Raining Fire

by Rajan Khanna

  With my one hand still firmly around the railing on the side of the truck, I reach down for my revolver. My hand closes on air.

  Ellie still has my gun. I look over to her, on the other side of the flatbed. A Feral tries to pull itself up that side. Ellie raises the revolver and fires. The recoil knocks her back a bit, but the Feral falls away.

  Good girl.

  As I’m processing this, a Feral clambers up the side of the Monster, pulling itself up by the same railing that I’m clinging to. Its dirty, blond hair streams behind us, even as the engines rev up even more.

  I lash out with the only weapon I have left, my boot, but I miss the face and instead hit the shoulder.

  Its clawed hands close on my other leg, by the ankle, its mouth open like it’s ready to clamp down on me. So with it on my leg and my hands on the railing, I lift myself up, my other leg coming up and coming down hard on the thing’s head. Once. Twice. The third shot smacks its face against the floor; it falls away as we move on.

  All around me, others are repelling similar would-be boarders. Buzz swings his metal pipe, and Tomas his baseball bat. Ellie and Coretta both fire down at the oncoming Ferals. Sondra is, thankfully, at the steering wheel, where she has all the light, and she’s more protected than the rest of us, but that depends on us keeping them from climbing aboard.

  Good enough.

  I use my boots as much as possible, slamming them down on fingers and wrists and arms. I kick in teeth and noses and try to break bones wherever I can.

  I spare a look behind us, at the back of the Monster, and see the mass of Ferals there, trying to keep up but unable to. That means we just have to contend with the ones still clinging to the Monster.

  I step to the edge and sight down at one, bald and scabby, trying to keep its grip. Then, thinking better, I turn to Tomas. “All clear?” I call.

  He nods.

  “Lend me your bat?”

  He nods again and tosses it to me. I catch it, take a moment to feel its heft, then swing down with it at the bald Feral. I catch it in the head, in the back, and the arm. It falls away as well, tumbling in our wake, narrowly missing the crush of the wheels.

  I shake off the bat, then turn to hand it back to Tomas. I step forward, not wanting to toss it to him with the Feral blood all over it. Tomas graces me with a rare smile.

  “Thanks,” I say, holding it out.

  He reaches out, and then suddenly falls back, and I see the Feral clinging to his leg. They both go spilling over the side, and out of the flatbed. As I rush forward, still ready to extend the bat to him, the Feral climbs atop him and bites into his cheek in a hot spray of blood. Two more stragglers who were chasing us fall upon him. Buzz next to me is vibrating with rage and sadness.

  “Ellie!” I yell, and hold out my hand. She slaps the revolver into it and I bring it up, aiming behind us, where Tomas fell. We’re moving quickly, but I do my best to sight, and fire off three shots before we’re too far away, hoping that at least one of those bullets finds Tomas.

  Then we roll on into the night.

  * * *

  After a frantic round of checking for cuts and scrapes (with none obvious) we take the main road in town out to the fence, and then out to where it reaches the nearest highway. Coretta is familiar with the area from trading and outreach trips, so she guides us. But Sondra is the first person to ask the question we’ve all been wondering. “Do we know where we’re heading?”

  Coretta stands up from where she’d been huddling with Ellie. “If we stay on this route,” she says, “we should find another town. Something. Somewhere we can forage and try to figure out our next move.”

  “If the road holds,” Buzz says. “If there isn’t anything blocking it off.”

  “We’ll just have to take our chances,” I say. “We can steer this thing. Or stop it if we need to.”

  “And if we disturb another pack of Ferals along the way?” Buzz asks.

  I shake my head. “What do you suggest, Buzz?” I ask. “I’m sure all of us would love to hear your better plan.”

  He scowls at me but then turns away.

  I address everyone. “The engines will last a while longer with the fuel we have on board. Assuming we don’t spring a leak in the ballonets, we should be good for another half day. Also assuming, as Buzz said, that we don’t hit some kind of obstacle. But I agree that the best bet for us is to continue going until we see a settlement or structure where we can find shelter and forage, or maybe even find some better kind of transport.”

