Hell Divers III_Deliverance Read online

  Miles looked up, sniffed the air, and reoriented his furry body. They had been hiding inside the vehicle for several days, maybe more. X had lost track of time again.

  The sporadic boom of thunder continued. It was calming, in a way. X wished he could stay sheltered here longer, but he still had hundreds of miles to go before he reached the coast.

  He looked at the spider once more and then flipped the hatch down over the inside of the window. Darkness filled the interior. He lit an emergency candle and placed it on the dash before climbing into the command center behind the front seat, where he lit a second candle. The flames cast a warm glow over the monitors and radio equipment. Several bucket seats faced the equipment, all of them covered in fine dust.

  Miles followed X into the compartment and sat at his feet while he reached into his vest and pulled out the book. In the dim light, he scanned its contents. A picture fell out. He held up the image of palm trees swaying in the wind on a beach. Teal water slapped the edge. This was where he was headed, although he knew it wouldn’t look the same.

  Two years earlier, as X was starting to lose his mind, he had found the image during a raid of an abandoned bunker. He had also found the book then. The pages had been empty, but now they were filled with his words and other things he had collected over the years.

  The book helped him remember those he had lost: Rhonda, his wife, and Aaron Everhart, his best friend. It also contained descriptions of the people he was still searching for: Michael Everhart, Magnolia Katib, and Katrina DaVita. He had described them to the best of his memory so he might never forget.

  There were also pages dedicated to the people he had some serious questions for. People such as Captain Maria Ash and Lieutenant Leon Jordan—the people who had left him behind.

  After recording a note to himself about the spider’s venom, he set the book on the bench, next to the candle, and reached into his pack. He took out a power pack and set it by the radio, then connected them with the attached cord. He then used a second cord to patch his wrist monitor into the power pack.

  Miles watched curiously as X jabbed at the cracked touch screen of his wrist computer. As the radio equipment charged, he tapped into the system that would allow him to transmit on any open channels.

  “Maybe Captain Ash will hear this one,” he mumbled to himself.

  Miles wagged his tail at the sound of X’s voice. X reached out and stroked the dog’s soft fur. If he didn’t have Miles, he wasn’t sure what he would do. He looked up, trying to remember how old his dog was now. They had been together since Hades. For an entire year, he had resisted the temptation to break into the cryogenic chambers and choose a companion for himself, and then he and Miles had stayed another year in Hades. They had left that city around four years ago. That put Miles at about five years old. Had it really been that long since X last saw another human? Six entire years?

  He went back to petting his dog, hoping that the genetic modifications ITC had made to his DNA would keep him healthy for many years to come.

  A deep wistfulness passed over him. X had no such modifications, and every day that passed, he grew older and weaker. The radiation exposure and injuries had taken their toll. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep going.

  You have to keep going. You can’t ever stop.

  If he died, Miles wouldn’t be able to survive in the wasteland. X had selfishly chosen to break the dog out of his cryogenic sleep, so it was his responsibility to take care of him.

  The radio equipment suddenly crackled, and the screen flashed blue. Data began scrolling across it.

  “We’re in business, Miles,” he said with a satisfied nod. Using his wrist computer, he pulled up their current coordinates. The database revealed they were in the foothills of a place that had been called Asheville, North Carolina. The name meant nothing to him, but he scribbled it down in his book so he could remember it later.

  “Asheville. Asheville, North Carolina,” he said. “A town made of ash.”

  The dog wagged his tail again. He didn’t care about the words; he was just happy to hear his friend’s voice.

  Reaching for the radio receiver, X repeated the ritual he had performed at dozens of locations over the years, relaying the same starting message. “If anyone’s out there, this is Xavier Rodriguez, currently broadcasting from Asheville, North Carolina. I’m heading toward the coast.”

  From time to time, he also added the coordinates of locations he had raided that yielded food, water, weapons, or fuel cells, just in case someone was listening—someone like Magnolia, Weaver, or Katrina. If X could help them, he would, even if it also helped the bastards who left him for dead.

