Wastelands

by Jack Porter

  A warm tingling sensation began to spread through my body, at first slowly, and then with increasing force. From different points along my body, I felt a surge of energy rush toward Camille. It was more powerful than anything I’d ever experienced during sex, and immediately I knew it was the transfer of chi that was supposed to happen.

  Once it began, I couldn’t have let go of her if I’d wanted to. All I could do was hang onto the fierce woman, and she leaned forward to grip my shoulders with her strong hands, panting harshly as she absorbed the energy my body was offering her. With a harsh yell, she shuddered once again, and light began to permeate the darkness around her. A green glow began to emanate from her skin, lighting up her entire frame. As I looked on, her entire skeleton shone through her flesh, green and luminescent, as if I was looking at an x-ray of her.

  Then the bioluminescence faded as quickly as it had arrived, and both of us sank panting to the ground.

  “Damn,” I said, not knowing what else to say. Then I grinned. Camille smiled, and I thought she would settle in beside me for a while, but she sat up, gathered her clothes, and made her way—staggering a little—to the supply wagon.

  I watched her disappear inside it before getting dressed again and laying down beside the fire.

  21

  When Ash woke me in the small hours, he reported that all was well, and that Lady Gamma and Camille hadn’t left their respective wagons. I couldn’t help the smirk that crossed my face, and Ash shot me a knowing sideways look. Grinning, I punched him in the arm and took up my post.

  Until he woke me, I had been sleeping like a baby next to the fire, covered by my blanket to protect myself against the surprising cold of the night. And I’d dreamed of Camille and her glowing body. Did everyone glow when they had sex? My body hadn’t lit up, so maybe it was just the transfer of chi.

  Or maybe, I had dreamt the whole thing, but I didn’t think so. More and more, I was becoming convinced this was real.

  Most of my theories no longer seemed to fit. With the evidence of the spaceship, the AC lens, and Ash’s history lesson, I was mostly convinced this was not an alien world or a dream, but dear old Earth more than six hundred years later than I remembered.

  And anyway, during Ash’s watch when I’d slept so soundly, I’d dreamed of the life I left behind. Nothing much, just glimpses of my parents, fond memories of the golden retriever I’d grown up with, things like that.

  Yet I couldn’t shake the thought that if this was some kind of delusion, I wouldn’t have dreamed at all. I mean, a dream within a dream?

  It just didn’t seem likely.

  So if, when I closed my eyes for the night, I expected to wake up in a military hospital with a hole burned through my side by the goblin, then that expectation also fell flat.

  I just woke in the same post-apocalyptic world in which I’d gone to sleep, if a little bit colder than I had been before.

  Yet I was pleasantly well rested, in part thanks to Camille, despite my transfer of chi to her. I felt strong and capable, my muscles loose and relaxed. Even though I had only slept for a handful of hours, I was ready and willing to take on the day.

  I made sure my sword was on my back and took my turn staring into the Wastes as my oversized friend curled up next to the fire.

  If there was one more expectation I had of the night, it was of the distant watchers, those things Camille had described as creatures of the wasteland, the sand walkers, denizens of the Wastes, remnants of human species far gone to mutation.

  I expected them to use the cover of darkness to attack.

  Either them, or the mysterious other that Camille had mentioned. The presence that frightened her, the one that seemed different from the rest. But, no one disturbed our night.

  I kept myself amused for the first couple of hours simply by doing my job, thinking about Camille, looking away from the fire to ensure the light didn’t take away my night vision, and wondering again if it might be possible to power up my AC lens.

  I made a point of wandering about the encampment, never staying in the same spot for long, and straining my senses to their limit in order not to be caught unawares.

  The Wastes were not completely silent. Some small beasts roamed the sand, occasionally chirping to one another in the darkness, scraping their claws or shells on the occasional rock.

  Within the camp, Ash began to snore, a slow, rhythmic sound that was strangely comforting. The cow-beasts seemed to be content to sleep where they stood, still harnessed to the wagons. This was to enable a quick escape if needed, but the cow-beasts seemed incapable of moving faster than a steady plod.

  As the first hint of daylight broke over the horizon, I felt an urge to move. Not in any random way, but with a specific purpose. Not fully understanding where the urge came from, I unlimbered my sword and began, slowly at first, to step through a pattern. It was like a dance, and it took me some time to recognize what I was doing.

  This was practice for fighting with the sword. I recognized some of the movements from when I’d slaughtered the bandits.

  Then, suddenly, I knew what it was called.

  The Divine Steps.

  It wasn’t a voice in my head, not exactly, but it was an understanding.

  Rogan Ward’s understanding. Not mine, but that of the martial warrior whose body I now possessed.

  As the understanding became clear, I relaxed and let my feet do as they would. I found myself flowing through the sequence of steps more gracefully and fluidly than I’d ever moved in my life.

  And it wasn’t just a dance. I’d been marrying those steps to different swings and strikes of my sword, carving the air around me in a deadly ballet.

  The Way of the Sword, my subconscious supplied.

  I moved through it with a sense of joy, as if it would offer a profound understanding of the universe.

