7 Sykos

by Marsheila Rockwell

  “Be my guest,” she said.

  Light shouldered the rifle, sighted in on the hipster Infected, and fired. Brains and skull fragments chased the bullet through the back of the knit cap.

  Another Infected started from the south. It took Lilith three shots to put her down. “Let them get closer,” Fallon said. “So you’re more accurate.”

  “I suck at this,” Lilith said, frustration evident in her tone.

  “Better at sweet-­talking men into doing your killing?” Light asked.

  “Whatever works,” Lilith snapped. “Got a problem with it?”

  “Enough, you two,” Fallon said.

  Three more Infecteds broke away from the line on the east side of the basin, splashing through standing water. At the same time, one came at them from the north side and another from the south. If the dam wasn’t shattering, it was at least springing leaks.

  Then, above the eerie silence from the Infecteds, Fallon heard the roar of engines, growing nearer every second.

  The helicopter!

  “Not a second too soon, Book,” she said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Your chopper. The Infecteds are starting to be a problem.”

  “Fallon, I told you, the second chopper’s been delayed.”

  “Then what—­”

  “I don’t know!”

  Headlights sliced through the gloom, and she knew that the engine sounds weren’t from a helicopter at all. She remembered what he’d said about RPGs.

  “Oh, shit,” she said.

  CHAPTER 53

  2 hours

  “What?” Book asked.

  “Just a hunch.” She counted headlights as they rolled down the street toward the basin. Six in pairs, and two more single ones. Five vehicles, then.

  “What, Fallon?” Book asked again.

  “I think it’s Reedley’s Raiders.”

  “I was afraid of that.”

  “Not sure yet, but it’s looking that way.”

  “Oh, shit.”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “Well, you were right.”

  “I’ll talk to you later, Book. I’m about to be a little busy.”

  “Please be careful, Fallon. The ’copter’s on the way. You’re almost home.”

  “Might just be a bridge out between here and home,” she replied. “Over and out, Book.”

  He said something else, but she was no longer listening. The vehicles drew up behind the Infecteds—­herding some of them onto the grass and down the gentle slope toward the three Sykos.

  Instead of stopping, the ­people in the vehicles opened fire with high-­powered automatic weapons. They scythed through Infecteds, who danced at the impact of multiple rounds, fell, and in some cases got up again, grievously wounded but still ambulatory.

  “Sounds like they’ve got plenty of ammo,” Light said.

  “No surprise there,” Fallon answered. “Don’t let them near the meteor, no matter what, or it’ll be Jane all over again.”

  “We’re fucked,” Lilith said.

  “Not yet. Help’s coming.”

  “Soon enough?”

  “Soon as they can, Lily.”

  “I hate that name, Fallon.”

  Fallon was going to reply—­she wasn’t sure how, maybe snap at the girl, maybe apologize—­but it was too late. Infecteds were rolling into the basin likes waves onto the shore. Cutting through them, bumping up over the curb and down over the grass, were the Raider vehicles. Two pickup trucks, a Jeep, and two trikes. Rodell—­Rodent—­was on one of them, and a Raider Fallon didn’t recognize on the other. Al was in the back of one of the pickup trucks, a machine gun hanging from his shoulder on a strap. Reedley himself, in the bed of another truck, held an RPG launcher.

  The vehicles stopped about thirty feet from the Sykos. Infecteds continued flowing around them. “I figured we’d find something if we followed the Red-­eye migration,” Reedley said. The smile on his face could have been put there with a hatchet. Fallon had seen happier-­looking rattlesnakes. “Didn’t think it would be you, though. It’s a pleasant surprise. We have things to talk about.”

  “I’m afraid we can’t stay,” Fallon said. “We have a thing.”

  “I didn’t say you had a choice,” Reedley replied. “Anyway, I can do the talking. You don’t have to be alive for it.”

  “I thought your gig was saving ­people,” Lilith said.

  ­“People who deserve saving,” Rodent put in. “Which don’t include you.”

