Kitabı oku: «The Puzzler’s War», sayfa 6

10
Peach

Wake up, Lady Peach. We’re making a tinkle stop.”

I opened my eyes and had to blink several times before I could focus. I’d dozed off simply to gather some strength, but the conditions inside the truck’s cabin were far from ideal. I was jammed in the backseat among heaps of junk, dried meat, a keg of beer, and several primitive guns that looked as if they were taken from the museum of historical armaments.

To make matters worse, suspended above my head by chains and ropes was an old, heavy machine gun. It swayed dangerously with the rocking of the truck. If that thing fell on my head it would be the short end of this vessel. The old truck was jerking sideways as much as it was moving forward on the broken road, and it made me nauseous and weak. Having to duck every so often so as not to get hit by the machine gun wasn’t helping things.

“Sure,” I said weakly, the taste of dust in my mouth. I’d already lost the contents of my stomach three times in the last five days and was down to my last five nourishment pills.

Brak was the driver. I didn’t know why he kept a cowl over his head during the entire journey, even in the oppressing heat of the truck’s cabin, but other than that he was still the chatty, glass-half-full kind of guy I’d met in the looter’s camp. In fact, I believed the reason Brak agreed to take me along was less about the contents of my sack and more about companionship.

Trevil kept to his silent brooding and spoke to me only when it was necessary. He also kept his revolver on his person at all times, remained vigilant throughout most of the journey, and took the entire night-watch duty, refusing even when I offered to relieve him for a few hours. He’d never expressed his consent to taking me along, and my educated guess was that he was not happy about it but had given in to Brak’s whim.

Brak had introduced Trevil as his cousin, but I had my doubts they were blood related. It wasn’t just that their physiques and demeanours were extremely different; there was something in the way they related to each other that spoke of a different sort of familiarity. There were other signs; my womanly instincts told me neither of them ever looked at me like the men at the bar had. Yet they refrained from touching each other, or expressing their intimacy in any obvious way. I spent time during the journey wondering why they kept their relationship a secret. The world I came from had long accepted same-sex relationships, and Tarakan society was even coming to terms with human-Angel relationships. Sadly, it seemed like the world I’d woken up to might have fallen back to its old inhibitions.

Brak parked the truck and turned to me, sweat glistening under his cowl. “This spot is really beautiful, Lady Peach. We should go to the ridge and look down at the valley.”

The look Trevil shot his companion was so apparent I almost laughed.

“Oh, come on, Trev.” Brak gestured at me. “Look at her. Lady Peach needs a bit of fresh air, and you need some peace and quiet from my chattering.”

Trevil shrugged but leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes as we climbed down. It was a short trek through rich, tall grass, and we had to climb down a bit till we got to the ledge, but Brak was not exaggerating. It was an odd sight that filled me with mixed emotions. The vast lowland below was filled with destroyed buildings, roads, and bridges, but it was also rich with vegetation. I even spotted several small fields with clear signs of cultivation.

“This is where we’re going”—Brak pointed in the distance—“Lakewood Hope. It’s a new settlement built over ruins. They named it Lakewood because it’s between a lake—”

“—and a wood,” I said, finishing his sentence.

“Yeah, Lady Peach, that’s right. My grandad came here after the breaking of the world. He was one of the founders of Lakewood Hope and my father lives there, and my older brother. My sister got married seven seasons ago and moved away, but she moved back when her man went foraging too deep and too long in the contaminated cities and died of sickness.”

“So, it’s just you and your cousin on the road, then?”

The look of momentary vagueness in Brak’s eyes was all the proof I needed.

“Yeah … just me and Trev on the road, looking out for each other.” He changed topics. “You never told me where you’re from, Lady Peach.”

A part of me was listening to Brak while another was trying to figure where I was, but I was never strong in topography. “I am from very far away,” I answered.

“I gathered that—your accent is not from these parts—but how far?”

I levelled a stare at him. “Where I come from people do not need to hide who they love.”

Brak quickly turned his head to watch the land below. “That’s far away indeed then,” he said quietly. “So, what brings you here?”

There was no reason to lie. “I don’t know yet, but I need to get to the City of Towers.”

