Death Machines - Ghost Book II

by Mike Stackpole

  Goliath tried another monster swing, but Thrasher wasn't going to get caught again. He danced away with a lot more grace than I expected, then came in on the big man's off side and rained hits down on him like he was playing a drum solo.

  Before, he'd tried to crack Goliath's armor; this time he targeted the gaps and joints. A thwack at the neckline popped the monster's gorget off and exposed his throat. His off hand came up to protect it. Thrasher saw the opening and bashed his side full force just below the edge of his breastplate. I could hear ribs snapping.

  The Guardian staggered sideways, clutching at himself and bellowing in pain. He spread his legs, trying not to go down, then held up a gauntleted hand. It was shaking.

  "I YIELD! I YIELD! YOU HAVE BESTED ME!"

  Vargas stepped forward and cracked him in the helmet with the butt of his rifle. "Yeah yeah, yield quieter. Sheesh."

  "You go ahead," said Athalia as Goliath toppled backwards onto the stony ground. "I'll disarm him in case he comes to again."

  She heaved the big man's big axe up into the rocks of the canyon wall like it was a broomstick, then knelt beside him and started searching him. The others started ahead, but I hung back to wait for her. She pocketed his side arm and a knife, then tugged a neck chain out of his collar. It had something long and narrow dangling from it. She yanked it free and pocketed it too.

  "Hey, what was that?" I asked. It looked familiar.

  "Hmmm?" she said. "Some kind of amulet or something?"

  "No, wait. Let me see it."

  She shrugged and pulled it out of her robe again. I stared.

  "That's one of the self-destruct keys!"

  She frowned at it. "Is it? I didn't get a good look when Angie showed us."

  "It is! Let me have it."

  She handed it over and I ran after the others. "Angie! Vargas!"

  They turned and I held out the key. "Athalia found it. The big bastard had it around his neck."

  Angie stared. "That's the Pulsar key!"

  "Why the hell would the gorilla at the front door be wearing something like that?" asked Vargas.

  Angie raised an eyebrow. "Maybe they thought he couldn't be beat?"

  "Or maybe they don't know what it is," I said. "Maybe he thought it was just some kind of religious amulet."

  "Whatever," said Ace. "At least we got us some kind of bargaining chip now."

  "No," said Hell Razor, shaking his head. "Don't let 'em know you have it. If they think you've got one of their sacred doo-dads, they'll throw everything they got at us to get it back." He snorted. "Chances are slim to none that this parlay business'll work in the first place, but if you show 'em that, it'll bring the odds down to less than fuck-all. I guarantee it."

  Athalia rejoined us as we turned toward the gate again.

  "All right," said Vargas. "Here goes nothing."

  ***

  "Stop right there, interlopers!"

  A woman's voice came from the top of the perimeter walls, but it was dark, so we couldn't see anybody.

  We stopped and Vargas saluted into the night. "Heya, amigos. Not here to start anything. We come in peace."

  "Oh?" said the voice. "Then what happened to Brother Goliath?"

  Goliath? Ha! I'd got his name right and didn't even know it.

  "He's, uh, resting," said Vargas. "He said we should talk to you."

  "The Guardians do not talk to outsiders. They have nothing to teach us."

  Behind his trademark shades, Vargas rolled his eyes, but he kept any sarcasm out of his voice. "You're absolutely right. That's why we've come. We were hoping you could teach us something."

  The voice sounded slightly more agreeable. "Were you? And what is it that you wished to know?"

  Vargas cleared his throat. "Uh, well, as I'm sure you already know, there's been an army of killer robots coming out of the north recently, from a place called Base Cochise. Apparently the computer there wants to use 'em to kill everybody and take over the world, but we recently learned that you Guardians might have a way to stop this computer and... well, we were wondering if that was true."

  There was a long pause, then the voice came back. "And what way is it that you think we have?"

  "Um," Vargas looked around at us, unsure, then continued. "Apparently Base Cochise is equipped with a self-destruct system, but we found records that said the four keys that activate it were kept in the Citadel Launch Facility, which, as you know, is the original name of your, uh, club house."

