Blind Hero

by Nix Whittaker

  Toa raised an eyebrow and asked, “Seriously? How much can it take?”

  Megan said, “We have only tested it with small arms. We haven’t had access to what you fellas carry around.”

  She motioned with her bound hands to the soldiers on either side of them. They sat pretending to ignore them, but one of the soldiers tightened his grip on his automatic rifle and she knew they were listening to their conversation.

  Toa said, “Let us hope that we don’t need to put it to the test.”

  Megan could tell from his expression he wanted to ask more questions, but they couldn’t talk freely with the eavesdroppers so near. They travelled in silence for a while longer.

  She motioned with her head to the front of the truck. “He have anything to do with you wondering in the Wildlands?”

  Toa leaned forward so he was closer to her and hoped the others couldn’t hear them. “The General worked with my dad once. They were ordered to hide a lot of things for their superiors. When the army was disbanded and merged with other groups, the superiors didn’t survive. That meant all that was hidden had no one to claim it. Murphy here thinks that my dad told me something.”

  Megan huffed. “Greedy bugger, but I take it you knew the secret?”

  Toa nodded his head. He motioned with his cuffed hands. “He did this to my eyes when I wouldn’t tell him what he wanted. He brought in my sister to watch. She was just trying to save me. But she told him where the vault was but not how to open it. He thinks I can open it.”

  Toa couldn’t keep his pain out of his voice. She gasped. “That is why you left last night. To get your family back? Is it just your sister?”

  Toa shook his head. “They have my mother as well.”

  No wonder he had left. She would have gutted someone emotionally if it meant her family’s lives were spared.

  Megan said fiercely, “We will get them free. Don’t you worry.”

  Toa said, “I’m sorry I got you into this.”

  All of this wasn’t his fault there was evil in the world. She was one of the few that could help him.

  ___

  General Murphy separated them when they entered the camp. Toa wasn’t surprised by that.

  Knowing that a handgun couldn’t do anything because of the atramento made him a little cocky. If they had left him with Megan, he would have taken a few risks. To get not only her, but his family out of there.

  Toa was amazed the Bioware they had put into him was so good. He had never heard anything that could make him like Teflar. He realised he was also a fool to believe Megan without any doubt. He really was far gone; he didn’t think for an instant she might be telling him lies about the atramento’s capabilities.

  The General had him tied to a chair. This arrangement was better than being tied to a metal gurney which signalled they were going to torture him.

  Murphy paced before him. “You are looking pretty good for a dead man.”

  Toa shrugged. He was still a bit cocky because Megan had come after him. It meant she loved him. Toa stared at the General with his sightless eyes to unnerve him. “So do you.”

  Toa was taken unaware by the fist to his cheek. Though it didn’t hurt. He turned his face to the General. “That tickled.”

  The General was probably about to hit him again when his man said, “You need him alive, remember.”

  The General’s voice was filled with his anger. “We will take him out to the cache tomorrow. He will open that damn vault or we’ll cut off his head.”

  There was a tense silence, then the man said, “You will have that visitor tomorrow, sir. He told you last time…”

  Murphy swore. “Damn it, I remember. You don’t need to remind me. No matter. Just make sure he stays here. I don’t want our key wandering off. We have all the time in the world. It isn’t like the cache is going to go anywhere.”

  Murphy left, but the other man remained behind. Toa said, “I’m not going to go anywhere without all my people.” The man ignored him, but Toa wasn’t finished. “If this visitor sees me like this, there will be questions. Put me in the infirmary. No one will question why a blind man is in the infirmary.”

  The man grunted. Toa added, “Just keep me away from my people. If I don’t even know where they are, I can’t risk leaving yet.”

  The man approached him and said, “I’m not that dumb. You left once before. There is no guarantee.”

  The man then went to a table. He fiddled with some things. He came back and grabbed Toa’s head and shoved him forward. His arms strained in their bonds. Pain pierced his back as the man made a cut right next to his spine.

  The man grunted. “You have some tough skin, mate.”

  He let go of him. Toa knew the man must have put a chip in him. They had taken out his military one when he had been tortured. This way they would be able to find him if he left unexpectedly. They wouldn’t have left him without a chip that first time if they had thought he was in any condition to walk out of the place.

  Toa leant back. Thinking. He couldn’t stay here for long because it wouldn’t take long for Murphy to figure out, he couldn’t open the cache. Toa might appear like his father, but they were not an exact match. Murphy was delusional if he thought he was the key to a biometric lock. Once Murphy realised his mistake, they would all be dead.

  ___

  The guard was rough with her as Megan was shoved and pushed through the camp. They were taking her to a fenced off area. She was taken to a tent in the area.

  She was shoved hard and Megan stumbled and went to her knees. She could have caught herself, but she wanted them to underestimate her. She would need all the help she could rustle up to get out of here in one piece. Even with the added advantage of the atramento.

  When Megan tried to get up, she was kicked off her feet again. The guard laughed at her. She stayed on her knees but straightened up.

  Megan saw there were a few women in the tent. They had scrambled to huddle on the far side when the soldiers had entered. They were dressed in a pale blue smock that all appeared the same. They all seemed malnourished as well.

