by Michael Todd
No.
Wallace gritted his teeth and put himself into the altered mental state he entered when there was a task that needed to be done. Usually, it was something bigger, more violent, and more dramatic. In this case, it was simply to stand, but that made no difference. He would do it. He drew in a deep breath.
His legs felt half like they were returning, pins-and-needles, from cramp and sleep, and half like they had already been strained beyond endurance from running a marathon. He forced his brain to ignore the sensation and slowly, balanced himself and started to rise.
“Oops!” Marcus said and kicked him in the back of the knees again—much gentler, this time, but that was all it took. Wallace crumpled and fell face-first into the dirt. The mercenaries all laughed. Most seemed to have responded out of deliberate cruelty, but a couple of the laughs sounded relatively innocent—they simply hadn’t been able to not crack up at the ridiculous spectacle he had made of himself.
“Okay, okay, that’s enough,” Frankie interjected with a broad grin. Her tone was light and flippant. Chris had said something about how she didn’t seem to understand the reality of violence and pain and destruction, especially when it only applied to people other than herself. It was all merely a game to her.
“Listen, Erik,” she explained. “You probably think that we’re preparing to torture you for information or something like that. You probably think we need something from you and have some kind of…I dunno, a purpose for bringing you here.”
Wallace brought himself up onto his elbows so that at least his face didn’t rest on the ground. “I had considered the possibility,” he replied.
“Well,” she went on, “consider this. We have already won. We killed all your men and you’re basically dead already. That was our mission, by the way. We had the same orders you did. Kill everyone.”
“It would seem, then,” he responded, “that the mission is not yet complete since I’m still alive.”
Frankie snorted. “What will you do? Bite our ankles like that knight in the old British movie who gets his limbs chopped off? You’re really pretty stupid, actually. You don’t know when to quit.”
“So why haven’t you killed me yet?” Wallace asked.
“Because we have some spare time,” Frankie replied, as though this was obvious and he was a moron for not grasping it.
When all he did was stare blankly at her, she sighed and continued. “Because it’s fun. Like I said, we won—ahead of schedule, actually—and we don’t like you. And I, in particular, am really bored. When I served under Micky, he did most of the tedious leader stuff, and I got to have fun by infiltrating your base, pretending to flirt with Chris, and running around with that weirdo Pike. I got to kick ass and be a spy and all, while you were masturbating in your hospital cot or whatever, recovering from your injuries. Now, I have to mostly sit back at base and coordinate everything. It’s put me in a shitty mood.”
Wallace continued to stare at her. This woman was, he realized now, even worse than Chris has suggested. She wasn’t merely oblivious to the consequences of her own actions, she was a sociopath.
He didn’t exactly like the thought of having to endure whatever else she planned to do to him. But what really disturbed him was less the prospect of pain and death than the notion that his would be nothing but a way for someone to pass the time. It frightened him because he did not understand it. He had done terrible things to people but only when it was necessary. If he had to gouge out a man’s eye, shatter his kneecap, and put a few chunks of lead through his lungs, so be it. He had no idea, though, why anyone would want to do things like that only for the hell of it.
“You basically have no idea what’s going on here,” Frankie went on. “You’re a dumb grunt who does whatever you’re told, even when you’re continually told to do literally the same shit over and over. Which, in this case, is go back into this place on suicide mission after suicide mission. You simply say, ‘yes, sir,’ like it makes you awesome to do so. The guys who are sent with you all die because they at least realize that they’re supposed to die. But you are so stupid that you survive even when there’s no point in doing so. You’re a tool in someone else’s toolbox that’s getting rusty, so they might as well swing it at a tree or something until it breaks. Like I said, it’s fun. So even though you may not know when to quit, you are, finally, going to die here. It’s a pity, I guess, that you don’t even know why.”
Wallace coaxed a little cooperation from his atrophied legs and made up for them with the strength of his upper body. With a little effort, he finally managed to move himself from resting on his elbows up to his knees. It was a step in the right direction. He looked at Frankie.
“There are other people like me,” he said, “who will come and finish the job. I don’t know what vile scumbags you work for or what profit they hope to come by as a result of murdering U.S. soldiers in this place but I’m not as unique as you seem to think. Other men like me will clear people like you right the fuck out of here, and the Zoo itself will be turned back into a research project that will benefit all mankind.”
It felt good to say that. Those struck him as last words anyone could be proud of. Hopefully, she’d get pissed off and shoot him. He was finally starting to feel tired.
“Wow,” she replied, “that was really dumb. I don’t think you even realize how badly you just set yourself up.”
Wallace narrowed his eyes. “Enlighten me, then.”
“Okay. The ‘vile scumbags’ you refer to,” Frankie said, “are actually the same people who want to make this place into a research project. They’re willing to murder U.S. soldiers to do so. Because we work for Chris. Dr. Chris Lin. Your friend, who hired us after he went AWOL from you guys. We’re here, doing this now, because he paid us to.” She smiled.
Wallace suddenly felt like someone had stabbed him in the gut. But a kind of cold numbness radiated out from this invisible wound rather than a sharp, burning pain. “That’s bullshit,” he said in a weak voice.
