Radioactive Evolution

by Richard Hummel

  “Thank you, Scarlet. That means a lot to me. I’ve never encountered hostile explorers before and I…well, I didn’t think something like this would happen.”

  Jared resumed his search through their gear and found a half-depleted battery pack for his phase pistol. Since none of them had phase weapons, they’d either stolen or found the battery during their escapades.

  After searching through their gear, he leaned against the wall, letting the coolness of the stone seep into his back. The crowded room quickly becoming stuffy, and he wished there were some windows to generate a cross-breeze. Another thirty minutes passed before anyone stirred. The three Jared knocked unconscious were the first to recover, followed by Iliana. Jared worried that Scarlet underestimated her strength and permanently injured the last member of the party since he was still unconscious, but aside from a dislocated jaw, he looked fine.

  The tied-up intruders quickly realized their predicament and started squirming to free themselves.

  “Don’t move, try nothing, and you make it out of this alive,” Jared warned. “Iliana claims you came to explore the city for supplies, yet the moment you saw me, you abandoned that plan and followed me. Now, Iliana was already kind enough to spill the beans that you’d rob me and leave me defenseless, but I want to know why.”

  The three explorers glared at Iliana, promising retribution for giving away their plans, and she tried to defend herself. “I-I-It w-wasn’t m-my f-f-fault. She read my mind.”

  Jared saw doubt and skepticism in their eyes as they darted a glance at Scarlet. Though none of their gazes lingered on her, and Jared didn’t blame them. Scarlet stood on all fours, her horns and the spikes brushing the ceiling. A menacing expression cowed them into cooperation.

  “Answer me!” Jared cocked the hammer back on his Colt. “You’d better start talking. From my perspective, you’re just a group of thieves stealing from those who can’t defend themselves. Worse, it’s five against one.”

  Jared felt sick to his stomach. He hated acting like this and that he was holding humans hostage. His parents taught him to value life above all else, no matter who that person was. It’s the same reason he’d never fought back against Tiny when he was a kid. If these thieves knew the turmoil in his mind, they’d try to attack and subdue him. Breathing deeply to calm his nerves, Jared repeated his question, clipping each word to make sure they got the point.

  “Why. Are. You. Here?”

  “We were just exploring the city!” Iliana exclaimed. “I wasn’t lying when I told you that. We’ve been exploring every city from Florida up the East Coast.”

  “Following me is not exploring the city, and it doesn’t explain why you wanted to steal from me,” countered Jared.

  “I already told you! I was just curious. I saw you walking around with—with that thing. I’ve seen nothing like her before and I thought—” Iliana stopped speaking.

  “Thought what?” Jared pressed, letting his rage bubble to the surface. “Thought you’d waltz in here and pull your weapon on her? Kill her? Steal all my gear? Take the only things keeping me alive out here?” Jared narrowed his eyes and clenched his fist in anger.

  “With that creature by your side, I thought maybe you were from the city.”

  “Do I look like I’m from the city?” Jared retorted. “Look at me! I’m hardly a display of good fortune. My gear is falling apart, and the only reason I have clean clothes is that I found some in a sealed container beneath the city just this morning.”

  “But your phase—”

  “Which I also found,” interrupted Jared. “Yes, I found it. Me!”

  A muffled voice gurgled across the room and Jared turned to look at the speaker.

  “Loch!” Iliana exclaimed and tried to move to his side.

  “Stop!” Jared yelled. “No one moves. Got it?”

  Loch tried boring holes through Jared with his gaze. Jared humored him, stared right back, and raised his revolver. He had to give the guy credit, Loch didn’t flinch in the slightest with a weapon pointed at his head. Either he’d been in situations like this before or he was a superb actor. Based on Iliana’s performance earlier, perhaps it was the latter. Finally, Loch consented and motioned for Iliana to speak.

  Iliana narrowed her eyes at him, clearly outraged at not being able to tend to her comrade. To appease her somewhat, Jared said, “If none of you try to escape and you answer my questions, you will walk away from this alive. That is a promise whether you believe me or not. My quarrel is not with other explorers.”

  “Let me look at his jaw,” said Iliana.

  “Not yet. You’ll answer my questions first. He’s not bleeding. He’ll survive.”

  Frustrated, Iliana returned to her seated position and began telling their story.

  “We are—”

  “Wait.” Jared held up his hand.

  “What are you—”

  “I said wait!” Jared repeated.

  Scarlet, I want you to tell me if she’s lying.

  She must touch me again.

  “Iliana, please come next to Scarlet and place your hand on her,” Jared commanded. “And no, I won’t untie your feet. You can squirm your way over.”

  Iliana grunted and growled in frustration.

  “Look, you should’ve thought twice about crossing me, especially after you found out I have a dragon.” Jared enunciated the word to emphasize his point. He couldn’t believe she’d wanted to confront a dragon given their intentions to steal from him.

  They must be desperate, thought Jared. Scarlet, when Iliana told us about only having one and a half months left for her injection, was she telling us the truth?

  Scarlet hesitated. She was. I don’t—

  I don’t understand either. They clearly had enough in their packs, so I’m not sure why she didn’t use one. We need to figure out what’s going on here.

