He stepped back, reaching for the door.
Movement at the corner of my eye made me flinch and duck. Two of the Holland clones dove at me. Just outside, a wall of Ranjers carrying keepers ran toward the wide door from down the street. I kicked at the clones, knocking them off their feet. I wasn’t going to win a fight with all of those Ranjers. I sighted and fired, blasting the wide door’s control panel. Please work! Sparks exploded from the panel.
The door dropped smoothly, lightly sealing against the ground. I blasted the panel again for good measure, then straightened. The door to the sanitizing hallway was closing behind Holland. I dove for it, flinging my keeper ahead of me.
The barrel of the keeper wedged between the door and the jamb. Clone hands grabbed at my feet. I kicked wildly and reached for my keeper just as a booted foot thrust toward the barrel. I pulled the trigger. The boot shredded and a cry of pain came from the hallway. Holding the keeper in the narrow space, I levered it with one arm, kicking and punching at the slow-moving, irritating clones.
The wide door slid upward a half meter. Ranjer legs appeared. It slid up a little more.
Something, it had to be Holland, pushed at the barrel of my keeper. I fired again, threw myself against the keeper and levered the door back open enough to get half of my body through it.
The door slammed against my back, shoving me into the door jamb. I yelled in pain and fury. It felt like it was squeezing my spine out through my chest. The clones tried pulling me back into the clone room. I nailed one in the face with a lucky punch. It fell back. A hobbling Adam Holland reached the door on the far end of the narrow hallway. I fired in his general direction, but he didn’t slow down.
I pushed at the door clamping me against the jamb. It moved back only a centimeter. Four clones grabbed my arms and a leg, pulling. My chest scraped against the jamb as they nearly pulled me free of the doorway.
The wide door slid all the way up. Ranjers poured into the clone room, keepers up. I kicked and swung at the clones. Two stumbled back.
The Ranjers fired as they ran.
I dropped, using the clones as a shield. Bullets smacked into the walls and door where my chest had just been. The clones suddenly stopped pulling. As they fell, I shoved back into the hallway. I got my chest and arms through, twisting to bend my legs through fast.
More bullets exploded through the hallway door. I fired back toward the Ranjers and yanked my legs through the doorway.
Bullets slammed against the door as it slid closed.
I gulped air and pushed to my feet. A hot line of pain flared in my neck. I brought my hand away from the spot. Blood. The slice from the bullet that had grazed me rescuing my parents had reopened.
It wouldn’t take long for the Ranjers to get through. I had to move.
I turned and ran. Holland had ducked out through the door into the Ranjer room. It whispered open as I drew close to it. I dove through, staying low and checking to all sides. No Ranjers except the ones on the beds. Holland stood at the shining metal cylinder. He looked at me as his fingers danced over several readouts.
I brought my keeper up. “Stop whatever it is you’re doing to them.”
“So you can kill another one?” Holland’s smile needed to be punched.
“I will shoot you if you don’t fix what you’ve done.” I fired a bullet above his head.
“Fix what I’ve done? Why would I undo intelligent design?” Holland dropped his hands and faced me.
“Intelligent design?”
“For years, our predecessors believed some ethereal hand guided their evolution,” Holland laughed. How did he look younger than the Prime Administrator I’d fought in New Frisko? “Now, we have my hand to guide and enhance.” He stepped toward me. “And you ruined one of this batch.” He wasn’t hobbling anymore.
Only one? I thought I ‘ruined’ two of them.
“Batch? You can’t do this to people!” I shot a bullet into the floor in front of him. “Now turn it off.”
“Nik, you’ve been at this so long and you still don’t get it at all.” Holland smiled wide. “Everything I’ve done has been for a species that was self-destructing.” He gestured to both sides. “This is one of my finest creations. They are having the… less useful parts of their brains cleansed while their muscles and reflexes are enhanced.” He took a step toward me. “The perfect army.”
“Turn it off! Bring them out of it,” I growled. “I will kill you.”
“I have more,” Holland said. He smiled. “But you won’t kill me.”
