by Chris Bostic
“So they might leave us alone?” Leisa asked.
“Not a chance,” Connie said. “They’re probably gonna rub their pea brains together and try to figure out what suicide mission to try next.”
“How long are we gonna just wait here?” Pete asked. Joe knew their ammunition was desperately low, and he anxiously watched their sergeant consider the question.
“About that…” Connie paused. “I’ve been thinking.”
“That’s a first,” Pete quipped.
“Very funny. Now shut up for a minute.” Connie shot a long look toward the river, though it was hard to see beyond the lip of the cliff with all the bodies piled up. “You guys need to get outta here.”
“About time,” Pete said.
“What do you mean, you guys?” Joe asked.
“You three,” Connie said.
Joe’s eyes narrowed. “You’re coming with us, aren’t you?”
“That’d be suicide for you. You need to move quick…stealthy.” Connie still wouldn’t look at him. “I’ll only slow you down.”
“You’ve gotta come with us,” Leisa said. “We leave no man behind.”
Connie smiled wryly at her implication. He locked eyes with Leisa. “After the way I’ve treated you, I don’t deserve it. But that’s not why I’m staying.” She tried to protest, but he raised a hand to cut her off. “You know I only rode you hard to make you tougher. To put a chip on your shoulder…so you’d want to prove me wrong. And you did.”
She blinked, and stammered to reply.
“Look, you’re a helluva good soldier…and smart enough to know I can’t go on.” Connie’s voice trailed off. He noticeably struggled to suck in a breath, not that anyone wanted to inhale the stale, fishy, cordite-filled air. “C’mon guys, I’ll cover you. I’ll keep ‘em busy as long as I can.”
“Are you serious?” Pete said.
“Yeah,” Joe answered for Connie, and blinked away moisture forming in his eyes. “We should grab our gear before the savages come back.”
“Affirmative.” Connie nodded. “Hurry.”
They scooted back to their positions, grabbing gear as quickly as they could, not that there was much to carry off.
The pack Joe had taken from Laura was pinned under the body of a savage. He couldn’t bring himself to touch the bloody beast, and simply yanked as hard as he could. The savage was light. Not surprisingly, most of their weight was in their bulbous heads.
“Leisa, you ready?” he asked.
“Coming,” she replied, and the sound of her scooting across the gravel was music to his ears. At least she’d found her motor, and had brushed off some of the malaise.
They regrouped again by Connie. Sweat beaded his forehead, and breaths came more in gasps than any kind of smooth rhythm.
“Go on now,” he said. “Keep following the river all the way home.”
Joe muttered at the sound of home, but kept his thoughts to himself.
“Take this, and here’s my extra mags.” Connie held out his coilgun. Joe tilted his head and refused to grab it at first.
“Give me one of the savage’s rifles,” Connie said. “You take the good one while I make the diversion.”
Joe understood. The old rifle of the savages would only help in their escape. Coilgun shots were more like zips with min-sonic booms as the nickel bolts flew. The explosion of gunpowder in the barrel of the outdated guns was sure to bring the savages down on Connie.
“Thanks,” Joe said. He’d not always seen eye to eye with Connie, but hesitated, feeling like he owed the man something. At the very least a hug, but he wouldn’t do that. Instead, he nodded crisply and extended a hand to the man.
Connie’s grip was unexpectedly firm, though his face was more ashen than a burned out campfire.
“May the fortunes favor you, Sarge,” Leisa said softly.
“You too, princess.” He forced a pained smile. “I’m proud of you.”
“See ya, Sarge,” Pete said without fanfare, and the three mostly able-bodied survivors crept to the edge of the cave.
“Take off when I start shooting,” Connie called, and he raised a savage’s rifle across the gravel pile.
Joe lingered at the edge of the cliff, alternating between looking back at Connie and staring off into the blackness. Across the stream, dark trees stood silhouetted against the gray, hazy sky. Nothing moved on the gravel from the cliff face to the stream. Not a sound or a breeze. Joe listened, and not even a chirp of a bird or savage reached his ears.