  I gave myself to the dance completely, speeding it up, lightening my feet so I could gain the needed height, putting my heart and soul into it, as well as a significant amount of power.

  As I moved, I became aware that Ash was no longer asleep. He roused himself, glanced in my direction, then headed away, presumably to empty his bladder in private. Then he was back, sitting in place to watch what I was doing.

  I had worked my way through all three hundred steps and the associated swings of my sword three times in total, and knew the fourth would be the last. This time, I put everything into it, exploding with power as I fought imaginary foes, sending them to their doom with every slash of my sword, twirling about like the blades of a lawnmower cutting through the air as if defeating my foes.

  As I reached the final part of the routine, I leapt high in the air and brought my sword down with an overhead strike, letting out a brief, wordless shout as I struck with all my strength. I reinforced it with a short, sharp release of my chi, and drove my sword straight through a boulder half as tall as me.

  For a moment, I stood where I was, breathing heavily and perspiring. At first, I couldn’t believe I had risked my blade on the boulder, or that I had managed to cleave it in two. It was astonishing, and I was mostly sure physics wouldn’t be able to explain how I did it.

  Then I turned back to Ash, who brought his hands together in applause, clapping once, twice, and again.

  “You are remembering yourself,” he rumbled.

  But I shook my head. “Not really,” I replied. “I know the moves, but the Rogan Ward who learned them–it wasn’t me. I’m not the same person you remember.”

  And yet… maybe there was more of that Rogan Ward left than I knew. I mean, not only did I seem to be remembering his skills, but I felt I might have been changing into someone different from who I had been.

  I was bending to Lady Gamma’s will more easily than I would have hoped. And my penchant for swearing seemed to be fading. Like, when was the last time I gave a good fuck about anything?

  I could barely remember.

  It was something to think about. Although, was there anythin
g I could do if the Rogan Ward of this time began to return?

  “What about your chi power?” Ash asked, apparently unfazed by my argument.

  I’d used my chi to strengthen my last step and swing of my sword, but knew instinctively that wasn’t what Ash meant. He was talking about the visible burst of power I had used against the bandits.

  I frowned. “I don’t know how it works,” I said.

  “You–the Rogan Ward I remember–used to practice that every daybreak as well.”

  “He did? How?” I had to admit, I was curious. There was power within me. And in the world like this, I wanted every advantage I could get.

  Ash simply shrugged. “I do not know the mechanics. But he would sit on the ground with his legs folded, and lights would dance from his fingers.”

  It was better than nothing. With the women still yet to surface, I could see no reason why not to give it a try, and rely on my subconscious to do the work.

  So I did as Ash said.

  Just like when I’d tried to meditate while walking beside the wagons, I cleared my mind, and thought about what I wanted to do.

  This time, there were no failures, no stumbled efforts. This time, my body knew exactly what to do. Within moments, I was looking at my hands as arcs of light jumped from finger to finger.

  It left a tingling sensation on my skin, and I caught a faint whiff of ozone.

  It didn’t seem like much in the grand scheme of things, certainly nowhere near as spectacular as when I’d released this chi power all at once. But this was on purpose. Under my control. And as I watched with a mixture of satisfaction and amazement, a strange thought entered my mind.

  This was power.

  Energy.

  Was it any different from the electricity I needed to operate my AC lens?

  22

  I was already wearing it. In my real life, to be caught without it would mean scrubbing the barracks with a toothbrush, and I’d seen a couple of recruits make that mistake the day I had arrived at the base. In this world, I’d taken it off while I slept but put it back on as soon as I took over sentry duty from Ash.

  Even though the unit was far less useful without power, the lens wouldn’t interfere with my vision, and it protected my eyes. From dust in the air, from sudden gusts of wind, and if Camille decided to use one of her knives to take out my eyes, it would help with that as well. Despite her using me for chi the night before, I still wouldn’t have put it past her.

  I was so used to the AC lens being there that it was effectively part of me. So I didn’t need to stop what I was doing to concentrate. I just needed to redirect the power I was manifesting away from my fingers and into the tiny power socket in my lens, just behind my left ear.

  I had no idea what voltage my chi manifested, and didn’t want to blow out the AC lens on my first try. Knowing the odds of it working were slight, I dialed down the power and focused on what I meant to do.

  I cleared my mind and sought that moment of balance I needed. And at first… Nothing. No hint of life at all.

  But this was my first attempt, and there was much I didn’t know. I wasn’t sure if the power I felt even made it to the lens. I didn’t know if the lens was in working order. Nor did I know if the voltage I had gone for was anywhere near the right one.

  There wasn’t anything I could do if the AC lens was broken, and I thought I was directing the power in the right direction. So it was voltage I could most easily experiment with.

  I slowly increased it little by little, second by second.

  I began sweating at the effort required, and knew this chi exercise was at least as difficult as the Divine Steps had been. Yet I wouldn’t give up until I knew one way or the other if it was going to work.

  And then, after I’d sat there for several minutes with no response, I saw a flicker as the AC lens’ heads up display came to life.

  I was so surprised that I lost my concentration. Of course, that was enough. The HUD flickered and died.

