REHO: A Science Fiction Thriller (The Hegemon Wars) (19 page)

Reho stepped closer to the door.
How could he be like me? Human?

“You’re father was not like you,” James said.

“What are you talking about?”

“Your uncle would tell you that your father was fast and strong and that you were like him. But you’re not like him, and he was nothing like you. Your father was weak and often lost all his money on the races. Anything he did win, thugs would steal from him. I told you there were questions you might not want to ask.”

The room flashed red as a siren blared. Reho cupped his hands over his ears. He looked up just once. For a moment, he had not seen James but Jimmy. The familiar green lizard-like skin and claws like knife blades. And he saw the room as it had been before: an abandoned, trash-filled room in OldWorld Chicago.

Water seeped through the floor and covered his legs.

Sirens and red
lights turned everything to chaos. Reho woke, gasping for air as the image of Jimmy faded, replaced by his own reflection in the water on the floor.

“They hit us hard. The river is flooding the tunnels,” Finch shouted over the deafening siren.

“Where’s Rainne?” Reho asked.

“They’re still in the room, I think,” Reeves said. Slater and Ends heaved cases onto the table and began packing equipment into them.

Reho heard Rainne and Thursday shouting in the next room. He sloshed through the water and struggled to push the door open against the rising floodwater. Inside, Gibson and Sola packed equipment into similar cases.

“Reho!” Rainne said, standing atop the submerged sofa. “How did this happen so fast?”

“The river is flooding the tunnels,” Reho replied.

“What’s the evac plan?” Sola asked.

“I don’t know, but I have a feeling we have much more than water to worry about.”

Ends waded into the room and handed Reho and Thursday a pair of modified pulse rifles.

“How are we getting out if the tunnels are flooded?” Rainne asked.

“Slater has that covered,” Ends replied. “But the entire system is out down here. We don’t know what’s topside.”

“Let’s go!” Slater yelled from the other room.

“Wait! I can’t explain how I know this, but I think this might be the Hegemon,” Reho said.

“It’s always the freaking Hegemon,” Thursday said rushing past him. He had ripped the splint off his leg that Coder had made.

“I mean it might not just be Log and the Vectors or even Kawasaki,” Reho said.

“We’ll know when we get out. Either way, we have to move,” Ends replied.

Reeves positioned a ladder under a place in the ceiling that Reho had thought was an air vent. It was open now, and Reho could see metal steps leading up.

The water was waist-deep. Its icy chill sent shivers through Reho as he climbed onto a table and lifted Rainne onto his shoulders and out of the water.

“This is the plan, and no one deviates,” Slater said. “No matter what you think should happen, it means jack. What matters is getting Ends’ crew to the Southern Hanger and back to their ship. They and the equipment must make it.” His eyes moved from face to face, but Reho knew his words were directed at Reeves and Finch.

“Yes sir! Let’s go,” Reeves said, moving up the ladder through an escape hatch that led to the surface above the tunnels.

“Send up your stuff,” Finch said, as Slater and Ends lifted cases to Finch and Reeves topside.

Ends fed the last two overstuffed bags and a container upward.

As soon as everyone was topside, Finch sealed the hatch as the water bubbled onto the building’s floor. They were in an old warehouse in above Shibuya. Piles of trash scattered the room.

“We have to move this equipment to the tank,” Slater said. “It’s three hundred yards from the back of the building.” He eyed Reho, Thursday, and Sola. “Take point and shoot anything that isn’t human!” He grabbed one handle on the heaviest container and Finch lifted the opposite end. The others followed likewise, each carrying two cases.

Behind the building, a crimson early-morning sun greeted them. Once Reho’s eyes adjusted, he could see crowds of people moving along the street. The tunnels had flooded everyone out of their underground dwellings.

“We’re halfway there,” Finch said.

They were exposed as they traveled in the open from the warehouse to the next building. The sun beamed down on them as they approached a massive outer door made of thin metal that slid on wheels. It opened into a room that reminded Reho of the train station in Darksteam.

