“Taking territory and then holding it after,” Jesse said spitefully. “Yet, he needed to convince certain people that there was a major threat in the first place. Then, he would be able to do his work and build those forces without suspicion. Three guesses as to who we’re talking about. I bet you only need one.”
“Frost,” she said sourly.
“Yep!” confirmed Aftershock, finishing his meal and folding his arms over his chest. “Turns out he was the one that supplied weapons and parts to the Vipers, and paid them well enough to attack the pipelines leading out of Diablo…”
“And the Gulch?” Jenny said, her sparkling eyes both sad and angry. With the plate resting in her lap, her hands vigorously rubbed her forearms.
Everyone stayed still and quiet except Aero, who had finished packing away provisions in the cave and had come to join them.
“Yes,” he replied. “Master was quite vocal about it once he had heard the news. Thrilled would be the word I would use to describe him.”
Jenny was fuming. She had been standing no more than a meter away from the bastard that caused the death of her old life and she had no idea. None of them did at the time.
“It all makes sense to you now, doesn’t it?” Jesse asked, recalling the weekly meetings with the mayor at Grand Hall. “He wanted sway the population into his waiting arms, thinking that more powerful and frequent raider activity would lead to an increased demand for security in Diablo.”
“Speaking of there, has there been any word on how things are?” Jenny was concerned for the few nice people she had met along the way. “It’s been nearly a week since we sent word to our contacts. With the mayor gone and you too, Jesse, he pretty much has free reign of the place.”
Jesse frowned, so deeply he appeared to sink down into the stone a few centimeters.
“Got word from someone named Marcus at the Junction today,” said Lobo, causing Jesse and Jenny to perk up with great interest. “Would have said something sooner but we were dealing with the stubborn Pack and their issues.”
“What’d he say?” asked Jesse.
Lobo proceeded to summarize the report he’d received (from those monitoring an old radio Aero had fixed up), starting with the fact that Frost didn’t seem to bothered by their escape.
“He’s not calling for searches or anything like it,” Lobo said, though he is incredibly angry with the bot.” All eyes fell on Aero. “He’s made it quite known that you are at the top of his shit list…”
Aero’s eyes looked away from the rest, and he placed his arms across his thighs.
“But yeah, he went straight for it and assumed control while things were in chaos,” Lobo continued. “I guess it was all sparked by your departure and he did so in the interest of, how was it Marcus put it? Peace and stability.”
“What kind of control?” Jenny asked as Jesse stood up and started walking around, still within earshot of Lobo.
Lobo watched Jesse carefully as he continued.
“Someone named Evelyn reported that Frost went for Winthrope Limited.”
Jesse immediately kicked the ground, a dusty, stony cloud of debris launching from the spot. He wanted to scream but spared the others from seeing his anger spill over. Frost was walking around his home, looking through his things, and stealing his inventions.
“You all right Jesse?” asked Aftershock, removing a flask from his pocket and flinging it at him. “You need that more than I do right now.”
“Do you want to know more?” Lobo asked out of courtesy.
Jesse opened the flask and swallowed two hefty gulps of liquor. It burned as it went down but he couldn’t care less. Holding onto it for a little longer, sure he’d need it, he nodded.
“Lemme guess, he’s been busy making steam capsules for all sorts of things?” Jesse said, taking another preemptive guzzle.
Lobo shook his head saying, “Marcus didn’t mention anything about steam capsules, whatever those are. He did say that several of your factories are making parts for something called a battery, while his are using your alloy specifications to make new bots.”
Jesse’s groan could have been a herd wild creatures for how loud it was. He stormed off to the edge of the overlook and took another drink. Aftershock got up and swaggered over.
“How are the people doing, Wyatt? Okay?” Jenny asked.
“Marcus didn’t say all too much, but I gathered from what he did tell me, and some reading between the lines, that there’s a menacing air hanging over the city. Citizens are confused, wondering where the officials are, and being mistreated by Frost’s emboldened security forces. Violence hasn’t erupted, yet, but tensions are running high.”
