Defenders

by Will McIntosh

  “Ninety minutes,” Luis said. “I figured they’d be at it until nightfall, at least.”

  “I think they’re in a hurry,” Kai said. “It shook them, when we bombed our own people to get them. They thought they knew what to expect from us.”

  “Yeah, well, they forgot they ain’t starfish.” Luis pointed at his temple.

  Something was unsettling Kai. For a moment he didn’t know what it was, then the sound registered. The low rumble of aircraft.

  “Oh, come on,” Luis said, crying up at the ceiling. “Can’t you give us a few hours first?”

  “You talking to God, or the stilts?” Shoelace asked.

  “Anyone who’ll listen.”

  Shoelace tilted his head to one side and smiled grimly. “Then you’re talking to no one.”

  They filed onto the back porch and watched the distant transport planes spit defenders. The paratroopers dropped feetfirst, their sky-blue parachutes not deploying until they were close to the ground. Heavy artillery pieces dropped out of one of the planes, their larger parachutes deploying almost immediately.

  Kai eyed the tank at the top of the hill, nestled behind the blockade of vehicles the dozers had constructed. Its presence was somewhat comforting.

  Shoelace turned to Jaden. “I don’t want to be rude, but a dozen shooters in one location is a waste. How about you take your people and set up a few houses down the road?”

  When they were gone, Luis and Tina took up positions in upstairs windows. Kai took the back door. Shoelace chose a window facing the front and knocked out the glass with the butt of his rifle. Kai pulled the sliding glass door open; he left the screen closed, figuring it provided a bit of extra camouflage.

  “I’d like to say today is a good day to die, but I’m not feeling it,” Shoelace said. “Today would be a shitty day to die.”

  “I’m with you there.”

  Soon they heard gunfire. It was distant at first, coming from the north. It grew closer.

  Then it was everywhere. A thousand battles, going on simultaneously. That was the way you wanted it if you were facing a superior force—harass the enemy, slow them down.

  Before he’d stepped into line the day he’d volunteered to fight the defenders, Kai had zero interest in military strategy. Now it was the only thing that did interest him, besides poker and his family. He figured he had better odds of staying alive if he knew what was going on, and why.

  Kai scanned the backyard, watching for movement. There was an in-ground pool back there, the water murky and greenish brown, and a shed too small for a defender to use as effective cover. Beyond that was a line of pine trees, then the backyards of houses facing the other way.

  At any minute, the first defenders would appear. They’d likely come along the road in front, but they might come through the back.

  “You know what I’m craving right now?” Shoelace asked.

  Gunfire erupted from the street in front of the house.

  “Do you see anything?” Kai called.

  “No.”

  Kai ran to join Shoelace at the front windows.

  The face of a defender appeared over a rooftop across the street. It had climbed onto the roof. One of its eyes closed, the other sighted down a rocket launcher. Kai ducked away from the window as an explosion shook the house. It must have hit the house next door.

  Kai went back to the window. Another defender had joined the first, peering from the roof. Everyone in Kai’s house held their fire. Shooting at them from this distance would only serve to get the rocket launcher pointed in their direction.

  Three defenders broke from between two houses up the street.

  The tank at the top of the hill boomed; the roof of the house across the street exploded, shooting wood and black tile into the air.

  Kai sprang up, took aim, but the three defenders who’d been on the move were already gone. He ran to the back door and spotted human soldiers in the backyard, running. They passed out of sight. A moment later two defenders appeared in pursuit. Kai raised his rifle, squeezed off a few tight bursts that missed. Then they were gone. They were so fast.

  Upstairs, Tina and Luis were firing at something in the street.

  Shoelace opened fire, then paused. Cursing, he dove away from the window. Defender bullets ripped through the window, shredding the wall beyond in a wide arc.

  Two or three more defenders opened fire on them, their bullets thumping into the front of the house, shattering windows. Kai heard shouted orders outside, then a roar. Outside, the air suddenly grew bright orange.

