Claudia slipped from her position, sidling down the hill to keep an eye toward the north, the direction she thought help would come from if help were to come for the dead Slark. Liam was at the tower when she finally crossed the open field at the bottom of the hill she’d perched upon. He was scavenging useful items from the dead, bits of plastic sheeting, a coil of wire, a bag or two of items neither of them could identify, but the bags themselves would likely prove useful.
Claudia set aside her rifle and rolled the largest of the Slark over to begin the work of butchering the carcass. The sound of her knife slipping from its sheath drew Liam’s attention to what she was doing.
“I feel like the chivalrous thing to do would be to offer to do the cutting,” Liam said.
“Do you know how to quarter a kill?” Claudia asked, deciding just the limbs would likely work for their purposes.
“I haven’t the foggiest,” Liam said.
“Then it’s best to leave it to me,” she said, adding a wink so he would know she wasn’t meaning to be rude. “Do you know how to rig a grenade trap though?”
“More than one as it turns out.” Liam apparently caught exactly what Claudia was thinking. He unclipped one of the grenades she’d given him and went straight to the access panel on the communication relay left open by the Slark. She didn’t even need to watch him to believe he would do a competent job of it.
Quartering the Slark kill wasn’t too significantly different from butchering a deer. Of course, quartering implied four limbs—she couldn’t immediately think of the corresponding phrase for six limbs. She was most of the way through sextupling him when Liam finished rigging the booby trap on the communications relay. He offered one of his salvaged bags to her and several sheets of the plastic the Slark were using as clothes. They wrapped the Slark meat in the plastic and tucked it safely away in the odd backpack thing the Slark had used to carry some of their spare parts.
“Anything else we need to do here?” Liam asked.
“Nope,” Claudia replied. “Now we continue west toward the ocean and find a way to set up a dew trap to collect water using some of the plastic you collected. Tonight, we dine on green meat!”
Chapter 22:
Help Comes in all Forms.
Olivia knew something was wrong long before they sailed beneath the ruins of the Golden Gate Bridge. The sounds of war were in the air and the Hercules, a classic tugboat formerly of the same docked nautical museum as the Balclutha, was out in the bay, armed to the teeth, and chasing Slark swift boats out of the space between the peninsula and Alcatraz.
The Hercules, which was a remarkable vessel in its own lifetime, found new service as something of a destroyer. The hull was retrofit with armor, gun mounts were fitted wherever they could, and the engines, once meant for heavy torque, were exchanged for salvaged Slark models meant for speed. The Slark seemed to be having trouble taking on the Hercules even with their twenty to one advantage.
The side-wheeler Eppleton Hall, another historic ship from the nautical museum, spared as the Slark hadn’t thought they were worth destroying, steamed out to meet the Balclutha. The Eppleton was the primary tug of the bay now, fitted with some weapons, but not nearly as swift as the Hercules as the main means of propulsion were the two paddle wheels along the sides while the Hercules had a more efficient propeller setup. Olivia briefly considered ordering the signal flagger at the bow of the ship to tell the Eppleton to give them a push back out to the open sea, but the captain seemed fine with bringing her into the bay. If the Slark caught them on the ocean with their swift boats, the Balclutha wouldn’t be able to out run or out fight them. The captain clearly thought the Hercules had the bay well in hand, or at least well enough in hand to bring in his cargo and let the sea wall’s defense cover things from there.
The realization set Olivia’s stomach to churn—the sea wall defenses, built by the Transcended on both sides of the peninsula and on Alcatraz, weren’t firing. In fact, there looked to be a few battles raging on the shore as well. She ordered to arms and on deck for the remaining men of her squad.
They were armed and at attention when the Balclutha was tied off at the pier that once served as the nautical museum. Her men followed her down the gangway first, but made it no farther than the end of the dock.
“Hold this position,” Olivia ordered. “The Balclutha must not be boarded by anyone but the port authority until I return.”
She hadn’t made it far before a small, yet surprisingly strong hand grasped her arm, stopping her dead in her tracks. She turned to find Esmeralda holding her back.
