MoonFall (16 page)

He sighed. The kind of woman he wanted to be around, for all the good that would do him now.

He stooped and picked up the axe. There might still be trouble out there – Dionite patrols, or stray Apollonians, or whatever wanderers and critters were drawn by the sound of violence. He’d need something to keep him safe, and a stop sign didn’t seem up to the task.

His eyes drifted over to Burns again, and the town behind her. A hospital. A school. Engine parts. She was right, he’d never find those things on the road. Just more folks like this one lying dead at his feet, folks who ganged up seven to one to take down their prey, cowards and wretches even worse than him.

And in them seven on one fights, Noah the wanderer was never going to be part of the seven.

“You never know,” he said, reaching down to Bourne for comfort. “They might even have bullets the right size.”

In the distance, across the ruins and the woods, the hills rose higher with their promise of abandoned towns and freedom. But right here there was a town worth fighting for. And it had been twenty years since he’d had anything worth fighting for.

“Alright dammit,” he called out.

He turned to follow Burns, but she’d already disappeared between the ruined buildings.

“Wait up,” he shouted again.

Tiredness was still on him, but now there was determination too, something more than survival pushing him to keep going. He ran towards the buildings, hoping to catch up, the axe swinging in his hand. He rounded the corner but still couldn’t see her, kept on running.

Someone stepped out of the long shadows to his left, and he turned towards them with a grin, only to see a pair of Dionites bearing down on him. There were others too, some closing in from the left, feet dislodging rubble behind, a tall woman with sharp teeth screaming orders, urging them all on.

He raised the axe. Hadn’t he learned anything since he’s lost Jeb and Pete? There was a reason to be cowardly, a reason to stay alone. Courage got you killed. Other people got you killed, or were the ones trying to kill you. All you had was yourself.

“Listen,” he said. “I ain’t with them. I’m just a wanderer, just a guy trying to get out of here.”

They came closer, prowling in like wolves. Wolves with machetes and spears.

“Really. I’ve been in prison. I was there with Iver. You folks know Iver, right? Crazy fellow, big blond dreadlocks?”

If they knew or cared for Iver, then they weren’t showing much sign of it. Just circling closer and closer while the leader raised a samurai sword and pointed it straight at him. She was like a figure out of legend, this hulking woman with her wild hair in nothing more than a loincloth and tattoos, wearing her anger like armor.

“No more walls,” she growled. “No more prisons. No more governments. No more wars. Get ready for the wild, Apollonian.”

“I swear to God, I’m not…” Noah knew a lost cause when he saw one, and now that lost cause was him. Least he could do was go down fighting. He raised the axe. “For schools and hospitals and goddamn engine parts!”

It was the world’s worst war cry, but he still felt it stir him as he rushed towards the leader. She stood on a mound of rubble, sword raised behind her like a hugely muscled batter at the plate. She grinned and bared her teeth.

Then the grin slumped and her whole body with it as the point of a sword appeared through her guts.

Noah stumbled to a halt as the Dionite’s body fell to the ground, revealing Burns standing behind her, sword dripping with blood.

“Run, you bastards!” she yelled as the leaderless Dionites scattered.

Then she looked down at Noah.

“Well, come on,” she said. “We’ve got a civilization to save.”

C
HAPTER
N
INETEEN

A
PPLIED
I
NTELLIGENCE

“D
O
YOU
EVEN
know how to use that?” Burns asked.

They crouched in the rubble a couple of hundred yards from Apollo’s ruined main gates, watching the fighting. It was mostly a matter of arrows being fired back and forth, rocks and spears flung between attackers and defenders. Every so often a pack of Dionites would charge forward and get through the gateway, only to be pushed back by the massed defenders. But however the fighting went, there were still scores of Dionites between them and the gate.

“It’s a sword.” Noah said, looking down at the weapon he’d taken from the fallen Dionite. “Pointy end goes in, enemy falls down dead. That’s about the limit of it, right?”

Burns shook her head.

“It’s a Katana, one of the finest swords ever made,” she said. “And it is totally wasted on you.”
 

