Forged From Ash - Book #7 of the Skinners Series

by Marcus Pelegrimas

  “We weren’t blown up,” Frank said. “That’s good.”

  After pulling the halberd from where it had been lodged, Cole used the forked end to scratch a spot at the base of his spine. “Yep. You still smell those explosives?”

  “Even more so.”

  “Good. That probably means this door really is rigged to blow if it isn’t opened just right. From what I see here, the keys are built to be turned in either direction. Those wires,” Cole said while pointing down at the first dial, “have got to lead to the charges.”

  “You’re certain of that?”

  “If this works like every other door, it’s not opened by a wire. The charges were added to the lock, and so were those wires. That being the case, it looks like that first key will blow the charges no matter which way it’s turned. That one,” he added while pointing to the dial in the middle, “will detonate if it’s turned to the right and the third will detonate if it’s turned to the left.” He nodded. “I wasn’t even thinking about which direction to turn them. Just what order. Very cute.”

  “If you’ve done the research, I believe you.”

  Cole had done a little research on setting traps and using explosives while working at Digital Dreamers. Most of it was to make sure the wiring and bundles of C4 in his games looked like the real ones. How those devices actually worked depended on what was best for the game. Rather than tell Frank all of that, he nodded again as if he knew exactly what he was doing and said, “I already know which keys go where, so I’ll take care of this. Last chance for you to take cover.”

  “Do what needs to be done,” Frank said. “Quickly.”

  Cole placed the keys in their respective slots which now stuck up from the bottom of the little box he’d opened. Even though he could see the inner workings of the device and was pretty sure he knew how it worked, he still felt his chest tighten before making another move. He closed his eyes, thought of someone who might be waiting for him if he was blown sky high, and turned the second key to the left.

  Nothing happened so he moved his hand to the third key and twisted it to the right.

  There was a muted click, which made Cole twitch. A few seconds later, all of his limbs were intact, and there was no bright heavenly light to speak of. He looked over his shoulder to find Frank staring back at him with the same amount of fearful expectation as he felt.

  Cole pushed on the metal panel and even pulled on it using the keys, but it wouldn’t budge. A series of quick footsteps slapping against the floor were the only sounds Frank made as he raced out of the cabin. A couple of seconds after that, there was another click and the entire panel started rumbling.

  “Shit,” Cole grunted as he hopped to his feet and jumped away from the exposed section of the floor.

  The rumbling continued, followed by a gout of smoke that smelled like exhaust from a car. Somewhere beneath him, a gas-powered generator worked to lift a larger section of the floor to the right of the one with the keyholes. The second panel was about the size and shape of a dining room table and would have opened quicker if not for the square of chopped metal resting on top of it. Eventually, the larger panel swung open like an inverted ramp to drop the metal piece behind it.

  When Frank stuck his head through the door at the far end of the cabin, he said, “Good! It’s open!”

  “What did you do?” Cole asked.

  “Since those keys were meant to turn in both directions, I went back to the shed and turned that one the other way. One direction opened the small panel and the other direction opened the larger one.”

  “It could have also blown us both up!”

  “I already turned the key in that other direction when I was there the first time and nothing happened. Presumably, because your side wasn’t unlocked yet.”

  “Still…”

  Frank shrugged. “You are allowed to gamble…then so am I.”

  Instead of arguing any further, Cole shifted his focus back to the opening beneath the larger panel. Seven metal steps led down into a shadowy space that wasn’t much larger than a closet turned onto its side. Light coming in through the hole in the ceiling was more than enough to illuminate the hidden compartment. Inside of it, only one man huddled against the far wall with his legs gathered up near his chest and his arms stretched out on either side to press his hands flat against a rusted metal floor. His eyes were wide and his mouth opened to reveal teeth stained to a dark brownish yellow. Several were chipped into sharp, jagged edges.

  Gripping his halberd to point the blade down at the man, Cole said, “Come on out of there. You’re free.”