“Are we seriously doing this?” Leisa whispered.
Upon those words, Connie barked, “Get outta here and don’t look back.”
Joe lunged into the open, and a rifle shot resounded from under the ledge.
CHAPTER 16
The three ran as fast as they could while crouching. Joe led them along the face of the cliff, making for the brush in the distance. As Connie shot through a full magazine, they crashed headlong into vines with coilguns ready at the hip.
Joe expected to run headfirst into a savage. He led the way with his weapon, finger locked on the trigger. But only brush slapped at his exposed face.
Abruptly, the shooting paused. Joe debated slowing. The initial shots had covered up the sound of their boots crunching noisily on the gravel. In the sudden quiet, he cringed with each step. As he sidestepped a particularly dense shrub, shots rang out again.
“He must’ve grabbed another rifle,” Pete said.
“I left him four close,” Joe replied.
“Good.”
Joe ducked another branch and found himself at the edge of the river. Water rolled by almost peacefully, coming out of a hard bend to the left.
There was no open space along this stretch of the stream, which pleased Joe. He followed Connie’s words to the letter and turned to stay along the river.
Shots continued to echo through the canyon, growing in intensity. It was obviously more than Connie could provide on his own. Joe shook his head and muttered what little of a prayer he could muster.
“It’s actually working,” Pete said, interrupting the scattered musings of the wholly unreligious Joe—or rather untrained. For religion did not have a place in the Republic. The Republic was a place of unceasing joy, a veritable paradise on Earth, Joe thought with a sneer. Propaganda was as powerful a weapon as their coilguns.
“He’s drawing them to him,” Leisa said.
“Yeah, he just needs to hold out.” Joe couldn’t see more than twenty feet in any direction, but knew hiding wasn’t an option. They needed more distance—lots more. “A little bit longer and we’re gonna make it.”
“So brave,” Leisa mumbled.
Joe listened to her continue talking without paying attention to her words, and at the same time wondered when they’d lose the headset connection with Connie. The helmets transmitted a long way between squad members, but the sergeant hadn’t said a word since they’d left. He’d probably muted his microphone, Joe assumed. And Joe wasn’t going to break the unspoken code by saying anything to Connie directly.
A storm of shooting continued, making Joe feel certain Connie was still in the fight.
“I’m gonna run you ‘til you drop,” Joe said without bothering to look back. “I’m not stopping until one of you two says you’re done.”
“You’ll fall first,” Leisa replied.
“Yeah,” Pete added. “No way you can outrun me.”
“Not from what I’ve seen so far,” Joe retorted. “You been holding out on me?”
Pete laughed. “You’ve just never seen me this scared, bud.”
You’ve got every right to be, Joe thought, but he didn’t reply. He worried that the doubts probably lingered in all three of them as heavy as lead. However, he could really only worry about forcing enough air into his lungs to run. The words dried up in his parched mouth, and he slowed long enough to sip from the water tube poking from his chest into his helmet.
Even superheated water tasted good at that po
int. Though not one to waste it, he swished a mouthful and spat in the brush as he ran. He could spit again and again and never rid himself of the stench of death. Not even the minty soap could bring him back from what he’d seen. Too many friends and so many savages had lost their pathetic lives in some forsaken canyon behind enemy lines.
The shooting faded into the background, and eventually tapered off much like Joe’s strength. He finally gave out; the first one to slow just like Pete and Leisa had predicted. He stopped with hands above his head to gasp futilely like a fish on dry land. His companions offered no jests.
Leisa popped open her visor and sucked at the night air. Her face was covered in a sweaty sheen, her cheeks red with her own oxygen-deprived blood. Pete hunched over and clutched at his stomach as if he had cramps.
As Joe’s eyes met Leisa’s, a solitary gunshot rolled around the bend in the cavern like thunder. Static scratched over Joe’s earpiece, and the night fell silent as a morgue.
They waited for a moment, no one bothering to breathe. So silent. Then Leisa stifled a sob.