  He lowered the receiver and waited, listening to the hiss of white noise from the ancient speakers. They crackled loudly, sparking Miles’ attention. The dog tilted his head at the radio, then let out a low whine.

  X tuned to a different frequency, repeated the same message, and continued the process. On the fifth try, a sound answered. It started as a high-pitched wail that X almost mistook for the radio. Almost, but he knew better by now.

  He shut off the device and scrambled out of the command center, into the front seat. Just as he opened the hatch to look outside, a boom of thunder sent a tremor through the metal bulkheads.

  Miles followed him, tail between his hind legs.

  “Keep quiet, boy,” X said.

  He pressed his visor up to the hatch and held in a breath as a brilliant flash of lightning captured the shapes of long-limbed beasts racing through the streets. Darkness once again reclaimed the land, and X waited for another flash.

  The next strike was even more vibrant than the last, illuminating the debris field directly below the bluff—and more Sirens, skittering over the foundations of old buildings near the bottom of the hill. Eyeless leathery faces searched the darkness for prey. Most had already homed in on the vehicle.

  Each flash of electricity showed the beasts advancing. It wouldn’t be long until they reached the slope and began to climb.

  X swallowed and looked away, taking a moment to think.

  He could make a run for it with Miles, but they wouldn’t likely get very far. Perhaps it was safer to stay here, sealed inside. He returned to the command center and checked that the hatches were secure. Both were rusted thin, but they would hold.

  A second later, the bone-chilling screech of the beasts cut through the rumble of thunder. The fur on Miles’ back stood straight up, like the spines along the creatures’ backs. X slowed and deepened his breathing, preparing for the attack.

  The wait wasn’t long. A Siren smashed into the side of the Stryker, the clank of bone on metal echoing inside. Another jumped on top, claws scratching over the armor. Two more slammed into the side.

  The sound of a beast pulling on the hatch handle above froze X to the core. He pulled the blaster from his thigh holster and pointed it overhead. His other hand grabbed the rifle and propped it against the bulkhead. Then he unsheathed his blade. If the beasts somehow found a way to open the hatches, he would make them work for their dinner.

  For the next hour, the creatures crashed into the Stryker and pounded against the rusty armor. Their angry cries rose into an electronic howl that made X’s ears ache as they became more desperate to get inside. Miles hunkered on the floor, blue eyes wide with fear. X wanted to comfort the dog, but he dare not say a word. Maybe the beasts would leave.

  But that was wishful thinking, and he knew it. The Sirens knew they were here, could sense them somehow, whether by scent or by sound. Whatever the case, they weren’t going to give up easily.

  Maybe this was what the soldiers had felt like years ago. Trapped, at the mercy of a threat they could not see.

  As the minutes ticked by, X lowered his blaster and knife to ease the strain on his shaking hands and arms. He had stopped flinching each time the Sirens knocked against the
vehicle.

  Just as he was about to whisper words of encouragement to Miles, the onslaught stopped.

  The silence was short-lived. Several squawks sounded, short and sharp. X had heard them act this way only a few times before. One would cry out, and another would answer in their otherworldly language.

  The Sirens were planning something.

  A heavy body crashed into the back hatch, sending a vibration through the vehicle. X nearly fell off the bench. He raised his rifle at the metal door.

  Another jolt hit from the rear, rocking the entire truck. Two more Sirens and then a third slammed into the hatch all at once, and this time X did fall onto the floor.

  Before he could get up, the vehicle rocked again from the impact of more bodies. The force pushed the vehicle several feet.

  “Oh, shit,” X whispered.

  Flipping open an armored peephole, he could see the monsters working together to push the Stryker over the cliff. One stood on its hind legs, extending its wings. Its black lips opened and released a high-pitched wail.