  No one says anything, so I continue. “We should take the opportunity to get some rest. If you can. We can have two people keep watch while the others sleep, or just give your bodies a rest. One in front on the steering wheel and one in back. We only have the one flashlight, so the person in front gets that and uses it if they hear something or need to check out any potential obstacles. Yes?”

  Some of them shrug. Others nod. Buzz looks away.

  “If anyone sees something, they have to let us all know.” I make sure I meet them all in the eye. Each one. Even Buzz. “You saw what happened to Tomas. It can happen like that.” I snap my fingers.

  I see Ellie flinch, and I feel shame for doing that, but this is important. Normally I would be scoffing at entrusting my life to these strangers. These optimists. These idealists. But I don’t want to see any more of them die. Not even Buzz.

  Not any of them.

  I move to Coretta. “See if you can get Ellie to sleep. I’ll take the first watch.”

  “Me, too,” Buzz says.

  “Okay. The rest of you get some shut-eye, if you can.”

  Coretta looks at me doubtfully, but she takes Ellie by the shoulders, and they move to the center of the Monster. “I guess it’s just me and you, then,” I say to Buzz.

  “I want the front,” he says, in his usual, surly way.

  “You need to use the flashlight,” I say. “Can you do that?”

  He just gives me a look that says, of course I can, shithead.

  “You have to let me know if you see anything.”

  He meets my eyes and just sets his jaw.

  “I get you don’t like me,” I say. “I don’t give a shit either way, but if you endanger the rest of them because of some grudge you have against me, I will make it a point to make sure you get your brains blown out before I go.”

  He looks at me, incredulous. “You think that I wouldn’t . . . You’re the stranger. We barely know you.”

  I walk a step closer to him and put my face in front of his. “None of that matters. Our lives are tied together now. Our survival depends on one another. Each one of us matters. You. Ellie. Sondra. Coretta. And yes, me. You’re just going to have to take all that disappointment and choke it down, like an undercooked piece of rat meat, because that’s what’s going to get you through to tomorrow.”

  He clenches his jaw so hard, the muscles flex in his cheeks. Then he grabs the flashlight from my extended hand and moves to the front of the junker to relieve Sondra.

  After talking all that toughness, I move to the back of the junker and hope that Buzz doesn’t get us all killed.

  * * *

  My watch passes without incident. I’d like to say that I let Buzz be the big man up front, but the truth is that every so often I move to the front to make sure everything is okay, that he hasn’t fallen asleep, or that he isn’t missing the barricade or a crack in the road that would derail this whole thing. But everything seems okay. He deploys his flashlight periodically to check out something to the side of the road. Then, when I am satisfied that it isn’t anything threatening, I slink to the back unseen and resume my watch, which isn’t eventful. Hell, I can’t see much, even with my vision adjusted to the dark. But I listen. And I smell. And I hope that I’ll be able to pick up the presence of any Ferals. Or wild animals. Or anything.

  I stay there for a while until someone taps me on the shoulder—Coretta. Already the dark of the sky is lightening to a grayish glow all aroun
d us. “You’re relieved,” she says.

  I nod and stand up. “Did you manage to get any sleep?” I ask.

  “Something in the general area.” She shrugs. “It was better than nothing.”

  I nod to her. “Buzz did well.”

  “Not a surprise.”

  “Ellie?”

  “I think she slept for a bit.”

  “Good.”

  “Go do the same.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  So I move to the center of the junker and I lie down on my side, cradling my head in the crook of my arm and curling my legs to fit them into the space there. Buzz takes up position on the other side. I think about saying something to him, but then I think about his reaction—a sneer or something like that—and instead I close my eyes and hope that I can dig up something resembling sleep.

  I lie in that position for a while, my eyes closed, trying to find sleep. Hoping for it. Hoping for some kind of rest. Thinking of rest makes me think about the temple. And the settlement. The idea that I was going to put my father to rest. Put myself to rest. Place the ending on the story. Wrap up the loose ends and close all the doors.

