Chapter 229: (Hesstla)

For all she knew, she was driving in circles. Every time she was forced to choose which way to go the only way that mattered was away from smoke, white lines in the sky, or the sound of explosions, lightning, and buzzing. The car ran smoother and she was grateful for that. Her brother and sister played with the dataslate, playing games with Mewmew, while the baby laid on the floor in front of the passenger side of the bench seat and gnawed on her sucky to help her new teeth come in, the whole time glaring at Dambree with her amber eyes.

She drove with a bottle between her legs and the pistol on her lap, keeping one eye on the charge level, which was working again. She had no idea that the car was getting a lot better milage out of the charge that previously, the quick tuneup altering the mechanisms to be far more efficient.

Every time she finished a bottle, she slung it out the door, leaving it on the dirt of the road. At crossroads she slowed down and dropped a sippy bottle out the door to mark that she had gone that way prior.

The dirt roads were a long winding maze between fields of grain, fruit, and vegetables. The rain stopped and the day got hotter even though there was still heavy cloud cover.

She came around and corner and slammed on the brakes, making her siblings cry out and Mewmew stand up with its rear paws on the seat and its front paws on the dash.

In front of her was a black metal thing, stretching across the road, disappearing into the grain on either side. It had holes in it that no longer smoked, although she could see sparks inside of it. It had dozens of thick insect legs and she could barely see thick treads on the other side of the insect legs. It had protrusions, bulges, and half open irises.

She backed up quickly, driving almost a mile in reverse before she found a large enough spot to turn around. At the intersection she made sure to mark that one with three sippy-bottles before taking a left and hoping for the best.

An hour later she realized that she had only one way to go, and that was toward more smoke. She sighed, checked the pistol, seeing again LOW-V APERS on the little tiny display on the side, and set it in her lap. Her elbow hurt on her left arm, her wrist and shoulder hurt on her right arm.

She never thought driving could be tiring but Dambree felt like someone had stomped on her shoulder blades and back, her legs ached, and her feet hurt.

Driving toward the smoke, watching the sun slowly lower, she saw one of the big towers and slowed down. It was tall, at least two hundred feet tall, a metal lattice reaching up in the sky with dishes on the top and blinking lights.

"We're hungry," Tru said.

"I know. Eat a nibble," Dambree said.

"We're tired of nibbles," Elu said.

"I know. So am I," she said, taking another long drink off the bottle and slinging it out into the grain.

"Punee's stinky," Tru informed her.

"I know," Dambree said. The baby had been stinky for a while, but so far had seemed content to sit there with a full diaper and gnaw on her sucky.

The tower turned out to be in the middle of an open spot and Dambree pulled over, next to the tower, and shut off the car.

"Let's have something to eat, go potty, and walk around," Dambree said, getting out and stretching. She almost dropped the pistol but caught it.

"There's no where to go potty," Elu whined.

"Pee on the back tire of the car. Nobody will watch," Dambree said.

Elu looked a little huffy but went around the back of the car.

"Mewmew is watching," Elu complained.

"Mewmew's a robot. I'm sure you'll be fine," Dambree said, picking up Punee, who promptly tried to smack her. Dambree grabbed a swaddling and another milky. She popped the tab on the milky, waited for the nipple to pop up once it was warm, then handed the milky to Punee, who spit the sucky out and started sucking on the milky.

At least she only tried to kick Dambree twice while she was being cleaned and changed. Dambree picked up the sucky, put it in her mouth to clean in, then put it in her pocket.

"Are those your clothes?" Tru asked. "They don't look like your clothes."

"I know. They are now," Dambree said. She walked to the back of the car, pulled down her pants, and squatted, leaning against the back bumper.

"I have to pee too," Tru said.

"Go ahead," Dambree said, sighing in relief. Tru pulled her nightgown up and followed her sister's example, staring off at the field of grain like her sister.

"There's no potty wipes," Tru said.

"I know. Sometimes there isn't," Dambree said, standing up and pulling her pants up. She buckled the belt and shook her head, looking down at herself. A fuzzy checkered shirt over a dark shirt, heavy pants, boots.

She wouldn't have been caught dead wearing those clothing a week ago.

