Sanctuary 1 (The Foliage Series Book 3)

by Aline Riva

  “My angel...” he wept, as more shots came from somewhere in the tall grass and peppered the sides of the motor home, bouncing off the armour plating.

  Inside the motor home, Jekel breathlessly grabbed his gun then came out of his room, colliding with Joy as Lynch snatched up his machine gun as Elise armed herself too.

  “Joy,” he ordered, “Up top – take those fuckers out!”

  “Be careful,” Jekel said and Joy nodded, then she was up the stairway, ready to man the upper level guns.

  Flynn checked his rifle, stuck it through a gap between the open window and two armoured plates, aimed into the sea grass and started to fire.

  From above, guns boomed shot after shot in the direction of the hidden enemy as Lynch and Flynn dropped and rolled from the midsection of the vehicle, then ran for the path that led to the ridge above as Joy covered them with a hail of gun fire. Jekel saw a gap much like the one Flynn had shoved his rifle through, and did the same with his hand gun, aiming high and he stayed low below the glass.

  Lynch reached the top just before Flynn, and the two men let fly a hail of bullets into the tall grass, left and right, not stopping, letting the barrage of fire cover the wide area.

  Cries were heard from below the coverage, as blood began to run on to the pathway where Spike was still low, clutching at Ruby's lifeless body.

  Flynn went first, pushing aside the sea grass with his weapon to see three men bleeding out lifeless on the ground. Lynch found two more further up the centre of the undergrowth, and then he turned back and waved to Joy, who was manning the guns.

  “Potential looters!” he called, “Taken out!”

  Then all that could be heard was the sound of Spike sobbing as he cradled his dead love who was still bleeding on to his jacket.

  “Joy, Jekel,” he yelled, “Get up here...” Then he looked to the front of the motor home, where Elise had been firing from the driver's window, “Elise, go up and man the guns and watch the area...”

  She nodded, then as Joy and Jekel left the motor home and hurried up to meet him, he looked down at Spike.

  “None of us saw this coming,” he said, showing rare softness about his voice, “Sorry for your loss, Spike.”

  By now Joy and Jekel had joined them and Lynch gave his orders.

  “Joy, take care of this ...situation. He's in shock and she needs burying. We'll tend to her grave when we get back.”

  “We?” said Jekel in surprise.

  “Yes, Jekel,” Lynch replied, “You me and Flynn need to sweep the area to make sure none of those bastards got away.”

  “Me?” Jekel swallowed hard as his eyes widened and he looked into the sea grass as its tips swayed in the breeze.

  “All three of us,”Flynn added, and then as he and Lynch turned to the sea grass and began to carefully make their way through it with weapons ready, Jekel followed as Joy leant over Spike who was weeping over his dead love, urging him to get up, because they needed to carry her down to the beach, and Spike just clutched at Ruby harder, sobbing into her bloodstained hair.

  As the three men ventured further into the tall grass that stretched on for quite a distance, Jekel stepped up, taking the lead as he walked on, feeling more secure now he saw not a trace of any more potential looters, he wished he could glance back and see the look of surprise on the faces of Lynch and Flynn as the two men realised he did have an ounce of courage after all, but instead he just carried on walking, silently activating his internal scanner to get first warning of any oncoming hostilities.

  The battery symbol inside his head at the back of his vision flashed up warning the scanner was draining power. Jekel ignored it, turning his head as he picked up two life signs somewhere over where the grass was thick and dense.

  Just then a scream came from the coverage and a man thrashed out, screaming as, to their horror, they realised a Howler was proceeding to bite into his shoulder, severing an arm greedily as its drool dripped to the dying man, causing flesh to bubble. Then it looked up from its prey,and as it gave a roar, they saw half its face was burned and melted – this was the leader from the blaze last night, and it was missing an arm, but still fixing them with a glare of pure evil.

  “It bloody followed us!” Flynn exclaimed, “The big fucker...Angus the Fungus Head or what ever his name is...and he's wounded...” a slow smile crept over his face as he looked to Lynch.