“No, it isn’t. Chris isn’t the type of guy who knows a lot of private contractors and other scary people. The only one he ever really knew was me. So, here we are. He decided that all you guys were expendable, compared to Fruit-Spore Woman—who, if I remember correctly, also once thought you were expendable. Gosh, I’m so sorry to have to inform you of this before you die.”
The sergeant did not respond and she squinted intently at him. “What the hell is that?” She pointed at the small plate Jimmy had created as a separate piece over his shirt near the lower part of his chest and slightly left of center. Marcus and the others had missed it. “Ohhh,” she said. “Heart protection. Someone must have put it there to prevent your heart from being, uh, broken. Obviously, it failed.”
Wallace’s head lowered. His lips pressed too tightly together, his eyes felt a bit moist, and a lump had formed in his throat. He swallowed it with difficulty and forced himself back to calm and strength. Finally, he looked at her.
“You were right about one thing,” he said in a soft voice. “I do not…” He began to rise from his knees into a shaky, awkward squat. “Know when…” He bent forward and his legs began to straighten. Veins and sweat showed on his neck and forehead from the agony and immense strain. “To quit.”
He stood.
Marcus wiggled his eyebrows up and down as if not sure how to react. The other mercs watched with stony faces. Frankie stared at him with narrowed eyes and rolled her tongue around her teeth.
“Okay,” she said, “now you’re really annoying the shit out of me.” Her demeanor had changed, almost instantly, like a glass had cracked. “Your psych file said that a major betrayal would probably lead to a total mental breakdown.” She pouted again but this time, in genuine anger, disappointment, and indignation—like a teenage girl whose birthday party had been spoiled. “I had this really cool scenario pictured where all the life drained out of you and you would die tragically with us basically putting you out of your misery bec
ause we had already killed your soul, or whatever. You are fucking it up, okay?”
She really seemed upset now. Wallace continued to stand in silence.
Frankie stepped forward and, with admittedly impressive speed, accuracy, and power, punched him in the solar plexus. He crumpled but burst out laughing.
“Um, why are you laughing?” Frankie asked, her entire face a mask of confusion.
“I fell now,” he replied, “because you threw me off balance. My legs still don’t work that well.” He began, once again, to push to his elbows, then his knees. “It wasn’t actually all that strong a punch. I mean, I can tell that you have martial arts training, but at the end of the day…” He stood again, a little quicker this time. “Your half of the species, well…simply doesn’t have the upper-body strength.”
“Yeah, well,” Frankie retorted and her eyes blazed and clouded in turn with anger and confusion. The rules of the game she played had changed and no one had told her. “Your, uh, lower body, is…” She turned away in disgust and, perhaps, embarrassment. “Still pretty useless. Marcus!”
“Yes?” the Scandinavian piped up.
“Kill him.”
Marcus blinked. Wallace wasn’t there. Instead, during the brief moment when both Frankie and he were distracted, the sergeant had done the impossible. He’d run.
Chapter Eleven
The pain that assaulted Wallace with each step was frightening. It wasn’t simply that it hurt—although it hurt a hell of a lot—it was the fact that his body wasn’t even meant to do this in the first place. At least not since his injury or until he actually recovered.
There was a feeling of physical wrongness to it, a sense that he forced something to happen that was unnatural or borderline impossible. As if, he thought wildly, he held his body vertical but upside-down and tried to run on his fingertips. Or maybe as if he tried to make his limbs bend the wrong way without breaking them. He almost sobbed with the enormity of it. That, however, would have made noise.
“He went this way. Get him!” Marcus screamed from somewhere behind—and not very far behind, either.
Wallace had bolted in approximately the same direction from which Marcus and the other mercs had brought him when they approached Frankie’s camp. At least, he was reasonably certain he had. He’d been blindfolded, but it was a firm habit of his to always orient himself direction-wise as best he could.
Aside from that, he had no idea where he was or where the hell he was going.
Downhill was obvious, away from the mesa-like area of the camp. The pull of gravity helped him increase speed but also put even more strain on the coordination of his feeble legs. They could barely keep up with how fast the earth wanted him to go, and he had very little muscular power with which to resist or control the urge.
He also had no weapons, no food, no water, and no badass cybernetic suit. Only his clothes, the small heart plate, and a mere human body that functioned at about sixty percent—maybe seventy percent capacity, at best. And they were definitely in pursuit. Behind him, leaves and branches rustled and boots clomped the bare earth.
There was one other thing he did have, however, still clutched it in his hand. He held it up briefly to look at it. A closed-line, closed-circuit communications device, much like a phone but more like an old walkie-talkie. Frankie used to have one on her belt until he’d swiped it when she’d punched him.
Notwithstanding his pain and barely-controlled fear, he allowed himself a grim smile. Oh, would she ever be pissed when she found this thing missing. He hooked it securely onto his own belt and pressed on.
Marcus and his thugs were close behind and would catch up to him soon. He had already amazed himself by being able to run this far, especially in the state he was in, but he would not be able to keep it up. Already, his legs felt like they were about to break off.
