One Crazy Machine (Apocalypse Paused Book 9)

by Michael Todd

  They didn’t plan for their adversary to follow Ava, though. The arachnid was supposed to stick to the open desert. Apparently, she wasn’t particularly concerned about being near the Flying Bastard.

  Ava ran for her life, but the telltale trail in the sand gained on her.

  Gunfire erupted—Peppy, no doubt, shooting at the scorpion queen’s retreating tail, but it only served to make the creature move more quickly.

  She had no idea what to do. While she didn’t want to die running like a coward, she also didn’t want to stay and fight like an idiot.

  “Pull the pin, then throw?” Manny shouted from atop the Flying Bastard.

  “Yes. How many times do I have to tell you?” Gunnar yelled back. He sprinted toward Ava, having come around the Flying Bastard from the other direction.

  She caught the glint of burnished metal as the pilot threw a grenade at the approaching enemy.

  It landed on the hill of sand she pushed up and immediately, she plunged to safety.

  “No way. She knows what a grenade is?” Gunnar stopped his race toward Ava and flung himself down. She did the same as the massive tail burst from the desert and launched the grenade skyward. It exploded high above them and left its target unscathed.

  The sand undulated wildly as the monster pushed herself to the surface. Ava scrambled backward, too terrified to stand.

  The creature waded toward her and the vicious claws snapped and clicked with frightening intent. She could see her face where Gunnar had shot her, and she didn’t like what she saw. The wounds were plugged with a mixture of its gooey blood and sand. They had known they wouldn’t be able to kill her outright, so their plan had been to pepper her with enough wounds that she died from blood loss—or at least slowed down enough to enable them to finish her off with a volley of explosives.

  Ava now understood that might have been a lethally optimistic plan.

  “She won’t die from blood loss!” she shouted and continued her backward scramble.

  “Well, we’ll have to do it the old-fashioned way, then.” Gunnar fired at the arachnid’s face as the monster propelled herself through the sand. A few of the shots made it past her claws, but not many. She was adept at blocking gunfire, apparently.

  Which made it all the sweeter when Peppy appeared behind her, remained close to the Flying Bastard, and fired from ten feet away.

  Normally, Peppy was one to control her rifle fire, but this time, she squeezed the trigger and didn’t let go. She emptied her entire magazine into one of the creature’s segments. The scorpion queen—unsurprisingly—didn’t much care for this sort of treatment and burrowed into the sand once again.

  Manny—his jump timed horribly—leapt from the roof and landed exactly where the scorpion queen had been. “I was gonna ride her.”

  Everyone ignored him.

  “Did that do the trick?” Gunnar shouted to Peppy.

  She shook her head. “No way. The bitch doesn’t have any veins or organs, as far as I can tell. All I saw in there was goo and what looked like empty goo capsules. That’s like the equivalent of being hit by a piece of shrapnel. I think I only pissed her off.”

  She was right that the gaping wound had not slowed the scorpion queen, for a moment later, her tail lurched from the sand and forced the group to fling themselves in different directions.

  They scrambled away from one another. The one part of the plan that seemed to have worked was to remain separated. That, at least, gave them the angles they needed to attack her from the sides instead of only the front or rear.

  “Have another grape,” Manny said and hurled a second grenade toward the undulating waves of sand. A claw punched from the sand and knocked the grenade back toward him.

  “Hey! That’s bullshit!” Manny complained but ran like hell. “Who doesn’t like grapes? Why, I once convinced a Tasmanian devil to watch over me at night with nothing more than some seedless red ones.”

  The grenade exploded close enough to the Flying Bastard to rattle its glass and loosen some of the sand from against the cockpit.

  “What’s plan B, Peppy?” Gunnar shouted.

  “Same plan as always. Shoot it until death,” she replied, but her voice lacked conviction.

  Ava didn’t know what the hell they could do. The bullets broke its shell if they struck the right spot, but that seemed like trying to kill a man with toothpicks. The damn thing knew what grenades were, so what other options were there?

  “I have an idea!” Manny shouted.

