Desert Angels

by George P. Saunders

  She moved her eyes around the room, each one feeling like it weighed a ton. Ten feet away, in Jack's gun rack, was a single, grenade launching rifle; a favorite, custom made item that Jack had created from scratch. It was loaded, she could see, a full magazine of heavy armor piercing shells attached to the firing chassis.

  Manna from heaven, her feverish brain promised; a veritable treasure from the gods. Laura shook her head painfully.

  She knew the gods had died a long time ago.

  She oozed along the floor. Slowly, so as not to catch the Stiffer's malignant attention. Everything seemed to move in slow motion, not the least of which was her own pummeled body. Ten feet might just have been ten thousand, because every inch was a trek of agony and Herculean effort.

  The Stiffer had taken no notice of Laura, though it had not forgotten about her completely. Jack could not have known, any more than Laura, that the Stiffer was at it's most vulnerable; so busy was it concentrating its mental energy within the Growler's body, as well as conducting personal hostilities with Jack, that the entity within the Stiffer was, in fact, overly preoccupied. Impatience for victory and death was making it hurry. That old sloppy streak was showing through again for the demon inside.

  Had it been only slightly more alert, the Stiffer would have noticed the girl to his rear snaking herself along the floor toward Jack's grenade rifle.

  But the Stiffer's eyes and thoughts were filled with blood. It was also filled with anger, since it had experienced some surprise in Jack's pipe-wielding attempt at braining it, and suffered considerable periodontal damage as a result thereof.

  Immortal it may be, the demon Stiffer thought venomously, but pain was pain and nothing – except the dead – were free from that.

  It continued to move relentlessly toward the far wall where Jack lay, semi-conscious and exhausted.

  Laura reached the gun rack, near the outer hatch. Her fuzzy vision also recognized the distant shape outline of the Ball Job, moving off the furthest dune in the horizon, directly for the Dome.

  * * *

  Gleeson fired into the mutant horde, along with ten of the stronger men of Eden, Brandon, Jim Rosen and Gus included. Except for these courageous few, the remaining population of the encampment was snuggly hidden in the Dome shelter for the second time in 24 hours.

  The mutants were still bad fighters, even with reinforcements, but their poor skill in battle gave Gleeson little hope for some kind of effective retaliation or defense. The Maddogs now had heavy artillery. Gleeson glared at the tanks, roaring downward from the high ridge that marked the boundaries of Eden's borders.

  He also noted the newest addition to the Maddog foot-soldier contingent.

  They moved almost rhythmically, not quickly, not passionately, like the growling Maddogs. And they were not quick to fire needlessly from distances that would assuredly fall short from their targets. Gleeson and the others were

  fortunate in dispelling the first wave of Maddogs, being the better fighters and the more discriminatory.

  Gleeson took aim at one of the strange, sallow looking soldiers that followed this first, noisy group of Maddogs and fired. A direct, bloody hit to the man's heart did not slow him up. Gleeson squinted, not believing what he was seeing.

  He fired again, as his men were similarly doing. The soldier took another bullet in the chest, but remained standing, expressionless. Maybe just a tad perturbed, the soldier's eyes seemed to say – but Gleeson couldn't tell for sure. More of the same kind of soldier, raggedy, white and lethargic marched closer and closer, deflecting – no – ignoring the bullets assaulting their bodies from the Eden defense force.

  Gleeson swallowed and put his hand up.

  "Fall back!" he yelled, though his men needed no urging to do so.

  "What are they?" Gleeson heard Jim Rosen yell from his left.

  "Fucking zombies," was Brandon's reply, lost in gunfire.

  "Bad apples," Gus snorted laconically and retreated at Gleeson's side.

  The corpse soldiers, as they moved nearer, raised their weapons and fired.

  Jim Rosen yelled out and slid into the sand fifty feet from the Dome. He clutched at his throat, now a shredded trunk of blood and flesh.

  "Jim!" Gleeson yelled, running a beeline backwards.

  But Jim Rosen was dead by the time Gleeson got to him.

  The zombies continued firing. Gleeson snarled and ran back toward Brandon, Gus and the other Edenites.

