Blood Runners: Box Set

by George S. Mahaffey Jr.

  The stairwell ended at a ramp leading into low-ceilinged, wide corridor. A withering sweep of fire rang out from a hidden machine-gun nest, nearly cutting Elias in two. Marisol grabbed his back, pulling him to the ground as bullets quicksilvered off the walls, striking dead two of the accompanying Mudders as the others dived for cover.

  Elias glanced out and caught sight of two obscured gunners and nearly lost his head as another burst of machine-gun fire rang out. Jessup and Bennie angled up and crouched, each holding a grenade launcher.

  “You see them?” Jessup asked Elias.

  Elias nodded. “Two, maybe three shooters, but there’s no way you’ll get a direct shot.”

  “Who says I need one?” Jessup said.

  He cradled his launcher and fired a shot that caromed off the sloped wall and blasted apart in the middle of the hallway. There was a scream from one of the shooters and then Jessup dove out and fired another shot that obliterated the machine-gun nest.

  Marisol and Elias were soon in the lead again, galloping under tube-lighting that flickered and flashed when—

  BRAT! BRAT! BRAT!

  An avalanche of bullets filled the hallway’s air. They dove to the ground as several of the nearby Mudders were hit mid-stride, their bodies blasted back into the air. Elias looked up as three of Longman’s fighting machines lumbered into the open, the cannons on their arms spinning like dervishes, spitting lead.

  “Wha – what are those things?!” Marisol exclaimed.

  Elias shook his head. He had no idea what the machines were, but he was going to find a way to bring them down. He rolled to his right and fired his pistol, but the bullets pinged off the translucent shields protecting the machines’ operators like droplets of water off a windshield. The machines rampaged forward, the echo of their gears and pistons deafening.

  Elias cried out and ran forward. He slid between the first machine’s legs and hooked a hand on a hydraulic cable that snaked up to the thing’s belly. Grabbing onto the cable, Elias pulled himself around the side of the machine. He saw the operators of the other machines gesturing at him. Making himself small, he retreated to the relative safety of the inner thigh of the beast as they opened fire.

  The machine suddenly swung left to right, trying to dislodge Elias. The movement forced the pistol from his hand. He grabbed for it, but the weapon hit the ground and spun away into the shadows.

  The machine turned and Elias scrunched into a ball as the other metal beasts opened fire. A wave of bullets from the other machines swept across the hallway. Elias felt the lead pound against the exterior of the machine he was hiding under. He heard the screams and expletives loosed by the operator up above him.

  He waited for the cannon-fire to end, then swung around to see that the translucent shield protecting the operator was shattered. The other killers had missed him, and killed the operator of the machine he was hiding under instead. Elias saw the operator, covered in blood, lying slumped over the machine’s controls. A shudder coursed through the machine and then it staggered forward like a drunken man, driverless, headed toward a faraway wall. Elias jumped to the side as—

  WHAM!

  The machine jackhammered into the wall, its legs still pumping. The sound of metal grinding against metal followed and then the machine broke apart. Elias rose and gaped back, only to see the other two killer machines aiming their cannons at him.

  BLAM! BLAM!

  Bullets bounced off the two machines. Elias squinted sideways to see Marisol. She’d recovered the pistol he’d dropped and was firing ineffectively.

  “RUN!” Elias screamed at her, but there was nowhere to go. Marisol raised her pistol again, aiming at the machines’ operators as they turned their cannons toward her and—

  BOOM!

  There was a flash of light and a tooth-shattering blast as an explosive detonated against the metallic exoskeleton closest to Marisol.

  The force of the blast lifted the machine off its feet, heaving it back through the air where it collided against the other robotic killer. The machines cracked open like oysters, the operators ripped to pieces, the walls and floor spattered with blood and machine fluids. Elias looked back to see who’d fired the shot that down the machine, but there was so much smoke it was difficult to see. He darted forward and grabbed Marisol and they continued forward.

  Soon the other had joined them and Elias could see Longman’s men up ahead, scurrying to take cover near crude breastworks. The fighters were high on narcotics, hoovering up handfuls of the White, their eyes pinballing as they struggled to their positions.

