Deadland Drifter: A Scifi Thriller

by J. N. Chaney

  Finally, they heard the shuffles of their targets returning with another heavy crate between them. Burner listened to the pace of their approach and timed how long it would be before they reached the transport.

  “And why shouldn’t I complain?” Cade grunted miserably under the load. “This is usually yours and Reginald’s job. How did I get stuck with it?”

  Eggie spoke with a rough voice that didn’t sound as strained as his partner in hard labor. “Because you were told to do it.”

  “You always just do what you are told without question?” Cade breathed heavily from the physical exertion. “If Cypher ordered you to jump off a bridge, would you?”

  Eggie’s voice was close now. “Might as well. If I didn’t, he’d probably just throw me off.”

  The transport shifted as the two began to slide the crate onto it. That was Burner’s cue. With a nod to Sara, he circled around the back of the transport and crept along the other side of it, counting down in his head. This all came down to timing. He and Sara had to strike at the exact same moment.

  “All I’m saying,” Cade continued, obliviously. “Is that my time and talents are better spent elsewhere. I’m wasted on physical labor. Who do you think is going to crack that blonde’s true identity?”

  As his countdown neared its end, Burner slid to the edge of the transport and peered at Eggie’s back. Just a few more seconds.

  Eggie grunted as he pushed the crate into its place. “Well, you sure as shit haven’t managed it yet.”

  Some people just have that instinct when there’s danger, and no matter how quiet you are, sneaking up on them is just not possible. As Burner came around the side of the transport, arms already in position to go for Eggie’s throat, Eggie stopped what he was saying mid-sentence and reached for his gun.

  Sometimes, things are just out of one’s control.

  Burner struck out at Eggie’s throat, but the terrorist was already turning and the strike didn’t hit straight on. Eggie grunted and reached for his throat with one hand while trying to raise his gun with the other. Burner lunged and grappled with the terrorist, pressing the arm against his body to keep him from fully raising it.

  The Union military had an official martial art that taught the basics to every soldier during initial training. It was mostly grappling, trips, and hold-breaks. If you ever questioned your trainer why they didn’t teach all the punches and kicks that were popular in other martial arts, the answer you would get is, “Because if you are resorting to punches in combat with an armed opponent, something has already gone horribly wrong.”

  He could see the truth in those words as he and the terrorist wrestled for control of the gun. Eggie was wheezing as his lungs struggled to draw breath through his bruised throat, but he showed no sign of weakening. Burner laid into Eggie’s side with a flurry of punches as the two of them pushed against each other, trying to shove the other off-balance. Burner struck against hard muscle and was semi-aware that he was probably bruising his knuckles just as badly as his opponent’s body.

  They spun around as their legs tangled against each other. Burner caught a glimpse of Sara, who had more luck sneaking up on her opponent. She had Cade in a neck-lock from behind and was choking the consciousness out of him. The small man struggled and kicked his feet but—despite her smaller size—was helpless against the expert hold. Burner wondered if she would have her target unconscious in time to help him. He couldn’t count on it. Assuming she managed to apply the right amount of pressure on the carotid artery, it would take seven to fourteen seconds for her to slip him into unconsciousness.

  Grounding himself with his right leg, Burner locked his left under Eggie’s right foot. As Eggie pushed forward, his balance became momentarily upset, giving Burner a chance to seize the advantage. He rushed forward with his shoulder, slamming the man back against the transport. Eggie grunted as the impact knocked out what little breath was left in his lungs. Burner pressed an elbow against his opponent’s throat, pinning him against the transport.

  He could feel the terrorist begin to weaken as his brain was denied oxygen. They continued to struggle for control of the gun, but Burner had a tight enough hold on him that Eggie couldn’t hope to raise it. Burner thought he had this one wrapped up, but a trembling in Eggie’s gun arm told him that the terrorist was up to something. Burner looked down at the terrorist’s trigger finger fumbling around the gun’s trigger guard. He had the gun pointed down, aimed directly at Eggie’s right foot, to discourage him from trying to fire it, but apparently that no longer concerned the terrorist.