  Brandon suddenly had an attack of Garbo; as shots sprinkled around her, Garbo held her assault rifle and just stared at it, frozen solid.

  Gleeson, who like the other Edenites, was by now well familiar with Brandon's bizarre transformations, dived into the sand and crawled toward the panic-stricken nurse.

  But again, Gleeson was too late. Brandon's chest sprinkled with red; he buckled to his knees and turned to regard Gleeson.

  Even at the last, Garbo was the strongest personality. And perhaps the most courageous.

  "Here's lookin' at you, kid," she slurred and died in his arms.

  Gleeson hugged the body of Brandon close to him, crying for the first time since his wife and children had died.

  "Back to the shelter!" he screamed to the remaining soldiers at his side. He did not believe that the Edenites would stand a better chance in the shelter; in fact, trapped in those confines assured their destruction. But against this new kind of enemy, Gleeson reasoned, any kind of deterrence seemed useless now.

  Gus plodded toward Gleeson, his foot badly mangled by gunshot.

  "We'd better move it, son," Gus said and pried Gleeson's hands off of Brandon's corpse. Gleeson nodded and followed.

  Hopefully, Gleeson looked toward the Dome. Perhaps, Jack Calisto would again delve into his bag of miracles and save the day.

  Gleeson, of course, did not know that Jack was having troubles of his own at the moment, and was in no position to help anyone, least of all himself.

  An explosion shook the ground near Gleeson; turning, the hunchback could see that his companions lay scattered, in pieces, vivisected by the exploding shell nearby. Only Gus, a little bit ahead of him, near the Dome's cellar doors remained intact. Gus was looking at him with enormous pity.

  Gleeson was surprised to see such an expression on Gus' face.

  Most surprising of all, though, was his own ability to keep moving. He looked down at his legs.

  Blown off, his legs gone, Gleeson was resting on his trunk, his insides rapidly escaping through a chewed up portion of his hip. Oddly, there was no pain, and Gleeson for a moment just stared dully at his masticated body.

  The last thing he did see was the strained face of Laura peeking out the hatch entrance of the Dome. Her eyes met his, the dead to the dead, in a final expression of farewell. In both eyes, there was a noticeable absence of fear, simply resignation. Gleeson hadn't known Laura well, but his final thought, as he toppled forward, was that he wished he had.

  SEVENTEEN – THE GOOD FIGHT

  Laura watched Gleeson die then reached up to a small box attached to the wall, just below the hatch activation switch. She pushed the one small red button on the box with all her might.

  The Dome suddenly began to throb, as the giant lead doors and outer walls began to vibrate. The hatch began to close slowly.

  The Stiffer turned to face Laura, barring its large, broken fangs menacingly. Jack tried to move, failing the first time, then successfully rising to one knee the second time around, while the Stiffer momentarily focused its malignant attention on Laura.

  Laura pulled the gun to her chest, cocked the firing mechanism, and struggled to point it at the Stiffer.

  The Stiffer walked forward and stopped.

  And it began to change.

  Shedding its skin like a snake, the Stiffer, within seconds, began to take on a different form. Flesh and tissue seemed to melt off the heavy bones, sizzling as it hit the lead encased concrete floor. Gradually, what inhabited the Stiffer, transformed into its true shape.

/>   It looked like a comic book pictorial of what a demon was supposed to be; high cheekbones, tapering off to a full-lipped mouth that housed two enormous incisors, large enough to be called tusks if the mood was right. The heavy muscular arms of the Stiffer were now replaced by reptilian appendages, scaly and sinewy, finishing off with hands that were distinctly claw-like, as if they had been liberated from some giant eagle and pasted on to the out-of-place serpentine arms and legs. Most striking of all, as they had been even in Stiffer-form, were the eyes. Two charcoal red pits fire stared down at Laura, hateful and menacing.

  Laura found the strength to aim her gun.

  The demon laughed, a laugh from hell.

  She fired.

