Dusk Mountain Blues

by Deston Munden

Captain Xan smirked. “See blood and - ”

  Appetite responded with a punch so strong that it sent the Captain flying into a building, barreling through the glass and the concrete to the other side of the street. The sheer power of the blow echoed over the chaos of the battle like thunder.

  “Stop talkin’.” Appetite held his stubs of his missing fingers as he wandered forward. Charred, beaten, and bloodied, he blinked through his ever-increasing agony. Thinking too long about it would lead to shock. He needed to lean on the adrenaline, focus on what needed to be done. Kill him before he kills you. Kill him before he kills you.

  Appetite bit down on the remainder of his sleeve, ripping the fabric away with his teeth. He wrapped the mess of his right hand. Bile stung the back of his throat at the sight of two of his joint bones poking out from the poor man’s tourniquet. Don’t think about it, kill him before he kills you.

  Captain Xan cracked his neck back into place, stepping from the concrete and glass. “You don’t get it. I’m going to kill you by the time that you even have the chance. You’re wasting your time.” He flicked the two blue blades again, reforming them at his side. “You don’t learn either. I suppose that’s a side effect of being an uneducated pig.”

  Not falling for that again. Appetite smiled instead. “Ought to keep ya mouth shut sometimes, and maybe you’ll get a promotion one day.”

  “Ah, so you do learn.” He extended the blades into long blue swords the color of ice. “So maybe there will be something left for your daughter to bury.”

  Chapter 16

  Touchlight Trigger

  Drifter

  “We’re old. You’re our future. We’re giving this world to you.”-- Luke “Drifter” Caldwell

  They told Drifter to stay home, but he was never good at doing what he was told.

  ​When his oldest boy hatched this plan, he wasn’t included. Bless his heart, but ain’t no way he was gonna stay at the Homestead and let the young folk do the heavy lifting. After a load of convincing and threatening to go anyway, he managed to convince his dear, worrying son let him at least help steal the Terracore. Taking stuff that wasn’t his was what him and his boys was good at. Appetite agreed on one condition: take the Hounds, Dane and Bulldog, with them. Drifter didn’t mind. It gave him the rare opportunity to show the young people that he wasn’t washed up. On the other hand, he heard something else - a voice he hadn’t recognized in years, haunting him.

  You can’t do this. You’re too old for this. Pack up and leave you old man. Stop tryin’ to be relevant.

  Having the young people around gave him a little comfort. If he was being honest with himself, the fires at the Drum and his decisions thereafter shook his confidence somethin’ mighty good. Pride had always been what drew him to make bad decisions.

  ​The Hounds, Big Thunder, Moses, and himself had made it to the CEO building without much problem. The distraction gave them enough time to double back around to the back area and find a window on the other side to break into. A very helpful hill cut through the back of the spiraling building, half-burying the first few floors under an ocean of sand and plants. Pit and Shepherd led the charge, breaking into one of the windows with the butt of their rifles. From there, they leaped into what appeared to be the second or third floor. Felt like a heist already.

  ​Dane, Bulldog, their father Shepherd, and their grandfather Pit took lead, sweeping the room with a scary efficiency. They pawed from place to place, relying on their animal-like senses to navigate the dark room, Pit’s flashlight on the tip of his rifle the only source of light. They sniffed the air and cleared the corners almost soundlessly despite bristling with the most weapons outta all of them; hunters in every sense of the word. It was amazing how safe Drifter felt.

  Safe. The word stung a little. He hadn’t thought about his safety like that before. Drifter took a deep breath, deflating his puffed up chest and finding solace in his revolver and extra pistol. See. Washed up. Done let that ’roid take a little of your nerve. Drifter groaned at the truth of his own thoughts. He felt his stomach tighten a little, the fear of what came next settling deep within his gut. Good. It was a good reminder to himself.There wasn’t fear without courage.

