She nodded but he didn’t believe she believed that nod.
“Your idea,” he told her. “The two of us coming out here.” She started to shake her head and he went on. “It was a good idea.” She looked at him. “I mean, when’s the last time we had a night out, just the two of us?”
She started to laugh but kept it quiet. He smiled and kissed her.
“We’ve got this,” he told her.
Footsteps hurried across the dirt on the ledge above them. Rachel and Dusty pressed tight against the side of the drop and waited until they faded into the distance.
“See,” he said. “They’re not even lookin for us. Cake and pie.”
She nodded. “Cake and pie. But next time you take me out for steak,” she told him and he smiled and kissed her again.
“You bet.”
After a long breath she told him she was ready, though her heart was still racing and she wasn’t sure if she really was or not. When he started to move she made herself believe it enough to follow. Once her feet were moving every step grew easier and before she knew it she had to pace herself so as not to pass him. Her head was spinning and for a moment she thought she must be dreaming because this couldn’t be real.
Dusty made his way along the drop before the shore, keeping low to the ground and tight against the ledge wall. Rachel followed and as they crossed meters of shoreline she slowly began to believe she might be able to do this after all.
They were almost to the other side of the lake when automatic gunfire broke out behind them. Dusty and Rachel turned and saw that the Brood’s rig had arrived and there was a man kneeling on the trailer, the gun in his hand spewed a brilliant muzzle flash with each rapid burst.
“We need to be quick now,” Dusty told her and they moved on with a bit more urgency.
Once Men didn’t like a fair fight, let alone one where they were the underdog. This sudden shifting of advantage would bring about an aggressive but brief onslaught. Once aware they were on the loosing end they would abandon the Brood and rush back to where they’d come from.
“Look,” Rachel said, almost laughing with excitement.
Dusty looked at her then to where she was pointing and couldn’t help but smile. Quey had been right, there was an access bridge but it wasn’t at the bottom of the lake, it was running strait across and it was only a hundred or so meters away.
They ran, almost recklessly toward the bridge. It was a hydraulic bridge designed to drop to the bottom of the lake when it wasn’t in use but this particular design was made to surface if the power or hydraulics were cut. It needed energy to keep it down, insuring that people on the island would never be trapped there because of a malfunction.
Rachel and Dusty hurried across the bridge and crouched against the side of the tower for a brief rest. They both knew the bridge was the most dangerous time for them because there was nowhere to hide. On land they could keep low, find crevices or buildings to stay close to but on the bridge they stood out.
They watched the other side of the lake for a split, where the Brood was finishing up their successful defense against the savages attacking them, and Dusty was satisfied they hadn’t been noticed. He turned to find Rachel and saw she was at a metal door trying to pull down on a lever like handle.
“Stuck,” she whispered.
Dusty joined her and together they managed to move it slightly and with a loud metallic squeal.
“Shit,” he whispered and looked around. The gunfire was beginning to die down. “Come on,” he said. “We have to hurry.”
They gripped the handle and began to pull again. Rachel was almost hanging from it as Dusty leaned back gripping it like a baseball bat and pulled until his face was red. It squealed through another few centimeters of movement then broke free and slammed into the down position with a clank. Another cautious moment of looking about assured him no one had noticed the sound, and so they began to pull the door open. Every bit it moved was protested by old metal rusted in place and the few seconds it took for them to pull it wide enough to enter seemed like an eternity.
Eager to be out of sight the two of them squeezed in through the partially open door and entered the blackness inside.
Dusty pulled his sheet computer from his pocket and selected the bright screen app. It wasn’t much light but it was enough.
“What are we going to do if there’s no power to this place?”
“Then we’ll just take the hard drives,” Rachel said and started deeper into the building.
The corridor they’d entered wasn’t long, twenty feet maybe, and then there was another door, though she was glad to see this one wasn’t metal. It was wood and it opened easily enough and with a subtle squeak as opposed to a violent squeal. Through it was the main room of the building. She took the folded sheet computer from Dusty and scanned the room. It was a control room, the walls lined with computer banks and a center console in the middle, just ahead of the door they’d come through.
“This is it,” she told him. She looked back and said, “Cake and Pie.” As he stood in the doorway smiling back at her she noticed the glimmering reflection of eyes in the darkness behind him. Next the shimmer of metal emerged from the darkness and her smile melted into terror.
Quey and Reggie were crouched on opposite sides of the window facing the main road, each peeking out at the battle between the Once Men and the Brood. Behind them Rain was sitting on the floor with Leone next to her, her arms wrapped around him. Arnie was beside her. She smiled at him and he offered her one of his hands, as much for his benefit as hers. She knew this so she took it and slid against him.
“Coming to an end,” Reggie pointed out.
“I believe so,” Quey agreed.
The bursts of rapid gunfire came less and less. The individual pops cracked from time to time but the Once Men weren’t interested in the fight anymore.
The next set of shots that rang out sounded different and it took Quey a moment to realize they hadn’t come from the main road but from somewhere else. They had come from the other side of the lake.
