by Platt, Sean
What looked like hundreds of Reptars were behind the vehicle, climbing, prying at every plate as if trying to worm their way in.
A strange thought occurred to Trevor: this thing — whatever it was — seemed to have crashed the gate and barreled through the city, demolishing anything in its path. It had been, apparently, chased by most of the city’s peacekeeper force.
But it had attracted no shuttles. The notion filled him with foreboding.
Looking up between buildings, Trevor could only see the usual Colorado blue, marred by a corner of the massive mothership off to one side, centered on the under-construction Apex. The motherships had a bounty of weapons, but again: the ship wasn’t flinching, letting the armored car do as it wished.
No time to ponder. Whatever the tank-like vehicle was, it had drawn the attention of every member of the street’s standoff — every Titan, Reptar, and human on both sides of the traitorous coin. It was a loud, insistent distraction. And without shuttles to end it, the thing barreled forward.
Trevor moved to flinch back, but the motion brought him close to Terrence. There was a chance he was playacting, but Trevor wasn’t sure. Terrence hadn’t hesitated a whit when Cameron had said to strike him, as if he’d meant to do it all along. Trevor wondered if he’d judged the man wrong. They’d all been under the Astral thumb for the same length of time — but being under the Astral thumb was almost the same as being under Astral protection. Ironic; he’d begun this adventure with his father by fleeing the ships, and now people flocked to them. The world’s safest places were under alien occupation.
Maybe Terrence was more comfortable in his new life than Trevor.
Maybe he’d misjudged Terrence, and the man had always been on the Astrals’ side.
Maybe, when Trevor had run to him for help finding Piper, Terrence had flipped, running to Christopher … who, it turned out, might also be a traitorous sack of shit.
Or maybe not. It could be a ruse. Perhaps these were small plans nested in larger ones, and they were all sharing a side.
It took six seconds for the tank car to reach them, and Trevor found himself adjacent to Terrence for three. Adrenaline still flooding his system from beating Raj, he punched Terrence hard in the throat then ripped the modified rifle from his holster.
Its barrel centered on Terrence’s chest for a beat, but there were bigger — and more obviously hostile — fish to fry.
The vehicle arrived with a carpet of Reptars. Trevor made the mistake of thinking they might be more than animals long enough for one to see him hesitate, then it leaped. The thing was on him as Cameron, somewhat comically, thrashed with his good arm. Trevor recovered smoothly, righted the rifle, and blew a hole through the alien’s chest. An obscene shower of gore sprayed the tank.
The Reptars startled backward at the sight — their preference for living kicking in. Trevor stood and aimed at the nearest monstrosities, meeting each in its ugly shifting eye, his implied threat perfectly clear.
It didn’t last long; one of the Reptars came from behind, taking him broadside, its mouth already open and purring in Trevor’s peripheral vision as he again hit the concrete.
Piper managed a shot — not enough, seemingly, to kill it, but enough to twist its interest from Trevor to her. Again, he aimed and prayed, having no clue what his weapon fired and when it might require reloading. It discharged faithfully, tearing the upper half of the monster’s mouth to memory.
Trevor got to his feet.
He looked at the vehicle in time to see the air around it pulse, a low buzz thrumming into his bones. He felt his hair want to stand on end. Every Astral clinging to the vehicle tensed, and Trevor heard several loud cracks. Then the pulses stopped, and the Reptars slunk away from its metal skin, wounded.
A hatch popped on the armored vehicle — which looked, now that it was close, as if it might be a short bus prepared for combat. The turret was still a mystery.
A head wearing an enormous orange mohawk emerged, beckoning furiously, casting glances at the cast-off Reptars, large earlobes impaled with swinging rollers the size of a toilet paper core. Trevor had a moment to think that this guy had taken the term road warrior to the limit, but then Cameron was behind him, pushing. Piper was already halfway in.
There was no way to know who these people were, but going with them was better than being dinner.