  Smoke poured in through the windows.

  “They torched us,” Shoelace said as Luis and Tina barreled down the stairs.

  “Down,” Kai said.

  They huddled near the floor by the back door as the room filled with smoke. Kai coughed. His eyes burned. The defenders would pick them off as soon as they stepped outside, but they couldn’t stay inside. Kai glanced over his shoulder: The curtains and window frames were burning, the flames climbing the wall.

  Luis held up a set of keys on a yin-and-yang key chain. “I found these upstairs. Maybe there’s a car in the garage.”

  It was a chance, at least. They followed Luis, who pulled open a door leading to the garage. Thick, black smoke poured out. Kai yanked up his shirt, covered his mouth and nose, and followed the others, stumbling down wooden steps, blinded by the smoke, coughing uncontrollably, hoping the car was in the garage.

  Then it occurred to him: The car had been sitting in the garage, untouched, for fifteen years. There was no way it was going to start. They’d panicked; they hadn’t thought it through. He tried to shout to the others, but nothing came except racking coughs.

  Crawling on hands and knees, he turned and headed back up the stairs into the kitchen. Dragging himself onto the porch, he curled up in a ball, coughing uncontrollably in the cool air. There was a defender out back, watching the house. The smoke must have covered Kai’s exit. He tried to stay perfectly still, hoping the roar of the flames and the crackle of burning wood would muffle his cough, because he couldn’t hold it in.

  In the kitchen, Kai heard someone else coughing. Keeping low, he ducked inside. Shoelace was sprawled on the blackened linoleum. Kai grabbed his hand and dragged him partially outside.

  Through the porch’s slatted wood floor, Kai saw that the inner supports beneath the porch were on fire. The porch would go up in a minute or so.

  He heard a shout. The defender watching the back of the house hefted his rifle and trotted off. They were moving on.

  “We have to go,” Kai said, barely recognizing the voice coming from his singed throat. “You ready?”

  Coughing furiously, Shoelace nodded once. Kai staggered down the porch steps with Shoelace right behind. They got clear of the fire and dropped to their knees in the grass, still coughing.

  “Hold still,” Shoelace croaked. “You’re on fire.” Shoelace smacked at the cuff of Kai’s pant leg, extinguishing the flame.

  Lifting his head, he looked past Kai. “Oh, shit.”

  Kai followed Shoelace’s gaze. Half a dozen defenders were heading their way. He looked around for somewhere to hide. If they ran, they’d be spotted for sure. The shed was too far, the storage bin for pool supplies too small.

  The pool. “Come on.”

  They crawled through the gate, stashed their weapons along the fence, and slipped into the warm, swampy water.

  When the defenders drew close, Kai whispered, “Under,” took a deep breath, and ducked underwater.

  He couldn’t see anything but green silt floating in brackish water. Because good soldiers don’t do much talking in the midst of battle, he couldn’t count on hearing the defenders pass. His best bet was to hold his breath as long as possible, though not so long that he surfaced gasping for air.

  Tina and Luis were dead. It was the first moment he’d had to register that. They were still in the garage. How had all four of them been so stupid? When Kai saw that key in Luis’s hand, he
’d instantly formed an image of the four of them bursting through the garage door, careening down the street and out of harm’s way. In a car that hadn’t been started in fifteen years.

  Stupid, stupid.

  Kai’s damaged lungs began to ache. He guessed they’d been under no more than thirty or forty seconds, probably not long enough for the defenders to pass. Worse, he needed to cough. His lungs were twitching, his throat tingling madly.

  If he was going to cough, better to do it underwater, where the sound wouldn’t carry. He let it go, expelling most of the air from his lungs, then held on a few more seconds before gently lifting his face above the water.

  A defender was standing directly over him. Kai took a deep, slow breath through his nose as Shoelace’s face surfaced beside him. The defender looked left and right, then moved on.

  Two more came into view. Like the first, these two were focused on threats from nearby houses and other areas that provided potential cover; none thought to look in an old swimming pool.

