Flux

by Jeremy Robinson

  “If it can be killed,” Langdon says after a beat. “You are right, of course. I’m an intelligent man. I did my research. I knew the risks associated with time travel, including who and what we might encounter along the way. We know it died. But not how. The skeletons uncovered by the Smithsonian showed no signs of advanced aging, or catastrophic injury. But they were all missing their heads. Some were missing limbs, as well.”

  Langdon’s words remind me of how Tsul’Kalu took every bullet fired at him, unless they were aimed at his head. And now he’s wearing the saber-toothed skull for protection. That’s got to be the key, but will a bullet do the job, or do we actually need to sever his head?

  “They?” Levi says. “How many skeletons are there?”

  “Dozens,” Langdon says. “They’ve never been as prevalent as mankind…not remotely. That they are still not among us suggests the others migrated somewhere else, someplace remote, unbothered by mankind.”

  “You think people chased the Nephilim off?” Cassie asks. “That the Indians somehow killed Tsul’Kalu?”

  Another chuckle. He’s enjoying this. Relaxed. Whatever he’s here for, he’s close to achieving it. The drone’s presence suggests that we and Tsul’Kalu are still a threat, but he’s feeling confident. “It’s more likely that another of his kind did the deed. Or something else, equally nefarious, with a penchant for body parts.”

  “What do you want?” Inola asks, cutting to the chase. I’m impressed with how well she’s adapted to her new reality, full of monsters and technology, both of which must be strange to someone who has no concept of machinery, electricity, or theoretical physics. Then again, Tsul’Kalu is straight out of her life experience, and who knows what other ancient North American knowledge has been passed down by her people.

  Langdon goes silent, leaving me to ponder Inola’s question. What does he want? Why is he talking to us now?

  “He’s distracting us,” Flores says, eyes turned downhill.

  I scan the forest below, but see nothing more than trees. There are modern birds and squirrels here, but so far, the dinosaurs have avoided this elevated land, probably because the air is thinner, and their big bodies need all the oxygen they can get.

  “I don’t see anything,” Owen says, twisting around my father to have a look for himself.

  “Doesn’t mean he’s not there,” my father says. “If he’s really a hunter, we won’t know he’s there until he fires the first shot.”

  But Langdon will. “You know where he is,” I say to the drone. “You’re watching him right now, aren’t you?”

  “I’m going to give you a chance to turn back,” Langdon says, confirming my suspicion by not addressing it. “Ride east and then back down. The land there is clear of danger.”

  Except for the giant still hunting us.

  “Or return to the tunnels, where you will be…” His voice trails off. “I’m afraid your time is running out.”

  Is he talking about Tsul’Kalu, or another Flux? I’m about to ask when a bullet rips through the air, and the drone. The flying machine falls silent and drops from the sky, narrowly missing my head.

  “Sorry,” Levi says, holstering his weapon. “Man’s a snake oil salesman. The more we listen to him, the more danger we’re in.”

  Can’t say I disagree with him, but it would have been nice to get an answer to my lingering question. Langdon isn’t afraid to let us die for his cause, but he’s not exactly out to kill us, either. Not yet. I suspect his indifference to our fate will shift if we continue to threaten him. He wasn’t just suggesting we lead the giant away, he was threatening to take action if we refused.

  I want to offer the others one last chance to back out, but we’re well beyond the point of no return. Anyone who takes a different route risks being found by the hunter without the full force of our ragtag unit. Going back means fighting Tsul’Kalu head on, and I’m not confident any of us would survive that. Pushing forward is our only real hope of survival.

  Langdon has an army of drones, but I know how to fight and destroy tech better than I do demi-gods. The drones are also guided by an AI, whose tactics can be predicted, or by people, whose skills on the battlefield are outmatched by me and Flores. The odds aren’t great, but they’re the best we’ve got.

  I push my horse harder and continue upward at a steeper angle. The horse whinnies in protest, but it pounds up the hill. If Langdon chose to confront us now, it means we’re close…and so is the giant. It also means there’s still time to stop him.

