Unfortunately, I later learned we were more like moths drawn to a vicious flame rather than Bradich being a diamond in the rough, but I'll get to that in time.
It wouldn't be until a year after joining the eagles that I first met Bradich's brother, Donovan Lesfort. Donovan was a scientist who followed the long lineage his patronage afforded him. The Lesfort family innovated and marketed the nanite implants after their original creation in Japan. They were also responsible for upgrades and the creation of further nano technology including purporting huge strides in the field of combat implants. As for Donovan, his interest and field of expertise was in the theory that nanites possessed subtle personalities; true intelligences; and, most controversially, wills of their own.
I saw him several times after that, and everything about Donovan piqued my interest more and more over the years of knowing him. Unlike his brother and the entirety of my new family unit, Donovan possessed no combat experience or prowess of any kind. As a, at the time, sixteen-year-old girl I found that to be most endearing. The prospect that there was someone I cared for that actually needed my protection nurtured a sense of usefulness and care-giving housed somewhere in my subconscious femininity that had not been completely incinerated by the flames of a male dominated group.
The kindness and patience he exuded even as he worked kindled a girlish fantasy in me that quickly deepened. It wasn't long until I realized, even in my immature state, the pangs of longing and adoration for Bradich's brother. I had fallen in love. Consequently, it was not long after that when my world's color, given to me by my new family, was once more thrust into darkness and shades of gray. This time, both literally and figuratively, the effects were permanent.
It would be a year later, as I approached my seventeenth birthday, that we accepted Donovan's request to travel to Egypt in hopes of discovering a breakthrough in his nanite theories. The events which unfolded in Cairo changed everything. It was there that Bradich… Al? Hey, Al?” I looked down to see the squirrelly crime lord's remaining eye glaze over as the bubbling sound of his last breath escaped the gaping fissure dividing his face. The dull gray sky indicated daybreak as the sun shined its rays from behind the veil of ashen fallout caused by the Titan Crisis ten years ago after the events that took place in Cairo.
“Al… it's rude to interrupt a lady when she's speaking.” I shook my head and rummaged through Al's belongings. Taking the things of value, namely his pack of cigarettes, I dusted them off and slid them into the inside pocket of my trench coat.
The rain slowed to a comfortable drizzle, so I stood and examined my injuries. With Panacea's work nearly complete, I decided to begin the trek back to Junction City; it served as my residence and the location of my contact and dear friend, Doctor Oswald. In addition to providing me information in my search for Bradich, Oswald was Donovan's closest friend and the only surgeon I trusted to repair, maintain, and graft new nanites to my cortex. Notwithstanding his position as the town's leader and the man that dished out jobs and pay to mercenaries like myself, I owed my old friend a slap to the back of the head.
“Al was too early…” I remembered.
File 04: Junction City
After several hours of walking, I stood atop a hill surmounting the modest establishment called Junction City. The wind fanned my raven locks in a haphazard clutter against my dirt-smudged cheeks, and a pale smile crept up the corners of my lips as I beheld the city which I protected since Harbinger tore the world asunder ten years ago.
Its giant fortifying walls were forged by melding together various rusty steel sheets of assorted color, and enormous, old tires from ancient farm vehicles braced the walls' posterior. At the peak of the protective circumference, lines of razor wire twisted into a spiral that lined the perimeter. From an exterior perspective, the queer looking oval wall would conjure either grimaces or snickers from the unsuspecting individual. Within those walls, however, resided some of the most endearing citizens one could ever hope to meet. No matter its rundown condition, Junction City was a good a place to be as any.
For several miles surrounding the compound, Oswald ordered the rocks and hills to be leveled into flat plains. That way, approaching entities could be sighted with relative ease by one of the many sentries using telescopic scopes fitted atop high powered sniper rifles. Even as I took the first step down the hillside a mile and a half away, I already felt wary stares tracking my journey.
By the time I reached the walls, the dim gray of the afternoon shining from behind rolling fallout clouds blackened to herald the sinister night. The only lights illuminating the desolate plains were the large flood lights at the top of the city's barricade and the dazzling lightning snaking across the growling sulfuric cloud cover. The colossal gate separating the city from the myriad of threats surrounding it required two men to operate. A third remained perpetually at its peak in a state of constant vigilance. Those sentries permitted visitors entry only after a series of inquiries and searches to ensure the safety of Junction City's dwellers; needless to say, they terminated bandits and Dusk Territory advocates with extreme prejudice.
“Ihlia?” The gruff voice of the sentinel calling my name at the gate's apex brought a grin to one corner of my mouth. From my perspective outside, the watchtower loomed overhead, nestled behind those protective steel sheets. I only barely discerned the bulbous physique of one of the aforementioned sentries standing atop it. It was Bojack. The man was one of the few surviving earthlings with any pigment of color in him, and compared to the majority of men and women surrounding him, he was understandably considered black.
