by Chris Lowry
“Yes sir.”
“That’s the spirit. Now run your ass out of one of those roll up doors and go tell Sherill to wait for my signal.”
“Wait for what?”
“He knows what.”
Jake leaned over and peeked out of the door.
“That’s a lot of ground to cover with them out there.”
“Yeah it is.”
“What if they shoot me?”
“Run fast.”
“Faster than a speeding bullet?”
“My boot or a locomotive are your only other options,” Lt said.
Jake sighed, then pushed off of his knees to stand up, his face lost in the shadows.
“What’s the message?” Lt asked him.
“Wait for my signal.”
“Not your signal, my signal.”
“That’s what I meant.”
“But it’s not what you said. Now go,” Lt rolled down onto his stomach and stuck the barrel of his rifle against the edge of the door.
He was still hidden in the darkness inside, but if the banditos crawling toward the warehouse made a move to shoot Jake as he ran, it was a clear shot.
Lt listened to the boy shuffle off, and heard the creak of the rolling door as it inched up a foot and a half. Then pounding footsteps echoed through the cracked asphalt surrounding the complex.
The bumps outside paused, waited, but no one popped up to shoot. When the footsteps died down, they resumed their relentless crawl.
“Hold up!” Lt yelled out to them and watched the bumps freeze again. “Ya’ll think you’re being sneaky-like, but we’ve been watching you for a while now. Why don’t you take off them ghillie suits and let’s have us a palaver.”
“What’s a ghillie suit?” Steph asked from the shadows behind him.
One of the bumps moved, like the leaf covered earth surging up, and settled on its knees. It was shaped like a man, vague and indistinct. Lt thought it looked like a lump of moss covered leaves on a stump he had once seen on a trek through the woods.
“That’s a ghillie suit,” he said to her. “Camo.”
He could hear her breath as she settled next to him on the ground, on the inside of the door so she couldn’t be seen.
“We have you surrounded!” the moss man yelled.
“You sure about that?” Lt yelled back. “I count a dozen ghillies moving up on me, but don’t see nothing out by the fence.”
“That’s how it’s supposed to work, isn’t it!” the man called back.
“Moss man, I think you THINK that’s how it’s supposed to work.”
“You know something I don’t?”
The suited man rested a rifle against his shoulder, aimed into the darkness of the doorway. Lt counted six more barrels disguised to look like sticks drift toward the same opening.
“Cousin,” he called out. “I know a lot of something you don’t.”
The man laughed.
“I don’t have any cousins left,” he shouted. “Lost them in the first wave. You must be new around here.”
“How you figure?”
“Because the people in there know the score. They know how this is supposed to work. You being new, and me being in a forgiving mood, I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt.”
“Hot damn, Cousin. That’s awful nice of you to be so giving like that. And I appreciate it. Now let me return the favor. We got ourselves some high tech going on’s inside of here, and there’s room on the team for you. Team Go Humans is now hiring. So, you want a job, lay down your weapons and line up for an interview.”
“What kind of high tech?” Moss man said. Lt didn’t like the greedy sound of his voice.
“They’re going to take it,” Burmage muttered behind him. “We’re outnumbered.”
“He got more than the dozen?”
“Thirty,” said Burmage. “Maybe fifty.”
“Go check on Babe, see if he’s got that suit working yet.”
Steph scrambled back from him. He listened to her scamper away and turned back to the opening.
“Look here Cuz, I don’t like this talking to a man with his face covered crap. I’m going to sit up here in this doorway, and you take off your hat, and let’s have a man to man on what’s happening next.”
“Agreed,” said Moss man. He lifted up a grungy hand and swiped the net covered headdress off.
Lt held out his rifle in one hand so they could see it.
“But look, don’t you go taking potshots at me,” he called out and settled with his back against the frame of the door. “This is just friendly discussions, alright.”
He watched Moss man’s hand wave the others down, but he barrels didn’t move. Lt sat with his spine against the frame of the door, his body half in the light, rifle on his lap. He made sure the bandits could see both of his hands.
“What is going to happen next,” Moss man said. “Is, you throw out your weapons, and we’re coming in to get what’s owed to us.”
“That the way you want this to go down?” Lt asked.
“Like I said, you’re new here. We have an arrangement.”
“I am new here,” Lt said. “So I’m going to give YOU the benefit of the doubt. I made a fair offer of employment, and you could still do me some good. But not one of you has laid down your weapon yet. That ain’t the way to build up trust.”
“What’s your offer?” Moss man asked.
