by Noah Fregger
“With my freedom,” she began, “I will get breakfast tomorrow.”
She smiled big and Mohammad couldn’t keep from laughing.
Then, to his surprise, she laughed too. He’d never heard it before–so real and genuine. It was lovely.
“I would like that, Radia,” he admitted. “Believe me, I want nothing more than for you to be fr …”
Radia raised her hand, silencing him, then turned her head and stared off into nothingness.
“What’s wr…”
“Shhh!” She silenced him again.
And with further conversation off the docket at the moment, Mohammad, too, pressed his ear to the morning’s stillness … and heard nothing. He looked at Radia as her eyes widened. She grabbed his wrist just as the door to the maintenance mezzanine burst open, spilling sunshine down onto the stairwell. The shadows of men lingered just beyond–the wispy predecessors of their intruders.
Radia tore Mohammad from his seat as they left the simmering pigeons behind. He followed her past the corrugator and into the forest of rolled paper, climbing up until they reached the nest.
And there–all his weapons were gone.
“Lumin!” Mohammad spat through clenched teeth.
The men were already within the plant. He could hear their voices and footsteps, the sound of one as he called them out.
Radia pointed to the hatch. Up.
But then what? We’ll die if we leave the building.
Radia jumped up the ladder and spun the wheel on the hatch, locking it in place.
It then lifted just enough that a slice of light could seep in from beneath. The hatch shook violently above them as the locking mechanism held it shut–the struggles of someone on the roof. It ceased as Mohammad heard the man say, “We gotta hatch up here, but it’s locked.”
“Alright, keep your eye on it.” The latter voice came from two places simultaneously: one from inside the plant and the other from the roof. “Someone is definitely here.”
They’re using two-way radios.
Now the roof was out of the question as they remained weaponless on the nest. They could make a run for the guns. Lumin must have taken them into the boiler room again. They could make it there, but Mohammad doubted they could make it back without being seen. They could stay where they were, wait it out on the nest, but he hated feeling like a sitting duck.
“I’m faster,” Radia whispered. “I’ll get the guns. Meet you here.”
“Radia … ”
“No time.” She leapt from the nest and ran toward the boiler room, her footsteps hardly audible as she disappeared behind the concrete partition.
“Shit.”
The hunter picked up the bird, tearing flesh from its bones.
Delicious.
There were two seats surrounding the grilling station–fire still burning, pigeons still cooking.
They’d earned their way in with a make-shift grappling hook to the building’s wall. Five men remained on the roof as the hunter entered the plant with Jackson and Rick. Kyle and Kevin came down, close behind.
“Come on out!” the hunter beckoned, rifle in hand.
With the exception of the sheets of day coming in from the skylights, the place was doused in deep shadow. Huge cylinders of paper blocked every apparent exit as the aisles were lined with towers of flattened, corrugated board.
The hunter signaled Jackson to follow the largest machine all the way to the end of the building as Rick stayed left, inspecting the smaller machines running perpendicular to it. The place was congested with all kinds of conveyors, infinite places for hybrids to hide.
His radio suddenly blared to life, Beetlejuice on its other end. “We gotta hatch up here, but it’s locked.”
He held down the receiver. “Alright, keep your eye on it … Someone is definitely here.” The hunter noticed a thin layer of dust layering the surface of the entire floor. He switched on his flashlight to examine it. “There she is,” he whispered, seeing that same female foot print from outside, along with a man’s.
There are at least three here: a man, a woman, and a female hybrid.
With his rifle trained ahead, he followed the prints. There were many–days and days’ worth of walking this same path back and forth. There was a routine, a schedule, and the hunter had just interrupted breakfast.
He held down the receiver again. “They’re at the north end of the plant, Jackson, right in front of you.”
Just then shots rang out through the building, Jackson’s voice booming a moment later. “Gotta hybrid over here!” he shouted. “She just ran into this room on the right!”
