by Jake Bible
“Traps it is.” I moved to the rear doors. “What will I be aiming for?”
“The last of the militia,” Maaike responded. It was hard to make out what she said over a couple more booms and an earsplitting shriek of metal. “Get ready! Now!”
Elias and Teddy joined me by the back doors. Elias flung one open while Teddy hung onto my belt loops to keep me from tumbling forward as I began assembling and throwing very large Dim boxes out onto the interstate behind us.
The first box was a mess and slammed into the windshield of a pickup truck, doing nothing more than cracking the glass and tearing off the radio antenna. A bunch of pissed off gunmen took aim and fired their rifles right at me.
I threw up a Dim wall, filling the open doorway, and blocked the bullets easily. Then I got my head together and threw that wall straight at the pickup, warping and twisting the Dim until it enveloped the entire truck’s cab. I added a few yards more to the volume and it took over the whole vehicle.
With the flick of a wrist, the Dim closed tight then I snapped my fingers and it was gone.
Permanently gone. I didn’t take a key from it, so that truck and those gunmen were lost to the Dim forever. I felt a quick pang of guilt, but that pang disappeared as the next truck took its place and more bullets came at us.
The militia did my job for me, each truck replacing the next. They were getting in line to be banished forever. Idiots.
I blocked their gunfire, threw the Dim wall at the truck, gave it a little tweak, snapped my fingers, and it was gone militia gone. Four trucks later and the interstate was clear of gun-wielding, pickup truck-riding, yahoos.
That left the kobolds to do their Fast and Furious impression.
Maaike had been keeping them back with her lightning, but it was easy to see the little buggers were working on hexing their vehicles to get past the strikes of energy. Different colored magics flashed across the already garish paint jobs, adding to the visual assault.
“Don’t use the Dim,” Maaike called over the walkie. “Elias? Close it up.”
“What? Why?” I asked as the rear doors closed. Elias shrugged and returned to his port. Same with Teddy. I looked over at Violete and Harper, but neither offered an explanation. “Maaike? Why no Dim with the kobolds?”
“Gut feeling,” Maaike said. “And Diane is seeing some weird infrared coming off those cars.”
“Mojo feedback,” Diane said. “Don’t know how the Dim will react.”
“Mojo feedback?” I replied. “Okay. Cool. No Dim.”
“Good call,” Harper said. “Mojo feedback might have sent that Dim wrapping back around you, Chase.”
“Exactly,” I agreed.
“We’re going conventional from here on out,” Maaike said. “Those sneaky little bastards.”
Not that conventional wasn’t effective.
Elias, Teddy, and Harper began firing out of their ports any time a kobold vehicle tried to get up on either side of our truck. Up top I could hear plenty of automatic fire and even a couple of RPG launches, followed by the dull explosion of a miss or the intense cacophony of a hit. Kobold driven or not, those cars were gas powered and gas goes boom.
“More on the way,” Lassa said over the walkie. “Dude . . . There has to be a dozen more of those little cars flying up on our ass.”
“What’s the total?” I asked.
“Eighteen? Twenty?” Lassa replied.
“I count twenty,” Maaike said, her voice tired and frustrated. “Not sure how they’re doing it, but they replace themselves anytime we take out one of their cars. They’ve got mages riding with them or they wouldn’t be able to do that. We’re outgunned here, people.”
“Thoughts?” I asked everyone in the truck. “Violete? Those barbs any good against mage-protected kobold cars?”
“No,” she replied. “I won’t be of much use until we reach our destination. At that point my expertise will come into play. Right now, I defer to your expertise in combat.”
“I could call in all of my dopplers,” the One Guy said.
“They won’t get here in time,” Harper said. “And you trust those idiots not to get lost on the way?”
“Between all their brains they’d get here,” the One Guy replied. “You underestimate the dopplers.”
“No. I don’t,” Harper said. “I really don’t.”
“Dopplers are off the table,” I said. “We don’t need you bringing in your own army. That doesn’t seem like a good solution.”
The truck shook hard and Harper threw herself to the floor as a flash of bright green hit her port. The metal began to melt then the port disappeared entirely and was replaced by that moldy skin stuff that the truck was really made out of. No more port and no more illusion.
“They’re going to bring down the camouflage,” Harper said. “Then they’ll try to destroy the truck once they know what they’re up against.”
“How many extradimensional treaties does that break?” I asked. “Intentionally revealing a hexed vehicle for all normal humans to see? The DEX is gonna be the least of the kobolds’ worries.”
“They want their kin back,” Violete said, her eyes locked onto the One Guy. “If we return the body parts, the attack will end.”
“Not a good idea,” the One Guy replied. “Those parts are all that stand between us and death when the blood ghasts arrive.”
“All that stand between you and the blood ghasts, you mean,” Violete responded. “They will not be targeting Exiles.”
“That so?” the One Guy smiled.
“Goddammit, what did you do, Leonard?” I snapped.
“Please stop using that name,” he snarled at me.
“If you tell us what you did,” I said.
“I may have gotten a message out that the Exiles were using their immense talents to see me safely escorted back to Asheville,” the One Guy said.