“Get the fuck in here, or we’re leaving you!” the man shouted.
“Go!” Cameron urged behind Trevor, still shoving.
Cameron swung his pistol around between shoves, aiming at Meyer and his two henchmen, at Raj still on the pavement, at the onlookers now appearing at what passed for slit-like windows in the vehicle’s sides, at the unmoving Titans, at the swarming, furious Reptars.
Then Trevor was in. Cameron was in. The mohawked man dragged the hatch closed with a clang and took a seat behind some sort of steering mechanism that may once have been a wheel.
Piper was across the dark interior, looking cold and out of place. In addition to the mohawk, two others shared the space, both with similar hairdos. One was a woman with what looked like a massive ivory fang through her septum, her face half covered in tattoos.
The second man stood inside the turret. The vehicle leaped — somehow sideways to the direction Trevor had thought its wheels were oriented. There was a shudder and a loud series of crunching noises outside. They’d run over a few Reptars, but the thing barely shook, as if it weighed several tons — and had spherical lead wheels to match.
“Haul ass!” the woman yelled.
The first man mashed his foot to the ground. The tank-like thing accelerated much faster than anything this size had any business doing, and Trevor watched through slits in the metal as they passed back through the detonated alleyway. The man in the turret did something, and several fireballs erupted around the thing — to the sides, to the rear, to the front. Trevor spilled from his seat onto the floor, and as she came down from her standing position, the woman with the tattooed face stepped on him without apology. She merely cast him a look of extraordinary inconvenience and shifted to where she needed to be, firing what sounded like a normal firearm through the slits. The noise, inside the enclosed and echoing space, was painful.
Trevor tried to stay still, casting glances at Cameron (who seemed pale with blood loss) and Piper (who looked terrified and sick) as the thing screamed back through the now-decimated gates and into the outlands. Soon, the rumbling stopped, and they were screaming across the hardpan, no words traded among the tank’s occupants, no idea — in Trevor’s mind, at least — where they might be headed.
The woman picked up something like an old-fashioned CB and spoke into it.
“Base? This is Tarantula.”
A radio replied. “This is base.”
“Tell Lieutenant Coffey we’ve successfully picked up our passenger. The big man’s most wanted and—” She looked over as if needing to count. Her expression soured. “And two others.”
Trevor’s eyes found one of the slits in the thing’s side, peering upward, now able to see the blue skies from his slouched position near the metal floor.
“The ships,” he said as the engine roared. “Why aren’t the ships coming after us?”
The woman looked at him with something like hatred then turned back to the vehicle’s front. Her voice returned, somehow angry, resenting Trevor for a reason he’d never requested and couldn’t understand.
“Because until we got called into this bullshit, we’ve kept a truce.” She sighed heavily and shook her head. “But if I were them, after what we just did? I’d say it’s game on, any minute now.”
Chapter Forty-Four
Lila was crossing the upstairs hallway, returning from Trevor’s room, when she heard Clara stir. Going downstairs could wait. After what she’d seen through the window, Lila could use the distraction of playing mother. Half of the city looked like it had gone up in smoke. Her entire family might be dead. Only her mother was for-sure still alive, bu
t only now had Lila summoned the courage to learn what Heather might know.
Her daughter’s small, innocent noises were more compelling. Soon, she may have to hear what Heather had to say. But for now, she could keep pretending.
Lila went to the crib then watched as the girl stirred from her nap. The crib was an embarrassment, and her two-year-old daughter had even said so, using that exact word: Mommy, this crib is an embarrassment. But what was Lila supposed to do? She’d had the crib before Clara was born. Normal mothers had a few years to use a crib. Taking her out now felt like admitting failure — or, strangely, a twisted breed of motherly success. Who else got a walking, talking, somewhat spooky kid before two? What other young mothers heard “Mommy, this is an embarrassment” so early? Usually, you had to wait until you had teenagers to hear that sort of thing — and then hear it about everything you did. That’s how Lila remembered her own teen years, now barely twelve months distant.
