Frags

by Thomas K. Carpenter

  The key difference, the one that Milton had never addressed and that Gabby would have centered her argument around, was that the Freelands publicized the state of every homestead, land or government. A tyrannical maniac could turn a location into a cesspool of debauchery, but soon the information would spread and the land would get shut down. The Freelands were market-based realities and if you didn't like the reality you were in, just go to the next land over.

  Milton stood on the back of the Caterpillar facing south with his hand shielding his eyes. The gray clouds still hid the sun, but the diffuse illumination made them all squint. They'd been discussing their newest dilemma for the last half hour without resolve.

  Milton turned back to them, ticking off points with an outstretched hand. "I don't think there's any choice. First, the meta-notes tell us that the Farm doesn't like visitors." Milton nodded back south to the land that blocked their way. On their maps it was called the Blood Farm and in reality it was only a few hundred yards away. They'd driven the Caterpillar near it and a great red pulsing wall had appeared, seen on their eye-screens and projected by the Freelands program. The klaxon that followed made their ears hurt. They drove back until they couldn't hear it anymore.

  "Second, the geobox says that if you pass through their land, they get to demand a 'blood toll.' I don't like the sound of that," he said, shaking his head. "And third, there's a place about one-hundred fifty miles east where we can restock the Caterpillar. It's just on the edge of our range."

  Mouse pointed to the floating map hovering between them. "If we just go east near the mountains, we won't lose much time and we'll avoid the Blood Farm."

  "But we need fuel and there's no place south within range. If we go your way, we might as well abandon the Caterpillar and go on foot, or head to that train," he said.

  Milton lowered his voice and made it sound like an old game show announcer: "Game away your days, traveling safely on the Game Train!" Milton laughed lightly at himself. "More like a Lame Train. Probably nothing a group of old LifeGamers couldn't handle."

  Gabby curled up on the bench and pulled her hoodie around her face. Thoughts of the train made her shudder, even though she only had a vague description. The Blood Farm had a more sinister name, but Gabby suspected it was more bluster than actual danger. The banal and inviting nature of the Game Train tags seemed off to her. Almost in the same way Mr. Johnson's faux-excited voice for the Asphyxia raid during Final Raid had made her feel.

  Mouse and Milton continued their arguments while Gabby looked to the others. Delilah occasionally added her opinion, firmly on Milton's side, while Michael spoke up on Mouse's. In the last couple of days, Michael was looking less haunted, the circles around his eyes had shrunken, but he still looked like something vital had been taken from him.

  Celia hadn't partaken in the conversation. She sat on the flatbed portion of the Caterpillar tinkering with the hijacked hovercraft. She'd been soldering controls from another vehicle they'd pillaged in the GSA. Gabby had been helping her at times, but she'd given up when she realized they didn't have enough spare parts to make it work, but that hadn't stopped Celia from continuing to tinker.

  Gabby was watching Celia work, when Gabby realized the nano-torch was motionless in Celia's hand. Gabby couldn't even see if she was breathing. She just looked like a picture of Celia rather than the real thing.

  The pale girl extinguished her torch with her mind and set it down like it was a fork at a fancy table. Then she started calmly climbing over the benches toward the front. The bandages across her eyes and the purposeful way she set her hands on the benches seemed a contradiction. Milton and Mouse suspended their argument to watch Celia. When she sat in the driver's seat, she said, without even turning her head, "Coders."

  The rest of them erupted in a fury of movement. Celia had the Caterpillar turning in a wide circle headed south by the time everyone got situated. Three dust plumes to the northwest signaled the pursuit.

  "Where are we going?" Milton shouted above the revving engines. Celia didn't answer, but they were definitely facing south.

  Gabby's instincts were to go south through the Blood Farm, despite the sinister description. They didn't have a choice. The Coder vehicles were approaching quickly and going east at their pace would only run them out of fuel.

  "We've got to go east," shouted Milton.