  Burner went for the coup de grace as that finger found the trigger. His haymaker punch connected with Eggie’s face at the same time as the trigger was depressed.

  The gun fired, blowing most of the terrorist’s right foot to bloody chunks as his eyes glazed over in pain and shock. His body crumbled to the ground while the resounding thunder of the gunshot continued to echo throughout the quiet field.

  Everything was suddenly very quiet. Not even the sound of forest animals broke the absolute silence. On his right, the farmhouse was still. To his left, Sara gently laid the unconscious Cade on the ground. It felt very much like the calm before the storm.

  Suddenly, one of the farmhouse’s windows blew open. Sara and Burner both ducked behind the transport for cover as the ground was peppered with gunfire. Burner felt a bullet cut past his cheek as he slid for cover. He heard the side of the transport get pierced by a rattling succession of the shots. After a few seconds it finally stopped, either for reloading or because whoever was firing realized they were doing more damage to their own transport than to him.

  Burner carefully peeked past the side of his cover. On the ground just a meter from him, Eggie was dead, his body having developed several new holes from friendly fire. Cade had apparently been less unconscious than he had appeared, because Burner caught sight of his feet as he crawled under the transport and out of danger. He popped up on the other side and made a break for the woods. Burner cursed letting him get away, but there wasn’t much he could do from here. He was pinned down.

  A voice called out from behind the shattered window. “Burner! I know you’re out there! Let’s have a chat!”

  The voice was easily recognizable as that of the terrorist leader, Cypher. Burner couldn’t make out any forms through the window, but Cypher was clearly close behind it. Likely he was crouching under the window while reloading his weapon.

  Burner gestured for Sara to take a few steps away from him in case this was all a ploy to get a more accurate idea of where he was. “What do you want to chat about, Cypher?” he called out. “The weather? The latest movies? Or how about you’re an insane asshole who kidnapped me and tried to make me your assassin?”

  “I’ll admit, we got off on the wrong foot, Burner. I underestimated you.” There was something close to respect in Cypher’s voice. “Or, I should say, the Union idiots who wrote your reports underestimated you. The man in those reports would have never tracked me here. Those fools really didn’t know what they had on their hands when they forced your retirement.”

  “Please, you’re going to make me blush.” Burner could tell Cypher was stalling. The faint sound of the farmhouse’s backdoor creaking open served as proof. Cypher wanted to hold Burner there so the others could go around and flank him. They needed to get away from this vulnerable position. But if they left cover, they’d be full of as many holes as poor Eggie.

  He made some hand signals to Sara, gestures taught in the military that represented common commands and maneuvers, telling her to wait until he gave her the signal, then he would cover her while she moved to a position to their left. She nodded her understanding.

  Burner glanced back around the side truck, waiting for the first moment the other terrorists would become visible.

  Cypher continued to speak to him. “You know, this doesn’t have to end this way. I’ll admit, I fucked up when I kidnapped you. I disturbed your retirement, and for that, I apologi
ze. But you’ve already gotten me back, with interest. You tanked my assassination plans. You warned the Union about my intention to bomb the Pharbis. You’ve followed me home and assaulted my men. How about we call it even?”

  “So, what are you saying? I just walk away and you’ll let me?” No sign of the others yet. Burner could feel the sweat beading on his forehead. He felt hot all of a sudden.

  “That’s right. We go our separate ways, and we never have to see each other again. You and that little blonde spy you’ve taken a liking to.” To Burner’s surprise, he didn’t detect any deception in Cypher’s voice. The terrorist was being sincere when he offered Burner a way out.

  That was why the others hadn’t appeared yet. They were waiting for Burner’s response. Cypher knew what the cost of fighting Burner here could be and didn’t want to pay it. He clearly needed his men. It wasn’t a sentimental choice. It was strategic. And strategically he was willing to cut his losses rather than finish Burner off.

  “It’s a very generous offer. Only one problem, Cypher.” Burner clutched his weapon at the ready. “You want to blow up thousands of people for fun. I can’t let you do that.”