  Then all of this happened. In that moment that I saw the explosions, I had a thought. That I hated the Valhallans. That they were to blame for everything that had gone wrong. Or if not everything, enough of it. Enough for me to hate them. Enough for the world to be a better place without them in it.

  I think, there, in the predawn dark, that if I don’t fall into a crevasse or get chewed on by a Feral or starve to death, I’ll find a way to do something. To hurt them. Even if it’s just one of them. Even if it takes me out in the process. Because that there’s the real revenge. Not Tess. Tess, if anything, was just a pawn. Someone trying to play both sides. That came back and bit her, and that’s done and gone. But the people behind most of the evil in the world were the Valhallans. And the Cabal. They deserve a little pain for their sins. No. They deserve a lot of pain. But if I can deliver even a little, that’s something.

  A knife to the gut in the dark.

  Something like sleep comes over me some time later. Until the cries wake me up.

  * * *

  I sit up straight and clamber my way to the front of the Monster, thinking that maybe we hit an obstacle or the road had fallen away ahead of us. Instead, I see Buzz pointing off into the distance. There, on the horizon, and on surprisingly flat ground, is a settlement of sorts. Coming up fast. I get a glimpse of tall walls. And towers.

  “I’ll slow us,” I say, then I rush to the back where the engines are, and with the trailing engine controls dial us down to a less breakneck speed at which we can consider our next move.

  As we slow, I see something in motion on the side of the wall; and a moment later, a ground vehicle, a truck of some sort, pulls out of the side and starts moving straight toward us.

  I don’t like the look of it. Dark metal and fluttering flags and . . . is that a cage bolted to the back?

  Coretta is by me in an instant. “I don’t think—”

  “No,” I say. “Turn us away!” I call. I start dialing the engines’ speed back up, past where it was before, to hopefully give us a quick boost. Then we swerve, and I move to the other side to try to keep the new vehicle in my sight.

  It’s still coming toward us, and I can see it more clearly now as it emerges from a cloud of dust and grit that it just kicked up. It’s the front part of a truck, the cab area painted all black; but on top of the flatbed behind it, they’ve bolted a large metal cage. On the side, there are platforms with men and women crouching on them, two on each side. One set sits off of the top of the truck, while the other sits just below the level of the flatbed. “That doesn’t look like a welcoming party,” I say.

  “What do they want?” Buzz screams.

  “Us,” I say. “What we have.” I turn to look at everyone. “But we’re not going to let that happen.”

  The voice comes back to say, how are you going to stop it?

  No time to think about that. I put the engines to maximum power, which is dangerous because they could die on me, but we need to put as much space as we can between us and the truck, and we’re in a cobbled-together junker and they are in a ground vehicle from the Clean, probably nicely topped up with fuel and with better steering and acceleration.

  “Grab that bat!” I point it out to Buzz. “Everyone grab what you can!”

  The Monster is kicking up huge dust clouds now that we’re off the road, which helps in that it obscures us, but it also makes it very easy for our visitors to see which way we’re going.

  “How many bullets do you have left?” I ask Coretta.

  “Five.”

  “Get ’em ready.”

  I check the revolver. Six in the cylinder. I count the bullets in my pockets. Or where I think the bullets are. Then I remember. I gave them to Ellie.

  I’m moving toward her, the revolver down by my side, when the bullets start flying.

  “Get down!” I call out and then follow my own advice, ducking back behind the engine casing. I sneak my head around, deafened by the roar of the engines, and see the people on the platforms raising rifles. Sparks fly off the engines next to me. They’re not shooting at us. They’re shooting at the engines.

  I pop out from my cover and take a bead on one of the shooters, squeeze the trigger. Only once. I stop the second pull. Can’t go through the bullets too fast.

  Of course my shot misses, and then they start firing at me. I drop back into my cover.

