We all filed in the room, weapons up but at half-mast, too taken by all the wonders around us. If the first armory had been useful, this one was just plain badass. Everything in the military equivalent of King Tutt’s tomb: untouched, perfect, and valuable beyond imagining.
“We have to protect this place,” I heard myself say.
“And we will,” Andi agreed. She looked past me, scanning the smooth floor. “Seems dry. The animals haven’t punched through the outer exit yet. It goes out that way. The entire wall comes away; slides back in two doors to that flat place we passed when we came in.”
“That would give us access to the remains of the road, too,” I said, thinking of everyone we left behind. This facility belonged to the future, and that meant my people. The Oasis.
“Pumps are humming, and we have control of the main boards,” Andi said.
“We don’t control the rats and scorpions, though.” Chloe’s answer was true, if a downer in the midst of such technological beauty.
“She’s not wrong, but I have an idea. Back up to the CC. We can discuss it there, and then we eat, rest, and start using what we have. By the time Rowan actually gets here, it might not matter,” I said, and with a reluctant look, I closed the door to the armory behind us, vowing to fly a Vampire myself if I survived the oncoming battle.
21
The CC was bright and alive with the main screen showing a slow-motion invasion. The three squads of fighters were in new positions, but as expected, not so close as to make me think they were charging in headlong. That was bad.
What was good was the number of people in squad A. “How many bodies there?” I asked Andi, who stared up at the screen. Both Condors were sending back data, though one of them would be landing in thirty minutes, it’s flight time consumed by the lazy eights we’d programmed it to fly.
Andi’s lips moved in silence as she considered the scene. “I’d say they had an accident. Or two. Looks like that squad took a beating. Might only be a dozen people left, tops.”
“Send the Condor after that squad first. They’re closest to us, and they’re the weakest. Take out as many as you can in one pass, then send the Condor home. We’ll recharge them while we get ready. Unless Rowan develops the ability to fly, we have at least twelve hours until squad B gets within effective distance of Mira’s gun,” I said.
“Say no more,” Andi replied, her fingers moving in a blur. “Single pass, coming in from the east. They don’t see us.” On the screen, none of the figures moved. The Condor was quiet.
“Is that—oh. Oh, yes,” Chloe said with near sexual satisfaction. The squad separated and ran, but one by one, they fell to the small, vicious guns of the drone. As the Condor wheeled for home, no one was standing. “Got all of the fuckers?”
“All of them. Might have killed some of them twice,” Andi remarked, sending the Condor into an automated return path. “That’s it.”
I exhaled through my nose, thinking. Even though I wanted the invaders dead, killing them had been so mechanical and distant. I felt a knot of uncertainty for the first time since we’d made our plans to fight. “We have to keep these weapons in our hands. At all costs.”
“I know what you mean,” Silk said. And she did. It was one of the reasons I knew she would be with me to the end. She understood the flaws everyone carried, and she knew how to avoid letting them become the end of what we were starting.
“Who’s next?” I asked, tracing a line of approach across the display with my gaze. “B has a hard road, too, but C is hanging back. I think that’s Rowan, now that I look at his approach. He’s letting the others run in with blood in their eyes, and he plans on sweeping up the gold after they soften us up.”
“Exactly. Cannon fodder,” Andi said.
“When the drones are ready again, we send two. One pass each, then hold them in high positions for a reserve run if we need it. Okay, listen up. We have some time, and we need to go into this with our eyes open, but I need you all to play a part,” I said.
They all watched me, listening. It made me think we might survive.
“Good. Here’s how it goes down.”
22
“Sleeping?” I asked Andi.
She ran her hands through hair that gleamed with sweat. “Like babies, except for Silk. She’s just . . . there. She sleeps likes she’s waiting for something.”
“High sense of self-preservation. It’s an occupational tool for her.”
