Hardy

by Theresa Beachman

  For now, she was staying.

  As soon as they were in Brackla she would make plans for heading up north. Make sure that she was properly prepared. The chances of finding Janie were much higher this way and that lifted some of the weight of responsibility from her limbs. And maybe she wouldn’t be on her own.

  She held the word that Hardy had said close to her heart. Together. It glinted on the horizon, full of promise.

  He kept to the B roads once they were past Bristol, pushing the Jackal on toward the River Severn. The journey was uneventful and slowly the knot in her gut began to unravel. When they had to get out to move debris or push abandoned cars off the road, she spotted Chittrix twice. But they were high in the sky, heading east and paid the Jackal no attention.

  It was after Bristol that she spotted the first signs for the Prince of Wales Bridge. She’d been over it once as a child and remembered its size and length as exciting. She’d happily do without exciting right now.

  Natalie was fidgeting, twiddling hair around her fingers.

  Georgina squeezed her hand. “What’s up?”

  “A bridge seems very exposed.”

  Georgina opened her mouth to answer but the Jackal ground to a halt before she could speak. The driver’s door slammed. Only Mabe remained up front, lost in a map he kept rotating. He must’ve sensed her scrutiny. “Dyslexic,” he said with raised eyebrows.

  Georgina shook her head and climbed out of the vehicle, grateful for the opportunity to stretch her legs.

  Hardy was surveying the bridge and the river below him with binoculars. Georgina shaded her eyes with her sleeve as she studied the landscape. The River Severn was a muddy silver scrawl. Weak winter light bounced off the shallow water. When she’d come here as a child, the mud had been peppered with wading birds and seagulls. Now, as she stared and scanned the desolate landscape, there wasn’t a single bird to be seen. Her stomach hardened once more.

  “How’s Foster?” Hardy kept the binoculars pressed to his eyes.

  “Asleep.” She hugged her arms across her body. “It’s very quiet.”

  “Hmm.” He handed her the binoculars. “Too quiet.”

  Georgina lifted the lenses to her eyes and twisted the focus. “Natalie and I are a bit worried about crossing the bridge.”

  His answer was a throaty rumble. “That’s understandable.”

  She dropped the binoculars, met his gaze. Her stomach flipped.

  He reached out and brushed the underside of her chin with two fingers. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

  Behind her, Mabe coughed and Hardy dropped his hand. Blood surged hot into her cheeks. Even her ears must be red. She rammed the binoculars back to her face.

  The river sprang into close focus. Georgina panned right up to the suspension bridge. It was still there. Just. “The bridge is a wreck.”

  She lifted the binoculars from her eyes.

  Mabe’s face was serious. He gestured with his field glasses. “There’s been some shit going on down there. Weapon fire’s pockmarked the struts. Several of the cables are destroyed.” He worried at his lower lip and stroked Barney’s head where it poked up from his pocket. “I don’t know.”

  “We should go around.” Natalie had come up behind her unannounced.

  Georgina slid a hand around Natalie’s waist and pulled her close. “I don’t think we can turn back now.”

  Hardy shook his head. “No, we can’t.”

  Natalie stiffened against Georgina. “Why not? Can’t we keep going, head up to Gloucester and avoid the river?”

  Hardy shook his head slowly. “Won’t work. That’s almost an extra hundred miles. We haven’t got the luxury of that kind of diversion. It’s not like we can pull over and get gas whenever we like.”

  Georgina pulled the sleeves of Hardy’s fleece over her knuckles and rubbed the soft fabric against her cheek, her mind racing. She’d studied this section of England on the map so many times recently. It was almost physically imprinted on her memory. “What about the Severn Bridge? It’s only a little further north.”

  Hardy pulled distractedly at his ear. “We don’t have spare fuel to take any detour, even the short distance to the next bridge up.”

  “There’s still fuel in some gas stations. We must be able to get some,” Natalie blurted.

  “Yes and no. There is fuel in some places. Can I guarantee we’ll find it?” He shook his head, his brow furrowing.