  Elias and Marisol were too fast for them, springing up on the men before they could open fire. Elias shot down two of them as Marisol twirled her sword like a death dealer. More guards appeared and gunfire rang out, the hallway soon obscured in dust and powder from the gunshots.

  Marisol cleaved her way through the gloom, thrusting her blade through the chest of a fat-bellied guard only to look up and spot a face she recognized. It was Harrigan, the Ape whose ass she’d kicked during a training operation in the Kill House!

  Harrigan emerged from the shadows like a wraith, wielding a machete in his hand.

  “You fucking bitch!” he shouted, charging Marisol.

  Harrigan swiped the machete down in a cutting motion. Marisol parried the blow with her sword. Harrigan switched grips, bringing the machete down again, this time from his right shoulder, slashing the air just above Marisol’s head. She slide-stepped Harrigan and his impossibly long arm telescoped out and connected with her jaw.

  Marisol fell back and Harrigan reached for her.

  “I’m gonna fill you up, whore,” he said, a runner of saliva dangling from his mouth.

  But his reach exposed his chest, if only for a moment. Marisol curled her back and whipped the sword up and across her body, taking off Harrigan’s hand.

  A doubtful and almost frightened expression danced across Harrigan’s face. The kind of stupefied look held by those who can’t believe that the hour of death is about to arrive … death at the hand of a girl.

  The swipe that came next from Marisol’s blade was so fast and so true that it was nearly impossible to see. It was simply a silver blur as the metal scalpeled Harrigan’s soft neck flesh. His remaining hand instinctively went to the incision, fingers clawing at the ruined skin as blood poured forth with much vigor.

  Marisol could have ended it quickly. She could have put him down with a thrust to the gut or perhaps another to the neck, but he needed to suffer for his sins. Her father was right all those years ago. She had been saved for some special purpose. And now, at this very moment, she realized what it was. She’d been sent here to strike a death blow against the demon who ruled over this squalid space. She was an avenging angel for everyone who’d been trampled underfoot by Longman Justis Heller.

  She turned her back as Harrigan fell to his knees like a penitent. He coughed and sputtered like the engine on an old car, then fell on his side and writhed like a gaffed fish, vainly trying to stuff the red back inside him. His body convulsed as he reached out a hand to grab her and Marisol had finally had enough.

  In one fluid motion, she brought her blade around in both hands and lopped off the top of Harrigan’s head near the hairline. Harrigan clutched at his bisected skull and then his eyes rolled back and he fell to the ground.

  Marisol spotted a shadow moving peripherally and brought her sword around—

  Nearly decapitating Elias!

  Marisol’s chest rose and fell. She was deep down in her zone, ready to kill anything. She could barely hear Elias screaming at her and then as her eyes came back into focus she noticed the bodies on the ground. They’d killed all of Longman’s men.

  Someone whistled and the two looked up to see Farrow and some of the others firing down the hallway.

  Gliding past the others, Marisol, Elias, and Malik ran on pure instinct, again seeming to anticipate the trajectory of the bullets fired by Longman’s remaining men, ducking and weaving
as they bounced off the walls and ceiling. Malik shouted at them as they ran, giving them directions, pointing to where Longman had stashed the warhead. Elias followed Malik’s upthrust arm and spotted it in the distance. What looked like a metal door.

  Elias fired several well-placed shots as Jessup screamed for them to duck and as they did, he fired his grenade launcher again.

  A grenade corkscrewed down the hallway toward the metal door which hid Longman’s warhead.

  The grenade detonated above the door’s frame, gouging a smoking hole in the wall. The backblast knocked down two of Longman’s men, but more appeared and began spraying their guns wildly.

  Soon the fighting was at close-quarters again.

  Bullets from Longman’s private guard thumped into several of the partisans as Elias and the others returned fire.

  Elias hugged the shadows, creep-running down when hands reached out of the gloom and grabbed him. The hands ripped away his pistol and he fell to his side. He looked up into the demonic face of Cozzard who held Elias’s pistol.

  Cozzard brought Elias’s pistol up with both hands, intent on shooting Elias when someone screamed:

  “COVER YOUR HEAD!”