“What, ‘cause I ain’t had fancy training I can’t hit someone?”

“If we get through this alive, you’ve got a lot to learn. Maybe if you’re lucky Rasmus will teach you.”

“Rasmus?”

“Lieutenant Poulson to you.”

Noah thought of Poulson’s scowling face and stern European tones.

“Don’t reckon your Rasmus likes me much,” he said.

“I’m not sure I like you much,” Burns replied with a hint of a smile. “But maybe you’ll grow on us.”

Another Dionite attack surged toward the gate. A couple of muskets fired, sending clouds of black smoke out into the gateway. One of the Dionites fell, but the rest kept running, their war howls followed by the clash of weapons.

“Watch,” Burns said.

The raid fell apart, the Dionites driven from the gate once more. As they did so, the rest fell back too, tending to the wounded, looking over to see what had been achieved.

“They’re planning,” Noah said. “Evaluating.”

“And while they do that…?” Burns raised an eyebrow.

“They ain’t attacking.” Noah nodded. “So that’s when we go in.”

“Precisely.” Burns wiped her sword with a rag on her belt, thrust it away in its sheath. “This is going to be about speed, not fighting. You ready for a sprint?”

Noah eased himself up from a crouch, keeping a chunk of wall between him and the Dionites. Just standing up made his legs ache.

“Not really,” he said. “But that ain’t gonna get any better. Reckon I might keep this ready.”

He waved the katana through the air. Just holding such a weapon made him feel like the hero of an action film.

“Jesus.” Burns shook her head. “Just try not to fall over and stab yourself, OK?” She grabbed his wrist, turned him to face the gate. “They’re going for it again. Get ready.”

She rose, still crouched but ready to spring into action, like an athlete at the starting line. She sure had the build for an athlete underneath all that armor and aggression.

Noah took a deep breath, tensed himself in preparation to run.

A group of Dionites rushed the gate, howling and screaming, waving their weapons. A few arrows flew past them, a musket popped and then they were in. Noah listened to the sounds of violence, waiting for the critical moment when clashing weapons turned to footsteps, when the Dionites started to run.

“Now,” Burns said as the change in tone came.

They ran toward the gate even as the Dionites ran away from it. A gap opened up between the enemy and the way into town, a safe path to salvation.

But some of the wild warriors saw them coming. Arrows and rocks hurtled toward them, and a small band of retreating Dionites turned to block their path.

Burns rushed headlong at the nearest Dionite, sidestepped to the left just as she reached him and slashed out in passing with her sword. The blow knocked the Dionite’s spear aside, and the swing with which she followed it caught him across the back. Staggering away in blood and pain, the Dionite left a clear path for Noah to follow through.

Another Dionite leaped in just as Noah was almost clear. He swung the Katana but instead of hitting this new threat with samurai precision he missed the Dionite by a good half a foot. It was enough though. The man stepped back, Noah raced past, and half a minute later he was running through the gate.

He’d gotten so caught up in being on Burns’ side that he hadn’t given a thought to what came next. So it came as a surprise when the soldiers behind the gate raised their weapons against him.

“Whoa!” Noah cried out, realizing that to folks who’d been fighting hairy dirty wilderness tribes he probably looked an awful lot like the enemy. “I’m on your side.”

“It’s true,” Burns said, and the weapons were lowered just enough for Noah to get past. “For now, at least.”

There were a lot of soldiers crowded around the gate, with their mismatched armor, their scavenged hand weapons, and their crude muskets. Furniture had been dragged out of nearby buildings to form a barricade – tables, chairs and sideboards jumbled together in a hastily prepared defense. These people had a grim determination about them and a whole host of pointed objects.

But what became clear, as Burns led him past and further into town, was that there wasn’t much depth to the defense. Past that thin emplacement of household woodwork and tired looking warriors, there were empty streets, the only movement an occasional fearful face peering out of a window.

They came to the town square, an open plaza with a well-patched floor of concrete slabs, even some flower beds around the sides. As they arrived a runner dashed in from a side street and toward the cluster of guards in the middle, just as two more dashed off in other directions. There was a frantic energy to that small group of guards, bent over a trestle table on which a map had been spread out.

