We needed to get out quickly, fan out into the desert, and find a place to hole up for a while before the plastic men, the brutes, and the drones swooped in to kill anything that moved. I hoped silently that the poor bots still caught up in the thick of it would hold out just a bit longer, would fight just a bit harder, if only so we could escape.
I realized I was hoping to prolong their suffering so I could live just to see this all happen again. Just as I had too many times before. Then it dawned on me that this was likely to be the very last time I would see it at all. And frankly, I didn’t know which was worse.
Chapter 10000
The Light at the End of the Tunnel
Mercer and I walked side by side, neither wanting the other behind us. Sure, we were forced to trust each other, but neither of us actually did. As soon as I got out of that dank, labyrinthine dungeon, I was going to get as far away from him as I could, and fast. I imagined we might each back away from the other, guns at the ready, until we were out of sight. But until then, we were unfortunate allies. So side by side we walked, neither able to stab the other in the back. Literally.
“Can I ask you something?” I asked him, both of us staring straight ahead.
“Shoot,” he said.
“Don’t tempt me.”
“What’s on your mind?”
“How you got back here so quickly,” I said. “I took your buggy. And it took me the whole night to get here.”
“You left yours behind.”
I shook my head. “There’s no way you could have known where I hid it. It should have taken you . . .” I trailed off, finally putting two and two together. He turned his head, staring at me silently, waiting for me to figure it out. “You were tracking me.”
He looked away from me, facing front again. “The whole time.”
“From the moment I left.”
“The day before that, actually. I had Reilly shadowing you.”
“Why didn’t you just ambush me? Why make a whole game out of it? That far away you could have hit the parts you needed by accident.”
“Chance I had to take.”
“Chance you had to take? There were four of you.”
He was silent for a moment, mulling over his response, then spoke up, hesitantly. “Because I’ve heard the stories.”
“Stories? What stories? There aren’t any stories.”
“About you?”
“Yeah.”
“The hell there ain’t.”
I’d never heard stories about myself. I wasn’t some local legend. Most citizens didn’t even know my name. I liked it that way. I hadn’t the foggiest hell what he was going on about. “And where did you hear these stories?”
“Scavenging up in the Pacific Northwest two years back.”
“I don’t get out there much.”
“I reckon not. But this old dockyard model I was running with for a while up there did. Bot by the name of Billy Seven Fingers.”
“That’s funny. I knew a dockyard by the name of Billy Nine Fingers.”
“Same guy,” he said. “Fewer fingers.”
“He can get them replaced.”
“He likes the name.”
“He was in my unit.”
“In the war. I know.”
“He told you old war stories?”
“All the time.”
“So you heard about some shit I did in the war and that scared you? We all went to war, Mercer. We all did shit. Some of us did shit we aren’t proud of, but we all did it.”
“Yeah, but not everyone’s shit scared the bejesus out of Billy. Now Billy wasn’t no saint. Frankly, by the time I ran with him, he already had one foot on the scrap pile. He just wasn’t right in the head.”
“He never was.”
“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.”