“However… however much I want to say I’m just me.” She eyed Vargr. “I’m not sure why I do some of the stuff I do. I want this gun. It makes me feel fearsome. Badass.” Her teeth showed. “And I do like that.”
“Okay.” He thought some more, paralleling their path, checking the periphery automatically for incoming creatures and falling debris. “As I said, I’m doing this to avoid the same mistake. I would rather trust you and be disappointed than not trust you and maybe lose you. Or lose a part of your trust. Do you get that?”
Cyn nodded. “Yeah. It’s complicated, isn’t it. I promise to warn you if the tentacles in my brain take over.” She smiled weakly. “Just be there for me when Maura and Willow start doing any brain surgery. Both of you.”
“Sure.” Vargr patted her leg.
“We’re both going to be your cheer team, girl. Damn, though.” Rutger hefted her, readjusting her position on his shoulders. “Did you put on weight?”
She leaned over his head, dodging the horns. “Mean.”
“Ignore him. You’re perfect.” He really meant that, in fucking spades. There was no other woman he would rather face the apocalypse with. When it was his turn to carry her, she seemed slow to dismount from Rutger.
An hour later she swayed and almost fell from his shoulders. He caught her, lowered her onto her back on the ground, dismayed by how little she seemed to see of him though he was right in front of her. Dust blew across her face, and he shielded her with his hand, closed her eyes with his fingers.
Alive, but this was bad.
“What’ll we do?” he asked Rutger.
Willow arrived a minute later while they were discussing making a travois. Sticking her back in the car seemed wrong.
“We’re nearly there, you two pussies. We put her in the truck. Maura will keep an eye on her. Besides, she’ll heal this same as she did the others.” She kneeled by Cyn’s side and placed a hand on her arm, stayed there a few seconds.
He left her alone, waited, but she only rose, shaking her head.
“I still cannot see it. Though the damage in her brain is visible now. I can even feel the healing happening but maybe it’s gone beyond what she can fix herself.
“We should hurry,” Rutger said.
“Of course. Put her in the truck, and I’ll see if I can speed things up.
He and Rutger exchanged looks. “We can both pull with Toother. If we get ahead, you make sure you keep up.”
If there was nothing there at the end, no Big Daddy vehicle, what would they do then? That hopeless prospect was best ignored. Not yet. Death wasn’t getting her yet.
Chapter 18
Cyn woke, swaying, and found herself in the truck again, but lying down. Groaning, she levered herself onto her elbow then into a sitting position and peered about through bleary vision.
“Cyn?”
Was that Maura? Yes, she was in the front seat with… Little Mo up on the dashboard still. They were both watching her, as far as her screwy eyes could tell.
“That’s me.” She popped a hand up, let it flop down.
“Almost there. There’s a door up ahead that Rutger has hauled open.”
“Let Little Mo out!” someone sang out.
The front door of the truck creaked open, and Mo sprang to the seat then walked to the left and disappeared. The door slammed, and Maura was there again, peering at her, looking worried. “We think we found it. Your Big Daddy.”
“Oh. Good.” She nodded then winced at the shooting pain in her neck.
Her head size thumped in and out with each heartbeat and as the truck bumped over obstacles. Then it jolted, stopped. With both hands cradled under her jaw, she could look around without it hurting badly.
To the left was gray wall. Ahead, past Toother in harness, was a blue liquid-ish wall, where the colors seemed to flow, with an opening that slowly widened—a dark opening. When enough light entered, the insides of the room bloomed before her.
Revealed was a long room occupied by the vehicle Willow had once sketched to Little Mo’s instructions, as well as mattresses and scattered rubbish, but the latter she barely glanced at.
Big Daddy.
“Here be dragons,” she whispered.
“What?” Maura swiveled. “Dragons?”
“An old belief about the edge of the world where unknown dangers might lie.” It seemed appropriate. They’d found the holy grail of their era. A machine that might, just might, hold an untold wealth of information, and more. Could it also be dangerous? Of course it could.