  When they were out of sight, Kai and Shoelace pulled themselves out of the pool and retrieved their rifles.

  “We should touch base with HQ, find out where we’re supposed to rendezvous,” Shoelace said as water dripped off him and pattered to the concrete.

  Kai took a deep, sighing breath, then looked off at the smoking wreckage. The thought of heading back into that insanity made him want to cry. If they went, they would die. He was certain of that. Kai didn’t want to die. He wanted to see his son again, his wife.

  It was time to fold, he realized. Time to collect what chips he had left and leave the table. He looked at Shoelace and said, “I think we should find a house that’s still standing and crash there until this thing is over.”

  Shoelace chuckled, but Kai gave him a level look. “No, I’m serious.” This war was so big, so complicated, no one would miss two soldiers. “We can get some sleep, read a book.”

  Shoelace gave Kai a pained look. “Kai, I can’t do that. Like the sergeant said, if we don’t stop them now, we’re not going to.”

  “We’re not going to,” Kai said. “We both know that.”

  “We at least have to try.” When Kai didn’t respond, Shoelace shook his head, then took a few steps toward the house, which was now nothing but a big bonfire on a concrete foundation. “You know what these stilts are like. You know that better than I do.”

  “I don’t want my son to grow up an orphan the way I did.”

  “I have four kids!” Shoelace shouted. “I’m afraid they won’t get to grow up at all.” Suddenly his face just fell. He looked at Kai, shook his head slowly, ponderously, then held out his hand.

  Kai shook it. “See you again sometime.”

  “Sure. You know, if the defenders take the area, you’ll be caught behind enemy lines.”

  Kai shrugged. “They won’t bother me if I keep my head down.”

  Shoelace headed in the direction the defenders had gone. Kai watched him walk for a moment, then he went in the opposite direction. He had about two days before the full defender ground force would arrive. By then he needed to be stocked up with food and supplies, and to be in a basement somewhere.

  His stomach was a knot of guilt, more for letting Shoelace down than anything else. The rest of them would fare about as well with or without him. As far as he was concerned, he didn’t owe them anything.

  A half mile away Kai found Jaden, Julie, and their family. There was a stream running under a little bridge on the access road that led into the housing development. They’d taken a position under the bridge. Not a bad move, all in all.

  They were all dead.

  58

  Dominique Wiewall

  July 11, 2045. Colorado Springs, Colorado.

  Orders were shouted. All around the war room, rapid conversations took place. Dominique left her swivel seat as unobtrusively as possible, and went to stand by the exit. Not that she was planning to go anywhere; she just felt like she should get out of the way, because she was of no use in this situation. Worse, she felt as if people were silently asking the back of her head why she’d made the defenders complete psychopaths.

  “They’re securing oil fields and refineries as they advance on Baghdad,” some colonel shouted. He was near the front, looking at a live feed of a tactical map. “Long-range rockets launched from the Persian Gulf have hit the center of gravity in Baghdad. No word on the status of the premier and other leaders working there.”

  A civilian in a black suit was suddenly at Dominique’s side. He offered her a bottle of water. “You all right?”

  She accepted the water with a nod of thanks. “I’m just trying to stay out of the way. I’m not of any use in this situation.” Someone shouted to the president. She watched him climb the steps, two at a time, then huddle with two strategists. “To be honest,” she said laughing, “I’m not even sure why I’m here. I was on the Australia team.”

  “Oh, I can answer that, Dr. Wiewall. The operation in Australia was recorded—everything is recorded; we’re being recorded right now. The president went over that recording, so he knows who fucked up and who didn’t. You didn’t.”

  Dominique laughed harshly. “No, I only designed the bloody things. I didn’t fuck up at all.” If felt good to say it, to get it out in the open.

  “You had to be quick. Not to mention, you saved the human race.”

  She stepped closer, grateful for the words, for a sympathetic ear. “I’m still responsible for what they are. I should have considered what they’d be like, not simply how effective they’d be in battle.”