  “Want to go hunting, General?”

  Lynch smirked as he checked his weapon.

  “Might be fun.”

  “I want that head on my wall,” Flynn replied, “When I have a wall again, when this is over and I have a place to settle down...I want it mounted and stuffed!”

  Jekel silently tried to activate his stealth mode as he stepped aside, but the battery warning came up again – his power was lasting out, but not enough to allow for his cloak of invisibility...

  Lynch turned to Flynn with a sly smile on his face as Jekel stood frozen to the spot, staring at the sight of the wounded Howler half covered by the tall grass, devouring its prey.

  “We need some bait,” Lynch whispered.

  “We do indeed,”Flynn replied, and then he stifled a laugh as Lynch jabbed Jekel in the ass with his gun. Jekel gave a yell and broke into a run.

  The Howler was up, sniffing the air, then it set it sights on Jekel and began to race after him, tearing through the grass like a lion chasing its prey.

  Jekel ran and ran, his eyes wide as the battery warning flashed, then he reached a tree and jumped, clinging to the bark and the branches as he began to scale the tree and the tree shuddered as the wounded Howler did the same. Jekel climbed higher, ignoring the battery warning and not daring to look down as the stench of Howler filled the air and all he could think was, it would shred his suit first, then it would eat him...

  Then a barrage of gunfire filled the air as the Howler's mouth yawned wide and its remaining eyes on its part burned face widened as it screeched as shot after expertly aimed shot hit the neck of the creature, as Lynch and Flynn combined fire power, the head rolled from the body sending a gush of glowing goo upwards, covering tree limbs that instantly started to dissolve as Jekel clambered about to the other side of the tree, clinging on high up and far from the carnage as the two men below approached the scene of the kill, shook hands, congratulated each other and then looked up at Jekel.

  “Are you okay up there, Mr Jekel?”asked Flynn.

  “Nice work, Ashley!”said Lynch, “You're getting there. You haven't earned your stripes yet, Tiger...but you will!”

  And Lynch kicked the body aside, then he and Flynn picked up the head by the ears and began to carry it off through the grass.

  “You pair of bastards!” Jekel yelled from up the tree, but neither man looked back as they carried their trophy away from the scene.

  As the sun sank low on what would have been a sunset to admire, the group stood around the deep hole buried in the earth where land met with shore, and Spike wept as the body of his love was covered up as Lynch and Flynn filled in the grave. After the last of the soil was laid on top, Spike fell to his knees weeping again, and despite the presence of the others who offered words of condolence, he continued to weep.

  “Let him weep,” Lynch said quietly, “Perhaps he needs this time.”

  Joy took a look back at the distraught young man, but silently concluded that maybe he was right, for this would be his last chance to say farewell. Then she and Jekel followed the others back to the motor home, leaving the door open for Spike.

  The head of the Howler that Flynn had named Angus now stood mounted looking ugly on a pole in a shady corner, acidic liquid draining from the creature as it features stayed frozen after a blast from a cannister of freeze drying substance Lynch had found deep in the storage area of the motor home. He had said they would blast it again once the last of the acid was drained out, then it would be ready for mounting – when they had a place to mount it one day...

  As night fell Spike returned to th
e motor home, saying nothing to the others as they sat around the table in the centre of the vehicle, awaiting his return to offer words of sympathy, but it was clear that he wanted no discussion on his loss as he closed his door firmly behind him.

  “And on that note,” said Lynch, “I'm turning in for the night...Elise?”

  She nodded.

  “Good idea,” she agreed quietly, feeling saddened by the loss of Ruby as she considered the human emotion of grief – the closest she had come to experiencing that had been watching Lynch fight for his life after his cyborg conversion and could only liken the thought of his possible loss as terrible pain.

  She went up the walkway with Lynch, their hands connecting as they reached their private living area, then they went inside and closed the door.

