Fire City

by Bali Rai

  He stood outside his room with two of his mercenaries, waiting for Aron to finish cleaning himself up. The boy had already wolfed down two steaks and six scrambled eggs. From the stink he carried, Stone doubted whether Aron had taken a proper shower in weeks. A maid, one of several servants the Mayor kept, had done as instructed and laid out fresh clothes too – brand-new army-issue fatigues from the central stock kept at the mansion. Stone had picked them out himself, enjoying the process. A simple grey vest, grey jersey boxer shorts, an olive-green, long-sleeved top, camouflage combats and heavy black boots. The final piece, a flak jacket that matched the trousers, finished the ensemble, and would turn the rebel boy into a carbon copy of Stone himself. For a second, Stone felt a strange sensation, an almost paternal feeling of pride, but he shook the emotion away and lit a cigarette.

  ‘Something funny, boss?’ asked one of the soldiers.

  Stone, who hadn’t realized he was smiling, shook his head. ‘Just thinking,’ he replied.

  ‘What’s the plan?’ added the other, scratching his grey stubble.

  ‘Talk to the boy,’ Stone explained. ‘The Resistance have a hideaway, somewhere that the demons can’t sense, and I’m going to find out where it is.’

  ‘And then we attack?’ the first soldier almost begged. ‘I could use some action.’

  Stone smiled with intent this time. ‘No, brother,’ he replied. ‘We tell the demons and they attack. Our mission is more subtle.’

  ‘Man, that ain’t no fun!’ the man moaned, flexing a tattoo-covered bicep.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Stone told him. ‘There’ll be plenty of combat soon enough.’

  ‘Better be. I’m tired of this babysitting gig. I’m too old to hold hands with some soft pussy ’cause he’s too scared to cross the street.’

  ‘Patience,’ said Stone. ‘We’ve got too much experience to fight without reason. That’s what those other troops are for.’

  The impatient soldier looked at Stone and shrugged. ‘Guess so,’ he agreed.

  The door opened and Aron stepped into the hallway, dressed in his new attire.

  Stone grinned, ruffling the boy’s freshly washed hair. ‘That’s better, isn’t it,’ he said.

  Aron pushed his hand away. ‘What next?’ he asked, his eyes looking from one soldier to the other. ‘And who are they?’

  ‘My men,’ revealed Stone, before making the introductions.

  ‘You look like a proper soldier now,’ the impatient one told Aron. ‘One of us.’

  Stone agreed. ‘You see, Aron,’ he explained, ‘we’re not regular army.’

  ‘I know,’ said the boy. ‘You’re mercenaries. You go where the money is.’

  Stone shook his head. ‘Not quite,’ he said. ‘We still work for the government but we don’t report to the normal army command. No, our little unit is self-contained, just me, these two, and you – if you want it.’

  Aron looked away and shrugged. ‘Depends,’ he said. ‘I’m no collaborator.’

  ‘Which is exactly why I brought you here. My orders come directly from someone high up in the government. Someone with more power than you can imagine. The world is changing, and we’re going to be the architects. I told you earlier, you need to stop seeing absolutes, Aron.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ Aron admitted.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Stone told him, ‘you will.’

  ‘And my being here,’ continued the boy, ‘that will mean Martha and the others are left alone?’

  Stone shook his head. ‘No, Aron,’ he replied. ‘They’ll join us too. Just trust me . . .’

  He turned and led Aron along the passage, past room after room until a small stairwell appeared at the far end. They descended to the ground floor, and then again down into a basement complex. Here the doors were made of steel and the walls were free of decoration and finery. It reminded Aron of the Haven, although judging by the footprint of the building they were beneath, it was smaller.

  ‘This is the army command centre,’ Stone explained. ‘The troops patrol the city but the orders come from here. There are sleeping quarters, showers, food stores and weapons down here. All of it run from this place.’

  ‘The Mayor,’ Aron spat in disgust.

  ‘Not him,’ Stone told him. ‘He’s just a figurehead. I control what really happens.’

  ‘Is that supposed to be impressive?’ asked Aron.