“Sounds about right,” Andi said. We were in the CC, watching the screen while everyone slept. We’d eaten, checked the levels for movement by scorpions or rats, and then settled in to let ourselves enjoy some quiet hours before the storm of battle. Her eyes grew soft as she pulled them away from the screen, and when she looked at me, something was moving in the shadows of her gaze. “Can you kill all of those fighters? If the drones can’t?”
I gave the moment its due, then nodded. “I can. If I don’t, it won’t matter very much.”
“Because we’ll be dead?”
I exhaled through my nose, deflated by a possible outcome that was too much to consider. “Among other things. So will our future. We need this place. We need you. The Vampires. The guns. The reactors. All of it.”
“You mean you need it,” Andi said. There was no judgment in her tone, just a statement of fact.
I was surprised, but not overly. It might seem I was busy building a kingdom, but that wasn’t true. Not even close. “No, I mean we. I won’t be an emperor. I don’t even want to be a—general, or whatever it is I’m doing.”
“And that’s why you’ll be good at it. Ruling, I mean,” Andi said.
“Ruling?” I laughed, and it even sounded bitter to me. “Odd language for a woman from my time.”
“There were kings when we lived. Mostly figureheads, but there was something in our cultural DNA that made them hard to get rid of. I’m not saying I like the idea of a single ruler, but if it’s what humanity needs to push past the stage where we’re barely hanging on, then I’m all for it,” she said. “So are they.” She pointed in the direction of the sleeping women with her bottom lip, then smiled. “You know what the ‘bots actually do? They make you better, not immortal. They—accentuate. The things in you that are good. That’s what they’re made for. You’re good at fighting, but you also make good decisions. So do I. The ‘bots weren’t given to just anyone. Mostly, it was proven officers, people of worth, or even people with skills that were too important to lose. That’s where you came in. I’m sure the military saw something in your profile worth saving, and now, here we are.”
“Not much of a here, but I understand. I never would have seen it in myself, though,” I admitted.
“Someone did. I know I do,” she said. Her eyes twinkled with mischief. “Think you can stay quiet?”
I looked at the lifted brow, the half smile, and the lean of her hungry body. She liked the danger of it all. “For you, I can be quiet as a stone.”
“I only need part of you hard as rock. The rest, I just need to be quiet,” she said in my ear. With a final look over her shoulder, she undid my belt and shoved my pants down in a decisive tug, then spread her legs in a pyramid, bent over, and took me in her mouth, all in one hot, frenzied motion.
I sprang to life in her mouth, every sense on fire as it dawned on me that if I died later that day, it would be with this memory close to the surface. When her tongue swirled, I thought it wasn’t a bad way to go, but then she pulled her own pants off like a magician on stage, spread her legs in an impossible angle, and slid down my length like she was made to be there.
“Small movements. Gotta keep me quiet, right?” she rasped in my ear, her words warm and thick.
“Small movement. Big finish,” I told her, then kissed her with the curiosity of an explorer. I wanted to remember this. All of it.
We moved. Up, down, slowly, together. She wrapped her arms around me, then drew my head into the nape of her neck. She smelled like an undiscovered place I’d b
een told about before, familiar and wild all at once. In a series of tiny shocks, she began to come, her own pleasure triggering me like artillery. I came with her, all without pulling apart more than an inch because we both knew that a repeat was not guaranteed.
“That’s worth fighting for,” I said, smiling into her hair.
When she finished kissing me for the last time, I watched her make a map of my face, looking at the details. We would carry this second with us, and if we lived, we could compare it to the next time. If we died, we died with more than we had before. It was a compromise between physical need and reality, and it was, for the moment, enough.
23
“All things considered, it’s not a bad way to attack. They’re coming in through that small gully. The storm left some debris, but not too much,” Andi said. She gave me a secret smile, which Silk saw. I’m sure Silk knew that we’d been busy while everyone slept, but she made no mention of it, being a consummate professional.
I began removing my blades and anything that would slow me down, earning a curious look from everyone except Andi. “I know we have a plan, but I’m making a change. That squad,” and I pointed to the screen, where the soldiers crept along in the pre-dawn light, “is about to meet the local wildlife.”
