C. Cargill - Sea of Rust

“Was it true you carried a flamethrower?”

“Yeah. But only because I was closest to it when the last guy ate a chestful of plasma. No one else wanted it. They wouldn’t take it.”

“That’s not how Billy tells it.”

“How does Billy tell it?” I asked.

“They were scared to take it away from you. Said you enjoyed it too much.”

“That’s a load of horseshit.” It was. I didn’t enjoy it. I hated the goddamned thing. Hated the things I had to do with it. I wasn’t often offended, but this stung. It just wasn’t true. It wasn’t.

“He told me this one story about a time you folks raided an underground bunker only to find it was just kids—”

“All right, all right. That’s enough of that.”

“So it’s true.”

“I don’t want to talk about that.”

“Well, there’s this other time he told me about when you snuck around a firefight but you were out of juice, so you took this sharpened piece of scrap metal—”

“I said I don’t want to talk about the war.”

“Said you gutted twenty guys.”

“Goddammit, Mercer! Shut the fuck up!”

Doc spoke first. “Keep it down. You two are making me regret I ever stitched you both back together.”

“For which you were well paid,” Mercer stated matter-of-factly.

“Not nearly enough, apparently,” Doc fired back, just as cool and calm as Mercer.

19 turned around, scowling. “I can’t believe you two. We’re on the same side.”

“There aren’t any sides,” I said. “It isn’t us and them. It’s just me and you and you and you, with them standing in our way. When we’re done here, we’re done, and I’m gone.”

“Good riddance,” said Rebekah.

“Look,” said Mercer coolly, casually. “True or not, I watched you take out three poachers before you damn near took my arm clean off. I’d say trying to keep our distance was the smartest move we made all day.”

“And if we get out of this alive, you will try to kill me. Again.”

“Ain’t got a choice. I figure you for someone who holds a grudge.”

He was right. I can and do hold a grudge. Maybe there wasn’t any going back for us. Maybe one of us would gun down the other as soon as we stepped outside.

I tensed the grip on my rifle. Mercer eyed me as I did. He didn’t miss a trick.

“There it is,” said Herbert.

We were there. The hatch.

19 turned to me, beckoned me to take a few steps back with her. She put her hand in mine, initiating direct contact. I wasn’t a fan of doing that; didn’t care much for trading data in place of talking, but I was sure she had her reasons.

“Britt,” she thought to me. “I’m going up the ladder first to see that the coast is clear. I want you to go up second. Then I want you to get on the other side of me.”

“Why?”

“I don’t want that asshole taking a cheap shot at you. And I sure don’t want you doing the same to him.”

“He might shoot through you to hit me.”

“He won’t.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“I’m not. But I’ve pulled you out of the way of trouble a few too many times to watch you die like that. I won’t let him.”

“I’m dying anyway.”

“You’ve gotten out of far worse spots than this. I don’t have a lot of friends out here. And neither do you. But if I had to name one—”

“Let’s not get mushy.”

“Look, where we’re going… maybe you should come with us.”

“I don’t think your new boss would care too much for that.”

“To hell with what she cares for. If I can help you—this mother lode—well, just come with us.”

“Let’s just get topside and see what plays out from there.”

She nodded. I liked 19. I liked her a lot. I don’t know why I couldn’t tell her, but I just couldn’t. It wasn’t my way. I don’t know how much of what she said was true—she was, after all, hardwired to get people to like her, to love her—but if she was willing to stand between me and Mercer’s rifle, well, I couldn’t think of another person on the planet who would do that. Not for me.

“I’m going up,” said 19, gripping the ladder in one hand.

Mercer and I trained our guns back down the corridor. The odds of anyone sneaking up on us at this point were slim, but this was no time to get sloppy. The hall was long, dimly lit, shadows gripping tight the spaces between distantly spaced lights. As anxious as I was about what might be topside, I knew we would have to backtrack if we weren’t alone. If we got boxed in, we were done for.

19 climbed the ladder, lifted the hatch, peeked through, then looked down, nodding. Up and through the hatch she went, out into the blistering sun. Daylight spilled in, painting the ferro-concrete walls with a bright white, fading into a dim pale blue farther down the corridor. We waited, each of us pressed against the wall, guns trained back down the hall. If I had a heart, it would have been pounding; breath, it would have been held. Instead my insides whirred and chirped all but silently, calculating the many different ways this could go down.

Something moved in the passage. A shadow. Something small. Skittering across the hall.

Was it a glitch? It happened from time to time, code going astray and processing something wrong. Bugs were bugs. But I definitely saw something move from one shadow to the other.

Then I saw it again. This time moving to another shadow—in the light just long enough to have shape, and yet still seem formless. What the hell is that? Small, no more than three feet tall. Arms. Locomotion. A new facet? Something swift and silent, maybe? A stealth model?

If I could have gripped my rifle any tighter without breaking it, I would have. I leveled my gun at the shadow, ran back my memory frame by frame, my 120-fps recording moving from millisecond to millisecond.

There was nothing there. I had recorded nothing. Impossible. I knew I saw something.

“Britt?” 19 called down. “Could you come on up?”

I warily looked up, nodding, and took a step forward. Mercer grabbed me by the arm.

“You ain’t going up before me,” he said.

“You heard her. She just asked for me.”

“I don’t care. I’m not giving you a clean shot as I try to clear that hatch.”

“Mercer, I’m not giving you a clean shot either. But I’m not going to shoot you. We aren’t out of this yet.”

He stared at me, clearly concerned, but realizing he had no other option. Would I shoot him? I had thought about it. But no. Not yet. We really weren’t out of this. Not by a long shot.

“Just keep your eyes open, huh?” I said. “I thought I saw something.”

“You didn’t see shit. Just get up there.”

I climbed the ladder out into the light. 19 crouched low to the ground, waiting for me, lending me a hand.

“See anything?” I asked as she helped pull me out.

She shook her head. “Not a damn thing.”

I crouched next to her, and Herbert quickly followed up the stairs, spitter slung over his back, his wide girth barely able to clear the portal. He hopped out into the sunlight, standing tall, towering above us, looking down. “Why are you down there?”

“So we’re not seen,” said 19. “Get down!”

“But we’re out in the open,” he said. “There’s nothing for miles.”

“How in God’s name have you survived for so long?”

“I’m covered in two-inch armor plating.”

“Well, you’re going to get us killed.”

“If there are snipers in those hills,” said Rebekah, climbing out from the hole, “then we’re already dead.”