“Now your mind is on the right track, Cuz. I’m in the Lick killing business and I’m looking to franchise my operation. You take your merry band of Robin Hoods there, and get to killing what needs killing the most. Fucking Licks. Then you leave these nice people alone to do what they need to be doing. Surviving.”
“What makes you think we’re not killing the Lick already?”
“Brother, you’re sitting here talking to me, ain’t you? After sneaking up and breaking in. Two plus two don’t equal five, no matter how you slice it.”
Moss man grunted. He shifted his head to the right. Lt watched him make eye contact with the unmoving lump there, heard the mutter of their voices.
He didn’t like Moss man’s pinched face. The grit and grime of the unwashed look, stringy hair framing skull like cheekbones. The man looked squirrely to him.
“Let us in,” Moss man finished muttering to the other bump and turned back to Lt. “We’re gonna take what’s owed to us and anything else we see fit, and if we decide to go hunt aliens after, that’s up to us.”
Lt shook his head.
“Cuz, I’m really sorry to hear you say that.”
Two more bumps sat up, stick like rifles zeroed in on Lt where he sat.
“Not as sorry as you’re going to be.”
“You don’t want to know about the high tech we found in here?”
“I’m going to find out.”
“It’s dangerous,” Lt shook his head. “Invisible weapons.”
He held up his finger like a gun, long index finger aimed at one of the bumps. He cocked his thumb back, flicked it down and winked at Moss man.
“Phew.”
The bumps head popped, spraying Moss man in goo. The sound of the shot reached them a half second later.
Lt moved his finger again.
“Phew.”
A second man’s head cracked forward. His body pitched across one of the men still on the ground. Moss man started screaming, to fire, to shoot, to retreat.
In the confusion and chaos, Lt lifted his rifle and sent two three round bursts across the tops of the men. Sherill, from his position at the top of the rose popped four more as they scrambled in different directions.
Lt slid his legs out of the door and dropped to the side of the concrete steps.
Moss man got two of the bandits turned around, laying suppressing fire into the woods behind them, aiming into the treetops. The rest of the uninjured sent a wave of bullets pinging off the concrete Lt was ducked behind.
A buzzing side winged in from another direction. Lt dropped a
s he saw more bandits scurrying toward his position, and even more beyond the fence making an angle on the trees where Sherill and Jake were hidden.
“Shit,” he muttered and flicked over to single shot selector. He lined up the sights, aimed at the point man, and sent a round through his throat.
The rest froze and stared at him in fear. They stood up straight, ghillie suits dangling from thin limbs and dropped their weapons.
Lt peeked over the steps to see Moss man and the rest doing the same, even the men hundreds of meters away as they stared at his hiding spot.
He stood up and kept his rifle trained on them, dancing the sights from man to man. It was nice to be respected, even better to be feared, he thought.
A shadow fell crossed his field of vision and he whipped around, startled.
Babe towered on the concrete steps in the suit of armor. A blaster rested across his forearm, aimed at the bandits on the asphalt. His face was hidden behind a reflective faceplate, the matte black suit giving him an alien appearance.
“Damn Babe,” Lt whistled. “You look like a real bad ass.”
“I didn’t before?” the helmet gave his voice a robotic metallic ring.
“No,” Lt mounted the steps to stand behind him, putting an extra layer of protection between him and the bandits just in case they decided to start shooting.
“You looked pretty bad ass before,” Lt said. “The bat was the clincher. Pulled together the whole ensemble. But this. This is a whole new level of bad assery.”
CHAPTER THREE
Lt left Babe to supervise the prisoner taking and returned to the hole in the wall. Steph leaned against the plaster next to Danish.
“What are you going to do with them?” Burmage licked his lips as he shuffled behind Lt.
“I ain’t going to do nothing with them. What are you going to do with them is the question.”
That seemed to send Burmage into a small fit of hysterics. Lt ignored his mutterings and studied the people in the corridor around them. They looked defeated, beaten, half stared.
“Oakley,” he pointed at Steph. “Get out there, find Chief and Sherill and the three of you bring back some rabbit or squirrel. Hunt up as much as you can find in the next two hours.”
She quirked up an eyebrow but didn’t argue.
“Doc!” Lt yelled through the opening.
Doc appeared further inside the room, a headband holding a magnifying eyepiece strapped to his forehead, a soldering iron smoldering in his hand.
“You got Babe suited up. You ready for the next one?”
Doc nodded.
“Get in there Danish,” Lt assumed his post guarding the door as the young man hustled inside the hole.
“Crockett, get a fire going in here or out there. Hustle up some roots for the stew.”