  The guard made a motion and one of the soldiers dragged two women out of the group. The soldier who had kicked her caught her hair and pulled her head back sharply.

  He leaned in close so she could smell his foul breath. “See these two. They are your man’s flesh and blood and see what he does to them. He left them here to be used as slaves. What chance do you think you have of being in his mind for even a second? Now if you are nice to me…”

  Megan didn’t wait for him to finish. She slammed her head back and the guard yelled with pain. He kicked out at her, but she scrambled out of the way.

  He was holding a hand to his nose and clearly she had broken it as blood dribbled between his fingers.

  A soldier at the entrance of the tent called to the injured soldier. The injured soldier waved off the order and turned to her.

  He pointed at her with his other hand. “You wait, girl. I’ll get what I want.”

  Megan almost said something, but the younger woman who had been dragged out by the men tugged on her arm and she realised she needed to keep her temper. The guards left then.

  The two women pulled her back towards the others and the youngest asked, “Are you alright?”

  Megan dusted herself off. “I’m fine. Are you Toa’s family?”

  They had the same colouring as him and the younger one had the same eyes as him.

  The older one asked, “You know what happened to Toa? Is he safe?”

  Oh, they were definitely his family. Megan reassured them, “He got caught but he is fine and he will be fine. I am Megan.” Megan swallowed quickly before she added the next bit, “I’m Toa’s wife.”

  The younger of the women looked her over. “You certainly have the spunk to be his wife.”

  The older woman asked, “How did that happen? He has only been gone for a short while.”

  The younger one put a hand on the older one’s arm
. “Mum, where are your manners?”

  The woman flushed. “I’m Toa’s mother, I am Masina. This is Natia my daughter and Toa’s sister. You must tell us what happened.”

  Megan settled in next to them and started her story. “We found him hiding out in the Wildlands. We patched him up. He is better than he has ever been.”

  Masina asked softly, “What about his eyes?”

  Natia winced but didn’t add anything.

  Megan said, “He isn’t completely blind. I can’t explain it very well. But you will see when we all get out of here.”

  Natia shook her head, her voice showing all her frustrated anguish. “We are stuck here. You think we haven’t tried.”

  Megan reached out and touched Natia’s arm and said with every part of her being. “We are going to get out of here.”

  She knew more than them and she trusted the atramento. Though this was the first time they were throwing the atramento against a whole army.

  ___

  They put the women to work straight away. Cleaning and mending uniforms. Megan and Natia were on washing duty that day. Natia piled wet laundry into a basket. She went to pick it up, but Megan stopped her.

  Megan shook her head when Natia frowned at her. Megan explained, “Let me do the heavy lifting. My Bioware gives me superior strength.”

  Natia raised an eyebrow and looked at her up and down sceptically. She gaped though when Megan picked up the basket and set it on her hip. Natia caught the other side and pretended to take the weight.

  Natia hissed. “How can you do that?”

  Megan smiled. “I have a friend who is super smart and she does Bioware. We put some of it into Toa as well. That is why he will be fine.”

  “I’m sure he will be.” Natia had a lot of faith in her brother. Frankly so did she.

  They took the basket outside. There was a line set up to dry the clothes. Some soldiers stood around joking. One gazed at them and approached in a swagger.

  He went up to Natia. “Hey there, babe.”

  Natia ignored the man. They took the basket to the line and put it down. Megan took Natia’s example and ignored the man as well. They started hanging up the laundry while the man circled Natia and looked her up and down.

  The man was undaunted by her chilly reception of him. He caught a loose strand of her hair and curled it around his finger. Letting it go he said, “You wouldn’t need to work so hard if you were nicer to me, you know that.”

  He reached out and grabbed her ass. Natia turned suddenly and slapped him. He caught her arm and dragged her off her feet and threw her to the ground.

  He laughed. “You are a feisty one.”

  One of the other soldiers yelled. “Hey, what happened? It seemed like that woman assaulted an officer.”

  The man laughed again “Yeah, it sure did seem like that and you know what that means. Punishment.”

  One of the others must have agreed as he was already heading back and he had a short whip in his hand. The soldiers moved fast. One soldier caught her arm when she would have interceded and put her into a headlock.

  They tied Natia’s hands in front of her. The original soldier ripped her top to reveal her back and forced her to kneel in the dust.

  Megan shoved out of the arms of the soldier who were holding her back. She slammed into the man with the whip. Megan grabbed it out his hands. She managed to snap it in half before the soldier could recover. The soldier hit her across her face and shocked her with the blow though it didn’t hurt.

  Megan shoved the soldier and he fell over. The others realised she was the real danger turned to her and with all of them focused on her there was no way she could resist for very long. They piled on top of her preventing her from fighting back though she did manage to get in a few good blows.

  While one of them sat on her, the other tied her hands together. She was shoved to her knees next to Natia. They brought out another whip from somewhere.

  Natia whispered, “I’m sorry.”

  Megan shook her head. There was nothing to apologise for.

