REHO: A Science Fiction Thriller (The Hegemon Wars) (9 page)

“
Let’s roll,”
Thursday said, running toward the train. He grabbed a side handle and hoisted himself onto the platform. Reho took one last glance at the town, wondering what tomorrow would be like for Darksteam.

***

Inside, he found Sola removing her armor and nursing her injured arm. Ends pulled a black bottle and some bandages from a medical bag he had taken off the steam-mule.

“I’ll tend to it,” Sola said. “Go check on Gibson.” She winced as she took off the last piece of her armor. Blood seeped through her shirt.

“You’re going to need this,” Sola said, slinging the medical bag onto a nearby table. She inserted a needle into her arm to dull the pain and bandaged the wound with the ease of a field medic.

Reho unzipped his jacket and unwound the wire. He fed the five-foot piece of wire through the hole in the jacket’s shoulder and then took the jacket off. And repeated the same process with his shirt.

“Holy crap!” she said. “That’s connected in there.” She finished her own bandaging and returned to the medical bag. She unsnapped a container with various sized scalpels, scissors, tweezers, and pins.

Sola directed him to sit on the table. She cleaned around his wound, avoiding the large hole and dangling wire.

“Got in the way of someone fishing?” she asked, her face calm and serious.

Reho looked into her eyes. She was focused, but there was something else, too.

“I thought the same thing,” he replied, grabbing a vial and syringe. He punctured the top labeled
Hydromorphone
and filled the syringe, clearing the needle of any excess air.

“Let me do it,” she said, taking the syringe and injecting it into the arm, away from the wound. She picked up a pair of scissors and tried to cut the wire.

“Whatever they’re using, it took several blasts from my pistol to break it. Just dig it out.”

She went for the tweezers.

“I don’t think I need to say that this is going to hurt,” she said before pushing the tweezers into the wound, “but this is going to hurt.”

***

The passenger car was meant for the wealthy. The furniture was all Old World. The pain had lessened in his shoulder. A gel Sola had smeared on it had numbed his wound as well. After removing the steel bullet, carefully dislodging the hooks that had gripped onto his flesh, they discovered that it hadn’t fractured any of his bones. It would heal quickly. The gunshot wound Dink’s brother had inflicted on his leg had already healed. Even the worst of his wounds was quick to heal.

His reflection in the mirror worried him. His face was battered, the whelps left by the burning shells looked worse than they felt. He hadn’t even bothered to put any numbing gel on them, and Sola hadn’t asked about them. He rarely looked at his reflection. As a child, his eyes had been ocean blue. Now they were darker, almost black. Maybe a change caused by his time out in the Blastlands, but he always thought it was something else.

What he saw in the gold-framed mirror reminded him of who he was and where he had been. It seemed like a lifetime ago that he was sitting in a holding cell in Red Denver, awaiting his sentencing. Reho’s hands had been red with the blood of one of Soapy’s henchmen. Not just another knock-down-drag-out, but a pusher who worked for Red Denver’s largest crime boss. He’d made sure Reho would never win another race in Red Denver. But Reho had taken care of that . . . and him.

Although Reho had fought and won at Red Rocks, gaining his freedom, the deep scars along his neck testified that Red Denver had never been his home. He had left there a killer, just as he had 4E. His purpose had been to return home and rejoin his community. Maybe work at the tannery or on a boat. But all of that was gone now. His family was dead, and he had blindly joined Ends’ crew, only to find himself caught up in a war that wasn’t his. All Reho knew was that Ends wanted him here, maybe even needed him.

“You should eat something,” Sola said, yanking Reho back to reality. “Gibson and Thursday are in the navigation car. I’d steer clear of them. Especially Thursday. He is fired up because he has to shovel the coal.”

Reho looked at Sola in the mirror. “How’s your arm?”

Her eyes were his mother’s eyes: emerald green.

“It’s fine. A flesh wound.”

