“You made that… that… thing move.” She pointed at the huge cyborg.
“Sorry, luv. You’re either seein’ things or it’s a ghost.”
She whimpered, glanced at the corpse, and eyed the narrow space between Aaron and the wall. “It’s dead.”
“Precisely why there’d be a ghost. I didn’t believe in that sort of thing either till I started reading some of the files my former compatriots kept.” Aaron shoved away from the slab and stood in the center of the only way out of the dead-end alcove. “I reckon there’s probably quite a few of them, and if the condition of the bodies is any clue, they’re probably rather cheesed off.”
“That’s not funny.” She risked a step closer to him. “That thing moved.”
Given the eerie feeling in this place, Aaron wouldn’t put it past truth. “Stop running?”
She glared defiance at him for a moment before a creak of metal made her yelp and jump.
Aaron looked away from the dead cyborg. Even he thought the skull had tilted. “Probably the wind, luv. Maybe there’s still a bit of charge in the power cell.”
She edged closer. “Why are you chasing me? You like little girls or something? Sorry asshole, I don’t put out on the first date.”
Her attempt to sound accusatory struck him as sad. “You know what?” He shrugged. “I honestly don’t have a clue. I seem to keep stumbling on people who need help. What are you doing here?”
“Running away from you.” She folded her arms, trying to look tough, but another creak from the old ‘borg left her shivering.
Aaron didn’t much care for it staring at him either. “I mean here.” He waved at everything. “With Professor Tweedbeard.”
Melissa let out an involuntary giggle. “Are you a cop? No bullshit.”
Aaron took his wife’s nameplate out of his pocket. “I haven’t entirely decided yet, to be honest.”
“What’s that?”
“All I’ve got left of me wife.” He held it out to her.
The girl seemed to lower her guard and moved close enough to read it. “Allison?”
“Aye.” He let his arm fall limp at his side. “Your boss’ new pet made me… uhh… yeah.”
“You don’t gotta say it. Sorry.” She leaned against him, several handguns under her coat obvious as hard lumps. A shiver rattled her as a labored metallic squeak came from the hulk. “I swear that thing is fucking moving. Can we, like, go somewhere else?”
“What are you doing here?” Aaron backed up, letting her out of the dead end. She scurried around the corner away from the ghoulish sculpture. “Your parents were well off, weren’t they?”
“Fuck ‘em.” She scowled. “They threw me out ‘cause I was a freak that kept calling poltergeists. Dumbasses thought it was ghosts.”
“Runaway subconscious manifestations are pretty common among telekinetics during hormonal changes.”
“You still sound like a damn cop.” She jabbed him the side.
He leaned on a bent pole wrapped in chain link fence, dotted with holes showing signs of laser melting. “Talis is Awakened. I couldn’t resist her suggestion. Something broke in my head when I shot my wife. Now, the bean doesn’t react well to being poked. Department telepath killed himself when he pushed it too hard.”
“Fuck…” Melissa looked up at him. “You killed a cop?”
“Technically he killed himself, but yeah… a couple. They’re not too happy with me right now.”
She sat on a coffin-sized chunk of scorched concrete studded with yellow reflectors. “They kept trying to abandon me at the dorm. I hated it there. It was like prison… showering with other people, forced schedule, locked in our rooms at night.”
“Bollocks. They don’t lock the doors.”
Melissa blushed. “They do when you, uhh… do bad shit.”
The sound of groaning metal made them both jump and stare at the corner, expecting the legless titan to drag itself after them. After a moment of tense silence, she breathed into her hands and shivered.
“So you ran away?”
“Yeah.” She kicked her heels against the block. “Got into a gang, got pretty wrecked on SoCal.” Her face scrunched up as if she were about to cry. “That was good shit. I want more. I didn’t think about anything but happy.”
“People die on that junk.” He moved to sit next to her and pulled the hair off her face. The corners of her eyes had turned red. “You’re what, fifteen? You’ve got too much life to throw away.”
