Authors: Nick Feldman
Chapter 6: A Bright, Guilty Worl
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I spent the whole night thinking, and it still wasn’t enough. Lucky for me, I’ve always been a seat of my pants kinda guy, so I’ll just make it up as I go.
Unluckily for me, Lime is smarter than I gave him credit for and he started the march before first light. That means the refugees (and there’ll be less of them than Coral counted on; people are dumb, and chicken) will be huddled up in a slum while the world burns around them, and it means I’m going to need to be creative on my way to that slum, because I don’t have a Corporation uniform or two-hundred pounds of muscle, halitosis, and hair on my tongue.
I hear the bikes ripping across the ground, Dogs hooting and shooting and generally killing anybody who’s not also on a bike. Since the Corporation doesn’t make bikes, it’s a pretty short list.
On the other side, there are Corporation mechs all over the sky, flying along with more grace than you’d figure, raining down governmental death on Dogs and unlucky refugees wherever applicable. Until one of those electrified spike-balls rips through them and fries their pilot, anyhow. Then their seven ton corpse just falls to the ground, usually doing some pretty major damage to a home or two in the over-crowded slums. I had a feeling more than a few children dumb enough to be born in this part of town were now rotting under their own ceilings. The sun is bright in the sky
It’s a real party.
I duck and dash on my way to Coral’s place. Nobody pays me much attention on account of I don’t have a weapon. I mean, I do, but it’s up my sleeve and in my arm and not half as big as the previously useless gun Lime took away from me.
I get in the door, and there’
s Coral… and her idiot brother. About fifteen refugees. Twice as many as I thought and maybe a tenth as many as Coral expected. She didn’t tell me so, but her face is a chatty Cathy.
I look over the refugees. The good news is they look mostly sober. The bad news is they look mostly worthless. Way I figure it, we’ve got about three miles to cover before we’re out of the danger zone. I hear explosions in the background, and screams. And laughter, too, which is worse. A bad Dog loves a good fight.
I lead Coral and her flock out, and things are bad. A Corporation mech had been doing some real damage, a silver giant death machine, gunning down dogs, but there’s just too many, with too many chains. A few get hooked or wrapped around him, and they start to climb. He’s overrun, like a rat being consumed by a tide of ants. At least we don’t hear any scream over the sounds they make eating the pilot.
“Come on!” I scream and lead them down a back-alley that might lead somewhere. There’s a Dog missing a good chunk of his side propped up against one of the walls, and one of our refugees vomits. From the sight or the smell I couldn’t tell ya.
We turn the corner, and there’s more violence. Twenty, maybe thirty Corporation soldiers with Corporation rifles trying to gun down about fifteen Dogs on bikes who’re closing fast. But it’s hard to hit something moving that fast and swerving that much, and there’s still plenty left to mow right through the footsmen, waving chains, crushing knees beneath wheels, and generally making a mess of things. The Dogs are laughing right up until a Corporation mech flies over head and drops a grenade right in the midst of them.
The refugees who didn’t already know find out that the Dogs bleed the same color we do.
It’s horrible, but we’re making progress. We’re making time. We’re getting out alive.
And then we try to sneak past a skirmish, and a little beeping circle lands right in the midst of our flock. I dive to the floor, taking Coral with me. Some of the others are quick enough too. But the grinder grenade
still goes off.
I don’t see it, but I hear it. A thousand little spinning hunks of rusty metal ripping through a dozen fools who thought they could leave this city. It’s not a quick death; the actual explosive blast radius is only a few feet; grinders were designed to hurt. The drill-bits spin through flesh, chip away at bone, and the recipient lives through the whole thing. He only gets to die a few minutes later when he bleeds out.
Coral wants us to stop. Wants us to try to help them. I don’t have the energy to explain to her that even if we stop all the bleeding, they use rusty bits to make sure the gangrene will still kill any targets that get that kind of ministration. So I keep walking. She, Rob, and a few of the refugees follow me. A few more stay behind, with their dying, bleeding families.
They’ve made their choice, and there’s nothing I can do for them.
I do a quick head count after an hour or so of more of the same. Three refugees left, plus me, Coral, and her idiot brother. She’s been crying. So has he. We’re closer to the fringes of the battle, now, but we still have to be careful.
“Detective!” I hear, and I turn to see a very large Dog (or was he a man?) in a bloodstained suit. Lime is limping towards me, using a cane for support. He’s been shot more than once. I jerk my head to tell Coral and the others to go on without me. They don’t.
“Lime,” I say and nod.
“I wondered if I might see you here, old boy,” he says, and
he’s having some trouble breathing.