“That’s dreadful!” Jenny said, horrified. “We have to do something!”
“What, just waltz up in there and ask Frost to stop being mean?” Jesse said on his way back with Aftershock, who was now holding the flask. “We’ve been thinking about this for two weeks now and not finding many options on the table, fewer still to make all the wrongs done right again.”
“So, what are you saying?” Jenny snapped. “Now you just want to live in the wastes?”
“That isn’t what I said at all!” Jesse yelled, his voice cracking at the height of strain. The two of them stared at each other, equally stressed, and suddenly Jesse felt as if the stars were watching, judging, laughing at his plight.
“all right everyone, just calm down,” Aftershock urged. “I’m the first in line for a good fight but we don’t need to be wasting energy ripping each other’s throats out.”
Lobo dropped his shoulders and looked down at his boots; there was a hole worn into the left one and his toe was sticking out of it. Wiggling it, he sighed.
“I hope a plan forms soon, because if it’s something that we want to involve the Pack with, it needs to be soon.”
The group fell quiet as they ate their meals, the long days and nights with little sleep starting to show signs. Nerves had already been frayed and every little nuance, glance, or loud chew was enough to shred them that little bit more.
Aero sat and watched them alertly, neither tired nor hungry.
“Might I say something?” he asked politely, breaking the strangling silence.
Aftershock and Lobo were the first to look his way; both didn’t know what to say. Lobo felt a bit disturbed by the whole notion of bots, especially this one who looked more alive than any he’d seen before and acted like it, too. Aftershock on the other hand was intrigued, starting at the bot’s ice blue eyes and thinking, for a second only, that there was more.
“I think you’re entitled to that,” Jesse said. “You did save us from the gallows, after all.”
Jenny smiled, a little hope rekindled, saying, “What do you have for us, Aero?”
The bot exhaled intensely, a strange thing to see and hear which caused the others to breathe in sharply in expectation.
“Evidence that could be used to disgrace my Master and restore innocence to both you and Mr. Winthrope.”
It grew deathly silent again.
“Wait… what?” asked Jesse, his senses resurrected. “Did I hear you correctly? You have evidence on you?”
“Not on me,” said Aero, “in me.”
Jesse was an emotional rollercoaster again, hardly gentlemanly. He flung his arms up in the air and they came crashing down to his sides again, unable to grasp a single question in the mental storm going on in his skull.
Jenny looked at him, upset, wondering if he was going to explode.
“Well go on!” Jesse exclaimed, latching on to the most burning question he had. “What is this evidence that you’ve withheld from us, for two weeks no less, while we’ve been out here in the wastelands?”
Aero closed his eyes in shame.
“I was there the night Master murdered the mayor…”
Jenny gasped and Lobo leaned forward to better focus as Aero told them in detail about that night. Jesse paced, still listening, while mulling over a litany of his own tho
ughts.
“Master believed that by short circuiting all the bots he had involved in the conspiracy that he would be able to wipe all traces of his crime away. However, he did not factor in nor want me being there, recording everything I saw while saving it to my memory banks.”
“Why weren’t your robot brains scrambled?” Lobo asked doubtfully. “And how do we know you aren’t recording what we say and sending it back to the boss?”
Aero tipped his head and considered what Lobo was asking.
“To answer the first question,” he replied, “Master built me to be unique, more human like if you will. So, while I still have a means to be deactivated, I am not tied into the same systems as the rest of the control systems. Therefore, when he sent the purge signal to their receivers, I did not receive it.”
“And the second?” asked Aftershock, shifting his weight from one hip to the other while his arms were crossed tightly across his chest.
“You don’t, other than by trust.”
Lobo sputtered his lips as he stood, joining the rest in the seemingly more comfortable position of standing.