  The urge to voice her disagreement was almost as unbearable as the impending presence of the Coders, probably led by Mr. Johnson. But Daniel, a boy she hardly knew, died because she'd inspired him into wanting to come. She'd only wanted his help in escaping, or at least information to that direction, but he'd gone the next step further and paid for it with his life. If being a leader meant that people died when you inspired them, she wasn't sure she wanted to be the leader of the Frags.

  Celia ignored Milton and headed straight for the border of the Blood Farm. The red hazy wall and the klaxon returned on approach. Then the Caterpillar skidded to a stop, sending up dirt and black smoke in a cloud around them.

  Gabby had been facing backward, watching the Coders approach. When she turned south, she saw why Celia had stopped. Just beyond the red wall were five squat vehicles about the size of a FunCar mulling about the other side. The machines reflected chrome and steel and crimson in overlapping layers of armor. On the top of each was an automatic gun, clearly tracking their movements. Deeper beyond the barrier, more mobile gun vehicles approached. They weren't moving with much urgency, but there were enough of them it wouldn't matter. Even with the armor they'd used to escape from the GSA, which they didn't have anymore, they wouldn't be able to stop all of them. If they were going to enter the Blood Farm, it was going to be on the Blood Farm's terms.

  "Don't just sit here, Celia, go east!" Milton was practically foaming at the mouth. Gabby hoped the stress didn't set off his epilepsy.

  Mouse, in a louder voice than Gabby had ever heard her use, said, "Go west, we can curl around the Blood Farm and fight them on the run."

  "We can't escape them," said Celia in a plain voice. "We can fight them here."

  Gabby felt like the old Mouse as she was sitting on her hands, wanting to tell them the obvious. Drogan, sensing the danger, had lapsed into "Cradle will fall..." He hadn't mentioned the Bubble World since they'd left the Flock.

  The only logical course, in Gabby's eyes, was to go through the Blood Farm and pay their 'blood price.' But she didn't want to speak up, in case someone was hurt again. Even thinking about saying something brought memories of Mouse getting shot and the man's head impacting the speeding hovercraft and Daniel drifting to his knees the moment before he died.

  She couldn't directly explain why she thought they should go through the Blood Farm even if she might be wrong and that the price of passage was too high and that it was as sinister as it sounded. She couldn't tell them at all. She couldn't convince them to go through the Blood Farm, because that would confirm that she was the leader of the Frags and bring back the chance of someone getting hurt, like Michael, but she could help them come to that conclusion themselves.

  "Can we fight the Coders? How many of them are there?" she asked, as timidly as she dared.

  Everyone looked to Celia. "Fifteen. Five in each vehicle. Your friend Unthar is there, Gabriella. And all armed with weapons not on any database. That Coder is leading them again." It was more than Gabby had heard Celia say in one breath since she'd joined them.

  The nodding glances showed that the other Frags had come to the same conclusion that Gabby had a long time ago. They couldn't fight the Coders and they couldn't outrun them. The Blood Farm was the only way. Gabby just hoped the Coders couldn't follow.

  As the tip of the Caterpillar broached the hazy red wall, a dialogue box appeared before Gabby. She sensed the others were getting the same thing.

  "Pay the Blood Price?" The ghostly crimson words floated above her. She only had to acknowledge it and be allowed onto the Blood Farm. Refuse and the gun vehicles would unload their deadly lo
ads. Gabby wondered what would happen if only one of them refused.

  The strange vehicles started to converge as Gabby hesitated. Now faced with the reality of submitting to their rules, she was having second thoughts. What if the Blood Farm was as bad as the Flock, or worse?

  Gabby glanced back at the dust plumes of the Coders, growing closer by the second. The entrance words were still floating before Gabby, now pulsing insistently. If she didn't accept soon, she would probably be ripped apart by a hailstorm of bullets.

  All the guns had trained themselves on her. The words were pulsing faster, almost strobing. There was no time left.

  Gabby accepted. She would pay the blood price, whatever that was.

  Chapter Twelve

  The Caterpillar had been a stalwart of their journey, carrying them over hundreds of miles and through terrain unsuited for even the most versatile vehicle. The Caterpillar was an unlikely masterpiece from their gentle giant, busily humming his favorite nursery rhyme.