“That’s quite a ramble, Lady Peach. Your best course would be the town of Newport and to buy a ride with a SuperTruck driver to Regeneration, but I hear the Tarakan highway is blocked nowadays.”

There was so much information crammed into Brak’s last sentence I had to figure out which question to ask first. “The Tarakan highway network? It still functions?”

“Oh yeah, Lady Peach, there’s a lot of it that’s still intact, but you need a SuperTruck to ride it proper, not our kind. You know of SuperTrucks?”

I nodded. The toll-operated highways and the selling of what were fondly called T trucks were one of the most lucrative side businesses of Tarakan. SuperTruck was definitely a good name for those machines, and I was happy to find out some had survived. It meant my trip to the City of Towers could theoretically become much shorter.

“But you say the road is blocked?”

“That’s what I hear, Lady Peach. Some warlord took a part of it for himself, made a roadblock, and is taxing the SuperTruck drivers. They say this warlord has some kind of heavy cannons on carts that can blow you away from a mile’s distance, and that a few truckers who tried to break through died along with their trucks. So now the only way to get from Newport would be the back roads on trucks like ours.” Brak pointed in the direction we came from for emphasis. “And that could take you several weeks, maybe a whole season. And I hear Regeneration is under siege, too, although it could be just a rumour.”

I did not recognize the places Brak mentioned, but it seemed that violence never ceased for a moment, even after Armageddon.

We both heard the very long honk of the truck’s horn. “Oh, Trev is getting impatient with us.” Brak smiled, but when two more short honks followed his smile faded and he began running back, pulling out a gun from his belt. “It’s our signal for trouble,” he shouted as I ran after him. “Hold on Trev, I’m coming.”

I hadn’t touched any of the guns in the truck, assuming such an action would not be appreciated, but I still had my sword. I pulled it out and went after Brak. My vessel’s shape and size meant I could easily blend into a market crowd in a reconnaissance mission, but it had short legs and was not built for speed, so I was trailing behind when I cleared the small hill. It turned out Trevil was travelling towards us. The truck cut through the tall grass, swaying dramatically, and I could count three figures holding on to the top of the truck, slowly progressing to the cabin. They were dressed in a mixture of rags and animal skin. A little behind them was a cloud of dust made by more men on horses galloping towards us. There was no time to zoom in or count them as we ran towards the truck.

There was a shot and a body dropped from the passenger side. I could see that Trevil was still in the driver’s seat but I guess Brak was too battle nervous to have a clear grasp of the situation because he screamed, “Trev, no,” stood his ground, aimed and shot wildly at the men on top of the truck. All three men ducked, but one of them shot back just as Trevil managed to steady the vehicle. I heard Brak shout and saw him fall into the tall grass just as the truck pulled over. One of the men on top skidded forward and fell in front of the cabin; another used the momentum to jump down, roll in the soft grass, and come up pointing the gun at the prone Brak. He did not pay attention to me, a middle-aged woman barely taller than the grass, until the moment I cut his arm off with the power sword.

Trevil climbed out of the driver seat. There was blood on his shirt. He shot the man who fell in front of the truck and began running towards us, unaware that the third man on top of the truck had gotten up on his feet and was aiming his gun at Trevil’s back. ESM kicked in. I grabbed the severed arm before it hit the ground, turned it and pressed the finger on the trigger, shooting above Trevil’s head. It was an old gun, and I think I missed, or maybe grazed the man, but it made him lose his balance and fall from the top of the truck. I ran and stabbed him with the sword as Trevil bent down and picked up the groaning Brak, put his arm around him and began carrying him back to the truck. The men on horseback were a moment from catching up with us, and there was no way we could push Brak into the cabin and drive away on time. I sheathed the sword, bent down and picked up the other gun. “Start moving,” I shouted at Trevil. “I’ll stall them.”