  I have my doubts about Black Creek’s survival in the Cretaceous, having seen the scope of what our small pocket of now homeless humanity is up against, but I doubt things will get easier a hundred million years further back in time. And before that…before the first single-celled organisms split and evolved into things with eyes, and limbs, and brains… I don’t think we could even breathe the air.

  I yank back on the reigns when the sound of tank treads reaches my ears. The mini-tanks are waiting for us. The moment we emerge from the tree line, we’ll have declared war on Langdon and will be cut down.

  “We can’t go up there,” Cassie says, pointing out what I already know.

  “And we can’t stay here,” Levi adds.

  “Thank you for making that clear to me,” I say, laying on the sarcasm.

  “So we’ll do both,” my father says.

  I’m about to point out the many reasons splitting up is a bad idea, when he continues. “Look around. Ignore the new growth. We’re near the peak. Near the tree line created by the mine. That hasn’t changed. Focus on the topography. You know where we are.”

  I scan the area, trying to see what he has already, but I’m either too tired or too distracted to spot anything familiar in the failing light. The sun’s rays have raced ahead of us, now bathing the barren peak in its orange glow. Soon it will be gone altogether, and the night will fall. I’ve never been afraid of the dark, but I’m pretty sure that will change in about, oh, an hour.

  “Ugh.” Owen shakes his head at me, and points into the forest to my right. “The tunnel thing is over there.”

  My father confirms his assessment by adding, “Maybe we can find a way in?”

  “Next time, just spit it out,” I say. “I’m too old for lessons.”

  “’Cause you fail them.” Owen smiles at his verbal jab.

  “Wise ass,” I say to him.

  “Shit for brains,” he replies.

  Levi thrusts his hand in the air, like a student in class. “I’m just going to point out that we’ve got hot metal death waiting for us up there, and primal rage carnage racing up behind us. If y’all are done being samesees, I reckon now might be a good time to pick which kind of horrible demise we prefer. ’Cause in a minute, we ain’t gonna have a choice.”

  “Unless we keep on moving up this mountainside,” Flores says, “that demi-god asshole won’t have a trail to follow.”

  And there’s the problem. Diverting our course risks delaying or preventing Tsul’Kalu’s introduction to Langdon and his killing machines.

  A howl rolls up the mountainside.

  We’re out of time.

  “Too much talking,” Inola says, hopping down from her horse. “Not enough doing.” Then she seals her fate, and maybe ours, by slapping her horse’s rump and sending it sprinting uphill.

  49

  The tumult of hooves charging up the mountainside comingles with the grinding crunch of tank treads rolling over the stony clearing beyond the forest’s grasp. The steeds charge fearlessly into battle, even when the first gunshots ring out. Even when the mini-guns unleash laser-focused beams of bullets into their bodies.

  The horses scream in pain. Briefly.

  I cringe at the sound. I had grown fond of the rides, not because I’m an animal lover in general, but because they were good soldiers. They carried us toward and through danger, facing inhuman fears and pushing past them like no person ever could. Myself included. But like all soldiers, their lives
were controlled by people whose agenda requires sacrifice.

  As the last of the horses cries out, its body slapping onto the hard stone surface a hundred feet above, I push myself deeper beneath the fallen tree that is my hiding spot.

  Breathing slowly, face coated with dirt, cloaked in a blanket of thick ferns, I am invisible. Short of being stepped on, I should be impossible to detect.

  Should be.

  We know too little about Tsul’Kalu, and what we do know is steeped in Cherokee and Biblical stories that might not be true. What I do know is that he is an experienced hunter, a savage killer, and a damn fast healer. I also know he’s not immortal—in the sense that he can’t be killed—and that he’s protective of his head. But are his ears sensitive enough to hear my heartbeat? The gentle ebb and flow of air in my lungs? Can he smell as well as a dog? Can his bare feet sense subtle vibrations in the ground if someone shifts their weight? If the answer to any of those questions is ‘yes,’ then this will go down as the worst plan of my military and security careers.

  Then again, it’s not my plan. It’s Inola’s.