The wide door that led outside slid upward, and all of the people in the room sat up on their hard plastic beds. They stared ahead, then every one of them turned and looked at me. A bunch of Ranjers poured into the room from the street. Behind me, the interior door slid open. More Ranjers came through.
Holland gestured at me, speaking to the Ranjers that had come in behind me. “Take him outside and kill him.”
Chapter 49
Strong hands grabbed my shoulders from behind and tore the keeper out of my hands. I jerked away, or tried, only freeing one hand. I tapped my EarCom and shouted.
“You think I’m alone? You think I did this all by myself?”
A Ranjer grabbed my hand and pinned it against my back. Come on, Melisa, hear me. Help!
I felt the projector bomb and knife I’d stuffed back there. I had no way of getting at them quickly.
“Of course not,” Holland said, “but we will catch up to your friends in the stolen pod. And my Ranjers are closing in on the rest of your people in the forest.”
They haven’t found them yet. The Ranjers pushed me ahead of them toward the wide door that led outside. I was five meters from being killed. And I hadn’t stopped anything. At least Mom and Dad got away.
“I just can’t figure out what you thought you were going to accomplish,” Holland said. He reached for his machine. “It seems you never really understood how hopelessly misguided you have been.” Was this one of Holland’s clones? It was talking even better than New Frisko’s Prime Administrator had. Was it really Holland? If not, where was the real Holland? How did he control these things?
“You’re a murderer,” I said. “I might not stop you, but someone will. The other cities will find out the truth and—”
“Nobody will stop me,” Holland said. “Nobody could.” He smiled broadly. “Between the Bug and my lovely technology, I control everything. Here’s a demonstration for your final moments.” He slid his finger down the shiny machine. All of the people hooked to the wires lifted their right arm into the air. He tapped a square on the machine; the people bent their right arm at the exact same moment.
Cold dread pulled me like gravity. He was too powerful. I should have blown up the machine when I had the chance. The Ranjers pulled me outside. The bright sunlight reflected off windows in nearby buildings, and heat radiated up from the ground.
Holland called out. “You see, Nik? They’re no longer anything but pieces. Puppets. I control everything.”
I craned my head to get one last look at him. “Wrong! You don’t control me. You don’t control any of us Pushers.”
Holland laughed. “Pushers?” He looked away, shaking his head. “Children, all of you.” He waved dismissively. “Kill him.”
Ranjers pushed me to the dirt. This was it. Melisa, I’m sorry. Maybe the other Pushers would escape the fires. I forced myself to look directly at the Ranjers’ helmeted faces and tensed for the spray of bullets that would end me.
A bone-shaking scream tore through the building and bright afternoon. The Ranjers all spun to see the source.
Bug me. I drove into the nearest Ranjer’s knees as hard as I could, grabbing for his keeper. He fell, taken by surprise. I got my finger around the trigger and fired as fast as I could. The keeper bucked, softly spitting five grenades, one right after the other. Grenades bounced off Rangers and sailed toward the building as I rolled behind the Ranjer I’d knocked down. I got my feet and one hand under me and scrabbled ba
ckwards. I turned to my front and tried to get to my feet.
Bullets pounded into my back as I heard keepers fire. Then louder explosions tore through the street, throwing me forward several meters. Darkness squeezed my vision, my ears ringing. What was that scream?
Two more explosions followed immediately after the first one. The front of the Ranjer building buckled and ripped outward. I wavered as I stood. I twisted and stabbed frantically for the ammunition drum’s selector. It beeped softly.
I fired. Bullets erupted from my keeper and sailed uselessly above the Ranjers that had dragged me outside. They were all down, their body armor no good against grenades exploding at their feet. I ran at them and grabbed two keepers by their straps. I sprinted toward the building, spraying the doorway and the huge hole in the front with my keeper. I slung both of the new keepers across my chest and pulled one around.
