September 29
th
Year 1 A.Z.
morning
I spent most of the night, rather than sleeping, making plans with Viking, Valkyrie and Apocalypse Girl to break The Kid out of his cell. The Technicians were willing to help us out, that much was certain, as long as we take them with us when we leave. I asked Viking if he thought the rest of the squad might like to tag along as well; he looked doubtful. I nodded, he was right. It was unlikely that our short time leading that squad had been sufficient to make them betray The Boss.
I wanted Apocalypse Girl to wait near the elevator with the dog, but she would have none of it. Instead, the two techs would wait with Apocalypse Dog while the rest of us went after our old friend.
We contacted Static via radio, learning that The Mech-Techs had been attacked by Righteous as well, though they had fared better than we. None of the Ghouls had been able to climb up onto The Elephant to any real height, and they were just taking pot shots at any that got too high. The Elephant had been designed with massed ranks of Dead in mind, as well as various mutants that might be hazardous to survival. Dingoes, for instance, or Dragons.
In any event, they were well ready to drop the Trunk down for us as soon as we’re in position.
We went to the mess hall, as usual, for breakfast. German Doctor stood around, clearly waiting for someone. The instant she saw me, she practically came running.
“Lieutenant, glad to have found you.” She seemed a little concerned. “These aliens you have brought in, are they to be trusted, do you think?” I nodded, saying that they had given me little reason to doubt them. She still seemed quite apprehensive. “Have you seen… I don’t know what it is, exactly, I only know that it was human, once. It can still speak, I have heard, though I’ve not been given clearance to examine it.”
“Doctor,
he
is a friend of mine, if you’re talking about who I think you are,” I hissed at her. “What do you know about him?”
“It-
he
, rather, was flown in when you were taking out the cloning complex.” She told me. “Nothing more. I have only heard rumours around the labs, only the highest ranking doctors are permitted to speak with i-him. If he is truly your friend, are you planning on extricating him from his current circumstance? If so, I would like to come with you when you leave. I can get you into the restricted laboratories easily enough, then I shall meet you at the elevator,
ja
?”
She seemed so earnest about it that I told her to wait with the techs and dog. One more tagging along wouldn’t be too much of a problem. I flagged down Tiny and Apprentice, telling the pair of them to gather everyone else nearby and wait for my signal. I didn’t know what it’d be, I told them, but it would likely be loud.
noon
The Kid’s cell seemed deeper inside the complex than before. I knew it had to be a trick of the mind, before I didn’t know what I was going to find, now I walked with purpose. German Doctor, true to her word, smuggled us into the secure section, then thanked us again and left.
Apocalypse Girl walked by my side, step for step, Viking and Valkyrie flanking us but a couple of steps behind, keeping an eye out for potential threats from behind. I had them hang back as I went to The Kid’s cell. As I had figured, the door was locked. However, I had a handy screwdriver, and easy access to the door’s hinges. A few twists of my wrist later, and the entire door lay on the hallway floor.
The Kid’s massive bulk lay on the floor in the centre of the room. “No more,” he whispered. “I can’t take it any more.”
“Hey,” I said. “Do you wanna get out of here, or what?” He glanced up at my voice.
“Is it really you? They killed her, you know. Yeah, she was already Dead, I knew that, but I loved her anyway, and they killed her.” His fist uncurled to show the shark-tooth pendant that he had insisted on going back to The Commune to find. “I’m glad you’re here. What about your girl, is she here too?” Apocalypse Girl stepped into the room behind me, shyly saying hello and waving.
The Kid was in tears at the sight of us, the water streaking through the grime on his face. He had been through far too much for his tender age, nearly succumbing to the Dead Plague and then assimilating it into his system, somehow making it as much a part of him as the rest. He was, as far as I was aware, indestructible as a result, and the research that The Major had ordered performed by The Smart Couple was responsible for our own inoculation.
“Are we going to keep standing here or are we actually leaving?” The Kid strained, tearing the shackles free of the walls with ease.
We made it out of the secure section easily enough, only to encounter the rest of our squad, guns drawn and pointed squarely at us.
“I thought you might be stupid enough to try something like this.” Giant grinned, putting her rifle up. “We’ve heard stories about how they’re treating this guy, but none of us had the balls to bust him out.
“He’s a friend. What else could I do?” I asked her.
“Now you know how we feel.” She grinned. “Come on, you guys need an escort. If anyone asks, we’re taking him to a more secure facility.”
The first patrol that we encountered bought Giant’s tale, but the second decided they wanted to open fire. Scar ended up hit in the shoulder, Viking took one to the upper chest. I felt the searing hot kiss of lead as a bullet whizzed past my ear, well, along it really. The Klee-Vics behind them, Criss-Cross, cut them to shreds before they could even register that he was there. In the end, only three rounds were fired.
We ran the rest of the way, the Klee-Vics swarming to the hangar, rather than the elevator. The Commander, the only one to come with us, told me that they’d be up the walls to the top of Uluru in no time, and would try and clear a path for us.
The elevator doors were closing as Apocalypse Mum came into view. The look of utter betrayal on her face as the doors closed will probably haunt me to the end of my days.
evening
Sure enough, the Klee-Vics had cleared a path for us, holding back the Ghoulish tide as the elevator opened and we stepped onto the surface of the Rock. Ghouls were attempting to eat some of the Klee-Vics guarding our passage, only succeeding in breaking their teeth on their tough exoskeletons.