  “We should turn in too,” Jekel added, all trace of his former anger at being used as running bait had evaporated after burying Ruby as he watched Spike sob for his lost love. Flynn had taken him aside and reminded him he had never been in any real danger from that wounded Howler – him and Lynch had it covered, and Jekel had simply nodded and said no more on the matter.

  “Goodnight, Flynn,” said Joy.

  “Night all,” Flynn replied loudly as he folded back the table and began to set up the spare bed.

  As Joy and Jekel headed for Jekel's room, they paused by the medical area as Joy caught his hand.

  “Your battery must have taken a drain out there today, let me check you over.”

  “I'm at eighteen percent,” he replied.

  “Then you need another power transfusion in the morning,” she reminded him.

  Jekel gave her hand a squeeze as he looked into her eyes.

  “I'll be fine till morning,” he promised, “The rest should conserve enough to take me back up to twenty percent.”

  “Then you'd better rest, mister,” she said as love shone in her eyes, and she kept a tight hold on Jekel's hand as he gave her a look that needed no words and he led her into his room, closed the door and locked it behind them.

  And then the night fell silent save for the rush of sea to shore as the calm waves sighed in a short distance away and the clear night sky showed a glowing moon to light a silvery path across the flat water. Then the silence was shattered by a single gunshot deep within the heart of the motorhome.

  Flynn jumped up first, by the time he had kicked open the locked door, Elise had joined him, along with Lynch and Joy and Jekel, who all saw the door open and the lock busted off the inside, and Spike sprawled on the bed he once shared with Ruby, his gun in his hand and his dead eyes staring upwards unblinking as blood oozed from the back of his head and bone and brain matter slid down the wall.

  By the time dawn had cracked a cold morning sky, two graves sat side by side, one marked with Ruby's empty pistol, the other draped with Spike's bloodstained leather jacket, as the motor home quietly pulled away to make its way along the lonely coastal road, still searching for the placed known as Sanctuary...

  Chapter 9 : Bullet Under the Hill

  The mood was sombre in the motor home as Lynch drove along the road that ran along the coastline, none of the occupants of the vehicle spoke as they made their way along the winding road, leaving the graves of their former companions further behind with every mile covered. Then the road took a sudden upward turn, a slow climb up the hillside, where its path led to was not yet in view, but it suggested higher ground and further back from the sea. Lynch turned the vehicle around the corner, went up the shaded, leafy climb, and came to a straight road, where more trees lined the way on both sides, here the forest was dark and dense and where it broke, fields were visible as were the cliff tops that overlooked the sea in the distance.

  Finally the silence was broken as Lynch spoke up.

  “I guess I should have seen it coming – those two were inseparable. Ruby only had cybernetic alterations to feel what Spike was feeling. I guess he decided to do the same – she was dead, he wanted to join her. None of us could have seen that coming, although we should...I wish we had.”

  “But we didn't,”Elise reminded him, glancing at him with understanding in her eyes.

  Flynn joined them, taking a seat behind as he watched the motor home swallow up more open road as they went onwards down the shady lane.

  “I wonder where this leads to,” he said, “The further we go the closer I hope we get to finding my Kait.”

  “We won't give up,” Lynch murmured as he thought of Elise and the life growing inside her, “We have to keep going...We'll find it. Sanctuary is out there somewhere...”

  As the motor home drove along the smooth, undamaged road surface, Jekel lay back with his shirt off behind the curtain in the medical area as Joy connected him up to another battery. She set the power on half charge then pulled up a chair and sat beside him as he lay back waiting for the transfer to complete. This time he showed no fear or distress because he understood the nature of his damage – although as he turned his head and looked up at her, there was a flicker of worry in his hazel eyes.

  “What happens when all the batteries a run out?”

  “We find a place to recharge them – we come across generators now and then and with some tinkering can get them working.”

  “But what about long term?” he asked, “I'm worried...how can I get this problem fixed?”

