Into the Wild

by Larry Correia

  “Since Acosta survived, I don’t think it’s Morrow you should be praising here, sir.” Rains grinned. “No sign of the skinwalkers. I think they fell back once we entered the tunnel.”

  “Excellent.” At the rate they were gaining speed, it would soon be impossible for anything to board them. Cleasby put one hand on his friend’s shoulder and shook him. “We did it, Rains. We’re on our way.” He turned to his exhausted men, triumphant, and shouted. “We’ve done it!”

  Pangborn was too busy loading the last of their coal into Headhunter to pay much attention beyond a thumbs up. Thornbury was sitting on a crate, physically wrecked, but he looked at Cleasby and managed a tired smile. “Bravo, lieutenant. Now I could really use a hot bath and a nap.”

  Cleasby looked ahead and saw the light approaching at the end of the tunnel. The miles of fast travel across the mountains and tunnels to get back to Ironhead Station lay just ahead. With luck, he might be on a train back to this exact spot with a platoon of troops sometime tonight.

  But as the daylight got brighter, something gnawed at the back of his mind. The skinwalkers had fallen back rather than enter the tunnel, but Caradoc hadn’t struck him as one to give up easily. While they were savages, they weren’t fools. If their situations were reversed and it was the future of his people at stake, Cleasby certainly wouldn’t have backed down.

  Novak and Acosta reached them. It was the first time Cleasby had ever seen Acosta look physically wasted. “Are those bullet holes?”

  “Mere scratches. Nothing more. It is a long story, my friend.” Surprisingly, the Ordsman flopped down next to Thornbury and lowered his head, tired.

  Cleasby beckoned to Thorny. “Nobody is too tough not to bleed to death. Check his wounds.”

  Their young nobleman seemed hesitant to lay his hands on Acosta without permission, but after a moment, the mercenary nodded for him to proceed.

  Cleasby asked, “What happened to that gun mage?”

  “He will not be joining us,” Acosta said. “His absence is related to these bullet holes.”

  Cleasby knew he should have trusted his instincts that there had been something off about Sayre, but he would have to worry about the specifics later. He looked to Novak. “I’m glad to see you made it, ranger.”

  “I’ll say the same for you, Storm Knight. I stopped to help your Ordsman aboard.” She dropped Acosta’s pack on the floor.

  “We didn’t see you.”

  “When I reached the tracks, I took cover and waited for the train. I didn’t expect to see you boys falling down the mountain so gracefully and had to double back.”

  “Wait…If you were hiding, how’d you expect to board?”

  “Ranger trick. Patrols board trains without the trains stopping all the time—if a train stops in the middle of nowhere to let a patrol on or off, it tips off the people we’re trying to spy on. If you know where the trains have to slow down for a bend or a grade, you just wait at the high ground and grab on when they pass.”

  High ground. “Damn it…” Cleasby looked ahead toward the sunshine.

  She saw where he was looking. “That was my plan. There’s a ledge there.”

  Caradoc was smart enough not to send his forces into the narrow confines of a tunnel against several glaives, and if a ranger were athletic enough to make such a jump, it would be easy for a skinwalker.

  He pointed toward the advancing daylight. “We’re about to be attacked.”

  As the rapidly accelerating train burst from the tunnel, a hairy form dropped from the rocks above and landed in the coal stores just behind the engine, raising a black cloud of dust. A moment later another landed on the roof of the first passenger car. It stuck, clinging, claws biting into the sheet metal.

  “Just once, Cleasby could have the decency to be wrong,” Thorny complained as Acosta shoved the nobleman’s hands away from his wounded side.

  Another skinwalker jumped, hit the second passenger car, but wasn’t as lucky. Its claws slipped, and it tumbled over the side.

  “Glaives up!” Cleasby ordered. They didn’t have an angle to fire on the ones farther forward, but he had no doubt there would be more coming.

  The skinwalkers were spacing themselves out to not get in each other’s way—one per train car. The next one to fall was caught in several galvanic arcs. By the time it hit the passenger car’s roof, it was on fire and went skidding off and down into the forest. Once they announced themselves, the monsters had nothing to lose. As the cargo cars entered the light, it began to rain skinwalkers.