She smiled. To her it was Hope with a big huge H.
“Help me out of here.” She leaned to the side and reached for the door handle, couldn’t get her butt to shift, and fell over. Crap. Embarrassing, to go from Ghoul Lord vanquisher to this.
She was up on her elbow trying to inch nearer to that cursed door, when Rutger hauled it open.
Tsking, he helped her climb out, letting her walk with her arm about his waist. Her black combat boots looked and felt as if they were miles away. Her shit-kicker boots.
She sure wished she’d get to kick more shit and teddy bears before her time on Earth was up.
Rambling, I’m rambling.
They staggered and walked and staggered some more, with Vargr grabbing her other arm, aiming at the opening and Big Daddy. If anything the two guys made her feel clumsier and stumble more.
“We got you,” Vargr told her when she scowled at him. “Is she being ungrateful?”
Rutger considered her. “I believe so.”
“What?” She looked from Rutger to Vargr. “Oh, okay. Thank you? I’d curtsey, but that’s not happening.”
“Feisty as ever. She’s cured.” Rutger laughed.
After letting the other man take her weight, Vargr released her arm and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “We hadn’t heard you talk for hours. You just made sounds when we asked you anything.”
All this attention was making her feel weird and helpless, and she hated helpless more than anything. Her foot bumped something, and she looked around. Whatever had happened here had left a shambles. Rows of single bedrolls lay on the ground, along with IV drip stands, tubing, syringes, and other discarded medical gear.
“Is this where we were made?” Frankenstein’s monster had it better with his one-on-one visits from his doctor.
Vargr turned to take it in. As he circled, his wings half-opened, fluttered, settled. “Maybe. What a mess.”
Mo waited in the opening to Big Daddy with his front limbs waving a hello. Lights dashed from side to side on his front visor.
“I believe we need Cyn to get Big Daddy to waken,” Mo said. “I sent a message but have received no answer. He will have been powered down for years.”
“And might never awaken,” said Willow from behind.
She and Maura had followed them in. “This is Big Daddy, Mo?”
“Yes, Miss Cyn.”
“Closer,” she croaked and was helped to wobble nearer.
Though no lights had turned on, her eyes adjusted. Big Daddy rested inside a large cubical room. The nose cone almost reached to point where the groove of the sliding door ran. The inner walls were also a liquid blue.
“That’s not a natural rock or a metal, surely?”
Despite her almost inaudible voice, Mo answered.
“The doctor called it bastardium. It is a rare if not unique metal found miles deep at the archaeological dig in New Zealand. The notes in my files state he called it that because it is difficult to transport without it shattering. When shattered, it loses the property he needed it for. That property is why he built this room.”
“And that is?”
“It can shield mankind from the Lure. When the invasion occurred, the dates coincide with a time when he was at that dig.”
Meaning he was shielded then. At first, she’d heard, the Lure wasn’t as broadly applied. As the days passed, it had strengthened.
“Ohhh crap,” Vargr muttered. “We need this
so bad.”
“Then why was he overcome? Why did he vanish?” And was that the man she’d killed… for a second time, when she ended the Ghoul Lord? She needed a photo to tell.
Mo remained mute, which seemed to indicate he did not know the answer.
“Open this.” Rutger placed his palm on the black glossy skin of Big Daddy. “And we might find out.”
“Sure. Sure.”
Big Daddy extended far into this room, and his skin ran back into the deeper darkness in segments like a centipede, with multiple legs that were currently retracted upward. Rubber-clad black wheels kept the chassis off the floor, though the rims looked solid enough to take the vehicle’s weight, minus the tires, if they had to.
She looked up, assessing the black gloss of the skin where it curved over the roof. Thick gold lines and swirls lay on the black, as if a circuit board had been enlarged and welded on.
Big Daddy was a steampunk lover’s fantasy, but she guessed a billionaire could get any customized appearance he wanted—even for a research vessel for a company no one had ever heard of.