  Cypher didn’t reply, but at that moment Burner spotted the second-in-command and the frizzy-haired terrorist coming out from behind the farmhouse. Burner gave the signal to Sara and then emerged from behind the cover, weapon blazing. He sent his first shots at the approaching terrorists. Not having time to aim, he didn’t have much hope of hitting them, but he succeeded in his goal of making them duck back behind the farmhouse, slowing them down.

  Without pausing, he turned his gun on the window and started to fire just as the shadow of a rifle appeared in it. He heard a curse as Cypher ducked to avoid getting hit.

  Sara was already moving, taking the opportunity to clear the distance between the transport and the vehicle Cade had driven here. It was parked at a crooked angle that would give her a better position for guarding their flank. Once she was safely behind it, Burner ducked back behind the transport. He was just in time, as a moment later another window in the front of the house burst open to spray the spot where he had been standing with gunfire.

  He slid around to the tail end of the transport, not wanting to be close to the same place he had just been seen. Gunfire sounded as Sara opened fire on the other two terrorists as they appeared. Reginald took cover behind another vehicle, the one Sara said that the frizzy-haired man had rented. Bullets shattered its windows and opened holes in its side, ruining any chance of the deposit being returned. Killington made an impressive sprint across the field, firing as he went, which pushed Sara back behind cover, and pressed himself to the nose of the transport. It put him outside of Sara’s line of sight and separated him from Burner by the length of the transport’s body.

  Burner held his gun out over the side of the transport and blind-fired in Killington’s direction, before quickly retracting his arm as a similar volley scraped off the tail. By getting within this range of Burner, the former soldier had put them in a tough situation where even glimpsing around the side could potentially lead to a bullet in the head. A blind-fire duel like this was a match of memory, geometry, timing, and most importantly, luck. With the first three skills, you could angle your shots to hit where you wanted without looking. Considering your opponent in the duel was likely doing the same thing, it often came down to the last one.

  Burner’s luck held out longer, and he was rewarded with a yelp as one of his shots found Killington’s hand. The blood splattered gun was knocked from his grip and slid away across the grass. With his opponent disarmed, Burner slid along the side of the transport, his gun out in front of him in a standard sweeping stance. He prepared to turn to the nose of the transport and pull the trigger immediately if Killington didn’t look like he was surrendering.

  The former soldier surprised him by acting first. He came suddenly around the corner with an arm swinging. Burner instinctively pulled the trigger, but Killington was able to knock the barrel out of line before the bullet fired. The shot went sideways. Killington grabbed the barrel and kept it pointed up in the air as the two struggled with it. With his good hand, he pressed the magazine release, causing the gun’s ammo to be ejected.

  Burner was impressed by the expert way that the former soldier performed the difficult maneuver. He might have had a bright career in special ops if he hadn’t left the military to pursue his passion in fanatical extremism.

  Not that his skills were going to protect him from Burner, who fired once more to empty the weapon before letting go. The sudden release caused Killington to stumble, and Burner used the opportunity to kick Killington in the stomach. The soldier slammed hard into the transport. He tried to slam Burner with the butt of the gun, but Burner killed the momentum of the swing by raising both of his arms defensively over his head and stepping into it. From that position, he closed his hands together and brought them down like a jackhammer on Killington’s head. Killington stumbled forward and dropped to the ground.

  Burner picked up his gun then grabbed the fallen magazine and quickly reloaded it. He was just debating whether he should put a bullet in the back of Killington’s head to ensure he stayed out of the fight when he heard a warning shout from Sara. “Watch the front!”

  While Burner had been distracted with Killington, the front door of the farmhouse had opened and Cypher had made his appearance in the flesh. He was taking a big risk. There wasn’t a lot of cover where he was, and it wouldn’t take Burner long to get into position where he could get a clean shot on him.

  That’s when he noticed Cypher wasn’t aiming a weapon but was in the process of throwing something in Burner’s direction. He caught a glimpse of it as it arced through the sky and glinted in the sunlight.

