by T. K. Malone
“Like electricity?” Pebbles asked.
Zac felt like his head was going to explode. “Yeah,” he mumbled, “like that; something like that. She just becomes everything.”
“Like a god,” Pogo whispered.
“Yeah, like that.” Zac clung to Pogo’s analogy and proceeded to wring it dry. “A god, a superbeing, something that can pull this messed up world outta the hole it’s in. Yes, she’s everywhere; plants, mountains, Pauly’s piss, the works—all over the place.”
“Sounds good,” said Noodle, nodding enthusiastically, a response that appeared contagious. “Bit like one of the old gods my mam used to pray to.”
“Bit like that,” said Zac, thankful for the help.
“Then again,” Noodle went on to say, “she did end up with me.” He scratched his chin.
Another ripple of agreement spread throughout the group, all except for Kenny.
“So,” he said, “what you’re basically saying is that this computer program will take over the running of the world? Everything?”
“Impossible,” Molly said, abruptly. “I won’t have it. It’s typical mumbo-jumbo. Folk always go on about how AIs will take over the world, how it will be the end of mankind, the rise of the machines, that kinda thing. Absolute rubbish. If an AI ran the would, it would run it correctly. I’ll bet an AI wouldn’t blow the place to ruins; it wouldn’t have to; we’d all work to common goals.”
“Like what?” Noodle asked.
“I don’t know,” and Molly shrugged. “Maybe we could settle down here and start exploring the oceans, conquer disease, eradicate poverty, or—”
“Reach for the stars,” Kenny whispered.
“Now that,” said Billy Flynn, “that I could get behind. I could fly me one of those spaceships.”
“Live on the moon. Get away from all this shit,” added Loser.
“You’d have just as many mates,” Noodle pointed out.
“Shut up!”
“Maybe if someone else was in charge, maybe you wouldn’t have to get away from everything,” Molly said. “Listen.” Her voice rose, passion oozing out of her. “What’s the risk? AIs have been running shit for ages; power stations, factories, production lines. They’ve been driving cabs, cleaning streets, and more, and they haven’t once tried to take over the world.” She looked around the room, but the bikers just stared at her. Zac wanted to give her a hand, but was fairly happy that someone who had a clue had taken the mantle of responsibility for explaining. She huffed, then walked right into their midst, forcing them all to look up at her, then she climbed onto one of the tables.
“Listen,” she pleaded. “Not two weeks ago, our government, all the governments, tried to wipe us out, tried to reset the world, and for no other reason than they couldn’t win. Win what? A war that’s been going all our lives? Did they really get to the point where there was no other option but to wipe us out? What’s wrong with a fresh start?”
Pauly stirred. “I’ll tell you what’s wrong with it. What happens if we don’t like what this Sable’s up to? Can we just pull the plug on her?”
“No,” said Kirk as he walked in. “No, you can’t reset, and no you can’t go back. I thought it might come to this; how did I know your bleeding hearts would fall on the side of the rebels, eh? You’re so close to them in spirit, you probably bleed rebellion out of every orifice. No, Pauly—isn’t it? No, you can’t go back, and that’s why all options should be on the table. That’s why we shall continue to eradicate these rebels and end this. Only once the stairwell is blown can we protect this accumulated knowledge. It will give us the power to rule.”
“Us?” Zac asked, getting up and distancing himself from Kirk. “Is there room for us in your…” Then their eyes met.
“Charm will prevail, Zac. Walter and Irving Meyers' run has come to an end. Don’t believe everything you’ve been told. It was all money with them. Those old bastards owned countries, and where they didn’t own the country, they owned the folk in charge. Money—Zac—money. It gave you power back then, but now—no, now it’s knowledge.”
“And you hold all the—”
“Cards, Zac. Yes, I hold all the cards.”
“No, you don’t, you fucking asshole,” Pebbles said in a decidedly bored voice.
Kirk’s gaze drilled into her.