Clara rolled over and opened her eyes. They were big and blue — as big, in fact, as Piper’s. But Piper wasn’t blood to Clara. Lila’s eyes were brown, and Raj’s were browner. Of Clara’s four grandparents, only one had eyes that weren’t brown: Meyer, whose pupils glowed with a greenish breed of hazel. Lila remembered from high school science that brown eyes were supposed to be a dominant trait, blue was recessive. And yet here were her daughter’s bright eyes, as deep as any ocean.
“Hi, Mommy,” she said, not rising.
“Hey, baby.”
“Are we still going to play with Grandma?”
Lila thought of the chaos outside. She’d heard explosions, seen fire and smoke, and might be attending several funerals this week, if she could summon the guts to find out. They should go to Grandma, all right — but definitely not to play on the lawn. Jets and bombers had failed to harm Heaven’s Veil, but someone had finally managed. And so far no one in the family, other than her mother, had returned.
“Maybe. Not outside, though, okay?”
“Oh. I wanted to play outside.”
“We can do that tomorrow, maybe. How about we play a game?”
“A game with Grandma?”
“Sure.”
“Okay! I dreamed about Grandma.”
Her heart skipped. Lila thought of the smoke. The fire. The strange itching sensation she’d been feeling for hours.
“What about her?”
“She had a thing.”
“What kind of a thing?”
“It was like Daddy’s salt shaker.”
Lila thought of the implement sitting on the grand dining room table. Only Raj would have a favorite salt shaker. There was a pepper grinder too — both stainless steel, far too expensive in the old world for something designed to hold salt.
“Oh. Well, that’s interesting.”
“Did you talk to Uncle Trevor?”
“Sure. Earlier. You were here.”
“I meant before he left,” Clara said.
Lila felt a chill. For some reason, she flashed back to the strange sensations she’d had while Clara was still growing inside her — that sense that felt like a mainline to some sort of under-the-current intelligence. She’d found ways to ask Clara about those things since she’d begun talking and understanding, feeling foolish every time. The girl had no recollection of any of it. And why would she? Fetuses didn’t speak any more than most kids Clara’s age did. Not beyond babbling and kicking uterine walls.
Before he left? If she’d heard that back in the bunker, she’d have thought it was a metaphor. For death, maybe.
“He’s just with Chris, Baby.”
“I mean after he went with Uncle Terrence.”
“Trevor didn’t—”
“And Grandma,” Clara finished.
“What about Grandma?”
Lila thought she might hear about Raj’s salt shaker again, but Clara stood and beckoned to be picked up. Lila obliged, appreciating the comfort of Clara in her arms now of all times, but the minute she was up, Clara flapped her arms to be put down. Maybe Lila needed comfort, but her daughter didn’t. Her mother was transportation. Beyond that, nothing was terribly disturbing to Clara because (and this, Lila realized sometimes with a feeling of creeping dread) nothing was terribly surprising to her. Just another day at the office for the girl in the upstairs crib.
Clara sat and started pulling two dolls apart. One had dark skin, the other’s was white, their dual colored hair intertwined in a tangled nest. Racial harmony by force in this dollhouse, if not by design.
“What about Grandma, Clara?” Lila repeated.
“I’d like to play a game with Grandma.”
“Do you think Grandma would like to play a game?”
Clara shrugged. “Maybe. It’ll make her feel better.”
Lila sat slowly. This was always strange, and Lila felt like she was balancing whenever speaking to Clara about events she couldn’t possibly know. Until someone drew her attention to the differences between herself and other young children, Clara would probably think that what she could do and know was normal. Lila didn’t want to point it out, or for her tone (or the tenor of her hesitant questions) to frighten her daughter. But Clara’s gift — if that’s what it was — startled Lila plenty.
The gift, yes. And in her quietest moments, Lila sometimes admitted to herself that she was a bit unnerved by the girl who held it.
