by Dhar, Mainak
The guard opened the door and poked his head out. He never got to say a word as John clamped a hand behind his neck and jabbed a knife under his throat with the other hand. He pulled the taller man down and close to him, as if embracing him, and walked into the room. An old man wearing wire-rimmed spectacles held together with tape looked at him with his mouth wide open. John dumped the dead guard on the floor and took a quick few steps towards Mikhail, till he was within touching distance of the man.
'Hi, Comrade Mikhail. You are relieved of duty.'
***
Alice's rifle had been thrown from her hands by the impact and lay a few feet away. She had no other weapons on her but her first priority was to get the gun in Nikolai's hand out of the equation. As he brought up the pistol to fire at her, Alice rolled towards him and kicked up, connecting with his wrist and sending the gun skittering across the hallway. He was fast, faster than Alice would have expected of a man his size and before she could bring her leg down, he had slashed across her ankle with his knife. Blood spurted out and Alice rolled away, getting on her feet to face him. The blow would have incapacitated a normal human, but Alice was very different from any adversary Nikolai had ever faced, as he was rapidly finding out. He pointed his knife at Alice.
'Freak. Now you die.'
Nikolai was a big man, used to leveraging his superior reach and strength in fights, and he fought according to those same rules that had served him so well over the years. He came in close, slashing with the knife in his right hand and ready to land a knockout blow with his left if he got close enough.
Alice on the other hand had spent most of her life fighting against opponents bigger and stronger than her. If Nikolai got in too close, he would have the edge, so she backed away, further from Zohar, who still lay prone on the ground, trying to get some distance between them.
As he lunged with the knife, Alice swiveled out of the way and brought her right leg sweeping around in a kick to the back of Nikolai's knee. He stopped, wincing at the blow, and Alice followed with a blow, aiming with the heel of her hand for the bridge of his nose. Nikolai blocked the blow and moved forward, suddenly and with frightening speed, trying to headbutt her. Alice jerked her head out of the way and fell back, rolling to get her balance back as she stood up again. Nikolai's face was a mask of rage as he closed in again, frustrated and angry at being denied what he had thought would be an easy victory.
Never fight angry.
That had been one rule that had been drummed into Alice by Jones, her teacher back at the settlement. Given her impulsive nature and propensity for getting into trouble, it had been needed. Nikolai had no such teacher, and even if his instructors at the academy had tried to teach him discipline, that had been frittered away by his lawless existence since the Rising. So Alice held her ground and did not react to his provocations while he lunged ahead again. This time, he almost succeeded with a feint with the knife, followed by a kick to the shin that Alice just avoided as she stepped back. Nikolai brought back his knife and thrust it straight at her stomach. He was conditioned to humans speaking and Biters being mindless monsters with no fighting skills, and in fighting someone like Alice, he reacted to the human side of her. That would be a fatal error.
Alice let him follow through with the blow and the knife entered her stomach, just below the navel. It would look messy, but it didn't hurt and certainly did not slow her down. Nikolai's eyes widened as he realized his folly. That was when the heel of Alice's right hand slammed into his nose, breaking it. Nikolai roared in fury and agony and pulled out his knife from Alice's stomach but before he could strike again, Alice had kneed him in his groin. As he bent over, Alice put all her strength and body weight behind her, bent her knees, and launched herself up at his face. Her head struck the bridge of his nose and finished the job her hand had begun. Shards of bone from his shattered nose were pushed back into his head, some into his brain. Nikolai tottered for a second and then fell down, dead before he hit the ground.
Zohar was groaning, and as much as Alice wanted to make sure he was okay, she didn't have much time to spare. She tousled his hair.
'Kid, you okay?'
He spoke through clenched teeth.
'Go, get the captain.'
Alice picked up Nikolai's pistol and knife and ran as fast as she could towards the bridge, hoping she would get there in time. Hoping John had succeeded. Hoping that the net result of all this would not be a smoking radioactive ruin where Wonderland had once stood.
***
The captain was sitting in his chair, flanked by two of his men, both carrying rifles. To Alice's surprise, he did not seem panicked or concerned in the least. Instead, he snapped his fingers and both his men lowered their rifles.
'Alice, I had thought you to be more sensible but clearly you did not take my warning seriously. I would have loved to have gone to Wonderland and lived near those farms, eating fresh fruits and enjoying the labor of my slaves, but it looks like that was not meant to be. I got a message from your friends saying that Robertson's plane is due in the next ten minutes. When they land, they will be ambushed and killed as per my plan, but I will no longer fly to Wonderland. I have ordered my Weapons Officer to fire a single missile—two warheads will be targeted at Wonderland and four will go on to the Homeland, destroying four military bases and everything around them. Robertson will both see the power behind my intent and also be robbed of much of his long-range aviation assets.'
Alice just stood there, stunned by what she heard. She looked around frantically, looking for some way to stop this, but realized she had been too late. The captain continued.