  Another pause, then, "How did you learn this information?"

  I snorted. "For a gang who knows everything, they sure ask a lot of questions."

  "Shhh," said Angie.

  "We learned about the psycho computer in Darwin Village," said Vargas. "We learned about the four keys in Sleeper One."

  "You... you have been to Darwin Village?" asked the voice.

  "Yep," said Vargas.

  "Does... does this mean that Irwin Finster is dead?"

  Vargas looked back at us again. "What do you think? What do they want to hear?"

  "Tell them you killed him," said Athalia. "They do not like Finster."

  "Thanks."

  I glanced back at Athalia. How did she know that? And why was she standing behind Thrasher, completely in his shadow?

  Vargas spoke up again. "Yeah, we killed him. Finster is dead. And so are his mutants."

  The voice was getting excited. "And does the fact that you were inside Sleeper One mean that you have recovered the Pseudo-Chitin armor?"

  "That one we probably shouldn't tell 'em," murmured Hell Razor. "They'll wanna come out and take it off our bodies."

  Vargas nodded. "Sorry, we don't know anything about any armor. What about the self-destruct keys? Can you help us with those?"

  There was no answer from the wall, but I thought I could see people scurrying around up there.

  "Get ready to scatter," I said.

  Vargas grunted and tried again. "Listen, I know you folks are mighty protective of your property, and you ain't comfortable lettin' strangers borrow historical relics, but you gotta see that this is a problem that affects you as much as it does us. Those robots are coming for all of us. Doesn't matter whether you're Rangers or Guardians or gangsters from Las Vegas, as long as you're human, those tin-hat tyrants are out to kill you. So maybe, just this once, you could let us take those keys up to Base Cochise and blow that crazy computer to kingdom come. Or, hell, if that don't work for you, let's team up. Assemble a squad of your best and we'll go up there together - a joint Ranger/Guardian task force to finish this thing off once and for all. Whaddaya say?"

  There was another long pause - so long I thought they weren't going to answer at all, but finally the voice came back.

  "So," it said. "You are proposing that we, the Guardians of the Old Order, the chosen custodians of all the technological wonders and all the wisdom of the ancients, charged with protecting all that was good and great and pure from the world that came before the apocalypse, should join forces with the Desert Rangers, a group of Neanderthal thugs unfit to touch the merest paperclip from those halcyon days, so that together we can destroy the most incredible marvel of the age? The world's only self-aware computer? The artificial super-intelligence that has devised the only viable plan for taking mankind forward into the future and making him the god that he was always intended to be?"

  It sounded like a rhetorical question to me, but Vargas answered it anyway.

  "Uh, yes?"

  The voice sputtered. "Fools! Kill them, brothers and sisters! For Cochise! For the future!"

  We were all diving for cover before she'd finished shrieking, so the first salvo missed us by yards, but their aim got better mighty quick.

  "She coulda just said no," said Angie, crouching behind a broken brick wall as bullets battered the front of it.

  Vargas was looking around from behind a boulder. "Looks like we're gonna have to fight our way in after all. Angie, Athalia, stay back and pick off those shooters. Ghost, T
hrasher and Hell Razor will go forward and see if they can light up the walls with flares. Ace and me will use the rockets to..." He trailed off. "Wait a minute. Where the hell is Athalia?"

  I looked around, squinting into the darkness behind the rocks and walls. Was she still hiding behind Thrasher? Had she been shot? Was she lying there, bleeding, and I hadn't even noticed?

  No.

  She was nowhere.

  Athalia was gone.

  Chapter Four

  There was no time to worry about where Athalia had gone. I mean, I worried anyway. I worried plenty, but those bullets were zipping in like a sideways hailstorm, so I worried while running. Hell Razor, Thrasher, and I darted forward from boulder to broken wall to flagpole while Ace, Angie, and Vargas kept the Guardians occupied with return fire.

  Finally we were flat against the Citadel's outer wall under the shadow of their battlements.

  "Okay, Thrasher," said Hell Razor. "On yer way."