“Rowan is still two hours out, winding his way up the path to the north. He circled all the way around, and he’s going to let his people soak up rifle fire. Quite the hero,” Andi said with disgust.
“So why go out to meet that group, Jack? Why did we install those guns if not to let them do some of the dirty work?” Silk asked. She was right, but she didn’t know my new wrinkle.
“Because I’m thinking for the future, and I want to secure this facility and kill Rowan’s people in one move, if we can. I think I have a way to do it, but it’s. . . an unusual method,” I said. I had a pistol, one sword, and no bag. I was as mobile as I could be.
“What are you doing?” Silk asked in a soft voice.
I looked toward the stairwell, flexing my hands. “I’m going to cause a stampede.”
“There aren’t any cattle here, Jack,” Mira snapped.
“Who said I was going to use cattle?” I said. “Be right back. If you hear a lot of noise, you know what to do. Run,” I told everyone.
“Where?” Chloe asked in confusion.
“Anywhere but the scorpion tunnel exit they made on their nightly hunts. Go into the CC and lock it up. I’ll be headed outside at all speed, but in the event this goes sideways, that’s what you do,” I said.
Silk looked doubtful, but she nodded, so everyone else did. They deferred to her without knowing it. The scorpion tunnel was barely large enough to fit through, but it would work, as long as you weren’t under attack by the scorpions. It wasn’t flawless, but it would work. Maybe.
“You’re going to lead the rats into the tunnel?” Mira asked, seeing a possible connection.
“Sort of. I’m leading one rat, anyway. Be right back,” I said, striding out of the hallway into the stairwell. I had no idea if my plan would work, because I know nothing about rats except that they like food.
I didn’t say it was a complicated plan. Just a plan.
With soft steps, I ascended levels until the glare of the first floor hit me, trash and bones and signs of the long-term war between species all around. There were no rats visible, but there weren’t any scorpions around, either, which meant their evening hunt was over. I knew they would emerge due to hunger at some point, and fixing the reactor was the same thing as ringing a dinner bell. The smell of fresh rat droppings hung in the air, an unpleasant note that made the hallway smell somewhere between a barnyard and a swamp. The rats and scorpions had been out for the night. I could sense it.
I needed a rat. Any rat would do. I started counting doors, running through the map Andi had shown me. The second room on the left was what I needed. It served as clothing and linen storage, and I knew rodents liked nesting. The only question was how to get a rat without sounding the alarm.
When I heard a squeak, I knew I had my answer.
There’s always a straggler, and rats are no different than people in that regard. At the end of the hall, a plump, ancient rat with a broken fang and an expression of raw anger came scuttling along, late to his nap after a successful night’s hunt above the surface. He saw me, lifted his nose for a sniff, and charged.
I was prepared for a lot of things, but being charged by a rat the size of a golden retriever wasn’t one of them. He made it to my boots before I could overcome my shock at the sheer balls of his attack, but I punched down with the grip of my sword right at the junction of his neck and skull. The dull thump echoed in the hall as he shuddered and went limp, sagging onto my boots like a sack of wet corn.
“I guess you guys aren’t big into bathing,” I said. He smelled. . .ripe, which was perfect for what I had in mind. I grabbed him by the scruff, using all of my muscle to see if his weight would slow me down for my trip. He wouldn’t, despite being near forty kilos.
I stood in the stairwell, breathing deep to fill my lungs for what I was about to do. Turning toward the scorpions, I began a deliberate walk into their territory, the rat dragging along on the floor next to me.
Then, as I had hoped, the rat began to wake up.
I held the rodent by its greasy scruff, advancing past doors and spaces I knew were crowded with scorpions, just returned home from their evening pillaging of the desert. For a few steps, I heard nothing, and the rat did the one thing I needed.
It squeaked in alarm.
“Let it all out, big guy,” I told the struggling creature, picking up the pace as I began to trot down the hall. I was ten meters from the end when I heard the first mechanical rustling behind me.
