Not So Simple ~Part 6
Not So Simple
Part 6: Look ma! Oh wait. . .
I stuffed the rest of the MREs into my pack and finished filling my canteens. The ammo I pulled off the trunk lid and slid it into the pouch I kept my clips. I got dressed, my clothes still stiff from air-drying, and buckled on my armour. The shotgun went back in its sling, the knife and Colt back onto my belt. I looked back around the room, making sure I had everything. By the door, I noticed the rest of the glo-sticks. Those were added to my pack as well. Satisfied, I pushed my pack up through the hole, then my rifle, and scrambled up. A repeat performance to the next floor and I was ready. I flexed my wings, and thought back to the suburbs. They ached with remembered pain as I started running across the empty floor towards the window, pack and rifle held in front of me. I leapt out the window, kicking off with all my strength. Wings snapped open and caught the air.
While I couldn't fly, I could do a sort of fall-glide. My wings worked well enough to slow my falls and gave me some ability to control my direction that instead of falling eighty feet to smash into the ground, I glided. Somewhat. Because of my pack, it was more fall then glide, but at least it gave me distance. And a soft enough landing I didn't have to worry about dying a horrible bloody death. My boots kissed the ground, already running to absorb the remnant momentum. There was still about an inch of water on the ground, but in a few hours it would be gone, the sewers and storm drains still flooded. I shouldered my pack, cradled my rifle, and set off down the road, still on some mad journey inspired by a dream.
Was that even really it, though? Maybe the dream had just pushed me to do what I'd always been planning. Give me an excuse to go wandering again. I never was comfortable at the compound. Guess "safe" wasn't something I wanted. I don't know. Maybe I just craved the solitude of the road more than a room surrounded by others like me. That seemed more likely. I never had stayed with any of the groups I'd helped. A few shots, and then I'm gone into the night. And every time I found some way to justify it. Was I just making excuses for myself? Was I just trying to find a way to justify running away?
Hell, had I even been running away? Maybe I was alive today only because I never committed to the battles. Maybe if I'd decided to keep fighting back in the suburbs, or along the mountains, or pushing into Denver, or any of the other battles I'd walked away from I wouldn't be alive right now. Though would that really have been a bad thing? How much would change if I'd died at any point? I thought back to the kid. Maybe if I hadn't met him, I wouldn't be walking through the flooded street right now. Was all this supposed to happen? Was I just playing a role in a script I had no choice in?
"Well, if I am, to whoever is writing this, I would just like to say fuck you. Isn't it about time for my happy ending? I've bled enough for you," I said aloud, then laughed.
I lost track of how many times I'd done that. Always while alone, I'd cursed at whatever higher power had decided to interfere with my life. Some days it was a god, some days some evil puppeteer or writer, and sometimes it was just the universe in general. Might as well cover my bases. Maybe it might hear me and listen to me and stop screwing with me. I doubted it. Six years, and it still hadn't listened to me. Bastard.
I froze in my tracks and listened. I could have sworn I heard . . . There. Yea. A shout. I closed my eyes and turned my head, hardly breathing. The trickle of water in the gutters. Wind whistling through the husks of buildings. Cries of pain. Another shout. Several shots. I moved my ears, working to overcome the echo.
I sprinted forward, water splashing around my legs. Somewhere in front of me, getting clearer with each step, was the source of the noise. Three blocks I passed, the echoes diminishing. Get off the street. The instinct was clear and sharp. Off the street, through that door. I stormed up the stairs two at a time, up several floors and then to a window. I leaned out carefully and looked through my rifle's scope. Four humans, a fifth on the ground. One was bending over him. Next to them, a black shape. I adjusted my scope and looked again. Not a shape. A thing. A creature. The creatures that were the reason I was out here. It was dead, which would explain the shots. I strained my ears to hear, but the distance was too great for their words. The screams grew fainter, and the human stood up from their friend. A slight movement. Shake of the head? I guess. Hard to tell at range.