Her gaze drifted up to what she’d glimpsed. More luscious gold, only this gold created letters.
MAELSTROM INC.
The words were scribed above what seemed to be the outline of a wide door.
Slam dunk. “We have lift off—a door.”
“That?” Rutger grunted. “There are steps.”
“Oh.” She looked down. “I did only just wake up.”
Vincent could fit through that, if it opened. The entire Big Daddy was the length of a few train carriages. Judging by the legs, it might go places no car could ever go.
“Pretty.” Wriggling free of Rutger, she placed her palms on the skin. It was frigid. “Wake up,” she whispered, and a shudder ran beneath her fingers and palms. “I’m Cyn and I need you to wake up.”
“Excuse me, Miss Cyn, the correct request is to: initiate power-up and run system checks.”
She eyed the agitated Mo. “Close enough. Fucking open you big-assed lump of inert crap. There.”
Mo’s lights bounced across and back furiously.
“Well, you seem to have annoyed your critter even.” Vargr smacked her ass.
“I have talents.” She turned and put her hand to his chest while poking out her tongue, then she thought better of it. This massive hot, sexy beaster right in front of her demanded more. Slowly, she slid her hand lower until it was cupped over his hardening cock. “Wow.” Her grin spread.
“You need something?” His eyes turned hard, a look she’d grown to love.
“I’d help you spank her, but she’s not well enough, unfortunately…” At her pout Rutger continued with a more scolding tone, “This is premature, plus… there are others coming.”
Dang. She removed her hand.
“You, two,” Vincent had arrived, and behind him were Maura, Locke, and Willow. “Get a room.”
At a new quiver in her left leg, she leaned on Big Daddy, and the vehicle made a kerplunk-chunk noise. The door slid open at her back. Vargr caught her just in time to prevent her falling backward.
“Later,” he murmured. “Promise. Let’s explore.”
A rugged male voice poured from some internal speaker. “Power-up successful. Cyn, you are identified by voice and faceprint. Initiating system checks. I’ll be absent for a while, folks, as I haven’t done a power-up for over two years. Make yourselves at home.”
“Wait. Did that sound like Hemsworth or am I dreaming?” someone said—Maura probably.
She wasn’t sure who had said it, since her head had thumped with pain.
She had her right foot on the last rung of the three metal steps below the door into Big Daddy when her eyes chose to do a shut-down.
“Fuck. Not again.” Her knee hit the floor, though someone grabbed her arm to stop her doing a face-first plant. Carpet below. Red carpet, her failing eyes informed her. “Shit. I hate this.”
“Get her up. We need to move fast. These episodes are coming more and more often.”
Sound faded out, faded in.
The night swallowed her, only spitting her out now and then.
“As long as she keeps breathing.”
“Yes.”
Shut up, shut up. Stop being negative, peoples.
The blackness whirled and became absolute, utter… darkness.
Sentences perforated it and thoughts as time swept by, churning her like so much ocean litter.
“Wow. This place is gorgeous. Cross between office and laboratory.”
“And fighting machine.”
“I aim to please. I also have coffee machines. I regret I will need to shut down again.”
Was that Big Daddy?
Swirl came the dark, gobble-gobble, gobbling her up.
Sounds intruded, whirrs. Pain in her arm. And she couldn’t move even though she wriggled, hard.
She’s fine. The throwing up is to be expected. Keep her on her side while we clean up.
Damn. She hasn’t talked for ages.
You mean days.
Yeah.
There’s papers back here. Tons. A total craptastic mess. Maybe we will find what happened in these notes.
Rustling sounds. Cursing. Chairs scraping, and she opened her mouth to speak.
Everything started to shake. Her head rattled, and memories blurred across the landscape.
Papers. The words were blurry.
She’d signed because someone had to. Someone. He was essential to this, so that left only her. She was the last expendable.
She’d lain on the table and let them sink in the needle. After that there was nothing. Blessed silence reigned.