Dust and smoke filled the air. Something inside the building had caught fire, and I could see dancing orange light through the thick haze. I skidded to a stop outside the building, between the hole and open doorway. I thought of the sanitizing hallway leading to the Ranjer room. Not so sanitary in there now, is it? I leaned against the exterior wall and took a moment to catch my breath.
Only one way to do this. Holland had been able to play me, play all of us, our entire lives. We’d been predictable, slow, and scared.
I lifted a keeper in each hand. No more. Time to tear this thing down. To the ground.
I spun, ducked low, and pelted through the doorway, spraying bullets in both directions. Between my keepers and the raging fire, the noise was deafening, but I kept moving. The thick haze made it hard to see, but I could make out the gleaming machine in the middle of the room. I ran that way, turning slow circles and shooting controlled bursts every few seconds.
Ranjers popped up from behind some fallen plastic beds. I pumped a grenade their way. I winced, wishing I could do something for the people Holland had hooked up to the machine.
It was too late for them. But not for the rest of us.
I kept running and ducked behind the glowing cylinder just as the grenade exploded. Where was Holland? Whatever he was? I circled the machine. Ranjers appeared and unloaded in my direction. Every part of my body screamed at me to stop moving, but I dove to the ground, firing back at their legs. The armor must have been thinner down there, because two of them went down.
I pushed back to my feet and finished my circuit of the machine. No Holland. Where had he gone? I noticed the people were all lying back down, eyes staring blankly up at the ceiling. Another scream cut through the haze and noise. The scream! It was the one from before, the one whose brain readout I’d messed with. He screamed and twitched.
It had been him. The scream that distracted the Ranjers had been him. I’d turned off his brain control thing and he hadn’t died. Now he grew still. I wanted to stop and tear the wires off his head and body, see if it really was too late for him and the others.
Not now. No time.
Looking around, I spotted the hallway that led to the clone room. Were those clones still trying to save the ones I’d messed with? If there’s nothing new that way, what about this way? I peered through the haze toward the other end of the room. It looked like a smooth wall, but I knew by now that didn’t mean anything.
Turning and checking all around me, I jogged toward the wall. Ranjers came at me from both sides. I fired and kept running. I came to the blank wall. Nothing here. I spun and dropped to a knee. I fired two grenades ahead of where the Ranjers had been, grateful the room was big enough that I should be okay. I turned to the glowing metal cylinder that was transforming good people into murderers.
I unloaded all of my grenades at it, then poured bullets after them. Over the noise of the building falling apart from the explosions, I heard the grenades hit the floor and skitter. I scrambled behind a nearby plastic bed and counted. Three seconds later, they blew. The concussion felt like it squeezed my entire body flat.
A high-pitched whine filled the air. Vibrations shook the floor. I glanced over the plastic bed. The machine spat bright sparks. Blue and white flame licked up from the inside. I poured more bullets at it, aiming at the flames. More sparks flew. The whine grew louder; the vibration stronger.
Something leaped at me, over the plastic beds. I fell backward. The Ranjer landed on me, pushing me to the floor. I twisted, tried to buck him off. He was too heavy and strong. He grabbed my throat and squeezed. I got my keeper up and fired. My bullets blew him backward. The floor shook. The whine became a grinding noise that I felt in my bones.
The Ranjer kept coming. He’d lost his keeper somewhere, but he dove at me again. He moved faster than I could react. His weight landed on me. Every bone in my chest felt like it cracked. His hands reached for my neck again.
I bucked and shot again. The bullets hit his body armor, but he held onto my neck anyway. Blinding pain flooded me. My vision went dark.
An enormous explosion from the center of the room almost flung the Ranjer off me. One of his hands slipped off my neck. I sucked air. The Ranjer’s hand found my neck again, and he squeezed.
Chapter 50
I jammed my keeper against his side, right above his waist, and fired upward.
The Ranjer flew back just as another massive explosion sent shockwaves through the building. My ears were never going to stop ringing. Blinking and trying to breathe again, I rolled to my side. The gleaming, sleek machine was torn open, wires and components shattered and burned. Sparks flew all over in endless streams.