Ends returned from the front. Reho knew he was running the show on the ground, but there was an employer and a buyer involved, too.

“What’s the plan?” Reho asked.

“For now, we head to Killa-jaro,” Ends replied, offering nothing else.

Ends would give as little information as possible. He knew just as much about them as they knew about him: next to nothing. Trust took time. Reho had never spent enough time in one place to know that kind of trust and dependence.

The steamer passed through the darkness, powered now at full speed. His AIM displayed their speed at seventy-three miles per hour.

They passed through one of the few areas in the world unaffected by the Blasts and wars from the century before. Further north, closer to the seas and below the Eastern Bloc, the Blasts had destroyed everything just as it had in Usona. Reho knew that if a real society ever emerged to rival what had been before the Blasts, it would emerge, here, out of New Afrika.

His AIM continued mapping. He could see the nearby terrain and stats: zero radiation.

Sola’s voice startled him. “It will take use nine days to reach the foot of Killa-jaro. We’ll have an escort waiting for us to help deliver to Jaro.”

“Jaro’s in the mountains?” Reho asked.

“Yes, Jaro is a community there,” she said. “Our employer’s customer is their leader.” She avoided looking at Ends. Perhaps she was saying more than Ends’ wanted Reho to know.

They had traveled
for five days, Gibson and Thursday taking shifts in the navigation car. Reho had slept very little. He had pieced together some details from his conversations with Gibson. He had explained that other communities existed, similar to the one that had formed in Darksteam. But Jaro was not built on steam and crude OldWorld industrial technologies; instead, it was more of an island paradise in the mountains. It was hard for Gibson to explain, as everything seemed to be for him. He had never been before, but Ends had and knew the buyer.

Ends had been stressed since leaving Darksteam. He rarely ate with the crew, and when Reho did see him, he was po
sitioned behind a GPS monitor. Reho hadn’t noticed it at the time, but it had been with Ends on the boat to New Afrika, too, a black briefcase—closed and resting on the table or locked and shelved out of the way in the navigation room. He had asked Sola about it. She’d said very little, other than to explain that it was a tracking system. But she never said what was being tracked.

Reho hadn’t figured her out yet. Sometimes she was high-spirited and cracking jokes with Gibson and Thursday as though there was nothing to worry about. Other times she was depressed, even angry. It was then that she tended to distance herself from the crew, even from Ends.

Reho sat in their familiar spot near the window in the passenger dining car where Sola had stitched him up. The sound of the locomotive, its predictable rhythms and occasional bumps, dulled everything around him as he drifted off to sleep.

***

Darkness. The sound of scraping metal from somewhere distant—maybe another room or nearby building. To his right, a soft blue glow. The light intensified and formed a symbol: a cross within a circle, its horizontal crossbar curved on each end, its lower segment looped. The light flashed white, blinding him. Reho smelled a musky dankness, like stagnant water. A chill blew through the room, and he rubbed his eyes. Spots danced against the blackness. Then pain erupted along his back. He expected to see someone like the clock-man; instead, there was nothing. The pain returned again, pushing through his shoulder from the backside of his wound. Reho kicked behind him, rocketing something across the room. Metal scraped again followed by a thud as the unknown assailant slammed against the wall behind him.

***

Reho’s chest hit the table, sending its contents crashing to the floor. The steamer had come to an abrupt stop.

Sola and Ends rushed from the back compartment where they’d been sleeping. Reho checked his Casio: 2:41. He’d slept less than four hours. Ends snapped on his vest and gun belt.

Another sudden jolt sent everything to the floor. The gold-rimmed mirror fell on Ends as he struggled to attach the last of his armor.

A third, shorter vibration followed, cracking the window.

“Jesus! We’re two hours from Killa-jaro!” Ends said, snapping open the briefcase and peering into the monitor. According to Reho’s AIM, they’d traveled over eighteen hundred miles, and their destination was less than two hundred miles away.

