“What the fuck you doing, Perry?” Trip called without turning his head.
Perry exhaled a pillar of gray-white smoke. “Firing one up.”
“You dumbass, they’ll see the smoke and know where the target is.”
Perry tossed the pipe away as if it were a snake. It shattered on the tiles. Perry breathed fast and shallow, his eyes bloodshot. Franklin figured if worse came to worst, Perry would be the most erratic one but also the easiest to distract. He didn’t know what the biker redneck was smoking, but it looked like the drug kicked in fast and strong.
“How many of them out there?” Perry asked.
“Don’t know,” Trip said, then, to Franklin, he said, “What about it, old-timer?”
Franklin considered a lie, exaggerating the size of his group. But Trip might only grow more desperate if he felt cornered. “Depends on who got shot,” Franklin said. “There are five of us, not counting the girl. They’re all armed except me.”
“Any explosives, or just firearms?”
“I don’t know for sure.” Squeak shuddered in his arms and Franklin forced himself to keep his voice calm. “Let me talk to them and see if we can make that deal now, before anybody gets hurt.”
“I need to see Fiona first,” Trip said. “Otherwise, the only deal is that all of you die. And then I take all your shit.”
“She probably shot the Zap,” Perry said. “She’s been in the meth again, and you know how she gets on that shit.”
“You shouldn’t have left her.”
“You needed help.”
Trip poked his head up for another look out the window. “With an old man and a little girl? I’ve handled lots more than that.”
“Well, Fiona can handle one Zap by herself.”
Franklin had the sinking feeling these guys didn’t care about Fiona or anyone else. They were ruthless to have survived so long in the middle of nowhere. But Franklin needed them to think he was scared, and that he thought the “deal” was the only way to save himself and Squeak.
“Let me talk to my friends,” he said. “They won’t shoot if they know the girl’s in here.”
“Is Rachel okay?” Squeak whispered, pointing to Perry. “That mean man hit her.”
“She’s fine,” Franklin whispered back. “Remember? You have to keep going no matter what.”
“Get the girl, Perry,” Trip ordered. Perry chuffed in defiance but crawled across the floor and knelt beside them. He held out his arms for Squeak, like he was a distant uncle she just hadn’t seen in a while but was family anyway. Franklin considered going for the rifle, but he was pretty sure Trip would have no qualms about releasing both shotgun barrels even though Perry was in the line of fire.
“It’s okay, hon,” Franklin said, releasing the girl so Perry could take her. He didn’t like seeing the redneck’s filthy hands on her, but he smiled at her in reassurance. Then, to Trip, he said, “Okay, I’m standing up now.”
Franklin half expected someone to shoot when he was high enough to be visible through the window, so he moved so slowly he almost lost his balance. He raised his arms in the air and walked toward the nearest exit.
“Don’t go far,” Trip said. “I can shoot you right through the glass and then take out the girl.”
“I’ll stay right here,” Franklin said as he pushed open the door. “Just take it easy.”
He stuck his head outside into the gray-green afternoon light. He couldn’t see anyone. “K.C.! Private Cone! DeVontay! Hold your fire. They have Squeak.”
He figured they already knew the situation, but he was buying the others more time to maneuver and decide on a course of action.
“Are you okay?” K.C. called from inside the Humvee. Although the windows were vulnerable, the side panels were armored and bulletproof.
“Yeah, we’re both fine. How about Rachel?”
“We don’t know. We haven’t seen DeVontay, either. Or anybody else.”
Franklin’s chest muscles constricted his rib cage. If these bastards had killed Rachel, he’d tear them into little red pieces with his bare hands. Then he realized K.C. was likely bluffing—poker required at least two players and usually at least one was lying. Sometimes both.
He leaned back into the dining room and said to Trip, “Hear that? Fiona’s probably still alive.”
“You better hope so, hoss.” Trip took a couple of green plastic-and-brass shells out of his pocket and laid them in his lap. “Or I’ll turn you into hamburger so fine we might have to open the Dairy Queen back up for business.”
