Tale of the Dead Town (13 page)

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Missiles closing—three seconds to impact!” came the bloodcurdling news from the microphone
on the man’s shoulder. All eyes were on D. The Hunter reached into the hole in the
wall, and, grabbing a fistful of cables, he pulled down. From his shoulder to his
wrist, pale blue electromagnetic waves clung to him like a spider’s web, and white
smoke rose from his body. His face didn’t show the slightest hint of pain. His right
hand went into action, pulling out the ends of the severed cords. Electromagnetic
waves covered D entirely . . . Perhaps it was the first time this young man had worn
a color other than black. Using his body as a conductor, energy suddenly shot from
the reactor to the barrier projector.

Richly colored blossoms opened near the town. Flames that could get as hot as fifty
million degrees and a lethal dose of electromagnetic waves and radiation churned through
the atmosphere, threatening to destroy the electronic wall that’d suddenly appeared.

The people saw the electromagnetic waves running from D’s right hand to his left in
reverse direction. D’s eyes narrowed. The flow changed back again. The barrier didn’t
fade until the trio of blasts dissipated in the air.

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II

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Even after D had backed away, no cheer went up in the control room. What they’d just
witnessed was so incredible it left them absolutely stunned with amazement. Their
amazement, along with their overwhelming sense of relief, was enough to throw them
into a state of dementia. The man before them—their savior—clearly couldn’t be human.
That’s why he was so good-looking.

Lightly tossing his head, D shook off the white smoke still rising from his body.

“The flying object is closing,” a somewhat listless voice announced through the microphone.
The main craft still remained.

Braced, perhaps, for the next attack, D didn’t move.

“It’s closing on us—just a thousand yards off, nine hundred, seven hundred, six hundred
. . . ”

“It’s gonna hit us . . . ” someone muttered.

“We can’t change our heading.”

“We’ve had it now . . . ”

A black wind fluttered by the men.

D exited the control room. Racing up the stairs, he charged across the street. The
center of town was completely empty. With sunlight falling in a bright shower, the
town was a picture of tranquility. A voice he knew cried out, and D looked over his
shoulder. Lori and Dr. Tsurugi were dashing toward him. D didn’t stop for them, but
kept on running. Something became visible beyond the town’s defensive walls. The form
of their foe was clear now.

It seemed that floating cities of various kinds followed the same basic structure,
and the shape flying toward them at high speed bore a strong resemblance to their
own town. In fact, it was almost identical. The familiar rows of dwellings, the navigational
control tower, and three-dimensional radar arrays all stood out in the sunlight. Perhaps
the only point where the two towns differed was that all of the structures on the
other town were reinforced with menacing armor plating. One look at the new town and
its aim was apparent. The vessel was built to plunder.

Posing as an ordinary city, they might close in on their victims under a pretext of
trade, then use their cannons to rob their prey of their defenses before sending armed
troops to board. In other words, they were pirates of the sky. But, strangely enough,
not only wasn’t there a single person to be seen on the streets or in any of the ship’s
portholes, but no one was visible through the control room’s window, either.

“That’s odd—if this ship’s here to loot us, they should be softening us up with their
guns now,” D heard the winded Dr. Tsurugi say from behind him. “But they’re pulling
alongside us instead. We’ll have to fight them.”

“What about the sheriff?” D asked, eying the pirate ship slowly circling them.

“He’ll be here soon, I’m sure,” the physician replied. “The real question is whether
he’ll be of any use or not.”

“Why’s that?”

“As you may already know, due to their overprotected state, people around here are
incredibly susceptible to shock. The towns-folk here have had peace for too long.
Fights and other disputes have always been the sort of things they could settle among
themselves in their little town. Forget the fact they wouldn’t know how to begin to
deal with attackers from outside—the whole incident with the lightning has left the
lot of them in a stupor.”

“Then it’s up to just the three of us.”

A perplexed expression wafted over Dr. Tsurugi’s face. “The three of us?” he muttered,
paling instantly. “I can’t believe you! You intend to have Lori fight? Why, she’s
just—”

“She has to live on her own.” D’s words had an edge like the wind.