“Kyle, Kevin, go give Jackson a hand over there! Rick, come meet me center aisle!”
Both brothers flew past as Rick came to his side. With the hybrid cornered, that only left the man and the woman–both could be heavily armed, waiting beyond the partition to pick them off. So the hunter would take Rick and go around, placing them at the center of a pincer attack.
Raydea locked eyes with the man just before he fired, the pale-one’s projectiles embedding into the concrete beyond her running body. His skin was dark, even darker than Mohamyd’s, his eyes brighter in contrast. They looked to be on fire.
Unscathed, she leapt into the boiler room and climbed the piping to find Lumyn hiding in her upper shadows … without a weapon in sight.
“Guns!” Raydea shouted, shaking her. “Where are the guns?!”
Lumyn only stared blankly back at her. But there was no time. The dark pale-one had already entered with another two at his side. Raydea lowered herself, crawling away from Lumyn, as the men below searched for her, combing the shadows with beams of light at the death’s-end of their weapons.
Raydea couldn’t look at them directly; her irises would give her away in an instant.
Mohammad heard gunfire almost as soon as Radia went to retrieve the weapons. They’d missed her, luckily; at least they thought they did. There was still a chance she could survive. Radia had better aim than even him.
Mohammad heard the voices of multiple men as they followed her into the boiler room–where the seconds seemed to drag for all eternity. Then a gunshot rang out, and another, along with the sound of a falling body. His knuckles tightened as it echoed through the building–the violence of metal upon flesh, then the final smack of asphalt, like the popping of a great balloon. But their rejoicing was the worst sound of all.
Mohammad could no longer wait. He had to find a way to defend his home. He lifted himself to the hatch, unlocking it slowly, and lifted it just a quarter inch. There he found the boots of a man, his heels toward him. Throwing open the hatch, Mohammad grabbed the man’s belt and yanked him inside.
“Whuda f…” the man started to shout, the edge of the hatch silencing him instantly. He hit the nest completely limp as a pool of dark blood began seeping out the back of his skull.
Mohammad jumped down, retrieved the man’s rifle and aimed it back up at the open hatch; but the blue morning’s sky was the only thing to cross it for several seconds. He reached down, swiping the man’s radio; and judging by the rate the blood was escaping his body, Mohammad doubted he’d be waking up again.
If Mohammad could take back the roof, he could cover the intruders’ only exit. He could take back the entire plant at the bottleneck above the mezzanine. He climbed the first rungs, gaining vantage point at roof level. Below the ducting he saw four pairs of feet at various distances. He had to be quick; but he knew this roof better than they did.
They were in his jungle.
He leapt from the hatch, closing it behind him, and targeted the first. Mohammad sent the man spinning with a shot to the head. The rifle was louder than he liked, instantly earning him the attention of the other three.
Off guard, the next fumbled momentarily with his weapon–the very second that cost him his life.
But the other two would be more of a challenge. Already they’d taken cover; but Mohammad was on the move, yards away from where his
previous shots were fired. He rounded a roof blower, discovering one of them behind the ducting. Single shot; and he went on.
Bullets then carved the air in his direction, ricocheting off metals as Mohammad fell to his side.
“Beetlejuice, what’s going on up there?!” The radio blared to life. “Beetlejuice!”
Beetlejuice is bleeding out on the nest right now. Leave a message.
Mohammad caught the final man in the ankle as he flopped over, receiving an additional two in the chest.
“Beetlejuice!”
Mohammad rose, pressing down the receiver. “Your men are dead.”
A brief silence hung thereafter. “Who is this?”
Mohammad thought for a moment, then responded. “The rifleman.”
“Rifleman?” the voice on the other end chuckled. “Well, I’m the hunter … and I assure you, Rifleman, the pleasure is all mine.”
10
Regards
They shot Lumyn!
Raydea had to watch in horror as they sent her flailing off the piping. She looked down at her–Lumyn’s limbs twisted and mangled, bits of her hair caught on sharpened angles.