I ran as fast as I could while crouching low in the tall grass, and I heard the thunder of hooves approaching. My personal, inner briefing was short and bitter. I had a pair of unchecked, old guns with only the element of surprise on my side and short-spanned ESM facing an untold number of armed riders. Those were not odds I wanted to work with. Three horses passed me, and their riders noticed me too late to react. The fourth one almost trampled me and I had to roll sideways. I emerged from the tall grass shooting with both hands. All around me men and horses screamed and fell. My left-hand gun emptied after five shots, and I figured I had one or two more shots in my right. I ran to where a rider fell as bullets began whizzing around me, and an arrow struck the ground in front of me. A rider was lying on the ground, still breathing, but nursing a gunshot wound, his pump-action shotgun at arm’s length. When he saw me he tried to reach it. I shot him twice, dropped the handguns, and went to retrieve the shotgun. I was in the midst of a fog of war, the sort that gets you killed quickly. Somewhere behind me I heard the truck’s engine roar. I rolled again, picking up the shotgun with both hands, turned, shot a charging woman off her horse, ducked, and ran fast along the tall grass as bullets chased me. Without the ESM I would have been dead already, but my body was beginning to weaken. The truck was already moving away as I began racing after it. I knew that this action would be the last physical exertion I could muster before I collapsed from exhaustion. Already my sight was beginning to get blurry.

I saw a lone horse and went for it. He might have been docile, in shock, or too slow to react to my ESM speed, but I managed to reach him and jump-mount. I had never been a horse person, but I had put in my fair share of saddle miles during various assignments which had brought me to the farthest corners of the world. The saddle was makeshift, leather and animal skin, but was surprisingly soft—not that I had time to enjoy the sensation.

My attack had momentarily disoriented the riders, but they were circling for another charge at the truck. I estimated there were more than a dozen left. I ducked my head low and urged the horse forward. Hitting a moving target from horseback was a very difficult task, but it didn’t stop my pursuers from trying. Bullets and arrows flew past me with enough density to pose a threat. I kept my head down and urged the beast forward with my heels. The truck was built for endurance but not for speed, even on a paved road. Reaching it on the back of a galloping horse took only a moment. I manoeuvred to the right side of the truck, then grasped the first thing I could reach, a rusty ladder. My horse suddenly veered away and I was left dangling, holding onto the ladder with one hand, my feet almost touching the ground. The shotgun dropped to the ground and a second later I saw the truck roll over it. Normally climbing to relative safety would have been easy enough, but after ESM, my vessel was reaching the end of its physical ability. Through desperation alone I managed to get a foothold on the ladder, but all I could do was cling to it and watch as the first rider reached the truck. He was a burly man with a wild beard, dressed in a bearskin and high fur boots. In his hand he held a long spear with a wicked-looking metal spike on the end of it. I didn’t need to use my imagination to guess what he would be trying to do first. He aimed the spear at me as he got closer. Trying to climb up would just expose my back to him, and besides, my arms and legs felt like they were made of stone. I managed to draw the sword with my left hand as the rider closed in on me, but as I pressed the power button, nothing happened. It was either broken or depleted of energy cells. The rider lunged with his spear and I barely managed to deflect it. Two other riders were close behind him. One had long, braided hair and was holding a gun in her free hand. The rider with the spear tried again. This time the tip of the spear missed me but the sharp metal brushed against my skin and without registering the pain yet, I felt the skin on my thigh open. I willed my legs to climb up the ladder but his companions got within shooting distance and were just taking their time to get closer so they wouldn’t miss. I was going to be shot, and then the vessel’s strength would not be able to hold on to the ladder and I would fall down to the ground. If I was lucky I would get run over by the truck and be done for the fast way.

The burly rider aimed his spear again just as his chest exploded and he flew backwards from the saddle. I turned my head to see Brak, white as death, leaning from the roof hatch, aiming the truck’s heavy gun. He shot three more times, single cannon-like bullets that flew above my head and missed, but they were enough of a threat to make the riders veer away and hide behind the bulk of the moving truck.