  Chapter Eight

  Edge June 2097

  Toa’s back didn’t hurt anymore. Though he pretended it did as the guard shoved him along towards the infirmary. He bumped into things as well. None of them needed to know he could sense enough around him to be able to move around by himself.

  Toa was shoved onto a gurney and he had to catch himself on it or otherwise fall. It was tempting to stumble some more and make the guard think he was more handicapped than he was. But he didn’t want to try too hard, otherwise the guard might become suspicious. A medic came up to him and whistled. “What happened to him?”

  Toa didn’t answer but waited for Murphy’s man to give an excuse.

  The soldier grumbled. “Accident in containment.”

  The medic flicked at Toa’s clothes. “They dress you well over in containment.”

  Toa grunted, but didn’t explain his outfit. He wanted there to be suspicion over his appearance and injuries.

  The soldier huffed. “Just fix him up and keep him here. The General wants to make sure he is looked after and that he doesn’t wander off.”

  The soldier went to the edge of the tent and turned his back on them.

  The medic snorted. “So you got on the wrong side of the General. Not very clever or do you have a death wish?” The medic pushed his head back. “This appears like it’s years old. When did this happen?”

  “Last month,” Toa answered confused.

  “Wow. You heal well.” The medic sounded very shocked.

  The medic had him take off his shirt. The medic checked the wound on his back. “All nice and pink you probably won’t have a scar either or a mark in about a month. Healed up perfectly. You didn’t have any problem with infection or inflammation?” he said distractedly.

  Toa reached behind him. The medic was right. The small cut was completely sealed. The faint wound felt like it was a month-old wound.

  Toa said to the medic bewildered himself, “No problem at all.”

  What the hell had they done to him? Natasha had implied they had been using these atramento things for years. Why hadn’t he heard about this bloody miracle Bioware that could stop bullets and heal so fast? If the military had a Bioware which could heal wounds in the fraction of the time they would have been putting it into every soldier they could afford to.

  Toa turned his head a little to listen to the soldier outside and then said to the Medic, “What would it take for you to be careless about watching me?”

  The medic chuckled. “Let me just take a blood sample, then I’ll be over there for a bit checking it over.”

  Toa smiled at the medic. It seemed Murphy was burning his bridges like he had done before. It appeared the axiom that a leopard couldn’t change their spots was accurate when it came to Murphy.

  When the medic finished, it didn’t take much to slip off the gurney and out the back of the tent. The soldier must have either trusted the medic or he was afraid of hospitals. Mostly Toa just thought he was incompetent. But his incompetence meant Toa was free to walk the military camp.

  Toa headed towards the domestic area where the women worked to keep the camp running. He heard some people laughing and the sting of a whip against flesh.

  He rushed between the tents. Tripping a few times on the ropes. His new senses might help him with most things, but he was moving too fast and the ropes were difficult to discern even with his senses. He stopped when he got to the gate to the domestic area.

  Toa was stunned to realise his sister and Megan were kneeling, while a few soldiers stood around. One was whipping Megan. She was spitting out insults at the soldier. And it was from her words he could decipher the situation. She was crazy to be speaking like that to angry soldiers. While Natia muttered soft apologies to Megan for getting her into this.

  Someone yelled behind Toa and he knew he had been found out. The soldiers whipping Megan stopped and they must have seen him. One swore and then
feet started to pound the earth as they chased him.

  Toa didn’t wait for them to surround him instead he turned and ran. The only way to go was further into the camp. Away from his family and Natia. He stopped when he realised he wouldn’t be able to escape without running into more soldiers or with his family. He decided he would pick where he would fight. Somewhere a person like him who was on their own had the advantage. He found a narrow space between two tents. They couldn’t come in numbers or risk their guns. Not that he had to worry about guns.

  Toa stopped and turned to fight. They came one at a time from both sides. He ducked and blocked blows. But one was better than the others and a shade faster. He was harder to keep off and that allowed the other to get an advantage. He put Toa into a headlock.

  He heard Natia and Megan standing behind the soldiers. They had obviously been released because they called out to him and begged the soldiers not to hurt him.

  Toa pulled the man over his shoulder and threw him against the better fighter. Toa turned and rushed the soldiers standing in front of his wife and sister. He managed to throw a few of them into the others.

  Megan caught his arm and he said in a rush of breath, “Get my family out of here. Don’t worry about me.”

  The soldiers pulled him back and he let them. If he got away once he could do it again. He just needed to make sure his family was safe. That included Megan as well. He was a fool to have allowed her to get involved in all of this but it was too late to save his heart.

  ___

  Masina found them back at the laundry line. She grabbed Natia’s arm and asked, “Are you crazy?”

  Megan said in a soothing voice, “It’s alright. They started with me and when Toa distracted them the other soldiers let us go.”

  Masina turned her gaze to Megan and asked again just louder this time, “Are you crazy?”

  Megan shook her head and Natia backed her up. “She is fine. She saved my skin quite literally.”

  Megan said, “While everyone is still distracted, I need you to set something up for me. You see that valve on the tub. Knock it off. I need to do something else to make this all work. Hopefully.”