,” he grunted, after the third attempt. It refused to budge.

  “Tommy, help him.”

  I wondered if they could see the smoke in the air. It was faint, but my eyes are sharp. They could probably smell it.

  “Wedged, Talbot.” Tommy pushed against the door while BT slammed against it again. It held.

  “Stand back. I’ll shoot it.” Gary aimed his rifle.

  “Yeah, no,” BT argued. “Hold one on that idea. It’s wedged in the frame.”

  I considered the door and ran a tendril out, finding a steel truss, some sheet metal, and mixed bits of broken masonry piled outside to about halfway up. Dust and a flap of sheet metal blocked the window. The door wasn’t going to swing outward, and the steel frame wouldn’t let it swing inward. There really was a fire on the other side, but it was blocked from sight by the sheet metal slapped over the tiny window.

  Where do you put your money? I asked. Fire door or Firebrand?

  Don’t ask silly questions, Boss.

  “Stand back,” I told them, “and shield your eyes.”

  BT stepped aside with a curse.

  “I’m not going to ask you to trust me,” I told him, placing Firebrand’s point near one edge of the door. “Just chant ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend,’ and you’ll feel better. I’m not going to be ripped apart by zombie hordes if I can avoid it, and I’m pretty sure I can. Being a decent sort, I’ll also bring you with me as we leave. Can’t ask for a deal more fair than that.”

  I thought hard at Bronze. She rumbled quietly out of the house—the glass in the garage door was gone, but it still opened normally. She started a
quiet cruise around the neighborhood, gauging how best to approach through the remnants of the horde. We should go out this door, and the timing would be fairly tight…

  “I’m getting something,” Tommy said, softly, to Talbot. “It’s… garbled. Like distorted images at the bottom of a dirty pool.”

  I was impressed. I didn’t think anyone could eavesdrop on Bronze and I. Then again, he didn’t exactly hear us, just notice us. Interesting.

  Firebrand lit. Flames danced along the blade and BT backed away in a hurry. The flames focused, narrowed down to a white-hot line along the edge. I pushed the point into the metal door like it was butter. Firebrand penetrated to the exterior and hit rubble. Rather than cut rubble, I drew back a little and we started cutting around the perimeter of the door.

  Yeah, I could have used my Saber of Sharpness. Firebrand was a better visual. It also has an ego and likes to show off, and there were fires to deal with, as Firebrand pointed out.

  The room’s partly on fire out there, Boss. Some sort of fuel, mostly.

  I’m not surprised. Can you keep it away from the door?

  The oil or whatever is on the rubble just outside and on the wood floor. I can absorb a lot of the flames, but it’ll get hotter before it goes out.

  If that’s what it takes, I agreed. Burn it off. Can you keep down the smoke?

  No, but the hot air rises, and there isn’t much roof left. That should help suck it away. Give me a minute.

  I’ll pretend to cut slowly.

  “Any chance I could get one of those?” Talbot asked, as we cut. He kept a hand up to shield his eyes.

  “I don’t have a spare dragon,” I told him, “and you might want to step away.”

  “Can I try it?”

  I shot a harsh glance at him. I don’t know why, but the idea of anyone handling Firebrand triggered an immediate negative reaction. I didn’t used to mind. I’m guessing it had something to do with not having anyone else. There’s Bronze, there’s Firebrand, and there’s me. Everyone else is… well, not “gone,” exactly, but not here. I shouldn’t have reacted so sharply, but it seemed awkward to apologize for a harsh look.

  Talbot took my glance as a firm negative and backed away. I turned my attention to slowly cutting the door and to my tendrils. I couldn’t heft the larger pieces of debris with my tendrils, but I moved smaller bits and toppled some of the larger ones. If I could reduce the pile, getting through the door and out of here would be relatively straightforward. Fortunately, my tendrils are non-material manifestations of psychic force. Being inside mundane flames doesn’t bother them. The trade-off is they manipulate non-physical forces much better than they manipulate matter.

  “That’s, like, a really small acetylene torch, right?” BT sotto voced to Talbot.

  “Where?” Talbot demanded, softly. “In the hilt? It would already be exhausted.”

  “I know you hate the concept,” I said, still slicing slowly, “but it is quite definitely magic. Firebrand has a dragon spirit inside of it, and you’d better get used to the idea of spirits inside things, because they’re going to save our collective asses.”

  “A dragon?” Winters looked distraught at the thought. Maybe he was thinking of a biblical dragon rather than a mythological one. “Lieutenant, what did you get us into?”

  “I really don’t think this can be laid at my feet.”

  “Come on man,” BT started. “I guarantee, any other team came out on this bullshit run, they wouldn’t have encountered any of this weirdness. There’d be, like, an old discarded flashlight in the middle of the field and one old toothless zombie gnawing on it. Eric, here, would be a scarecrow in a cornfield.”

  “Hey!”

  “Sorry,” he tossed at me. “I’m just saying, Talbot, you’re like a magnet for this type of crap. One of those special rare-earth magnets, but instead of metal you attract crazy, a super-conductor for insanity. Why do I decide to stay with the guy a few cushions shy of a couch?”

  “What?”

  “No insulation in the attic,” he continued, nudging Gary. “Probably put your shoes on before your pants, you crazy bastard.”