“She went outside the wall and didn’t come back with the others,” Esme said. “Nobody will tell me anything and nobody has gone to find her. You have to help.”
They were in the same situation of not knowing where Claudia was, but only Olivia was in a position to do anything about it. Part of her felt sorry for Esme and the horrible sense of helplessness she must have felt. They might be rivals for Claudia’s affections, but that didn’t mean they had to be enemies.
“Come with me,” Olivia said. “I’ll see what I can find out.”
The surface was in full battle mode as they strode toward the town. The street cars weren’t running and the Transcended were nowhere to be found. Olivia led them toward the White Tower where she suspected she would find Dr. Gatling or Commander Marceau. Esme kept up with her easily, actually seemed at times eager for Olivia to move faster than her prosthetic leg would allow.
They crested the edge of Telegraph Hill to find the valley between them and the tower filled with the militia. They were still in a clump that indicated mustered, but not put into rank and file yet. She pushed her way around the edge of the gathered men readying themselves for orders to defend the city. Before she could reach the base of the tower where she suspected she would find the Commander and Dr. Gatling, she was cut off by Inspector Cavanaugh who was dressed in the uniform of a military officer under General Hastings’ command. The uniform, which Commander Marceau hadn’t supported the use of any longer, was a holdover from the days right after the cataclysm and the war they’d waged in the broken streets to deliver the city from the Slark occupiers. Olivia had once worn the same uniform before it was stripped from her after her leg was cut off by a lasher tree; she would have lost the uniform a month after anyway when Hastings officially banned women from combat.
“Get back to your ship, Warder Kingston,” Inspector Cavanaugh barked.
“I don’t take orders from constables dressed in outdated finery,” Olivia said. “Unlike you, I hold a commission in the defense force, so why don’t you tell me what is going on here before I have you thrown into the mix with the rank and file militia.”
Cavanaugh didn’t flinch in the slightest. In fact, a strange, angry grin pressed across his tight lips. “Fine, Warder,” he said through clenched teeth. “The Slark are assaulting on two fronts and the mutants are attacking us on several more.”
“Get out of my way,” Olivia said, “I need to talk to the commander.” Olivia pushed past Inspector Cavanaugh, leading Emse farther up the hill. Cavanaugh caught Esme’s shoulder before she could follow.
“The Mouse stays here,” Cavanaugh said. “We could use her to run messages and report back on troop numbers.”
Without even thinking, Olivia slipped the steel ASP sentry baton from her belt, extended the telescoping club, and swatted Inspector Cavanaugh on the upper arm with a three-quarters force strike. He immediately recoiled and grabbed his arm.
“Count yourself lucky I don’t have time for your shit,” Olivia snarled. “A break in military protocol like that would normally dictate I give you a public beating.” Olivia grabbed Esme by the hand and continued dragging her toward the White Tower. Before Claudia, before she’d heard of the Ravens, Olivia would never have brushed aside Cavanaugh so easily; having met real Ravens recently, everything Claudia told her was verified and she couldn’t go back to being cowed by men, especially not ones she outranked.
Commander Marceau was in the midst of a hornet’s nest of activity. Olivia had to wait her turn in something of a makeshift queue, refusing to let go of Esme’s hand while they waited quietly for their turn to speak with the commander. She let go of Esme’s hand and saluted Commander Marceau when her turn came. He responded in kind.
“The Balclutha is safely docked and under guard,” Olivia reported. She faltered before continuing, knowing the rest of the news would not be so innocuous. “The Crescent City lumber camp is gone, wiped out in a mutant attack. No salvage operation was attempted as I left half my security detail in Winchester Bay fishing village and didn’t think I could ensure the ship’s security without them. Gold Beach was as hardened against attack as could be managed though.”
“When it rains, it pours,” Commander Marceau replied. “Good work regardless, Warder Kingston. We’ll see about sending proper guards to the remaining camps when our current situation is stabilized.”
“Permission to ask what the state of affairs is, sir?”
