The Saffron Malformation (53 page)

             
Reggie took a deep breath, hoping for the best, and stepped out from behind the wall, taking aim with his weapon as he did.  The Broodling registered him but didn’t hesitate as the big man had hoped.  This guy had seen combat before and Reggie thought briefly that sneaking up on this one might not have worked out as well for him.  They both settled in on one another.  Reggie’s heart raced but he breathed slowly.  He had to fire first and it had to count.

             
The Broodling’s eye closed into a slit as he traced the dark man with his site.

             
Reggie took what he knew might be his final breath and when it was gone from his lungs he started for the trigger.  Looking down the barrel of the gun Reggie saw the Broodling was right with him.  Both men meant to fire it was just a matter of who was first.

             
Movement snapped Reggie’s focus from his target and he had just enough time to register Dusty emerging from his burning motel room.  Reggie pulled his rifle up and dropped to the ground, his shot went high and wide.  The Broodling’s did not.

              The burning bottle had come through the window and crashed against the bedside table where Rachel was perched.  She barely had time to dive to the floor before it shattered and spewed flames across the room.  Rachel scampered away from where she’d been, smelling the pungent stink of melting cotton and searing flesh.  Dusty fell onto her and smothered the flames on her back and right leg.  He checked her thoroughly while she assured him she was okay.  His eyes filled with tears as he surveyed where her clothes had burned to her skin and he kissed her repeatedly.

             
“We have to get out of here,” he said and she nodded.

             
He opened the door while she took aim with the rifle.  Her back felt cold and her leg too.  She glanced down at the charred bits she could see and noted there was no pain.  She knew that wasn’t a good sign.  Her attention returned to the world outside as the hotel room slowly filled with smoke and flame.  There’d be time for this later.  For now they had to get out if they meant to survive.

             
Rachel popped rounds into the car the Brood was hiding behind as Dusty stayed low and started through the door.  She didn’t hear the shot.  She just saw his head snap to the side and burst.

             
Blood splattered across the walkway that ran past the motel room doors and Quey was looking into his best friend’s lifeless eyes as blood pooled around his broken skull.  Past him he saw Rachel loose the grip on her gun and he knew what was coming next.  Rage burned through him and he rolled out from under the car, his eyes trained on where the shot had come from, the son of a bitch flanking from the corner.  Quey knelt for balance, bracing his gun with both hands and resting his elbow on his knee.  He fired once, tearing through the Broodling’s right shoulder and then again, this time hitting him in the gut.  He wanted the motherfucker alive.

             
Gunfire rang out and he turned toward the Broodling’s car, its trunk still ablaze.  He saw Render peering at the fight through the flames.  He wanted him alive too.

             
A bullet meant for his heart tore through his left arm instead and Quey spun.  Knocked off balance he fell to the ground.

              Man down.  That was Reggie’s only thought, a mental note to be dealt with later, it was that or end up dead.  That or all of them were going to die.  He sprang to his feet as Quey started his shooting spree.  There was no tactic in it, just rage and before the big man could close the distance and get to him he was down too, though only winged.

             
Rachel threw herself onto Dusty’s body and buried her face against his chest, weeping violently, screaming, pleading for him to get the fuck up.  “Don’t you die on me you fucking asshole,” she was repeating when Reggie noticed Render send the remaining Broodlings in for the kill.  He planted his feet and opened fire.  Two of them fell dead, the other two fell to avoid falling dead.

             
Rain felt her stomach tie itself into tight knots.  She was crouched between the blue car and moving truck staring at Dusty’s empty face.  Damn it’s fast, she marveled, horrified.  Just like the night Sticklan had fired into the passenger’s side of the van.  He’d meant to kill her but instead it was Kat’s head that opened.  She’d been a friend and lover, the only one she’d considered keeping until Arnie came along, and she’d gotten her killed too.