  The Stiffer, or whatever it had become, was lifted off the ground and knocked on its backside. It sat there on the floor for just a second, a baffled expression on its face. One claw went to its midsection, feeling the outline of the gaping hole that Laura's discharge had produced. Laura felt faint, though she was able to cock the weapon once again.

  She did not fire, though, because she was distracted by a sound; a familiar sound.

  A flapping of wings also brought Jack's bleary attention to the center of the room. Even the demon looked up as Walter appeared through the hatchway. The bird flew to a favorite ledge, cooing and dancing frantically.

  She knows, Laura nodded to herself. The Ball Job is getting closer and she knows. Well, Angela, we're trying old girl. Wish you could lend a hand, Laura mused in spite of herself.

  Or a wing.

  The demon bounded to its feet in a movement so quick and breezy that Laura inadvertently pulled down on the trigger of her weapon. The charge fired wide of the demon and the creature snarled, knocking the weapon from Laura's hands and sending it clanging to a corner.

  Jack lunged forward, and found himself on his face, his broken leg failing him and the general shock to his body sabotaging what little strength remained. Cursing, he inched his way toward the gun, staying on the blind side of the demon.

  With a vicious backhand, the thing slapped Laura full in the head, lifting her off the ground. Laura groaned, not even trying to escape. The demon reached for her again.

  Something hit it square in the face, something soft and warm. The demon swatted at the ball of feathers and missed, irritated with the interference by the bird. In its complex mind, now fully committed to killing and pain and having no further use for communication or analyses, the demon roared and slapped the air as Walter did her best to distract it. Agile as she was, however, Walter was no match for the demon in its native form.

  Again, a lightning quick movement from a claw that seemed to come out of nowhere suddenly sent Walter flying with considerable force into a wall near the spot Jack was approaching.

  Walter slammed to the floor, her white feathers stained with blood. Jack let out a sound, as if he had been struck himself. Walter panted on the floor, her head and beak twisted unnaturally, her eyes, however, never leaving Jack. Jack reached out to touch her, but then shifted his focus back to the demon, as it picked Laura up and threw her across the room.

  Jack snarled, a primal look of desperation and hate crossing his face. He rolled with the grenade gun in hand.

  "Eat this!" he yelled out, as the creature turned, arms raised in anger and hatred.

  The grenade pellet caught the demon in the neck, detonating, and sending the thing's head smashing into the still closing outer hatch. The creature's body disintegrated into a crumpled heap, twitching, reaching for a head it no longer possessed.

  Jack stared at the head, snapping its fangs together, staring at him with surprise and loathing. Jack fired again, sending the remains of the head out the hatch, as the heavy door came to a close against the lock.

  * * *

  The Growler slumped in the seat beside Mathias, his giant hands falling away from the controls like wilting flowers. A few seconds later, and the mutant began to moan groggily, as if he were drunk or just waking up. Mathias didn't realize anything was seriously wrong, until the Ball Job began circling on itself, going nowhere fast. Veering sharply and suddenly to its left, the Ball Job crushed several corpse-soldiers and Maddogs. By the time Mathias reached over to commandeer the vehicle back on course, the Ball Job had retreated a quarter of a mile.

  Confused, the Maddogs just stared at the Ball Job, ceasing their attack forward in toto. Grabbing their attention more than the erratic retreat of their leader's death tank was the inexplicable behavior of the zombie corpses that had performed so admirably up until now.

  For suddenly, they had all collapsed, twitching pathetically in the sand, their dead eyes rolling into their heads. Some of the Maddogs tried to assist them in standing once again, but their efforts met with failure. They now just gibbered to themselves, looking hopefully to the Ball Job for an answer and for a further indication to sustain their attack.

  Mathias shook the Growler gingerly, but only the strange, besotted moans escaped the mutant's lips. Mathias felt both relieved and angry; relieved, because undoubtedly, something had gone wrong, sending whatever inhabited the Growler's body away or helpless and angry because despite the presence of such an unholy entity in their midst, Mathias and the Maddogs were about to enjoy the novel taste of victory thanks to it.

  Now, all the power and mystery had seemed to vanish in a single moment, taking with it the assured promise of success against Jack Calisto.

