Chapter 7 Ready For Takeoff
Ready For Takeoff
The Ducati’s engine had developed a knocking; her poor horsie sounded increasingly unhappy.
Well, so was Cass—her face stung from a thin knife of air forcing its way through the helmet’s cracked visor, the grumble of bruises and scrapes was rising through a metallic singing of adrenaline in her veins and the minor bump Trille had dispensed earlier, her fingers cramped on the handlebars, and the big muscles in her thighs were quivering as if she’d had the mother of all step workouts.
Her temples throbbed, her throat was afire, she could barely see—she found the campsite more by touch and the odd sort-of-radar that usually kicked in when the cold spots and bogeys got too close, leading her past danger by the slimmest of margins.
But it had other uses, and true to form, she’d found one by being in a real pinch.
The bike limped to a halt, wheezing as she cut the engine. She braced it upright while tearing at the helmet with clumsy, gloved sausage-swollen fingers. A gurgle was her attempting to yell, but the noise couldn’t break free.
“Cass? Cass!” Grik grabbed her shoulder; he preferred watch duty on recon nights. She flinched, but at the heels of that reflex came a deep swell of relief.
She’d made it.
His fingers tangled in the helmet’s chinstrap. It was an outright miracle the thing was still clinging to her head, and when the buckle parted and he ripped it free night air kissed her sweating skin while the windburned bits of her cheek and forehead ached.
Even her tightly braided hair throbbed. Cass gasped; Grik swore, one hand on her shoulder, shoving as he examined her with impersonal thoroughness, checking for damage a soldier might not feel until too late.
The RV was a blur, windows glowing gold, and its side door banged open.
Figures boiled out; first was a shadow which turned into Apoc, wearing his summertime olive-green tank top and cargo pants, scrubbing his hands with a paper napkin.
Finally she had her breath. “Incoming,” she gasped. “Bogeys. We gotta move.”
“No shit.” Grik let go of her. He held the deeply cracked helmet up, squinting in the gloom; most of the campground was asleep at this hour and the motorcycle’s headlight had died. The only illumination was from the RV and a yellow slice of gibbous moon.
“Cass?” Bern pushed past Apoc and skidded to a stop, hair a wildly curling rat’s nest and one hand hovering suspiciously close to the sidearm strapped at his right hip. “How long? And are you hit?”
“Not hit, and not long.” Her lungs heaved, trying to catch up now that she’d stopped, and the shakes had her hard.
Trembling poured through her in great gripping waves, but at least she wasn’t cold anymore.
“Bogeys. Lots of them. Barely got away. But—no, listen.” Words jumbling together. “Bern, I saw something.”
“We’ll debrief in a hot second.” He turned slightly, right hand curling into a fist. “Saddle up, soldiers, we’re moving in less than five.
Apoc, you’re driving the bus. Grik, Steve, get this fuckin’ bike loaded and meet us at the one near Grayland.
” That done, he pushed past Grik to grab Cass’s shoulders as she attempted a full dismount from the poor wounded Ducati; it swayed dangerously since she’d forgotten the kickstand, the living breathing engine now an insensate chunk of rapidly cooling metal.
“Shit,” Apoc said, lunging to brace the machine as Grik did the same, his hip bumping Cass, nearly throwing her off unsteady legs. “What the hell, man, my baby’s all scuffed up.”
“Better the bike than our girl,” Bern snapped, and commenced dragging Cass for the RV. “All right, sweetpea, tell me what we got.”
“Singing bogeys and cold spots. Dogs with the things, the tentacles, veggie spiders, and those blue-eyed assholes with extra arms and without, but Bern, listen to me, there were others. Other bogey-killers.”
He didn’t pause. But he stiffened, his arm snaking around her waist, lifting her neatly over a patch of loose gravel. “What the hell?”
“One had a fuckin’ sword. The other did something to a bunch of the tentacle dogs and they exploded.
He was shooting at them.” It wasn’t making sense, but she was getting the salient points across—or so Cass hoped.
She managed to hook a shaking arm over Bern’s solid shoulders, and the exquisite relief of reaching safe harbor was only matched by the fear of something following her here, hurting her crew.
“They… they moved weird. Like bogeys, but they killed them.” Good God, did they ever.
“Huh. Keep talking, tell me. Get it all out.” Bernadotte, his bare arm scorching-warm, hefted her again as Cass’s legs threatened to fail. During a crisis she was just fine; it was afterward her limbs usually turned to quaking Jell-o.
This was another sign of safety, and she hoped like hell it was warranted.
On the other side of their campsite the pickup rumbled into life; the bike was being hauled up to its traveling spot with both soft, vicious swearing and a maximum of efficiency.
Another shadow darted around the RV—Trille, his cargo shorts flapping near his knees, blinking furiously as he unhooked water and electrical with the speed of long habit and weekly drills.
The tents, big and small, were already struck and stowed, part of Bern’s planning—on recon nights, they were always ready to move.
Just in case.
“Two I saw, maybe more.” There had to be more of the other bogey-hunters, there was no way a lone pair of soldiers could do what she’d witnessed. Did they have someone like her running scenarios, maybe?
The idea was terrifying and appealing in equal measure.
“You get enough on the bank?” Bernadotte boosted her through the side door, into comforting yellow light flickering as batteries took over from the campground electrical.
Wonderful familiarity enclosed her, from the smell of cooking and male worry-waiting to the coconut air freshener Trille was addicted to.