His hair, a wild assortment of frizzy copper and blond, surrounded his face like a lion's mane. It was difficult to tell where the fluff of his hair ended and the scruff of his beard began. His gargantuan physique towered close to six and a half feet, and it amused me to behold him within the confines of a watch tower which forced him to slouch just to avoid smacking his head against the roof. His stout body bulged with a combination of bulky muscles and a thick layer of insulating fat. Despite his overbearing appearance, Bojack was considered one of the most loveable individuals to ever grace the sanctuary of Junction City.
“Yes, Bojack, it's me. It's freezing out here, if you don't hurry and open this blasted door I think my breath will mist up the entire area,” I dramatically hissed warm air against my palms before rubbing them together in mock attempts to warm them.
“Hah, that's not the weather, it's that icy heart of yours. If I let you in, it might contaminate everyone else, too.” Directly behind the gate, at the post of either technologically primitive pulley mechanism responsible for swinging the giant doors ajar, I heard the muffled laughs of Bojack's comrades who were more than entertained by our jovial exchange.
“Bojack…” I allowed my voice to trail off as both my hands pressed against the slender swell of my hips and a single brow cocked skyward to mimic a threatening glare.
“All right, all right. You heard her, boys. Open the gate straight away! You know, Ihlia, you might not be so cold if you actually put some clothes on for a change. I mean look at you… what little clothes you do have are torn to shit!” The man chortled beneath his breath even as the iron door gradually opened with an ear-piercing metallic screech. As I stepped onto the other side and entered Junction City, I lifted my hand in a dismissive wave to the three gate guardians.
“Have a nice night, Bojack,” I called back in a sing-song voice and ventured into the settlement twinkling with the artificial incandescence created by street lamps scattered throughout the city like flickering stars. The domiciles littering the expanse of Junction City were crafted in much the same theme as the protective walls. A typical house was comprised of incohesive junk melded into a cubical dwelling vaguely resembling the architecture of old. Inside, basic electrical capabilities were maintained by generators using synthetic fuel called “sludge” that served as the legacy of the twenty-seco
nd century's scientific achievements.
Sludge utilized most forms of refuse mixed with the synthetic formula created after years of research during the golden age of transcendent humanity. In essence, one could add a heap of trash to the synthetic formula in order to create clean-burning fuel. Coincidentally, it shared the same name, chemical makeup, and texture with the typical alcoholic beverage akin to old fashioned beer, albeit the fuel was far more potent a concentration.
Home furnishings and aesthetic decor varied from fundamental to lavish depending on the scavenging or trading talents of a house's owner. During the day, the streets filled like a busy market as men and women poured in to peddle wares. The price of an item reflected the price one was willing to pay to obtain it. Food to a man with a full belly might be worth significantly less than sustenance to the starving sack of skin and bones.
Most families in Junction City operated as an efficient unit, with one parent venturing into the wilds at dawn to scavenge for supplies or reporting for labor duties in the synthetic food production complexes. Payment for scavenging included what one could find in the old ruinous cities writhe with bandits and hyped stalking about. Payment for labor included an extra portion of food or water one could use for bartering in addition to the mandated amount for survival.
The other parent stayed behind to set up the bazaar or attend to household chores and child raising. The concern of those too lazy to work solved itself quickly. Productive individuals ate, unproductive individuals starved. The man responsible for determining the level of a man or woman's productivity was none other than the city's founder and operating nanite surgeon, Doctor Oswald.
In addition to trading for goods and services, bartering items served as payment to a town's nanite surgeon for surgeries; it proved particularly important for the prospect of raising children. Upon birth, a child would be presented to a doctor along with a predetermined stipend of goods. These goods ranged from scavenged commodities to extra or exquisite food and drink. If the payment was satisfactory, the newborn child would receive his scar, a term denoting the cranial scar caused by the initial opening of the scalp for nanite implantation. If unsatisfactory, the child would be left to die to radiation. Unlike most doctors, however, Oswald possessed a soft heart. In all the history of Junction City, no child ever died… at least, not from radiation.
The most important nanite to be implanted was, of course, Panacea. For many newborns this would be the first and final implant, as it was the only one necessary for survival in the post-apocalyptic disaster called Earth. The surgical scar became an identifying mark, and if, perchance, the infant matured into a combatant requiring further augmentation for the sake of the city's defense, that same scar would be reopened as many times as necessary to perform nanite surgery.
As I comfortably sashayed down the vacant streets in the middle of the frozen night, the stale scent of rust and grime transmuted into an intoxicating aroma of sludge and inebriation. The only establishment with lights glaring and voices blaring, the town's local tavern, remained abuzz with business well after the darkness crept down from the heavens to lull the young ones off to sleep.
I paused for a moment and glanced up the hillside road leading to Doctor Oswald's manor; a frigid breeze whistled through the lonely void. I casually glanced back to the tavern glowing with life, laughter, and incandescent orange light. I recognized that a trip down that trail would assuredly consume several hours of irrelevant liquid distractions, unwanted sexual advances, and barbaric bar brawls, but the assured amusement resulting from such events swayed my otherwise rational logic: the tavern it was. Besides, I needed to see an old friend, and I knew that finding that old friend required only that I find the most abundant source of sludge in town.