  But I’d done it! There was life in the AC lens yet, and I could power it with chi! It was such an incredible thought that even though I’d done it, I could scarcely believe it. Was this magic? Or was it simply the manipulation of the energies of life?

  Better question. Was I the only one who could do it? Or was the ability common in this world?

  Even if it was, it still didn’t matter. I doubted anyone in this world would even know what an AC lens was, or what it could do. Which meant I was the only one who would think to try to power one up.

  Encouraged, I tried it again, doing my best to recall the level of power I’d put into my efforts.

  Almost at once, the HUD came back to life, and I realized that the AC lens I was wearing was a different model from the one I was used to.

  The options were there as before. Night vision. Distance vision, Microscopic, and Thermal. But the styling was different, the fonts both a little smaller than I had expected, but strangely clearer as well. And instead of displaying the information in a cool, luminous green, this AC lens showed it in shades of orange.

  But the biggest difference was when I glanced at Ash.

  The lens I’d worn back in my own time had been a brand-new invention. Groundbreaking, it was true, and stunningly clever. The information displayed had done the job nicely. Class, Level, Armor, Weapon, Capability. It was unlikely my original lens had the sophistication required to give me anything useful here.

  But this thing was different.

  As soon as I looked at Ash, the whole screen filled up with useful information. The original stats were still there, but each one offered additional sub-levels of information as well. For example, the Class noted was that of Human mutation/hybrid. But this was broken down to include additional information:

  Dominant DNA: Human (93%)

  Additional DNA: Rhinoceros, crocodile, + assorted others (7%)

  Height: 14’2”

  Weight: 856 pounds

  Age: 27 (approx.)

  Gender: Female

  Mutation: Chi power (enhanced strength)

  * * *

  The AC lens described Ash as being at Level VI and included a more detailed description of what that meant:

  Extremely dangerous. Level VI hybrids are immensely strong and capable, equivalent in strength to twenty men or more. Depending on their specific genetic makeup, they can be fast and agile as well, and resistant to damage. Approach with caution. Use high-powered weaponry, preferably from a distance.

  I might have continued to delve into the stats, but there was one I’d already seen that caught me by surprise.

  “You’re female!” I blurted before I could stop myself.

  Ash looked at me. “I am,” he–she–rumbled. “What of it?”

  I shook my head. I’d never even thought that Ash might be a she. Her size and strength, and lack of any apparent clues to the contrary had made me think she was a guy. But as I looked closer, I thought that perhaps her breastplate night be hiding more curves than most guys would possess. As for anything else–well, she was still a huge, muscular figure with the face of an orc. But while there was no hint of a beard on her chin, there was also very little in the way of femininity about her.

  How had she felt about my tryst with Camille last night?

  “Nothing,” I said, quickly. “I just hadn’t known.”

  Nor was I about to share how I had figured it out. I had been open about not remembering this Rogan Ward’s history, but this was different. All the advantages I had in this world were due to the Rogan Ward I had replaced. I was using his strength, his expertise, his everything. And while it was his ability to manifest his chi as external power that enabled me to activate the AC lens, the knowledge and the desire to do it were mine.

  This was an advantage peculiar to myself. And for some reason I didn’t fully understand, I wasn’t willing to share it.

  I grinned. This AC lens was far more sophisticated than the one I was used to. It was obviously a much later generation
, designed to assess characteristics and attributes not just of the alien goblins and wraiths, but of hybrids and mutants as well.

  So it must have been made long after I’d endured the death of a thousand suns. After the wraiths had, to use Ash’s words, enabled the merging of species.

  It was the only explanation I could think of why it would show the updated stats.

  Either way, I couldn’t wait to test my new AC lens out on Camille, to find out what I could about her ability to vanish, and even on Lady Gamma and her pet. And if I could find a mirror, it would be more than interesting to find out a little more about me.

  And if the creatures of the Wastes, including the one that Camille had sensed, should come into view, then at least I would be able to figure out what we were dealing with.

  I was still buzzing from my achievement when Camille and Lady Gamma both appeared at the open ends of their wagons. Camille was once more tucking one of her knives into her shirt, and I couldn’t help but remember her threat. Did she still plan to carry it out at some point? Was sex last night simply a way to put me off my guard for the chance to exact revenge for capturing her in the Wastes?

  I raised an eyebrow at her, but Camille ignored my look. Indeed, as she passed me on her way to the fire, she acted as if nothing had happened last night. If she was looking for a way to annoy me, she’d found a good one. And with that annoyance came a big serving of distrust.

  It took me a moment to realize that Lady Gamma was again waiting for my help to descend. Edda was on her shoulder with a disapproving look that could only mean I had failed to do something.

  When I figured it out, I stifled a sigh and bowed to the inevitable.

  The new day had begun.

  23

  Breakfast was more stale bread and cheese, and then we broke camp and headed out again, under the broken sky. Once again, Lady Gamma remained out of sight in her wagon, but this time she had Camille for company. The two very different women had seemed to have struck up an instant friendship, bonding over their mutual goal of reaching the Hidden Temple.