"Let's have a picnic next to the car," Dambree said, digging in the back. She found some can of self-heat and started holding them out until her siblings each grabbed a can. She found a nice soup, picked Punee up, and walked over to where her siblings were sitting on the plascrete base of the tower.

"It's going to be dark again soon," Tru said.

"I know," Dambree said, staring at the fields.

"Mewmew's climbing the tower," Elu said.

"Mewmew will be fine," Dambree said, shoveling the food into her mouth. She didn't notice that it didn't really have a taste to her. It was almost mechanical, shovel the thick soup into her mouth, chew, swallow, repeat.

"Can we go..." Tru started to say when Dambree heard a faint roaring noise, getting louder.

"Get in the car," Dambree ordered, grabbing Punee up, who promptly passed gas and laughed.

"But Mewmew," Elu started.

"Mewmew can take care of himself," Dambree snapped, hustling to the car. She climbed in, waving at her siblings, and laid down, holding all three of them tight.

The roaring got louder. It sounded like the Slorpys but not sputtery. It circled once then got really loud before cutting off. There was a whining sound overlaid by heavy sounding footsteps coming up to the car.

Dambree looked up and screamed.

It was a jet black bipedal robot with a skull face, wings lowered to the sides of its body, and a big gun with a drum underneath it. It looked fearsome and Dambree knew right there that her long run had come to and end.

She yanked out the pistol and put it against her brother's temple.

"Weapon lockout," the armor said.

The pistol beeped and the words vanished to be replaced by "LOCKOUT" on the side.

"Chromium Christ, kid, you were about fucking snuff your brother for no reason," the big black robot said.

Dambree looked back at the robot in time to see the skull split down the middle then pull back to each side, revealing a brown skinned primate like the one she had hit in the middle of the road. The primate was sweaty, with eyes that had a glow in them that was slowly fading from red to amber.

"A Terran!" Tru squealed, wiggling to get loose.

Dambree sat up and Punee bit her arm, gnawing on it and drooling.

"What are you doing out here? This whole region's a battlefield," the Terran said, moving up and kneeling down.

"Running," Dambree said.

"Bree shot some people! They were trying to grab our stuff and one grabbed Punee and tried to pull her out of the car, but Bree shot them! She didn't have a shirt then! Bree ran over some people! Bree stole clothing! Bree stole the nibbles and sippies!" the words all came tumbling out of her siblings mouths.

The Terran just nodded, looking serious. "That sounds like you've had an exciting night," the Terran said.

Mewmew vaulted through the window and into Tru's lap. Tru started petting her without thinking about it.

"Bree didn't pay for the stuff we got from the store or for charging the car," Elu said. "There were bugs fixing the car but then they started shooting at Slorpys so Dambree drove away!"

"Bree ran over a Terran then a Slorpy got him then the light turned red on the Slorpys head and it started hitting itself," Tru snitched.

"That where you got the pistol, kid?" The Terran asked.

Dumbree just nodded.

"That's a dangerous weapon," the Terran said.

"I know," Dambree said, thinking about how the guy trying to pull her out of the car had exploded.

"I'm going to unlock it if you promise not to shoot your little brother," the Terran said.

Dambree nodded and the pistol beeped. When she looked at it it read "Hi-V DP" on it.

"All right, this whole region is a shit-show and you can't stay here," the Terran said.

"Why not?" Tru asked.

The Terran looked at her then pointed at the tower. "That's a wireless signal repeater. Right now those are priority. You got lucky I heard your purrboi's SOS signal."

"Where do we go?" Dambree asked.

The Terran heaved a breath in and out. "I'm trying to raise an Evac Hospital or a Refugee Point, but the commo net is all hash," he(?) said. "You can't go back into the cities, and out here in dangerous."

"I know," Dambree said.

"To be honest, every time we put up an evac or refugee point those Precursors mass assault it. They really want large groups," the Terran said.

"They suck out people's brains. SLUUUUURP!" Elu said.

"Yeah, we figured that out earlier today, kid," the Terran said. "These aren't like the other ones, these ones are a lot different."

"Oh," Dambree said. "Have you seen machines like that before?"

The Terran shook his head, a quiet whirring sound accompanying it. "No, these ones suck out brains."

"I know," Dambree said softly.