“Grab what you need and go to the control room,” Ends said, snapping the case close and handing Sola a vest. He spun her around, snapped the latch, and handed her a helmet.

Gibson was at the panel in the navigation room, a single gaslight his only source of illumination.

“Something shorted the panel,” Gibson said. “We have power from the steam room, but the electrical components are out.” His speech was clipped and high-pitched like that of a twelve-year-old boy. Panic had set in.

“What happened?” Sola said.

“Maybe another Fighter, but bigger, sending those shock waves,” Gibson said. “My guess would be that it’s patrolling a nearby community.”

“It sounds close,” Thursday said as he emerged from the back compartment, his face smoky-black from the coal dust, two white circles outlining where his goggles had been. His pulse rifle and armor were in his arms, his eyes fixed on Ends.

“Suit up,” Ends said as he leaned across the panel. “Steam isn’t going to do anything if we can’t use the controls.”

Gibson jumped from the chair, muttering something that no one could decipher. He lifted a stack of maps and flipped through them.

“
Gibson!” Sola said. “What is it?” She grabbed him by the shoulder.

“Sorry,” Gibson replied, taking deep breath. “We can still operate the train without the electrical system. The control panel only adjusts the speed and displays the navigation. We can still make her move. We just need to disable the electrical regulator from the main gears. Then she’ll go as fast as we heat her. A rough ride, but she’ll go.”

Ends’ eyes darted between Thursday and Sola. Another quake sent everyone to the windows.

“And you need us to go out there? Into the jungle?” Thursday asked.

“Reho will go outside with me and remove the regulator,” Ends said. “Thursday and Sola, go to the back and protect the cargo. Gibson, what does the regulator look like?”

Gibson unfolded a diagram across the panel.

“Here,” Gibson said, indicating a location underneath the navigation car. “It will have four bolts. Remove them and the device will unlock from the gear.”

“Got it,” Ends said and moved for the door. Reho followed.

It was dark outside; the muted glow that oozed from the windows of the dimly-lit navigation car did little to light their way. Out here, the air smelled of green, reminding Reho of the flower garden his mother had planted behind their house. To Reho, green had a smell: wet earth and rain mixed with the fragrance of magnolia. Another quake snatched him back from the memory.

Something hissed behind them. Ends snapped one of the glow sticks Thursday had found in the boiler room, and in its hazy blue light they saw an eight-foot-long snake ringed with every color imaginable, its head poised in defense. Ends removed his knife from his weapons belt as he approached it.

As Ends drew closer the snake, two shadows darted across the front of the train. Behind them, Reho heard something move, reminding him of the nightmare he had awakened from.

Gibson’s face was cupped against the window, looking past them into the darkness. Ends’ attention was still on the snake, but Reho knew Ends had to have seen the shadow.

Ends flung his knife, severing the snake’s head. As soon as the knife left his hand, he slung his rifle into place and joined Reho.

“Throw the light farther down the track,” Ends whispered, reminding Reho who was in command out here.

Reho tossed the light fifty feet ahead. Something stood just outside the light up the tracks.

“It’s human,” Reho said, questioning his own statement.

It remained outside the light. Reho saw what he thought to be an animal’s paw with claws, but the two legs it stood on looked human. It appeared to be no taller than Thursday, the tallest in the crew.

“Whatever it is,” End said, “it’s not coming into the light.” He cracked another glow stick and tossed it a few feet behind them, closer to the steamer. Orange light illuminated the area where they stood.

“I’ll go under and remove the device,” Ends said. “I don't care if it’s human or not. If it comes into the light, kill it. Understood?”

Reho nodded.

The area underneath the navigation car was awash in muted orange light. Ends would have no trouble finding the device. Reho positioned himself in front of the steamer, his back a few feet from it.

Reho listened as Ends worked beneath the train car. Like a mechanic, his tools clanked against the metal. A few minutes later, Ends had successfully removed the device. Reho hadn’t seen the shadowy figure since Ends went under.