  As if on cue, a half-dozen Sirens charged from a hundred feet away. They came running all at once, their bony heads angled downward, fins cutting through the air. Several more swooped in from above. They smashed into the back of the Stryker.

  X staggered backward. He quickly righted himself and grabbed Miles. He put the dog in a bucket seat and buckled the harness across his body, then sat beside him and clicked a belt across his chest armor.

  The next impact pushed the vehicle to the very edge of the bluff. The front seemed to dip, and X held in a breath.

  The beasts hit harder the next time, and he felt the vehicle teeter on its undercarriage. There was a sickening lurch, and for a second, all sense of motion vanished.

  Miles let out a whimper as the vehicle accelerated down the slope. The front of the Stryker smashed into rocks, jerking X back and forth with each impact.

  Through gritted teeth, he said, “Hold on, buddy.”

  FOUR

  Present day

  Captain Leon Jordan tried to shake off the recurring nightmare as he walked through the dimly lit passages of the Hive. In the dream, Xavier Rodriguez would slice Jordan’s throat from ear to ear with a rusty blade. Jordan tried to plead for mercy, but that only made X push harder on the blade until it hit bone.

  Jordan always woke up bathed in sweat, breathing heavily and reaching for his throat. And now he didn’t even have Katrina to comfort him in the early morning hours. She had betrayed him, which hurt worse than the torture of the nightmares.

  Holding up his wristwatch, he checked the time. 0600 hours.

  Almost everyone on the ship was still asleep, but he had a feeling Katrina would be wide awake by the time he got to the brig. Deep down, he still held on to hope that she would change her mind, that she would see that he only wanted to save the human race. That everything he had done was to secure a future for her and their unborn child.

  Two guards flanked him as he worked his way through the winding passages of the ship. Rusted steel hatches covered the portholes on the bulkheads, and in the faint glow of the overhead lights, he studied the bright drawings of fluffy white clouds, blue skies, and happy sun faces painted on them. Ever since he was young man, having put aside childish fantasies, he found the artwork disturbing. Why hide the truth?

  He halted for a moment and then turned to the guard on his right.

  “Ensign Lore, I want these hatches removed and used for scrap,” Jordan ordered. “People should see what’s really out there.”

  Lore scratched at the back of his neck but didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to; reluctance was written across his face.

  “Those have been here for a hundred years, sir,” said the other guard, a thickset man named Del Toro. “My grandfather helped paint—”

  Jordan took a step closer to both guards, staring them down without saying another word.

  “Yes, Captain,” Lore said. “I’ll … we’ll make sure of it.”

  Jordan continued around the next corner, the two guards hurrying to catch up. Ahead, two women from the lower decks emerged from an open hatch. He examined the contents of their baskets as he passed. A handful of undersized tomatoes, some of them still green, which told him things were getting even more desperate below. The women avoided his gaze and walked in the opposite direction, toward the trading post, while Jordan and his escort continued to the brig.

  Red helium pipes snaked across the overhead. The gray fins of sea creatures cut through the faded blue ocean scene decorating the pipes. The images reminded him of Janga’s prophecy. She had claimed that a man would lead them to a new home near an ocean filled with strange fish. The dangerous rhetoric had forced Jordan into the position he was in now, with most of the lower-deckers hating him and everything he represented. He took a moment to imagine her body smashing into the surface twenty thousand feet below. The image filled him with grim satisfaction. He no longer had to worry about Janga, at least.

  “I want this artwork …” Jordan paused. “I want this shit removed.”

  Lore nodded. “I’ll add that to the list, sir.”

  Jordan continued walking toward an intersection. The bridge was to the right, but he turned left instead. Many of his staff lived in this wing, but he hadn’t been here for a while. Over the decades, the occupants had added little decorations to the bulkheads and hatches.

  He recalled long ago, when he was just a child, scribbling his own drawings along this passage. His mother was dead by then, and his father spent most of his time in the water treatment plant where he worked, or at the Wingman, drinking his sorrows away, and hadn’t been around to teach him right from wrong.