  ​Drifter followed beside Moses with Big Thunder at their rear, watching for anything outta place in this dark area. Every flash from the rifle’s light gave Drifter a small tale of the world they were trying to build here. There were old cubicles tucked into every space, now covered in plumes of ivy and flowers. Old, massive computers stood around them like markers of graves long forgotten to the sands of time. The more they walked, the less clean it got. Papers lay untouched on the ground, yellowed and crumbled into almost dust. What he could read in the small chances he got talked about projects and stuff he didn’t quite understand. Appetite would’ve been much more interested in these things. Maybe they’d come back for it.

  ​“We’re not alone,” Pit whispered. “Tracks.”

  ​Drifter saw the boot treads in the dust now, heading towards the stairs to the far in of the office space. There weren’t many of them from what he could tell. The Hounds whispered among themselves, discussing; After a while, the four convened on a general guess.

  “There’s a few; no more than about twenty, much less than I thought,” Dane said, her smooth voice echoing softly in the ruins. “One’s a bit heavier than the rest. It’s probably the ’borg.” She stooped down for a second, checking the tracks again. “From their formation, they know what they are doing.”

  ​“Good to know. Good job.” Shepherd gave his daughter a small pat on the back. It was an odd show of affection for the Hounds. At least one good thing happened from all this. “Stay here. I’m gonna check out the stairs. Turn off the lights.”

  “Don’t tell me what to do -”

  “Listen to ‘em, Buck.” Drifter cut in before his brother got all huffy. “We ain’t here to boss ’em around. Let ’em do it.”

  Pit blinked his confusion. The dark gave his eyes a yellowish-green canine glow. He went to open his mouth to mutter somethin’ or another but stopped himself. There was the same struggle on his face that Drifter found himself dealing with lately.

  Time was moving forward around them. They wouldn’t have gotten this far without the younger people’s quick wit. Perhaps holding onto the metaphorical torch too long welded it to the old men’s fists; young’uns need to let them take charge, sit back, let them drive.

  Defeated, Pit deflated and took his position to cover his folks from afar. Shepherd and the two pups padded to the stairwell. The old men watched with bated breath. Anything could be livin’ in there. Drifter squashed that thought before he took charge again. Old habits from old men died the hardest.

  ​The young ones made it there and back without a problem, but their expressions had changed. Dane’s already pale face lost any color that it might’ve had. Bulldog, poor kid, wretched on the ground.

  Their father dragged in what appeared to be a corpse - or what was left of one. The massive winged creature was torn to pieces as though shredded and crushed from the waist down. Entrails leaked from the side of the open wound in its stomach and a foul smell took to the air.

  “The whole stairwell is full of ‘em,” Shepherd explained after a few coughs. “Tried to get the jump on the Major. Didn’t pan out.” He tossed the corpse down into the dusty floor, green blood leaking dangerously close their boots. Suppose we’re gonna have to get dirty one way or another if we’re gonna head up there. “They made a mess up there so ya gotta watch your step.”

  ​Everyone gave a clean nod and followed them back to the stairwell, stepping over the grotesque creature.

  ​They didn’t even make it to the door before the smell decked them; Drifter coughed and dug his nose into the folds of his shirt’s collar. The smell reminded him simultaneously of rotten garbage and cooking chitterlings. Shepherd cranked up the door to the stairwell with his shoulder and it only got worse.

  Moses wheezed, choking do
wn the contents of his stomach at the sight of what surrounded them. Bodies everywhere. Drifter had a hard time processing the devastation. He took some tentative steps forward, an uncomfortable amount of squish underfoot. From wall to wall, the leathery-winged creatures painted the walls and floor with their blood and gore. One man did this? He pushed the thought away. Evidence proved otherwise. Only one person had the sheer force needed without a single weapon mark on the walls. The ’borg Major did this to ’em, probably without a second thought. Just doin’ his job. Killing was no different than filling out paperwork for men like the Major. Just another day in the office.

  ​In a sick and twisted way, Drifter respect the Major’s cold demeanor towards his morbid job. It didn’t seem much fun - or that interesting - but to each their own.

  ​Big Thunder pushed through the corridor last, leaving the door open to at least let out some of the smell. With weapons drawn they ascended through the mush; Big Thunder and Drifter took turns killing any mutant that managed to survive the initial onslaught. Simple slices to the neck or stabs to the temple put them down without so much as a hush.