“We’ve got mutants in the BART tunnel and coming across the broken bridges,” the Commander said wearily. “Only a fraction of them are making it across the bridges, but even they number in the thousands. I’m regretting not destroying the bridges entirely after Claudia managed to get across. We’re trying to choke them off in the tunnel without sacrificing it, but we lost a mile in the first hour of the attack and have been steadily heading backward since.” The commander signed off on a few orders offered by his support staff who immediately handed them off to runners. Olivia followed him as he made his way out of the cluster of questions to head down the hill toward the assembled militia. “This would be bad enough on its own if the Slark weren’t attacking at the same time. They’ve got two or three divisions right outside the wall and they’re doing their best to land another division around the Bay Bridge base while we’re busy with the mutants.”
“The mutants and Slark are coordinating?” Esme asked.
“I don’t think it’s as dire as that,” the Commander said. “I think the Slark saw what the mutants were going to do and decided it was an opportunity to throw two armies at us at once.”
Olivia knew exactly why the mutants were hitting the city and she knew exactly how much warning the Slark had in it to plan their coordinated attack. Rather than let the Ravens roll up their line, the Slark must have withdrawn and let them push against the mutant population. Once the mutants were on a stampede toward the sea, the Slark simply organized their reserve troops and followed them across the bay. There was no way the Ravens could know what they’d done, but they had seriously fucked the City of Broken Bridges.
“Why aren’t the sea wall defenses active?” Olivia asked.
“The engineers, who can’t normally make heads or tales of the Transcended’s work, think it’s the mutants. Apparently they act like little nuclear weapon EMP bursts when they get shot, destroying electronics and frying computers, which is probably why the Transcended headed underground,” the Commander said. “If there’s any good news in this, it’s on the west. No mutants are coming up the ocean side, so the defenses there still work. Once the Hercules has cleared the bay, we can send our support fleets off the western shore to sit in a defensive flotilla under guard of the western sea wall.”
“Esme said Claudia was still outside the wall,” Olivia said.
“Two of the four men from her tractor returned this morning as part of a makeshift column,” the commander said. “The driver said she was still alive when he last saw her. He said she went back into the fray to find more survivors.”
“I request official permission to lead a rescue effort beyond the wall, sir,” Olivia said, stiffening formally with the request.
“Would that I could, Kingston,” Commander Marceau said, his voice cracking a little at the end. “With the mutants wreaking havoc on our sea wall defense weapons, I don’t have the men or weapons to spare. We’re spread thin and barely holding. Anyone I take off the line now leaves a crack in a very delicate defense.”
“If I get you the soldiers, get the guns from somewhere else, can I lead the mission?”
“If you can find at least fifty able bodies not already in the militia and arm them with civilian weapons, I’ll even get you the remaining tractors to take out,” the Commander said. “Right now, I really have to get to work putting the militia to work plugging holes.”
Olivia saluted as the commander walked away. When he was out of hearing range, she turned to Esme. “Can you get your hands on weapons stashed away in the Chinican District?”
For a moment, it looked as though Esme would play dumb, but the moment passed and she nodded. “I’ll see what I can scrounge if it means getting Claudia back.”
“Go, and meet me back here before sundown.”
Olivia and Esme parted ways. Esme headed down into the first open tunnel leading into the city below while Olivia headed in the direction of the torch brigade staging area. Her plan was ludicrous on the surface, but brilliant in its pragmatism. They had a store of military trained, battle-hardened soldiers who were not on the field and wouldn’t likely be sent to it anytime soon. If Olivia could convince them to join her and Esme could convince the Chinican trade guilds to arm them, they could be outside the wall within a day.
Working with Esme toward saving the same woman they were both chasing seemed strange. Olivia resolved to keep her head down and work the plan she’d concocted rather than think too much about it. She wouldn’t want Claudia making up her mind based on a feeling of onus toward either of them anyway.