  He walked slowly toward room 789 and stopped outside the hatch. Memories flashed in his mind’s eye as he reached out to touch a faint picture of a star-filled sky. He ran a fingertip down the metal to a sketch of a stone castle. He had seen something like it in a book—a place surrounded by white walls with fields of crops, and pastures where he could ride a horse, and streams where he could skip stones or fish for food.

  Everyone on the Hive had imagined an ideal home at some point, a fantasy cobbled together from pictures and old videos along with rumors and daydreams. But none of those places existed anymore. The closest thing to a castle on the surface, Jordan knew, was the Hilltop Bastion, a concrete bunker that housed only monsters, not knights and princesses.

  He yanked his hand away from the hatch as if it had burned his flesh. There were no fairy-tale castles. No safe havens. No heaven.

  Only hell.

  Children needed to grow up knowing the truth instead of holding on to dreams of the past.

  “I want the Hive purged of every single painting, sketch, drawing, and graffito,” Jordan said. “I want the bulkheads and everything else scrubbed clean. Anyone caught defacing the ship will be subject to loss of rations, or time in the brig. Repeat offenders will be dealt with harshly.”

  The guards nodded, their faces expressionless, and prepared to follow Jordan, but after a few steps, he halted in the middle of the passage.

  “Del Toro, I want that order carried out immediately,” Jordan said. “Lore, follow me.”

  “Aye, aye, Captain,” Del Toro said.

  Footfalls receded in opposite directions as the men parted ways. Jordan continued toward the brig, but when he got there, he didn’t stop. Lore remarked on the change of route this time, but Jordan ignored him. Three turns later, they stopped.

  “Stay here,” Jordan said.

  He opened the wide doors to the launch bay and stepped inside. Across the room, past the launch tubes, four silhouetted figures paused their routine of push-ups and stood. While most of the ship still slept, the new Hell Divers trained.

  Sergeant Jenkins stood watching with his sleeves rolled up to midbiceps, showing off old muscle covered in militia tat
toos. Jordan wasn’t sure exactly how old the man was, but he had to be nearing sixty—a venerable age aboard the Hive. In many ways, Jenkins was a legend, much as X had once been.

  The soldier lowered his arms to his sides and stiffened as Jordan approached. He saluted. The divers followed his lead.

  “Good morning, Captain,” said the sergeant.

  “We’ll see about that,” Jordan said.

  He stopped to scan the new divers. Jenkins had been tasked with vetting the three volunteers from the ceremony and scouting two more individuals for a complete dive team. So why did Jordan see only four divers?

  “Form a rank,” Jenkins said gruffly.

  Jordan walked through the maze of launch tubes and stopped ten feet from the new divers, who were now standing side by side. He knew their names already but decided to let them introduce themselves.

  “Name, age, and occupation,” Jordan said. He paused for a second and then added, “And tell me why you’re here.”

  Jordan nodded at a thin man dressed in black pants and a button-up blue shirt.

  “Tom Price, age thirty-four, assistant cook,” the man said. “I volunteered to be a diver because my wife and daughter could use the extra rations.”

  Jordan nodded, unimpressed. His eyes flitted to the next diver, a short woman with dreadlocked hair and piercing blue eyes. She reminded him a bit of Magnolia.

  “Jennifer Hodge, forty-one, farmer. I’m here because my daughter was diagnosed with cancer and she needs treatment.”

  She held Jordan’s gaze, and he could tell she was angry. Whether it was directed at him or at her situation, he wasn’t sure. She would need to be monitored.

  Next came Lester Mitchells, the tallest man on the entire ship. The tuft of thinning brown hair on the top of his head reminded Jordan of some sort of extinct bird.

  “Les Mitchells, but most people call me Giraffe,” he said with a wry smile. “I’m thirty-five years old and have been an electrician my entire life.”

  Jordan waited for him to continue, but Mitchells simply looked at him.