“Why not just give the order to your soldiers?” Mac asked. “Send a battalion to smoke his ass.”
“Because I’m not sure they will follow the order, and I do not want this coming back to us. I had the chance to kill him a couple of days ago—had his throat in my hands. If I’d squeezed a bit tighter for a few more seconds, he would be octopus shit.”
Rhino was glad he had spared Vargas then. It would help him get away with killing him later. No one would see this coming.
“Vargas sleeps with those bug eyes open,” Mac said. “I’ve seen it, and it is some weird shit.”
“Then we’ll find another way.” Rhino handed him a chain with a key. “Meet me at the capitol rig tonight and show the guards this.”
“Where you going?”
“To talk to the third recruit,” Rhino said.
“Going to tell me who you got in mind?”
“Whale’s boy,” Rhino said.
Mac chuckled. “Which one?”
“Felipe. I fought him a few days ago. He’s got skills. I just need to convince him to follow me like his father once did.”
TWENTY
Michael hunched behind a concrete wall while Edgar and Alexander waited for his signal. They were a half mile from their drop zone, in a section of the city that had been reduced to mounds of rubble.
If he had to guess, the area had been shaken down by a massive earthquake long after the tsunami washed away the coastline. The flattened buildings and leaning ironwork left little protection for the divers, and plenty of places for an ambush. Sinkholes, deep fissures in the ground, and tunnels in the mounds were all potential nesting spots for mutant beasts or shadowed enclaves for the machines.
Michael slowly rose above the wall to scan the area for signs of life. The infrared sensors came back with multiple contacts, though mostly insects, lizards, and rabbit-sized rodents. Nothing the size of a Siren or a defector.
He still wasn’t sure what the hell he had seen walking upright on the dive in, but he would bet his rank it wasn’t a naked human. No one could survive out here without protective gear and helmets.
The radiation levels were in the yellow range, almost red, and his scans were picking up toxic fumes. The surface and air quality were little better here than at the fuel station where the mammoth snakes ambushed them.
Everything south of the equator seemed different, and they had little intel on what sort of beasts lived in this area. Thinking of all the possibilities brought a chill through his body. He switched his optics over to night vision again and hunkered back down, wishing he had Cricket to help look for threats.
But Les was right to recall the robot to the ship. With all its electronic parts, it was just too big a target for Sirens and defectors.
Michael raised his hand and flashed the “advance” signal to Alexander and Edgar. The two divers dashed to his position. Lightning flashed at the same moment, capturing both men in the blue glow.
They made it to the wall safely and took up positions on his right and left.
Thunder boomed, and Michael waited for the inevitable high-pitched wail. But the electronic cries of the Sirens did not come.
The beasts still didn’t know the divers were here—at least, not his half of the team.
He checked his HUD for Sofia and Arlo, now less than a mile away. Their beacons were still idle, but they were active, which meant they were alive.
They appeared to be hunkered down and waiting, just as Michael had told them to do if they ever got separated. While he was glad they had followed orders, getting to them was going to be a struggle. The hive of Sirens Timothy had marked on their map was right between Michael and the two stranded divers.
Edgar peered over the top of the ledge to check for hostiles, but Michael kept prone, studying his HUD for the best route.
“Looks clear,” Edgar said, bending down.
Michael didn’t know how accurate the map on his HUD was, but it showed a road not far away. He decided the safest route was the one through the ruined structures beyond the wall they now hid behind. It was the long way, but it would avoid the potential Siren hive.
Also, one of the cardinal rules of diving was always to stay off old streets and out of view.
He took point and guided the divers along the foot of the first mountain of debris. Rebar and twisted steel beams stuck out of the fragmented concrete, but he didn’t see any openings or tunnels here that could lead to nests.
He slowed down when they reached the outskirts of the destroyed city blocks. On the other side, several structures were still standing or, at least, hadn’t finished falling down.
Roofs had caved in, windows were shattered, and each building had an apron of scree around its base. Nature had taken over—mutant trees growing through ceilings and vines worming their way out of windows.
A distant animal howl broke the silence.
It wasn’t just flora here.
Michael raised a fist for the divers to hold position. They crouched down, weapons up and roving over the broken structures.
Another noise pierced the night, this one midway between a growl and a wail. He didn’t know the sound—only that it wasn’t human or Siren.
Michael raised the laser rifle scope up to his visor, then saw something on his HUD. One of the beacons was moving.
It was Sofia.
“Stay put, damn it,” he whispered. He wanted to use the comm but couldn’t risk breaking radio silence. Not yet, not for this.
He gave hand signals to Alexander and Edgar, who fanned out in combat intervals. If their HUDs were correct, Sofia and Arlo were just on the other side of the structures ahead. He had to get to them before whatever was making the noise found them first.
Michael kept a brisk but cautious pace to avoid stepping in any holes or snagging his hazard suit on anything sharp. There were plenty of threats. Tendrils grew out of the cracked dirt ahead, and bulb-shaped flowers opened slightly as he approached.
He changed direction and signaled his team to do the same.
Halfway across the stretch between the debris piles and the buildings, he came across another cluster of foliage with the same tentacular limbs that he had seen turn an adult Siren into a deflated sack of mutant skin.
The divers moved around the plants but stopped at a meter-wide crevice in the ground. Vines covered the chasm walls like cobwebs, and he decided to take another route rather than jump across. He could make the easy hop, and so, probably, could the next diver. But after that, the plants would be awake and ready for the last one to jump.
Another eerie call broke the silence, rising into a long, melancholy moan. Sofia’s beacon moved again as if in response.
Michael turned back and made his way around the carnivorous plants. A bug the size of a bread loaf crawled from under an uptilted section of curb in his path. The single eye atop its armored head swiveled back to look at him as it scuttled away.
The insect was small, but life out here was violent, and even the most benign-looking creature might kill a man. He carefully trotted the last stretch to the building.
Alexander and Edgar arrived a moment later and took up position behind a brick wall covered in blue, sticky moss that seemed to riffle in the breeze. But there was no breeze.
“What the fu…” Edgar whispered after almost leaning against the wall.
Michael saw then that the moss wasn’t moving after all. It was the bugs, ants, and flying insects trapped on the surface that created the rustling effect.
The team stepped away from the killing field of bugs, not wanting to be there when something bigger came along for a snack.
A mostly intact street separated them from the next building. Michael stopped at the corner to check his HUD again.