Trevil manoeuvred the truck to a road close enough to a mountain ridge to make it hard for riders to pass us. When I looked up the machine gun was still there but Brak was gone from the hatch, and it was up to me to decide whether to climb up and try to get inside the cabin through the open hatch or inch my way back to the passenger’s door, open it slightly, and get in. I chose the scenic route, finding out on the way that we were driving down the mountain to the valley below, moving between a mountainside and a deadly drop. The riders were still behind the truck, and they were nothing if not persistent. I turned to lower myself into the cabin. My feet were just touching the top of the seat when two raiders, a man and a woman, managed to climb on top of the truck. With only my toes touching, I balanced myself on the seat and grasped the machine gun. It was very heavy, held down by chains, and clumsy to wield. The recoil from the first shot almost threw me off balance, but it blew the leg off one of the climbers. The other one could have rushed me then, but she panicked and retreated to the back of the truck, climbing down. There was a loud banging noise as they tried to open the truck’s haul doors while riding behind us.

My legs were trembling. I looked down at the cabin. Trevil was still behind the wheel, his shirt crimson with blood, but Brak was worse. He was lying underneath me with his eyes closed. Right then we were relatively safe, but once we were back on open ground things would change.

“Trevil, is there a way to open your haul door?” I shouted.

He shook his head stubbornly. “No way,” he shouted back. “Fuck those naturalists.”

“I can’t treat Brak and hold the machine gun.”

Trevil glanced back at Brak and swore loudly. He reached down and pulled a lever, and I immediately felt the truck tremble as the haul’s doors folded upwards. A moment later the entire haul tilted upwards and I heard the noise of metal sliding down and spilling onto the road behind us.

When we moved a little farther away I saw that the riders had stopped pursuing us and were gathering around the metal we dropped. It was useless and stupid to shoot at them anymore, but I can’t say I wasn’t tempted to do just that. I lowered myself down carefully and Trevil pulled another lever, causing the chains all around us to move as the heavy gun was pulled back into the cabin. I was already next to Brak when the hatch closed. His breathing was shallow, and the wound on his pelvic bone was a mess. I’d seen worse—hell, I’d been wounded worse—but I knew that these kinds of wounds in the field were either treated immediately and by sophisticated medicine or the person died.

I looked around. “Trevil, do you have anything I could help him with? This does not look good.”

“There’s a medicine bag in the back of the truck under those blankets.” He guided me as I moved about the shaking cabin until I found a large satchel and rummaged through it. I did not expect to find a cell regenerator, but I was hoping to find a skin patcher, or at the very least an antibleeding salve, the sort almost every human soldier used to carry. All I found were some brown cloth bandages, an alarmingly thick needle and thread, and a bunch of leaves.

“I can’t do anything with this!” I said to Trevil. “He’s going to die if we don’t stop the bleeding.”

“Can you drive the truck?” he shouted back.

I looked at the wheel, pedals, and levers and said, “I could try.”

“Then take the wheel from me.” He pointed at the pedal below. “Here you accelerate, not that it will go any faster, and here, the other one is the brake. Push it too hard and we will skid and probably roll off this mountain, so just try to steer it steady.”

We quickly changed places and Trevil disappeared behind the front seat. I had to fold one leg underneath myself to be able to see through the front windshield and quickly discovered the steering wheel had at least a two-second delay, but it was better than trying to patch a hole in a human being with only a broken needle while inside a rocking cabin. I heard Brak moan behind me, then shout in agony as Trevil tried to stop the bleeding and stitch the wound closed under less than ideal circumstances. Eventually Brak fell silent, and I was hoping he just passed out.

By the time we reached the plains I was barely holding myself awake and had been suffering from tunnel vision. Trevil’s head popped up from behind the seat.

“How’s he doing?” I asked, but Trevil did not answer. His expression betrayed desperate resolution.

“Let me drive again. No, don’t stop, we need the truck’s momentum, we’ll change places the way we did before.”

When the manoeuvre was complete I looked at Brak lying behind us. His pelvis wound was wrapped in cloth, and I could see some dried leaves sticking out from beneath it.

I turned back and inspected Trevil’s arm wound. “This needs treatment, too.”

With his teeth and my help Trevil ripped the bloodied cloth of his sleeve and I wrapped it around the wound, then I collapsed back onto my seat. The pounding in my head grew and fog surrounded my vision. I had exerted my vessel to its limit and possibly beyond. It was time to pay the price.

I heard Trevil ask me something but his words didn’t register. “I’m sorry,” I said, or mumbled, or whispered, “I need to rest.”

And then the world went dark.