“Aero,” said Jenny, the only one of the group still seated with Aero. She sensed something good in him, even though he should just be a collection of bolts and gears wrapped in fake skin. “Why… why did you wait to tell us this until now?
“Loyalty,” he said without hesitation and both Aftershock and Lobo gave each other surprised glances. “Of course, I have it for Master… for Frost, as he is the one who created me. I would have no basis for all other judgement if that were easily dismissed.”
The group looked at each other with surprise.
“You think that’s all preprogrammed in there?” Lobo whispered to Aftershock. “Has to be, doesn’t it?”
“I have no damn idea,” he replied, looking over to Jesse and Jenny to see if they were faring any better with the bot that had a conscience.
“Over the last two weeks,” Aero continued, “between the all the stress you have endured, I have seen so many examples of laughter and joy and happiness, things that I have only ever witnessed at a distance, such as through a spyglass. Never have I seen the complexities of your interactions up close; you all show each other such a dynamic of friendship, of family, of love… that contrasts with my world view of abuse and pain.”
Jesse felt an odd feeling in his gut, tearing him in two directions. Aero talking about such highly emotional topics was moving, yet the ease at which he was divulging it was uncanny, both aspects shaking the notion that this was just a machine saying it all, no different than the vehicle they crossed the wasteland in before it crashed. Yet, right there in front of them was something more.
“Aero, you mentioned the fact you were there at the murder scene. How did you find out that the meeting was happening in the first place?”
“I was undergoing diagnostics, minor repairs, and fluid refills,” Aero said as Lobo cringed, “and overheard a discussion between Frost and –”
A series of jarring beeps sounded.
“Between Frost and –”
The beeps sounded again.
“It seems that I cannot say,” Aero said with distress, closing his eyes for a quick second. Another series of tones trilled before he reopened them. “There is a block that I cannot bypass.”
“Curious,” said Jesse lowly. “The burrow goes even deeper than we thought. Aero, if you can, continue trying to breach that wall. It seems like there are pertinent details waiting on the other side.”
“I shall.”
“Thanks,” Jesse replied, rubbing his eyes while trying to stifle a yawn. It escaped anyway. “Well, everyone, given this information it seems like we still need to develop a course of action and determine who to show it to, and soon. No pressure.”
“If we can get to the broadcast tower,” Aero said, “I may be able to hack in and interface with system to transmit the recording over the radio and holotubes.”
“That’s brilliant!” Jesse said. “Do you think it will work?”
“I honestly have no idea, but based on my capability and calculations, it’s probably our best chance.”
At that second, everyone saw a pinprick of light form at the end of the long tunnel, Jesse starting to say something else but not before he yawned again.
“I agree that’s probably our most promising option, Aero,” Aftershock said, “but looking at everyone made of flesh around this fire right now, it’s like the dead have come to life. We need to get some rest and finalize this in the morning, taking everything into account. Lobo?”
“Yes?”
“Do you think the Pack could wait for two, maybe three days for us to make sure this will work? I’m not even sure we will need you guys yet but this has me motivated.”
“I’ll try my best, Aftershock. Three days is doable for the Shadows; the Pack may start to leave before then.”
“Try your best, but if not, that’s fine, so long as we have some aid,” Aftershock replied. “If we are going to get Jesse back into Diablo, it’s not going to be easy and we will need all the help we can get.”
EVEN THOUGH THE air was warm, Jenny felt wonderful tucked into Jesse’s deep embrace as they made way for the cave. Lobo had just said goodnight, walking with his slight limp back down to the base of the mountain to let the other raiders know what was decided.
Slipping beneath the rocky canopy, Jesse let go of Jenny and removed a tan canvas bedroll from the alcove, spreading it out fully on the ground. Jenny then added a thin blanket and even thinner pillow to the arrangement, Jesse looking down as he put his hands squarely on his hips.