The Terran lifted up one wrist and Dambree noticed that his arm was thicker than her thigh. His wrist had little pointed cones slightly sticking out at the back of his hand. A panel opened up and a hologram appeared.

"OK, you're here. The bulk of the fighting is over here. Some of those Telkan Marines are over there, you don't want to go there. This spot the clankers have air superiority for now," he mused, tapping at the map. "It's still touch and go over here. That's a major clanker Ell-Zee there. Hmmm."

To Dambree it just looked a mottled green and brown mess with squiggles, weird shapes, and red or yellow crosshatched areas.

He shut it off. "All right. Does your car's GPS work?" the Terran asked.

"GPS?" Dambree asked.

"It's autonav," the Terran said.

"Uh, no. I broke it last night," Dambree admitted.

"BREE STOLE A CAR!" Tru crowed out.

Dambree sighed and hung her head with sudden guilt. She'd robbed and murdered her way across the entire night.

"Hey, kid?" The Terran said gently.

Dambree looked up, tears shining in her eyes.

"Don't," the Terran said. He reached out and lightly patted Dambree's left shoulder. "Don't do that. I can see the clankers tried to get into your car a couple of times. You made it through the night."

"A man was grabbing on me, trying to pull me out of the car. I shot him," Dambree admitted.

The Terran nodded. "Yes, you did. And you and your siblings are alive."

"The other Terran said not to let them take us alive," Dambree admitted.

"No, you don't want to do that," the Terran agreed. He unhooked something from his belt and tossed it to her. "See that ring?"

She looked at and saw there was a metal ring at the top with a lever down the side. "Yes."

"You pull that ring, open your hand so the lever pops off, and by the count of three it will blow up. It'll be quicker than trying to do it with a mag-ac pistol," the Terran said. "It's a M81A6 high explosive with white phosphorous jacket enhanced fragmentation grenade. If the clankers want you after that goes off, they better bring a sponge."

Dambree nodded slowly, getting the gist of it.

"Trust me, kid, don't let them take you alive," the Terran said.

"I know," Dambree said. "They took our father and mother," she said softly.

"I'm sorry," the Terran said, and strangely, seemed to mean it.

"What's a 'Simba', Mister Robot?" Tru asked.

The Terran turned to Tru. "It's a feline cyborg. Big, heavy duty combat chassis, packs dual 20mm three-barrel rotating autocannons, 30mm plasma ejector, mortar and missile launchers, battlescreens, and carry a four-pack of purrbois. Why?"

"That's where we got Mister Mewmew," Tru said, holding up Mewmew, who was danging from her arms like he didn't have bones.

"Ah. I wondered where you got that. Keep Mister Mewmew close, kiddo," the Terran said. He suddenly looked up then back at Dambree. "You have a datapad?"

Dambree held out the datapad to the Terran, who put his finger against the input port. The dataslate started flashing then stopped, showing a map.

"There, I uploaded a possible route. Right now, get out of here, this whole place is on the edge of going atom smasher," the Terran said. "I put directions to a nearby forest. Head there, follow the directions," the Terran crouched slightly and the wings snapped out. "There's some cabins up there and a camp-site store. Rob the store, go to the cabin I marked. Stay there."

Dambree noticed the Terran's eyes were beginning to glow red.

The face shield closed and again Dambree was staring at a black skull.

"When do we come back?" Dambree asked.

"Someone will come get you. Stay quiet, stay alive, kid," the Terran said. He suddenly jumped straight up. Dambree saw him jump at least fifty feet in the air, then with a roar the engines on the back fired up and the human flew away.

"He left," Tru said softly.

"I know," Dambree said. She looked over and saw that Tru and Elu both were crying. "We have each other, we'll be all right."

She looked around, saw the only thing they were leaving behind were the empty self-heat cans, and started the car. It shuddered for a moment then the engine leveled out. She put it in drive and pulled out, noticing the dataslate reoriented. She handed it to Elu.

"Here, you watch that. Tell me if I need to turn," Dambree told her little brother.

"How come he gets the dataslate?" Tru asked.

"Because I need you to take care of Punee. He's a boy, she'll bite him," Dambree said. "You can hold Mister Mewmew too."

"Oh," Tru said. She shifted Mister Mewmew and looked down at Punee, who was holding onto the milky-sippy with her hands and feet as she gnawed on the nipple. "She looks OK right now."