We came to the Elephant’s location quickly enough, let The Mech-Techs know, and they let down the trunk for us. The Klee-Vics sprung up lightly when the human contingent was aboard and the trunk raised once again. Apocalypse Mum and a group of soldiers was just appearing as the elevator rose once more, and I saluted her one last time, calling out that I would take care of her daughter and our child but that we couldn’t stay there.
A swarm of Ghouls then rose near The Boss and her men, who immediately opened fire. I looked to The Commander, who immediately whistled sharply. All of his warriors but one leaped into action, slaughtering the Ghouls surrounding Apocalypse Mum.
“We need to share a world. We must help them now. This one will stay with you. He will be seen as a murderer in that place.” The Commander shook my hand once again and threw himself from The Elephant onto a Righteous Ghoul that had just appeared near The Boss.
I turned to Criss-Cross. “Well, looks like we’re stuck with each other. Welcome.”
Septemner 30
th
Year 1 A.Z.
morning
The sun rose, pale and insignificant behind the all-encompassing clouds. The Elephant trundled on its merry way, to the south and west, away from the chaos and carnage that we left behind us at AR-18. A pack of dingoes tried keeping pace with us for part of the journey, until Mech-Tech gunners persuaded them otherwise, other than that we saw no moving creatures. Apocalypse Girl claimed land-sea-sickness as she nursed a bucket in the Captain’s Cabin, our canine companion keeping her company as Viking steered the ungainly vehicle that his clan of mechanics and technicians had cobbled together.
The Kid, huddled in a corner on the main deck, was given a wide berth by the majority of Viking’s men, though I sat with him for a while. He said little, just thanked me for getting him out of yet another sticky situation. I told him that he’d have done the same for me, had done a few times, and that was what friends were for. We shared a comfortable silence together for a few minutes, then he asked me to leave him be, he just wanted to feel the wind on his face again.
“We’ll talk more later,” The Kid told me. His eyes were fixed on the fist that continued to grasp tightly his shark-tooth talisman. His time at AR-18, though brief, had not been pleasant.
German Doctor watched him from a reasonable distance, jotting down notes on her ever-present clipboard. She had interrogated me at length as to everything I knew or remembered about him, but even though I had been there the entire time, I had no real insight as to how he became the way he was now.
Maori, Wall, Scar and Giant were busily teaching younger Mech-Techs about weaponry, showing them the proper way to operate their equipment. My squadmates had brought along a lot of hardware, reasoning that The Boss had plenty to spare.
noon
Apocalypse Mum had been in contact. The Commander and his Klee-Vics warriors had been instrumental in wiping out The Righteous, their leader had been sighted scurrying back to the northeast, a bare handful of his followers tagging along in his wake. Hundreds,
thousands
of Ghouls lay dead about Uluru. I must say, I’m grateful to not have to deal with
that
particular clean-up detail. She told me that she understood why I had left the way that I did, and that she expected me to look after her daughter. Then, she told me that I’d never hear from her again, and the line went dead.
Viking found a handy Meat-Beast, setting up the butchery as Mech-Techs went scouting. They returned a short while later, conveniently as fresh steaks were being laid out for the hungry. I was unable to think of food, however. Instead I found myself looking to the future, wondering where we’d find ourselves next.
The Kid and Criss-Cross seemed to be spending some time together, both being unique amongst our Mech-Tech hosts. I wondered if we would really be able to share this world with the Klee-Vics. Surely they would have different needs to us, wouldn’t they? Different goals? Different ideas? The Commander seemed reasonable, but what if he had been trained or even bred to deal with humans?
I wondered again about something we had learned while staying as the Klee-Vics’ guests, The Commander had told us that humanity had come first, before any other space-faring species. The different worlds that had suffered the same calamity as our Earth, the Dead rising to devour the Living…
evening
Scout left this afternoon, heading back to Coober’s Nest. Apprentice wanted to go with her, but felt that her duty was with The Mech-Techs. There were tears.
Now, at sunset, The Elephant stopped for the night, The Kid wanted to talk. So, we discussed everything, every last little detail about Archer’s Daughter. Four hours, we talked. I learned that she had always wanted to be a marine biologist, but had not been able to afford the required education. Instead, she found herself with a job at a mine, in a tiny town that barely warranted its own pub. She had planned on saving up every last cent that she was able in order to get into university.
When The Kid found her, she was already Dead, in fact, it seemed as if she had been for a while. No matter, he thought to himself, and simply reached out to her, as he had to other Dead in the past. There had been, he informed me, a modicum of her left. Just the tiniest portion, deep down in the decaying ruins that had once been her brain, but it had still been
her.
Then, soldiers had come, ruined everything with a bullet to her head.
“Here, you take this,” The Kid extended his arm, opened his fist, dropping the shark-tooth pendant into my waiting palm. “Give it to your own kid one day.” His grin was the first sign I’d seen of his normal, old self. It was good to see that he was still in there. I told him that our child would indeed receive this thoughtful present, and that we hoped he’d stick around this time. “Why not? I’ve got nowhere else to go, not anymore.”
Later, I stood with Apocalypse Girl, looking up at the night sky. Through cracks in the cloud we saw the red Intruder Moon. It looks as if we’re going to have to get used to that one, now.
Apocalypse Girl looked into my eyes, her singular orb darting back and forth between them, unable to decide into which to gaze. “I was thinking,” She began, “According to my mum, nobody’s heard anything from the west of the country. How about we head to Perth?”