  “Fire at will!” Cleasby ordered.

  The skinwalkers were far more graceful than any human as they landed among the crates and pallets. They’d given up on their long spears and polearms for the close confines of the train. Now they were armed with jagged knives or and claws.

  “Rains, Pangborn, cover Headhunter. Thorny, Novak, on me. We can’t let them stop the engine.” There was no point in ordering the Ordsman to do anything because Acosta would simply go wherever he wanted anyway.

  Cleasby rushed to the next car and leaped across the gap, just in time have a skinwalker fall directly in front of him. It landed atop a crate that Cleasby promptly struck with his glaive, blasting it to splinters with a galvanic discharge. The creature fell hard and rolled over the edge, but it caught itself by sinking one claw into the floorboards. Thorny promptly kicked it in the muzzle. It slipped over the edge and made a disgusting splatter noise, accented by a wet crunch, as it fell under the wheels.

  The next skinwalker landed behind them, but Headhunter promptly smashed it into pulp. Cleasby pushed on, confident the others had his back; he didn’t look back From somewhere behind him, Novak fired her rifle over their heads, aiming at the monster atop the passenger car.

  Cleasby called to Thornbury. “Shoulder to shoulder. Without those spears, we’ve got the reach advantage. Alternate galvanic blasts. One shoots while the other glaive charges. Anything gets through, cut it down. Got it?”

  “At this point my limbs have the fortitude of warm oatmeal, Cleasby, but I’m with you.”

  “That’s the spirit. For Cygnar!”

  Rains fought for his life as monsters fell all around him. Jagged knives crashed against his shield and claws scratched his armor. Pangborn was beside him, firing his thrower and stabbing the bayonet at anything that got past Rain’s shield. Pallets and burlap sacks had caught on fire from stray voltage.

  The two Storm Knights were doing rather well until Headhunter suddenly drove his shield into their backs and sent them flying.

  Rains landed on his shoulder, rolling and crashing into a barrel. He couldn’t figure out why their own warjack had shoved him halfway across the train car, until a hairy monster nearly the size of their warjack fell out of the sky and landed precisely where they’d been standing. It landed with such force that it shook the entire train, and the car jumped. Rains was braced for the entire car to tip off the track, but metal-on-metal screeching told him the wheels had held to the rails despite the impact.

  Rains crawled away as giant claws ripped through the wood. He looked up, and up, and up even more to see the massive form of the warpwolf that had broken their fort into kindling. This was the first time Rains had seen the whole monster, and it was even worse than he’d first imagined. It was like the Wurm had taken a skinwalker and stretched it, twisting flesh and bone until it was the size of a warjack. Bone spikes had grown through its flesh. Long lips peeled back to display fangs the size of daggers as it glared at Rains with its feral red eyes.

  Thankfully, the beast turned on Headhunter instead of them. Their Stormclad lowered its shield and lifted its generator blade. The beast roared. Apparently they remembered one another. Looking around frantically, Rains realized the flatcar was far too small for these two titans.

  “Rains!” Pangborn shouted. He’d not been so lucky in his fall and had slid over the side. Luckily, he had caught hold of the edge—but his metal gauntlets were slipping, unable to find a purchase
on the wood. Dropping his glaive, Rains dove for his friend. He caught Pangborn’s wrist and held on with every muscle trembling. There was nothing below Pangborn’s boots but a narrow strip of rock and then a long drop down a cliff. His storm thrower was dangling from his backpack by the hose, bouncing and sparking as it was smashed against the rocks.

  Rains pulled with all his remaining strength, but Nestor Pangborn was the biggest man in the unit, with the biggest suit of armor, strapped to the heaviest weapon, and wearing an apron filled with metal tools and ’jack parts. “You weigh a ton!” Rains shouted, red-faced. Desperate, he looked toward Headhunter. The instant the two massive things stopped appraising each other and finally clashed, he would either be crushed or tossed over the side.

  Pangborn realized the same thing. “Let me go. Save yourself.”

  “Shut it,” Rains snapped as he pulled harder.