'Mikhail was on the radio with me just a few minutes ago. The guard at the Weapons Room killed your friends and now he is programming the missiles. He will launch in two minutes' time.'
Alice began to pivot on her feet, hoping that she could get out in time and find the Weapons Room, when the captain raised his pistol and fired a single shot which would have hit her head had Zohar not run into the room and pushed Alice out of the way. Alice fell behind a desk. On his knees, Zohar fired his pistol, emptying the clip before he was hit by a shot to the shoulder and fell, screaming. He had not fallen in vain as his shots had hit one of the guards who now lay dying when Alice jumped up to fire at the captain.
The captain was behind the tall, padded chair in the middle of the bridge and was screaming into the radio.
'Mikhail, fire the damn missile!'
The remaining guard fired with his rifle and Alice took cover as bullets pinged off the desk. When the man stopped to reload, she jumped over the desk, using her left hand as leverage to push her up, and before she came down in a roll and took cover behind another desk, she had fired three rounds into the man. She was up again, scanning for the captain, who was now trying to escape by going out the emergency exit door at the far end of the bridge. When he was just feet away from it, the door opened and Bunny Ears came in. Behind him was Mikhail with John's gun pointed at his head.
The captain screamed, a low-pitched shriek of terror as he realized that all was lost. His last thought was that he should have stayed on that island with his First Officer. Then Bunny Ears broke his neck.
***
ELEVEN
It was a smell that Alice knew only too well, yet even after all these years, standing at the site of a battlefield never ceased to move her. She had been taught to fight from an early age, but also to respect the damage a gun or knife could do, and to feel grief when a life was wasted in unnecessary bloodshed. Before her, she saw lives thrown away to serve masters who had moved these men like pieces on a chessboard, dispensable before their agendas and goals.
Four marines from the submarine lay dead in a ditch where they had laid their ambush, just a kilometer from the landing zone, along with a dozen of their local thugs. Before them lay more than two dozen troopers who had flown in from the Homeland, many of them cut down in the first volley before the others had regrouped and fought back.
&nbs
p; Alice took it all in with a practiced eye. The troopers from the Homeland had been taken by surprise but the reinforcements that Nikolai was supposed to bring with him had never arrived, so they had the advantage of numbers. Also, they were all very well equipped, with body armor and top-of-the-line assault rifles, while only the captain's men were similarly equipped. None of the local thugs had body armor, so when the counterattack began, the troopers must have extracted a heavy toll. The marines had tried to withdraw, knowing reinforcements were not coming any more, and tried to get to higher ground. They had all been cut down at the base of a hill where they had prepared a fallback position. Their local thugs had not been as disciplined and had scattered, many being cut down in ones and twos all around the battlefield.
'War is old men plotting and young men dying. Some things never change. I wish I had kept my bloody mouth shut.'
Alice looked at John, who spat in disgust. He had taken it particularly hard, as he had given Robertson the idea of landing on the highway, without realizing what that would lead to.
'We had no idea at the time. You can't blame yourself. These troopers died because of Robertson's greed and the captain's desire for power.'
John knelt down to examine some spent shell casings. Then he suddenly spoke in a whisper.
'Get inside the ditch.'
Alice did as she was asked and he pointed up the hill.
'Those shell casings are higher than the ditch. They must have rolled down the hill. There might be someone still up there. Let me say hi and make sure.'
'How do we find out?
Alice never got to finish her sentence as John got up and waved his hands.
'Privet!'
A hand waved back from behind a boulder.
'Stay here and cover me.'
Alice watched as John climbed up the hill and two men stood up to greet him—one a blond marine from the submarine and the other a thug, both carrying rifles. Seeing him in uniform and hearing him speak in Russian, they must have assumed he had come from the ship. The marine began to walk down towards John and about a dozen paces from him realized that something was amiss. The marine brought up his gun but never got a shot off as Alice shot him. The thug dropped his gun and began to shout something but Alice shot him as well. There was a place and a time for mercy and compassion, but this was not one of them. In the eyes of the man she shot, Alice saw not a human being deserving of mercy, but a ruthless predator who had preyed on the weak like Neha and countless others like her.
Satisfied that there were no more surprises in store for them, Alice and John set out for where the plane would be.
'Alice, let me handle this.'
Alice took cover a few hundred meters away from the large propeller-driven transport aircraft that was parked on the highway. The two crew members were on the side of the road, holding their rifles at the ready, spooked by the sound of gunfire and awaiting news from the men they had unloaded just a few hours ago. John walked to them, unarmed, his hands in the air.
'Hey, guys. I'm American and on your side.'
The pilots lowered their guns and walked towards him and after a few minutes of talking, John waved towards Alice. One of the pilots had flown to Wonderland before and had seen Alice so he quickly slapped his friend's hands down when he was about to bring his rifle up. Alice looked at the name tag on the pilot's chest.