  While Jared and Scarlet held their silent conversation, Iliana wormed her way across the floor and hesitantly placed her hand on Scarlet.

  “Remember Iliana. You cannot lie to her. I want to know your whole story, starting with your names.” Iliana looked at Loch again, but Jared raised the revolver, demanding that she continue.

  “Don’t look at him, look at me.”

  “All right, call down!” Iliana said, holding her bound hands up in a placating gesture. “My name is Iliana Harle, the man your dragon hit is Loch, my brother.” She mimed air quotes at the mention of dragon, and Jared smirked at her denial. If they pissed Scarlet off enough, they’d learn a hard lesson.

  “The big guy there is Jon Davis, the silent one is Lee Sakumota, and then you have Rob O’Neille.” Iliana pointed out each person as she introduced them. “We’ve been exploring cities all the way from Florida up the East Coast.”

  “You said that already. Tell me why and what you want with my injectors when you already have more than enough for the five of you.” Iliana darted her eyes at Loch once again.

  Jared sighed in irritation. “No, don’t look at Loch. If you try to lie, Scarlet will detect it, and Loch gets a round through the head. Do we understand each other?” Jared raised the gun again and Iliana nodded her head.

  “We’ve been looking for my nanite injections, weapons, and ammunition for our fraternity,” explained Iliana.

  “That symbol on your neck? That’s for your fraternity?”

  “Yes, we call ourselves the Daggers.”

  “How many of you are there?” Jared grew concerned thinking there might be more of them in the area. “Better yet, how many of you are here right now? In this city.”

  “There are forty-three of us, but only the five of us came north. Another party went west, but the bulk of our people are back at the camp in the northern part of Florida.”

  “Camp? You don’t live in a colony?”

  “Many of us are exiles of the colon
ies,” she replied.

  Jared grew alarmed, and it must’ve shown in his face because Iliana was quick to add.

  “Whoa, Whoa, calm down. It’s not what you think! The leaders at our colony think everyone should work for the greater good of the colony and that means helping with resource harvesting to keep a steady supply of needed items and injectors coming from the cities. When we refused to help and instead set out to explore, they told us to never come back, and they would no longer give us anything, injectors included. That’s how most of us ended up exiled, because we wanted adventure.”

  “So, what? You plan to use the weapons and ammo to go after your colony?” Jared’s voice turned menacing as he thought about these people taking the lives of other humans. Jared exhaled, calming himself, and motioned for Iliana to continue.

  “We want to take the fight above.”

  Scarlet, is she telling the truth?

  Yes, she told the truth, but I can tell she is holding information back.

  “You want to attack the free cities? How? No one’s ever even been to one. They’d shoot you before you got close. Plus, how do you plan to get up there?” Jared was incredulous. These people thought they could attack a city floating in the middle of nowhere.

  “I can’t tell you.”

  Jared held up a hand. “I’d think very hard about the next words out of your mouth.”

  Nervously, she turned to Loch who considered Jared. After a long, pregnant pause, he motioned for Iliana to continue.

  Looking flustered, Iliana said, “We know when the drop ships will be at our colony and plan to ambush them.”

  It was Jared’s turn to look shocked. “You want to take out a drop ship?”

  “Not take one out. Capture it, so we can use it to get to the city.”

  “And you don’t think they’ll notice a captured ship? They’ll blast it out of the sky!” Jared said, incredulity laced in every word.

  “We’ll force the pilot to—”

  “What if these pilots can interact with the ship using nanites? What if they send a warning you don’t know about, and a boarding party is ready to shoot you as soon as you land?”

  “We have no other options!” The desperation in her voice was all Jared needed to hear to know she told the truth. For good measure, he asked Scarlet and she confirmed. He just shook his head at the audacity of these people. They thought they could commandeer a ship, and then make it back to a free city. It was insane.

  “Well, that is not an option unless you want to commit suicide, but you know what? I don’t even care. I thought we could help each other out, but I can see that’s not likely to happen. Move back over to the others.” Jared pointed to the other side of the room.

  After she’d taken her place, he tossed all of their gear and weapons outside the room.

  “What are you doing?” They all shouted and wriggled on the ground. Jared reminded them of their predicament, pulled his phase pistol, and fired a warning round into the ground next to their feet. Chips of concrete chips sprayed the tied-up explorers hard enough to inflict pain.

  Oops.

  Jared hadn’t meant to harm them. He only wanted to show them that he wasn’t messing around and that he’d do what was necessary. Secretly, his mind railed at him in opposition to his current actions.

  “If you need another reminder, the next shot takes out someone’s leg. We’ll see how far you get when you need to carry that brute over there.” Jared pointed at Jon, eliciting an angry growl from the meathead.

  “Listen up. I’m only going to say this once, and then I hope to never see you all again. Your gear, weapons, and ammo are going outside. I’ll only take what I can use and leave the rest. The boosters? I’ve no need of them, so you get to keep those. Don’t mistake my generosity for kindness. I’m just not in the habit of preying on my own kind.” Jared bit out the words, showing his displeasure at their immoral behavior. “I’ll then barricade you in here and release you when I’m ready. If anyone tries to escape before then, I’ll shoot without hesitation.”