  Headhunter was the most aggressive ’jack any of the Malcontents had ever seen. It should have torn right into the monster, but instead its yellow eye slits fixed on Pangborn dangling on the other side of the beast…and Headhunter moved back. The warjack carefully stepped onto the next flatcar, crushing boxes underfoot. It was almost as if it were beckoning the beast to follow. Rains couldn’t believe his eyes. Headhunter never retreated.

  The crouched beast went after Headhunter.

  It was their chance. “Pull!” Rains groaned to himself as he dragged Pangborn up over the edge until the big man could get ahold of a crate to help. A moment later, it was done—Pangborn was on board once more. After he was safe, they both lay there gasping for a moment until Rains realized yet another skinwalker was coming for them. Pangborn quickly pulled up his hose to find the storm thrower dangling from the end of it was now broken.

  Rains had dropped his own blade to save Pangborn. Horrified, he watched the skinwalker kick his glaive off the side of the train.

  At that moment, the entire train shook again as Headhunter clashed with the beast.

  The two massive things collided. In an attempt to crawl over Headhunter’s shield, the beast’s lupine claws ripped great tears into the Stormclad’s armor. Headhunter slashed at the warpwolf with its generator blade, splitting open the thick, hairy hide. Muscle and fury smashed into metal and electricity as oil and blood flew into the air. The two pushed back and forth; the first to shift to the side would inevitably fall from the moving train.

  Rains still had his shield; Pangborn pulled a heavy wrench from his apron. It wasn’t a storm thrower by any means, but Pangborn was so damned strong Rains was willing to bet he could bludgeon a skinwalker to death with it. But rather than attack, the skinwalker had stopped and was also watching, amazed, as its beast fought their Stormclad.

  “My money is on Headhunter,” Pangborn spat at it.

  The skinwalker turned, slowly twisting its head, and rose fully on its hind legs to loom over Pangborn. “Blood Drinker,” it hissed.

  “Blood Drinker, huh? Well, Headhunter is about to ruin him and put his head on a chain.”

  “Heh-unter?” The words were mangled coming out of the beastly mouth, but it was close enough. “False beast.”

  “He’s a Stormclad. Better than your…whatever it is.”

  “Blood Drinker. Warpwolf,” proclaimed the monster proudly. It snarled something else completely unintelligible.

  “What did you say about my ’jack?” Pangborn roared. He had no tolerance for loudmouths, regardless of what species they were. “That’s it!” The big man went after the skinwalker, beating at it with his wrench.

  Caradoc leapt from the stone ledge. He fell through the air and landed smoothly in a crouch on the last car of the train. He immediately began to search for prey.

  Nothing. He’d thought for sure the blue soldiers would be waiting here at the end. He’d gone last deliberately, in expectation of the best fight. He’d hoped to fall right into the midst of them and to kill as many as he could before dying a glorious death. But once again, Caradoc had been robbed. He was still furious that his tribe was being banished by the Circle, and there was nothing he could do about it. With a roar, he shoved a crate over the side.

  The entire train was now in the sunlight. It seemed to stretch forever, this parasite on his mountain. The next car was stacked high with logs, surely stolen from Caradoc’s forest, splintered from ancient trees that the Cygnar would turn into furniture or toothpicks. He ran forward and leapt across the distance to land atop the logs. He sunk his toe claws into the bark to avoid slipping. From this vantage point, he could see all the way to the other end. His warriors were fighting the blue soldiers, and Blood Drinker was fighting their infernal machine. Caradoc suspected if the enemy lost their warjack, the rest of this train’s passengers would be nothing but snacks for Blood Drinker. The machine had its back to the chieftain, and Caradoc knew if he could damage its precious boiler, it would become easy prey for Blood Drinker.

  Caradoc began to run across the logs but stopped halfway across when he realized there was a lone human in his way. The man was climbing up the other side of the stacked logs, and Caradoc could smell the blood on him. He’d seen this one on the road. It wasn’t their chief, but this one was the deadliest of them all.

