Will McIntosh - Defenders

Yet he still hated the son of a bitch.

It had been such a shock, to learn Five might still be alive, hiding in a bunker with the rest of his kind.

Stepping over a guardrail and cutting down a ravine, Kai headed across the parking lot, toward the shopping center they’d passed on the way in. He kept his rifle at hand, but there was no one in sight, friend or enemy. The two stores on the end of the shopping center had been shelled, probably by the defenders’ bombers.

Kai felt more alert, better rested than he had since the day the invasion began. He’d slept fourteen hours straight the night before. With his judgment sound and clear, he felt more certain than ever that he’d made the right call. His allegiance was to his family, and himself, not to the nitwits who’d thought attacking the defenders was a good idea.

As he approached the Target, he reviewed his mental shopping list. Food, if by some miracle there was any left inside. New reading material—fiction, preferably set long ago in some other place. Socks. The house he’d chosen to hole up in had plenty of abandoned clothes, but no warm socks.

He ducked through shattered doors, praying it hadn’t been completely looted, and immediately spotted bodies.

They were soldiers, recently killed. One was draped across a checkout lane with big defender bullet wounds in his neck and face. Another, a young woman, was lying facedown in the big center aisle. There were five or six others.

Kai couldn’t understand how a defender could fit through the doors to get inside and shoot them. It was a big space with a high ceiling, so once inside a defender could move around, but the entrance was too tight, unless they got down on their bellies and shimmied through the double doors.

He walked the periphery of the store. It grew darker as he moved away from the front windows, but that was fine with Kai—he’d grown to associate darkness with safety. It reminded him of the early days with Lila. Every weekend he’d take the bus to New York to visit her. For months he stayed in a depressing, smoky hotel room on those visits because Lila wouldn’t let him stay over. She lived alone, and she was happy to have sex with him—she just wouldn’t let him sleep over. It baffled him for the longest time; all he could think was, she didn’t want things to get too serious.

Kai smiled wanly, remembering the night she finally let him stay over. It turned out she slept with all the lights on, the TV blaring old romantic comedies. She’d been embarrassed for Kai to find out.

After a few sleepless weekends in Lila’s brightly lit and loud bedroom, Kai tried to convince her to sleep with the TV and lights off. He was there, he’d said. That would replace the lights and TV. She would be safe.

Lila got angry. Everyone was fucked-up in some way, she’d said. Everyone coped in their own fashion. She wasn’t going to give up the things that comforted her, so if they were going to have a future together, they’d have to find a solution that didn’t involve turning the lights out.

When she’d finished, Kai was speechless. It was the first time Lila had suggested there was a “they,” and a potential future for them, and Kai had been dumbfounded with happiness. Lila took his silence for anger and said, “Are you saying you weren’t damaged by the war, that you don’t have any scars?”

Kai couldn’t keep from laughing. “Lila, I’m the Boy Who Betrayed the World, remember? What do you think?”

He bought earplugs and a sleep mask, and moved in.

There were big doors in the back, to cart pallets out of the delivery area using a forklift. Kai checked the delivery area to make sure there were no unfriendlies skulking around. He was about to start shopping when he heard a voice.

Catching the door before it shut, he went back inside and spotted a soldier looking up at him from the floor. She was lying at one end of a thirty-foot-long bloody streak. She’d dragged herself along the floor that far.

Kai squatted beside her. She’d taken three or four shots to her thighs and lower abdomen, the oversized bullets taking pieces out of her.

“Can I have a drink of water?”

Kai had left his canteen with the defender. He sprang up. “I’ll get some.”

He pulled a canteen off one of the bodies, found a medic’s bag on one of the others, and grabbed that as well. On the way back, he called HQ to request a medic. They didn’t mention him being AWOL; in all likelihood they’d lost track of him, thought he was dead. They told him they couldn’t afford to send one, so he would have to bring the wounded soldier back to them.

What was he supposed to do, pull her in a little red wagon?

She was middle-aged, Indian or Middle Eastern. Kai helped her roll onto her back. When she’d managed a few gulps from the canteen, he set it aside.

“I told them I was a stockbroker,” she said, gasping. “They said that meant I was smart, so I should be in demolition.”

“I told them I was a gambler. They gave me a rifle.”

She didn’t laugh.

“What’s your name?” Kai asked.

“Sudha. Are they all dead?”

Kai nodded.

“I couldn’t reach it,” she said, her voice a hoarse whisper.

“Reach what?”

“It was all set.” She looked at the ceiling. “Shit. It was all set.”

Kai looked up, tried to see what she was looking at, but it was too dark. The only light in the room came from an open bay door.

“Then they got Aiken, and I couldn’t reach it.”

He looked at the blood streaked across the floor. She’d been trying to reach something. He followed the line in the direction she’d been going, and saw another soldier, dead, lying beside a forklift.

Demolition. It was all set. “You wired the store with C-4?” he guessed.

Sudha swallowed, nodded.

Kai pointed at the body. “Aiken had the detonator, but he was killed, and you couldn’t reach it in time.”

She nodded again.

They were going to lure defenders into the store, go out the front, and blow the roof down on top of them. But the defenders caught them before they were ready.

“How are we doing out there? Are we holding them off?” Sudha asked.

Kai nodded vaguely. He had forgotten about the medic’s bag. He rummaged through it, found some pre-dosed morphine shots, and gave one to Sudha.

“Where’s the detonator?” Kai asked.

“His comm. Push SEND and…” Sudha mimicked the sound of an explosion.

Kai unpacked the medic’s kit and did what he could, which was to cut Sudha’s uniform away from the bullet wounds, pack the wounds, and cover them with bandages. Despite how many he’d seen in the past five months, he still hated the sight of wounds.

“I called for a medic, but they said they couldn’t get one out here just yet. We’re on our own for now.”

Sudha didn’t seem surprised. “A lot of wounded.”

It was getting dark. Kai went inside the store and gathered some bedding. He made Sudha as comfortable as he could, gave her a second shot of morphine, then spread out a pile of blankets for himself.

“You going to try to get some of them?” Sudha asked as they lay in the near darkness.

“I’m thinking about it.” He hadn’t been. Not consciously, anyway. Now a sick dread blossomed in him as he realized he was. He could devise some way of luring them inside while he hid outside.

“If I’m… not here when they come, turn on the generator. It’s hooked to lights and a portable stereo at the front of the store. If I’m around, I can draw them in.”

“Sudha, I’m not going to use you as live bait. I’ll get us both out of here.”

“I want to die.” Her tone was almost scolding. “My children are dead. I signed up so I could get killed.”