The navigation door opened and Ends stepped in.

Reho grabbed the handle to lift himself up and felt an excruciating pain in the same area where he’d been shot a few days earlier. A hyena-like creature with human features and stature had attached itself to his thigh and hung on tight, its nails buried in his skin. Its eyes burned like a flame and from its throat came a garbled sound, much like the indecipherable speech of a dying man. Reho thought it was trying to say something. It wouldn’t get the chance to say it twice.

From behind him, Ends’ rifle thundered, taking off the man-creature’s head. Its corpse was dead weight as it pressed its nails farther into Reho’s leg. Reho lifted the creature and rolled it to the ground. In the distance, a loud cry erupted as another creature appeared midair, illuminated by the faint glow from the navigation room. This one appeared different from the other. Its head was elongated and its ears pointed.

Ends’ next shot went wide. Reho launched toward the creature, preventing it from entering the navigation car. Just before their bodies collided, Reho heard a loud thud from the top of the steamer and glimpsed Ends, his gun pointed upwards.

Several shots fired behind Reho as he and the creature landed in the dark, green jungle. He heard the creature scramble against the earth near him in the dark.

More shots filled the night.
Sola and Thursday!

It hadn’t gone far. The creature swung underneath him, knocking Reho to the ground. Reho grabbed into the darkness as the creature slipped through his hands. Its body was sinewy with thick, matted, wet fur.

It attacked again. Reho buried his knife into the top of the creature. He felt the blade hit bone, then twisted it and jerked it upward. The creature shrieked as it struggled to get away. As it pulled, Reho pressed down on the knife with all his weight. He felt the creature’s blood soak through his jacket. Reho pulled his knife from the creature.

He heard no more gunshots as he ran back to the steamer. Sola opened the door for Reho then shut it behind. Reho didn’t expect to see what was lying on the floor.

“Gibson, get this bucket of steel moving!” Ends said, pressing his hand against his side as blood poured from between his fingers and onto the floor. Sola was digging through the medic kit in search of clotting powder to stop the bleeding. There was no time for stitches.

“Where’s Thursday,” Reho asked, kneeling next to the dead creature.

“Filling the burner,” Sola replied.

The train was building momentum, but if there were more of these deadly creatures out there, they could easily jump onboard before the steamer gained significant speed. Gibson was at the controls, frantic but focused, unlike how he had been behind the trigger. Here, he was in charge.

Sola took the gaslight off its hook and lowered it to what lay dead on the floor. The man-creature was the one Reho had seen at the edge of the blue light. It was as much human as animal in appearance. It resembled a wolf Reho had once seen in a picture book as a kid. Its nose protruded, but its matted fur and pale yellow eyes were unmistakably wolf. At the top of its head, long hair covered part of its bloodied face. These creatures looked spliced together and unnatural.
They must be escaped experiments from Omega. What else could they be?

Ends’ pistol was still gripped in his right hand. “I shot that bastard while it dug its muzzle into my side.”

“I heard shots from the back of the train,” Reho said.

“They were on the roof,” Thursday replied. “We heard the shooting and decided to join the fun.” He had a coal shovel in hand and wore an expression that told Reho the fun was over.

“Fun?”
Ends said, grimacing as Sola stuck him with a needle.

“It’s a flesh wound, but it’s deep,” Sola said, pressing a bandage and running tape around his
waist.

“I can get stitched once we get to Jaro,” Ends said, unscrewing the top of a flask of hard shine that had seen strapped to his ankle.

Like a madman behind the controls of a suicidal steamer, Gibson never looked away from the tracks ahead of them.

“Is he going to be able to slow this thing down when we reach Killa-jaro?” Thursday asked, looking around the room. No one replied. Reho walked over to Gibson and looked down at the speedometer. Its digital readout was blank. He looked at his AIM: ninety-seven miles per hour.

Behind him, Thursday lifted the dead creature, kicked the handle of the outer door, and tossed the wolf-man into the darkness.