Unbelievable. She was messing with him.
She laughed, a gorgeous throaty sound, and rose. “All right.”
That was his Talia.
She returned to her seat. He restarted the tractor.
Branches flew up against the front, blinding them for a moment, then churned beneath the tractor’s wheels. Base One emerged before them, quiet.
He stopped the tractor and put out the solar charging panels. Sensors sought friends and enemies in the wrecked base.
Time to get Daz and then get the fuck out to the outcropping, where they would transmit the attack and their evidence of the Robotics Faction’s plans.
As they headed for their armor, a clang echoed through their tractor.
What the fuck?
He turned back to the outside screens.
Daz was pounding on their glass!
* * *
Talia had never been so happy to see a blown-up base in her life. The creeping, crawling vines tangling across the downed comm tower wreckage like hungry tentacles were new. So were the pieces of androids strewn around the quiet yard.
And then there was Daz.
He couldn’t see in, but there he was, wearing a shock rifle and his combat greens, carefree in the sun, waving and grinning.
Genuine happiness welled up in her heart. Another symptom of the return of her humanity, which she had to blame on Logen.
Logen made a sound deep in his throat. Gratitude.
She had to dash the tears from her eyes as she hit the open button and let his brother in.
Daz stormed up the ramp, cycled through the vestibule, and met them just inside. “No fucking way! I’d say you guys made it, but you sure as hell don’t look like it!”
He enveloped them both in a hug. They all laughed and talked and cried.
“We have to get out of here.” Logen finally ended the reunion and went to cycle the airlock. “There’s an outcropping a few miles away where we can transmit what happened to the solar station—”
“Wait, wait.” His older brother stopped him. “The synthesizer’s set up and it can’t be moved. You need medical attention now.”
She and Logen traded looks.
Even though she could feel the poison in her veins, giving her shakes and burning hot flashes, Logen seemed far worse off. The constant red cheeks, and he couldn’t keep down food or water, so he, too, looked emaciated. When he ate a real meal bar again, that’s when she would know they were out of danger.
Danger from the poison. The comm tower had taken out some of the canopy, exposing Base One to satellites, and the Bad Company CO’s pictures showed that a Robotics Faction ship could get to them from the Arctic in hours and drop bombs.
Logen reopened the airlock and they all exited the tractor.
While synthesizing cures for their ailments, Daz told them about hiding near the base, and the androids getting picked up by another ship, and him being able to return in safety.
“So with a reprocessor and scavenged guns from the armory, I’ve been fine. Here, med pen.” Daz sprayed his brother with dino tranq neutralizers.
“Talia needs it more,” Logen protested.
“Soon as her blood analysis is done, it’ll start synthesizing antivenins.”
“Sirus will be here in a few days, but the robots might be back much sooner,” Talia said, sharing their communications.
“He always was late to the party.” Daz tapped his lip. “Let’s load up the rest of the medical supplies in case we have to hide out longer than we realize.”
They started moving things from Medical out to the tractor.
The med pen worked quickly, which was nice; Logen turned to a healthier tan.
The two men worked together setting up the tractor for an extended time on the run. The bunks weren’t optimized for sick pallets, and she did feel sick. She’d felt bad before, and after enduring for all this time, now, in sight of the synthesizer, she lost her tough resistance and let herself fall apart.
But Logen was right there beside her. When she rested, he rested, and when she picked up her load again, he tried to take most of the weight off her.
Daz seemed to have something he needed to tell Talia badly. Talia paused to speak with him several times, but every time, Logen remained near, and he eased off again.
After all the movement, the poison took its toll.
She finally collapsed against the old officers’ wing. “I’m just going to rest.”
Logen waited with her.
Another idea burned for her attention. “If anything’s still repairable in the officers’ ready room, I could use it to play the badge recording.”
He raised a brow.
“It’s more sensitive than what’s in the tractor.”
His gaze dropped to the old acid-eaten badge she had pinned to her shredded collar. “Vi and Navina are already stented.”
“One of them was compromised before.” She eased her headache-filled skull against the wall, warmed by the afternoon, with a groan. “I still want to know who.”
He set his shock rifle in the dirt beside her.
“Sure?” She rested her hand on the thick barrel. “You’ll probably have to kick out a whole nest of poison geckoes.”
“Daz cleared the buildings.” He tapped his new uniform lapel badge, making the one she had secured to her collar hiss. “Call if you need me.”
She bid him go and closed her eyes.
He loved her. He loved her. And he wanted to bunk with her officially.
Which meant he would pay out and then reenlist as a volunteer. The idea drove her crazy. She wanted him out of here, away from the controlling Robotics Faction, and safe. She felt the same drive to protect him that he felt to protect her. That’s why she understood.
She had spent her entire enlistment dreaming of the day she left. But how easily could she settle back into civilian life knowing Logen was inside, fighting off an invasion that had stolen their teammates and threatened their humanity, and she wasn’t there to spot for him? The answer was that she couldn’t. Every day she was outside, she’d crave the security of his touch, and dream of reenlisting.
As soon as he got back, she’d tell him.