“Sergeant Burns.” A woman with a buzz cut and a scar on her cheek looked up as they approached. “And who by all the gods is this?”

“Noah was one of our prisoners, Captain McCloud.” Burns saluted the woman. “But he helped me get clear of the Dionites. He might not look like much, but he’s on our side.”

“If you say so.” The captain ran an incredulous eye up and down Noah.

“Hey, I can hold my own,” Noah said. “I killed a man with a stop sign back there.”

“Of course you did.” McCloud turned back to the table. “Tell me sergeant, what did you see out there?”

Burns leaned over the map. Lanterns weighed down its four corners, but the sun itself was now high enough in the sky to show the details clearly. This had once been a map of the pre-apocalypse town, now amended with grayed out areas of ruin and a thick line marking the walls. Noah could make out what must be a prison and the town square, but beyond that he didn’t know the place well enough to follow the discussion that followed.

Burns had been leading a scouting party when she got cut off from her group. She’d seen where the largest Dionite forces lay, and confirmed that large groups were still waiting to pour through if either gate fell.

“It’s not just the gates now.” Lieutenant Poulson, who had, until now
,
stood silent amid the other officers, pointed down to a stretch of wall. “They blew a hole in the wall here, where we had few defenders, and a group broke through. We’re still struggling to hold it, and now we have these scum coming from behind our backs.”

McCloud looked around the group.

“Thoughts, ideas?” she said. “We never expected something so thorough and coordinated. I’m open to any options, but we need to be quick.”

“If I may, Captain.” Rasmus bent over the map, pointed to an area in front of the main gates. “Based on Sergeant Burns” intelligence, the largest block is here. That’s where they’re sending assault parties out from and so where their leader must be. They are keeping us on the defensive and, as long as that happens, they will keep wearing us down. An elite strike party, supported by covering fire from the gates, could break through this rabble and take out the man or woman in charge. Take off the head and the body will fall.”

“I assume you’re about to volunteer to lead this party?” McCloud said.

“I am the best swordsman in the guard,” Poulson said. “My leadership experience speaks for itself.”

McCloud nodded.

“I can think of no-one better,” she said.

The boom of another explosion shook the town.

“If they keep this up we’ll have no prison left at all.” McCloud pinched the bridge of her nose, stared down at the map. “Alright, Poulson. How many guards will you–”
 

“It won’t work,” Noah said, and they all turned to look at him with the very looks of challenge he’d been hoping to avoid. But he’d been learning the past few days, and if he wasn’t going to use that knowledge to get out of Apollo then at least he could use it to save the place. “Dionites don’t have a leader, that ain’t the way they work. Least not the sort of leader who gets to set a plan and keep everyone following it through orders and structure.”

“And how do you know so much about Dionites, Mr. Noah?” McCloud asked.

“He’s one of them, isn’t he?” Poulson said, drawing his sword. “You’ve brought one into our midst, Burns.”

“You’re the one who brought me in,” Noah replied. “But I still ain’t a Dionite. I just spent the last few days in the cell next to one, and he was mighty chatty if you asked him in the right kind of way.”

“I said any thoughts,” McCloud said, “and I stand by that, but get to the point.”

“Yes ma’am.” Noah placed a hand on Bourne to help settle his mind, noticed Poulson twitch his sword towards him and let go of the gun. He’d just have to do this one on his own. “Dionites ain’t like you folks. Ain’t no good asking who’s in charge or who’s the leader or what the big plan is – that ain’t their way. Truth is that’s probably why you’ve gotten to understand them so little, asking the wrong questions the wrong way.

“They live free and chaotic, an anarchist kind of deal. If they’ve got this organized it ain’t because some leader told them to do it, it’s because an idea sprang up and enough folks wanted to do it that they dragged the rest along. You take out some top leader, the rest will all keep doing what they want to do, which is attack you and maybe bust their buddies out of jail. Can’t say I blame them for that bit, but there it is.”

“And you have a better plan?” Poulson looked like he’d have cut Noah’s head off as happily as he would a Dionite’s.