After a bit of hemming and hawing, Dr. Tsurugi nodded. “You’re right. That’s what
life on the Frontier is all about. But what’ll we do?”

A sharp impact shook the ground they stood on. The enemy ship had finally pulled alongside
the town.

D produced a memo pad from one of his coat’s inner pockets. It was the same pad that’d
been left out for Lori at the hospital. Eyes wide with astonishment, the physician
wondered why he’d been carrying it around. Putting the tip of his forefinger in his
mouth and nicking it open, D drew it across the memo pad.
Fight or die,
he wrote.
We want you with us.

Us. That meant the three of them were going to fight together. Lori nodded fervently.

“But, what’ll you have her do? She’s an injured girl.”

“Go to the weapons bunker and get us some arms. She’ll carry the ammo and be in charge
of reloading.”

“Okay.”

The two of them dashed away. D looked back at the blocks of buildings. As his companions’
footsteps faded out, more rough footfalls arose to take their place. It was the mayor,
the sheriff, and some of his men—four men in all. And the physician had said he didn’t
know if they’d be of any use . . .

There was another impact against their protective walls. From the deck of the pirate
ship, several steel sheets extended toward the town. Hooks sank noisily into the top
of the town’s walls, and the sheriff and his companions unconsciously backed away.
Every face was taut with fear. These men lived in a closed society where everyone
understood just how tough they were supposed to be, but now that they faced invaders
who wouldn’t know the reputations they’d long relied on, they were reduced to cowards.

D’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly. He waited, but what he waited for never appeared.
Silence. . . Nothing happened. While the planks had been laid for plundering, not
a single blood-crazed outlaw appeared.

“What the hell is this, then?” one of the lawmen said, sounding rather relieved. “Are
they just fucking with us or what? Not one of them has shown himself.”

“They’ll come out any second,” another one said, his voice on the verge of tears.
“And when they do, they’ll rip us to shreds with some god-awful weapons. Damn it!
God damn it all! Why do we gotta go up against these damn freaks?!”

The sheriff roared, “Knock it off! You’re turning my belly. We’re here now, so there’s
no use bitching about it. We ain’t letting a single one of them marauding motherhumpers
into town.”

Compared to his compatriots, Hutton was certainly brave. In the wake of that outburst,
his cowardly deputies readied their shotguns again. And yet, still—nothing happened.

The mayor looked at D suspiciously. “Somehow, I don’t think they’re toying with us
. . . ”

No reply came from the Hunter, but his black coat zipped past the men’s noses. D stood
on the gangway bridging the two vessels. Black hair streaming in the wind, coat fluttering,
he trained his gelid stare on the deck of the enemy ship. Suddenly, he advanced without
making a sound.

The men looked at each other. They must’ve realized protecting the town was an unavoidable
part of their duty, but the mayor stayed where he was, led by the sheriff, while the
others struggled up the wall and began to cross the same gangway. Just as they finished
crossing the ten-foot-long plank, two things made the men grow pale—a strange aura
and a stench. The aura could only mean death. And the stench was that of death as
well.

Just moments earlier this ominous vessel had them fearing for their very lives, but
now the unsettling silence did even more to start these rough men shaking. There was
no sign of D. The men hopped down onto the street. Right in front of them lay the
residential sector. The layout itself wasn’t all that different from their own town.

“Pete, you and Yan find the control room. I’m gonna check out this area.”

“But, Sheriff—this place gives me the creeps . . . ”

“You damn fool! The way things are going, there’s probably nobody on this tub. Maybe
they took to killing each other, or some kinda epidemic broke out, but for all we
know everyone could be dead. Now think for a second what that’d mean.”

Pete’s face, sullen until now, suddenly shone. “Oh, I get you! This here was a marauder
ship. Meaning there’s probably a load of treasure here.”

“Damn straight! We’ll tell the ol’ mayor the town could use some of their energy surplus
or their navigational computer or something, but the most precious cargo we’ll keep
for ourselves.”

“Damn, you’re a shrewd one. No wonder you’re sheriff. But what’ll we do about the
Hunter that went on ahead of us?”