“You okay to pull guard duty alone, Lt?”
Lt just squinted, answer enough. Crockett double timed for the opening before Lt could say anything else.
Behind him, he could hear Doc instructing Danish on how to don the armor. There was an order to it. He planned to learn firsthand soon enough.
“What’s the plan, Lt?” Waldo leaned against the other side of the opening.
“Food, Waldo.”
“I meant after we eat.”
“We ain’t eating. Not yet. We’re going to feed these folks.”
Waldo cleared his throat.
“That’s a lot of people, Lt. An army moves on its stomach. Can we afford to give it away?”
Lt studied the crowd, noting the bowed heads, the quiet desperation that hung like a miasma in the air.
“I like killing Licks, Waldo. Let me tell you, it gives me a good feeling, like doing an honest day’s work. But if all these folks die, what’s the fucking point to it. It’s like a yin and yang thing, a balance. We found us a gift today, and good Lord willing, I plan on us putting it to some good use. But I want to give a little hope too. Hard for a man to feel hope when his belly is grumbling. Harder still when he’s looking into his little kid’s eyes, and can hear their belly grumbling. That make sense to you?”
“I think it’s almost poetic, Lt.”
“Don’t break out your fucking handkerchief yet,” Lt snickered. “These folks still might die. Just not tonight, not on my watch.”
Burmage hustled out of the dark end of the corridor and waited until Lt acknowledged him.
“Your man has gathered the prisoners,” he said when Lt locked eyes with his.
“Those weapons are yours,” Lt said. “Ask around and find folks who know how to use ‘em.”
Burmage nodded and scurried away.
Danish ghosted up behind them, his foot skittering on the plaster dust the only sound of his arrival.
“Your turn,” Lt nodded Waldo through. “What do you think?”
Danish flexed the fingers in the gloves, bent into a squat and back up again.
“It’s like a second skin,” Lt could hear his grin through the helmet.
He stared at his own skull like face reflected in the faceplate. All day hikes under a sixty pound ruck had burned every last vestige of fat off his body. His skin was stretched taut over razor sharp cheekbones. His eyes looked sunken, and dark under a pronounced brow.
The faint reflection made it look like a ghost was staring back at him through the helmet, and Lt bit back a shiver.
“Doc!” he shouted.
The man in the monocle popped up again in the lab.
“Once you get Waldo suited up, we need to have us a meeting.”
Doc nodded and went back to working on the suit, a man in his element.
“Stand guard,” he told Danish and went back up front to see to the prisoners.
CHAPTER FOUR
Jake and Steph marched back through the fence with almost two dozen squirrels. Lt motioned them toward the trench fire Crockett had built. There was a small debate on just roasting the meat on a spit as opposed to a stew.
“Stew goes further,” Lt ended the debate. “Besides, these folks ain’t had a lot to put in their bellies, they’ll sick it up. Keep the stew thin, and they can thicken it up later.”
As Crockett cleaned and dressed the meat, chopping it into small bits and dropping it into several large pots nested in the embers, Lt gathered his squad around him.
Babe, Waldo and Danish stood to one side in their new suits of armor. Oakley, and Jake bracketed Crockett as he cooked. Doc was the last one to join them, pulling the headpiece off and holding it in his hands.
“Alright,” Lt said. “Crockett’s going to put that stew on to cook, and then suit up. Doc, why don’t you tell me a little more about these things. They’re more than just body armor, I take it?”
Doc cleared his throat.
“These are just first generation prototypes,” he said. “Some of the enhancements we added later are lost on Mars or in destroyed bases around the globe.”
“I ain’t too worried about what I don’t got Doc, just want to know what I do.”
“Bio-enhanced feedback,” he said. “Strength, endurance, stamina. Think of everything you can do, and multiply it by a factor of ten. That’s the nanotechnology.”
He pointed to Babe’s helmet.
“Reticular targeting with plutonium charged plasma blasters.”
“Like they took to Mars?” said Waldo. “Space guns. Cool.”
“Plasma,” said Doc. “Hot.”
“We got us some grade A weapons then,” said Lt. “What else.”
“The first gen were bulletproof,” said Doc. “But not alien proof. Their weapons proved to be more difficult to predict.”
“What do you mean?”
“They operate on different light frequencies.”
“That’s just how they look,” said Lt.
“And how they interact with our atmosphere,” Doc explained. “The light has a heat value associated with it, and combined with the alien construction.”
He shrugged.
“We haven’t been
able to stop them from piercing the armor.”
“Got that boys,” Lt shouted. “Don’t get shot.”