  The man shook his head, causing the long clumps of greasy hair sprouting from his head to sway back and forth. “Ain’t nothin’ in this world is free,” he said before leaping to his feet and charging at Cole.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  There was some ground to cover before the wild man made it to the metal steps, but he was covering it way too quickly for Cole’s liking. Taking the steps three at a time, he was up and out of the cramped room before anyone could stop him. He grabbed hold of Cole’s weapon by its thorny handle, gripped it tight and willed even more thorns to sprout from the varnished wood. The thorns that were already in Cole’s palms widened and split apart inside of him, sending a hot wave of pain through his arms and straight into his brain.

  Cole felt the Skinner serum as well as Nymar filaments within his body work together to keep him from blacking out. The thorns were still moving in his hands, shifting and twisting as if every one of them had become sadistic little worms intent on chewing up as much of their host as possible. The wild man pulled against the halberd but was unable to take it away from Cole. He followed up by kicking Cole’s shins and snapping his head forward with his mouth opened wide. Less than an inch before he sank his chipped teeth into Cole’s face, he was stopped by a scaly hand grabbing a generous portion of long, greasy hair.

  The wild man ripped free of Frank’s grip, leaving several clumps of hair in the Squam’s hand. Cole then pivoted his upper body along with his weapon to force the guy off-balance. After bringing the man down with a simple foot sweep, Cole placed a boot on the guy’s chest, pulled the halberd away and immediately felt the thorns retreat back into the grip. “Who are y—” was all Cole got out before the wild man sank his teeth through the side of his boot and into his foot.

  Frank descended on the crazed prisoner with a fist that had been raised above his scaly head. After dropping more than the length of his entire body with a good portion of his Squamatosapien strength behind it, the punch slammed directly into the wild man’s face and knocked the back of his head against the floor. Turning to Cole, Frank asked, “Are you all right?”

  Cole peeled one bloody hand from his weapon’s grip and flexed it. He nodded once and then reached for the .45 Glock holstered at his side. The holster itself was designed to chamber the first round into the pistol as it was drawn, which Cole did in a well-practiced downward scooping motion. Suddenly finding himself in Cole’s line of fire, Frank stepped back. The .45 wasn’t aimed at him, however, but at the man who he assumed was unconscious on the floor.

  The wild man, or any human, should have been knocked out by the vicious punch. Frank had even dropped a few Half Breeds with that move, but the man who’d been trapped beneath a fallen plane laced with a ridiculous amount of explosives rubbed his cheek while pulling himself to his feet.

  “All right, boss,” the wild man said. “You got me. Truce?”

  “Truce?” Cole snarled. “We came here to bust you out, and the first thing you do is try to bite me!”

  “Right,” the man said. “I was locked up in a soundproof, damn near airproof, box and haven’t seen daylight for…I don’t even know how long. That door barely got opened once every couple of days so yeah, when I saw my chance I took it. I did stop, though.”

  “We stopped you,” Frank amended.

  The man’s smile was so wide, it created wrinkles in his face that cracked the mask of fi
lth stuck to his skin. “Ok. Let’s go with that.”

  Cole studied the wild man carefully. He was wearing tattered jeans and a dark t-shirt with one sleeve ripped off. His skin tone was almost impossible to discern and would stay that way until he was either hosed off or dumped into a river. At first glance, his hair looked like it was styled into dreadlocks. Now, the long, thick strands looked more like clumps that had been twisted together, partially braided and crudely tied off at the ends. His face was covered in a scraggly beard interrupted by scars or old scabs where some of the whiskers had been ripped out.

  The prisoner’s scars didn’t stop there. They covered not only the palm he showed when he held out his hand in a placating gesture, but most of his entire arm and even a good portion of his neck. He wore no shoes, which might have accounted for the scar tissue on the bottoms and tops of his feet. The nails on his fingers and toes were scraped down to hard nubs.

  “Who are you?” Frank asked.