He looked to Reggie with wild eyes and the look the big man gave him confirmed what he had suspected.
“Never a break,” he muttered slightly under his breath then said, loud enough for everyone to hear, “Get packed.” Reggie moved with purpose, checking the bags of guns and ammunition they’d carried in from the vehicles.
“What’s going on?” Rain asked, a tremble in her voice.
“We’re humped,” he told her.
“How do you know?” Arnie asked as more gunshots rang out from the wrong direction.
“Because,” Reggie told him, “Those shots aren’t coming from the road.”
“Maybe we’ll still be okay,” Rain said. “Maybe-”
“Maybe the Brood won’t hear them,” Quey interrupted. “Chances are good you’re right, for now, but soon enough the Brood’ll be done and the only ruckus around’ll be whatever Dusty and Rachel got into. Then it’s only a matter of time before they notice that and scour this place looking for us.”
Rain took a long breath and kissed Leone on the forehead. “So what now then?” she asked. Quey had to silently admit he was beginning to wonder that himself.
The Once Man was lying on the floor twitching ten feet from where Dusty stood with his rifle aimed into the dark hallway.
“Make it quick baby,” he said and Rachel shifted into another mode. She put her fear aside for the moment and focused on the task at hand, getting the information out of the tower’s computers. She moved to the main bank at the center of the room and looked for a power up switch.
Dusty fired again, the report was a cannon shot in the confines of the computer room. Another Once Man collapsed to the floor and he could see more moving around in the moonlight at the end of the hall. He saw hands grip the door and heard the hinges cry out as the savages struggled to move it.
Rachel hit the power button twice and got what she suspected, nothing. With a deep sigh to
calm her nerves she looked around the room and on the far wall she saw what she needed, an emergency power switch. She ran to it and flipped the switch to the up position. All around the room weak yellow lights began to glow and lights blinked on the computer terminals. She hurried back to the bank in the center of the room and pressed the power up button again, this time the computer beeped and holoscreens flickered as it began the boot process.
“Good work baby,” Dusty said, then pulled the trigger as a Once Man poked his head in from the outside, splattering his skull into a thick mess that slowly dripped down the door. “How much longer?”
“Just a few minutes,” she replied as she watched the system come online. The first thing she did was disable the network’s security system. Then she accessed the network with the sheet computer and set to copying the contents of the hard drive onto it. Progress bars appeared on both the sheet and tower computers screens. Rachel watched its slow and steady progress with nervous energy. The bar was moving at a good speed, considering the amount of data being copied, but to her it seemed to stand still.
Dusty fired again.
“Arnie’s going to have to come with me,” Reggie said, standing next to one of the downstairs windows looking out at the night. “Quey you can cover us from here if it comes to that, got a good vantage point, but we need him behind the wheel and once we start rolling a vehicle around we’re not gunna have time to switch.”
Arnie nodded, “I’m with you.”
Reggie gave him a little smile and a wink. Then he turned to Rain and the boy. “Be ready, we get to that door you need to be in the back of the truck pronto.” She nodded. Reggie liked the look in her eyes as she did so. She was afraid, sure, they all were, but she knew what to do with that fear. Some people let it get to them, take them to a bad place of panic and despair and all that ends in people getting killed. But this girl was a survivor, she used the fear to fuel her determination and the place that took her was a good one. It was where you might just make it out alive.
“You ready?” the big man asked Arnie.
“Let’s do it.”
Quey knelt near the window and peered out at the road leading past the front of the house while Reggie and Arnie hurried out the back and snuck around to the boat hanger where the truck was parked. Arnie kept watch as Reggie pulled open the big door and tapped his shoulder. Next he hurried to the driver’s side while the big man opened the cargo door and climbed in.
Arnie jumped in behind the wheel and waited for the two knocks on the metal wall behind him before turning the engine over and throwing the truck in reverse. Using only the mirrors Arnie backed the truck out of the hanger and clear of the doors before he spun the wheel hard to the left and arched it around the barren yard to the front door. The back right tire rolled up the first two steps of the front porch before the truck came to a stop.
Ahead of him, Once Men were stopped in the middle of the road, staring at him sitting behind the wheel of the truck with heavy curiosity. A moment passed before they barked loudly and as Arnie looked down the road, toward where the Brood was parked, he saw more of the savages take notice of the truck.
Behind him there was the clamor of footsteps on metal as Rain, Leone and Quey piled into the back with the bags of guns and the cooler of food. From the road ahead Once Men dashed toward the truck, makeshift weapons of jagged metal in their hands. When the signal everyone was inside came in the form of two hard knocks on the wall behind him, Arnie’s foot mashed the accelerator and the truck leapt forward with a jolt. Three of the four savages managed to dodge the vehicle, but one got clipped by the right side of the bumper and he felt a jostle as the truck rolled over and crushed the Once Man’s body. It was followed by a harsh scream that faded into the distance as he turned the truck onto the road that circled the lake and started toward the far side where more single round shots rang out.