The station’s roof opened to the sky. Its glass had long been shattered. Pieces still littered the concrete floor and glistened on the tracks. A round six-foot clock mounted on its wall ticked wildly, its minute hand moving faster than time would allow. A century had passed since the Old World died, giving birth to this new realm that had been stunted and smothered by the alien invasion. The world couldn’t move forward until it belonged to humankind again. Time was running out, and Reho doubted whether he could do what they were asking of him. Everything was happening so fast. He still hadn’t processed everything that had happened in his dream. He wasn’t sure how much of what he dreamed was real, but he did know that his conversation with James—Jimmy—was real. He was tied to Jimmy through his mother, somehow. Had Jimmy been the one haunting his mother, reminding her that neither she nor the Earth would be free?

An OldWorld tank with room for twenty people waited on the tracks. Its mounted gun could rotate in a complete circle. Slater opened the back end.

“Let’s get it loaded!”

Rainne joined Reho at the clock and placed her hand on his shoulder.

“Everything’s been so frantic,” she said as she pressed her head against his arm.

Reho wasn’t sure what to say. He loved her. He hadn’t said so verbally, not yet, but he did love her and the thought of being with her one day, in a world not like Usona or like Neopan, is all he wanted. Somewhere, there was a future for them. If the clock they were looking at was any indication of the time: time was almost up.

Thursday’s rifle roared to life. Electricity danced across its barrel as fire bursts from its muzzle, releasing a rapid fire of blue bolts. One found its way into a Vector dropping on a grappling line from the opening in the ceiling. The blast sent it flying to the other side of the room.

“Get to the tank,” Reho said to Rainne.

Three more Vectors dropped from the roof. Sola fired, ripping off the lower half of one. The guns Slater had given them were designed for this sort of assault. Reho fired at an android, blasting it twice in the chest, disabling it.

Thursday got off a few rounds at the third android before his gun misfired and blew up in his hands. He tossed the gun, but not before losing two fingers on his non-dominate hand.

As Rainne passed Thursday, the explosion caused her to wince and lose balance. She screamed as she fell off the platform and onto the tracks. Another android descended and snatched her, lifting her up the grappling line to the roof. Reho fired once but was interrupted by an android that had dropped from behind. It kicked him in the back, sending Reho flying forward across the platform. His gun slid over the edge and landed onto the tracks. Reho flipped over and booted the android as it attempted to crash land on top of him. It flew through the air before finally striking the wayward clock.

Sola blasted the remaining android and ran to Thursday’s side.

“Jesus, Thursday!” Sola said, helping him to his feet.

“Reho, we can’t go after her,” Slater said. “If we do, we compromise everything!”

Reho climbed on top of the tank. There was no way to reach the roof without a grappling line, and all the lines had been cut loose.

“I have to find her!”

“If you leave, then the mission has already failed,” Ends said, joining Reho on top of the tank. “There aren’t two choices here.”

Two more androids dropped behind the tank, their grappling line cut lose once they hit the ground. Sola shouted obscenities from inside the tank as she hammered a volley of bullets into them. The androids jerked and danced until one’s head exploded, followed by the other one slumping to the ground. It landed prostrate across its fallen comrade, both of their bodies shredded with OldWorld lead.

The backdoor slammed shut once Reho and Ends stepped through. The tank rolled forward on the tracks and picked up momentum. A moment ago, he had been watching the clock and thinking about the future—not just in a world without the Hegemon, but a future with Rainne. They hadn’t killed her; instead, they had taken her with them.
Log?

“Log is completing its protocol?” Reho asked Gibson.

“The attack on us is bigger than just Rainne, but I think you’re right,” Gibson said. “We are in the system to be apprehended. Rainne posed no threat, so they arrested her instead of attacking.”

“Where will they take her?”

“Back to Neopan.”

“Don’t even think about it,” Slater said. “I am getting us out of here and on our way to Omega. We’ll monitor Log’s activities once she arrives there. Reeves can hack in and tell us what Log does. I can’t offer anything more than that right now.”

Reho dug his fists into the steel wall of the tank, welcoming the pain that shot to his elbows.

“No one dragged her into this. She was here because she knew she had a part to play,” Sola said, her hands wrapping around Reho’s forearms as he pushed harder into the steel. “She still has a part in this.”

