by SD Tanner
“I thought we were goners, and what the hell was Billy praying for?”
He didn’t know Billy and he barely knew Tuck. At least he and Tuck had worked in 2nd Platoon for the past three years. Billy had only just finished basic training, and he wasn’t too pleased about having a greenhorn assigned to him. Mike wasn’t even from his platoon and he hadn’t known him at all. He still wasn’t sure what had happened to him, but he suspected they’d find his body with their destroyed truck.
He’d been in the army for eight years and this was his fourth combat tour, which made him an experienced veteran. Signing up at the age of twenty-six, he was considered to be an older recruit, but he’d had enough of selling cars for a living. If he was completely honest, he’d been bored and had wanted a change of pace, which the army had certainly given him. Although he’d enjoyed his time in the military, when he was asked if he wanted to sign up again he’d said no. The deployments had been a much-needed break from his small apartment and predictable lifestyle, but now he was married and expecting a baby, his priorities had changed and it was time to move on.
When they finally cleared their way into the small base, a medic walked over to them. “You guys okay?”
Taking his hand from his still bleeding neck, he said, “I had a run in with an asshole and a rusty knife.”
Pulling out a small vial, the med tech sprayed his hands with a sheer coating that would both protect and disinfect them. Touching his neck gently, he said, “Doesn’t look too bad, but you need to get that patched up and have a tetanus shot.” Looking him closely in the eyes, he asked, “Are you in any pain? I can give you something now.”
Shaking his head, he said, “Nah, I’m good, but you need to check this nav out.”
Several soldiers approached their stolen vehicle, and they carried the prone Navigator to a nearby medical tent. Dumping the body onto a sturdy bed, it groaned under the sudden weight. Starting with the boots and gloves, the medical personnel began to free the Navigator from their heavy gear. This was his first sighting of a Navigator, and he waved away the medic trying to look at his neck. Once the gloves and boots were removed, they began to unbuckle the weapons, armor belt, used power packs and the water bag. Beneath the gear was a fitted black suit with heavier armor strapped to the chest, arms and legs. It looked like a tight wet suit, and he assumed it contained the hydraulics. After unbuckling the removable parts of the armor, a medic had pulled out a large pair of scissors, obviously intending to cut the suit from the Navigator.
“Don’t cut that,” a voice called out.
Turning, he watched a masculine looking woman with white, sharply cropped hair march into the medical tent. Walking up to the table where the Navigator was lying, she elbowed the medics away and said curtly, “If you cut it, you break it.”
Pulling out a thin, pencil shaped unit, she slipped it inside a sleeve on the Navigator’s suit and read the display. Nodding brusquely, she said, “All the vitals look good.”
Having confirmed the Navigator was safe inside the gear, the woman began to unclip the neck brace and peeled it away from the torso. Through the small gap between the chin and collarbone, he could see the chest was rising and falling as he breathed.
The headgear was a helmet with a large, hinged lower jaw that blended in so well it was almost invisible, and the eyes were covered with a black, glossy wide strip. Once the woman had deftly unclipped the lower jaw on the helmet, he could see the flesh colored skin of the Navigator inside.
Now able to be heard, the Navigator said irritably, “Get me the hell out of this thing.”
The woman didn’t reply, but continued to gently remove the helmet and visor from the still prone Navigator. To his surprise, the finely boned and highly structured face of a woman with cropped, blonde hair emerged. Instead of eyes, the woman’s sockets were filled with light silver colored orbs, and she was blinking rapidly as if the sudden exposure to light was uncomfortable for her.
She continued to complain. “Get this crap off me. I can’t fucking move. Get Ark on the grid. I wanna yell at him.”
Snapping her chest armor open, the woman pushed her hand under the Navigator’s shoulder, helping to free her arm from the heavy suit. Once the woman had both arms free, she began to peel the armored suit from her lower body.
While she roughly threw the lower part of her armor onto the floor, she complained incessantly. “I hate this job. I wanna talk to Ark.”