  Infecteds swarmed between the vehicles and the Sykos, seemingly undecided about which brains to go for. Fallon was critically low on ammunition; she gripped the M4 by its barrel instead, lifting it to her shoulder like a baseball bat, ready to swing.

  Lilith was close by her side, ready to shoot if any came too near. There were still hundreds of Infecteds around them, as well as the Raiders, so going out shooting made as much sense as anything else, Fallon figured.

  It was at that moment she realized she couldn’t find Light. He’d been right there with them, but she swiveled her head painfully in both directions and didn’t see him. Figures he would take off when things look the worst.

  And they did. The scene was chaos: Infecteds passing between her and the Raiders, breaking the burning headlights into shards alternately blinding her and then vanishing; Raiders occasionally firing into the crowd of Infecteds, their muzzle flashes adding to the strobe-­light effect. An Infected charged her, hands out to grab or claw. She swung the stock of the M4 into the woman’s skull. Teeth flew, blood splattered, the woman fell. Another Infected tripped over the first. Fallon brought her weapon’s stock down hard and fast into the man’s head.

  Beside her, Lilith fired a three-­round burst at a ­couple of Infecteds who ventured too close. Fallon turned her head, saw them fall, then saw, through the mass of bodies, Light. He had left the Sykos behind and was working his way toward the Raiders. He kept Infecteds between himself and them, crouching low when he had to, or moving with one, then changing course behind another that brought him a little nearer. She caught a glimpse of his rifle in his hands, then lost him altogether in the mob.

  An Infected grabbed her from behind. When crooked fingers caught her shoulders, Fallon lunged forward and bent down at the same time, drawing the Infected off-­balance. She was still holding her gun by the barrel, but she whipped it around, upside down, so it was pointing behind her, and squeezed the trigger. The Infected lost his grip. Fallon straightened, whirled around, jammed the barrel into the thing’s face, and fired again. Only when he was falling backward did Fallon see that it was a boy who could have been president of his high school chess club. It took another few seconds for his identity to sink in. His sister had babysat for her and Mark, on some of the rare occasions that they went out without Jason. The boy had dropped his sister off and picked her up a few times, often enough that Fallon knew him by sight. They lived in Maricopa, but had family here in Mesa, if she recalled correctly. His name was Weldon, she thought. Something like that.

  She closed her eyes, shivered, and decided having her eyes closed was the worst of all possible ideas.

  For the moment, she was free of Infecteds. She scanned the basin for Light, found him again. He had almost reached Rodent’s trike. He glanced back once. She thought his gaze found hers, but his eyes were in shadow. She couldn’t see anything in them, or any hint in the traitorous bastard’s body language that he had any doubts or regrets about abandoning her and Lilith.

  Then he turned away again, dropped to a crouch, and aimed his M4 at Rodent, waiting, Fallon assumed for a clear shot. The Infecteds parted for a moment, and he took it. The gun barked, the muzzle flared, and Rodent crumpled, sliding from the trike’s seat. One leg remained wrapped around it, and Rodent twitched uncontrollably as the life ebbed from him.

&n
bsp; Raiders in Al’s truck reacted. Fallon couldn’t hear what they were saying, but one of them jumped down and started toward the trike. Light leapt from behind some Infecteds and sprayed a long burst. The man went down, and another fell from the back of the truck. One headlight blinked out.

  In the midst of that, Light darted to the trike and shoved the wounded Rodent off. Then he threw his leg over it and parked himself in the seat. He gunned the engine, jerked into motion. Light swiveled the handlebar-­mounted machine gun toward the Raiders and squeezed the trigger. Fifty-­caliber rounds slammed into the trucks and the Jeep, shredding tires, shattering glass, and punching through steel. Light bolted forward, into the crowd of Infecteds. Some scattered before him, others stood, motionless, as he ran into them.

  For a brief moment, Fallon thought he was angling toward her and Lilith—­that he had stolen the trike because all three of them could ride on it, and escape the Raiders and the Infecteds. That he meant to rescue them. It would mean leaving the meteor behind, but—­

  But no. He looked her way again, his shoulders square, his gaze steady, and he turned the trike away from them, headed toward the canal.