  ‘No,’ replied Stone. ‘It’s just a fact. Again, stop the black/white thinking. The Mayor looks like he’s in control, but not without someone else pulling the strings.’

  Aron stopped at one of the many doors, pushing it open. Inside was rack after rack of tinned and packet food. His stomach began to grumble.

  ‘You still hungry?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘I’ll get the kitchen to make you some hot dogs.’

  Aron looked at Stone in revulsion. ‘Why would I want to eat dog?’ he asked, causing Stone to laugh out loud.

  ‘It’s not actual canine,’ Stone revealed. ‘Hot dogs are sausages in bread rolls . . .’

  When Aron remained confused, Stone took him into the food store and grabbed a can of frankfurters from the racks. ‘Here,’ he said, handing the tin to Aron. ‘Sausages.’

  Aron studied the can, turning it round to look at the label.

  ‘Can you read?’ asked Stone, trying on his best look of concern.

  ‘Mostly,’ said Aron. ‘Some of the elders taught us enough to get by.’

  Stone put his arm round the boy’s shoulder. ‘That’s all going to change from now,’ he said gently. ‘You join my unit, son, and you become my family. Ask the others about that. We look out for each other and no one messes with us. We’re tighter than a nun’s underpants.’

  ‘What’s a nun?’ asked Aron.

  Stone grinned. ‘Never mind about that,’ he said. ‘I want you to speak to someone. Come on.’

  He took Aron to a small room near the rear of the basement and sat him in front of a computer screen. He connected to the Net and called up his boss. Layer after layer of encryption kicked in until no bug on Earth could have snooped on the link. Aron’s face glowed with awe as a face appeared on the screen, an old man with amber eyes and grey hair combed back on his head. The man smiled warmly – something, Aron realized, he hadn’t encountered in a very long time.

  ‘Is this the recruit you’ve told me about, Stone?’ the man asked.

  To Aron, the man’s voice seemed to appear like magic. He looked around the room, searching for some form of amplification.

  ‘Yes, sir, this is Aron.’

  ‘Good afternoon, young man.’

  Aron looked at Stone, unsure of himself.

  ‘Just speak normally,’ urged Stone. ‘He can see and hear you too.’

  ‘Hello,’ Aron replied nervously, causing the old man’s smile to widen.

  ‘Don’t be afraid, son,’ the man told him. ‘You may call me Brogan. I am a friend.’

  Stone took out his mobile phone and began to fiddle with it. Aron asked him what it was but Brogan replied. ‘It is a communication device, Aron. There’ll be time enough to explain these things later. For now, I wish to set your mind at rest regarding your role in Stone’s unit.’

  ‘I haven’t agreed to join yet,’ Aron told him defiantly. ‘I will not collaborate with demons.’

  ‘That is exactly what I wanted to hear,’ Brogan replied. ‘None of us wish to cooperate with the Hell-kin.’

  ‘So why are you?’ asked Aron as his confusion began to grow. ‘It’s obvious that you work with them.’

  Brogan nodded. ‘Yes, it is,’ he admitted. ‘But that is only what the surface suggests. Dig a little deeper, my son, and you’ll find another truth, a more profound understanding.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ said Aron. ‘Stone keeps talking in riddles too. I’m not that clever. The only reason I’m here is so that my friends won’t be hurt. I don’t care what you do with me. I don’t care about anything, not any more.’

/>   Brogan’s expression grew concerned. A tear formed in the old man’s left eye, one he wiped away quickly. Aron felt something changing inside. He wondered why Brogan, a man he’d never met, would shed a tear over his plight. Confusion clouded his mind as he thought about the world he knew; the absolute world that Stone had asked him to reconsider. Here was a collaborator, a man who seemed to be everything that Aron despised, yet he was warm and friendly and appeared concerned. He’d shown Aron more kindness than he’d felt in months.

  ‘I am saddened to hear of your alienation,’ Brogan told him. ‘Let me explain the truth to you. Let me dig through the multi-faceted nature of the world around you and explain our mission.’

  ‘What mission?’

  ‘To rid ourselves of these demons,’ revealed Brogan. ‘Once and for all.’

  Aron felt his mouth fall open. A shiver of emotion ran down his back.