  Mathias worked the controls of the Ball Job, fumbling with levers and buttons, eventually finding the correct ones to turn the complicated machine around. Yelling and waving his arms, he motioned to the watching Maddogs, now standing bovinely still in the desert a thousand or so yards from the Dome.

  "Kill them!" he screamed hysterically, refusing to be robbed of this final glory, pounding his fists against the windshield and turning beet red.

  But the Maddogs could not make out Mathias' wild gestures from so far away. They waited, shrugging to one another.

  Apoplectic, Mathias screamed himself hoarse.

  He did not hear the small buzzing sound from the lower level telling him that a fuse had been engaged. Nor would it have mattered if he had.

  The Ball Job turned red for just a second, then white.

  Finally, even the air turned to fire.

  * * *

  The impact of the explosion smashed into the Dome with all the disproportionate force of a sledgehammer hitting a pebble. Jack, for the last time, went flying through the air, coming to rest in his none-too clean kitchen area about fifteen feet from the outer hatch.

  When he came to, Jack noticed that most of the interior of the Dome had fractured; plumbing lay tangled and scrapped on the floor, or hanging from the ceiling, like giant serpents, spitting forth either sewage or water or both. Somewhere, Jack thanked heaven, a generator still functioned, because the emergency lighting remained operational. Dust, ruptured concrete, masonry and plaster swamped the floor, making Jack's living room look like some kind of claustrophobic obstacle course.

  Broken and sore, Jack moved slowly and carefully. He could only crawl at this point; both arms felt dislocated and the leg that wasn't fractured felt bruised and weak. As was his habit under any circumstance, Jack glanced at his watch. He had been unconscious since the Ball Job's detonation for about an hour.

  His eye fell upon a little patch of floor in a corner; there lay Walter, and consequently Angela, bloody and lifeless.

  From another corner, Laura moaned weakly. Jack threw himself over debris, rolling, crawling his way toward the source of the moans. He did not release the book, though.

  Laura lay curled up like a fetus, breathing heavily. She was not quite conscious.

  But she was alive.

  Without a detailed examination, it was impossible to determine the extent of her recovery, but recovered Laura had done. Jack fell against the wall that she was leaning against, just watching her. He put his hand through her hair, and caressed her, not realizing that he was smiling now.


  * * *

  "Jack."

  It was a dream, he knew. And he knew, too, that it would be over soon.

  "Angela," he said.

  She was standing a few feet away from him, dressed in a bright red skirt he had given to her for her twenty-ninth birthday, only a month before she died.

  "No questions, please," she said softly.

  He wanted to reach out and touch her – but couldn't. Another rule that was not to be broken, he mused.

  "No questions," he said.

  "Do you understand?"

  "No. Not all of it," he said, wondering if he was shrugging or not.

  Angela smiled radiantly.

  "That makes two of us, darling."

  She was beginning to fade. Jack panicked.

  "Please come back. Don't leave me this time."

  Angela smiled. "Part of me will always be with you. In Laura."

  "How?" he asked.

  "It was the only way I could save her. I could do that much. Part of whatever I am was used to give her life back."

  "I don't understand."

  "I know. But when you love Laura, you will be loving me. She won't remember you now; she'll have to relearn meeting you. She'll have to relearn everything."

  Oh, god, if he could only hold her, he thought. Just for a moment.

  "Take care of things, my sweet," Angela said. "Take care of Eden. And take care of Laura."

  "For you," Jack heard himself whisper.

  Angela smiled again, and this time Jack could see a tear roll down her cheek.

  "I love you, Jack Calisto. I always have. And I always will."

  Angela Doe Calisto, alias Walter to her closest friends, closed her eyes and disappeared.

  * * *

  Things change.

  Gleeson was gone. So was Eden's baritone, Jim Rosen.

  And Brandon, along with Garbo.

  Jack leaned against the door of the Dome and stared out at the horizon. It seemed to him that only the good in the world changed - or disappeared, leaving only the stale and bad. Eden was still dying, along with the world. Perhaps the worst had come and gone, Jack thought, but there was still no happy ending in sight.