  “I’m the same as you,” the man replied in a voice that somehow managed to be equally parts scratchy and smooth. “Dead if we don’t get the fuck out of here real damn soon. I’m guessing by the bodies laying around and the general dishevelment of this place that you didn’t exactly pop open my box the way it was meant to be popped. That’d make you gen-u-wine saviors.”

  “Come on,” Cole said as he placed his weapon back into its harness. “We can talk as we move.” He led the way toward the end of the cabin connected to the shed, picking up the Brown Precision along the way and slipping its strap over one shoulder.

  When they emerged from the wreck, the prisoner shaded his eyes with a quickly raised hand and let out a pained hiss. “Shit, I forgot how hot that damn thing was.”

  Frank idly looked up as if to make certain the other man was referring to the sun in such unfamiliar terms.

  “It just the two of you here, boss?” the wild man asked.

  “Don’t call me that,” Cole said.

  “Then what should I call you?”

  Having only taken five steps away from the wreck, Cole stopped and turned to face him. “My name’s Cole and this is Frank.”

  “Everyone calls me Asher,” the prisoner said as he stuck out his hand.

  Cole shook the hand that was offered and wasn’t surprised by the other man’s strong, leathery grip. “Is Asher a first or last name?”

  “That’s what these assholes that locked me up call me. Been a while since I met anyone else.”

  Frank drew a long breath in through his nose and let it out with a hiss. “Humans are coming,” he said while nodding toward the north. “Some from that way. Others from the east. Those are driving in a vehicle burning diesel fuel.”

  “Ol’ Gorn here is pretty damn helpful,” Asher said.

  Cole smirked and turned toward the west.

  Scowling, Frank asked, “Who is Gorn?”

  “A reptile guy from the original Star Trek series,” Cole replied.

  Asher started walking in Cole’s footsteps. “Don’t worry, bud,” he said while slapping Frank’s shoulder. “Gorn was an ass kicker.”

  Frank slumped down until he dropped to all fours and scampered ahead of both of the other two. Even though Cole and Asher had broken into a quick jog, Frank quickly shot past them and disappeared into the tree line at the base of the canyon wall.

  “He’s a Squam, right?” Asher asked.

  “That’s right.”

  “I used to hunt them bastards down in the bayou. He ever steps out of line, just use some brown sugar to lure him into whatever trap you like. Every Gorn I ever met loves ‘em some brown sugar.”

  “So you’ve been a Skinner for a while?” Cole asked.

  “Yeah. More recently, I been a rat in a box.”

  “How long were you in there?”

  As Asher thought about that, the only sounds to be heard were the pounding of his and Cole’s feet against the ground. Soon, the engine that Frank had smelled growled in the distance.

  “You got a way out of here?” Asher asked.

  “We’ll put some distance between us and this plane, get up and out of this canyon and make our way back to the main road. If we can’t get to the truck we used to get here, we’ll find another one somewhere nearby. Shouldn’t be hard.”

  “What about after that? I got some business to tend to in the States. I’ll be lookin’ forward to getting back home.”

  Cole glanced over to him and asked, “Back to the States? As in the United States?”

  “Best ones there is!”

  “We’re in Wyoming.”

  Asher’s pace slowed to a trot, then to a walk and finally he came to a stop while placing his hands upon his hips. Turning in place, he looked up at the canyon walls as if they’d just sprouted on either side of him. “Wyoming? Shit! Those motherless fucks had me thinking I was somewhere in Russia!”

  Now Cole looked up at the tree-covered terrain. “Russia? Really?”

  “Or Yugoslavia. Or…hell I don’t know. Somewhere other than Wy-fuckin’-oming!” Asher started running again with fresh resolve. His eyes were set on the canyon in front of him so intently that he seemed ready to grab onto the closest rock wall and climb all the way to the top without breaking stride. “All the rest is probably bullshit too.”

  Cole ran to catch up with him and asked, “What else did they tell you?”

  “A while ago, some of ‘em made it sound like the whole world came fallin’ down. Wolves runnin’ all over the place. The Army blowing up cities left ‘n right. Real apocalyptic shit, but I never believed none of that. I know a mind game when I hear one.”

