The Stefan Mendoza Trilogy Boxed Set, page 54
part #1 of Stefan Mendoza Trilogy Series
“Chan, parking area!” I tried to dig more speed out of a body that was already starting to quiver from too much exertion after losing so much blood.
“Look now!” Chan sounded almost excited. Good.
The video showed different cameras, different angles. The vehicles had stopped well short of where our own car was parked. Two bodies lay half in a car, half on the ground. Huiyin’s bullets had been more effective than we could’ve hoped for. Seven other people—all in black—were pressed against the cars for cover, returning fire.
An eighth moved toward me, crouched.
The drones. They were still getting information on us.
I slowed, got off the trail.
Then I heard it: high-pitched, something between a whistle being blown inside a plastic bag and a kettle boiling over.
“Missile incoming!” I dropped flat and covered my head.
Almost immediately, the whistle stopped, and I thought I might have heard a pop just before a concussive wave shoved me. Heat followed on its tail.
Saplings snapped and collapsed, sounds I couldn’t hear over all the noises.
And then the explosion was done, replaced by a pounding sense of pressure in my head and a painful awareness of silence.
And ringing. Inside my head.
I rolled and swatted at my clothes, then took a desperate look at the display sliver.
The gunman who had been coming at me was down, rolling around groggily. The cars had done okay, but most of the gunmen were slumped, getting to their feet slowly. Huiyin was down, moving slower, smoldering.
I got onto the trail, managing what speed I could. Balance was tricky. The gunman between me and the others got two bullets, just to be sure.
Then my legs wobbled, gave out. Cybernetics failing?
No. Not my legs. Me. Crashing.
Two of the other gunmen got to their feet. Brought their pistols up.
My arms were too slow, too clumsy. I should have forced more of the gel down my throat when I’d had the chance.
Something dropped from the trees, onto the roof of the center car. Brown and green. Powerful. Graceful.
Ichi.
The gunmen turned.
She leapt just before they fired, somersaulted, and landed on the shoulders of the farthest one. She pulled her wakizashi from his eye socket just as it registered in my sluggish brain that she was holding a weapon.
The second gunman turned as she rode the first body to the ground, but he was still slow and clumsy. He fired, the first round tearing away the side of the dead gunman’s face, the second round burying in the dirt about six inches away, just shy of Ichi’s left foot.
She pivoted on that foot, driving the heel of her other foot into the second gunman’s jaw. The gunman’s face slammed into the side of the car, and he fell to the ground dazed. Ichi tumbled toward him.
I didn’t need to see the rest. They were all seconds from being dead.
I headed into the woods, reloading, then holstering my gun. Huiyin’s jacket was torn, still smoldering. I tore it off of her, grunted at the foolishness of the sheer shirt she wore beneath. If it had been some sort of lightweight armor, it wasn’t any use against concussion and heat. Parts had burned away, some of it melted into her flesh in red welts. I tugged the shirt remnants away, wishing I’d brought water with me. I had to settle for pulling the fabric from the welts with shaking fingers.
“Danny?” I shook my head, but everything felt off-center and unreliable. At least the ringing was fading. “There’s a bird up there.”
“Um, three, actually.” Danny whistled. “Two of them have me locked down. One’s losing power, but the other one—”
It sounded like a rocket exploded somewhere close to him.
“Danny?”
“Yeah. Just…the fire’s the problem. Burning away my camo. Shit! I’m pulling the big gun out.”
Ichi crunched to a stop a few feet away, flicking blood from her blade, eyes on Huiyin. “Will she live?”
I threw Huiyin over my shoulder. “It’s mostly cosmetic. We need to move.”
The sound again: a missile incoming.
I dove onto Ichi and covered them both as well as I could while protecting my head. My ears popped from the pressure, and once again, the heat was on me, digging into my flesh like a lover with flame for fingers. It roared on and on, pushing me down against the two of them, consuming the air, cooking me.
And then it was gone.
I rolled off, gasping, screaming, deafened, heart pounding, expecting my body to shut down at any moment.