I turned to see a nightmare made real. Giant scorpions began to flood the tunnel like metallic monsters, their segmented bodies flowing out into the light, tails lifted high in perfect menace as their eyes focused on me.
Just like I wanted.
“Dinner is served,” I said, shaking the rat to make it squeak even more. It obliged, and the stampede began in earnest as dozens of scorpions nearly two meters long began to rush forward, claws and mouths clicking like breaking glass. At the end of the hallway, a broken smear of mud and debris marked where we were going. Over the centuries, a crack in the wall turned into a tunnel after the claws and feet of countless creatures, finally wide enough to let the huge scorpions in and out with their prey.
It was going to be tight, and I had a problem. The rat and I were too big to fit through the hole.
“Buddy, this is your lucky day,” I told the squirming rodent. I turned and shoved the rat into the tunnel hard enough get a series of squeaking protests. The scorpions were two meters away and gaining, every part of their lethal mouths visible as they reared up in anticipation of a bedtime snack.
“Time to go,” I said with a hiss, my teeth clenched as I pushed at the struggling rat. I dove into the tunnel, punching the rat’s ass until we exploded into open air. The first scorpion into the tunnel clamped down on my boot with enough force to break bone, but I landed a savage kick that crunched the exoskeleton under my heel. The claw released, and I pulled myself out, seizing the dazed rat by the scruff again and hurling it away from me. I needed a clear path for what was coming, and the rat would only slow me down.
Glancing into the tunnel, I saw the scorpions fighting for position as they began to emerge, enraged to the point of following me. “Come on, you pricks. Just a little more.”
Ten meters away, I heard the first of Rowan’s fighters on the low ridge just above me, and I knew the moment was right. A washout led down toward the tunnel, the surface rough but passable. For humans, it would be an easy descent. For scorpions, the way up was simple. I lunged to the right, took up position in the washout, and waited for the oncoming horde to cover the short distance.
Both groups obliged.
The first fighter was a grimy woman, her hair a tangled mass of sun-bleached cu
rls. She carried an ancient rifle, the bluing worn through and a stock that was held together with a metal strap. It looked tough but functional, just like her. She lifted the barrel toward my face without hesitating, then turned her head to look past me, her brows going up in shock and horror at the oncoming scorpions.
“Move it, Jack,” I told myself, diving to the left as the first pair of scorpions crashed past me in a clicking song of death. They grabbed the fighter before she could fire, both tails driving down to punch into her back like daggers. She screamed, then was lifted up by the stingers, only to be torn in half by four claws as her killers fought for supremacy over their prey. Shots rang out as the platoon came to life, fighters spilling over the ridge in a frenzied rabble. I saw three men go down in seconds, but not before they all fired weapons, striking two scorpions with limited effect. A fourth fighter was dragged down the ridge, impaled on a stinger, screaming as it pumped venom into his body. His cry ended when the scorpion cut his head off with the snap of a claw, and I knew it was time to find a new location to watch the battle.
I began to retreat, whirling and cutting at the scorpions as they charged up the hill, crazed with bloodlust. I slashed down at a juvenile scorpion, parting the shell from end to end as the steaming innards slid down the hill in an oily mass.
In seconds, I was out of their sight, but still close enough to hear the chaos of a hundred scorpions fighting to the bitter end with Rowan’s doomed platoon. I circled away in a trot, my eyes darting across the scarred landscape as I looked for signs of Rowan’s main force. They were an hour out and closing, which meant I had just enough time to get everyone in position for the coming onslaught.
The bullet tore through my thigh before I heard the distant rifle shot, sending me in a pitched fall toward the waiting sand. Hot blood sluiced into my pantleg, spilling onto the thirsty ground before I had stopped moving from the force of the blow. My ‘bots went to work, but their job was a big one. A divot of muscle was gone, but my arteries were intact.
Future Rebuilt: A Post-Apocalyptic Harem (Future Reborn Book 2) Page 19