  The dust plumes rapidly approached, growing larger until they could see the Coder hanging from the side of the lead vehicle. Gabby knew it was him by his mane of hair fluttering in the wind, even though she couldn't see his LifeGame skins.

  Much to the shock of the Frags, the engines, which had been thrumming along like an unruly beast, sputtered and coughed like an old man with pneumonia. Celia gave it more gas, which only deepened the cold.

  The vehicle had been so predictable and reliable, none of the Frags, including Gabby, thought about running as the three GSA vehicles skidded to a stop. The Caterpillar died as the men jumped out of their vehicles.

  Unthar got out last, staring incredulously at the Blood Farm's mobile gun units that only moments before had their guns trained on the Frags. The guns swiveled around, facing their new enemies.

  "What the hell are those things?" said Unthar.

  Mr. Johnson continued to hang on the open door. His skin didn't completely translate from the GSA to the Freelands network, so it appeared as patchy white paint on his face and the sword and half the clothes were missing. He appeared to be an actor not quite ready for his show.

  "Nevermind those," he said, "we'll deal with them in a moment."

  "Damn right we'll deal with them, then I'll deal with that bitch over there." Unthar shouldered his gun, pointing it in Gabby's direction.

  Mr. Johnson, who didn't have a weapon, walked up to the edge of the Blood Farm property line. Gabby assumed he had a mod that helped his LifeGame interface access the Freelanders, but it clearly wasn't perfect, given his uneven skin. Gabby couldn't figure out if his smirk toward the mobile gun units was real or an affection of the partial skin.

  "Think this little fiefdom is going to protect you?" he asked, smiling contemptuously. Mr. Johnson appeared to have all the cards by his confidant stance.

  "Go back to the GSA," yelled Michael. "You've got more kids to kill."

  "Is that what you think?"

  Gabby glanced down to the shotgun lying at her feet. The fifteen GSA special forces had their guns pointed at the Caterpillar, keeping thoughts of even reaching for it at bay.

  Mr. Johnson paced slowly on the other side of the red wall, his hair blocking his face. He appeared to be on a leisurely stroll. "If you give me Ms. Gabriella DeCorte and her little sidekick, I'll be happy to tell you what we do with them. Even let the rest of you go. Be Freelanders if you want. The lot of good it'll do you."

  "Go frag yourself!" yelled Milton, bringing laughter from the other Frags. His little defiance made Gabby smile.

  Mr. Johnson, however, cocked his head sideways and peered at Milton as if he were just realizing he was there. As he did, the skin covering the right side of his face disappeared for a moment, Gabby got a sense of déjà vu. She could see his nose and jaw line on half of his face. Mr. Johnson turned the other way and the skin reappeared.

  "We're not giving them over," said Michael. Gabby could see how much the effort of yelling drained him. "So just turn tail and head back to the GSA, or these gunships will rip you apart."

  Gabby first confused the look on Mr. Johnson's face with fear. Then she realized it was shock and then right after, the whole crew of special ops, including Mr. Johnson and Unthar started laughing.

  "Gunships?" said Mr. Johnson, laughing behind a cupped hand.

  The Frags looked amongst themselves trying to figure out what they'd missed. Were the gunships not guns at all? Had they given themselves over to the Blood Farm on an illusion just like the Flock?

  Mr. Johnson pulled out a pistol from the back of his pants, pointed it at the nearest gunship and pulled the trigger. A deep, throaty moan erupted from the gunship and it fell over. The special ops soldiers started laughing again, slapping their legs, while Mr. Johnson stood with his gun out, smirking like a cat with a half-dead mouse under its paw. Gabby felt like she was sinking into the floor of the Caterpillar.

  Gabby glanced down at the shotgun and the air exploded in an avalanche of noise and dust. She threw herself into the floorboards. Mouse gave an anguished squeak that sounded like a tortured seal, and Gabby wondered if she'd been shot, but she dared not look up as the gunships were unleashing themselves on the GSA retrieval squad.