They then turned their attention to the creature. And then started dragging it. They left their comrade in the street and were taking the creature with them. What the fuck? I jumped from the window, flaring my wings. My pack made it harder, causing me to fall faster then I wanted. The ground came up to meet me and I crashed down hard. My legs were numbed from the impact, but I started running anyway. Whatever these humans were doing, I wasn't about to lose them. They seemed too well dressed to just be another scavenger group. Didn't care about what the dead had. I reached the body after a few minutes of hard running and knelt to examine it. He looked to be about 30, give or take, and was wearing the combat uniform I'd come to know during the war. It was a complete suit, except for the lacerations. His stomach was all but ripped out, blood flowing away with the draining water.
There was a keening wail in the air. I stood up and looked around, my blood turning to ice again. It was answered by several more, the wails echoing through the husk city like the howls of the dead. I swear, if my blood wasn't already frozen solid, it would be soon. But I knew why I was out here, and I wasn't going to let the wails of a few creatures that could kill me in a heartbeat stop me. Ok, well, when you put it that way, this really did sound like a suicide mission.
I moved forward, chasing the source of the sound. Every fiber of my being demanded that I turn and run. This time, I wasn't going to. The only way to get rid of the nightmares was to kill these things. That much I knew. Bastards. Having to go and get inside my head. Well, I'll return the favour. I came up to a corner and peered around. Straight ahead was a large park. The trees had long since been ripped out. But what was interesting was the grass was flattened. Around the edges it still swayed, bent from the water, but still tall. In the middle, though, it was trampled and broken. In neat paths too. Not something that even soldiers could accomplish.
However, the soldiers were there. And the creatures. The latter was milling around a bit, the soldiers a distance back with their guns trained on them. I looked around, and then sprinted to a door, straining my ears to hear. Still nothing. I went up a floor that over to a window.
"We're pretty sure this is all of them. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. No, we lost five. One went berserk; the other four were killed by something else. We think it might have been another experiment group since we found a group of humans dead just down the road. No, sir, the rain interfered. Yes, sir. We're waiting for the truck. Yes, sir."
Well, that was damn odd. He was the only one talking. Which meant that somehow they had short-range communication. While it was likely there were shielded electronics, or shielded bunkers, after 5 years power tended to fade. So how the hell did they still have power?
A deep, throaty roar reached my ears then. It grew steadily louder until the source was in sight. I didn't want to risk leaning out too far in case the humans were more observant then it appeared. It was a truck. A converted troop carrier, the back end covered in a cage. Ok, now this was just getting really fucking weird. Yea, the creatures were made by the humans, but used by them now too? Or maybe that's what they were all along. They were other attempts like we were. They were what we were supposed to be. Or so I assumed anyway.
It took twenty minutes to get the creatures loaded up. More than a few were gunned down when they freaked and killed whatever was near them. Kept on a nice tight leash. Guess we taught them something after all. Their wail kept making me want to run, or shoot, or something. Something other than just sitting here.
"We're going to have to get a recovery team together. The building they holed up in is . . . weird. They did something to it. It's the old Bank of America building on 90th and Fairfax. I have to finish my patrol," one of the humans said to another grabbing onto the truck.
The truck revved and drove off, leaving just two humans. They talked for a minute, and then turned. Both fell dead a heartbeat later. I waited, expecting the truck to return, but it didn't. Finally, I dropped to the sidewalk and crossed to them. One of them was carrying a satchel of demo charges. That didn't make a lot of sense. Why would a patrol need demo charges? What would they possibly have to blow up? I checked how many charges there were and, satisfied, slung the satchel over my shoulder and headed off. 90th and Fairfax. It wasn't all that far away. I sighted down the road and found Fairfax soon enough.
An hour later, with the sun finally beginning to pierce the cloud cover and the water mostly drained away, I stood outside the building. They did something here, and the humans wanted it. With any luck, I'd deny them that. I headed inside and checked the first floor. Nothing. The same as you'd expect to find in any building's first floor at this point. I set the charges as best as I could, hoping the weakened support columns would be destroyed with so few charges. I was about to head out, but paused. What DID the humans want here? What was so damned important? My curiosity got the better of me and I moved towards the stairs. The rifle was replaced by the shotgun. I figured I'd be better off with more firepower.