“Stop bitching,” the woman replied sternly. “And tell me if anything hurts.”
Snorting derisively, the woman replied irritably, “Everything hurts, Donna. I’ve been stuck in this gear and thrown around like a penny in a can. Who the hell trained this squad?” Starting to remove her hydraulics layer, the woman muttered angrily, “They don’t know what they’re doing, and they were throwing me around like a sack of dirt.”
The hydraulics layer was designed to the woman’s exact size and shape. According to his briefing, it was lined with interlocking rods that formed an exoskeleton, complete with hydraulic joints. Working much like a human joint, it had the added benefit of being virtually unbreakable. It meant the joint could take massive impact without injuring the Navigator’s limbs, and it gave them the ability to run, jump and carry weights beyond normal human capacity. It was impressive technology, but he wasn’t sure it was being used correctly. Apparently the army thought they could create entire battalions of Navigators, effectively replacing the current boots on the ground. While they’d listened to the online tutorial during the briefing, both he and his CO had shared more than a few skeptical looks. Without even discussing it, they’d both agreed that a blind soldier so utterly dependent on a power source was a dead man walking or in this case a dead woman.
Once the woman was free of her hydraulics gear, she began to peel away the thin bodysuit of sensors covering her. When she was finally free of all of her kit, she was left sitting on the table wearing only a small pair of black panties.
“Lie down. I need to check you for injuries,” Donna said sternly.
“No,” the woman replied abruptly.
Swinging her legs over the side of the table, she slid from the bed and stood unsteadily. Rolling her eyes, Donna said with a sigh, “Lexie, stop being difficult. You’re only feeling cranky because you’re still full of adrenalin.” Now examining her body for bruises or injuries, she added, “You’re also standing practically naked in front of about twenty people.”
Snorting again, Lexie replied, “I’m only naked, it’s not like I’m having sex.”
“Oh, is that where you draw the line for having an audience?” Donna asked bluntly.
Screwing up her face, and waving her hand at the room full of people she couldn’t see, Lexie replied, “Given I can see through walls, as soon as I’m wearing my visor again, none of you people are gonna have any secrets from me.”
The Navigator who’d disrupted their enemy long enough for them to fight their way out was a woman, and she had some attitude. Giving her a grin he knew she couldn’t see, he said, “Hi, I’m Leon Shield. I’m a Squad Leader in Bravo Company, and I was also the guy who was getting his head cut off.”
Lexie didn’t appear to hear him and she continued to complain, “Donna, give me the visor. I wanna talk to Ark. Does he know I’m okay?”
Looking over Lexie’s shoulder at him, Donna said, “She can’t see you, and her hearing isn’t great when she comes off the comms gear. If you want to talk to her, then you should touch her arm.”
He moved closer to Lexie, and while he touched her arm gently, he repeated, “I’m Leon Shield, Squad Leader in Bravo Company.” Lexie seemed to flinch slightly at his touch, and then she slapped his arm. Frowning, he said amiably, “That’s an odd response. And I thought you couldn’t see.”
“I can see shapes,” she replied dourly. “And you deserve to be slapped around after the way you treated me.” Slapping him again, she said irritably, “There’s a person inside that armor, and being thrown ar
ound like a sack of dirt isn’t any fun for me.”
Looking at her slim and leanly muscled body, he decided had he known their Navigator was a woman he probably would have been more considerate. Touching her arm gently again, he said, “Sorry.”
Sniffing unhappily, she replied, “You should be.” With a slight shrug of her shoulders, she said in a mock sulky tone, “Next time I might let them cut your head off.”
Shaking his head, he grinned. “Welcome to Bravo Company.”
Donna was wrapping a blanket around Lexie’s shoulders, and she looked across at him again. “I’m guessing you haven’t heard.”
“Heard what?” He asked.
“There’s been an emergency recall. We’re all going home.”