  When the shooting stopped, Gabby expected to peer over the edge to see a litter of dead bodies, but instead there was just one partially shot up blue and gold vehicle and the rapidly departing dust plumes of two more. The mobile units were articulating their guns, almost waving goodbye to the GSA.

  Gabby heard fearful crying from the next bench over. She hopped it and put her arms around Mouse to comfort her. "They're gone, Song. We're okay." But it didn't seem to help. She kept shaking her head and mumbling something.

  Gabby tried to pull Mouse to her feet, but she stubbornly stayed glued to the floor, shaking her head.

  "They're gone, Mouse. No more GSA. They went back."

  Slowly the words seemed to dawn on Mouse. She peered up through tear soaked hair stuck to her face, "Gone?"

  "Gone."

  "Not dead?"

  The question struck Gabby as strange, but then she thought the girl might be afraid of bodies or blood. Though she hadn't seemed squeamish in their battle with the Flock or in Final Raid.

  "Not dead."

  Mouse gave a huge sigh of relief. When the girl saw Gabby watching, she hid her face behind her hair. Gabby was about to question her, but then Celia said, "Vehicles approaching. Blood Farm."

  "From one problem to the next," said Gabby.

  Milton was digging for a weapon in the storage compartment until Gabby waved him off. She'd left her shotgun on the floorboards and walked out to greet them. It wasn't like they were going anywhere.

  Five crimson and chrome vehicles pulled up. Each one more different than the last. One of them even appeared to be a FunCar with the roof cut off and roll bars added on. The crimson and chrome "colors" of the Blood Farm vehicles and the GSA's mocking laughter about the gunships made Gabby realize the "colors" were just skins.

  Milton walked past her, stepping a few paces in front, as the last of the dust subsided. The men and women from the vehicles had weapons, automatics and other implements, but kept them on shoulder straps and tucked under their arms.

  "Hail, friends," said Gabby and felt foolish immediately. This wasn't LifeGame and they weren't on Final Raid. These were real people with needs and wants and rules they didn't understand.

  Milton shot her a disapproving look. "Hello."

  When Gabby saw the full-bearded man duck out from the towering truck, she thought he might be their leader, but he stopped and crossed his arms. Another man with spectacles stepped forward.

  "Greetings. Ben is my name."

  The manner in which he touched his hand to his chest and the unassuming simplicity of his name practically disarmed Gabby's fear on the spot. Ben was plain faced and his auburn hair had touches of gray at the sides. Gabby guessed he was older than she thought and noted that he, and the others, didn't use skins to hide their
appearance, even though they had modified their vehicles that way.

  "I'm Milton. I'm the leader of us Frags." He stood with his arms crossed, one foot slightly forward in a defiant manner.

  Gabby couldn't help but feel annoyed by Milton's declaration, but then she reminded herself, that she didn’t want leadership of the Frags.

  When Ben looked to her, she touched her chest, mimicking his gesture. "Gabriella, or Gabby for short."

  "Gabby for short, it's nice to meet you. And you as well, Milton."

  Ben's eyes flickered over the Caterpillar before returning to Milton and Gabby. He seemed to be judging them.

  "So you escaped from the GSA?" The manner in which he asked indicated he already knew the answer, but they both nodded regardless. "And you've outrun a retrieval squad to take refuge here on the Blood Farm."

  Milton kept his closed pose. "We'd like to trade for some fuel, restock and keep moving south, if possible. We have," Milton paused and Gabby closed her eyes briefly hoping he wasn't going to spill out their plans, "things we need to do."

  Gabby sighed.

  "So," said Ben, "you're just going to come in here and get some supplies lickity split and then move on? Did you even bother to learn who we are and what we do?"

  At first impression, Gabby pegged Ben for a former school teacher. He had that easy, comfortable air around him. But his eyes had hardened as he lectured them. The other Farmers kept relatively still watching them. They were cautiously tensed at the ready. The Blood Farm didn't trust them.

  "I'm sorry, Ben," said Gabby, catching a cutting look from Milton. "We're still recovering from that close call. Thank you for running them off for us."