Franklin made sure Perry wasn’t hurting Squeak, and then he shouted out the door again. “These two gentlemen say they won’t shoot and they’ll let us go if we give them the Humvee.”
Neither Trip nor Perry caught on that Franklin had just reported the opponent’s strength—two armed men. If both happened to expose themselves at the same time, K.C. and Cone could coordinate a hit knowing there was no third target to worry about.
“Weapons, too!” Trip yelled at him. “Tell them we get all the guns.”
Franklin complied, knowing it wouldn’t be hard to stash a few weapons since Trip and Perry had no idea how many guns the group had. His captors weren’t too bright, but that didn’t make them any less dangerous.
“We need a minute to talk it over,” K.C. shouted loudly enough that Trip could hear. Trip gave Franklin an irritated nod, and Franklin came back in and rescued Squeak from Perry’s unctuous grip.
After a stretch of silence, Perry coughed and checked out the window. “Hey, I thought you said they was only five of you.”
“That’s right,” Franklin said.
“Then who are those guys?”
Trip raised his head again. Franklin waited, wondering if the others would make their play. They must’ve rigged up some kind of trick or maneuver to make the two men think they were surrounded by a small army.
“Those ain’t men,” Trip said.
“Stay down,” Franklin whispered to Squeak, and he, too, lifted his head for a peek. It was the metal figures from the pile-up, jog-gliding along the road in their long, fluid strides. The fifth one, its head still split and pocked from bullets, brought up the rear, listing badly to one side.
Holy hell, they’ve covered twenty miles since we stopped. But how did they know we were here?
They eased past the Humvee, paying it no attention. Franklin was surprised nobody shot at them, but K.C. and Cone were likely as startled as he was.
“It’s men in metal suits,” Perry declared. “Must be some secret military armor.”
“That’s the weirdest damned armor I ever saw,” Trip said. “And that one guy, it looks like his helmet’s blown almost clean off, but there ain’t no head inside.”
“Whatever they are, they’re coming straight for us.”
Franklin slid back down to where Squeak was, made a shushing motion with his fingers to his lips, and pointed for her to run to the kitchen. He wasn’t sure she’d be able to work the heavy latch on the back door, but maybe she could find a temporary hiding place. As long as she was out of danger, Franklin would be happy to take his chances with these clowns. She hurried away, smart enough to tiptoe so her shoes wouldn’t slap the tiles.
Trip and Perry crouched at separate windows, thirty feet apart. Franklin decided to try for Trip’s shotgun. He eased into a sprinter’s stance, his knees aching, but before he could launch himself, Trip said, “Damn, they’re not stopping.”
Trip stood erect and lifted the shotgun, which roared in his hands. Franklin wasn’t sure if the buckshot shattered the window or if it was the first of the robots propelling itself through, but broken glass rained down in bright, tinkling chaos. The robot lay sprawled on the ledge, half of its torso blown away, and still it swatted at the air as if trying to claw its way toward Trip.
“What the fuck is it, man?” Perry said, raising his rifle and putting a round in the thing’s neck, shearing off a nick of silver.
“Don’t know, man,
just keep shooting,” Trip said, breaking down his shotgun, kicking out the spent shells, and reloading in seconds. By the time he clacked the chamber closed, a second robot jumped over the ledge and into the dining room with animal grace. It skidded momentarily on the broken glass, and by the time it regained its footing, Trip sawed it almost in two with buckshot while Perry reloaded.
As the second robot toppled, it reached out a flexing arm and slapped at Perry. The panicked redneck jumped backwards, losing his grip on his rifle, but the robot’s mitten-like hand hooked into his denim jacket and pulled them close together. Franklin was horrified to see that the robot’s face bore the bare outlines of lips, eyes, and nose, as if it were trying to become human.
“Get it off me, Trip!” Perry wailed, but Trip was busy with the third robot. Trip had evidently only used one barrel, and now he unleashed the other barrel and obliterated the robot’s head. Its metallic arms reached up to assess the damage while Trip reloaded.