  “The only way to fix it would be to open you up and physically replace the section of cracked cable,” she replied, and Jekel's face paled.

  “I don't want an operation!”

  “But you became a very advanced cyborg a few years back,” she reminded him, “All your work done by THE Blake Riley – the man they say cyborgs call King Steel. You can't be scared of a simple procedure -”

  “But I don't remember any of it, he kept me asleep for six months while the connections fired up... and I have a chemical in my bloodstream that causes my skin to heal rapidly too....I really hope the others never find out about that, then they'll know I'm not an ordinary cyborg!”

  Joy cast her mind back five years to the day the Howlers ripped into him, yet Jekel was able to walk away with barely a scratch...now she got it...

  “Just don't tell Lynch you underwent all that work and felt no pain,” she replied, “He went through hell during his conversion.”

  “I wont say a word,” he promised, and then he closed his eyes, breathing a sigh as more power flowed into his system, feeding life back into his cyborg body.

  As Lynch covered more road taking the motor home uphill then round a corner where the wooded area cleared and there were fields either side, he stared at the sight in the distance, and so did Elise.

  “Is that what I think it is?” exclaimed Flynn.

  “I do believe so!” Lynch said in surprise, looking to the end of the road where beneath a tall hillside sat what looked to be a broken down, rough and shabby village. Once it would have been picturesque but now the houses were in disrepair and here and there make shift tents and wooden sheds had been erected and dotted about the landscape. There was a sign mounted over the entrance that read Bullet Under the Hill, it was made of wood and the sign had been painted crudely with a thick brush and the dried gloss paint shone in the sun. Men at the open gates were armed, and caught sight of the approaching vehicle and lowered their weapons and waved, flagging down the motor home.

  “I sense no hostility...” Lynch said in a tone of suspicion and looked to Elise, who reached for her weapon and kept it in her lap, as did Flynn.

  Joy stuck her head out of the curtain that divided off the medical area and looked up the walkway.

  “Why have we slowed down?”

  “There's some kind of town up ahead,” Lynch called back, “You take care of Jekel, me and Elise and Flynn will see how the land lies.”

  “Okay,” Joy called back, and instinctively reached for her gun, slipping it into her holster as she went back over to Jekel's bedside. He raised his head from the pillow with a look of alarm in his eyes.

  �
�What's going on?”

  “Nothing you need to worry about,” she told him, placing her hands on his shoulders as she urged him to lie flat, “Just let that power transfusion complete, okay? Lynch can handle this. Right now, its my job to look after you.”

  Lynch drove the motor home up to the open gateway, where men with exposed cyborg plating on their arms kept their guns lowered as one stepped forward and looked up at Lynch, who looked out through the open window.

  “Is this a settlement?” Lynch asked.

  A second man stepped forward, he wore an old shirt and faded jeans and carried a rifle and there was a noticeable metal plate set into his left cheek as a pipe ran down the side of his neck to somewhere beneath his clothing.

  “This is Bullet Under the Hill,” he said, “A cyborg settlement. You may enter in peace there are no quarrels here - but Mr Dixon Featherstone will expect a trade in return for shelter.”

  “Featherstone?” Lynch questioned.

  “Our Law Man and Peacekeeper,” the man replied, “He's been alerted of your arrival.”

  “Well please tell Mr Dixon Featherstone I'm General Felix Lynch – a cyborg,” he informed him, “And I am travelling with Mister Flynn, my partner Elise who is pregnant and we have a cybernetic medic on board named Joy Thorn and her partner Ashley Jekel, a cyborg who has a mild main cable damage issue. We seek temporary shelter and will trade what we can.”

  The man nodded then stepped back and waved the vehicle through. Lynch drove through the open gates and into the heart of the settlement.

  Now the motor home had come to a stop, Lynch looked about the place, seeing houses and crudely put together shelters dotted about what had once been a picturesque village. There were people all about the place, some young, some older, most had some kind of visible cybernetic work done and all looked weak and weary.