The progress bar was nearly full as Dusty and Rachel took cover behind the main computer banks. The savages had been unable to pull the outer door opened any further and that had been good. They were forced to squeeze in one at a time and that made them easy to pick off. Five were lying at the end of the hallway, piled on top of one another in the dull and ambient yellow glow of the emergency lights.
Outside one of the savages barked in their simple language and the door began to squeal again. It opened a little more and the savage barked once again, this time with excitement.
Dusty looked over at Rachel. “You ready for this?” he asked her. She nodded. They both leaned across the large computer console and Dusty told her, “Remember darling, they’re just cans of beans.”
The door swung open further. “Just cans of beans,” she repeated quietly to herself and then again. “Just cans of beans.” When the first one ran in she didn’t give herself time to look at his face or notice that it had eyes. She pulled the trigger and splattered its brains into the air behind it. Thick, chunky liquid arched from the back of its head and slopped to the floor with a heavy splat. Just like a can of beans. She almost laughed but then another rushed in.
The sheet began to vibrate in Quey’s pocket as the truck raced along the road that circled the lake, jostling the passengers in the back and tossing them left and right. Quey pulled it free and tapped the screen. Dusty appeared clear as though Quey was holding his head in the palm of his hand and he said, “Got my dick in a lions mouth.”
“I noticed,” Quey replied as gunfire erupted and screeched through the computers speakers. “Who’s shooting?”
“Rachel,” Dusty said.
“I’m out!” she shouted as she passed him her rifle and took up his. A moment later there was another pair of bangs.
“You hold tight,” Quey told him. “We’ll be there before the tick can tock.”
On the other end of the line Rachel emitted a sound that was somewhere between and scream and a shout for, “DUSTY!” The screen blurred as Dusty dropped the sheet to the floor and then shots came with frequency.
“Fuck,” Quey muttered and hung up. He moved to the back of the truck and held onto the handle along the side of the cargo door as he leaned out for a better look. He could see the tower. They were nearing it quickly. Once Men crossed a bridge while others swam the lake and pulled themselves up onto the shore.
There was no more gunfire from the main road, near as he could tell, and that was bad. That meant the Angels of the Brood were in the clear and moments away from wondering what the hell was going on on the other side of this lake.
Arnie took the turn toward the tower sharp and Quey nearly lost his grip on the handle and went tumbling onto the gravel road. The truck swerved right then left before straightening out and closing the last hundred meters between it and the tower’s access bridge.
Reggie jumped out of the back before the truck had a chance to settle into its stop and as Quey started to follow the big man laid a hand on his shoulder. “You should stay with them.”
Quey looked back into the truck, at Rain who was checking the chamber of her handgun and the boy, Leone, with the gun Quey had given him clutched in his trembling hand. He nodded and Reggie started toward the bridge.
Arnie opened the door and Reggie shouted to him as he passed, “Stay right there Arn,” he said. “We’re gunna need to get out quick.”
Quey hopped up into the back of the truck and knelt near the opening, watching the night-covered waste.
“You don’t try shooting,” Rain said. When Quey turned he could see she had the boy’s head in her hands. “You just hold onto that thing and give it to me if I ask for it.”
Leone nodded. She kissed his forehead and movement brought Quey’s eyes back out toward the road. Once Men were closing on them, their cracked lips peeled back against their rotting broken teeth in a guttural snarl. Their eyes were so wild it sent a chill through him.
There were too many of them. With the outer door of the tower pulled most of the way open the savages were able to charge in a handful at a time. Rachel had drop
ped the first two but the bastards were fast and not phased by the sound of gunfire. They ran into the control room and swarmed her. That was when she screamed.
Dusty dropped the sheet computer to the ground and jumped to his feet. One of the savages rushed him as he reached for the pistol in the belt of his paints and got a hold on him before he could draw. There was a struggle and damn if the Once Men weren’t strong. Dusty managed to get a bit of leverage on the bastard and drug him to the ground.
Rachel tried to raise the rifle but one of the savages grabbed it and tore it from her hand. Luckily he didn’t keep it for himself. Instead he threw it to the ground behind him. As he came forward she tried to fend him off but he grabbed her arms and slammed her back against the wall. He smelled like an old trash can and there was the stink of feces on him as well. He looked at her with wild lustful eyes and leaned toward her, bringing his rough scarred face close to hers. She felt his long brittle hair caress her cheek like a dirty bit of rope as he sniffed her, his hot breath swarming across her neck making her cringe. She could sense his excitement as she struggled in the grips of his sandpaper hands and tried to bring a knee up and into his groin. She had one chance and she missed, striking his hip, then she was pinned against the wall and he gripped her hair in the back and yanked, forcing her head back and her face up at his. His skin was dry and caked with filth trapped in a layer of stale sweat. When he smiled she could see his teeth were dark around the edges and yellow in the middle, his gums were black and spotted with broken scores that leaked.
“Ba nu va,” the Once Man said slowly as his eyes traced her face and he pressed firmly against her. The savage behind him turned and she saw he meant to help the other one, still struggling with Dusty on the floor across the room.
The Saffron Malformation Page 40