“We got company!” Thursday was looking through a peephole, his blasted hand pinched in his armpit, a pistol in the other.

“I got it.” Finch was sitting behind Reeves and Slater at an illuminated control panel. The joystick mounted there rotated the cannon above them. In the monitor, they saw two cycle-riding Vectors heading their direction and gaining speed.

“That is ridiculous,” Sola said. “They’re balanced on the rail. That skill is beyond precision.”

“They’re tires are magnetically attached. It’s good engineering, not skill,” Gibson said.

“Blast them now! We’ll lose them if they get too close,” Slater said.

Reho heard the cannon thunder above.

“We still have one,” Thursday said.

Ends undid both latches to the back door. He grabbed a weapon that had been mounted above them, shoved a rocket into one end, and flipped the optical targeting sight on the other. He positioned himself in the center of the floor and shouldered the launcher.

“Slater, I hope this thing has a soft launch,” Ends said.

“It’s OldWorld Soviet. You’re good! Shoot that droid!” Slater replied.

Sola turned the latch and the back door dropped to the ground, sending a volley of sparks from the gravel and steel beneath them. The android was fifteen feet from them as Ends fired the rocket directly into its cycle. A brief wave of heat then smoke filled the tank’s interior.

“Way to go, Ends!” Finch said from the gunner’s seat. “Now can we put that door back up?”

Reho helped Sola raise the door from a lift chain connected to its lip. Sola dug out a medic kit and sat next to Thursday.

“I thought we could wait until the chopper, but you’re looking bad.”

She stuck him with a needle and unwrapped his bloodied hand.

“Oh gross, Thursday,” Sola said as she cleaned the wound where Thursday’s pinkie and ring fingers had once been and bandaged his hand as tight as she could.

“You’re turning me into a doctor. And that is not what I signed up for.”

“I think we’re in over our heads now. This isn’t what any of us signed up for,” Thursday said.

Ends jerked around and gripped the bar above Thursday’s head. He lowered his face and looked him in the eyes. “So quit.”

“You know what I meant, Ends. Our plan. This whole thing is too much. We’re not an army.”

“Who else is there?” Ends asked, looking around at the crew. “Who do we find to help us do this?”

“If you’re with me,” Ends said, “then you’re on the chopper with me. If you want out, stay with Reeves and Finch. God knows they need help figuring out what to do here.”

No one moved.
“It’s five against the Hegemon,” Gibson said.

Everyone fell into their own private silence as the tank continued to the South Hanger.

***

Gibson maneuvered the chopper through the opening in the hanger. The tank had gotten them this far; the chopper would take them to their ship. Then there was no coming back until it was done. Slater would stay with them. Reho understood that they needed him and that he now shared the responsibility to see it through, to finish what he and Ends started before Reho had ever been born.

“How long until we reach the ship?” Thursday asked.

Gibson adjusted the controls on the panel and reported that it would be at least fifty minutes. Ends was flying shotgun, his briefcase open and his eyes lost in the screen.

Reho gazed from the window. He could see Shibuya and Neopan in the distance. Somewhere, Rainne was being transported back to Neopan and would be tried.
What was the charge?
Reho had been targeted for the murder of Coder’s brother.
And Coder had left hours ago to check on her mother.
Had she made it out alive?

***

“This is it,” Gibson said as he put the chopper down on the strip of beach where they’d left their ship anchored off the coast just two days ago.

“You never said your ship was a floating palace,” Slater said. After several failed attempts to communicate with his contacts on the ground, he’d spent the flight sorting and repackaging their equipment. Reho had wanted to ask him about the equipment and more about the plan, but his thoughts stayed on Rainne.

“It’s the newest line of warships, courtesy of Kibo himself,” Gibson replied. “I hope someone is ready to get wet, because I flew the chopper. Someone else can retrieve the water taxi.”

Thursday had woken up groggy but volunteered to retrieve the water taxi from the ship. The ship had originally been equipped with two water taxis; one was still docked in Neopan’s harbor, leaving them with a single taxi to complete their mission.