But I was alive.
Ichi coughed, then groaned. Smoke rolled up from her camouflaged bodysuit. She screamed, rolled, then began tearing it off. Charred…something hit my nose. It took another second for me to realize that I was on fire.
I peeled my jacket off with blackened fingers. My cheeks were sunburned, tender. I swatted the fire out on my pants, then did the same on Huiyin. Her chest rose slowly.
Ichi dropped next to us; I looked away, then got to my feet.
She grabbed my hand, pressure that seemed minimal, like a child. “What are you doing?”
“There’s a helicopter up there. It’s going to kill us if we don’t move.” I needed to get to the rocket launcher, but it was half a state away. “Can you carry her?”
Ichi stood, cradling the smaller woman in arms blackened by charred clothing. “She is hardly anything.”
“Yeah.” I pointed in the opposite direction from the rocket launcher. “Northwest. Fast. Stick to cover.”
Ichi shifted Huiyin to a fireman’s carry and turned without a word, then jogged away.
Find the strength of that kid. If she can do it, you can do it. I staggered past the cars, caught smoke spiraling up from them, then tried to put at least a little bit of direction to my stumbling. A small part of my brain wished for someone to put me out of my misery, but that would have meant death for Ichi. And Chan. And Huiyin.
I picked up speed, held my arms out for balance, then pulled them in for more speed. The wicked slant the world had taken after the first explosion started to even out. I was back in the woods. Jogging.
“Chan?” I sounded funny to my own ears but understandable.
No reply.
“Chan?”
Had I missed an explosion? Had they found—
“She’s out there,” Chan whispered.
“She?” I almost stopped.
“Assassin. Maribel.”
Shit! Sure. Why not? Maybe they could drop a nuke on us while they were at it! “Where?”
“Not far. Saw her moving around. Searching.”
An android or a helicopter. What did I focus on first? “Can you stay low?”
“I am.” Whispered even softer.
The sound of the rotors grew distinct, clear. My choice was made for me—the helicopter had chosen me.
Good!
I scraped against a tree trunk, regained my balance, fought against a renewed sense of the world turning upside down, and ran into deeper cover. The helicopter drew closer. Louder. A distant explosion echoed through the mountains; Danny dropping the final helicopter that had been firing on him.
The parking area where our car had been hidden passed by, then another tree I recognized from its strange, almost slumbering repose against another trunk. It wasn’t much farther.
Rotor wash battered treetops overhead, raining pinecones all around me. The helicopter team was searching, getting desperate.
Or getting close.
The ground sloped away, this time not caused by the aftereffects of the explosion. Not even a hundred feet! The area was open—saplings, bushes, dark soil covered here and there by patches of loam.
I sprinted as best I could and dove face first at the spot where the rocket launcher was buried. Rocks scraped away the flesh of my chest as I skidded, reminding me I had nothing protecting the soft and vulnerable parts of me. I dug fire-blackened fingers into the soil, gripped plywood, and levered it up and away. Dirt slid down into the hole where the dark green case—unlabeled, like the helicopter—waited.
The rotor noise became a roar, drew closer. Debris took to the air all around me.
I tugged the case out and flung it toward the closest trees. Cover.
Machine gun fire—staccato, deafening to my tender ears—bellowed in the open space. Bullets dug fist-sized holes in the soil. Close. Far too close.
I rolled away, got to my feet, and sprinted, zigging, zagging, then flopping on top of the case and tumbling deeper into the woods. The clasps were like ancient, rusted iron—fused, refusing to release. I snapped them off and popped the lid open.
The helicopter was overhead, its nose slowly rotating, the pilot searching, close enough that I could make out pale flesh, a feminine nose, soft cheeks.
I loaded the rocket, brought the launcher up.
She must have spotted me. The helicopter was too close to launch its own missile, so she twisted around to get the machine gun on me.
I fired and dove away.