  Thrasher grunted and sidled sideways along the wall toward the main gate. It was so dark he disappeared into the night after five steps, but after a minute the quick flick of a lighter told us he was in position.

  Hell Razor flicked his in response, then opened his pack and pulled out two flares. "Okay, Casper. Get ready."

  I put my assault rifle to my shoulder and aimed straight up. Hell Razor stepped out from the wall, cracked the first flare and pitched it high. It hissed as it climbed, then blazed as it arced over the battlements and landed on the top of the wall. Shots cracked from Angie and Vargas as the light exposed the Guardians there, and there were screams and confused shouts above us.

  Hell Razor chuckled and threw the second flare further down the wall. There were more shots and screams and a body toppled over the battlements. Then, the thing I was waiting for. One of the Guardians stuck his head out to see who'd thrown the flare. I fired and he ducked back, screaming and grabbing at his face.

  The second guy was smarter. All I saw was his arm as he whipped the flare back down at us. The other one sailed out into the middle of the field and bounced near Angie, Ace and Vargas, turning their position into a pool of red light and black shadows. Now we were the ones being lit up, and the crack of gunfire echoed all along the walls.

  I picked up the flare again and was making to throw it back when a little black ball dropped down toward us.

  "Grenade!" shouted Hell Razor, and we sprinted for the nearest cover, a rusted gun turret that didn't look like it had worked in a hundred years. It was tall, but not much bigger around than a garbage can, and Hell Razor and I hugged behind it like lovers as the grenade exploded and shrapnel smacked into the turret, whistling past us on both sides. Gunfire followed it, and they were really zeroing in. It was like we were in broad daylight.

  Hell Razor shoved me. "Idiot! Throw that fucking thing!"

  I looked down. I was still holding the flare! "Shit!"

  I whipped it up toward the wall. A Guardian reached up to catch it, but a LAW rocket screamed in from Ace's position and he and the battlement around him disappeared in a ball of fire that rocked us back on our heels.

  As the explosion dissipated, we saw burning figures stumbling down the wall away from it.

  "But wait," shouted Hell Razor. "There's more!"

  He pulled a grenade from his pack and arced it after them. It was a picture-perfect throw. Landed right on the wall. More shouts and screams, then a thud that I felt in my chest, and grit and blood rained down on us.

  The light from the flare died. It was dark again.

  "Time to change positions," said Hell Razor. "Come on."

  We ran back to the wall, but closer to the gate, waiting for another fool to poke his head over for a look. Instead, we heard a frantic argument.

  "Brother None, take your squad out there and get them!"

  "No way. Throw another grenade!"

  "Okay. Look out and tell me where I should throw it."

  "And get my head blown off like Brother Findley? No thanks."

  "Then get out there!"

  "But—"

  "I'm beginning to question your dedication to the cause, brother."

  "Tsk. Fine."

  Hell Razor flicked his lighter. There was an answering flick from Thrasher. We were ready. Hell Razor was more than ready. His chuckle as we shouldered our guns and drew our knives was the scariest thing I'd heard all night, even scarier than bullets whispering in my ears.

  "Now for the good part," he said, and started forward in a low trot.

  I followed, feeling a bit queasy. I might have been a suicidal lunatic who walked into danger without giving it a second thought, but having a complete disregard for one's personal safety isn't quite the same thing as getting all hot and bothered because you were going to get to stick your knife into somebody. That was just plain disturbing.

  A small door set in the big gate opened and a handful of nervous Guardians with flashlights on the ends of their rifles stumbled out and turned in our direction, just like Thrasher and Hell Razor had hoped they would. Then they started shooting, just like I'd hoped they wouldn't.

  Hell Razor and I hit the dirt, and most of the shots whistled over our heads, but not all of them. A punch like a sledgehammer hit caught me on the shoulder and I spun as I dropped and landed on my ear. My whole left arm felt numb, and I clutched at it, terrified it would be a bleeding wreck, but other than the impact, there was no damage. The pseudo-chitin armor didn't even have a mark on it.