“Making us possible targets for blood ghast summonings,” Violete said. “You truly are the most duplicitous being I’ve met.”
“Thank you,” The One Guy replied. “Although my goal was simply to keep the lesser players from joining the fight.”
“Lesser players? What are you talking about?” I asked.
“The DEX, the kobolds, and the militias aren’t my only worry,” the One Guy said. He tapped his ear. “The magical grapevine is all abuzz. Anyone with a grudge against me from here to Asheville was going to try to get their shot in. Not anymore. Little guys are backing off.”
I wanted to punch the shit out of him, but I held back. I also held out my hand.
“Give it,” I said.
“I think not,” he replied.
“Give it or get your ear ripped off.”
“That so?”
“Harp? Rip his ear off,” I said over my shoulder.
“You wouldn’t,” the One Guy said, turning his attention to Harper who was quickly passing me with her goblin sickle out. “Harper. Come on now. I didn’t wake it up until all hell broke loose. It’s an asset, not a liability.”
“I’ll ask once,” Harper said, her sickle gripped tight in one hand while she held the other out, open palm up and waiting. “Give me the earworm.”
The One Guy growled low and his whole body tensed. To Harper’s credit, she didn’t respond to what appeared to be the One Guy readying himself for an attack. She kept her palm up and waited. The One Guy finally calmed down, stuck a finger in his left ear, and slowly pulled out a dayglo pink worm. He plopped it into Harper’s palm and she immediately squished it into pulp.
“They eventually start to whisper lies,” Harper said as she reached out and wiped the goo on the One Guy’s shoulder.
“I know the risks,” the One Guy said. “Which is why I keep it asleep ninety percent of the time. That w
orm cost me a lot of money, Harper. It was grown for my ear canal specifically.”
“I could tell. Otherwise I would have found it before. Good biotech. I’ll want the name of your supplier when this is all done.”
“You honestly think I’ll give that info to you?”
“You honestly think I can’t get it out of you?”
“You can try.”
“I plan on it.”
“Shelve this discussion,” I said. “Listen. You all hear that?”
29.
THE ENGINE SOUNDS had ratcheted up a notch. There was a new layer of noisy machinery that began to drown out the kobolds’ cars.
“Lassa?” I asked over the walkie.
“Hit the deck and hold tight,” Lassa said, his voice calm, but not chill. It was very far from chill. “More pickups have arrived. Here they come!”
The truck swerved and those of us not already down on the floor were sent flying across the truck. We quickly got our shit together and grabbed on to the benches on each side as the truck continued to swerve back and forth. Gunfire, rocket fire, and hex fire exploded around us, lighting up the ports one by one until they disappeared and were replaced with flesh.
Unless we opened the rear doors, we’d lost our view of the road.
I looked at Harper and she met my gaze. Nothing we could do but hold tight and hope Goss and Verber could get us back to Asheville in one piece.
I glanced at the backpacks. The kobolds were there for the parts. That was easy to figure out. But did they know how many parts we had?
“We should dump the parts,” I said.
Everyone looked at me like I’d lost my mind.
“Seriously,” I continued. “All except for one backpack. Keep that to banish any blood ghasts that come for us. Otherwise, we toss the rest at the kobolds and hope they back off. No way we can take on them and more”—
I was interrupted by Lassa exclaiming, “Holy shit! The new militia trucks are going after the kobolds, not us!”
That revelation was punctuated by the sound of several explosions. The truck shuddered from the concussions, swerved hard, went off the road for a couple seconds, which was easy to tell from the way the whole vehicle started bouncing, then got back on the road and sped up. More explosions went off, but they sounded like they were a ways behind us.
“Did we get clear of the fight?” I asked into the walkie.
“No,” Maaike replied. “We’ve got eight kobolds on us and three pickups filled with militia.”
I cocked my head, but didn’t hear any gunfire except for far behind us and getting quieter by the second.
“They’re only following,” Maaike said, answering the question I was thinking. “Pacing us, and each other, but not engaging.”
“Something is up ahead,” I stated.
“We can’t see it yet, but you’re probably right,” Maaike said.
As soon as she said that, the truck began to slow.
“Traffic is jamming up,” Lassa said. “We’re hitting the shoulder. Hold on.”
I would have replied, but I was busy holding on. The truck hit the shoulder hard and everyone in back was jolted almost a foot into the air from wherever they were sitting. Except Violete. She seemed as comfortable and at peace as ever, as if she were riding a cloud.
I gripped the bench I was on and watched her. Her eyes were half-lidded and her lips were moving slowly.
“Harp?” I called quietly.
Harper glanced at me, saw where I was looking, and turned her attention to Violete. She studied the woman for a few seconds then shook her head. I clicked my walkie.
“Lassa? What’s up ahead?” I asked.
“No clue, dude,” Lassa replied. “We’re getting past a few, but it looks like some are trying to turn around. We’ve got headlights coming our way.”
“Stay sharp,” I said. “I think Violete is working a hex or something.”