             
Guilt tried to sweep her but she had no time for it.  There was movement to her right.  It was a Broodling coming around the side of the car.  A grimace on his face, eyes wild, he leveled a pistol and her heart clenched as she looked at the deep black of the barrel, staring at her like a malevolent eye.  She saw the flash and somewhere in the background she heard the shots, two of them, that tore through her.  Pain burned through her as she returned fire, squeezing the trigger over and over as her body went weak and her mind spun.  Finally her weapon merely clicked.

              Reggie waited for any one of the remaining Broodlings to show him something he could pump a round into.  He heard a series of shots ring out from between the cars and he started to move in that direction.

             
The door on the driver’s side of the Broodling’s car opened and Reggie took a shot as Render climbed in behind the wheel.  He only got one and he missed.  The man stayed low as he shifted the car in reverse and backed away from the fight leaving two of his men without cover.  Reggie pumped rounds into them as Render continued to back up until he hit grass, then he sat up, shifted into drive and peeled out and down the road.

             
Reggie found Rain curled up between the vehicles with a dead broodling for company.  He nodded to her once then started for the remainders.  When he came around the front end of the car he saw the last one lying on his back, his hands empty.  Poor guy couldn’t believe Render had left him like that.  Before he had a chance to beg for mercy Reggie put a set of bullets in him and lowered his gun.  It was when he turned and started back toward the others that he noticed Rain clutching her side… and the blood.

What Ends and Begins

             
Blood flowed from the hole in Quey’s arm, near where it met his shoulder.  He gripped the appendage hard and pain fired through his chest.  He didn’t mind the sight of his own blood, however.  It was Dusty’s blood that made him want to vomit.  Dusty who had survived the camps the streets and the detention center.  Dusty who’d lived hard for more years than not and finally settled in and made a real attempt at a life… Dusty who’d been kind to him when he didn’t have to… when no one else was.  Dusty who’d never even been grazed by a bullet before.  It was something they’d joked about after the third time Quey had been shot.  They said he was magic, that bullets just bent around him.

             
“Quey,” Reggie’s deep voice was slight in the morning air.  It was air that had contained the sweet scent of grass and trees only minutes ago.  Now it was plagued by the smell of gunpowder and burning.

             
As the motel was slowly consumed by flames he glanced to Reggie and then to Rain who was curled on the pavement clutching her side.  She looked up at him with terrified eyes.

             
Leone ran to her and fell against her, wrapping his arms around her.  “Do something,” he pleaded.  Arnie had followed Leone and he knelt beside her.  Quey watched the way Arnie looked at her, so full of fear, her life his only concern and then the way she looked back up at him.  Her look was different.  Her fear was for Leone.

             
The big man walked over and met Quey.  They stood together and spoke softly.  “It’s in her gut?” Quey asked.

             
Reggie nodded.  “She’ll hang on for a while.”

             
“Anything we can do?”

             
Reggie shook his head.  “We’d have to take her somewhere.”

             
“Nowhere to take her.”

             
“Yes there is,” Rachel said absently.  Quey looked down at her.  She stood, trembling and looked at them.  “Natalie.”

             
Quey shook his head.  “She’s out of touch.”

             
“What’s that mean?” Rachel asked.

             
“Sticklan Stone came for her,” he saw the horror begin to form in his crew so he assured them quickly.  “She got out, but she had to ditch her sheet.  Don’t even know where she is right now.”

             
Quey looked from him to Rain and saw she understood.  She turned to Arnie and told him, “They can’t do anything for me.”  He looked at her.  “There’s nowhere they can take me.”

             
“Bullshit,” Arnie blurted, tears prickling his eyes.  He looked up at Quey, “You know people, people all over, people who can help us.  People who won’t ask questions.”

             
“Help her.”  Leone’s voice was heartbreakingly small.  He was staring at the blood soaking into her shirt.  Finally he looked up at Quey.  “Please.  If you can help her, then help her.”