  Elias did and a sound like a thousand hammers being struck at once filled the underground space.

  Elias watched as Cozzard, struck by a grenade, vanished in a plume of blood and gristle. There one instant and gone the next, leaving only a bloody slick on the ceiling.

  Elias looked over to see Bennie clutching smoking grenade launcher.

  “This is getting old, kid!” Bennie shouted. “Me saving you!”

  Elias suppressed a smirk, listening to the sound of gunshots echo. He rolled over next to Malik and Marisol.

  “We’re running out of time,” Malik whispered.

  “Where is it?” Marisol asked.

  Malik pointed. “Behind that metal door.”

  Elias poked his head out as Lout, Hendrix and four other men fired at them from a blind outside of the shattered metal door.

  Elias watched Farrow and the others return fire. Lout was hit in the forehead and slumped to the ground. The other guards were soon gunned down as Hendrix, the lone survivor, threw up his hands and fell to his knees, sobbing, crying out for mercy.

  In a blur, Marisol and Malik, without warning, rose and ran past Hendrix toward the metal door.

  “NO!” Moses shouted, running forward.

  He raised his hands when he saw it.

  Saw that Hendrix had grabbed Malik and wrapped his arms around the child with a knife to his throat.

  “Come any closer,” Hendrix hissed, “and I’ll fucking gut him.”

  128

  On the other side of the door and down in the sunken space, Longman waited. He’d been knocked down and disrupted in his efforts to enter the detonation codes for his warhead by the blast that took the door down. Bleeding from a gash to his head, he sat deep in contemplation. One of his men had fetched the LeMat pistol which was balanced across Longman’s knees along with a stabbing knife.

  Longman was sitting next to the warhead which rested on the powerized cart. He held the laminated card with the authorization codes in his hand, typing the sequence of numbers into the warhead.

  Longman listened to the battle raging outside, heard the shouts of Hendrix and the others as he entered the final numbers into the warhead. There was a whirring sound and then the mechanism engaged unlocking the butterfly valve on the device, so that it engaged and a timer began counting down. Longman smiled.

  And I shall make this city desolate.

  Indeed he would, Longman thought. He would prefer it to happen in seconds, but the time was on a delay. No matter. He would make the entirety of New Chicago vanish in fifteen short minutes. He could cleanse his subject and if the blast was as large as he believed it would be, he would take out the surrounding areas as well. He would cleanse the lands and eradicate the Thresher and dispose of the woman, Scarlet Poe, who’d purportedly stolen the silver object she’d found for him in The Tanglewood. All of his problems would vanish in a wall of fire and this please him well. Footfalls echoed and Longman grabbed his gun and his knife and stepped back into the murk.

  Marisol, separated from the others who were all busy dealing with Hendrix, entered the warhead room all alone. Her sword was at her side as she scanned the interior which was heavy with shadows.

  She heard the sound of the warhead before she saw it, listened to the whirring of the timer on the device. Her eyes followed the sound and then she saw it, shimmering silver, cradled atop the powerized cart.

  She jumped down into the sunken space and moved toward it and then the room exploded!

  Marisol ducked as a thunderous blast nearly took her head off.

  She saw the muzzle flash from Longman’s pistol, reacted as he rose up from the semi-darkness like a fairy-tale giant.

  He fired again and this time the smaller caliber bullet winged Marisol in the shoulder. She dropped the sword and clutched at her shoulder as Longman made a move for her.

  Firing along the way, Longman crossed the space that lay between the two, but missed Marisol who barrel-rolled to her right. By the time Longman had reached Marisol, she’d grabbed up her sword and was ready.

  She swung her sword and Longman dropped his gun. He whipped out his knife and swung back at her. She retreated several steps, waiting for her opportunity. Blood seeped between her teeth from Harrigan’s punch and her shoulder throbbed from the gunshot, but she could barely feel anything. She watched Longman like a cornered animal, matching him move for move, the pair circling each other.

  Marisol could see that Longman had the metal loops around his right wrist, the ones he’d pried away from her. The ones that once belonged to her father and brother. She pointed her sword at them.