  They clearly want us for something. No use wasting bullets and fuel on killing a bunch of stragglers. And the junker isn’t worth anything to them. Not if they have a working truck. So they want us.

  And there’s that cage on the back of the truck.

  Slavers. Again.

  I look back at Sondra, trying to take cover behind a railing, the bat held firmly in front of her. Coretta crouches just past her, automatic out, trying to get a clear shot at someone.

  Slavers.

  I inch my head and arm out around the engine, and try to hold my arm steady, which is impossible with all the bumping and jostling. The driver’s too well covered—I can barely see him—but if I can take out enough of the men on the outside, they won’t have anyone to board us or take us down.

  I line up on one side, try to compensate for the movement, and fire. Three shots this time.

  One of them finds the mark and the shooter falls limp, but now I see that the shooter is still attached to the truck. Smart. The shooter bangs and bumps and twists on its platform, which temporarily distracts the other shooter on that side.

  Good.

  Only two bullets left and then I’m dry.

  Now what, Ben?

  Slavers. They don’t want the junker. They want us alive. They’ll probably be okay with shooting me to make it easier to take the rest, but they’ll want to keep the others intact so they can sell them off. Which means we have a little bit of an advantage. Because I want to kill all those fuckers.

  So I move back to the engines and turn down our speed. It will allow them to get closer, but that will give me a better shot at them. The trick is turning the speed down just enough so they don’t get on top of us.

  Then, as I watch, the remaining three platformers put themselves flat against the side of the truck, like they’re hugging it, and the truck shoots forward. Too far. Too fast.

  I pop out and fire twice for the windshield, where the driver should be sitting, but the first shot hits an overhang of armor, and the second one hits the armored front.

  Fuck. “Reload!” I yell, and slide the revolver over to Ellie. She catches it neatly, nods, and starts fishing bullets out of her pocket.

  Then the truck leaps forward and slams hard into our backside.

  For a moment I’m thrown into the air from the impact. Gunshots ring out from the truck and I get down, but bullets hit one of the ballonets, and it becomes a limp rag. Only four left, which gives the engines more work to do
as the weight of the truck increases.

  One of the people on the side of the truck detaches herself from the side and runs across the hood of the vehicle and onto the back of the Monster. I move forward, only to realize that I don’t have the revolver back yet and I just gave the bat to Sondra. I grapple the woman before she can reach the engine controls. She’s wrapped in tight fabric, a hard helmet and visor over her head. She slaps my arm away and slams me hard in the face.

  For a moment I can’t see from the stinging pain. A bat swings out by my head—Sondra—but the slaver catches it on an arm. If it hurts her, she doesn’t show it. The slaver throws Sondra back and moves toward the engines. I try to intercept her, grab for her wrist, hoping I can overpower her. Though it doesn’t look like I can. She elbows me in the chest, and I lose my grip and then—

  BANG.

  I duck instinctively, only to see the slaver fall back from the Monster and onto the hood of the truck. I reach for the engine controls and turn them back up. With a lurch we pull away from the slaver truck. “Turn!” I yell. We curve away from the truck, and I’m thrown against a railing.

  I turn to see Ellie, still holding the revolver. “Thanks,” I say. She just nods back to me.

  Really like that girl.

  The slaver truck takes a moment to reorient back on us, but it quickly closes the gap. We’re moving slower now, with some of our lift gone, and the engines are pushed to the max. I’m worried that they’ll overheat soon, and then we’ll be done. We need to lose some weight. And we need to find a way to stop the slavers.

  I look at Coretta and Ellie, even Buzz, these poor idiots who tried to find a better life and now are the only survivors. I think about how people like me are better suited for this world and how fucked up that is. The world could use more like them.

  I beckon Buzz over. I’m forced to yell over the sound of the engines, but I point up to the controls and explain how they work. “I’m going to slow us down again,” I say. “But then you speed right back up. Push them to the max until you have a decent lead, then keep them somewhere in the middle. Don’t want them to overheat or give out on you.”