  I withdrew Firebrand when we were almost completely around the door. The smoke was fairly thick, but Firebrand finished fast-burning all the nearby fuel and it started to clear. The debris pile was more distributed, and the door would make a decent ramp for getting over it. This seemed a good time to interrupt.

  “The door will go with a good kick,” I told them, sheathing Firebrand. “Are we going to pick on Talbot some more or run like hell?”

  BT nodded and they raised their rifles.

  “I’ll take down the door and go through first,” I told them. “Bronze is waiting for us.”

  “The statue? That’s the statue, isn’t it?” Tommy asked.

  “Yes and no,” I replied. “It’s complicated. There’s a truck waiting. Just pile in and we’ll sort it all out later, okay?”

  I pushed the door down. It fell over the hip-deep pile of rubble holding it closed. The two bulkers we sent to the stands were running around the gym, still on fire, fat sizzling and popping as they burned. At least the floor was no longer on fire and the rubble was only hot, not actively burning. The bulker with the wounded leg was black and crispy, unmoving—jet fuel and Firebrand, probably. We all clambered over the pile, unnoticed by the bulkers.

  Nothing else was coming into the gym. The side originally attacked was a combination of broken and on fire. Part of the wall was still there, but some of the rubble was flammable. It wasn’t a barrier to anyone determined to go through or over, but I don’t think the zombies like fire. They also couldn’t see us through what was left of the wall. Maybe they weren’t smart enough to simply circle around. Or maybe the burning bulkers were communicating their pain through the shriekers and the rest were staying away. I don’t know how the zombies work.

  “Well, that’s gross,” Talbot observed, eyeing the burning bulkers. I agreed, but it must have been exceptional to draw comment from zombie-slayers. “Don’t shoot them,” he ordered. “Let’s try to get out of here without making any more noise.”

  I was all for it. The gym—what was left of it—was still on fire in scattered spots. At a guess, the remains would eventually catch fire entirely and burn anything left. I decided he was right. Being here was not high on my priorities list.

  “What aren’t you telling us about Verdan?” BT asked as we headed for one of the doors on the side away from the field. Nobody seemed to notice I was leading the way, or maybe they were happy to have someone else willing to draw attention. “This is about more than just a couple of shitty uniforms. You run over his pet turtle? Maybe put your trash out too early?”

  I paused at the door and was delighted to hear the throaty chuckle of a V-8 just outside. I held up a fist in a “hold” signal and everyone paused. Talbot looked a question at me. I nodded and held up three fingers, counting down.

  Not yet… not yet… now.

  I pushed on the fire door and it broke free of the frame. Oops. I went through with it and caught it awkwardly before it could topple. I put it aside and hurried out, leaping into the back of the pickup truck and grabbing the upper edge of the headache rack. Zombies were still milling around, but they were focused more on the fires than on prey. I was right. They didn’t like fire.

  Good, Firebrand purred, as I turned my attention to the others.

  Nobody else was in the truck.

  “Well? Come on!”

  “It’s not going to turn into a statue, is it?” Tommy asked, staring at Bronze. I wondered what he saw.

  “That’s not how it works! It’s a truck!” I hissed at him, trying not to raise my voice. “It’s a perfectly normal truck!” Her engine surged twice in laughter. “Mostly normal,” I amended. “It’s just possessed! Get in! Marines, we are leaving!”

  BT looked at Talbot.

  “Hummer ain’t that far away,” he suggested.

  “You mean the one behind all those zom
bies?” I asked, pointing toward their vehicle. “Think we can clear them, get it going, and get away before the rest get their act together?”

  Talbot opened the passenger door and examined the cab, presumably for a hidden driver or a remote control system. He wasn’t really focused on what BT or I were saying. I can’t say I blame him. Bronze does a spot-on Christine impression.

  A shrieker, barely visible behind what remained of the visitor’s bleachers, threw back its head and wailed in a way I hadn’t heard before. It didn’t hurt, but it was loud.

  “Oh, wonderful,” Tommy and I said, in unison. He added, “It’s summoning.”

  Zombies swung around, ignoring the various fires, and focused on us. Tommy was absolutely correct. I’m starting to think shriekers don’t like me, but they probably don’t like anyone, so I shouldn’t feel special. Nevertheless, I felt a distinct urge to set it on fire.

  “Oh, well,” Talbot decided. “I guess I can always tell my grandkids I rode inside a magical statue. I’m pretty sure they’ll just commit me at that point, but what the hell.” With this rousing endorsement, I helped everyone into the bed of the truck while Talbot slammed the passenger door. Bronze revved, bellowing as only a big-block V-8 can, and left a trail of rubber and smoke behind. In moments, we skidded, fishtailing, and made the highway amid shouts and yells and much sliding and clattering. I hung on to the headache rack with one hand and enjoyed the ride, amused. Bronze wasn’t doing her traction trick, but behaving like a more normal vehicle. Normal-ish. Normal for a routine definition of normal.

  Talbot slid open the rear window and shouted at me through the steel mesh.

  “Don’t you want to get in?”

  “Swords,” I replied, over the engine roar and wind. “This truck doesn’t have the sword rack option installed.”

  He shut the window and went back to watching the steering wheel and pedals. I think he would have been happier if I was at least sitting in the driver’s seat and pretending to drive.

  Bronze was having a great time, whizzing past old cars, rolling over debris her undercarriage would just barely clear, and rattling her passengers around whenever opportunity presented. They didn’t seem to appreciate the deft way she handled herself as much as I did.