  “Hand them over and ask forgiveness for killing my father and brother and all the others and I might end your life quickly,” she said.

  Longman stared at her, absolutely no emotion in his face.

  “Do you know how many times I could have killed you, girl? I could have killed and eaten you, but I didn’t. I spared your life to teach you a lesson so show some goddamn respect!”

  He swung at her and she parried his thrust, locking the blade on his knife. He drew her in and spat in her face and then when Marisol reacted, Longman head-butted her violently. She stutter-stepped and fell to the ground, a dozen feet away from Longman.

  He looked at her, grinning like a madman. “What do you have to say now? At the darkest hour, at the time I give you deliverance, what have you to say?!”

  She glared up at him, fire in her eyes. “I’m not scared of you. If this is my time to go, I will do so boldly.”

  Surging with anger, she shot to her feet and swung her sword wildly. Longman danced around her blade, laughing. Out of the corner of her eye, Marisol saw movement, a form entering the room.

  It was Farrow and he raised a weapon. Longman was one step ahead of him, however. He’d stooped and grasped his LeMat pistol and fired at Farrow. Marisol screamed as Farrow slapped back against the wall, taking a full shot from Longman’s gun.

  “NO!” she screamed.

  Longman turned and Marisol flung her sword with all of her might.

  The blade slammed into the meat just below Longman’s neck, causing Longman to drop his gun.

  Longman felt real pain for the first time in a very long time. He fought to remove the sword, feeling the pulses of red jet from the wound.

  He pirouetted only to see Marisol running full steam at him!

  She jumped and slammed into Longman, jamming the sword so forcefully, that the blade erupted from the middle of his back.

  A sucking sound followed and Longman fell to his knees. He looked up at Marisol. There was no shred of humanity in her face. Longman focused on her eyes and he thought they looked a little like his own.

  “Say their names,” she said. “Say my father’s and brother’s names.”

  “Dead,” L
ongman muttered, his voice barely above a growl. “You little whore. Don’t you realize we’re all dead?”

  Marisol planted her boot on Longman’s chest and roughly withdrew her sword, making sure to slice open Longman’s upper torso in the process. Then she ripped the loops of metal from Longman and returned them to her own wrist.

  Longman flopped to the ground like a dying fish and Marisol ran to Farrow who was wheezing, the color draining from his face. His chest was matted red and he was having trouble maintaining his balance.

  “C’mon!” she shouted.

  He shook his head.

  “I’m done,” Farrow said. “I played out my string, Marisol.”

  “What am I going to do without you?” she said, her voice breaking, tears guttering down her cheeks.

  She helped him to his feet.

  “The same thing you did before. You’re going to leave this place and help make things right again.”

  Longman was laughing, spitting up blood, but cackling and now Farrow noted the warhead and staggered toward it.

  “God Almighty,” he said.

  He looked to Longman who was whispering to himself, barely able to contain his glee.

  “Get out of here!” Farrow said to Marisol. “Go and get the others and run!”

  Farrow kissed Marisol on the forehead and shoved her back. He caught sight of the path between the stacked machinery that ran to the open bay door. Farrow fell before the warhead and saw the timer. “Thirteen minutes!” he screamed at Marisol who was already gone. “That’s all you’ve got!” His mind raced. He wheeled around and collapsed on top of Longman.

  “You’re coming with me, you sonofabitch,” Farrow said.

  With every last ounce of strength, Farrow manhandled the dying Longman up and hurled him onto the powerized cart.

  Then he climbed behind the controls and worked them, powerering the electric machine into life. He spun the machine’s driving wheel and drove the cart back down the tunnel, away from the others.

  Outside, Marisol emerged from the warhead chamber to see Hendrix still holding the knife to Malik’s neck. She wanted to scream out about the warhead and Farrow and Longman, but Elias and the others were too busy squaring off on the other side of the hallway. Her eyes swung from Hendrix on one side of the corridor to Bennie who was standing aside Elias, holding up a pistol as if ready to shoot Hendrix down. She was terrified that if she uttered a single word, it could cost Malik’s life.