I scanned the room, checking for Ranjers coming my way. A number of them were on the floor. A few more lay still in different places around the room.
I pointed the two keepers at the machine and emptied the ammunition drums into it. Gotta make sure it’s good and dead.
Pushing to all fours, I dropped the two empty keepers. I still had one slung across my chest; it hung under me as I tried to get to my feet. Pain throbbed and lanced all over, where bullets had been stopped by armor and shrapnel had sliced through. My right side ached. When I turned my head, the skin on my neck felt like it was going to tear.
I stood. My right leg buckled. I caught myself on the wall. My calf throbbed enough that I wondered if I should just cut my leg off. At least surgery would mean I got to lie down. Those plastic beds were looking great right now.
No, I could sleep when this was over. I pushed off the wall.
I stopped and leaned back against the wall, shoving the pain aside and trying to focus. Too many explosions. My brain felt scrambled. I felt something on the wall, something I couldn’t see.
When all was said and done, Holland had pretty much the same tricks over and over. Fear, control, and hidden bugging doors. I found the edge of the door that blended into the wall perfectly and pulled.
It didn’t move. I traced the edges of the door, finding the top, then the side. It was just over a meter wide and two meters tall. I tried yanking at the other side. Still no good.
“Spam this.”
I popped a grenade out of the ammunition drum, thought for a moment, and popped out another one. I set both grenades on the floor at the base of the hidden door, pressed the activators on the end, and ran.
Or stumbled. Basically I ran like a guy with a leg that didn’t work. I got behind the burning, smoking machine, getting a lungful of chemical smoke in the process. My grenades exploded. Light and shrapnel blew out from them.
I flung one arm across my face to keep the awful smoke out of my nose and mouth, and ran back to the door. One bottom corner was completely gone and the whole thing had blown up and inward. I kicked the cracked and broken door to pieces and found stairs leading down into the earth.
Just like in the old city. I descended the stairs, using one arm to lean on the wall. My right leg did not want to hold my weight. Every time it hit the floor, a bolt of hot pain shot from my heel to my neck.
Long, cold white lights on the walls lit the stairs, leaving no shadow
. I turned at a landing and found more stairs. I bent to see what was at the bottom. A stark white floor. A few thick, snaking cables. Wincing and hissing with each step, I got down the stairs.
Holland was waiting.
He stood in the middle of a huge round room. The walls were smooth and had screens lining the entire top half. Consoles and machinery I didn’t recognize stood in clusters around the room. Black cables connected everything. Lights flickered on the far side of the room. Voices muttered. A thicker cluster of equipment and furniture sat on the far side, too. Holland stood between me and that end of the room.
I stared at Holland. It was the same one I’d fought upstairs; his boot was shredded. He looked at me, but didn’t say anything. I took a careful step closer. I couldn’t afford to fall. I scrubbed dirt and debris from my face, blinking to try to clear my eyes. Why didn’t he say anything?
“You should not be in here,” Holland finally said. He spoke slowly. Then something changed. His body straightened and his eyes met mine. “Granjer. Why won’t you die?”
I glared at him. What was he? “Because I’m. Not. Done. Yet.”
He moved faster than I could register, darting at me and smashing me in the face. Agony erupted in my head. My feet lifted off the floor. I hit the ground, the keeper slamming me in the side as I rolled.
“Well, I am done playing games,” Holland said.
I scrambled away from him and lifted my keeper and fired. I glanced back at the far side of the room. Shock sent icy tingles down my spine. Somebody was over there, sitting in some huge desk thing.
He hit me again, tearing the keeper out of my hands. I somehow stayed upright.
“How?”
“You are nothing,” Holland said. He held my keeper and glared at me. “You come here, destroy my children, my army. Because you’re stupid.” He slammed the keeper against his uplifted knee.
The keeper snapped in half. He dropped the pieces on the floor. This was not a clone. Or at least not a normal one. It was like a Ranjer and a clone mixed together.
Push (Beat series Book 2) Page 29