  ‘I see that my words have shocked you,’ said Brogan.

  Aron could do nothing but nod.

  ‘We are planning a coup, Aron, one that will take time and effort. By working within the government, we have access to the highest levels of information, the best resources. Now we need to contact the Resistance out there, where you are. To fund them with arms and food, and everything else they will need. There is a wasp, Aron, which lays its eggs inside a caterpillar. When the grubs hatch, they eat the caterpillar from the inside out. That is our aim, son. We are the wasps.’

  ‘But Stone and the others . . . they’ve killed humans.’

  Brogan shook his head slowly. ‘A terrible thing, Aron,’ he replied. ‘Yet it cannot be helped. In order to remain hidden, our agents must behave like collaborators. This is where you must try to rationalize your reactions, son. We are talking about sacrificing some humans in order to save many others. Tell me, how many of your friends have been sacrificed?’

  ‘Too many,’ Aron told him sorrowfully. ‘Far too many.’

  ‘Yet the ends are justifiable, are they not?’

  ‘I think so,’ Aron replied. ‘We either fight and die, or we cower and still get killed anyway. I’m no coward.’

  ‘Precisely my point,’ Brogan declared. ‘Stone is willing to do whatever it takes to make contact with the Resistance, to explain the true nature of our plan. He is just like you.’

  Aron began to shake his head vigorously. ‘Wait a minute, that’s not true,’ he accused. ‘Stone said he would hurt my friend, to get his information. He said he’d—’

  ‘He’d hurt you too,’ Brogan admitted. ‘Don’t you understand? This mission is more important than any of us, Aron. If you won’t give us what we need, you will suffer. Nothing can stand in the way of our revolution. Stone is willing to lay down his life to save the world. Are you prepared to do the same?’

  Aron put his face in his hands, mesmerized by the conflicting thoughts and emotions that whirled around him like a typhoon. What was he supposed to do? Stone was hard to trust, but this? If the demons found out what was being said here, everyone involved would perish. Brogan, whoever he was, was taking a huge risk to explain things to him. Why would he do that if he weren’t genuine?

  ‘OK,’ he eventually replied, looking up at the screen.

  ‘So you’ll help us to defeat them?’

  ‘I will,’ said Aron. ‘I’ll help you to bring them all down. Every last one.’

  Brogan moved his face closer to the camera. ‘I need you to be clear, Aron,’ he replied. ‘You’ll help us to find your friends. To access their hideout?’

  ‘Yes, I’ll help you to find the Haven. I’ll tell you how to reach them.’

  ‘Good boy.’

  ‘What happens now?’ asked Aron.

  ‘Now,’ smiled Brogan, ‘you get your reward. Anything your heart desires. You have joined us, my son. You are one of ours now.’

  Aron nodded as Martha’s face appeared in his mind. He wished she could see him now, at the centre of things, helping them all, really helping. Not like Jonah, who let so many die without any benefit. Brogan’s words were honest and real. His mission was better, more astute, and would truly help the Resistance. And he, Aron, would be the hero, bringing genuine hope to his friends. That would show them his true worth. That would make them see their mistakes. That would make Martha understand that she really did love him.

  ‘I only want one thing,’ he told Brogan.

  ‘Ask.’

  ‘There’s a stranger with them, Jonah. I want him dead.’

  Brogan smiled. ‘We know,’ he said. ‘We don’t trust him either. He is not what he seems.’

  ‘How so?’ Aron asked him.

  ‘Jonah is a spy. He’s a special operations soldier, trained by and working for the government. That’s how we know of him. We’ve been tracking him for months.’

  ‘I knew it!’ cried Aron. ‘I knew something was wrong with him!’

  ‘So it is imperative that you help, my son, and quickly. Your friends are in grave danger. This Jonah, or whatever he’s calling himself, is a cold-blooded killer.’

  Aron’s eyes glazed over with anger and his heart began to pound. He had been right about Jonah all along, and now he would make them see.

  All of them . . .

  37

  THE GUARD SEEMED dazed as he walked towards them. Mace turned to Jonah, saw that his eyes were closed. Words poured from his mouth in some strange, guttural language that Mace didn’t recognize. The soldier, tall and athletically built, knelt before them, his head bowed, weapon placed at Jonah’s feet.