  “If it’s to ride the damn thing like you do everything else, it ain’t going to work. She’ll simply dive down and leave you on the surface, and that’s if she don’t pop you with her tail.” Gunnar fired at the sand their quarry displaced. It did nothing, however, not even change her direction.

  “Okay, fine. Now I have a different plan,” the pilot declared but sounded less sure of himself. He ran toward the Flying Bastard and climbed inside. “I’ll need a few minutes. Peppy and Gunnar, if you can entertain our guest, that would be much appreciated.”

  Ava shot a glance at him, then at the two soldiers. Against her better judgment, she followed Peppy and Gunnar out into the desert.

  They really were an amazing team. One would shoot, draw the ire of the scorpion queen, and goad her closer and closer with gunshots. Then, they’d stop and sprint laterally, forcing her to turn if she wanted to follow.

  The other would then fire at her side as this was the only place that seemed to actually hurt the damn bug. The arachnid would then change course for the new assailant. It was a brutal ballet, a dance of death with no conclusion.

  Ava helped when she could. She fired at the scorpion queen’s sides when they were exposed, but her accuracy simply wasn’t good enough to strike between the plates, so most of her shots simply dented the exoskeleton.

  She had no idea what Manny was doing in the chopper, but she had to assume he didn’t need her. He hadn’t asked for help and after all, he’d built the entire thing on his own. Surely he would know where whatever gun he decided he needed was stashed.

  Plus, she didn’t want to be in the helicopter while two of her friends died.

  The two soldiers continued their strike and strafe technique and fired careful shots into the monster’s sides. It honestly seemed that while they might not be able to do fatal damage, the queen had no idea what to do about these two pesky humans who managed to constantly outsmart her.

  Until she did.

  Ava thought she would remember the scene for the rest of her life. Given their current circumstances, though, that might not be all that long.

  Gunnar fired at the queen, the monster approached, and he retreated. Business as usual. Then Peppy fired at her, and scorpion queen turned to face her new attacker.

  This time, though, her movement was more lethargic. For a moment, Ava thought the creature had finally lost enough blood to slow her. It didn’t occur to her that it was a ploy until it became horribly clear that she had outsmarted them.

  As the enormous creature turned her back to Gunnar, her tail exploded from the sand beneath his feet. It launched him into a wild spin, and he flailed and cursed until he landed hard in a tumbling skid.

  With him out of the equation, she attacked Peppy with unrestrained fury.

  Ava galvanized into action and fired repeatedly at the sand-shrouded form, but the monster ignored her and extended a claw to tumble the soldier from her feet. The woman sprawled awkwardly and raised her weapon as the queen rose from the sand with her pincers snapping malevolently. Ava raced and aimed her fire between the segments. She was so close, she couldn’t miss.

  Unfortunately, she was also close enough that their enemy would definitely notice her.

  The creature turned her rage on this new threat.

  While Ava was brave—far braver than she’d been before she first stepped into the Zoo and faced the horrible abominations within—she wasn’t stupid. She bolted and sprinted away as the enraged beast turned to pursue her.
>
  She ran instinctively toward the Flying Bastard but, to her horror, Manny was firing up the damn helicopter.

  Apparently, the grenade had knocked sufficient sand lose for the pilot to take to the air while two of his friends were stunned and vulnerable after their recent encounters with the scorpion queen.

  Ava had no clue what the hell he was thinking. She wondered crazily if he intended to crash the aircraft into their adversary. Surely he couldn’t fire any weapons while piloting.

  Whatever his plan was, it looked like it would simply kill them all.

  Chapter Eleven

  Manny couldn’t be leaving. He wouldn’t abandon his friends. Yet the helicopter blades spun faster and faster as if to challenge what her heart told her to believe. Ava could see him through the glass of the cockpit as he flipped switches, adjusted various controls, and generally ignored his friends.

  She raised her carbine and aimed at the arachnid as it continued its murderous approach. It seemed her only choice was to fire a ceaseless barrage and hope that it at least slowed the queen.