  The man gave her a kind smile. “I’m not sure you’re being fair to yourself.”

  She offered the civilian her hand. “I’m sorry, I don’t know you.”

  “Forrest Rosenberg. Secret Service.”

  “Thank you for telling me about the recordings. I feel better, knowing everyone in the room doesn’t think I’m an idiot.”

  “No problem.”

  59

  Kai Zhou

  July 11, 2045. Mapleton, Utah.

  A wounded defender lay beside the road. His side was flayed open, his arm gone above the elbow. Shrapnel wounds, from a tank round or a howitzer. Probably a tank. The defender had torn a strip from his pants to use as a tourniquet. The arm that was missing was the one that had held the defender’s built-in weapons system. His rifle was nowhere in sight.

  “They left you behind?” Kai called from a distance. They just left their mortally wounded behind to die, like they could care less about each other.

  “Yes,” the defender said. He was in obvious pain. Maybe they were short on morphine and didn’t want to waste it on a hopeless case.

  “Do you want me to, you know.” Kai touched the rifle strapped across his back.

  “If you want to kill me, I can’t stop you.” The defiance, the hostility in his voice, was unmistakable.

  Kai held up his hands. “Hey, I didn’t mean it as a threat. I meant, if you wanted me to do it as a favor.” Why was he talking to this stilt? Maybe it was just morbid fascination. He’d never spoken to one before. Even lying there, mortally wounded, the thing scared the shit out of him.

  He took a few steps closer. “Why are we fighting? I mean, we’re supposed to be allies.”

  “I’m a soldier,” the defender said, as if that were all the justification he needed.

  Kai nodded. “Fair enough.”

  The defender licked his thin lips.

  “Do you have water?”

  “No.” He sounded almost embarrassed to admit it.

  Kai pulled his canteen from his belt, unscrewed the cap, took a few more steps toward the defender, and underhanded the canteen to him.

  He went on his way.

  As he walked, it occurred to him that this wasn’t the first time he’d provided comfort to the enemy. He laughed out loud. What was it about cold-blooded killers that brought out the maternal instinct in him? Maybe Oliver could explain it.

  There mu
st be something about him, though. How many times had he wondered why Five picked him that night? There had been thousands of people within Five’s psychic range. Tens of thousands. Yet he’d chosen Kai. What had he sensed in Kai’s mind? Was it weakness? Kindness? That Kai was an outsider?

  His entire life, everything he was, hinged on Five’s decision to choose him. Kai would have died in that bathroom if Five hadn’t goaded him into making a fire. If not for Five, he never would have met his father, or Lila. There would have been no Errol. He carried the burden of being the Boy, but what was that, compared to life, a father, a wife?

  Yet he still hated the son of a bitch.

  It had been such a shock, to learn Five might still be alive, hiding in a bunker with the rest of his kind.

  Stepping over a guardrail and cutting down a ravine, Kai headed across the parking lot, toward the shopping center they’d passed on the way in. He kept his rifle at hand, but there was no one in sight, friend or enemy. The two stores on the end of the shopping center had been shelled, probably by the defenders’ bombers.

  Kai felt more alert, better rested than he had since the day the invasion began. He’d slept fourteen hours straight the night before. With his judgment sound and clear, he felt more certain than ever that he’d made the right call. His allegiance was to his family, and himself, not to the nitwits who’d thought attacking the defenders was a good idea.

  As he approached the Target, he reviewed his mental shopping list. Food, if by some miracle there was any left inside. New reading material—fiction, preferably set long ago in some other place. Socks. The house he’d chosen to hole up in had plenty of abandoned clothes, but no warm socks.

  He ducked through shattered doors, praying it hadn’t been completely looted, and immediately spotted bodies.

  They were soldiers, recently killed. One was draped across a checkout lane with big defender bullet wounds in his neck and face. Another, a young woman, was lying facedown in the big center aisle. There were five or six others.