“I don’t think I could live in the wastes for my back alone,” he said, stretching. There was a painful strain, then a relieving pop in his spine. “These two weeks have nearly done me in and just looking at that bed makes me uncomfortable.”
“Maybe we can make it a little more comfortable,” Jenny said while her hands were lowered, then slid around to massage his lower back.
“Ah! That’s the spot, right there,” he said jubilantly. “I would like to request that you never stop, please.”
“I don’t plan to,” she said, resting her chin on his shoulder, “though you can be quite a handful at times.”
“I think you like that about me, though you have yet to see the best part,” he said, one of his eyebrows arched high though hidden from her view.
“Maybe I do like it, maybe I don’t,” she said playfully.
She increased the pressure she was applying and Jesse rolled his eyes until they were merely thin lines of fluttering white. The satisfaction he was getting from the massage, even through his clothes, was grand.
“You know, I have said it before, but I’ve never met a woman quite like you. Most are coy, obedient, and proper…”
He winced, that last rub she gave deep.
“While I’m just brash, rebellious, and improper, right?”
As much as he wanted to keep getting massaged, Jesse turned around. Looking Jenny right in her eyes, his weren’t the only part of him straining.
“Exactly,” he replied, “and that makes you the perfect woman for me.”
“I see what you mean by handful,” she said, her gaze having drifted down to the rise in his trousers.
“My eyes are up here,” he said with a gentle laugh.
She ignored him, still staring.
“In all earnestness,” Jesse muttered, taking a hand to her chin. As he lifted it, her smile rose too. “If you’ll have me, Jenny, going forward I plan on being there and providing for you, no matter what life tries to throw our way.”
She looked to the side ever so slightly, humming pensively before replying, “I think that I can live with that.”
Those words sent a surge of powerful desire through Jesse like a great river, full of life and hope and…
“Love,” he said. “What a strange and remarkable thing. This time a month ago, I was walking the streets of Diablo an empty man with nothing but
my work as company. Yet here we both stand today and I feel fully alive with you beside me. In my greatest moments of invention and within my wildest dreams, I never thought something like love could be as grand as it seems.”
Jenny moved in closer, placing her head on his chest where she found his powerful heart beating. Closing her eyes and lifting her hand to caress his bearded cheek, she said, “Me either. It’s as if life before was dull and pallid, now bursting with color and life. I do not wish to go back to the way it was before, so full of sorrow and strife.”
“Promise me that won’t happen; just the thought of you being away turns my heart to ice.”
“I promise!”
That was enough to send their lips crashing into each other, melting away any lingering thoughts of cold and the past.
Hands alive with exploration, Jenny pressed herself against Jesse, her fingers roving all over his back and shoulders while his worked feverishly to remove her clothes. They were no match for his determination and once the last slip of fabric fell to the ground, Jenny was standing before him, a smooth vision so glorious in the desert that it had to be a mirage.
He groaned as she pinched her fingers on the topmost button of his shirt. Though he might have been efficient, she was going to savor her turn. Twisting, she released the button from its hold and down the line she went, first exposing his furry, heaving chest and then his flat stomach, rippling with muscle and heavy breaths. Flinging the shirt apart, Jenny kissed Jesse’s exposed neck and took in his scent, thrilling as his soft beard touched her skin like a thousand tickling feathers. She pulled the shirt taunt as her kissing strengthened, slowly dragging it over his shoulders until, at last, it rolled down his back and was off.
He leaned in to nuzzle her ear then breathed softly into it, “I want you.” Her hands left his back, launching straight for his belt, immediately undone and gone. Then, just as she did with his shirt, her fingers found themselves poised on the button of his trousers.
Jesse was aching below her grasp, tight against the textile prison, begging to be released.
She could sense all the want, wrapped in his musk. Knowing that she had the control, it took an eternity to unclasp his pants before slowly plunging the zipper toward the base. With the cage door open, she reached inside and gasped, for he might have had ample in length, yet his girth was overwhelming.
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