CHAPTER SEVEN: Homeward bound (Steve)
A body landed at his feet with a wet thud. The woman had exploded on impact and her face was flattened into the sidewalk. Blood was leaking thickly from her head and torso, but she wasn’t one of his so he didn’t care, and he stepped over her corpse. Continuing to walk down the street, the screaming and gunfire was louder, but there were far fewer sirens. A man ran towards him brandishing a baseball bat, and then stopped directly in front of him. The end of the bat was sodden with blood and he assumed it had been well used.
With a shock of dark hair flopping over his eyes, the man was covered in blood and none of it was his, but he didn’t know how he knew that. While they stood studying one another, the man began to scratch vigorously at his scalp. It reminded him of his own annoying tingling, and he used the gun to dig into his back again. While they stood on the sidewalk facing one another and scratching in unison, people continued to run along the road, and cars were driving erratically around them.
The man was tearing into his scalp so aggressively a chunk of flesh and hair came away from his head. Holding it out like a hairy offering, the man sighed contentedly.
Reaching his other hand to the back of his own head, he dug his nails deep into his scalp, ripping at the already broken skin. The scalp began to peel away under his fingers, and he awkwardly caught the edge until he could pull it away from his skull. It didn’t hurt, but the noise inside his head reminded him of ripping Velcro apart. His blood made a warm trail down the back of his neck, and tugging sharply, a chunk of his own hair and skin came away under his fingers. Amused by the effect, he held it out to show the man.
While they stood holding out pieces of themselves to one another, a woman stopped running to stare at them in horror. “What are you doing?”
He was getting rid of his itch once and for all, but he didn’t have to tell her that. When he took his hand with the gun from the center of his back, the woman’s eyes widened in fear. Without taking her eyes from the weapon, she began to back away. “Please don’t shoot me. I can just go. You don’t have to kill me.”
She didn’t belong here anymore than Lucy had and clearly the other man agreed. While she continued to stare at him, the man quickly stepped closer to the woman, and swung his bloodied bat at her head. It connected with the side of her skull with a heavy thud, and she clutched at her face and began to wail. Her outburst didn’t deter the man, and he swung again, bringing the woman to her knees. He repeatedly hammered the bat down onto her bent head, beating her to the ground. Each blow was stronger than the last, and eventually the bat snapped with a sharp crack.
“That’s not a good weapon,” he said flatly.
The end of the bat was hanging by a small piece of splintered wood, and the man studied it dispassionately. Together they began to walk along the sidewalk. Around them vehicles were caught in deep snarls, unable to move and clearly abandoned by their owners. The roads were becoming deeply congested, and more people were running along the cluttered sidewalks. While he and the man kept a steady and calm pace, another man joined them, falling into step as if they’d always walked together. It was a long road, and he and Lucy had often travelled it to visit her parents in Parkway, so he knew it would lead them outside the city.
Albuquerque was a tidy city, filled with modern buildings and wide roads. The city center wasn’t huge, but it boasted neat parks, office plazas, swanky hotels, theaters, schools and nightclubs. The region had a long Native American history and was most famous for the Rio Grande River. He hadn’t been born in the area, but had settled there with his previous wife. When he’d first moved to Albuquerque, he’d tried their hot air balloon rides and ridden the cable car, and after their divorce, she’d left and he’d stayed. He’d liked having all the benefits of a big city without the congestion.
There were cars parked haphazardly along the wide road, dead bodies were strewn awkwardly, and the city had lost its usually calm atmosphere. Above him were tall buildings and he knew there were more people hiding deep inside them. Some people were being chased along the street, and he could hear the cries of the dying from every direction. None of it bothered him. It was simply their time to leave, and he didn’t break his pace or allow himself to become distracted.
By the time he’d reached the interstate, I-40, hundreds of people had joined them on their long march out of the city. Each person was covered in blood that didn’t belong to them, and they all carried a weapon of some sort. They marched down the I-40 until there were more than a thousand people following them. Passing by the old town, several thousand more people joined their group. They were a parade of bloodied and silent followers, walking at a steady clip, and ignoring the chaos around them.