Franklin scooped up Perry’s rifle, saw a fresh round in the chamber, and slapped the bolt closed. He aimed first at Trip’s head, but his odds were better with a chest shot, so he lowered the barrel and fired.
Trip reached for his chest in confusion and his hand came away wet and red. He held up the blood and looked at it, not believing any of this. Perry issued an amazingly feminine scream and pulled away from the robot that grappled with him, tearing the metal creature in half. The legs fell to the floor, but the upper half dragged itself up Perry’s body even as he beat at it with his fists.
Franklin wanted to shoot him, but Perry had all the ammo. A fourth robot climbed into the restaurant—apparently the things either didn’t understand doors or didn’t care—and Franklin braced for its attack. He took the rifle barrel in both hands and raised the wooden stock like a club, grunting. “Come on, you bastard.”
But the robot ignored him, instead helping its comrade finish off Perry, wrapping those rounded metal hands around Perry’s neck and squeezing until the man stopped squirming. Then the fourth robot picked up the remains of the bisected robot, arms and legs dangling, and climbed back over the ledge. The others were already waiting outside, and then they all wobbled, jerked, and limped their way up the road again.
Franklin nudged Perry’s corpse with one foot. “Perry, my man. You got any of those drugs left? I sure could use some.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
As the rumors of the metal creatures spread, the citizens of New Pentagon grew sullen and defeated as they returned to their makeshift houses in the depot.
From the landing outside the steel door that led to the radio room and command center below, Gen. Alexander inspected the camp with his adjutant, a gray-eyed, matronly lieutenant named Reeves. She’d served four years in the National Guard in the old world, so unlike many of the cavern’s inhabitants, she had real military training. Alexander lamented that his best troops had already sacrificed themselves on scouting runs and lightning attacks, and the remnants of a couple of divisions were now out of contact. This was the best that he had left.
Munger should be able to regain leadership of his old unit now that Murray and Ziminski were dead. If not, Alexander might have to order a mass execution for treason and mutiny. But everything depended on whether Munger as able to catch up with Rachel Wheeler and acquire the confirmation code. If Alexander couldn’t abort Operation Free Bird, none of it mattered.
Not to anyone outside the caverns, that was.
“Civilian population is low, sir,” Lt. Reeves said. “They’re still hiding in the caves.”
“They’re losing faith.” The general was flushed with fever, weak but refusing to yield to his condition. He was further shaken by the strange behavior of the metal creatures and their slaughter of the Zaps.
“You can’t blame them.”
“I certainly can. This is a sacred duty. We all have a role to play in restoring the United States to its former glory.”
“Should I send in search teams, sir?”
“We can’t afford to weaken our defenses. They’ll come back when they get hungry enough.”
A few soldiers ran back and forth among the tents and improvised homes, looking for loved ones. None of them were authorized to be inside the caverns. All personnel were supposed to be defending the front lines. Order, which dangled by a thread even in the best of times, was breaking down in the face of new threats.
A scream rang from one of the tunnels on a rocky ledge above the depot floor. Alexander couldn’t tell which one—a series of dark crevices ran the length of the limestone. Then someone burst from a wedge of darkness on the far cavern wall about two hundred feet from Alexander. It was a woman carrying a small child, blood streaking the bundled form in her arms.
“Zap!” she wailed, voice resonating throughout the depot and piercing the commotion below.
“Damn,” Alexander said. “They must have gotten in again.”
“Those metal things flushed them out,” Reeves said. “Maybe the Zaps were forced into the caves.”
It was just such an invasion that had compelled Alexander to seize power from President Murray. If she couldn’t protect them from such a threat, then she was incompetent and weak. Most of the population had supported Alexander’s coup. They were so afraid they grasped for any solution that was offered, and they welcomed Alexander’s show of strength.
But the Zaps couldn’t penetrate the cavern system anymore. The civilian population had been moved from the larger, open caverns to the depot. Alexander’s troops had searched for any fissure that eventually connected to the bunker areas and sealed them if they could. Around-the-clock guards protected all other entrances that led to their new stronghold.
Some of the soldiers must have abandoned their posts when the metal creatures came. Or else they were killed.