“Why does Grandma want to feel better, Clara?”
“Everyone likes to feel better.”
“But why today?” Lila tried to make herself smile. “I didn’t talk to Grandma yet.” She swallowed then forced herself to finish the sentence: “To ask her about what she did today.”
“Oh. Well, Uncle Trevor is gone. Them and Grandma Piper.”
“Piper?” Lila’s hand went to her mouth. Where were they? She didn’t know how to ask if they were dead. She also wondered what it said about her that she’d reacted more to news about Piper than about her brother. Her stepmother seemed so innocent. She’d become her dad’s quiet companion again the moment he’d returned — always a bit unhappy perhaps. Trapped. Dragged along for the ride.
But then she remembered Clara’s plural. “Them and Piper?”
“Mr. Cameron too.”
But Clara, of course, would have no idea who Cameron was, if it was the Cameron Lila suspected.
“They’ll be happy there,” Clara said, finally separating the dolls’ hair.
“Where?” But she didn’t want to know, if the answer was Heaven — not the city but the place she’d grown up believing was somewhere out there in the clouds, beyond the reach of spherical spaceships. She didn’t want to know that any more than she wanted to head downstairs for her mother’s report.
“With Mr. Cameron’s daddy. Where Grandma Piper was happy.”
Moab? Was Clara talking about the lab in Utah? Why not; she’d covered so much unknown ground already.
“So you know Mr. Benjamin,” said Lila, playing along.
Clara made a little mmm-hmm noise and began dressing the dolls, sticking purses into their claw-like hands. Apparently, the discussion was over.
Lila stood, casting her daughter a final glance. She really should talk to her mother and face whatever music needed facing — good, bad, or indifferent.
“I hope Mr. Benjamin doesn’t help them find it,” Clara said.
“Find what, Clara?”
“If he helps them,” she said, “I guess we’ll all be leaving.”
Lila didn’t think Clara was being literal. This time, she felt sure that leaving was something she wouldn’t want to face.
Chapter Forty-Five
Benjamin watched the vehicle approach. It was a refurbished Jeep Cherokee from years before Astral Day — probably not even auto-drivable; hardly a suitable vehicle for outlands royalty. But as much as Benjamin feared Nathan Andreus, he couldn’t help but respect the man even before properly meeting him. He ruled the outlands like a despot but didn’t court luxury. He’d done what he needed to do, from begin
ning to end, mass murderer or not.
The Jeep stopped. Again, Benjamin expected the driver to let Andreus out through the rear doors, but instead he walked a few feet away and took in the open desert surroundings, allowing the passenger to get out on his own.
The rear door opened, and instead of Andreus, a woman emerged in a black Andreus Republic uniform, same as Benjamin had seen on broadcasts about the outlands. He tried to contain himself, but the uniform’s sight gave him a chill.
The vehicle’s driver walked forward, the woman fell into place beside and slightly behind him. The pair reached Benjamin, and the man extended a hand.
He wasn’t merely a driver. The man from the driver’s seat was Nathan Andreus himself.
“Are you Benjamin?” he asked.
Benjamin fought a hard response. He made himself grasp the man’s hand then meet his icy eyes. They were buried in wrinkles as he squinted in the bright Utah sun, hard and unyielding. His grip, for a man who’d left his thirties behind quite a while ago, was strong. He had a trimmed goatee and a shaved head that practically glowed in the sun.
“Yes.”
“Nathan Andreus. This is Jeanine Coffey.”
Benjamin shook the woman’s hand.
“Thanks for coming,” he said, unsure what else to say. This was an awkward meeting, but Andreus had given him a choice: They could meet at Andreus Republic HQ or in Moab — but (and Andreus didn’t need to say this; it had been implied in bold type) they would be meeting. Andreus had given his estranged wife and daughter their space for long enough. Now that the elder in that pair was dead, Andreus was through being an absentee father, even if it meant grabbing responsibility by its quivering throat.