             
“Anywhere I take her your father will know or the Brood will come.”

             
“I don’t care,” he said with the irrationality that comes with youth and desperation.  “Please Quey,” he begged.  The boy looked up at him.  “You love her, I know you do.”

             
It was like a spear through him and comparatively the bullet didn’t feel so bad.

             
“Leone,” Rain said reaching for him but the boy pushed her hand away.

             
“No,” he shouted at her.  “I know you turned him away but that doesn’t change it.”  He looked back up at Quey and said, “You love her.  You love her and you promised remember?  Nobody dies.”

             
Rain looked at him, realizing that he’d been watching the two of them sitting on the car last night, which meant he’d been faking sleep when she came back into the room.

             
Quey looked at Reggie who was a stone.  He wished he could look to Dusty.  A long sigh escaped him.  Leone’s eyes would not leave his; even if he looked away they were still there.  Finally he nodded.

             
Reggie looked to the ground.

             
“Get the sheet out of the truck,” Quey told Leone.  The boy smiled and hurried off.  “Big man.”  Reggie looked up at him and he was watching the Broodling near the corner of the building, the one he’d shot when he first emerged from under the car.  “That one’s alive.”

             
Reggie looked and then started toward the man.

             
“Just bring him here, no killing him yet.”

             
Reggie nodded and continued on.

             
“We’re not going to kill him?” Rachel asked coldly, as if that were unthinkable.

             
“I said no killing him yet,” Quey told her.  “I mean to know how the Brood came to find us here first.”

             
“I’d say the cars parked out front might have been a tip,” Arnie said, with a bitter tone.

             
“Maybe.  But there’s a building between them and the road and if you don’t know where to look that makes it quite the lucky find.”

             
“Might be they were just checking every motel they came across,” Rachel added as Leone ran up and handed Quey the folded sheet.

             
“Sure, I’m all for any of these explanations; I just want to be sure before we go rolling of to… wherever.  Hell I don’t know if there’s anywhere to take her she’ll make it to.”

             
Reggie returned with the Broodling, barely clinging to consciousness.  Quey opened his sheet and his heart ramped with hope.  There was a message from Unknown.  “Well I’ll be,” he trailed off as he read the message that came sometime last night. 

             
‘Got the device from your friend.  You were right about it not being a sheet or even from this decade.  It’s a Siglove if you can believe it.  Works like shit but… well it works.  Wanted to let you know I’m on the road again.  Nat.’

             
The Broodling began to stir on the ground at his feet as he took in the message a second time.  “Got a message from the doctor friend huh?” the man asked.

             
Quey’s eyes snapped to the broodling and he took a step forward.  “What was that?”

             
“You heard correct,” the Broodling told him.

             
Reggie was kneeling beside him, devoid of humor.

             
Rachel moved to his side and stood over him.  “How do you know about her?”

             
The broodling looked at Dusty briefly and then back up at her.  “First,” he said, gasping.  “Tell me what I have to do to live.”

             
“Dying quick should be what you’re worried about now,” Rachel said and Reggie stood and took hold of her before she could do anything to the man.  He spoke softly to her for a moment and she backed off.

             
“I’m already dying slow,” the broodling said to Quey.  “And painful.”

             
“It can be more painful,” Reggie assured him.

             
The broodling nodded.  “Reckon it can.”  He struggled to breathe, “If you’re so inclined.”  He coughed blood.  “You can leave me here to take my chances with the authorities if you like, who’ll probably be along any time now, by the way.  Just give me a chance.”

             
Quey nodded but he knew it was a bluff.  No one was going to call anyone about this and the nearest official Blue Moon security depot was at least an hour away.  “Tell me how you know.”

             
“I have your word?”

             
“True as my name is Dustin Orsmith,” Quey told him.  Rachel looked over at him surprised but nodded.