The blast caught me in the air, threw me a good ten feet, parking me hard against a tree trunk. I twisted around in time to see the flaming hulk dip its nose and plunge straight into a clump of trees, where it came to an abrupt stop with the sound of tortured machinery and splintering wood. Then the helicopter came to rest with a shuddering thump.
I ran to the case, reloaded, and searched around. No other threats dropped from the sky.
I set the launcher down. I needed to be sure. I ran into the clearing, reaching for my pistol in case the pilot had somehow survived.
But the pistol was gone. Fallen out while I was running through the woods.
And Maribel stood at the edge of the tree line, dressed in a dull wood camouflage bodysuit similar to Ichi’s. Watching. Smiling.
How far away? Thirty feet? Forty? Could I run back to a weapon? To the rocket launcher?
Maribel dashed forward and leapt at me. Planted a booted foot in my chest. Knocked me back.
No running away.
I got to my feet, once again sluggish. Aching.
Maribel strolled to the fiery wreckage and braced against the fuselage, then tore away a piece of smoldering, blackened metal. A section of one of the runners.
Why?
She spun it around. Like a staff. Like Jacinto had used in the VR.
“Jacinto? Are you running her?” I backpedaled. Maribel would have killed me. Jacinto wouldn’t be content with simple murder. “Is this about Chan? All of this?”
Maribel closed. “It is about all of you, Stefan. It is about finishing the job. Chan will be a part of me when this is complete. You—”
She swung, and I barely caught the blow with a forearm. The force knocked me back.
I rolled away, favoring that arm, staggering to my feet and backpedaling. “Is that really you, Jacinto? Or are you just a bad copy, a tool for Stovall?”
Maribel-Jacinto charged me, flipping at the last second and bringing the staff down on the shoulder I was favoring. My cybernetics held up, but the flesh around the limb screamed.
I went to a knee, got up, stumbled back until the trees were at my rear. “Is all this your choosing? Is it, Jacinto? Are you going after Chan because you want to defeat the only person better than you, or are you—?”
Maribel-Jacinto didn’t let me finish, hopping forward, leaping, once again kicking me in the chest. Not great. Not particularly skillful. But I was an easy target.
I bounced off a tree, felt the wind burst from my lungs, and fell to the ground. It certainly felt like Jacinto was running the android. There was ego behind the actions, emotion. Simulated or real, it didn’t feel like Maribel.
Maribel-Jacinto spun the staff around and sneered. “Where is Chan?”
I got up, sucked in air, then fell back to my knees, gasping. “Is—”
The android drove the staff into the ground, like a spear. “Where?”
I got up again, steadied against a tree. “Can I…” Once again, I lost my balance and fell back. The android seemed to be licking it up. Bitch. I stood. “Can I make a deal?”
“I can find her on my own.”
“You haven’t even heard my terms. Maybe…” I dropped to a knee, put both hands on the ground. “Maybe you’ll like them.”
Maribel-Jacinto pulled the staff from the ground and spun it around again. A ridiculous amount of flare and ego. Jacinto, definitely. “There are no good terms. No deal.”
I pulled up the rocket launcher I’d been maneuvering toward.
And fired.
The rocket raced through the air and detonated against the android’s armored chest. It was hurled back, then skipped across the ground for several feet before coming to a rest. I found the arm that had been holding the metal staff and wrenched it free.
Maribel-Jacinto pushed its upper body up on the remaining elbow as I approached. The body was torn apart at the waist, exposing the same skeletal frame as before. Its charred and twisted lips moved.
I straddled the ruptured chest. “You should’ve listened to my terms.”
It shook its head.
“No?” I drove the staff through its head. “What about fuck off and die?”
It twitched, then went still.
“Seems like a fair deal to me.” I staggered a few steps, stopped. “Chan?”
“Stefan?” Chan’s voice. Relieved.
“She’s dead. I’m not much better.” I listened. No more rotors. No more explosions. “Where are the others? Danny? Ichi?”
Silence.
“Chan?”
More silence. My legs gave out. The sky grew darker, the breeze colder.