Raydea discovered her hand clasped over her mouth, her tears coming to gather atop it–all she could do to keep from screaming.
The dark pale-one removed a knife, readying to slice off Lumyn’s right hand, when there was gunfire on the roof. The three pale-ones stopped, looking at one another, before they all vacated in a hurry.
“Mohamyd,” Raydea whispered. But she couldn’t leave without a weapon. She was lucky just to make it to the boiler room.
Where did you hide the weapons, Lumyn?
But the secret died with her, one that could ultimately bring Raydea and Mohamyd to join her in death as well.
Then Raydea heard more gunfire. It was so crisp, so clear, just above her. Looking up, she found a four-bladed object suspended in a void. The space was just large enough for her to fit, if she could reach. It would require a jump. Hopefully she’d land gracefully, were she to miss.
Raydea threw herself upward, catching one of the blades, and lifted herself up and into the void. A rounded door swung slightly above her and she pushed it open, finding the bright sky beyond. It stung her eyes as she climbed over and let the door fall shut behind her.
Raydea was now within an enclosed box on the roof, the day finding its way in through a metal grate on the top. She was well concealed there.
More shots fired–and then she heard Mohamyd’s voice in the distance. She pressed her palms to the grate and pushed; but it did nothing to allow her exit. She pushed again, harder–still nothing. She could feel the tremors of footsteps as someone approached, the shadow of their face as they eclipsed the sky.
“Rayd…!” Her name seemed to catch in his throat as Mohamyd appeared above her. “Raydea.” He fell upon the metal void. “Are you okay?”
She nodded, new tears forming at the sight of him.
“Look away, Radia,” he said, shooting the heads off the four bolts keeping her locked in the blower housing.
She began to push it open when he put his weight on it.
“No, Radia,” he said. “Stay here. I’ll come back for you.” He paused for a moment to look over his shoulder, toward the mezzanine the hunter would be coming through. “But if I don’t, Radia … you wait here and you leave tonight.”
With tears welling in her eyes, she nodded in understanding.
“Good.” Mohammad felt his own emotions beginning to stir, the tightening of his throat around his tongue as he spoke that last word. But now wasn’t the time to worry about goodbyes. He’d probably killed half their men already. Now surely more were coming, coming to meet the rifleman atop his roof.
He swapped his magazine for a full one, waiting for the rest to come through the mezzanine on his hunt.
But the white door never moved.
They must be waiting him out on the inside.
And then there was pain–intense pain–like a shard of glass through his midsection. Mohammad tried to cry out, but a hand came quick to choke it back. He was thrown violently, the knife removed from his side, as his rifle came loose from his grip. He landed, clutching his wound, his hands becoming moist with blood.
“The rifleman, I presume?” A man asked, standing over him. It was the same voice from the radio, the man who referred to himself as the hunter–the one who stood on the hybrid grave a week before. He brought his boot hard into Mohammad’s stomach, sending him to wrench forward, the taste of blood on his lips. “You killed five of my men, Rifleman.” He came to kneel beside him. “That’s eight men I’ve lost on your property.”
Mohammad coughed violently, the sensation of blood beginning to trickle from the corner of his mouth.
“Now where is the woman, Rifleman?” The hunter tangled his fist in Mohammad’s hair as another man came to stand beside him. And from the floor Mohammad could feel the footsteps of others coming.
“There is no woman,” Mohammad mumbled. “You already killed the hybrid.”
“Don’t lie to me, Rifleman!” he said, extending a finger to Mohammad’s nose. “I’m not talking about the hybrid. I’m talking about the girl who killed three of my men.”
“There … is no woman,” Mohammad repeated, receiving the hunter’s fist to the jaw.
“You almost had me there, Rifleman,” the hunter said, shaking the pain from his knuckles. “Thank God for Beetlejuice; his blood ran all the way to the floor. Even in death he served me well.” The hunter pressed his boot to the side of Mohammad’s face. “Nice little hideout you got here, Rifleman. Now I’m gonna ask you one last time. Where … is … the … woman?”