  Thunder did his so cleanly that he never had to clean his knife. The new mechanical arm - hobbled together from rusted metals and colored wires found in the typical Loner raider style - worked well for him, but there were things that couldn’t be replaced. He’d lost a bit of his confident and self-sure demeanor. In its place was a hardness that Drifter only saw in Thunder’s face from time to time, the shards of a pride forcely hammered into determination. A memory struck Drifter, seeing his brother reserved and serious. Drifter felt like the teenage kid, back in the desert planet, trying to get a smile on his brother’s face. He’ll be the Bobby I know again one day. He needs some time.

  ​Maybe by then, he would feel more like himself, too.

  ​They climbed and climbed up the building.

  Once they got through the trudge of the first few floors, the corpses became more and more rare. Midway through the fifteenth floor and just past an enormous mutant corpse, they were in the clear. It came to them as a relief when the air returned to its standard quality of dust, mold, and staleness - anything was better than trudging through the dead. It felt mighty disrespectful if he was gonna be honest with himself.

  Drifter put his knife away now, focusing only on the slick movements of their ascent. Up and up. The musk of the old building died away, leaving a freshness on his tongue that Drifter hadn’t tasted before. Around about the nineteenth floor, the walls looked clean and white, the floor wiped clean of any dust. Small green lines buzzed around them, flashing and circling like hundreds of fireflies during a cold night. Drones. Miniaturized drones. Any manner of defense could’ve killed them before they had the chance to react; luckily, their only functions seemed to be cleaning and building. Or somebody cut the defenses off. Not a good feeling thinkin’ ’bout that.

  They reached the top floor and stopped at the door exiting the stairwell. Shepherd leaned against the door, pressing his cheek against the thick, green metal. He shook his head. Nothing. One hand on his rifle and the other hand free, he opened the door to the main floor with a horridly loud creak. Drifter winced. He expected gunshots, the toil of battle sweeping through them. He expected an explosion or a trap, ready to take them out the moment they stepped foot in the door. Nothing. Still nothing. The Caldwells took a few cautious steps into a world long extinct.

  They were met with a white glow of the building’s light mixed in with the harsh sunlight pouring in from the largest window Drifter had ever seen. There was carpet on the floor, apple red and as fresh as if it had been cleaned daily for years. There were glossy wooden bookshelves on every side, each lined with thick-spined, colored leather volumes from shelf to shelf. The walls, scrubbed as much as the upper stairwell floors, had paintings hung on them of landscapes of a now-dead world millions of light years away.

  Drifter gawked, mouth open. He tried to imagine the Old World, the first one. He had tried every day of his life. Apparently, seventy-two years wasn’t enough time to imagine the landscapes seen in these paintings. He took another few steps forward into the massive office, guns raised.

  A form sat behind the massive wooden desk, oddly empty in all this. He sat facing the window in the swivel chair, twisting back and forth. “Expansion’s always bloody. Humanity can never stand on a piece of land, sail an ocean, take to the stars without drawing lines around them and claiming it’s theirs,” the man said, his voice low and pensive. “It's amazing how those lines become more important than the people in them." The Bluecoat Major turned, leaning over the table. He scanned their group, frowned, and sighed. “You didn’t bring her. That’s a shame. It really is.”

  Pit fired a spray of bullets. In a flash, faster than anything physically possible, Debenham brought up a grey light shield. The bullets tore apart the desk and everything around it, slamming and shattering the window at his back. One stray bullet slipped by and for a brief second, they thought that Pit got him They couldn’t have been more wrong. Debenham poked at a bullet in his palm, unamused at the prospect of being shot. He had snatched it from the air. The ’borg even laughed.

  “You’re the bastard...you’re the bastard that killed my boy.”

  “I am,” Major Debenham said, standing up with arms stretched out like he was gonna give them a hug. The bullet bounced off the ground. “I killed your boy. He attacked me - or at least tried to - and I defended myself. You would’ve done the same without a second thought. Already have, actually.” The smaller man pressed his fingers against the bridge of his nose. “I may not look look it, but I’m doing the best I can. There’s people that needs this planet and they aren’t gonna feel safe with y’all around. It’s the truth. Tell me otherwise.”