Several minutes later, Daz edged up to her. “Where’s Logen?”
“Around. Is my antivenin ready?”
“Another couple minutes.”
She squinted at his jiggling knee. He had never been a fidgeter before. “Are you nervous about something?”
“Maybe.” Daz scratched the back of his head. “Something occurred to me. About you and Logen. Are you close?”
She tilted her head at the protective older brother routine. “Are you concerned?”
“Not really. Logen doesn’t have the best track record with women.” He glanced sideways at her. “You know?”
“I hope I’m not similar to the woman who ruined his life.”
“No, no, no. But you’ve got a target on your forehead, and if something happens to you, I can’t imagine what he’d go through.”
Ah, man. Maybe it was the headache, maybe it was the numbness spreading up her jaw to her lips and down her chest to her belly, maybe it was the tremble in her fingers. His question depressed her.
She wanted to be done surviving. She wanted to have made it. She wanted to have won already.
Talia sighed and forced herself to her feet. “Well, I have no plans to kick off, much less to satisfy some braindead metal robots.”
“I’ve just got one more question.”
She was done with questions, and her groan should have obviously told him so. She turned away from him and saw Logen sauntering down the hall.
“Talia? A question?”
“What?” she snapped, distracted. Did his grim expression mean he had found something or he hadn’t? “Is it important?”
“Nah, not real important.”
Real important.
The phrase echoed in her head.
It’s real important.
All of the hairs on the back of her neck stood up.
Daz’s shadow approached hers. The long barrel in his hand pointed at her chest.
She slowly turned.
His sparkling eyes focused on her collar. “Is that acid-stained badge from the gut of a ground rooter?”
No.
He wasn’t cold like Vi or ignoring her like Navina. He spoke with a smile. Personality. And his temples were clear. Unbruised, perfect. Not at all like the other stents.
“It was you?” she whispered.
“Sorry, Talia.” Daz lifted the barrel. The laser sight stuck on her bare chest.
“You don’t have stents,” she protested.
“Who knew following your brother for one day to prison, where they didn’t even let me out of the processing plant, would still result in my getting stents?”
He laughed, a little too high-pitched.
“But it was a blessing in disguise, you see. I was about to fail out of Medical. To heal people, you sometimes have to cut them up, and I didn’t have the stomach.
“But then, thanks to the stents, I could eat a four course meal while sopping up a whole platoon! The surgeons were so nice to cover them up with a skin graft, gratis, since I was innocent and all. The volunteer, you know, not regular enlisted. I excelled in Medical and turned into a good little mercenary. Nothing has ever bothered me again!
“Until a month ago, when a little voice wormed into my brain and disturbed everything.” He tsked. The laser target remained on her chest. “That can’t happen. I need my brain back so I can stop caring again. You understand.”
She shook her head.
“Sure you do,” he insisted. “I’ve seen how you push everyone away who could possibly get under your skin. Friends in other units. Your own team, who’s got your back. Logen, who fucking loves you. That’s the saddest part of all this. I really do think losing you will shove him back to the most violent, hopeless point in his life.”
Daz frowned for a long moment.
Then he shrugged and centered the target again. “Oh well. He’ll get over it with his own stents.”
She tensed to run.
A shadow burst from the collapsed hallway and attacked Daz.
Without wavering, Daz fired twice.
She dodged.
The shots slugged Logen in the chest.
Chapter Fourteen
“No,” Talia gasped.
The rifle in Daz’s hands pointed at Logen. A strange, dead expression covered his face. And then it lifted and he became Daz again. Shock opened his features.
Logen staggered. His mouth gaped open.
Oh no.
Daz’s wail pierced her heart. “No!”
They both converged on Logen.
Blood pooled around Logen’s fingers, clasped over his chest. Oh, no.
“No. No. No.” Daz’s horror matched hers. He stuck pressure tape over the wound, sealing in the blood. “Don’t move. How could you do this? You’re impossible. You always love too much. And always the wrong people.”
Her brain screamed that Daz had shot his own brother. Daz had shot at her, and Logen had taken the blast to save her. Daz was horrified. She was horrified. But Daz had done it, and would do it again.
The whisper of words crossed Logen’s lips. “Talia, run.”
She backed away.
With the pressure tape in place, and Logen’s bleeding momentarily staunched, the deadness slammed over Daz’s face again. He rose. His rifle dropped to Talia’s level.
She ran.
Into the base, into the collapsed hall. A dead end. No! There, a place to squeeze through. She scrambled into the main hall that ran the length of the compound.
Flashing in and out of shadow, the ping-zing-zap of a shock rifle missing its target smacked the walls, the barren ground, kicking up dust at her.
Her heart beat in her throat; her blood roared in her ears. Her hands trembled. Run, run, run.
What the hell? What the hell? What the hell?
It had been Daz all along?
She raced past the place Chaelee had died. A black spot marked the ground.
Talia had to get back to the tractor. Get back to the tractor and lock herself in. No matter what Daz did, he couldn’t get her in there. She could suit up and save Logen. Logen had to live that long. His wound couldn’t be so bad. He’d only been shot in the chest. Twice.