"Good," Dambree said, steering around the wreckage of a pair of fliers.

She followed the directions that Elu kept giving her, only having to turn around twice when Elu miscalled the directions. The sun was slowly setting behind the clouds. She cracked open another fizzybrew and took a long drink off of it.

Several times massive shell casings rained from the sky, other times shards of armor, and once a flier fell from the sky and slammed into the road in front of her but she managed to swerve around it. Once a Terran vehicle crashed out of the grain, huge, all black, with a massive barrel on the front and clattering tracks instead of wheels. It had vanished into the tall grain before she could even scream.

It slowly got dark and Dambree found out that one of the headlights had been fixed, giving her an OK view of the road. Tru and Elu went to sleep, staying asleep even when Dambree pulled over to squat next to the car and pee then change Punee's swaddling. Eventually the trees began to slide by on either side of the road, getting thicker and thicker, until she was driving through a forest, on a dirt road, in the dark, with only a single headlight to guide her way.

She kept the pistol on her lap even as she kept drinking the fizzybrews and slinging the empty bottle out of the car through the empty door frame.

It was nearly midnight when the dataslate beeped and she glanced at it, seeing she needed to turn. She slowed down, keeping an eye out, until she saw it.

The dirt road had a sign next to it that made Dambree wonder if the Terran was right.

DANGEROUS BRIDGE

She closed her eyes, sighed, and took a deep breath. The bridge couldn't be more dangerous. She turned onto the dirt road and headed slowly up. The bridge was wood and clattered as she crossed it. She could see the stream below and wondered how deep it was.

Dambree almost drove past it. The sign wasn't lit, the windows were dark. It read 'PackGuru's Camping Store' and the door was shut.

Rob the store, went through her head and she wondered if Terrans often broke the law.

She braked and got out, making sure the Punee was asleep. She was frowning, her fists balled up, chewing on her sucky. Mister Mewmew looked up from where he was curled up on Tru's lap, who was leaning against her brother and drooling.

"I'll be right back," Dambree said quietly.

A logo appeared on Mister Mewmew's face. :-)

Dambree turned and headed to the store.

She would walk all the way around it before going in.

Dambree's recent lessons had taught her to be cautious.

She peeked in each window, seeing nothing but darkness. Each door she tested was locked. She went and got a big rock and used it to smash in the plexglass window, reach in and fumble around till she found the lock, then unlock the door.

She took her time, moving slowly, partly from exhaustion and partly to be careful. A flashlight first, which she kept on dim. Then camping gear, more food, a water filter, and whatever else caught her eye. There was a small portable "Dr. Fusion" generator that she managed to cram into the back seat on top of the sleeping bags and plas wrapped pillows.

She also took two emergency hand-crank radios and a pair of night vision eye-wraps, which let her turn off the flash.

Once the car was as full with as much she could cram inside of it, she locked all the doors and got back in the car. Mister Mewmew flashed her another :-) as she followed the twisty road. She passed by several dark cabins and wondered why the Terran had chosen one so far away.

The cabin was at the end of the dirt road, with cliffs on three sides of it. There was red streaks in the dark rock, trees overhung the cabin, and the lake was only a little ways away.

Dambree parked the car and stared at it.

It looked like nobody had been there since the Overseers had fled.

Why here? she wondered. She looked at the cliff walls. The rock looks like its bleeding.

Still, she explored the cabin, this time with Mister Mewmew following along. It had a kitchen, two bedrooms, a front room, and a fireplace.

No power. The stove took wood.

At least there was an axe on the wall next to the door.

She woke up Elu and Tru to help her and together they unloaded the car. Dambree didn't get mad at her two younger sibling's whining. She was just as tired as they were.

"We have to get it all in case it starts raining again. Some of the food got ruined when the rain soaked through the paper," Dambree said.

Finally, it was done. Dambree tucked them both into their sleeping bags in front of the fireplace and kissed their forehead. Punee didn't even try to bite her, just glared at her with her amber eyes.

Dambree dragged a chair next to the fireplace, so she could see the window and the doors, put the ball with the ring and lever on the table next to her, and stared out at the darkness.

She kept the pistol in her lap even while she eventually slept.