Dead Mech (44 page)

She didn’t bother to strap in, immediately
setting to work powering up the machine and readying weapons.

“You’re all going to die!” she cried
out.

***

Capreze’s office was like a bake oven as
June rushed inside and lifted the boy into her arms. He was burning
up and limp, but still breathing.

“How much time do I have?” June yelled.

“None! You need to be on the platform now!
One of the mechs will grab you up!” Jethro responded. He happened
to glance at the hangar vid feed and blanched. “Oh, fuck…”

“What?” June asked, running down the hall.
“Jethro? What’s wrong?”

Jethro watched the undead UDC troops rise
and the Rancher corpses become what they worshipped in life:
zombies.

“Control tower! Now!” Jethro ordered.

***

“Well ain’t that a sight for sore eyes,” Jay
exclaimed as the mech base came into sight.

“No shit, my man,” Masters agreed. “I wish
we could stop for a shower and a shave, but duty calls! Smashing
duty!”

“Hey Masters!” Jethro interrupted. “Can your
mech reach the top of the control tower?”

“My fucking mech can see into the fucking
control tower. Why?”

“Change of plans. June’s coming out that
way.”

“Huh? Why not out the… front… door…” Masters
trailed off as UDC troops emerged from the smashed front of the
hangar and began to load into transports. “Oh.”

***

One, two, three, four, five.

The Skinners fell under Harlow’s blades, the
steel slicing through flesh and bone like soft butter.

To the casual observer, Harlow’s face would
have looked blank, almost calm, but inside a homicidal fire burned
brighter and brighter as she fought her way to Bisby, seeing her
friend’s life pulsing from what used to be his left arm.

Six, seven, eight, nine, ten.

They continued to fall. Without realizing
it, Harlow began hacking the left arms off of everyone in her way,
her subconscious finding an outlet to keep her centered, to keep
her from breaking.

***

June felt her legs beginning to give as she
took the control tower steps two at a time. She was amazed her body
hadn’t given out yet, after the days of abuse it had suffered.

The sound of boots hitting the steps below
echoed up the stairwell.

“Jethro! Talk to me!” she called out.

“About a dozen fully armed UDC troops are on
your ass!” the mechanic responded.

“Troops? Didn’t their Reaper chips fry their
brains when they went down in the hangar?!?”

“Right, you’ve been outta the loop. Yeah,
their brains regenerate now. Sorry.”

“Are you fucking shitting me?!?”

***

Harlow heard Rachel’s mech open fire as she
gutted and decapitated the last two Skinners in her way.

Dropping her long blades, she knelt and
ripped the sleeves from her uniform, using the material to apply
pressure to Bisby’s wound.

“Hey there, pretty lady,” Bisby whispered
through ashen lips. “I think I cut myself shaving.”

Harlow grinned despite the tears streaming
down her face. “Shut up, idiot. Save your strength.”

“You know, I’m sorry,” Bisby continued
weakly.

“For what?”

“For busting your balls all these years. I
was just jealous you’re a better warrior.”

“Shhhh,” she said choking back sobs.

***

“Great time to try the new sonic disc!” Jay
hollered over the com.

The Rookie watched the UDC transports swing
about and head straight for the mechs and Railer train. “Yeah,
kinda agree with you there.” The Rookie turned to Marin. “Is it
powered up?”

“Ready to go, but it takes a minute or two
between pulses so make the first one count.”

As the transports rolled into range, the
Rookie held his breath and engaged the disc.

A high pitched whine sounded then everyone
in the train felt a pressure behind their eyes and like that, it
was over.

***

The Boss felt hands grab him and he came to
immediately, wasteland instinct overriding the sickening pain in
his crotch.

Without looking or thinking he lashed out,
knocking the hands away. The resulting hiss and growl told his
foggy brain what he was up against.

He pushed himself to his feet and came face
to face with the Archbishop. The fourteen year old boy snarled and
bared fangs hungry for the Boss’s flesh.

The Boss kicked out, knocking the robed
zombie away, but he instantly wished he hadn’t as the pain from his
crushed testicle brought him to his knees.

***

June made it to the top of the old control
tower and set the boy down. She grabbed up a chair and threw it
with all of her strength against the windows. It bounced harmlessly
off, clattering to the floor.