“He’s gone,” Pete whispered.
Joe nodded his head and ignored the pain resonating from his aching brain all the way to his blistered feet. “So are we.” He looked over his shoulder, but couldn’t see any trace of their old hiding place. It was tucked well behind the corner. “There’s no time to rest.”
“Already?” Pete said.
Leisa straightened up. “He bought us this time, and we’d better make darn good use of it.”
“You heard the girl,” Joe said. “It’s time to go.”
“Time to go home,” Pete added.
“You say it like you believe it.” Joe kicked at the gravel before trying to mask any other sign of his growing disgust at the word.
“You don’t want to go home?” Pete asked.
Joe wasn’t in the mood to answer, so he only muttered, “You know better than that.” He adjusted the straps on the backpack and turned to look ahead. “Let’s go.”
Keeping the coilgun balanced in his two hands and ready to fire, Joe pushed off through the woods. He decided to stay close to the river, and his companions didn’t argue.
At first he tensed at every sound, occasionally stopping to listen. But the farther he went, the more he lost the urge to investigate even the louder noises. He became an old-fashioned freight train, set on a path straight ahead and unwilling to turn.
They trudged for what Joe thought must have been two miles, maybe more, before he finally collapsed again. Panting between long drinks on the water tube, he slumped down beside the river.
“Far enough?” Pete said, his first words in an hour or more.
“It’s gonna have to be,” Joe replied, though he looked to Leisa for confirmation.
She nodded her approval and sank to the ground.
“Just right here?” Pete said, leaning hard to the side as he remained on two feet. “Shouldn’t we hide or something?”
Joe gestured to the thick woods all around them. “I dunno. Seems pretty hidden.”
It was still too dark to see much of any distance horizontally, so Joe looked to the sky in the hopes of finding a clue. Not many were to be had. The trees were definitely taller, with big leafy canopies that blocked out any hint of the brighter stars partially obscured by the usual haze. That meant he couldn’t really get a feel for how far away the hillsides or a cliff face might be located, and he was too tired to go check.
Instead, he shed his pack on the ground next to Leisa’s and tossed his helmet aside.
“We’re spent,” he said. “It’s time to catch a nap, boys.”
“Boys?” Leisa shot upright. “You’re not starting that, are ya?”
“Starting what?”
“Acting like Connie.”
“Someone has to whip you ladies into shape,” he replied with a chuckle that quickly faded to a sickly murmur. It was too soon for jokes, he decided. “Anyway…”
Pete wouldn’t let him change the subject. “He was a tough old bastard. I’d almost say tough but fair, but…you know.” He shrugged and sat next to a fallen log.
Joe leaned back against a tree trunk and rested his weapon across his lap. “We owe him. He should get a medal for what he did.”
“I don’t think he really cared about medals,” Leisa said. “Can’t say that I ever saw him wear one.”
“That’s true.” Joe shook his head. “I don’t even know who they’d give it to. I mean…who’d go to his funeral?” Certainly not a wife or girlfriend, Joe thought.
“Parents?” Pete offered.
Joe shrugged. “Beats me. He was a blank page.”
“He might have a dozen kids,” Leisa said. “You never know. The guy was a walking contradiction.”
“A dozen kids?” Pete chuckled. “The Republic would’ve given him a medal for that. Think of all the future soldiers.”
“Twelve little Connies, huh?” Joe wiped his brow with his shirtsleeve. “Could you imagine?”
“Oh, heck no,” Leisa said. “It’d be like his own little platoon of sexist, racist, uhm…”
“The perfect soldiers,” Pete quipped.
Joe frowned deeply at that remark, and his mood soured. It could’ve been the exhaustion talking when he barked, “Let’s knock off the chatter, guys. I’m beat.”
“Yes, sir,” Pete quipped. “You want anyone to keep watch, sir?”
“I don’t care.” Joe slid down the tree until he was on his side, his head resting on a folded arm. “Just don’t snore too loudly. The savages will hear you from a mile away.”