             
The Broodling nodded.  He’d heard the roader’s oath before.  He spoke between wheezing gasps.  “He’s already been on the doctor.  Made you in Northshire clear and true.  Registered town… security and all.  Plus he’s got your things.  From the ranch.  Fore it burned we snatched some stuff.  He’s been siftin’ through.  Stone’s went there himself.  Paid your friend a little visit.  She called you and we got a proxy ping.  Not enough to know where you were exactly but enough to know the area.”

             
Both Rain and Leone reacted to the mention of Sticklan Stone.  Quey simply nodded.

             
“Figure you still got some time,” the broodling wheezed.  “Render’ll be around soon as he regroups.  There’s Brood scouring this whole region.  We juss happened,” the man coughed up part of his insides and spit a bloody mass onto the pavement.  “He’ll be comin after you full on I suspect.  Got a real hard on fer you now.”

             
“Get a bed sheet from one of the rooms,” Quey said.  Then he indicated Dusty and added, “Wrap him up and put him in the back of the truck.”

             
Rachel hurried off to get the sheet.

             
“Arnie you get Rain in the back of the car.  Leone,” the boy looked up at him with wide eyes.  “Find something that can be used as a bandage.  We’re gone in two,” he finished and they began to scurry.

             
When Rachel came back with the sheet Reggie helped her wrap Dusty in it.  Leone returned a moment later with another sheet and some towels from one of the rooms.

             
“How’d you find us here?” Quey asked the broodling.

             
“Told you,” the broodling said weakly.  “Made you in Northshire.  Got the proxy ping.”

             
“Proxy ping is bullshit.  It requires a device with a chip, without that you’d just get that I’m attached to the North Continent network relay.”

             
“There’s an app,” the man began but Quey’d had enough.

             
“You have until their loaded then I either leave you or shoot you,” the once great moonshiner informed him.  The broodling looked into his eyes for a long moment, sizing him up and deciding.

             
“Kay,” the broodling said tossing his hands up and coughing.  “I’ll tell you.”  He wheezed.  “Motel guy gave you up.  Render put a call through the area and offered a reward.  Figured there weren’t many ways for you to go, after Vernire.”

             
Quey was nodding solemn.  It fit.

             
Arnie had Rain loaded up and was helping Leone with the bandage when Quey raised his gun.

             
“Wait!  You gave your word,” the Broodling protested.

             
“That I did,” Quey said then looked down at the broodling and took a step toward him.  “Only my names not Dustin Orsmith,” Quey informed him.  “His is,” he said, nodding toward the body Rachel was wrapping carefully.  The Broodling was allowed a single horrible moment of life, just enough to get it, and then Quey pulled the trigger.

             
Quey got Natalie on the screen after two rings and gave her a brief rundown.  He watched her face drain of color as she realized what he wanted from her.

             
“Quey, I don’t know if I can.”

             
“You can,” he told her.  “I know it.  And if you can’t you’ll do everything can be done.”

             
She nodded.  “I’ll need to stop for supplies.”

             
Quey nodded.

             
Quey got her location and was glad she’d spent as much time heading west as south because he knew a place they could meet and get to before Rain bled out.

             
Quey hopped into the passenger’s seat of the truck and Arnie climbed in beside him.  Reggie was back behind the wheel of his car with Rachel riding shotgun and Leone was in the back with Rain.  Dusty was in the back of the moving truck.

             
They pulled out of the parking lot and started down the highway.

             
Arnie drove in silence for a long while and this was why Quey had insisted he drive the truck.  There had been an argument on the subject but in the end Rain had told him to do as he was asked.  Quey told him Reggie was better with the car than the truck and the speeds they needed to travel at required a confident touch.  All that was true but what was also true was the need for Quey and Arnie to clear the air a bit.  Quey was trying to figure a way of broaching the subject when Arnie did it for him.

             
“You’re in love with her.”  It wasn’t a statement or a question but something in between.  Maybe an accusation, but if it was it was weak.