“Shit!” June yelled. “Jethro! The windows
are blast proof! We’re fucking stuck!”

“Umm, okay, I didn’t think of that,” Jethro
responded. “Sorry.”

“Sorry? I will skull fuck you with your
goddamn sorry!”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa! Calm down! There’s roof
access in the utility closet behind you,” Jethro said.

June picked the boy up again, straining
considerably under the child’s weight.

***

The Boss watched helplessly, incapacitated
by pain, as the last UDC troops streamed from the hangar and he was
left alone with the undead Ranchers.

“Bring it, fuckers,” he grunted.

The Archbishop and the others began to
lunge, but froze almost immediately as a high pitched whining
filled the air. The Boss felt the beginnings of a headache and then
it was gone and each of the Rancher zombies fell to their knees.
The Boss barely had time to cover his head with his arms as the
zombies’ heads exploded, spraying the hangar with grey-red goo and
bits of bone.

***

“Fuck!” Jay shouted. “It didn’t work on the
UDC troops!”

“What the hell are you talking about, Rind?”
Marin asked. “The transports have stopped and the ground troopers
are down.”

“But their heads should have exploded,” Jay
insisted. “The nanotech must have altered their brains just enough
so the frequency incapacitates them, but doesn’t make ‘em go
pop.”

“So fucking what?” Masters joined in. “Down
is fucking down.”

Masters/Stomper began to crush the
transports under their feet then stepped past, grinding the exposed
troops into the dirt. “See?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Jay sulked. “But I wanted
the heads to pop.”

***

June collapsed upon the control tower roof,
the boy draped across her, clinging to her. “Holy fucking shit,”
she gasped. “I can’t move another muscle.”

“Well, you better, ‘cause her comes the
cavalry!” Master shouted. The tower shook with each massive
footstep Stomper took.

June’s eyes went wide at the site of the
Hill Stomper reaching a giant fist up to the roof. The boy shook
with fear and June held him close. “Don’t worry, baby, the good
guys are here.”

It took all her strength but she managed to
carry the boy over and climb aboard the offered hand.

***

Jay kept his eyes on the UDC deaders that
Masters hadn’t crushed. Some were already beginning to stir.

“Fuck,” Jay swore. “Minutes. It only gives
us minutes.”

“It’s fucking better than nothing,” the
Rookie said. “If we can slow them down long enough to blast them to
Hell then I call it a win.”

Jay shook his head, eyeing the now upright
troops. He aimed his plasma cannon and fired, obliterating the
deaders in a blast of fiery red. “Yeah, I guess.”

“Oh, come on Rind, you old grouch!” Marin
scolded. “Stop being such a perfectionist. The fucking disc
works!”

***

“Jethro! Open the ramp now goddamit!”
Themopolous shouted. “Bisby’s down!”

“What?!?” Jethro turned his attention from
the mech base feeds and slammed his hand on the ramp controls.

Grabbing her med kit, the Doctor sprinted
from the transport and was at Bisby’s side immediately.

“Hey Doc,” Bisby whispered. “I think I cut
myself shaving.”

“You already used that one, Biz,” Harlow
soothed, her pleading eyes meeting Themopolous’.

“Yeah, but… it’s pretty… fucking funny,”
Bisby stuttered weakly.

“It is, Biz. It is,” Themopolous played
along, pulling the make shift bandages away. Blood squirted from
the open wound, making the Doctor wince.

***

Rachel systematically went from Skinner to
Skinner and stomped them into pulp. The corpses she couldn’t get
to, the ones too close to the transport or the mech personnel, were
finished off by the Commander as he put two bullets in each of
their skulls.

“I think we got them all, Baby Girl,”
Capreze said over the com. “Stay up there though in case there’s
another wave. Don’t forget we have thousands of these fuckers below
us.”

“You think they’ll attack?’ Rachel asked
concerned.

“No,” Capreze responded. “Not all of them,
but some might try it.”

“They do, they die,” Rachel promised.

***

“We’re about clear,” Jenny said, checking
her readings as the Railer train shot past the mech base. “Blow
that shit up!”

“Do we really need to? “Jethro asked over
the com. “The troops and Ranchers are all dead, right?”

“Do it, Jethro,” Jay ordered. “There are too
many resources that can be used against us here if more UDC show
up.”