Melissa drew her knees up to her face, hooking her boot heels on the edge. “I was so happy. I can’t even explain it. Nothing mattered. When I was tripping, everyone had long, silky blonde hair and bright blue eyes like a Jamaican ocean. There was this music, too. Always, music, faint in the background. I couldn’t tell you what song, but it was always there.” She rocked side to side, humming. “No parents, no laws, no pain. I was happy and mellow all the time. I miss it so bad. They detoxed me, but I’d still kill someone to get more.”
“It’s hard to find that stuff. They caught the only guy making it. Fascinating really. He combined a synthetic hallucinogen with clever short-life nanobots programmed to stimulate certain regions of the brain to create specific hallucinations and emotions.”
“Dr. Kushing thought the world was circling the drain. He wanted to take away the pain before we went down.”
“You knew him?”
She shrugged. “I helped him sell the shit.” Five handguns floated out of her jacket and hovered in the air around her. “Mostly I played guard.” The weapons glided back to their holsters. “I think I shot some people, too, but I didn’t mean it. I was hallucinating.”
Melissa hid her face behind her knees and shivered.
Aaron glanced at her surface thoughts; hazy memories played out of her experiencing a pastel-colored reality filled with smiling blue-eyed, blonde people straight out of an idealized suburban utopia. The tenor of the scene changed without warning. Blithe happiness gave way to dread as black blood seeped from the walls and bubbled out of storm drains. All the smiling people hunched forward, becoming a legion of shadow-faced figures with glowing eyes and the same perfect blonde hair. Melissa ran, but couldn’t get away from them. The bright flash and scream startled away his telepathic link.
“Oy, that looked like a bad trip.”
She nodded, sniffling. “When I woke up, I saw so much blood. I ran away. I don’t remember much. I was all kinds of fucked up.”
“Withdrawal.”
“No shit.” She smirked at him. “Aurora found me. Said I was Awakened and they wanted me.”
“So you came here?”
Melissa stared at him, mouth open. “Have you seen that bitch?”
“Aye.” Aaron grinned.
“Fuck, no. She’s freaky. I ran home.” She got quiet. Aaron waited for a few minutes, until she eventually continued, albeit with a begrudging expression. “Mom and Dad weren’t too happy to see me, but they let me stay. I was shitting bricks about what happened, sick from the drugs. You know, I actually did whatever they told me to do like the perfect little preppie daughter they wanted. It was nice for a little while… I almost thought they loved me.” She made a gagging face. “Fuckers kicked me out a week later, saying I was too dangerous to be around. Mom was afraid she’d ‘catch the psionics’ and Dad thought I would kill him the next time we argued.”
She spent a few minutes trying not to cry and failing.
“Melissa…”
“Fuck them. They don’t want me.”
Aaron squinted into the smog overhead, eyes drawn to glowing patches where advert bots flew in the distance. Her story sounded all too familiar and more than a little suspicious.
“You sure you’re all right?”
“Yeah.” She wiped her face. “Tell anyone I cried and I’ll rip your nuts off.”
“Not a soul.” He held up his hand as if being sworn in. “I promise.”
11
The Presence
Mamor
u
Far above in the sky, a hawk’s cry broke the silent veil of dreamless sleep. A steady but mild wind blew over Mamoru from the right side. He drew a deep breath, holding the flavor of Badlands dust in his nostrils for a minute before letting it out. His fingers squeezed the handle of the vibro-katana at his hip, its presence assuring him all remained right with his world.
Mamoru sat up and squinted at the shimmering horizon. Everything took on a blue tint, an aftereffect of the sun beating upon his formerly closed eyes. A lone tumbleweed bounced lazily past his boots. He frowned at his once-black coat and pants, which had become closer to light brown with a coating of fine sand. The skeletal remains of Albuquerque darkened the ground to his right, distant enough to where he couldn’t differentiate the resettled interior where that thing resided from the ruins surrounding it.