  “Ava, no!” Manny shouted through the glass, loudly enough for her to hear him.

  Her attention focused on her adversary, she ignored him.

  The creature flicked her tail, but it was too far away to strike. The barbed tip stabbed into the sand barely twenty feet from her. Ava jumped at the sheer force of the strike but no longer ran. Instead, she aimed her carbine at the big, circular target in front of her and homed in on the tiny barb in the middle of the tail—a bullseye if she’d ever seen one—and emptied her magazine into the lethal appendage.

  Despite the fact that the entire monster was armored, the barbed tail was still fairly susceptible to thirty bullets delivered by carbine from less than twenty feet away. When the barrage finally ended, the target resembled a watermelon that had been attacked with a hammer.

  The arachnid burrowed instantly beneath the sand and the rows and rows of legs along her long body jetted flurries of sand into the hot desert air.

  Ava wasted no time and immediately reloaded.

  “Ava, get the hell over here. Bring your friend.”

  Her friend? How the hell was she supposed to rescue both Peppy and Gunnar? She’d worked out, of course, but— Realization crashed into her like a freight train.

  Manny wasn’t trying to take off. Most of the helicopter was still buried and he hadn’t activated one of the rotors.

  She didn’t know if her plan was the same as his and also wasn’t sure that he’d approve of it at all. Honestly, it seemed like a damn stupid thing to do—one of the dumbest decisions of her whole damn life. So of course, she set it into motion.

  With her weapon reloaded, she raced toward the Flying Bastard.

  “You have company!” Manny bellowed from the cockpit. He sounded terrified and excited like a kid about to ride his first roller coaster.

  Oh, shit. Did he have something different in mind? She shoved her doubt aside. It didn’t matter and it wasn’t like there was time to hold a conference. Either her plan would work, or they’d all die out there in the Sahara Desert.

  Ava turned and now backed toward the Flying Bastard. She resumed her fire as the scorpion queen barreled closer and closer. The arachnid seemed less able to block her attack, however. Apparently, the damage to her tail had severely impaired her concentration. Poor, pathetic, murderous monster!

  Maybe, just maybe, she could finish it off. If she could pull that off, she really would save everyone. It might take only one shot delivered near its brain cluster. Then again, if she could perhaps destroy the eyes, she would retreat, or—

  Her gun jammed.

  It simply stopped firing and in an instant, transformed from a weapon and her salvation—her only defense against a monster—into an inert piece of metal.

  The scorpion queen noticed that her attacker transformed from a bullet-slinging, screaming force to be reckoned with to a panicked, retreating morsel. She ceased all attempts to block and instead, surged forward, pushing through the sand like a great white shark.

  Ah, well, Ava reasoned through her very real fear. It was probably best to stick to her original idea.

  She spun from the approaching monster toward the Flying Bastard. Two of its propellers now spun faster and faster. She would be closer if she hadn’t stopped to try to obliterate the creature—and simply proved the necessity of gun maintenance to Peppy. Instead, she now sprinted desperately away from the concerted attack of a Zoo creature.

  Her pursuer was frighteningly close. She could feel the gritty particles spray against her back leg as the queen spun arcs of sand in all directions as she moved.

  Seconds before the burrowed monster closed, Ava changed directions and bolted toward the back of the helicopter.

  “Now, Manny. Pivot the damn propeller now!”

  She flung herself forward onto the sand as the pilot activated the controls. One of the osprey arms of the helicopter pivoted to create a spinning wall of death between her and the scorpion queen. Desperately, she hoped this would work. It all depended on the exoskeleton. Either her plan would be successful, or she was about to find herself in the scorpion’s belly.

  The arachnid erupted from the sand and directly into the spinning propeller.

  White slime, shards of exoskeleton, and chunks of bizarre organs spattered Ava.

  “It’s not so bad,” she told herself as she recoiled instinctively.

  The scorpion queen toppled forward and more of her body tumbled into the rotors. Another spray of guts arced over Ava, a veritable river of organs and acrid goo. She didn’t have a dry spot left on her body and her nose had become a tool of torture.