“Snore? Me?” Pete laughed as he bedded down somewhere behind Joe. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”
“Dream, huh?’ Leisa sighed. “Don’t be counting on any sweet ones.” She positioned herself an arm’s length away from Joe, and stretched out on the hard ground facing him.
Leisa’s voice dropped so softly only Joe could hear her whisper, “Not a chance. Not a chance of that.”
“You…okay?” he whispered back, interrupted by a gaping yawn.
“How could I be? How could anyone?”
As he pondered on that, her eyes closed and breathing slowed until he thought she’d fallen asleep. Then she blinked her eyes open to find him still watching her.
“The last couple weeks were bad,” she whispered, “but this is the stuff insanity is made of.”
“Or PTSD. They’ve got meds for that.”
“I’m not sure there’s anything strong enough…other than a mind eraser.”
Joe thought about reaching a hand out to Leisa, but pulled it back and pretended like he’d meant to stretch his muscles. He ended up scratching the back of his other hand, still holding her gaze.
Behind his eyes, his brain was working overtime. He recognized he had no business getting involved in any way with Leisa. Connie had taught him that much. Besides, he knew they would have to be more than lucky to make it out alive, so it wasn’t worth getting more attached.
He went for the joke instead, but couldn’t keep the seriousness out of his voice when he said, “That mind eraser doesn’t sound so bad some days. Anything to forget. Forget it all.”
Leisa’s brow furrowed. “You don’t mean that.”
Joe couldn’t stave off another yawn. His eyelids were as heavy as the blackness, and he barely had the strength to keep them open. “What do we have to live for?” he mumbled. “Not home.”
“We need to talk about that sometime.”
Joe would have willingly talked to Leisa for hours, but sleep prevailed.
CHAPTER 17
Joe rolled over to find a dull morning glow filtering through the tree canopy like weak camp coffee dripping through a filter. He rolled back to his side to check on Leisa, but found only a matted place where she’d slept.
He grabbed for his coilgun and sat up in a rush.
“Shh,” came a whisper from somewhere past his feet. Leisa sat with her back against a tree, keeping watch over a sleeping Pete
and groggy Joe.
He crawled forward, weapon in hand, and butted up against the tree next to her.
“Did you sleep?”
“Some.” She fought off a yawn. “It was hard as a rock.”
“It is rock. I think my side’s bruised, and there’s this wicked kink in my neck.”
“Probably not from the sleeping.” A smile crept across her lips. “I remember a certain someone tumbling halfway down a hill.”
“And here I thought you’d be nice enough to rub my neck for me.”
“Yeah, right,” Leisa replied half-heartedly.
He tried to catch her eye. “C’mon.”
“Quiet,” she whispered harshly and pointed with her head off to the right.
“What?” he mouthed and gripped his gun in both hands.
She pointed with the barrel of her weapon to an impenetrable patch of woods. “I dunno. Heard something.”
Joe concentrated, listening for a chirp or a rustle, but couldn’t pick up on anything other than an occasional wheeze from their comatose companion. Even the lazy river offered no pleasant gurgle to echo through the woods. They had to be close to the water, Joe thought. But maybe the vegetation was so thick that sound didn’t travel far. If that was the case, whatever Leisa heard could be right on them.
Joe’s finger slipped to the trigger on that realization. He shot a quick sidelong glance at her.
She shrugged. “I guess it was nothing.”
“We’re all jumpy,” he whispered back.
“Not Pete.”
She picked up a small rock and tossed it at him. It bounced off his leg harmlessly, but he shot upright like a lightning bolt, proving her wrong.
“What was that?”
“Nothing,” Joe replied. “Calm down. It’s all good.”
Pete settled back to his haunches and expelled a giant breath. “You sure?”
“Yeah. It’s about time you woke up,” Leisa said.
Pete rubbed the sleep from his puffy eyes. “I said I’d take watch,” he said defensively and turned to Joe. “You never answered.”
“Well, we survived,” Joe replied, and moved away from Leisa to grab his borrowed backpack. “Let’s eat and get moving.”