  Grenade.

  Burner was left with no choice but to run as quickly as he could, hoping that Sara had the last terrorist properly pinned so that he wasn’t just rushing through a hail of gunfire. His senses heightened, he was aware of the crunching of the grass beneath his feet as he ran, the heavy groan as Killington fought to his feet behind him to get away, the innocuously soft plop of the grenade hitting the ground near him. He dove.

  BOOM!

  The world went silent and everything happened in slow motion.

  Burner felt a pressure in his head as the blast behind him carried him further, causing him to soar headfirst across the ground as blazing shrapnel cut paths all around him. He rolled as he hit the ground, but the impact was still hard, and combined with the scalding heat and the ringing in his ears, left him dazed and unable to figure out which way was up.

  There’s a shock that the mind goes through when it reorients itself after something like being too close to an explosion. In the Union military, it was called the second blast, because even if someone survived the explosive itself, they were just as likely to be killed in the defenseless moments shortly after.

  That was why, despite Burner’s intense training, or the fact that he had survived one or two close calls with explosions in the past, he still struggled to come to his senses. His brain grappled to prioritize which information to give him as his senses returned. The grass was dry. He was vaguely aware of Sara shouting something at him, but he couldn’t make out the words over the ringing. Behind him, a huge hole had been blown in the side of the transport, and pieces of metal that used to be part of its side lay in smoldering ruins on the ground. There was no sign of Killington, which meant he had either escaped or had been blasted somewhere Burner couldn’t see.

  And the transport was starting to move away. At first, Burner thought that was his dizziness playing tricks on him and making it seem like stationary objects were moving, but as the transport gained speed it became clear that it was actually leaving. Somehow, despite the damage it had taken from gunfire and explosions, it was still operable. Must have been a military make, with all the redundant systems and reinforcement around the core of the engine to allow it to survive war zones.

  As Burner
’s vision became clearer, he could make out who was in the transport’s driver’s seat. Cypher. The terrorist leader had used the confusion in the wake of the explosion to make his escape. Burner couldn’t let him get away. His accuracy wouldn’t be great right now, but if he unloaded all of his ammo at the driver’s seat then at least one of the bullets would have to make their mark. He hoped.

  Burner raised his weapon and prepared to fire. That was when he finally heard what Sara had been yelling at him. “Behind you!”

  Burner turned and saw the frizzy-haired terrorist, Reginald, pointing his gun directly at him. There was no cover and little chance of the terrorist missing at this range. Burner leveled his own weapon toward the terrorist but knew he would be too slow.

  The terrorist fired just as Sara came crashing into him from the side, causing the shot to miss Burner. Sara and the terrorist went to the ground together, and the two of them wrestled across the grass, locking themselves together too tight for Burner to get a shot without hitting Sara.

  The sound of another engine turning on pulled his attention. Not far from where the transport had been, Killington had gotten into another vehicle. Burner leveled his weapon at it and fired a few shots at the driver’s seat. Killington ducked behind the console as his windshield was blown in and several holes appeared in the back of his seat.

  Swearing, Burner turned back to the grapple only to find it had not ended in Sara’s favor. Reginald was standing now, blood coming from his nose but otherwise looking steady, with his weapon pointed directly at Sara’s head. She struggled weakly against the foot that was pressing her arm against the ground. Blood dripping down her forehead showed where she had taken a hard hit. Now she was barely conscious.

  “Lower your weapon!” Reginald ordered. “Lower it! I swear, if you don’t lower it, I will blow out her brains just so I can say I took one of you assholes out with me!”

  Burner hesitated, but the look in the young man’s eyes told him that he was not bluffing. He was desperate and would have no problem shooting Sara, even if it meant he died right after. And therefore he wouldn’t live to tell the tale he was hoping for. Somehow Burner figured that pointing out the error in his logic wasn’t going to register with the terrorist right now. Slowly, Burner lowered his gun, but only about halfway to the ground. If Reginald decided to turn his weapon on Burner, he could still get a shot off in time.