  Georgina turned to face Natalie. “We could end up with no vehicle and an incapacitated man on our hands, trying to hike it.” Georgina pulled at her collar with shaky hands then shoved them in her pockets out of sight.

  No one was coming to help them. They were on their own. The severity of the situation was like a lead weight on her shoulders that compressed her lungs. “I agree with Hardy but we should decide as a group. Mabe?”

  The vet nodded, his eyes dark. “This bridge. God knows what other shit we might come across if we head inland.”

  She reached for Natalie’s hand in the fading light, waited for her answer.

  “I guess it’s the bridge then,” Natalie finally said. She forced a smile.

  Hardy gave a terse grunt. “It’ll be dark soon. We should cross now so we have time to find somewhere safe for the night on the other side.”

  Natalie pushed back her shoulders and tucked her hair behind both ears. She removed the handgun that Hardy had given her from her waistband. “If that’s what we’re doing…I want a bigger gun.”

  Mabe chuckled and a crooked grin spread across his face. “That’s the kind of fighting talk I like.”

  A smile split Hardy’s face too, lighting up his features and easing the weight on her shoulders a fraction.

  His voice was gruff. “Are we ready?”

  Georgina squeezed Natalie’s hand as she guided her back to the Jackal. She released a pent up breath. “Bigger gun time then.”

  25

  Hardy eased down the road leading to the bridge. It was their best chance, but as he drove onto the slip road, the misgivings in his belly multiplied like locusts.

  Mabe pointed as they passed a set of road signs daubed with rusty red writing.

  Plague.

  “You see that?”

  Hardy nodded, his hands cramped around the steering wheel. He’d heard rumors of plague zones brought on by the squalid conditions people were forced to live in as they fought to survive the Chittrix, but this was the first evidence he’d seen with his own eyes.

  The Jackal tilted as he steered downhill toward the bridge, branches and swollen drifts of soggy leaves crunching and squishing under the tires.

  Soon, every sign they passed was smeared in red. Sometimes words, sometimes a handprint or a smudge, as if the writer didn’t have time to convey their message before they died.

  “That’s blood,” Mabe finally said, letting out a soft breath. “All blood. On the signs.”

  “I know.” He rocked his grip around the steering wheel. “Man, what I’d give for a tank right now.”

  Finally, the tires crunched onto the approach lanes. Hardy stopped and turned off the ignition so he could think, letting the silence settle in his bones. Ahead, there were six lanes, three in each direction. Some of the supporting tensile cables had split. They were either hanging off the structure, disappearing into thin air, or sprawled on the blacktop like giant sea serpents that had flung themselves onto the deck of a ship.

  He turned to the rear of Jackal. Natalie’s face was pale and pinched behind him but her jaw was set, the pulse rifle held close to her body. He winked at her and she inclined her head in acknowledgment. Georgina was by her side. Fierce determination glinted in her eyes.

  Despite the guns, they were depending on him. He had to make this right. He wasn’t in a cage anymore facing a bloodthirsty crowd. But this was what he did. He was a fighter.

  “The bridge is clear right now, but we all know that means nothing.” He let his words sink in as Natalie and Georgina exchan
ged glances. “Georgina, take the rear with Natalie. Mabe will cover me up front. Everyone take it easy. We don’t have unlimited weapons or ammunition.”

  Foster cranked himself into a half-seated position, his face etched with pain. “I don’t need babysitting. Give me a fucking gun. If anything with more than two legs jumps into the back, I can say hello properly.”

  Hardy’s mouth twitched. Foster was back.

  “Can’t believe I don’t have any fucking booms,” Foster muttered as he checked the clip of the spare SIG Hardy handed him. He rammed the clip home. “Ready for any uninvited leggy fuckers.”

  Hardy started the engine again and coasted down the hill. As they drew closer to the bridge, the road surface became more derelict, peppered with bullet holes and melted from laser fire. Carefully, he edged around a white van lying on its side and rolled onto the actual bridge. Wind buffeted the Jackal and he gripped the wheel tighter. The slow, sonorous creak of the structure was loud, like the bridge was dying.