  ‘You called?’ he droned.

  ‘Enemies have infiltrated the complex,’ Jonah told him. ‘You must take your platoon and engage them.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘They hide in the sleeping quarters. Wait ten minutes and then sound the alarm. Is this clear?’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘Then go,’ Jonah commanded.

  The soldier stood and shook his head, and then, as if neither Jonah nor Mace were there, he pushed past them.

  ‘What the hell was that?’ asked Mace, eyeing his companion.

  Jonah took a deep breath and then exhaled. He pinched the bridge of his nose with thumb and forefinger. ‘Mind control is something demons can achieve,’ he explained. ‘My mother taught me how.’

  ‘So that guard will obey you?’

  ‘Yes,’ replied Jonah.

  Mace wondered why Jonah didn’t apply his powers to the entire camp, if that was the case.

  ‘If I were fully demon,’ said Jonah, ‘I could.’

  ‘Mind-reading too,’ said Mace. ‘Excellent.’

  Jonah shrugged. ‘I don’t read minds as a rule. It’s something that I shut off, most of the time.’

  ‘Most of the time?’ replied Mace. ‘Great. So when do you read them?’

  ‘In combat situations,’ Jonah admitted. ‘Helps me to keep one step ahead.’

  ‘What about when we were chatting earlier?’

  ‘Not then,’ said Jonah. ‘That would be intrusive.’

  ‘But if you wanted to . . .?’

  Jonah nodded.

  ‘This gets better and better,’ said Mace. ‘Maybe I should wrap my head in tin foil, stop you spying on my thoughts.’

  ‘I didn’t choose to be this way,’ the other boy parried. ‘But I did choose to join the human fight.’

  ‘Are you asking me to give you a break?’

  ‘Yes,’ Jonah told him. ‘I know you want more answers, and once we’ve finished here and got Tyrell I’ll tell you everything. Right now, we’ve got ten minutes.’

  ‘How do you know Tyrell is even here?’

  ‘I don’t,’ said Jonah. ‘But his scent is here. Faint but here all the same.’

  ‘His scent?’

  ‘Later, Mace. We need to get moving.’

  Mace fingered the sonic trigger in his pocket and considered how much plastic explosive they’d used to wire the compound. He wanted to be a long way away when the detonators hit home. Only there was no chance of that,
as Jonah had explained. The sonic transmitter only worked within a fifty-metre radius. Nowhere near distant enough for comfort.

  They’d spent the last twenty minutes finding and taking a truck, meeting surprisingly little resistance along the way. The only challenge had come from a bored young man with a crooked nose and acne-encrusted skin. Jonah had played his part well, persuading the boy to relinquish his truck and actually help them to load up too. The poor sod was with the angels now, his neck snapped by Mace’s hand. Another collaborator gone, thought the giant, unconcerned. Given the chance, he’d kill every turncoat in the complex.

  ‘OK, start it up and drive us to the front gates,’ said Jonah. ‘And let me have the trigger.’

  ‘Why should you have it?’ asked Mace. ‘I’m happy to use it.’

  Jonah shook his head. ‘I’m faster than you,’ he pointed out. ‘Once we’re ready, you engage the prison guards and find Tyrell. I’ll go back and detonate the explosives. Then you drive through the gates and keep going. I’ll catch you up.’

  Mace shrugged and agreed. ‘You’re the demon,’ he joked, handing the detonator over.

  The truck rattled as the engine kicked into life but, again, no one paid attention. A patrol passed the windscreen and Mace gave them the thumbs-up. Both guards nodded a reply, smiled and went about their business.

  ‘These uniforms really work,’ said Mace.

  ‘Why wouldn’t they?’ asked Jonah. ‘Hurry up.’

  Mace drove slowly between two smaller huts and out into an open zone at the very heart of the complex. Several other vehicles sat in a line in the centre of the clearing. Next to one of them were wooden crates stamped with numerical codes. Jonah pointed to them.

  ‘Food,’ he said. ‘Tinned stuff, probably, ready for transport. This is more than just a round-up camp, it’s a supply base too.’