As I shoved the squeaking metal doors ajar with nimble hands, my brain immediately hummed with biochemically induced electric pulses that awakened an implants located in my cortical folds. Every augmented human experienced the sound, though it was not so much an audible buzz, whine, or hum as it was an infinitesimal vibration pulsating within the mind itself. It became a familiar sound to which one simply grew accustomed.
The nanite which I activated happened to be the one responsible for my inhuman perception and temporal awareness. Oswald referred to it as my “Cognitive Accelerator.” Apparently, no other implant existed like it in all the world. Time slowed to a crawl as though movements and reactions were stuck in a thick gelatin. While my mind raced with thoughts at normal speed, even my own body succumbed to the effect of my implant.
The ability allowed me to concoct elaborate plans, make acute observations, and account for multi-directional and rapid assaults in the blink of an eye. Actually moving my body to match those plans, accredit justice to those observations, or avoid those multi-directional and rapid assaults did not always work out, oftentimes to my harrowing misfortune. In the dull light of the tavern, however, my implant responded instinctively to a flying bottle spinning at breakneck speed directly for the front of my face upon entering the establishment.
Already the excitement was making me gush, which was exactly what the bottle would have done were it allowed to shatter against my nose and shred the entirety of my face with its impact. Behind the rotating bottle, a pair of unaware miscreants, with far too much sludge in their system for even Panacea to process, sat with faces frozen in an enraged screaming match.
The man losing the apparent argument must have decided that if his words were ineffective, perhaps his empty bottle would make a more impacting statement. Unfortunately with his drastically impaired hand eye coordination, it appeared more that he threw the bottle at the door in a pouting tantrum resulting from his inability to properly debate while drunk.
Several bystanders who had, up to that point, enjoyed the furious exchange between bar buddies, followed the careening bottle toward me with faces crawling into a position of horror. Several ladies moved their hands to cover their eyes, while the men's hands shot slowly, or so I perceived, to their mouths to cover the inevitable “ooooh!” which would satisfyingly escape their throats once the bottle mauled my face into synthetic meat. Fortunately for all those involved, I maintained a heightened state of awareness after my bout with Al.
I effortlessly tilted my head to the side and closed my eyes. Frankly, I was unsure if my body would move quickly enough to avoid its miserable fate, and I needed my eyes to remain intact. After what seemed like minutes, I felt the faintest brush of glass skim by the side of my cheek as the bottle tumbled over my shoulder toward the swinging metal door. The cacophonous smash as the glass fractured into several tiny, translucent daggers snapped my Cognitive Accelerator into deactivation while plunging the entire room into an abrupt hush.
“Oh shit…” After several seconds of quiet, a single voice punctured the silence like a comic relief. I sighed, shook my head, and sauntered up to the table where the two offenders sat frozen in horror at the realization of whose face they had almost broken. In Junction City, I was the top mercenary. A year after Harbinger destroyed the world, I helped Doctor Oswald found the town, and over the years I developed my reputation as a ruthless defender who would took any action necessary to preserve order and protect the citizens.
As I neared their table, I took visible notice of their growing terror at the thought I might reach for the rifle strapped to my back. A coy smile danced across my lips; I slapped an open palm against their table. No words were necessary. The two newly sobered men cried out, leapt up, and dashed from the tavern likely rushing to their beds to sleep off that which they hoped would turn out to be a nightmare the following morning.
“Well, guess they had enough to drink,” The words bubbled from my lips as I stared up at the remaining patrons. Like chucking a chair at a glass window, the awkward atmosphere shattered into boisterous laughter and applause. As the bar returned to usual business, I spotted a man whose countenance and posture remained steadfast
during the entire ordeal. He called himself Crelyos Highwind.
Crelyos stood an impressive six feet four inches whenever he stood erect. Alas, rarity marked such an occasion. Normally, the man doubled over against his right side and shoulder, cocking his entire body in an odd slouch toward that direction. He did not look deformed, nor did it effect his gait, but it did shave a few inches from his height. His blond hair stood in carefully arranged spikes atop his head, and a constant apathetic grimace marred his chiseled jaw. His hardened body rippled with muscles forged through the endless fires of combat.
Before the Titan crisis, Crelyos served as a decorated soldier in the American Armed Forces. A deadly hand-to-hand combat specialist, Crelyos rivaled me as one of the top mercenaries in Junction City. When his fists proved ineffective or out ranged, he was a supposed dead-eye shot with the pistol he kept secure on the side of his combat boot. Aside from those facts, I knew little of the ex-soldier's past or the true extent of his capabilities. As he refused to let Doctor Oswald operate on him, a veil of mystery even shrouded his augments, but the one thing I knew was that Crelyos arrived at Junction City from far to the west. That assured his familiarity with the territories surrounding Texas.
“Ah, Crelyos, I figured I'd find you here.” After a day in the field or on watch, the two of us often found ourselves gulping down sludge together, and while Crelyos was a harsh drinking partner with a gruff voice and constant scowl, he regarded me with a sense of camaraderie and respect I imagined stemmed from his military service. In other words, he regarded me as a battle buddy.
NANO Archive 01: The City of Fire Page 5