The mere thought of it shot a pang of worry down his spine. That the creature resembled an innocent girl caused a sliver of guilt to taint his loathing. It made little sense. He remembered an overwhelming need to destroy the false child, yet at the same time, it seemed wrong to do so. The journey from the city to where he had collapsed had vanished from his memory. Only a trace of mortal dread remained. Looking at the city, even from this distance, made him uneasy.
Thoughts of Sadako brought a sense of peace in knowing she would live, as well as the weight of obligation. Dust lifted from his palm as he studied it, recalling the handshake. He must fulfill the oath he had sworn.
Despite sleeping on the unforgiving earth, nothing ached or cramped, and he stood with ease. He took another great breath and looked over his hands. A sense of power swam through him, beyond anything his chi had ever done. The west called, and he did the only thing he could—he walked.
The desert sands bore the occasional marks of habitation: tire tracks, footprints, large paw prints, and inexplicable serpentine trails that sent his imagination racing with visions of massive centipedes. Over the course of several hours, he sensed the presence of living things nearby, yet only once did he see anything. A hulking figure—part man and part wolf, with bright red eyes and patches of shining chrome grafted into its ebon fur—lingered at the corner of an old trailer barely long enough to make eye contact before it slinked behind cover.
It had bowed its head, ever so slightly, as if deferring to its master.
Feeling as though creatures shadowed his every step, Mamoru marched westward until the sun weakened in the sky. A collection of pre-war houses altered his course into what had been a small town. He walked down the main road, the only paved one in the area, glancing into the broken windows of several dwellings, a tavern, and a pizza shop before halting at an intersection. At the far corner, several children explored what had once been a hardware store.
Six small figures climbed over the rubble of a wall. A Hispanic boy of about thirteen led the way, holding a well-worn spear. A tattered brown skirt lapped at his legs as he stepped with care around snarls of rusting rebar. Behind him crept a blonde girl with a dark tan, carrying an ancient compound bow painted with green camouflage and loaded with a handmade wooden arrow. An electrical cable tied around her waist acted as a belt holding up a threadbare hand towel for a loincloth. Metal bits attached to various leather bangles on her forearms and shins sang in the breeze. Another boy, a year or two younger than the leader, clutched a crowbar as if expecting to have to smash something at any second. His pants appeared to be made of animal hide, with fringe along the sides of the legs.
Another blond, a boy, walked fourth in line, perhaps the archer’s brother. Green fatigue pants, cut down to shorts and sized for an adult man, ended in tatters at his shins. He carried a crossbow made of old machine parts welded together, as well as a knife in a sheath tied to each leg.
A second girl of about nine, with sienna skin and ankle-length black hair, followed him. Aside from a coating of dust, she wore only an anklet of polished copper wire and a beaded leather cord around her neck, from which dangled a cluster of small leather pouches. She carried a prewar handgun, which she kept in a two-handed grip aimed down and to the right while navigating the broken concrete. Mamoru found it amusing to watch a child walking like a soldier.
Were the weapon not real, he would have thought her adorable.
The youngest boy lurked at the end of the scouting party, guarding a pair of olive drab duffel bags big enough for him to sleep in. His single item of clothing consisted of a cracked, olive drab, bug-eyed gas mask, from which a metal box dangled down to his stomach on a ridged hose. He looked about seven or eight and had no weapons. Despite the shaded lenses, he noticed Mamoru before any of the others.
After three seconds of staring, the boy urinated where he stood.
Once the stream stopped, he let off a yowl, muffled by the mask, and ran out of sight toward the oldest boy with the spear. The other Scrag children froze in place. All of them—save for the girl with the pistol—trembled. She cautiously stepped to a taller chunk of debris and faced him without fear. The boy with the crowbar hid behind it as if it would protect him. The blonde girl raised her bow, but the one Mamoru assumed to be her brother pulled her arm down.