  “Hate to break it to you, but that stuff is true.”

  “Right. We’ll see about that.”

  After several solid minutes of running, they found a spot in the canyon littered with large chunks of twisted metal, broken shards of plastic and electric wiring. Some of the things laying in front of them were more recognizable. Padded seats, a large tire and dozens of pieces of baggage were also scattered on the ground. Everything was covered in mold, mud and other grime that had collected over the course of what could have been anywhere from a few months to a couple of years.

  “This must be where that plane first hit,” Cole said as he looked up to a large gouge that had been taken out of the side of the canyon.

  Asher’s eyes were fixed on the ground as he waded through an area covered by destroyed suitcases and shredded seats. “Surprised there ain’t any bodies lying around. Probably went down a while ago.”

  “Not necessarily,” Cole said. “The bodies would have been found and dragged off to a den somewhere.”

  “Right,” Asher chuckled. “Werewolf apocalypse.”

  Cole had to kick over only a few of the dislodged aircraft seats to find what he was looking for. He stooped down, picked up what he’d uncovered and showed it. The bone was long and curved, obviously a rib, and was gouged along every inch of its length. He tossed it to Asher who quickly examined it.

  “Something chewed the hell out of this,” Asher said.

  “And this one too,” Cole said as he found a larger bone that had been snapped in half. “One pack came through and had a feast. If there were more than that, we would have found a few Half Breed skulls laying around.”

  “There isn’t time to scavenge,” Frank said from above them. He crouched on one of the many shallow ledges that had been formed when the tail section of the plane had scraped against the rock. From a distance, that part of the canyon looked as if it had been slashed by a giant claw. “This is a good place to climb. I can help you one at a time to make it to the top even faster.”

  “You go first,” Asher said. “I need to catch my breath.”

  Even though the prisoner didn’t seem to be breathing especially hard, Cole nodded and walked over to the charred section of the canyon wall. He found several foot and handholds near the base. There were even lengths of wire snagged in some of the rougher sections, which could have been put there by any sur
vivors from the crash who’d made their way out. When there wasn’t much of anything to grab on to, Frank crawled down to lend him a hand.

  “He seems…unstable,” the Squam said as he lifted Cole to the next ledge.

  Once he was there, Cole stood on the rock jutting from the wall and looked down to find Asher digging through one of the many piles of luggage beneath a wide section of bent, rusted metal. From higher ground, that piece looked like it had once been part of a wing. “He’s been locked in a box for a long time,” Cole said. “I was locked up for a while in a regular cell and felt like I was starting to come unglued. Unstable might not quite cover what that guy is. Let’s give him a little space for a while.”

  “Is he what you were expecting to find?”

  Cole sighed and looked all the way up to the wall stretching above him. “I don’t know yet. He’s a Skinner, though, and we need all of those we can get. Do me a favor and keep an eye on him, though. Between the two of us we should be able to watch him pretty good.”

  “Watch for what, exactly?”

  “Who the hell knows?”

  After that, Cole devoted all of his strength and breath to getting to the top of that canyon. With Frank’s help, it took about half the time it would have if he’d been on his own. Once he’d completed the ascent, he could see a wide, charred path leading to the edge. Bits of wreckage were strewn about, but only scraps compared to what lay at the bottom of Tensleep. Cole followed the wide gouge that had been cut into the ground, trying to imagine how the plane had skidded along that trail, falling apart along the way, to wind up even further down where the fuselage now rested.

  Frank made his way back down again, leaving Cole to scan the surrounding area using his rifle’s scope. There was some movement in the direction of the main wreck but not enough for Cole to signal down for the other two to pick up their pace. Surely, Frank and Asher were going as quickly as they dared. To the southwest, Cole heard an occasional engine, but that didn’t mean a whole lot. Highway 16 was fairly well traveled since there was currently a lull in pack traffic through that part of the state. More than likely, The Vigilant had taken precautions to steer Half Breeds away from their little hideaway.