Mr. Ruins: A Thriller (Ruins Sonata Book 1) by Michael John Grist Page B
Authors: Michael John Grist
Tags: Science-Fiction, weird
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the backs and heads, chests and faces. I stab them two and three at a time like skewer kebabs, slice them like meatloaf portions, even as I watch the flickering red shield ahead sputter, fade, and die.
We burst through the final rank of soldiers and into the inner circle seconds after the shield cracks. So is there with a musket in her hand, fierce determination writ over the desperation. Far is curled up with his hands over his eyes at the tree's base, and all around us are the pressing ranks of the soldiers, advancing. Still there are too many and I know that they'll soon overwhelm us, like ants swarming a scorpion.
Then So cranks one of the muskets and points it at the nearest soldier, depresses the trigger, and
CRACK
The musket ball shears through the model soldiers like the QC should have, felling a handful in a straight line. She cranks it again, takes aim, and nods at me.
"Get a cannon Doe," I call over blood-mic. "A real cannon."
So's next shot cracks out and a half dozen more bodies fall and don't get up. I crank my own musket just like So had, aim it at the nearest bulge in the mass of pressing plastic, and fire. Soldiers tumble all in a line.
Soon Ray, So and I are back to back to back in a triangle, all shooting, adrenaline buoying us up as we pick soldiers off in straight lines, stepping in to drive our bayonets through any stragglers. Their numbers never seem to end though, and I'm tiring fast.
BOOM
The cannon-shot compacts the air like thunder, and abruptly half of the soldiers are blown to smithereens. A great gap appears in their ranks, and I see Doe on the other side with a fuse in her hand and the cannon at her side.
We stab at the remaining half, until Doe levels them too with another blast. We pick off the remnants with bayonets, a massacre with no screams or blood.
Afterward there is a curious absence of sound, beyond the ragged breathing of our chord and Far's quiet sobbing. I am sweat-slicked and exhausted, but the battle is over. We won.
I turn, taking in the scene. Far is still huddled by the tree, So, Ray, Doe have their HUDs off and are all steaming. So has a wild, fractured look in her eyes. Around us there is a mandala of dead plastic bodies and parts spreading outward like the layers of the Molten Core. Occasionally one of them champs at the air.
"Did we kill them all?" comes Ray's voice.
A long eerie moment passes as we each sweep the trees around us, waiting for more to emerge. None do.
The chord look to me. I am the captain, and my job is to lead, so I blink away the uncertainty and start giving orders.
"Ray help Far," I say. "Doe walk a patrol." My voice sounds strange after so much violence, like I should be more altered somehow, though I'm still the same. "Everybody take your shock jacks." I tongue the shock jack myself, releasing a stored flow of my own body's chemicals, designed to counteract the numbing, sickening after-effects of combat. At once I feel the impact, becoming more relaxed, more attuned to the world. My sense of smell returns, the fog in my hearing clears.
My orders are followed, and Ray goes to Far, Doe lifts a musket and starts for the tree-line perimeter. That leaves only So.
I turn to her. The wild look is still in her eyes. I walk over and take her by the hand, and I lead her to La.
THE DON E
Mid-afternoon, and the crulls are flocking through the blue-tarp park. The homeless marine is out, and so is an old mad women tossing seaweed crumbs. I watch them at their efforts as I circle the sagging lake of algae-scummed rain water.
He wants meat, and she wants companionship. That's what we boil down to, I suppose.
I nod to him, he nods to me, our ritual. I can see he's trapped a crull, is already wrapping it in old newsprint blown over from Calico. Roasted on an open flame of dried algae, the paper will come away with the feathers, leaving broiled and gamey meat.
I walk on, through the park and the outer slums, until I come to the
We burst through the final rank of soldiers and into the inner circle seconds after the shield cracks. So is there with a musket in her hand, fierce determination writ over the desperation. Far is curled up with his hands over his eyes at the tree's base, and all around us are the pressing ranks of the soldiers, advancing. Still there are too many and I know that they'll soon overwhelm us, like ants swarming a scorpion.
Then So cranks one of the muskets and points it at the nearest soldier, depresses the trigger, and
CRACK
The musket ball shears through the model soldiers like the QC should have, felling a handful in a straight line. She cranks it again, takes aim, and nods at me.
"Get a cannon Doe," I call over blood-mic. "A real cannon."
So's next shot cracks out and a half dozen more bodies fall and don't get up. I crank my own musket just like So had, aim it at the nearest bulge in the mass of pressing plastic, and fire. Soldiers tumble all in a line.
Soon Ray, So and I are back to back to back in a triangle, all shooting, adrenaline buoying us up as we pick soldiers off in straight lines, stepping in to drive our bayonets through any stragglers. Their numbers never seem to end though, and I'm tiring fast.
BOOM
The cannon-shot compacts the air like thunder, and abruptly half of the soldiers are blown to smithereens. A great gap appears in their ranks, and I see Doe on the other side with a fuse in her hand and the cannon at her side.
We stab at the remaining half, until Doe levels them too with another blast. We pick off the remnants with bayonets, a massacre with no screams or blood.
Afterward there is a curious absence of sound, beyond the ragged breathing of our chord and Far's quiet sobbing. I am sweat-slicked and exhausted, but the battle is over. We won.
I turn, taking in the scene. Far is still huddled by the tree, So, Ray, Doe have their HUDs off and are all steaming. So has a wild, fractured look in her eyes. Around us there is a mandala of dead plastic bodies and parts spreading outward like the layers of the Molten Core. Occasionally one of them champs at the air.
"Did we kill them all?" comes Ray's voice.
A long eerie moment passes as we each sweep the trees around us, waiting for more to emerge. None do.
The chord look to me. I am the captain, and my job is to lead, so I blink away the uncertainty and start giving orders.
"Ray help Far," I say. "Doe walk a patrol." My voice sounds strange after so much violence, like I should be more altered somehow, though I'm still the same. "Everybody take your shock jacks." I tongue the shock jack myself, releasing a stored flow of my own body's chemicals, designed to counteract the numbing, sickening after-effects of combat. At once I feel the impact, becoming more relaxed, more attuned to the world. My sense of smell returns, the fog in my hearing clears.
My orders are followed, and Ray goes to Far, Doe lifts a musket and starts for the tree-line perimeter. That leaves only So.
I turn to her. The wild look is still in her eyes. I walk over and take her by the hand, and I lead her to La.
THE DON E
Mid-afternoon, and the crulls are flocking through the blue-tarp park. The homeless marine is out, and so is an old mad women tossing seaweed crumbs. I watch them at their efforts as I circle the sagging lake of algae-scummed rain water.
He wants meat, and she wants companionship. That's what we boil down to, I suppose.
I nod to him, he nods to me, our ritual. I can see he's trapped a crull, is already wrapping it in old newsprint blown over from Calico. Roasted on an open flame of dried algae, the paper will come away with the feathers, leaving broiled and gamey meat.
I walk on, through the park and the outer slums, until I come to the
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