  “Whoo-hoo!” Manny shrieked as he scrambled out of the Flying Bastard. “Holy hell, that was the dumbest damn plan in the history of plans. I don’t even mind that you cost us our exit ticket. Seriously, Ava, I am impressed.”

  He rushed forward with arms spread, ready to hug her. At the last minute, he wrinkled his nose and recoiled. “Oh, damn.” He shook his head like a dog that had been stung by a wasp. “That’s…uh… That stinks worse than the kangaroo.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Ava plopped down in the sand and tried to wipe some of the scorpion gunk off her. It was like jelly—white, stinky, totally revolting jelly that had fermented in a swamp for six years, then mixed with rotten eggs. She squeezed it off her sleeves, but she was soaked.

  “All right, Ava!” Gunnar jogged up but slowed when he came within range of the fumes. “Oh, wow. Holy hell. Does anyone mind if I smoke?”

  “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but please do.” Peppy cringed behind her aviators. “This smells like it ate month-old garbage and nothing else. For once, your cancer sticks will be like perfume instead of invitations to a funeral.”

  “It may smell worse than a grease trap in the sun, but I’m still damn impressed that you assisted in its death,” Manny said.

  “Assisted?” Ava said as she continued her attempt to wipe more of the slime off.

  “Yeah, well…technically, the newest member of our team struck the finishing blow. Poor little bastard. The rotor is smashed to hell after all that.”

  Ava ground her teeth and considered punching him. Instead, she settled for hurling goo at him.

  He jumped back and grinned. “Oh, I see how it is. A slimeball fight.”

  “Please, no,” Peppy said. “Just…please, no.”

  Manny threw a slimeball at the woman. It landed near her boot and spattered it with slime.

  She raised her gun at him and glared.

  “Jeez, I was only kidding. You’d think a girl never had the fresh guts of a pregnant scorpion queen spatter her boots before.”

  “Why do you think it came back for us?” Gunnar asked. He exhaled a plume of smoke and stepped into it like the smell could protect him from the stench.

  “Obviously, it wanted to tango with a legend. I can’t say that I’m surprised. I once had an anaconda follow me through the jun
gles of Borneo because I’d eaten a deer it had been eyeing. The damn thing didn’t understand that it had lost the fight. Also, it might have been pissed because I didn’t leave any leftovers except the bones. It turned out okay, though, and we settled things over chocolate ice-cream.”

  “Gunnar has a good point,” Ava said and took a step toward the dead scorpion queen. “We assumed it was heading for a source of food, right? If that was the case, it should have been happy to ditch us in the storm and keep going away from the Zoo. Why would it come back?”

  She took another step towards the scorpion queen, dropped on a knee, and poked around inside the mangled body. The face and the first seven or eight feet of her body were sliced and shredded, but the remainder of her long, segmented body was still intact.

  “What are you doing?” Peppy said and gagged. “Because it looks like you’re trying to smell even worse, which I didn’t think was possible.”

  “Maybe she really has hung out with Manny too long. You don’t need to roll in the roadkill, Ava. You stink enough as is.”

  Ava worked down the massive corpse until she reached the part of the segmented body that swelled outward. She drew a knife from her boot, stuck it in one of the cracks between the segments, and worked the blade to force the crack wider and wider. After a few minutes of real effort, the two segments popped apart with a satisfying squelch. Or satisfying to her, anyway. Everyone else groaned dramatically and Peppy gagged once more.

  “What?” she asked and grinned. She couldn’t even smell it anymore, the benefit of being totally covered with the slime. “Haven’t you ever eaten crab?”

  “Great, thanks for that.” Gunnar shook his head. “I used to love a good snow crab, but never again.”

  “You’re worse than Manny,” Peppy said.

  “I resent that,” the pilot protested. “I’ve never made dinner plans while standing over the guts of a freaky bug. Well, there was that one time we squashed a bunch of tarantulas and made plans to cook them, but that was totally different. They didn’t smell like a sewer had vomited its contents on account of the stink being too bad.”