  Five thousand feet of steel cable and asphalt suspended over a filthy, meandering river. Fantastic. His jaw stiffened.

  He glanced over his shoulder. Georgina shifted the pulse rifle in her grip and returned his glance with a small smile of confidence that thawed the icy nerves in his belly.

  The road surface was littered with rubble, and the Jackal bumped as he drove cautiously over the uneven surface, swerving around severed cables. Wind whistled through his open window, low and mournful.

  “I really don’t like this,” Mabe grumbled, contemplating the skyline.

  “Just keep your eyes peeled,” Hardy replied, blinking sweat from his vision, not trusting himself to take his hands from the wheel. They were nearly halfway there.

  A sudden rush of air whooshed through the Jackal’s open back, bringing the hairs on the back of his neck to painful attention. Mabe rotated in his seat as a second wave blasted through the vehicle.

  “Chittrix!” Georgina screamed.

  In the rearview mirror she ducked with Natalie, and they aimed their pulse rifles out the open rear. Hardy slowed, trying to make the Jackal’s motion as smooth as possible, fighting every instinct that wanted to ram his foot to the floor and hightail it to the other side of the bridge. No way they could outrun an adult Chittrix on such a cluttered road.

  Beside him, Mabe squirreled his substantial upper body through the passenger seat window, impressive expletives flying from his lips.

  Hardy swerved around a burned-out car then tramped on the brakes.

  Fuck.

  Mabe rocked, his pulse rifle clattering against the window frame. He dropped back into the Jackal’s cab, whipping his head round. “What the—”

  Hardy stared out the windscreen, his gut recoiling in horror as a swarm of Chittrix rose from under both sides of the bridge, turning the fading day into night within seconds. They boiled in a black mass of jagged limbs, rising in a tight spiral only feet above the bridge.

  “Holy mother of God.” Mabe’s jaw dropped.

  Hardy unclipped his seatbelt, and scrambled from the Jackal. All thoughts other than protecting his people vanished.

  He sprinted to the rear of the jeep and, dropping the rear panel, ripped the Sweeper from its mount on the ceiling.

  Foster punched out the side window with his elbow and leaned out, snarling as he pumped bullets into the seething swarm.

  Hardy checked the Sweeper’s charge. Still at fifty percent. At least the fried battery had retained the charge. But it was still a one shot only deal.

  The thud of power told him Mabe was already firing from the front.

  Hardy jerked his head round the corner. A lone Chittrix had landed on the road ahead, screaming at the onslaught of laser fire scorching its thorax. Hardy shouldered the sweeper and aimed his pulse rifle at the alien as he stalked forward.

  “Mabe, fucking drive,” he hollered as he paced, savoring the grim satisfaction as his laser fire tore a ragged hole in the creature’s neck. Its head twisted unsupported and it toppled.

  Behind him, Foster was howling, his vocabulary stinging Hardy’s ears.

  Hardy dropped to one knee as Mabe drove past him.

  “Get the fuck into the jeep,” Foster yelled from the side window, gesticulating wildly with his free arm. Behind him, Natalie crouched, her eyes wide.

  The rear of the jeep drew level. Georgina was there, her arms outstretched. “Hardy!”

  He waved her on. “I’m going to take out the swarm,” he screamed. He couldn’t do that from the safety of the jeep. He jabbed a hand at the far side of the bridge. “Fucking go!”

  Georgina shook her head, but Mabe threw Hardy a grim look over his shoulder as he accelerated.

  Hardy pressed his lips together, ignoring the distraction of Georgina’s screams. Above, the air buzzed. The Chittrix were circling, their speed increasing as they prepared to dive. He’d seen it countless times before. They called to each other, their shrill cries cutting through the cold air, goading each other into an increasing frenzy, their flight circle tapering. Hardy ran, tracking the Jackal, heading for a sweet spot directly under the Chittrix funnel, where he could take aim.

  He skidded to a halt as jagged pincers appeared ahead at either side of the road, their pointed ends hacking gouges as they pulled the armored scorpion-like bodies up onto the asphalt.

  Scutters.