“That’s pretty obvious. Kill ’im,” said the other man, Yan, but he didn’t know what
D was capable of. While he knew about how D had killed the two deputies, not having
seen it with his own eyes meant he found the account impossible to believe. “Lucky
for us, the bastard’s all caught up in searching the ship. It’s a perfect chance to
blindside him. What the hell—we can always say some automated defenses got him.”

“That’s real good thinking,” the sheriff responded, but his words sounded hollow.
He knew, as only someone who’d had the tip of D’s blade pressed against their throat
could, what a dhampir was capable of. “But don’t lay a hand on him, you follow me?
We’ll just take whatever we want. I know how tough he is. You lump him in with normal
Hunters, and you’ll be in for a world of hurt.”

“Yeah, but—” Yan began.

“We’ll come up with some way to get rid of him later. You savvy? No matter what happens,
you don’t lay a hand on him,” the sheriff said sternly, adjusting his grip on the
rocket launcher.

Parting company with Pete and Yan, the sheriff walked into the residential sector.
Unconsciously, he sought a sound or anything else that would show some sign of life.
Anything would do. Some hint of murderous intent rising from malicious thugs in hiding.
The snarls of vicious beasts just waiting to cross the gangways with their masters
and sink their fangs into the windpipes of helpless victims. The sound of a safety
being disengaged on an automatic crossbow. Anything at all . . .

But there was nothing except the . . . howling of the wind. There was no sign of anyone
on the roads, where the artificial sand had blown away, leaving the underlying dirt
exposed. There were just lines of dead trees down either side of the street, their
branches rattling dryly. Dust catching in his throat, the sheriff pressed a handkerchief
to his mouth. His cough created an unsettling echo in the otherwise still air. The
sheriff shuddered.

The sky was blue. His own shadow stretched long and wide across the ground. And yet,
the giant was nearly paralyzed with fear. Here was a town. It had buildings. It shot
missiles. It pulled alongside them, then laid gangways for boarding. And yet, there
wasn’t a single crewman. How terrifying was that?

As Hutton was about to set off to look for the home of the local mayor—or, rather,
the commander of this pirate ship—the tip of his boot struck something hard. When
his eyes casually dropped to the ground, they ended up bulging from their sockets.
It was a single bare bone. Most likely it’d been there for quite some time, as it
was dried out and had a thin brown patina to it. It was clearly a femur. Seeing the
severed end of it, the sheriff’s eyes went wider still. It was burnt. There were signs
of carbonization. As he rubbed it with his finger, some of it fell away as powder.
This hadn’t been charred little by little at a low temperature, as would happen in
a fire. It’d been exposed to a blast of ultrahigh heat. Probably a laser.

For the first time, the sheriff noticed the white things hap-hazardly scattered about
the place. There was a skull. And a rib cage. And another denuded skull resting on
a pile of rags. As his eyes squarely met the skull’s empty sockets, cold sweat started
soaking his broad back. Stirring his mind to keep it from freezing solid with fear,
the sheriff headed over to a shack that appeared to be a bar and the intact skeleton
lying in front of it. The steel arrow jutting from its forehead was a vivid testament
to the tragedy that’d unfolded here. One of the skeleton’s arms was outstretched,
and tight in its bony grip was a gleaming black automatic handgun of vintage design.
Prying the weapon from its fingers, he examined it. All the ammo had been expended—most
likely the result of a long, deadly conflict. But what in the world could’ve caused
the roughneck crew of a pirate ship to start killing each other?

Sensing something behind him, the sheriff turned his gigantic form with lightning
speed. Standing stock-still in the face of the seven barrels of his missile launcher
were Dr. Tsurugi and Lori. “Oh, it’s just you two . . . ” he sighed. Wiping the sweat
from his brow, the sheriff lowered his weapon.

“What in blazes is going on with this ship? What happened here?” Even the voice of
the hot-blooded physician trembled a bit.

Looking around at their ominous surroundings and the remains at their feet, Lori seemed
anxious, too. However, unlike the physician or the sheriff, she was completely detached
from the whole world of sound, and this actually served to mitigate the terror for
her to some degree. She and Dr. Tsurugi each carried a shotgun.