Near the base of the wall stood the staging depot, which apparently was once part of a warehouse district near the old mint. There Olivia found what she was looking for. The support staff for the torch brigade, all of them amputees like her, were waiting in a fretful holding pattern over. They spotted her and several of the uniformed men moved to speak with her.
“Her men, Alfie and the Greek made it back,” the old master sergeant said as the de-facto spokesman for the group. “They were both on the edge of hysterics after seeing her run headlong into the fire, to draw the Slark away as they saw it. Alfie spilled about her being the commander’s daughter and suddenly everyone was mourning her as a martyr for a lowly cause.”
“You’re not a lowly cause and I don’t think she’s dead yet,” Olivia said. “I know what she came through and the shape she showed up here in. If anyone can survive out there, it’s Claudia Marceau.” This seemed to breathe a little life into the gathered men of the torch brigade. “We have a chance to rescue her if you join with me to take on the Slark once again. We are stronger for what we’ve suffered.” Olivia knocked on her metal leg for emphasis, which clanged a little under her fist. “They say we cannot serve in forward combat areas because we are not whole anymore. They say we can’t run, swim, or fight, but they’re wrong. If I can still take to the seas on a sailing ship, who among you can still fire a gun? Drive a tractor? Show the Slark we don’t need a full compliment of limbs to make them die?”
The men of the torch brigade’s support staff, some of them missing an arm and a leg, all knew the horror of the lasher trees just as Olivia did, and so many of them were looking for a new emotion to replace the deeply seated terror still within them after their dismemberments. She’d caught on something, a pride in honor, a rage at being overlooked by the enemy and their own command structure, and they let themselves be heard. Slowly, the sound of fists pounding on brass limbs echoed against the wall like a hale storm on a metal roof.
“Come with me now and help me show the commander he has two hundred men more in his army, soldiers of metal limbs, iron wills, and full hearts. Claudia Marceau is one of our own, and we will not leave her outside the wall,” Olivia said, shouting to be heard above the din.
They took to the street en masse, still rattling fists against metal limbs as they marched in an orderly rank and file behind Olivia. They were incomplete soldiers reborn. Olivia knew the resurging pride they felt
since she’d felt it on her last tour on the Balclutha. She’d spent so much time feeling worthless because of her lost leg. She’d fought with her fists within the bars for so long in hope of meting out some of the anger she felt at herself mostly and in turn receive punishment for the shame she felt at losing a limb. It was an odd, horrible emotional state to try to exist in and the person who had pulled her from it was beyond the wall. Claudia had shown such strength and resolve in reaching her father; it was inspiring enough to pull Olivia from her highly complex depression to watch Claudia’s recovery from radiation sickness. She’d felt pride and a restored worth when she fought the mutants outside Crescent City, saved Roger, and then braved an aquatic insertion onto a beachhead. She wanted to share that renewed sense of purpose with the men behind her, her men now, because they’d earned it, paid for it by surviving what killed so many others.
By the time she got back up to the White Tower with her new battalion, Olivia saw that Esme had finished her part of the plan as well, although in a seemingly odd way. She’d expected workers to carry the weapons from the Chinican hidden caches, but what she saw were top hats intermingled as well. The top hat leader, if there was such a thing within the loosely organized dichotomy of top hats and bowlers, was a man named Bruce Coffey. He, like Esme, was a San Francisco native and a generally reasonable man as far as Olivia knew. Only arbitrary tribal lines drawn by heritage, wealth, and delineated by headwear separated them.
“So the sweetshop sweetheart wasn’t lying,” Bruce said, coming away from the two dozen or so other top hats who had followed Esme and her Chinican workers out of the wards below. He tipped his top hat to Olivia and smiled. “You’ve found some men, or most of them anyway, and you’re going to take this hair-brained plan to the commander? Amputees and scavenged old slug throwers, is it, Olivia?”
“I’m happy to show you again what an amputee can do so long as she has two healthy fists,” Olivia said. She’d bested Bruce four of their last five tussles, and she was eager to make it a solid five of six.
The Steam-Powered Sniper in the City of Broken Bridges (The Raven Ladies Book 2) Page 20