Jethro sighed and typed in the final
command. “Alright, you’ve got sixty seconds to make sure you are
out of the blast radius.”

“We’ll be safe in 30,” Jenny responded.
“Jethro, right?”

“Um, yeah.”

“Good work with the tech.”

***

“T MINUS 55 SECONDS UNTIL DETONATION,” the
automated voice boomed over every single loudspeaker in the base.
“Please clear the area immediately.”

The Boss felt the piss trickle between his
legs as he dragged himself to an ATV. He grabbed onto the door and
pulled himself upright, screaming at the pain between his thighs.
It took all of his will to get himself in the ATV and seated.

“T MINUS 50 SECONDS UNTIL DETONATION.”

“I fucking heard you!” The Boss roared
pressing the ATV’s ignition button. He put the vehicle in gear and
swung it about towards the hangar entrance.

***

“I have lost contact with the mech base,
Your Grace,” Deacon Montoya stated reluctantly. “There is no
response to my hail.”

“Can you bring up the vid feed?” the Bishop
asked, trying not to worry.

“I will try, Your Grace,” Montoya responded,
working frantically at his control panel. “Here. It’s hard to make
out though.”

Bishop Wyble concentrated on the blurry
image, quickly realizing that the vid screen and camera must have
toppled over in the mech base hangar.

“Enhance that picture,” the Bishop ordered.
The image closed in on a headless corpse dressed in ornate
robes.

The Bishop gasped.

***

“T MINUS 10 SECONDS,” the voice echoed from
the hangar as the Boss pushed the ATV to full throttle, desperately
trying to put as much distance between himself and the impending
destruction.

He ticked off the seconds in his head and
when he reached 1, he closed his eyes, gripped the steering wheel
and prayed for the first time in his life.

There was a blinding flash and the landscape
about him went white. He never heard himself shrieking as the
resulting heat blast lifted the ATV into the air and flung it like
a toy out into the wasteland.

***

The mechs and Railer train shuddered, but
stayed steady as the shock wave from the explosion reached
them.

Those that could, watched from the train’s
windows, shielding their eyes against the near blinding flash.

“Anybody want to say a few words?” Masters
asked. “I mean that
was
our home.”

The com stayed silent.

“Then I will,” Masters continued. “Thank you
mech base for providing us with beds, showers, tables, closets, the
control tower during a full moon…”

Jenny looked at the Rookie. “What the Hell
is he going on about?”

“All the places he and Harlow fucked,” the
Rookie grinned.

***

“It was my fault, Doc,” Bisby said
quietly.

“What was, Biz?” the Doctor asked, suturing
like mad.

“Stanislaw’s death. It was my fault. He… He
thought I was the deader,” Bisby coughed and Themopolous swore as
several of the minute stitches she had been working on tore.

“Shit! You have to stay still and quiet,”
she pleaded.

“He shot himself,” Bisby continued. “Because
of me. I just needed… everyone to know that… before… before I
die.”

“Shut the fuck up, Bisby! I won’t let you
die!” Themopolous looked at Harlow. “Get me a blow torch. We’re
getting back to basics.”

“Sensors are going crazy,” Mathew said.
“What’s going on, Shiner?”

“We are picking up all of the movement in
the wasteland,” Shiner responded.

“All of those readings are deaders? UDC and
citizen zombies?” Mathew asked. “I can’t believe I just said
‘citizen zombies’.”

“Yes, all of the dead walk now, converging
on the UDC stronghold. They have been called.”

“I am so going to put my boot in the
Outsider’s ass when I get there,” Mathew growled.

“If we can separate, that is,” Shiner
said.

“Yeah, yeah, don’t remind me. The smell in
this cockpit is reminder enough,” Mathew complained.

***

Bishop Wyble held his head in his hands, his
shoulders shaking. Deacon Montoya looked over his shoulder,
concerned.

“Bishop? Your Grace, are you okay?” the
Deacon asked.

Wyble looked up, tears streaming down his
cheeks, but a huge grin on his face. He was laughing, almost
uncontrollably. “Oh, Deacon! I’ve never been more okay in my life!”
The Bishop wiped his eyes, getting himself under control. “You know
what this means, don’t you Montoya?”