Mamoru knew they were Scrags—primitive tribal villagers—out scavenging, but did not understand how or why he knew this. That part of him connected to the Akuryō sensed the presence of adults nearby, parents, he assumed, due to the way the gas mask boy kept edging in that direction. The soreness in their feet, the hunger in their bellies, and the terror in their hearts called to him. Something dark and deep within his mind reveled in it, demanding blood, wishing to feast upon the agony of their parents when they found bodies. However, the part of his mind that still existed as Mamoru, separate from the dark spirit, felt pity, and abject horror at the idea of harming children. A battle within his thoughts brought sweat to his brow. He wondered how savage a world would have to be for parents to send kids that young hunting on their own.
Mamoru wanted to protect them, but he sought pain.
They are connected to this place like the creatures. The girl who is not afraid senses the Akuryō.
After a moment, the children disappeared into the rubble in search of nooks and crannies too small for a grown raider to chase them. The girl with the pistol remained, standing with her head held high, staring right at him. Small fingers smeared marks like war paint in the dirt on her chest and face. She dipped her fingers in a pouch and added black smudges to the markings. Her whispering voice carried to him on the wind, which he should not have been able to hear from such a distance. Spanish words left her lips, which he did not comprehend, though her intentions came to his mind with clarity: she spoke a sign of reverence and a plea for his favor.
The little girl addressed him as ‘He Who Watches,’ and acknowledged his mastership of the land. She did not fear what the others had sensed within him. This girl knew, and she bowed to him with fealty. The Akuryō inside him smiled.
This one is strong.
Mamoru, the part of him still Mamoru, had no interest in harming a group of children or the adults who would come at the sound of screaming. The girl’s show of respect slaked the Akuryō’s need for anguish. He nodded to the tiny shaman and walked away. A chiding feeling crept up his back, turning his stomach. These people endured this harsh life of primitivism, unaware modern society still existed. Postwar hell had become their world, and they had no desire to leave it. The girl who had prayed to him weathered her unforgiving life in contentment. For that, he would watch over them.
Dead people could no longer suffer.
Ten paces away, he glanced back over his shoulder. The armed girl stood straight and tall, feet together, hair billowing to the side in the wind, as proud and confident wearing only dust as she might have been in samurai armor. She bowed, crouched, and climbed down out of sight amid the debris. He grumbled, remembering his distaste for the Red Planet. The Badlands embodied everything he hated about Mars and then some: desolate, dusty, devoid of comfort, and far beneath his station.
Darkness came hours later, though his body craved neither rest nor sleep. He did not feel hungry or thirsty, only driven. At night, the sounds of creatures intensified, yet still, none dared show themselves. The whole time he walked, the sense of being escorted by the strange denizens of this place followed him. Genetic wartime experiments gone awry, as well as crazed, degenerate humans, were common urban legends of the Badlands. Some of the stories had even reached Japan. From everything he had heard, he expected to need his blade drawn at all times while traveling. Yet, it seemed as if the land itself embraced his presence.
Mamoru walked, never slowing, even as the sun rose and set again, his direction guided by an inexplicable calling. Moments before the sun set for the third time on his journey, he spotted the remains of a small settlement. Once darkness fell, a weak, pulsating light throbbed in the center of a five-building town. Elongated shadows spread outward over the scrub, littered with the rapid motions of crawling insects. He kept to the dark, behind a leaning wooden building that had the look of a tap house.
At the center of the ‘town,’ eleven people arranged themselves around a metal barrel-turned-grill. One man in a torn pink dress and combat boots tended the meat, which appeared to be some manner of prairie dog. He mumbled a song in mockery of a French chef while adjusting the carcasses over the fire. A medieval-style sword, at least five feet in length, hung from a rope sling across his back. His bright red Mohawk brought to mind a rooster.
Others sat on the ground—two in the bed of a rusted pickup truck with no tires left on its wheels, and one hovering over a deathtrap buggy, tinkering with its engine. The mechanic noticed him and pulled darkened-leather goggles off his eyes while smearing a greasy hand over his bare chest. His stitched-leather pants looked ready to fall off from the weight of tools and parts crammed into the pockets.
Laughter and howls of celebration faded as the crunch of Mamoru’s boots on dirt captured their attention.
Angel Descended (The Awakened Book 6) Page 13