  She set it in motion by sending her horse uphill. As soon as I saw it charge away, I understood and instructed the others to do the same. The heavy-hooved horses left an easy to follow trail toward Synergy’s awaiting drones—the same trail Tsul’Kalu will have followed all the way up the mountain.

  Treading lightly, we veered away from the trail on foot, careful to step only where ferns and other unrecognizable ground growth would conceal our footprints. Now we’re hunkered down behind a tangle of fallen trees, waiting silently for the giant to pass us by.

  And we don’t have to wait long.

  I hear Tsul’Kalu before I see him. His oversized lungs huff as he charges up the mountain. At his pace, he’d have caught us near the peak, even if Langdon hadn’t tried to stop us. Looking through a curtain of moss hanging from the fallen tree’s underside, I see him thunder into view.

  He’s bathed in the blood of whatever creatures he came across in the field below. It’s caked dry in some places. Coagulated clumps dangle in his dark red hair, hanging out from under the saber-toothed head-covering. He looks more beast than man now, and that’s what he is. Despite being intelligent, he is driven by instinct alone, and a hatred for mankind, particularly those who have managed to wound and elude him. But he’s even more savage than the dinosaurs, driven by vengeance rather than simple survival.

  He’s evil, I think.

  I’ve fought and killed the enemies of the United States, and while their political, religious, or general world view put them violently at odds with my country, I wouldn’t describe them as ‘evil.’ Misguided. Deluded. Taken advantage of. But not evil.

  Tsul’Kalu is nothing but, and I can’t help but wonder if the story of his demonic genesis might be true. I can’t imagine something like him evolving. Rampant killing doesn’t serve the survival of any species, including people.

  The very worst of men are always taken down by the best, memorialized as madmen by history and generations to come. There is no evolutionary benefit to being a psychopath, a serial killer, or a genocidal leader.

  But that doesn’t stop them from existing. And from Tsul’Kalu’s perspective, there are no consequences for his actions.

  We’ll see about that, I think, tensing as his pace slows.

  When he stops, I start plotting a strategic retreat. The only chance some of us have at surviving is if we scatter. How long will it take him to find everyone? How fast can he move?

  Too many damn questions!

  He crouches where we stopped before sending the horses to their fate, pressing his fingers into the earth. He lifts his head and sniffs the air. Shit, I think, but then I realize the air is thick with the scent of horse blood flowing on the downhill breeze. I hold still when he does a quick scan of the area. He’s suspicious. It’s clear the horses stopped, but he doesn’t know why.

  For a moment, I think he’s going to scour the surrounding area, but one of the horses above, still clinging to life, lets out a death throe whinny.

  With a grunt, Tsul’Kalu launches himself uphill, charging toward the summit, where he believes his prey await.

  I listen to him go, his breathing now frenzied and rough, his body crashing through brush and branches. Then, for too long, silence.

  Did the drones already leave? Have they not seen him? Or are they simply attempting to not incite his wrath? The latter wouldn’t be a bad idea, but then this is Tsul’Kalu we’re talking about. He probably came out of the womb with a grudge.

  Was that monster really born to a woman? I see an image of a mother carrying that monster baby to term. Did he tear his way free? Did she survive the ordeal?

  I shake my head free of dark thoughts and rise from hiding. If Tsul’Kalu doesn’t engage the drones, we might not have long. But then my fears are put at ease when the giant’s battle cry rises from above like a volcanic eruption. The cacophonous shriek of metal crashing into stone announces the beginning of his assault.

  When it’s followed by the whirring of mini-guns spinning up, I leap from my hiding spot and whisper, “Go! Everyone! Now!”

  We trample and hop through the forest like bunnies on the run, focusing only on speed, not giving a fluffy-tailed ass if we leave a trail or make a lot of noise. We fully intend to be out of Tsul’Kalu’s reach by the time the battle above us is done playing out. And even with excellent hearing, there is no way he can hear us over the buzzing mini-guns.