Then…
People screaming. Big Daddy enunciating the protocol. Needles and more needles.
The writing had been on the wall. They were ALL going to die. If she turned into superwoman like he said, why not. Why the ever-loving fuck not…
Needles entering her.
The pain edged up her arms, fire in the veins.
If this doesn’t work.
I know. I know. We all know.
The pain reached cataclysmic levels, and she screamed, arched off whatever she lay on. The screaming tore her throat until it faded into whimpers.
Do something!
She’s still breathing. She’s okay. This is what we have to do. It hurts, but it has to be done.
You two go read up on something. Go back there. Those papers you found. Go.
Go!
The tentacles writhed as she slept.
Chapter 19
When she revived, when the shroud slowly lifted and her eyes opened, her two guys were before her. Mo was stuck to the ceiling above, and she lay on her side on something soft and padded—a table, judging by the height. A bar ran above the edge, probably to stop people rolling off.
Vargr and Rutger sat a few feet away on shiny steel chairs.
“Comfy?” she croaked.
“Oh hell.” Vargr startled, almost jumped off the chair. “You’re back, babe.”
Rutger inhaled deeply then slowly stood. Was that the shine of tears?
“Babe… is okay,” she said through her numb mouth and tried to smile.
“Huh.” Vargr squatted before her, picked up her hand and kissed her fingers.
Fingers. She blinked at them. They didn’t seem as if they were hers.
“She’s still sick if I can call her babe.”
“Today, only, asshole.” When her tongue ran over her dry lips, those too, tongue and lips, seemed to belong to somebody else.
Squinting, Rutger muttered, “That’s our girl.”
“I feel good just… tired?” She moved, lifting her head off the pillow, letting sound into her ear, and was all too aware that nothing was hurting. Yay team.
This place smelled of that raw alcohol you get swiped with at doctor’s surgeries, just before an injection.
“Good is a big advance.” Rutger rose and strode to the door, which was a few yards do
wn this tunnel-like room. He whistled. “Maura! Willow. Vincent! I think she’s going to be okay.”
“You’d better be okay. We have been waiting so bloody long to hear you talk.” Vargr played with her hand.
“How long?” She swallowed the gunk in her throat, feeling as if she should cough but not sure it was possible, yet.
“Three days. I can fill you in, if you want?”
“Sure. Though if you keep being so cute and wimpy, I may throw up.”
“You already did that. Loads. They had you on oxygen and fluids. The last of what Big D had in supplies. There’s a needle still in that arm.”
“Oh.” So that was the one last hurt. She checked out the arm on top of her body. “Did it happen? Could you fix me? I feel like I’ve been in Lalaland or hell.”
“We think so.” Rutger returned and he pulled his chair closer and sat. “Would you like to sit up? Can she?” He asked Vincent that as the rockman filled the door.
To allow Willow and Maura to enter, Vincent inched in then went to the foot of her table. The two women looked both cautious and curious as they came over to her. Had she been that ill?
Locke was outside and had obviously decided to stay there. She smiled at him.
His nod was grim, as if he wasn’t sure she was alive. The room suddenly closed in on her, as if about to eat her. Her heart rattled out a higher pace.
“Fuck this. I’m sitting up.”
Someone lowered the railing, so that by the time she swung her legs over and dizzily sat upright, there was only the soft edge. Standing was next. Before anyone could think to deny her, she slipped off, landed on her feet, then pretty dramatically collapsed all over Rutger. The tubing that ran to her arm whipped about.
“What the hell,” she spluttered. “Who took my legs?”
The beaster hauled her higher onto his lap, calming her with words—as if she needed calming—and she heard Vargr pull the other chair in to sit beside them. She was calm, just pissed off. Now she had the whole damn room glaring at her.
“What?” She held up her arms, meaning to splay them outward in protest but they failed her and landed on her own lap. “Okay, fill me in some more. Why am I a ragdoll? Why are you all staring?”
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