“Let it go, Lime.” A brave Corporation soldier tries to sneak up on him. He thinks Lime doesn’t hear him. Lime winks at me, and presses a button on his cane. A short, sharp blade pops out of the tip, maybe four inches of steel. Lime whirls, faster than you’d think somebody as big and injured as he is could, and runs the man through.
“Thank you for this,” Lime says, gesturing to the cane he’s pulling loose from a dead patriot, even though I’d never seen that cane before in my life, though a long time ago I might have seen the bullet that gave him the limp that begat the cane. I pop my shoulder, my gun slides down my sleeve, and I point it at him.
“Thanks for this, too,” I say, and it’s a standoff. He’s maybe eight feet away. I could probably drop him before he could get to me. Probably.
But he just laughs. “Come on, now, old friend. If I wanted you dead I’d have had you killed last night. I’m just saying hello.”
I nod. “Hello.” He looks past me and grins at Robert, who whimpers.
“Who shot you up?” I ask. He chuckles to himself, amused.
“She did, of course. No one else on that side is clever enough to get the drop on me.”
“She’s here? In the fight?” I ask before I remember not to ask. Lime nods.
“Yes, she is. Actually, I ran into her at your office. She
shot me because she thought I’d killed you, if you can believe it.” He sighs heavily, and falls back into a crouch, using his cane to maintain his balance. He’s breathing heavy, but he’ll live. I lower my weapon. “Last I saw her, she was picking off my men from a rooftop about ten blocks south. But they had her mostly surrounded…” His tone changes, and he sounds genuinely disappointed when he says, “I don’t think she’s going to make it.” He shakes his head, slow, and takes a deep breath.
“So you’re leaving?” he asks me after a long silence.
“That’s the plan.”
He takes another deep breath. “Pity. I could have used a good friend… when this is over. Or an enemy… anyone worth thinking at, I suppose.” He stands, weary, and prepares to return to his war. “But with you gone, and her dead, or soon to be…I suppose it’ll be a lonely victory. Adieu, old friend,” and with that he nods, and starts to walk away.
“Adieu,” I say under my breath. I take a long second to think about what he’s said, then turn to the idiots I’m supposed to be looking out for, “Let’s go!”
An hour later we’re out of the danger zone, on the cusp of the city. Everyone’s tired. Everyone’s hungry. Everyone needs to shut the hell up. I pull Coral aside. She’s tougher than the rest of them, so maybe there was a little wolf a ways back… maybe on her grandmother’s side. There’s blood on her cheek, but I don’t think it’s hers.
“Alright. Listen. You keep heading West, from here, and you’ll be safe.”
“You’re not coming?” she asks, and I almost hear her heart break. But the death in the background is just a little too loud.
“No. Not yet.”
“But… we’re safe now.”
“Yeah. You are. And you’re welcome.” I tip my hat to her and I turn to go.
“Are you… are you going back for Her? For whoever Lime was talking about?” It’s a stupid question.
“No.” It’s a lying answer, but she needs to hear it. “Back there, there’s blood and misery. When the dust settles, a lot of people are gonna be looking for their loved ones, or for safe places to go, or… well, let’s just say it’s gonna be a good time to be a detective.”
“So go back tomorrow,” she says, meekly.
“Nah. Still a whole lot of fighting to be done, today. I oughtta be there.”
“Why?” She asks, angry now.
“Because the Corporation are evil jackals, and the Dogs are mostly monsters. Today’s the one day of my life I get to take ‘em both on. And I wouldn’t miss it for the world.” I walk.
“The pain you’ve gotten used to will keep you from regret…” I hear her mumble through her tears. She’ll be ok. They’ll be ok. Maybe. At any rate, they’re free, and that oughtta count for something.
So I pick my way back over the wreckage, heading into a warzone where I’ll almost certainly
end up dead. And I’m losing an awful lot of blood from where one of those stray drill bits caught me in my side. But I’m thinking of my pal Lime, and that if I wanna take him on tomorrow, I better make sure he lives through today.
And, of course, I’m thinking of her, on that rooftop, waiting for me. If we both live through today, the smart money says she’ll be the death of me. And if not her, then Lime. Yeah, man, the future’s gonna be a dangerous place to live.
* The chapter titles are lines from, respectively and in order, “Dead Reckoning,” “The Third Man,” “The Maltese Falcon,” “The Blue Dahlia,” “Gilda,” and “The Lady From Shanghai.” All six of those films are well
worth your time.
*Lime is, of course, named after Harry Lime of “The Third Man.” Rita is, naturally, named for the inimitable Rita Hayworth. Coral is named, somewhat less obviously, after Lizabeth Scott’s character in “Dead Reckoning.”
*The basic story, and the world, are the creations of Wesley Slover and The Portait Now. Used with permission.