  On the other hand, I was bareheaded, and there were more bullets slapping the ground all around me. Except, all of a sudden there weren't. Instead there were screams and thuds and the crunch of bones coming from the Guardian squad. Hell Razor and I looked up. Thrasher was standing in the middle of them, his rebar billy-club a whirlwind of iron that blurred around him, spilling blood and cracking skulls.

  Hell Razor and I surged up and charged in, punching and stabbing, but there wasn't much left to do. Most of the Guardians were already on the ground.

  "The door!" Vargas's voice roared from the field. "Get the fucking door!"

  We looked around. The little door in the gate was swinging closed. Thrasher threw his billy-club and it jammed it open at the last second. Through the gap I saw a hand grab the iron bar and try to pull it out, but I ran forward and kicked the planks and the person who the hand belonged to sprawled back as the door flew open. It was an older woman. She shrieked at me.

  "Heathen savages! You will get no further! The future is on our side! It will bury you!"

  I knew that voice. She was the one who'd been lecturing us from the walls. I swung my AR off my shoulder and shot her between the eyes. "The future buries everyone."

  We stormed in through the little door, firing in all directions to cover our entry. There wasn't any need. Except for the few bodies that had fallen from the walls, the place was deserted, and the Citadel's giant bronze doors were rumbling closed as the last of the defenders ran inside.

  "Crap," said Hell Razor.

  "Hope you saved a few rockets," I said.

  Hell Razor spat. "Gonna take more than rockets to get through those big bastards, but I might have a little something."

  He stepped back out the door and waved the all clear to Angie, Ace, and Vargas.

  ***

  I kicked the big doors with the toe of my boot as we all stood looking up at them. Each one was wider than the tightest spot in the canyon - and just about as tall - and they were covered with line after line of engraved sayings. I took a closer look. It seemed to me like the words must have been carved after the apocalypse, because the edges were undulled by time and weather, and also because the lines were actually kind of crooked and the letters kinda wonky. Also the sayings - "Strong enough for a Man, but I like it too!" and "Extra value is what you get when you buy Coronet!" and "You've come a long way, baby!" Were they some kind of secret code? Did the doors open if we said the right counter phrase? I remembered a phrase I'd seen in the back of an ancient magazine once and
gave it a try.

  "You too can have a body like mine!"

  Nope. Nothing. I shrugged and turned to the others.

  "Who built these doors? No way it was these crazy pack-rats."

  Angie shook her head. "Nah, they're original to the facility."

  "Really? With the weird sayings? Doesn't seem like government issue to me."

  "That the Guardians did," said Vargas. "You remember ol' Flintlock?"

  The name rang a bell, but I couldn't place it. "Remind me."

  "He's our historian back at the Ranger Center library. You weren't much for book learnin' even back when you was you, so it ain't any wonder you don't remember him. Probably never set foot in the place. Anyhow, Flintlock says that when the Guardians discovered this place they found these doors blown out of their tracks and lying on the ground, and the whole front of the place caved in. Couldn'ta been a nuke that done it. No residual radiation, but it was something big, that's for sure."

  Angie snorted. "Flintlock thinks it was a giant lizard."

  "Flintlock thinks a lot of things," said Vargas. "Anyway, first thing the Guardians did when they got here was set the door back on their tracks and rebuild the wall." He pointed to the panels. "Second thing was they started carvin' those crazy slogans into the doors. Religious texts, Flintlock calls 'em."

  "And you might think carvin' into 'em made the doors weaker," said Angie. "But they're each more than three foot thick, so you'd be thinkin' wrong."

  I raised my gaze again to the tops of the doors. As crazy as the words on them were, the fact that the Guardians had managed to lift them up, put them in place and get them working again underscored the sort of dedication and fanaticism they possessed. And fanatics were dangerous. We'd found that out with Finster.

  I shook my head. "So what you're saying is, we're not getting in."

  "Not through the doors," said Hell Razor. "But look there."

  He pointed to the walls on either side of the door. They were made of poured cement molded to look like the face of the mountain, but parts of that thick gray cladding had fallen away, revealing cracked and rotten brickwork underneath.