“You’ll see,” he finally said, and lent her a cold smile, then a single shot rang out and Zac flinched as he felt a breath of air kiss his ear. He looked around at Pebbles and found she’d arched her eyebrows, her Glock still pointing at Kirk. A wicked grin suffused her face before she sneaked Zac a wink. “Was he pissin’ you off, too?”
A dull thud came from behind Zac, and he turned to see Kirk’s body had hit the ground, then came the sound of a dozen safeties clicking off. Kirk’s second-in-command was standing over his body, and around him in the door’s opening; a dozen of his men all poked their machine guns through, like a porcupine with its tail up.
“Pebbles?” Zac asked.
“Zac?”
“Kill them all.”
Pebbles grabbed her machine gun. “What? Now?”
“Right now.”
“Hold on a minute,” Garrett shouted, his voice shaky, his eyes betraying his fear. “We’ve got you outnumbered.”
“No, Garrett,” Zac said, and he held his hand up to stay Pebbles’ wrath. “No, you haven’t. You’ve just got more guns pointed at us than we have at you, but let me tell you something about a psycho: you see, Garrett—Pebbles, here—is a true maniac. Even once you’ve shot her full of holes, she’ll just keep on firing and walking toward you. Even after she’s dead, that finger will still be locked in place, her aim never wavering. And you wanna know why?”
Garrett nodded and visibly gulped.
“Then let me tell you: it’s rage, Garrett, pure rage that keeps you upright, rage that keeps that finger on the trigger, whereas fear…well, that’s a completely different kettle of fish. Once she starts shootin’, you’ll all scatter like skittles.” Zac took a step forward, the guns pointing at him slowly lowering. “You wanna be a skittle, Garrett?”
Garrett was sweating now, fat lumps of the stuff dripping down his flabby cheeks, and Zac knew the man’s courage had vanished, if indeed it had ever been there. But he also knew that one twitch on a trigger could set the whole thing off, and that he was now in the middle of it.
“No,” Garret said, “don’t suppose I do, and not that I’d even wanted to be in charge.”
Zac smiled. “Then why don’t you join our gang, eh?”
A look of relief came over the man, a look so complete that even Zac felt a measure of its joy, and Garrett nodded, at which the guns were withdrawn.
“Bollocks,” muttered Pebbles.
“And that’s why you’re supposed to be in charge, Zac,” said Pauly.
“Aye,” agreed Noodle.
“Aye,” said Billy.
“Aye,” said Loser, but then a huge explosion thundered through the compound, deafening all in its wake.
“That’s number eight,” said Kenny.
“So,” said Commander Croft, “the rub is that you’ve stripped the place of most of the guns and given them to a bunch of preppers and an army of convicts.” He looked around the table, to see if he’d about summed it up correctly.
While Zac was doing his best to pay attention, he couldn’t help but gaze up at the vast gates—the last set. Kenny had known instantly that the blast had been the demise of the last but one. With Karina Drey released, the fighting in the compound had ended and a peace been brokered with Croft’s men, “brokered” being something of an exaggeration once his troops had seen Sticks, they’d all been more than happy to lay down their guns.
Now, they were all crowded onto the balcony overlooking the loading hangar, below which preparations for Banks’ breaking through were already well in hand—Sticks had come up with a devious plan.
“Indeed, we have,” said Kenny, who’d taken it upon himself to media
te. “The Free World army is on its way to breaking into the compound, and Teah and Connor are organizing the defence.”
“With Connor’s father, the Black City Drone Slayer.”
“Well, it has to be all hands on deck, now, doesn’t it?”
Croft regarded Kenny for a long while before turning his attention to Sticks.
“And you; can you explain why you escaped, lost two men, and then, just as freedom beckoned, you returned?”
“Things were quite…fluid. Besides, I had to return to get you out of a hole.”
Croft shifted on his seat, his gaze then falling on Karina Drey. “You’re the rebel, eh? And from what Zac tells me, you were doing your level best not to kill my men, yet you killed more than a few of Garrett’s.”
“It got a bit heated up there. We didn’t really expect Garrett to fight back; thought it would be fairly easy. We underestimated how scared he was of Kirk.”