“Ichi?” My voice slipped into something so ephemeral and weak, not even the wind could carry it.
Chapter 25
Smoke rose from charred tree trunks, white against the black of the scarred woods. My throat and sinuses burned. It felt like I was baking, like someone had chopped me up, basted me with misery sauce, and tossed me into the oven. My steps snuffed embers and splintered twigs with whispered pops.
Chan stayed close behind me on the ash-covered trail, clutching the computing device that had probably saved our lives.
No. Chan had saved our lives using that device. Big difference.
We stopped at the car we’d parked off the trail. Fire-blasted but still functional. It would get us out, whoever us was now.
“Try again,” Chan said, computing device held high.
I planted my ass against the car trunk, coughed, spat out what I hoped was just ash-darkened mucus, and reconnected to our private network. “Danny? Ichi? Huiyin? Talk to me.”
Nothing.
Chan’s right cheek twitched. Magenta hair spilled over eyes that seemed ready to tear up. “Changing.”
“The network?”
“The attacks. One time, one approach, the next, another.” A jagged breath, then Chan brushed the hair back and slumped against the trunk next to me. The computing device thudded against the soot-darkened metal. “I need something. Too much.”
“Chan.” I twisted around and took the Gridhound’s soft shoulders in my cybernetic hands. It was such an odd feeling to know that my mechanical hands, the product of a life lived too hard, were holding flesh that had been put through so little. Chan’s exertions were mental, psychological, and there had apparently never been any consideration of the other demands a body had. “You’re not going back. You’ve gotten free of the drugs. You don’t need them, remember? What you did—”
Chan tried to pull away.
“Listen! You want to go back to what you were? Losing track of the world around you? Putting the rest of us at risk just because you couldn’t deal with some bad memories?”
The tears came, flowing around a snarl that twisted Chan’s round face. “Bad memories?”
“I know what Jacinto did to—”
Chan swung at me. It was unexpected, too quick to stop. Not powerful, but it left my jaw tender. “Don’t know anything! Don’t know what it feels like!” Chan grabbed at the breasts covered by a black T-shirt I now saw had flickering designs embedded in it. “Don’t know what’s desired, don’t know what’s feared and hated!”
Black-metallic nails clawed at me, at first I thought for my eyes, but then I realized they merely sought a jacket or shirt I wasn’t wearing. Chan clutched at my flesh, pulled me close, squeezed me with an intensity I wasn’t ready for.
I waited until I was sure this was what Chan wanted—needed—then I returned the hug, patted the bony back that had carried us through deadly encounters with Stovall’s creation, and let the sobbing go without interruption for as long as I could.
Chan suddenly went silent and pulled away, turned. “Sorry. Got snot all over you.”
“I’ve had worse.” I brushed ash from my hair. Singed. Probably a total mess. “Those other three cars. Are they still out there?”
“I-I’ll check.”
They would’ve been on us by now if they were going to attack, but maybe Lilly Duvreau was waiting, hoping we might be spent. We were, actually, but she apparently didn’t know it. I wandered back to the path, took a gun from one of the dead, and found a fingerprint that worked. There was plenty of ammo to be had. I took four magazines, then inspected their cars for any potential valuable information.
Nothing. Empty glove compartments and trunks. Even the corpses had nothing on them other than the occasional dedicated data device that wouldn’t have provided anything if it weren’t a warped, cracked ruin.
They weren’t about to repeat the same mistake.
An engine coughed, distant, but loud. Approaching.
“Chan—” Coughing shook me. I spat out more of the dark saliva and ash mixture. “Chan!”
Chan ran into view, then crouched behind a tree. “Hear it.”
I got in between two of the cars that hadn’t collided, dropped to my belly, and slithered forward on my arms until I was halfway under the rearmost vehicle. The few spots on my belly that hadn’t previously been scraped were now.
The engine growl grew closer. Its refined bass rumbling was familiar, but I had learned long ago not to rely on familiarity. Whatever came up the trail to us, I was ready to put a tight burst center mass.