“Or something? Try asking her what she’s doing, dude,” Lassa replied.
“She seems . . . busy,” I replied.
My conversation drew Elias and Teddy’s attention. They shot glances at Violete, but didn’t seem too worried.
“Anything we should know?” I asked Elias.
“No. We’re fine in here,” he replied.
“Lassa? Elias says nothing to be worried about since we’ll be fine in here,” I relayed.
“Hold on,” Lassa replied with a sigh.
I held on, waiting with the walkie in my hand as I kept studying Violete.
“Okay, Goss knows what’s up,” Lassa said and didn’t sound happy about it. “We’ll be fine.”
Horns honked all around us and I heard the distinct sounds of several collisions.
“Lassa?”
“Yeah, it’s chaos, dude,” Lassa replied.
“Because?”
“The flood. There’s a flood. We’re driving into a flood.”
“A flood?” I exclaimed.
“We float,” Teddy said and gave a high, sharp laugh.
More cars honking and more crunching of metal and fiberglass. People were shouting as we passed them. I could barely make out their words, but quite a few were yelling warnings and quite a few were begging for help.
“Uh . . . hold on,” Lassa said as the truck lurched.
It felt like we’d launched straight into the air. I was weightless for half a second before my ass hit the bench hard. The One Guy laughed then grabbed part of the bench as the front of the truck began to dip. Harper was seated across from me with Elias and Teddy.
Violete was as calm as calm could be, a slight smile playing at her lips as she continued to recite whatever hex was bringing a goddamn flood down on us.
We hit bottom and began to rise. This wasn’t a flood, it was a freaking perfect storm.
My walkie squawked.
“This is nice and all, but it didn’t stop the kobolds,” Maaike called from above. “The militia is river bait, but the kobolds have hexed their cars. They’re skimming the waves and headed straight for us.”
“Can we get the ports back open?” I asked Elias.
“How would that be a good idea?” he replied. “We’re riding a flood.”
“You heard Maaike,” I snapped. “Kobolds in hexed cars are still on us.”
“Patience,” Violete said. “You need to relax, Chase. Let nature take its course.”
“Listen to her,” Elias said and that was the end of talking to him. He turned his head and stared at the back of the truck.
“Okay, whatever,” I said. “Violete? What the hell does let nature take its course mean?”
“You will see,” she replied then closed her eyes the entire way and let out a high-pitched screech that was part nails on a chalkboard and part methed-out dolphin.
I cringed and tucked my shoulders up to my ears. It was one awful sound.
“She would be great at karaoke night,” the One Guy said, getting a laugh from Teddy.
“Is she all right?” I asked Teddy. He only blinked at me. “Right. Cool. I guess we’ll find out.”
“Here we go!” Maaike cried.
“Here we go what?” I replied over the walkie.
“She brought the catfish. She hasn’t done that in decades,” Maaike said.
The sides of the truck shook as something large slapped against it. Slapped. It had a distinct, heavy, wet sound to it.
“How big are the catfish?” I asked as I watched a dent form on the wall next to me. “Maaike?”
“Big,” she said with a laugh. “Oh, this is beautiful.”
“It would be nice to see what is happening,” the One Guy said. “I’m not one to enjoy the radio play by play.”
“Lassa? Ask
Goss or Verber how we see out the back of the truck,” Harper said over the walkie.
Without a response, the upper halves of the rear doors turned semi-clear in a sheet of gelatin sort of way. We were protected from the chaos outside by a shimmery membrane.
“Uh . . . thanks,” Harper replied.
I could see why she hesitated with the gratitude.
The flood was impressive. So were the sailing skills of the kobolds. They kept those compact cars skimming from wave peak to wave peak, never letting them get sucked down into the troughs. It was like they were windsurfing with their ugly ass neon vehicles.
But the flood and the kobolds weren’t what we were watching. It was the catfish. Those beasts had to be twenty-five feet long with mouths nearly ten feet from cheek to cheek. They came up out of the waves and snapped down on the kobolds like pond carp being fed by toddlers at every damn botanical garden ever made.
A bright pink car swerved to avoid the snapping jaws of one catfish and ended up being swallowed by a different one. One second it was there then it was swallowed whole and gone forever, the catfish diving down into the flood and lost from sight instantly.
“And you wanted to waste the kobold parts,” the One Guy scoffed.
I think he was taking notes and trying to figure out how to hire the catfish. He was seriously focused on what was happening outside.
“Do you think they can be trained?” he asked.
“I knew it,” I muttered then clicked the walkie. “How much of this are we in for?”
“You’ve got the flood maker back there,” Lassa replied. “Better ask her. I can’t see shit except for more waves and catfish tails slapping around.”
I raised my eyebrows as I looked at Violete. She still had her eyes closed, so I cleared my throat. Twice. Then a third time. One eye opened slightly.
“Yes?” she asked.
“How long are we riding the waves?” I asked as the truck dove down into a trough. We lost sight of the kobold and catfish dance for a minute.
“Be patient,” she replied.
“Yes. Patience. All for it.” I nodded and nodded then shook my head. “Done being patient. How long?”