“Indeed,” Croft muttered, lighting a smoke. “So, you shot him in the head?” Croft turned to Zac.
Zac shrugged. “A sort of accident; he pissed Pebbles off.”
“Pebbles?” But then he waved his hand around, scattering a trail of smoke. “No, don’t answer that. I have a fair idea. So, tell me: are we all finally united?”
A general murmur of ascent rumbled around the table.
“And we’re all agreed on Sticks’ plan?”
Most everyone that was either at the table or crowded onto the balcony said, “Aye.”
Croft firstly stared at Zac, lingering briefly before it continued on to Kenny, then Molly, Sticks, Billy, Loser, and finally Noodle.
“Well, I can’t say I’m going to miss Kirk,” he said, clearly in conclusion.
“But are you all in?” Karina Drey demanded.
“At my age,” Croft said, “all in is an ambition, not a choice.”
13
Teah’s Story
Strike time: plus 14 days
Location: Preppers' Compound
Sleep had never been a true friend of Teah’s, even before her memories had returned. It was like her nightmares had ravaged her from secret chambers hidden in the depths of her troubled mind, but now, now she remembered, and now she could truly embrace the cold steel of their deepest cut. What had happened to her in those days before she’d fought Lester had changed her; she understood that. It had made her more withdrawn, more aloof, just like the soldier, Sticks, had told her it would, all those years before.
Teah had seen him, the soldier she’d met back then. The soldier who’d taken her into the forest and shown her the power of the redwoods, and the man who’d been but a boy at the time but who’d been kind to her when all else had been hell. He’d been sitting in Lester’s cave when she’d bowled in with Cornelius. She’d seen him make to get up, but think better of it, and then their eyes had locked. He’d stayed in the wings, though, and let her reunite with her son, and afterward had elected to stay with Zac and Noodle and Co. She wondered if she’d ever see him again. She hoped so.
Sleep was still an enemy, and so she stood on the stockade and looked out at the golden glow of the land before her. It was ironic; that’s what it was. Ironic that the sun rose behind her. Ironic that the brooding, black clouds trapped its spread of golden light so low. But mostly, it was ironic because that was their color.
The Free World army had dribbled onto what was to be the field of battle. She could see them, ant-like, such was the distance, establishing a head—a show of force—or of defiance or bravado. No doubt itchy fingers hovered over hair triggers, and frightened eyes gazed down the barrels of sniper rifles.
Despite her lack of sleep, and she was sure she wasn’t alone in this, her mind remained alert, focused on the job in hand. Teah wanted to lean on the wooden palisade in front of her, wanted to study her enemy as a true general would. She wanted to organize her flanks, bolster her core ranks, and ensure that her reserves were primed and ready to reinforce where needed. But that would have required a trained army with which to work, and certainly not what she currently had. So, she hoped for intervention, the best she could imagine, and smiled when it made its welcome appearance.
A flash of lightning scored its way across the sky over the ridge to Sendro Valley, a distant rumble of thunder fast on its heels, hatched, no doubt, somewhere near Christmas, and the first heavy drops of rain fell. They soon gathered momentum and force, driven in by a waking wind fleeing the valley head. A smile teased her lips.
Had she been religious she would no doubt have prayed, but it appeared no barter was necessary, for the clouds had already chosen sides and opened up their wealth of rain for her. The storm grew, the wind rising, and The Free World’s banner reigned but for a short while: the gold of the sun and the black of the thunderclouds, before the golden glow became completely stifled by the darkening thunderheads, and the rain lashed down even heavier. It was weather suited to the day ahead, that she knew, as the water spilled in washes from her cattleman’s brim.
She made her way down groaning timber steps from the stockade’s walkway. The bleak weather suited the sprawl she found below. Rain was already pooling in the divots carved into the hardcore road by the industry of the preppers, the grim place now awash with toil and resigned expressions. Sandbags were being filled with everything and anything: mud, gravel, whatever was at hand. Though they’d spent years meticulously preparing, Teah knew there was no state of readiness that could have foreseen the storm that was to come.