'Captain Rollins, your men were ambushed not far from here, and I'm afraid there were no survivors. Their attackers came from a submarine located near the port, which we have secured. I could use your help and ideas in destroying that ship and then taking us back to Wonderland.'
Rollins visibly sagged, taking in the news that all the men he had ferried over, many of whom he had known for years, were now dead. Then something clicked into place as he remembered Alice mentioning a submarine.
'Three of the guys we brought were pretty old. They were hardly frontline soldiers, so I had wondered why the hell they had been sent along. When I talked to them, turned out they had something in common—they all served on subs before the Rising.'
His expression changed as he realized what he had just said.
'But how did they know there would be a sub?'
Alice said nothing. This would hardly be the first time, or the last, that fighting men had been sent into harm's way on the basis of the lies of their masters, but that would not make it any easier for Rollins to deal with.
They set off back for the port, with Alice hoping that Bunny Ears was holding up at his end and that Zohar was alive.
***
Neha flinched involuntarily as Bunny Ears came up to where Zohar was lying down, Neha's father and another man near him. Neha's father been a doctor before the Rising, and with the first-aid kits they had found on board the submarine, they had tried to tend to Zohar's wounds the best they could. Bunny Ears leaned down and his hand grazed the boy's hair.
Zohar's eyes opened.
'I'm fine, Bunny Ears. It just hurts a lot.'
Neha's father grinned.
'This boy is a real fighter, and you, my friend, are a Biter unlike any I have ever seen. They all call you Bunny Ears. Is that your name?'
Bunny Ears looked at Neha and then at him.
'Neeeehhaa… Neeeiil.'
Mikhail was sitting in a corner with his hands tied behind his back. Alice's gut had told her that he would not be trouble, but she could not take the risk, especially when neither she nor John were around. There was always the danger that some more of the captain's thugs might come back to extract revenge, or just to get more of their drugs, so several of the workers ringed the area armed with weapons recovered from the factory and the submarine.
Bunny Ears took a round of the area. There were Biters in the adjoining streets and he had already warned them to leave the humans alone, but he knew that he would not be able to ensure their total compliance till Alice came back with her book.
He sensed movement behind him and turned to see Neha. His mind was racing, trying to make connections that somehow never seemed to be completed. He could recall snatches—of the name Neha being incredibly important to him, of her calling him Neil, and of a struggle against time and death itself that he had once endured. But the details eluded him no matter how hard he tried, and all he got for his efforts was a splitting headache that caused him to roar in frustration. Neha took a tentative step back, and Bunny Ears held out his hand, palm outward, as he had sometimes seen Alice do when she wanted to show Biters that she meant no harm.
In the time he had spent as a Biter, for Bunny Ears life had been a daily struggle for survival. That had been till he had met Alice, and been told by his Queen that she was someone special, that she needed to be protected. That duty, that devotion had consumed him over the last few years, providing some certainty and purpose to his life. Now that had been joined by a new certainty, the fact that he once had a name. Neil. He too had people he had cared about, and had been cared for in return. He so wanted to remember, he so wanted to be the man he had once been. For the first time since the Rising, since the day a young man called Neil had been bitten in a struggle to save a girl called Neha from a horde of Biters and managed to get her to safety just before he turned into a Biter, he wanted to live.
His brain no longer worked as it once did—the virus that had caused people to turn into Biters had mutated to the point that nobody was really sure what it did to humans—but one thing was sure. Neil now remembered that he was more than a Biter called Bunny Ears.
Neha touched his arm and he flinched at the unfamiliar touch.
'Shh… Neil. That is your name, right? I suspect you knew someone called Neha. I'm so sorry that you had to go through all this, but Alice told me they have a vaccine now, and maybe they will have a cure. I pray one day you can become the Neil you once were.'
Just then, Alice and John arrived with the two pilots. John took Mikhail aside and returned after ten minutes.
'He says he can disable the boat but he wants assurance tha
t he can come with us to Wonderland and be allowed to live as a free man.'
Alice was about to say that Mikhail had been a party to many crimes committed by the captain and Nikolai, but she held back. She had long realized that there were only a few truly evil men and women who would actively hurt others to further their interests. There were also very few people who would stand up and resist such tyranny. The reality was that the vast majority of people were sheep who would follow without question, for whom self-preservation was all-important. There was nothing to be gained by killing Mikhail, who from what Neha had said had been at best a reluctant partner in the captain's schemes.
'All right, but go with him, just in case.'
Just as John was leading Mikhail to the boat that would take them to the sub, Alice saw an incoming video call on her tablet.
It was Robertson.
***
'Have you been able to get in touch with my men? They have not reported in ever since they landed.'
Alice looked right into his eyes. There was genuine concern there, but was it really for the welfare of his men, or the prize that he coveted so much? She decided to stick to the truth as much as possible without giving away just how much she knew. A few years ago, Alice would have waded into the man, bringing up how he was a liar and how he had wasted his men's lives for his own purpose. She had learned in the years since then that compromise with people you didn't like was part and parcel of growing up.