The woman with the wounded child scrambled down a crenulated stretch of moist rock, slipping and flailing. Behind her appeared a savage Zap, rags ringing its arms and legs although its genderless abdomen was bare and splotched. It was so pale that, even in the dim light cast by the solar-powered bulbs, its form was almost gleaming in silhouette. But its wildly glittering eyes gave away its true nature.
Someone shot at it from the depot floor, and it scrambled up the rock face like a spider monkey. The cavern walls curved high overhead into a pincushion of long stalactites. The Zap most likely would duck into the first opening it found. Alexander drew his Beretta and aimed, leaning over the steel rail than ran the length of the landing. Despite his dizziness, he fired a few 9-millimeter rounds, missing badly and kicking gravel shards from the limestone.
The woman fleeing the Zap tripped and tumbled headfirst. The child was flung from her arms and bounced off the rocks with a sickening, mushy crunch. Both of them tumbled down the slope twenty feet to the depot’s concrete floor, the woman’s arm sticking out at an obscene angle as she shrieked. The child, who might’ve been dead all along, landed on the concrete, the red-stained blanket unrolling to reveal a spill of fine golden hair.
More soldiers joined in the attack, automatic fire ricocheting off the rock and whining overhead. The Zap scurried on all fours down to the ledge again, where it crouched for a moment as if taunting its enemy. Reeves fired her pistol at it and a dark, wet hole opened in its side. The Zap turned and glowered at her and Alexander as if understanding they were leaders of this noisy, dangerous tribe.
More troops had entered the depot and Alexander shouted at them to go outside and man the defenses. A deafening volley erupted and the Zap jerked backward, splayed against the slick limestone for a moment, and then slid into a heap on the ledge.
“Stay alert!” Alexander yelled. “More of them might’ve infiltrated the depot.”
“Sir, you need to get to safety,” Reeves said, ushering him toward the steel door.
He shrugged free from her grip and said, “I can’t leave right now. New Pentagon is falling apart. We can’t lose this.”
“Sir, you’re wounded,” Reeves s
aid. “If the soldiers see you like this—”
“Like what?” he said, leaning heavily on the railing, ragged black spots swimming before his vision.
“Weak,” Reeves whispered. “Somebody else might think they can do a better job.”
Alexander wondered if she was remarking on his seizing of power from Murray but decided she was truly loyal. After all, she was second-in-command and she had a stake in his authority. She wasn’t strong enough to take over and she wouldn’t have much value to any new ruler.
“Very well,” Alexander said. On the depot floor below, a couple of people were attending the injured woman, who was inconsolable over the loss of her child. Alexander spotted a corporal and gathered enough strength to bellow. “You there! Corporal!”
When the soldier looked up and acknowledged him, Alexander shouted, “Maintain order here and send all nonessential troops back outside to defend the perimeter.”
The soldier jerked erect and saluted, and then scurried though the milling crowd. Even now, a few soldiers were disobeying and going AWOL, wandering into the caves to look for their loved ones. Reeves was right—Alexander was in no shape to instill discipline.
The metal door worked on a simple lever system and could only be locked from the inside. The electronic locking system had been fried in the solar storms, so it was manually operated. Reeves worked the heavy door open and Alexander entered, welcoming the relatively fresh air after the gun smoke and the stench of unwashed bodies. This section had originally been designed as a war room, from which politicians could issue orders in the event of a nuclear exchange. Naturally, the government had spent much more money here than on the depot where the vehicles and equipment were stored in large, aluminum-shielded crates.
Reeves secured and locked the door behind them. The hallway led to a set of circular metal stairs, and Reeves took his left side, wrapping her arm around his gaunt waist. She managed to take some of his weight while avoiding his amputated stump, and they hobbled down the steps, pausing halfway so Alexander could catch his breath. There were only two levels in the shaft, one twenty-five feet below that led to an unfinished hallway ending in a crumbling rock wall, and the main level fifty feet down where the radio room and headquarters were.
Half Life: A Post-Apocalyptic Thriller (Next Book 6) Page 8