  Jared paused to make sure they understood the situation and his instructions.

  “Got it?”

  Everyone nodded their heads in agreement, and Jared left the room. He grabbed the biggest piece of concrete he could find and propped it against the entryway. He also took a couple of smaller pieces and stacked them on top to make it harder for them to get out.

  I can sense their fear.

  Jared looked at Scarlet to see her staring at the room. “You can sense them from here?”

  Yes. They may not show it, but once you put that barricade in front of the door I felt a sharp stab of fear from them.

  Jared felt a little bad, but then thought about their willingness to harm Scarlet, and those feelings evaporated.

  “They deserve to suffer a little after what they put us through.”

  For what it’s worth, I did not sense hostility from all of them. Loch and Iliana appeared...reluctant. I think they had no choice.

  Jared paused. “We didn’t find out why they can’t use the injectors they already have.” Jared contemplated going back in to ask the question but thought better of it. It didn’t change anything anyway. The two of them needed to get far from this place, and these Daggers.

  Jared upended the packs, took any ammo he could use for his Colt, and a couple first aid kits.

  “I think we’ve done all we can here, Scarlet. Let’s get moving.”

  What about them?

  “Eventually they’ll tire of waiting and push their way out. I want to be far enough away by then they won’t find us.”

  We may want to find out more about their fraternity. If they really plan to go against the cities, we could use their help.

  “At what cost, though? I won’t go up against anyone in the colonies. If they attempt to capture a drop ship, innocents will die. The leaders of a colony will want to protect that ship at all costs, because it’s their livelihood. Without regular supplies from the cities, the colony dies.”

  Jared, Scarlet’s voice sounded cold, harsh. You must get past your refusal to harm another human. At the very least, we will face off against them in the cities, but if we run into more people like these mercenaries here, you will need to get your hands dirty.

  “When the time comes, I’ll do what I must, but I won’t condone killing innocent people to exact our vengeance. We’d be no better than the cities.”

  Are they innocent? You heard what Iliana said. They exiled them and denied them injectors. They prey on those weaker than themselves, as evidenced here.

  “Did they steal though? Or, would they have done so purely because I had these phase pistols? As for their exile, maybe it was just that simple and they only wanted to explore?”

  You just made my point. We must learn more about this fraternity.

  “We could follow them to their camp and verify their story? After we find their camp, we can head south to the colony they came from and ask questions. Maybe they’ll allow me to enter if I’m not there for nanites.”

  We will need allies in the fight to come, and these people, though unsavory, might be willing to help.

  “All right, I get it. We’ll follow them, but if I find out they’re willing to hurt—or kill—people in the colonies for no other reason than to achieve a desired end, I won’t work with them. In fact, I’ll label them as an enemy.”

  Agreed.

  “So how do you propose we follow them? They have at least one rifle with a scope on it here. I could bring it with, but it’s bulky, and my pack is already nearing capacity.”

  I will fly!

  Scarlet’s voice held an edge of excitement and Jared knew she couldn’t wait to soar through the sky.

  “Let’s move away from here first. Once you can fly, circle back and keep an eye on the group. I’m guessing they will a
bandon their plans to search this city and instead head back to their camp.”

  Jared and Scarlet walked for at least two hours before he felt certain they were far enough away. The area Jared chose was flat, open, and lifeless. It seemed like the perfect place for Scarlet to try flying.

  “You’re up!”

  Scarlet eagerly opened her beautiful wings. They shone with ruby brilliance as the sun beat upon them. Scarlet spent several minutes flapping her wings and stretching them to their limits. Then, without warning, she bunched her legs and thrust into the air with a massive beat of her wings. The dust swirled around him, creating small cyclones. At first, she hovered in place bobbing up and down. Then, the speed of her wings increased, and she rose into the air.

  Yes! Scarlet cried out in joy.

  Jared imagined the exhilaration. The feeling of the wind whipping around her. He couldn’t wait until she could bear the weight of them both. She rose higher into the sky before she tucked in her wings, straightened her tail and thrust forward. She shot through the air for hundreds of yards and then flared her wings to stop in midair where she resumed the steady flapping. It sounded like a rhythmic thump, even from this distance.

  Scarlet, can you hear me?

  I can.

  See how high you can go before we lose mental connection. Hopefully, you can fly high enough they won’t be able to hear you above them.

  I can see the ruined statue and city from here. I believe they are still inside.

  Scarlet flew higher into the sky until he could barely make out her form. If he hadn’t watched her ascent, there’s no way he’d see her up there.

  Can you find some place for me to wait? Maybe someplace that has some shade?

  There is an outcropping a mile to the east. I will keep watch, though I do not know how long I can maintain flight at the moment. When I tire, I will let you know.

  Jared walked to the outcropping Scarlet had observed, a barren and dusty area, but at least he’d have a reprieve from the sun while they waited. Hopefully, the party was impatient and would leave the room soon. It wasn’t a good idea to remain out in the open like this at night, even if they could see in the dark.