Only.
There, in the mess hall, the emergency comm stolen from the Supply Depot was set up and mapping the pattern of robot ships. One was descending on this base. It would arrive in minutes.
Shit.
She squeezed into a tiny space under a table.
“Talia?” Daz’s voice floated, strange and inhuman, down the hallway toward her. “Come out. I need to talk to you.”
Her hands fluttered like frightened birds. She clenched them into terrified fists.
His voice grew louder. “Talia, you’re not helping. Talia, come out and I won’t hurt you.”
There. He passed the mess hall.
She poised to run.
Her lapel badge hissed. “Talia?”
Fuck. Her heart slammed into her throat. She squeezed her hand over the local comm.
“Are you hungry for a snack, Talia?” The voice, audible beneath her clenched fingers, also echoed in her ear bones and told her he was returning to the mess hall. He’d heard the hiss from her collar. “You always had a great appetite. It was something my brother appreciated in you.”
His boots passed her hiding location. A little dirt kicked up against her still hand.
“You made me shoot him, Talia. I can’t lie. That made me a little mad. But you know what’s worse?”
His question hung in the empty air, just to her right. He could hear her. Tasting the air. Trying to smell her.
“The longer I’m in here, looking for you, the longer it is before I can get outside and save him. You’re killing my brother, Talia. Every second. If you kill him on this last mission, right before he pays out, I will never forgive you.”
He stepped away. Farther into the mess hall. She let out her breath.
“You don’t know what he went through before you,” Daz continued, oddly reasonable yet also completely unreal. Like his personality had gotten yanked out, unplugged, leaving only the reasoning shell behind. “He’s come a long way. Following his heart, doing what he believes in, having pride. You’re stealing that from him, Talia. The longer you make me chase you. Come out.”
If he were in the far end of the mess hall, it was possible she could make it out by running. There was a possibility. She tensed for the burst.
He sighed. “Fine.”
Her button emitted the call-alarm. It wailed, and his badge also wailed. Of course he heard her. Too late.
She burst.
He was already headed for her and leapt to take her down.
The table he pushed off was damaged from the original attack. It cracked beneath him, causing him to stumble and smash into her rather than catch her.
She dropped and rolled under another table.
He crashed on top of it, struggled up, crashed atop the bench.
She rolled free, darted to her feet, and started to run for the same window she had leapt out with Logen.
Gunfire cut off the route to freedom.
She banked and headed deeper into the base.
More crashes, and then silence. Fuck. That meant he was running.
Her limbs shook.
She darted left down a hall toward the biologists’ barracks. A closet with a table barring the door jiggled. The androids? No, a giant dinozoid pushed forth.
She leapt over its back, darted into the next open room, and slid behind the door.
Heart in her throat, she waited, struggling not to breathe, unable to stop oxygen from bursting in and out.
The dinozoid clambered past, six legs moving in segments, into another room.
Daz pounded past her and into the other room. Accide
ntally following the dino.
She waited until he began banging around in that room—slug-slug of shots—and then she burst out of the bunker room and down the hall again.
Talia turned back to the mess and ran into a stack of flares.
They fell with a clattering ruckus. A booby-trap. He’d put it together so swiftly—he must have done it while taunting her, before trapping her in the mess.
Silence behind her. He’d dealt with the dino.
She turned into the other hall and ran yet deeper. Closed door, closed door, closed door. Damaged by the first blasts, sideways on their hinges.
He started talking to her over the comm badge again. “You’re beginning to irritate me, Talia. I need you to die so I can go save Logen. Why won’t you die?”
She turned another corner. A dead end, blocked by rubble.
“First, you’re killing Logen. Then, you’re torturing me. All this time, Talia. I chose to become a med tech so I wouldn’t have to kill anyone, and then I realized the ultimate irony, that medics are constantly killing. We’re always cutting into the healthy flesh to get to the injury. And then those stents finally gave me peace until that final week, when I was struck with this inescapable feeling in my chest that you. Must. Die. Why is that?”
She ducked into Medical. Nothing in there.
Out the small window, across the wrecked compound, she saw the old office wall and Logen. He was propped against the wall, the shock rifle across his lap. His head bowed. A river of blood pumped down his chest and pooled around his body.
Her local comm hissed. “I didn’t want to kill anyone, but you have to die, and you won’t stay dead. I didn’t want to kill anyone, and then I find myself killing you over and over and over again. It’s like a nightmare. It is a nightmare. Why can’t you make it stop, Talia?”
She grabbed the penknife off the ledge above the bed, cut out her lapel badge, and threw it on the bed.
“If only you would have left that sedative line in a little bit longer.” He was in the hall behind her.
Talia retreated behind the cabinet, the penknife lifted to her eye level. Never bring a knife to a gun fight. She coiled like a spring.
“I sabotaged your hover bubble and hit you with a cliff-breaker and you got away. I poisoned you and you pulled the med feeding tube out. I lured you to the waterfall and bashed your head in and fed you to a ground rooter, and you came back.”
Resurrection Heart: Robotics Faction - Cyborg Mercenaries Page 17