As she passed between them, she was greeted by grunts and curt nods of familiarity. After all these years outside the city, in some small way, she decided she’d finally found her home. They were a feral bunch, and having grudgingly accepted her, they’d just got on with it. Big men and fearsome women, shin-high boots and long coats protecting them from the lashing rain. Spitting tobacco and growling, their ragged hair falling over their determined eyes and collars turned up against the rain, they emptied their dwellings, oiled their guns and made their way to their positions. Lead them? She knew in her heart that they needed no leader.
While the preppers were fuelled by years of preparation, Cornelius’ men huddled together, looking out like the confused sheep they were. They’d spilled over the ridge full of enthusiasm, by all accounts, no doubt bolstered by Wesley having promised them that the lush green valley below would be theirs for the taking. Maybe they’d even coveted the idea that it meant they’d finally be free. But there was nothing like cold rain to douse men’s spirits, nothing like the threat of battle to steal their hopes.
The preppers just looked at them through bemused eyes, clearly wondering why these huddled folk had come here supposedly to help them. Why, in a time of greatest need, at their Armageddon, had these folks volunteered to be cannon fodder? Teah had also wondered if the preppers would have taken to the convicts, or whether they’d have secretly thought that Cornelius’ army was here to stay, intent on taking prepper lands and that another battle would then be fought. Now, though, Teah saw what an uneven fight it would have been.
The prepper’s town at the moment looked thin and brown, cold and wet. Her cattleman down and her collar up, she hugged the drier side of the main trail through and aimed for the meeting hall. She could taste the wet mud and smell the dour odor of dread.
This was going to be a day to die early.
The few steps up to the hall, and she barged through its door and into a burst of warmth. Cornelius looked up: he was sitting with Wesley, Saggers, Hannah, and Clay. It looked like they were tucking into a hearty breakfast. Teah took a breath, took off the cattleman and punched it out. As she forced a smile onto her face, she looked up to see Kelly.
“Hey, hun, you bring a cloud in with ya?” she muttered, and Teah grimaced.
“Ain’t much to smile about.”
“Oh, I don’t know. You’d think we’d be happy. Been prepping for this, and now it’s come. Sure goin’ to be an interestin’ day.”
“How do you make that out?”
/> “We’re preppers; the apocalypse came and went and now we got our rapture, now we get to end the debate.”
“Debate?”
“Who’d win. Heck, there’re bets laid everywhere. If there’s anyone left after today, there’ll be some collectin’ going on.”
Teah grunted a laugh. “Folks’ll find a wager in anythin’.” She took Lester’s coat off, and Kelly grabbed hold of it.
“You go an’ see Clay,” she said, steering Teah to the right table, where she found Clay wriggling on its bench, forcing Hannah away to make room for his mam. She slid in between them, looking down at his upturned face.
“So, what’ve you been up to?”
“We was out spying growin’ places.” He flicked a look at Saggers, sitting opposite. “Ethan says that if we get to stay here, we’ve got to pay our way, and smokes are the way to go.”
Teah looked across at Ethan who shrugged, innocently, and put on a puppy dog smile. “Going to need more ‘n more plants now, me ‘n my assistant. Well, we got ourselves what they call a career path carved out.” His wink gave away his enjoyment.
“So,” Teah said, “you going to be a farmer?”
Clay nodded then reached for some bread, tearing a hunk off. “The food’s real nice here,” he said, absently.
“What d’you think, Teah?” Hannah asked.
She wanted to say that they’d be lucky to be alive, that they had to get through the day yet, but all eyes were on her, and that wasn’t what they wanted to hear.
“I think…” she said, slowly. “I think…” And then she looked up as Kelly put a plate of bacon, sausage and eggs in front of her. “I think I have just the place. It’s a little up the valley, but it has some spare cabins and a stream runnin’ past. It’ll be fierce cold in winter, though, but worth it fer the summer.”
“Wow,” said Clay, and both Saggers and Hannah perked up.