  “I knew I’d find you here,” the human said as he found his feet beneath him. “Like me, you go to where you think the best fight will be, but you should have known, the warjack would not do. This is very sad for you, Caradoc. Why, yes, even in your hideous wolf form, I recognize you, man who speaks for a mountain, or whatever your asinine title is.”

  As much as Caradoc wanted to rip the life from this fool, he needed to damage that warjack now for the good of the tribe. He could have to kill this one later. He prepared to leap over the human.

  “What? You think you can escape Savio Montero Acosta? I did not run down a mountain for nothing. You have to fight me.” The man held out a pack, letting it dangle from one strap over the side of the train. “I have your sacred rock.”

  “No.” Caradoc knew the smell of the stone well—it had been lovingly held by the hands of a hundred generations of his tribe. From all of his ancestors, the oil of their skin had been embedded into the pores of the stone, a memory of forever. As long as his tribe kept the stone, the ones who came before would never be forgotten. The stone was on this train—but it wasn’t in that pack. “You do not.”

  The human made a curious face and then opened the pack. He stuck one gauntlet in, rummaged through chunks of coal, and pulled out a plain flat rock about the same size as the sacred tablet. For a moment he was stunned, but then Acosta smiled. “Clever, ranger…”

  Caradoc had no time for this. The warjack was right there; it was more important. Caradoc was going to die today no matter what, so he would die serving his tribe. Driven by powerful muscles, Caradoc leaped past the human.

  But Acosta was far faster than a human should have been. He swung the pack, catching Caradoc’s arm with a strap, and jerked downward. Caradoc spun off course. The skinwalker chieftain crashed against the logs just on the other side of the human. For one heartbeat, his head was dangling over the side, looking down at the ground flashing past, but then he sunk his claws into the bark and caught himself. Snarling, Caradoc sprang to his feet, drawing a long, jagged dagger from his belt. He pivoted, swinging at the human’s chest, but the one called Acosta was already dancing back.

  “There. That is more like it.” The other blue soldiers fought with one lightning sword, but this one, Caradoc noted, readied two of the blades. “Come. Let us finish this.”

  Caradoc attacked, knife whipping about in his hands. By human standards the blade was long enough to be a short sword, but Caradoc spun it back and forth effortlessly. Acosta caught the blade with one glaive and attacked with the other. The skinwalker dodged the response and slashed out with his claws, trying to hook a vulnerable joint in the armor. They traded a rapid flurry of attacks, moving with the ebb and flow of battle as the train rocked beneath their feet.

  They circle
d on the uneven surface, each looking for an angle. “You do not fight like the other beasts. You use your strength, but you do not rely entirely upon it.” Acosta gave him a small bow. “You have technique.”

  Of course he did—the blackclads had sent him to fight across the whole world. Caradoc sized his opponent up anew. Acosta had been injured earlier but was still strong. Yet there was something not right about this one. Normally, humans stunk of fear before the might of a skinwalker, but this one was too confident. Surely, he had some tricks.

  But so did Caradoc.

  The logs were stacked in a pyramid, secured by heavy ropes. This human was surefooted, but no human could match a skinwalker’s grace. Caradoc swept his blade down and sliced through several of the ropes.

  Acosta’s eyes widened. Very few things surprised this one, but that had.

  Caradoc backed up, crouched, and ran his blade along the log, cutting through more ropes. As each one split, the weight increased on the remainder, causing the pile they were standing on to bulge and shift dangerously.

  Acosta stumbled as the log rolled beneath his boots. Caradoc did not think he was used to being put off balance very often, as the expression on the uncertain human’s face seemed to confirm. Caradoc stepped down and kicked the top log he’d just been standing on. The rest of the bulging ropes snapped, and their pile began to disintegrate.

  Surprisingly, Acosta attacked anyway.

  They fought back and forth, stumbling, continually striking at each other, as logs began to spill over the side and crash against the rocks below. The instant he lost a foothold, Caradoc had to push off and move again. To stay still for an instant meant falling. Or worse.

  Suddenly, it was dark. The speeding train had entered another tunnel. Another log fell off, hit the support beams on the side of the tunnel, and flipped back into the air, spraying them with bits of dirt and bark. Now they fought by the light of the two glowing blue swords.