  Hardy fired at the nearest on his right-hand side with his handgun, wanting to save the power of the Sweeper for the boiling mass of Chittrix over his head. He hit the closest two, shattering their exoskeletons with a satisfying crunch of bullets. But the remaining horde responded with a high-pitched screech and as he jerked his head round, the ones on his left surged forward in a revenge-fueled frenzy.

  Fuck.

  “Hardy!”

  Georgina was climbing out of the Jackal.

  Black spots spun at the edges of his vision. “No. No.”

  Foster swiped at her back, but his fist closed on thin air as she jumped. She sprinted toward him, head down, clasping her pulse rifle, her face set in determination.

  She collided with him, wheezing as she took his side, aiming low at the approaching Scutters.

  “What the fuck? Get back in the jeep, Georgina.” He grabbed her arm to drag her across the road, but ground to a halt.

  Too fucking late already.

  “You can’t hold them off on your own,” she spat, hoisting the pulse rifle onto her shoulder. “Someone needs to cover your big ass.” She let rip with the rifle, churning through the Scutters with a violent spray of power. They exploded in a spattering massacre only feet away.

  Air blasted his head from above. The Chittrix formation was like a dark shard in the sky.

  They were out of time.

  Hardy swung the Sweeper off his shoulder. Georgina bumped up against his back. The connection calmed him. Exhaling a controlled breath, he slowed so their backs remained touching, sheltering each other.

  One eye closed, he took aim as Georgina fired another round into the Scutters. The Chittrix spiral was a needle-like vortex, on the brink of plummeting.

  Hardy exhaled slowly, letting his body guide the weapon. He squeezed the trigger.

  26

  Georgina swept the pulse rifle through the juddering throng of Scutters. They continued to crowd onto the road, the two separate groups combining as one in the middle of the bridge, effectively sealing off escape to the other side.

  Frenzied Scutters clambered on top of each other, blocking her view of the Jackal. How was she going to get back to the jeep? Their route was blocked.

  The whump of the Sweeper passed through her as Hardy fired, then his big hand closed around her bicep and he was hauling her backward, so fast she tripped and stumbled, falling into the solidity of his body. He snagged her waist and supported her back to the start of the bridge.

  The start of the bridge.

  What the hell was he doing?

  She struggled in his grip. “You’re going the wrong wa
y,” she yelled. “The wrong direction.”

  Then it hit, a wave of black mist and atomized Chittrix that fouled the world. She screwed her eyes shut tight, not daring to breathe. Hardy tripped and Georgina hit the road, sharp stones and grit lacerating her cheek. She spat dirt and coughed as the pulse rifle was torn from her hands and the air razed from her lungs.

  Hardy groaned next to her, then seconds later, he was pulling her back up onto her feet. She stumbled with him, compelled to view the devastation behind her as she scooped the pulse rifle up.

  Air locked in her throat. The entire swarm had fallen from the sky, but the Sweeper hadn’t vaporized all of them. Partly melted insectoid bodies filled the bridge. Scutters were crushed underneath, creating a monstrous organic barrier of snapping, howling, aliens.

  One that separated her and Hardy from the Jackal. From escape.

  She stretched onto the tips of her toes. The Jackal was still visible. Light-headedness swelled up within her and she broke into a run.

  She had to get to the other side.

  A pincer grip on her elbow brought her to a skidding stop.

  His voice was authoritative. “No.”

  “We can make it.” She wrestled against him, pushing against him but he yanked her close, cradling her head to his chest. This wasn’t happening. This could not be happening. Hardy spoke low against her ear. “Georgina. There’s no way we’re going to get past that.”

  She lashed out with her feet, tears blurring her vision. Fuck. “We need to go. Before it’s too late.”

  But his grip was unyielding and with methodical steps he pulled her back from the gnashing Chittrix and Scutters. “It’s too late.”

  Georgina sagged against him, panting, her cheek rubbing against his chest. She blinked, struggling to focus her blurry vision. “They can’t leave us.”

  But the Jackal was already a rapidly disappearing dot in the distance. Anger bit sharp and acid at the back of her throat. “Why aren’t they waiting for us?”