  In the pickup truck, Al spun a tripod-­mounted gun around and opened fire, cutting through Infecteds, churning up grass, then tearing apart the trike’s rear tires. Light urged it on, but Al shifted his aim just a little. Fallon could see when the rounds hit Light; he released the handlebars and threw his hands out to his sides, his back arched, and he fell off the trike, which continued forward another few feet without him before coming to a halt.

  Al kept shooting for a long time. Light’s body jerked with every round, even long after he was dead.

  “We’re done for, aren’t we?” Lilith whispered.

  “I . . . maybe.”

  “I need to tell you something.”

  “Later,” Fallon said.

  “No, now. I just need to say, I only ever killed one person. You know, before. All this.”

  “Lilith, you don’t have to—­”

  “Shut the fuck up, okay? Yes, I do. It was Uncle Phil. He and Aunt Bess mostly raised me, after my folks died. But I was just a toy for them, a fuck toy. When I was fifteen, Aunt Bess was giving me some money, to run away on. I guess she felt bad, or I’d gotten too old for her, or something. Anyway, Uncle Phil caught us, and he shot her. Then he started crying like a baby, and he begged me to shoot him. I was so pissed—­a lifetime of pissed. So I did. I shot his ass with his own shotgun, then I reloaded and shot him twice more.

  “So I just wanted you to know that. You know, in case we don’t make it out of here.”

  “We will, Lilith.”

  “Yeah, right. You probably hate me now, huh?”

  “No!” Fallon said. “Not at all. I appreciate you sticking by me through all this. You shot a bastard who abused you. Nothing wrong with that. Even if there was, you’re more than that. Every one of you—­even Hank—­is more than the bad things they’ve done. More than—­”

  She broke off the sentence. More Infecteds were closing in. “Get ready,” she said.

  “Fallon!” Book’s voice, in her ear. “Fallon, it’s almost there. You should be able to see it. Do you see it? Hear it?”

  “Hear what?” she asked, distracted. “Never mind.”

  She looked at the western sky. There it was. The brilliant light in front, beaming down ahead of it, like the headlight on a train, the distinctive whir of its propellers slapping the sky. “I see it, Book. Tell them to fire at will, or whatever the phrase is. There are only two of us left, and everybody else here is trying to kill us. Smoke them.”

  “Is that safe?”

  “It’s the only thing that is safe. If they don’t mop up this place, somebody’s going to kill us. And it’s not gonna take long, so let’s get it done.”

  For a long moment, she thought the command hadn’t been relayed. The chopper came closer, the circle of light skimming the ground just ahead of it. It dropped lower. Its light circle settled on the basin, and the helicopter hovered just behind it. The Raiders were looking up, and some started to lift their guns to shoot. The Infecteds, if they noticed it at all, glanced up and looked away.

  Reedley raised the RPG launcher to his shoulder and balanced it there, trying to gauge his shot.

  “Give me your gun,” Fallon said. In the same instant, she snatched away Lilith’s M4.

  “Hey!” Lilith complained.

  Fallon ignored her, put the gun’s stock against her shoulder, aimed quickly, and fired.

  Her aim wasn’t what it should have been, or maybe it was the distance. Her rounds hit the truck’s cab, blew out the windshield, and tore through two other Raiders before hitting Reedley. Even then, she only got him in the left shoulder. The RPG was on the right. She squeezed the trigger again, but she had emptied the magazine.

  She had distracted him, though, slowed him down. Just enough. When a missile darted out of the sky, the entire truck he was in bounced into the air, spun once, and came down again in flaming shards. The shock wave hit Fallon seconds later, passing through her while she was still trying to process the brilliance of the explosion.