  They couldn’t. Or didn’t care to.

  On some level, he was right; they were the bane of normalcy on this world. Plenty of men and women tried to set foot on C’dar; pirates, bandits, other smugglers, vagrants of the galaxy. The Caldwells chose who they wanted on the planet and who they didn’t. After a time, visitors either left or, in some cases, came to an agreement with them. They were the wolf pack in the forest, the rabid bears in the den by the road. As long as they were there, no colony here would be safe. Territorial at their best, monsters at their worst. It’s our planet though. Drifter puffed up his chest, stepping forward again, ready for a fight.

  “This is our land. You ain’t gonna have it. You ain’t gonna have nothin’. You’re gonna leave here on your own or in pieces, ya bastard.”

  Major Debenham’s laugh died. “Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been in pieces.”

  What came next sounded like a boom of thunder. One minute, he was sitting in his chair, the next he was a step away fist raised. Drifter tried to react but found himself, the Hounds, and Big Thunder yanked weightlessly into the air. Drifter felt the odd pressure for a second brief second before being pushed again, landing and crashing near the bookshelves.

  Drifter blinked away tears of pain of pain. His head spun and swam in his skull. What happened….oh. Moses had moved them out of the way.

  Moses pushed forward with both hands, arms bulging from the force, as thick purple tumors bubbled on his skin. He forced the Major back, step by step, the air and space around them buckling. More and more he pushed, forcing him back and to the ground. The Major’s boots dug deep into the thick red carpet, tearing through it with his weight. His metal legs hissed steam and groaned from the pressure. Still he moved. Still he kept forward like a train unable to stop. Blood oozed from Moses’s nose as he tried to keep Debenham back.

  He couldn’t keep this up. The strain would be too much at his age. He couldn’t do this alone - none of them could alone.

  “Let ’im go, Monty! Let ’im go now,” Drifter shouted.

  ​And just like that, he did.

  Big Thunder tackled Moses out of the way of the charging ’borg. Debenham slammed into the wall behind them, bursting through it without losing a
ny speed. They heard his body slamming through wall after wall like a pissed-off bull trying to gore a rival.If they were lucky, he would’ve killed himself with that dumb move. It bought them some time at least.

  They huffed and puffed for a while, recovering from the sheer adrenaline that surged through them. Drifter took this time to get his bearings and helped his brothers to their feet.

  “That’s one crazy ’borg,” Drifter said, huffing. “Notice he doesn’t have a gun or a grenade or nothin’.”

  ​“The thought had struck me,” Big Thunder replied. “Whatcha think we should do?”

  ​Drifter looked around. There was a corridor to the far end of the room. The Terracore must’ve been over there as well as the rest of the Major’s unit. “Bobby, Buck, Monty, Spencer - go get that core. Me and the Hounds can handle the ’borg.”

  ​“You sure ’bout this, Luke?” Moses wiped the blood from his now disfigured face. “I ain’t seen nothing like him before.”

  ​“The best chance we got is to hold that Core over his head. Whatever’s holding ’em up might not be for long. Besides, Dane and Bulldog got my back, and Shepherd got yours. Trust the young people. It’s their future, let them hold it for once.”

  ​The young ones sprung into action without question; the old boys took a bit to process it. Their best chance for this to work was to split up, take the Core if they could, and run off. No one liked the idea of holding off that smiling ’borg, but somebody had to do it.

  Shepherd dragged his father and his uncles out of the CEO room and to the back corridor, guns raised, leaving Drifter alone with the two young Caldwells that might’ve started this whole thing. Drifter couldn’t blame ’em in hindsight; he only wished that it didn’t cost ’em a brother. Those scars had left a hardness in Bulldog and Dane. They needed to stand off with this man or they would never forgive themselves. In the end, it was their fight as much as his.

  Drifter unslung his revolver from his hip and tossed it to Dane. “Keep it safe, shoot when you can. Try not to shoot your ol’ unc in the back, ’lright?”