They would, of course, kill him on sight. At this point, Frankie simply wanted him dead. He’d spoiled her fun and she wanted to put him into the ground amidst the maggots as soon as possible. Then, she could go home and spend her new and probably bloated paycheck on a new elite, military-looking beret and show it off at a nightclub or something. As soon as the tattooed Scandinavian or the mustachioed Texan or the tall lanky grim-faced black guy caught sight of him, they would spray him with bullets and walk over to his twitching body to fire an extra round or two into his head. And that would be the end of it.
There was no way he could put up anything close to an honorable fight. Either he escaped them, right now, or he died like a dog—even less gracefully than the men and women of his unit. At least they’d all put up a damn good fight at the end.
“Ha, ha!” Marcus exclaimed behind, his high voice higher still with the sound of triumph. “Here are his tracks.”
Wallace pushed through some vegetation and suddenly, his feet splashed into water. He’d reached the stream they’d driven through on the way to Frankie’s camp and most likely where they’d slowed down to ford it. And where, Wallace now recalled, Marcus had advised the Texan to be careful of one of the large, man-eating vines.
He studied his surroundings hastily. Part of the body of the vine in question ran along the base of the stream. It writhed slightly and pulsated in place as the water flowed past it. He could see its thick, snake-like trunk sagging like a loose power cable between the branches of the understory above.
It was, he realized, a particularly brilliant solution.
“Down to the stream!” Marcus shouted and the sergeant tensed. They were almost there.
Wallace took a few steps beside the stream and grabbed a fallen, mostly-dead branch, about three feet long. He poked his unwitting vegetative accomplice and sloshed the stick around in the water for good measure. The vine began to move.
He leaned left and managed something between a tumble and somersault to fall onto his hands and use his strong upper body to swing himself aside and behind a tree. His thin, wasted legs made almost no noise as they followed his momentum and landed with a dull thud. He grabbed the tree and hauled himself onto his feet.
The business end of the carnivorous vine descended. Its deceptive, flower-like face opened and its lips parted to reveal its teeth, as it looked—or listened, or smelled, or whatever it did—for the potential prey that had triggered it. The mouth swooped gently to the side and now faced away from Wallace.
The sergeant pulled himself forward and, using his arms as much as possible to compensate for his legs, lurched directly toward it.
The creeper started to turn back as his outspread arms closed around what he thought of as its neck—close to the head the way one would catch a snake—and gripped it firmly so that it could not simply turn on him. It moved from side to side, slowly but powerfully, in an effort to shake him off but he held firm. The vine was incredibly strong. It truly was like some gigantic python. Thoroughly trapped, it seemed to panic and retreated into the understory of the forest, taking Wallace with it. The stream grew smaller beneath him, and leaves and branches high up in the trees enveloped him.
His head spun and his stomach lurched uncomfortably. He saw his opportunity when he glided past a large, thick branch and, holding his breath, he released the vine and grabbed hold of the limb. It shuddered and dipped downward, but only slightly, and settled. The carnivorous vine had disappeared. In confusion and defeat, perhaps, it did not try to find him again. It must have been too primitive a life form to actually hunt and could only wait for some other organism to spring its simple trap.
Below him, the mercs halted at the edge of the stream. Wallace clung to his perch and looked down but could barely see them through the dense foliage.
“He was here,” Marcus said to his goons.
“The tracks don’t continue on the other edge of the stream,” the Texan pointed out. “He must’ve gone down. Water hides tracks. An old trick but a pretty good one.”
“Which way?” the leader asked.
“Probably downstream,” replied the other.
“We will get the bikes. He is crippled and cannot have gone far. Duval, you stay here and watch in case he is hiding and doubles back.” Marcus, the Texan, and two other men ran back to camp and left the tall black man as lookout.
Wallace breathed as softly as he could as relative silence returned to this part of the jungle. Duval stood with his Russian automatic rifle in hand and glanced around him. Occasionally, he glanced upward but knowing that his quarry could barely use his legs, he did not look high enough. The soldier knew he ought to be safe for now, so long as he did not specifically alert them to his presence. His desperate and crazy gamble might have paid off. Just maybe.
After a moment, engines revved and roared and three of the motorbikes hurtled down the incline. They stopped at the edge of the water.
“You two, take the opposite bank,” Marcus ordered and gestured at Duval and one of the riders. “We will overtake him and squeeze him from both sides.”
One bike crossed the stream and the other two stayed on the camp side. Slowly, the rumble and growl of the mechanized pursuit faded away.
Wallace blew air out of his lungs with a strong sense of disbelief. There was no particular reason why he should still be alive, but he was.
Chapter Twelve
It wouldn’t take long for them to realize that Wallace had not, in fact, fled downstream. He had to act before they came back, figured out where he was, and amused themselves with various attempts to coax him out of the tree like firefighters rescuing a cat. Or, he reasoned, they could simply set the tree on fire.
Several vines grew between the large branch he clung to and another about three feet away. These were not the giant, man-eating variety but normal plants—or as close to normal as anything in this place could be, anyway. They looked fairly flexible and not taut. At the same time, he suspected they would do a halfway decent job of holding his weight rather than simply snapping. Good. Still, it was a risky way to get down.