  Then a machine gun started firing into the crowd. Its ratcheting noise was louder than the ’copter’s engines, and its muzzle flashes were almost sunlight-­bright. It started by shooting randomly into the mob of Infecteds, but soon corrected and pounded into the Raiders. Al got off a ­couple of shots before heavy rounds jellied his head. Another Raider shot a handgun at the ’copter, to no avail. He reached for a long gun, but bullets perforated his arm just below the elbow, and it hung there, connected by threads, until more churned into his chest, and he fell.

  Fallon watched it fire, and fire, and fire some more.

  “The pilot wants to make sure you’re the ­people standing by the glowing wagon,” Book said.

  “That’s us. Me and Lilith. We’re all that’s left.”

  “I’ll let him know.”

  She had almost come to know when he was there and when he wasn’t. When he was, he was like a presence. Like the way a house with somebody else in it feels different from an empty one. He was reassuring even when he didn’t say a word.

  He came back. “Okay for the chopper to move into position?”

  Fallon surveyed the scene. Bodies everywhere. In the stark light it looked like a photograph of Gettysburg after the battle. They were Infecteds, mostly—­a few Raiders, and Light—­but still, it stung. In the rest of the country, ­people would get up tomorrow, go to work or school or stay home and clean and watch the little ones. ­People would love and sing and cry. Ideas would be born that would change the world.

  These ­people—­these who had been ­people, before they got sick—­would never have those things. No more weddings for them, no more first days of school, no more promotions, no more vacations in France or Las Vegas or New York. No more sitting down to dinner with family and friends. No more rolling over in bed and caressing a partner’s leg.

  And the Valley? Phoenix might one day rise from the ashes, like its namesake. But not soon, not while the memory of contagion and slaughter lived on.

  At least with Reedley and most of his lieutenants dead, his fiefdom would probably collapse of its own weight. That would help the healing, she hoped.

  “Fallon?”

  “Yes, Book?”

  “You okay?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “I’ve dated enough women to know what that means. You did it, Fallon, with almost two hours to spare. They’re recalling the bombers.”

  “Yay,” she said, too tired to summon genuine enthusiasm.

  “What about the chopper? Is it safe to move in?”

  A few scattered Infecteds still moved among the bodies. Some had started feasting on Raider brains, and a ­couple of them were near where Light had fallen, though she could no longer
see his corpse. “Yeah, I think so.”

  A few moments later, the helicopter left its hovering position and seemed to nudge the sky out of the way until it was hovering again, directly over them. Fallon shielded her eyes with her hand but still couldn’t look straight up at it. Wind from above blew her hair around, flapped her clothing, and when it hit the ground and kicked up again, it brought soil and loose grass with it.

  “They’re going to lower the containment unit, Fallon.”

  “Tell them to lower away. We’re ready.”

  A momentary pause, then: “Here it comes.”

  Fallon shielded her eyes again, looked up, and saw what looked like a huge steel ball descending from the helicopter. She supposed she ought to feel something like triumph, or pride, or relief.

  Instead, all she felt was numb.

  EPILOGUE

  Getting the meteor into the lead unit was easier than Fallon had expected. The contraption was heavy but well designed, with hinges and catches right where they should be, and it opened smoothly on what she guessed were hydraulics. When she threw the final catch, there was a hiss as the unit was pressurized to keep whatever was inside it in.

  Once it was sealed, the chopper landed so the unit could be hauled aboard, and Fallon and Lilith could climb in. Fallon was almost too tired to be airsick. In the east, the sun was rising into a clear sky, and she watched the light slide across the landscape, like the helicopter’s, only much, much bigger. Lilith sat in her seat, hanging onto the straps that buckled her in, weeping quietly. Fallon couldn’t tell if her tears were happy ones or sad, and guessed it didn’t really matter. She would be evaluated, and she might receive a full pardon, or be released for time served, or at least be moved to a more comfortable facility. Part of that depended on her psychological condition. Now that Fallon knew the prototype worked, she figured she could help with that.

  Which gave her an idea. She fished the MEIADD from her uniform pocket, reset it, and used it on herself again. Lilith watched, openmouthed. “Shit,” she said, “are you going to go all Incredible Hulk or something?”