  Plus, he has bigger problems. He can heal fast, and he seems to revel in pain that would send any other living thing into shock, but mini-guns unleash up to 6000 rounds per minute. That’s a hundred rounds per second. And I count at least four different weapons unleashing metal fury. When people are struck by a mini-gun barrage they all but cease to exist. The giant is a lot bigger than the average person, but that just means he’s a larger target.

  He’s also quick, which is probably why the guns are firing in quick spurts rather than just unloading a stream of bullets into an unmoving body. It’s hard to believe anything could survive against that kind of modern might, but the weapons of modern war were designed to work against people—not demi-gods.

  Aim for his head, I think, and I resist the urge to shout it out. As much as I want Tsul’Kalu cut down, I wouldn’t mind if he also managed to diminish Langdon’s power in the process.

  A fleet of flying drones buzzes past overhead. I duck at the sound, watching two dozen of the things careen toward the battle. Langdon is throwing everything he has at the giant. He’s been watching Tsul’Kalu long enough to understand the danger the hunter presents.

  Explosions shake the forest.

  A deep, resonating roar follows, tracing the border between anguish and orgasm.

  And then, quiet.

  Levi mumbles, “Buddha’s shitty britches.”

  Did they do it? I wonder. Is Tsul’Kalu—

  A fresh roar, angry and defiant, rips through the air. It’s followed by the shattering of something metal and then more gunfire.

  Trees behind us explode as an errant stream of bullets tears through the forest. “Down!” I shout, tackling Cassie to the dirt. A line of wood-shredding rounds cuts through the air above us. Some of the small trees shatter and crack before toppling over.

  Below me, Cassie’s eyes go wide. “Look out!” She shoves me off and to the side, rolling with me. A tree trunk thumps to the damp ground where we’d been lying.

  “Thanks,” I say, suddenly aware that she’s on top of me, her legs wrapped around my waist. Nothing about it is sexual—until we both notice.

  She smiles down at me. “Right back at you.” Then she’s on her feet and yanking me up.

  I spot Owen smiling at me, and I shake my head. He hasn’t even hit puberty yet.

  I flinch at the sound of a second fusillade of bullets, but this time, they’re not randomly spraying the forest. They’re unleashing hell, but how long can they keep it up? The drones fir
ed a lot of rounds in the first assault. They’re going to run out of ammo eventually.

  And when they do, will the giant’s focus remain on Synergy, or will he come back for us?

  Knowing the question is without answer, I focus on putting us out of his reach. “Anyone see it?”

  Shaking heads are the only reply.

  “Spread out! Keep looking!”

  After a minute of searching, I’m afraid we’ve missed it, or we were wrong about our location, but then I see it—the hatch through which we rescued Inola and confronted Tsul’Kalu and the saber-toothed cat. The snow is missing, but the hatch is easy to identify, because it’s covered in the elder Kuzneski’s remains.

  It’s also closed.

  Langdon must have sent someone to shut it behind us.

  “Here,” I say, rushing toward the hatch. I drop to my knees beside it, looking for a latch or a locking mechanism. But it’s just a smooth, metal dome. I dig my fingers into the seam and pull. Two of my nails bend and break from the effort, which ends in my hands snapping up. “We’re not getting through here without a brick of C4.”

  Flores raps on the hatch with his knuckles. “Probably more than that.”

  “What now?” my father asks.

  “Langdon’s distracted,” Cassie says. “He’s throwing everything at the giant. Maybe we can breach the perimeter.”

  “You’re forgetting about the spikey death fence,” Levi says.

  “And there’s no way he’s left himself completely undefended,” Flores adds.

  “Do not forget Tsul’Kalu,” Inola says. “If he yet lives, and we expose ourselves to him…”

  Despite all this, Cassie is still right. We don’t have much of a choice.

  “Umm,” Owen says, but I barely hear him as I look for a fallen tree small enough for us to carry uphill, throw against the fence, and use as crude siege tower. I flinch when he shouts, “Hey!”

  All eyes turn down to my younger self, who is standing in a lumpy drying mass of what used to be a person. My heart breaks for him. This is too much. But he doesn’t seem to notice where he is and what he’s standing in. His attention is squarely on the hatch. “Listen!”