Scratchy plaid curtains rippled as the vehicle rocked and the bathroom door slightly ajar.
Taco seasoning, a hint of sweat, night air through the open windows, a confused glimpse of stacked dishes—most of all, it was blessedly warm.
“I… maybe, I can’t tell yet.” She wouldn’t know for sure until she sat down with pen and paper to game the job out, and Christ only knew if they’d be able to come back to this city and take a whack at the place.
Every edge inside the RV was solid and reassuring, even the dishes abandoned on the table.
Looked like the boys had been indulging in a midnight snack—eggs and chorizo since Apoc was on galley duty today, and whole-wheat toast or tortillas because Trille swore they were healthier.
“Easy there, sweetpea. Sit down.” Bern only called her that when he was really worried.
Cass was sure she looked like hell—windburned and scuffed, probably pale as death with fever-spots on her cheeks, and her eyes wouldn’t stop leaking hot water now that she was finally safe.
She fell gratefully into the booth on the far side of the table; Bern stalked back to the door and glared out, making sure his soldiers were on task.
Her pulse throbbed hard in neck and wrists, banged against her ribs. They’d just finished eating, by the look of it, and there was bound to be some left for her. Recon was hungry business, but her stomach was a closed fist at the moment.
“I only saw two of them,” she repeated, helpless to stop, and twisted to peer out the window over the table.
The truck’s headlights were on now, burning sleepily through the darkness; brake lights flashed as it was put into gear.
Grik and Steve were loaded up and already rolling.
“One jumped right over me. I saw it.” The old fear of disbelief from other people, normal people, had her by the throat.
“I believe you,” Bern said, as the driver’s door opened and Apoc hopped in, his keychain jingling with a trio of medals—Saint Christopher and Saint Jude, plus Saint Barbara for good measure.
The wall behind his seat held a rack for maps and the weekly schedules, paper quivering with tension and spare keys glinting secretively on neatly labeled pegs.
“Get ready for takeoff.” Apoc got the RV started, a familiar thrum passing through the entire road-ship. “We’re heading for number three, right?”
There were always contingencies, always.
“Yeah, but we’ll have to take the second route. Swing around the city, then head north.” Bern set about closing the windows as Trille piled in through the side door; when it banged shut and locked Cass had the urge to put her head down on the table and sob with unmitigated relief.
She barely believed she’d made it. And she hoped like hell she hadn’t brought any bogeys with her.
“We clear?” Trille asked, as if he’d read her mind.
“I th-think so.” Her teeth tried to chop the words into pieces, adrenaline and the remnants of synthetic upper in her bloodstream looking for an outlet.
Fight or flight was a matter of chemical cascades, both warring over one exhausted woman.
“I d-don’t sense anything, I went fast as I could. My h-helmet…”
“Get us rollin’, Apoc.” Bern leaned across the table to slide that window shut, then stalked for the cockpit.
But he paused to reach down, giving her shoulder a brief, hard squeeze.
It hurt; the pain was a balm, because it meant she’d kept her cool and done the right thing.
“Good job, Cass. We’ve got the wheel now, you do what Trille says. Let us work.”
She nodded, wishing her eyes weren’t leaking so badly.
The world in front of her warped, blurring through tears.
Trille grabbed a spare medkit from a cabinet near the bathroom and hurried in Bern’s wake, digging in his regular bag for stethoscope and blood-pressure cuff.
He turned off the lights as he moved, cutting down on backwash illumination so Apoc could see to drive; even the return of near-darkness wasn’t frightening because she wasn’t alone.
Still, her face prickled afresh, dried sweat itched on her scalp, she was greasy-damp under all the clothes’ padding, and her teeth chattered despite the interior’s warmth.
The RV lurched forward, a grazing beast happy to be shambling again.
Cass submitted to Trille’s ministrations—checking her pupils, peeling her jacket off to take pulse and pressure, a couple reflex tests she could have done in her sleep.
She kept talking, giving what details she could, and even though Bern was in the copilot seat up front she knew he was listening.
“Don’t like how fast your heart’s going,” Trille said, and his expression was grim. Of course Cass’s cardiac muscle was impersonating hummingbird wings, she could feel as much. “Get ready for an adeno nap.”
“Shouldn’t… shouldn’t I…” She wanted to ask if she should stay awake, all her antennae out to sense if the bogeys had managed to stay on her trail.
“No ma’am.” He already had the syringe out, double checking the bottle with narrowed eyes before nodding. “You look like shit. No fun and games for at least a couple days.”
“But I ought to take a big bump and watch to make sure that—” She was fixating, she knew it, yet she was helpless to stop. The body knew only that it was under dire threat, the mind desperately grubbing up reasons and justifications.
“No arguing,” Bern said over his shoulder, his I mean business, soldier tone. “We’ve got this, Cass. Stand down.”
She did her best. The needle stung her arm, the world pausing for a moment as her head lolled, chin nearly touching her chest, and an unfiltered blast of pure red-purple worry from Trille fought with the chemical telling her heart to stop fucking around and settle down.
It wasn’t her poor body’s fault. Her flesh was shackled to a madwoman, and doing the best it could under the circumstances. The world wavered, receded on a soft rushing like wings…
…and returned, the colors far less garish, the RV rocking as it negotiated the turn onto a paved ribbon leading for the campground exit. Branches scraped the roof lightly, trailing fingertips, as if the place was sorry to see them go.
“Christ, I hate adenosine,” Trille muttered.