The next three floors were clear, but I started smelling something odd. The fifth floor was clear, but the smell was strong as hell. Next floor, I started seeing black pulpy masses stuck in corners and on the walls. Seventh floor the door was smashed in and the black stuff was hanging from the vents like stalagmites. That couldn't be good. It was on the tenth floor that I got really worried. The entire floor was overrun with the stuff. I stepped carefully; the gunk was hard but squishy, and looked around. The disturbing part wasn't that they did this in the course of a few days. Ok, I lied, it was. This was pretty fucking creepy. The really disturbing part was the white orbs embedded in the stuff. Some large, some small. And more than I was comfortable with were pretty damn big. The smell was overpowering, almost bad enough to make me gag. Curiosity satisfied, time to get the hell out of here.
I turned to leave, and then froze in my tracks. Straight across from me, concealed within the dark except for the glowing eyes, was one of the creatures. It was smaller than the ones that had attacked me before, if the height of the eyes meant anything. This just got bad. Very very bad. I started slowly backing up. There had to be a window around here somewhere. The creature wailed, the sound amplified by the close space, deafening me. I screamed and fired the shotgun, the distance making the burst less effective. Really, it only seemed to piss it off. I charged at me claws out wide. I fired again at the last moment, sending the creature back in a fountain of ichor. I pumped the gun and slid two more shells into the tube. There was a wet popping sound, several actually. I figured I knew what that meant, and didn't want to be here in 30 seconds.
Another of the creatures charged me from around the corner. That one too went flying back as I slowly backed up. Probably should have been paying attention to where I was going, though. My foot caught on something in the floor and I fell back. The sudden change made the next creature miss, but one of the claws pierced my leg. I screamed in pain, one hand searching for the shotgun, the other pulling out the Colt. The hollow point rounds smacked into the creature, but didn't appear to do anything besides piss it off. It opened its weird triangular mouth and wailed. I kicked it, silencing it. Damn things really must love the sound of their own voice. I kicked it again and scrambled back, my leg screaming in pain every time I moved it.
The creature wailed and moved forward this time. A grey-green ichor leaked from the bullet holes, but didn't seem to faze it. How the hell could something so thin take almost an entire clip of .45 hollow points and keep walking? I emptied the last few rounds in the clip into its head. Not like there was a small target there. The head snapped back from the force, then centered on me again. It took a step forward. I reached around for something, anything to use. Another step forward.
I found my shotgun.
I quickly pumped it and brought it around to aim. It flew over me in a shower of ichor and meat chunks. I hadn't fired.
"Come on, we gotta get the hell out of here!" Kippy shouted, pulling me to my feet.
"The fuck are you doing here?" I growled, my leg burning.
"Hello to you two. Myla, we clear?" he said.
"Not back that way. There are more of them down there. I don't know where they came from. We need another exit!"
I couldn't carry all three of us down. My wings had problems with my weight half the time. There was no way all three would get out that way. Fighting out was not an option, there were too many from how Myla made it sound. She ran over to us, opening up with an assault rifle and tearing into another creature to come around the corner. The building was full of their wails. Damn my curiosity.
It was beginning to hurt to think. My leg ached horribly, my ears rang from gunshots and screams, and I'm pretty sure I was losing a lot of blood. Looks like this is how I died.
"You two, go. Zy, use your wings; you can at least slow the decent. Give me the detonator; I'll blow it when I'm clear."
I handed her the switch. It was then that I realized it was a remote detonator. Surly it wouldn't work because of the EMP? I didn't know. Trucks and radios . . . that was stuff for another life time. And yet that's what I'd seen today. And proof that the humans were still creating things. That needed power. Technology. Stuff that should have been fried.
Kippy shoved something into my holster. I hadn't even realized I'd lost the Colt. That would have been bad. I don't think that kid would have forgiven me if I'd lost his gun. I shook my head and laughed at that. All of a sudden, Myla was kissing me. That stunned me. She broke it and opened her eyes, looking into mine.
"Go, now dammit! I can't hold them all forever!" Myla shouted, giving us a push.
Kippy picked me up and threw me over his back. I screamed in pain again, but slowly adjusted myself so my wings could open. He started running, trying to pick a route through to the windows. His shotgun roared and another creature flew out of his way. I watched and saw it get back up slowly. Must have been too far away. He kicked open a door and there was a sudden brilliance. My eyes squinted shut automatically at the light. Sunlight. He sprinted across the room as one of the creatures tore through the door on our heels. He kicked off from the ledge, the creature lunged at us and I opened my wings.
Please, let something go right for once, I pleaded in my mind to whatever was controlling what happened. Just this once.