When the cloud reached the perimeter of the ruins, she decided it was time to act.
She swung herself off the edge of the building and began clambering down its exterior. She descended rapidly, and when she was three stories from the street, she leaped the rest of the way to the asphalt.
Her servos hummed in protest at the impact, but she ignored them and raced through the gap in the Texas barrier. She considered closing the heavy walls behind her but doing so would do little to hold back what was out there anyway, considering the Hydras could surmount the barriers with a single step.
She sprinted through the streets of Rust Town, shouting: “Bioweapons! Bioweapons! We’re under attack! Run!” She amplified her voice to the maximum possible volume. She also broadcast over a public channel, piggybacking on the settlement’s wireless network, though it was doubtful any would be tuned in. A loud voice was the best way to get her message across at the moment.
The security cameras attached to each home snapped toward her, but otherwise no one emerged.
She dashed toward the closest lean-to and yelled at the camera: “Bioweapons! Get out!” Not waiting for a response, she hurried to the building beside it and issued the same message to the waiting cam. She also rapped her hands on the dingy wall for good measure.
Her hood fell away as she dashed to the next lean-to, but she didn’t bother to replace it. Let them see who she was. She knocked on the door and yelled. “Bioweapons are coming! Run!”
She spotted a group of children in worn clothes nearby and sprinted to them. “Tell your parents to run! Quickly! And if they won’t listen to you, promise me you’ll get out of here.” The children merely stared at her, unblinking. “Promise!”
The children nodded in fright.
“Now tell them!” Rhea said.
The children ran away, splitting into two groups. The doors of the respective homes they fled to opened as they arrived, slamming shut behind them.
They’re not going to listen…
Rhea was about to run toward one of those lean-tos and try again, when beside her a door opened and an unshaven, shirtless man stood in the entrance. He was old, pale, and weak, with a long gray beard that reached to his hairy chest. He had a big wart on his nose.
“What are you ranting about, cyborg?” the man said. “You shouldn’t be walking these streets so plainly. Do you want to wind up a pile of spare parts on some salvager’s desk?”
“Bioweapons are coming!” She pointed at the Texas wall behind her. “You have to run!”
The man glanced that way, then shook his head and shut the door.
Rhea rapped on the lean-to loudly.
“Go away!” the old man shouted from within.
“Just take a look!” she said. “Please!”
A pause. Then: “Fine. If it will shut you up, I’ll be out in a second. Let me throw on a shirt.”
She moved on to the next door, and the next. She managed to convince two more men—just as old as the other—to leave their houses, and in a few moments, she was making her way back with the three toward the gate.
She wasn’t really sure what good it would do to have these three witness the coming calamity, but at least it felt like she was doing something. Maybe they held some sway in this community and could help her spread the word.
“Hurry!” she called over her shoulder.
“We’re coming,” the old man with the wart on his nose said, panting. “Some of us aren’t used to walking this far, you know.”
“Farthest I’ve stepped from my house in years!” another agreed. He wore big AR goggles over his eyes.
“You know, I’m surprised security hasn’t come to collect her,” the third man said.
“Security!” Wart Nose said. “Good one! We haven’t had any security around here since, well, I can’t even remember!”
She was keenly aware that bioweapons were racing toward the settlement at that very moment, and she half expected the gate to come crashing down on them at any moment. Then again, given how big the creatures were, she would have ample warning.
They reached the gate. Goggle Eyes started for the gap, but she said: “No. Get on these tires. You’ll have a better view.”
She beckoned toward several discarded tires that formed makeshift ramps on either side of the gate.
“I can’t climb that,” Wart Nose complained.
“Here.” Rhea grabbed him and another man, hoisting them under each arm like sandbags, then leaped from tire to tire until she was at the top of the barrier. Then she lowered the men.
“That was fun,” Wart Nose said. “Can we do it again?”
She ignored him and was about to clamber back down to help the third man, when she discovered he was already scaling the tires on the other side of the gap.
“No sentries…” Goggle Eyes said from beside her. He was looking straight down into the broken street past the gate.
“Probably snatched by one of the local parts collectors,” Wart Nose said, presumably for Rhea’s benefit. “Happens from time to time. Same fate will befall this cyborg here if she keeps calling attention to herself.”
“Why are the streets so dusty out there?” the third man asked.
Apparently, he had a better view from where he stood, because Rhea couldn’t see any sign of the bioweapons, not yet at least.
A moment later a cloud of dust spilled into view, filling the air between two skyscrapers that were three blocks away. Rhea hadn’t been sure the bioweapons would be able to maintain their dust cover within the city, considering they’d have to spread out, but apparently staying relatively close together was all that was needed to maintain the stealth field.
“Gritstorm,” Wart Nose said.
“The weather systems are supposed to prevent Gritstorms from getting this close,” the third man insisted.
Wart Nose shrugged. “The weather system fails from time to time.”
“Since when are Gritstorms so close to the ground?” Goggle Eyes asked.
The Texas barrier in front