He was still wearing his watch, and he noted it had only been three hours since the terrified news reporter had first announced the city was under siege by its own residents. For some reason, he thought he was making good progress, but he didn’t know where he was going. His feet seemed to have a mind of their own and they knew where he needed to be. Without looking at his followers, he was aware they were marching in step with one another. They were a single mind with one purpose.
The further they travelled along the I-40, the more people continued to join them, and anyone who didn’t understand them ran away when they saw them coming. If they didn’t run fast enough, then the followers would kill them, and they were leaving a trail of corpses in their wake. The sound of thousands of feet marching in unison preceded their arrival, and no one challenged them until a Chevrolet Malibu stopped on the road in front of them.
A large man climbed out the vehicle and pointed his gun at him. “Woah, folks, where are you going?”
When he stopped, so did his parade and he studied the man coldly. “I don’t know.”
“Okay. I’m Sergeant Harry Jones and I’m with Northwest Area Command. The city is under Martial Law. You folks should go home and wait for the all clear.”
His followers were lined up next to him on his left and his right, creating a defiant wall of bodies. “We are going home.”
“What do you mean? Where do you live?”
A name popped into his head and he replied, “Near Pueblo Pintado.”
“But there’s nothing out there. It’s a desert. Almost no one lives there.”
“We live there.”
“Since when.”
“Since forever.”
The heavyset man looked at him quizzically. What remained of his scalp was still itching, and he reached both hands to his forehead. Digging his nails into his hairline, he scratched and dug into his scalp, tearing at the flesh. It didn’t hurt, but blood was running down his forehead and over his eyes. Forgetting about the burly man, he continued to rip at his skin, until he was finally able to grasp the slippery thin flesh between his thumb and forefinger.
“What the hell are you doing?” The large man asked in horror. With a quick glance at his car, he added, “Jas, stay in the car.”
Caught up in the pleasure of relieving the itch that had been aggravating him for hours, he ignored the man and peeled the skin down his face. Muscle tore away from his skull and blood ran down his fingers. It was like removing an irritatingly itchy sweater and the relief was immense.
He didn’t care what the man thought, he didn’t belong here anymore than Lucy did. Tearing the last of his face from his neck, he held the loose flap of skin in his hand. He didn’t need it anymore, and he tossed it to the ground where it landed with a graceless flop onto the asphalt in front of him. Running his bloodied hands over his exposed skull, it didn’t have the bone structure he expected, and he looked at the man next to him. Instead of a white skull, the man’s face was a hardened shell with humanoid features, only it was black and rubbery looking.
While the heavy man climbed into his vehicle, he tried to smile at the man next to him, but his face didn’t move that way anymore. The fine slit that represented his mouth didn’t change, and he poked his finger at his nose, only to find he no longer had holes where his nostrils should be. His face was a hardened mask, and if he looked anything like the man next to him, he no longer had eyeballs, only dark round circles with no iris or color.
The vehicle was reversing away from him and his followers, and it quickly accelerated, heading out of the city in the direction he planned to go. His arm was itchy, so he shrugged his coat off and began to dig at his forearm. Like the skin on his face, he no longer felt bone under his flesh. His skin was covering something else, and continuing to attack his arm, he pierced the skin until he was able to tear it away. A hardened blackness appeared under the ripped skin on his arm. Rubbing it aggressively, it revealed a rubbery, black and slightly shiny surface. While he pulled at the flesh on his forearm, his fingers began to slough away, and a thin black hand with knobbly joints appeared.
All around him his followers were copying his actions, and soon the street was littered with slabs of human skin and abandoned clothes.
CHAPTER EIGHT: Step up or out (Jonesy)
“What the fuck was that?” Jas asked, but the shudder in her voice betrayed her fear.