“There … is no wom…” Mohammad’s words were cut short by a man’s sudden shrieking, prompting the hunter to remove the boot he had pressed to his face. The screams were coming from a large black man, trying to free himself from something wrapped around his torso.
It was Radia.
She was shrieking, too, between the mouth-fulls of flesh being ripped from the man’s neck and shoulder.
“Holy Christ!” the hunter shouted, the others raising their weapons.
The man, bulky as he was, was unable to get a grip on Radia to pull her off. “Shoot her!” he was screaming. “Shoot her!”
But then she was gone, jumping free from the large man as she took cover behind a run of ducting. They opened fire as she moved, losing her behind the immensity of metallic cover.
“Hold your fire!” the hunter shouted. “Hold your fucking fire!”
The three men obliged, lowering their weapons.
The hunter knelt again, patting Mohammad on the shoulder. “This one is all mine.”
The hunter followed his prey as she wove the industrial setting, droplets of blood being left in her wake. The hunter, at first, believed them to be from Jackson, dripping off her lips as she’d had her teeth within his skin; but he’d come to find this was not the case.
The hybrid was injured. And she was slowing down.
The traces of blood were becoming more abundant, the bare patches between scrap becoming larger as she propelled herself forward with increased difficulty. She was practically crawling. The hunter lowered his weapon, walking casually, slightly disappointed that his men wounded her so soon.
“Pitty,” he said, finding her beneath the shade of ducting. Her eyes were closed, but her chest moved with signs of strained respiration. “I suppose you are the very last.” He raised his weapon. “Time to end your suffering.”
“Ty … tired,” the hybrid spoke.
He lowered the gun. “What?”
“Tired,” she repeated, licking the blood along her lips. “So … tired.”
The hunter squinted. “You can talk?”
She opened her eyes to look at him, and he her in return, from her sopping midsection to the shoes on her feet.
“It was you,” he realized. “You killed those three.”
She nodded, swallowing hard. �
�You hunted us … and I … hunted you.” The hybrid closed her eyes again.
This one, this one was an anomaly, now capable of speech–had become more human than any other he’d come across. She was the epitome of everything he worked so hard to avoid. The hunter would not come to see them be recognized as equal, would never witness the abomination that would be their offspring. There would be no more masquerade, he’d seen to it. She was the last, the final nail in the hybrid coffin.
“Farewell, Hybrid.” He lifted his weapon once more, finger firm against the trigger. “My regards to your race.”
Minutes had passed, and still Mohammad heard not a single gunshot. The other men loomed over him, looking off into the direction of the hunter, while the large man cursed extensively on account of Radia’s feasting on his neck. He was holding an article of clothing to it, the gleam of blood traveling down his arm.
She got away, Mohammad was telling himself. She escaped.
“This is quite irregular, Boys.” The hunter came to break the silence. “But the hybrid’s got something it wishes to say.”
To his horror, Mohammad found Radia flung over the hunter’s shoulder upon his return. He knelt to place her on the floor beside him.
“Radia.”
Her eyes were closed, face bare, almost peaceful.
“Radia,” Mohammad said again, her name catching in his throat; but even beneath his tears, he could make out the beauty of her green eyes as she opened them.
“I’m … sorry,” she said, lifting her hand to rest on his cheek. “I couldn’t … just watch you die.”
“Radia.”
“Thank you,” she smiled. “Without you … I wouldn’t have known … ”
“Raydea.” Mohamyd was calling to her; but everything seemed so distant now. She was saying something as well, but there was a word she didn’t know. Everything began to escape her, slipping through the confines of an exhausted mind.
“Thank you,” she heard herself say again.
But sleep was coming–a deep sleep, one she couldn’t resist any longer. And in it she found those rolling, distant hills, the warmth of the sun as it fell upon her face.