Scarlet gasped. It was one her handmaidens. One who used to braid her hair and rub her down with exotic oils before the feasts.
“What have you done?” she asked Stevens in a whisper. “What have you become?”
The cage was held shut with a simple hasp and Jessie clicked it open then stepped inside, wary but unconcerned. Dead, black eyes stared back at him but didn’t see. He took the cold, clammy girl-thing’s hand and led her out. She was as compliant as a child and stood meekly, gently swaying back and forth.
Scarlet pulled the electrodes from her skull and they came loose with a slurping sound. The thing came out of its trance and immediately locked onto the fresh blood pouring out of Stevens shoulder. She stepped aside as it rushed towards him.
130
Jessie + Scarlet
Jessie pulled the door shut behind them, locking the zombie in and locking out the protests and crashing of equipment. They were both calm. They weren’t afraid anymore. There wasn’t any hope for her and Jessie would see it through then join her when it was time to go. It made everything easier, clearer, when worries about escape or living to see tomorrow were gone. When you were only focused on the mission, knew you would succeed and didn’t even want to survive it. They just had to live long enough to know they had destroyed what they set out to destroy and without the Doctor’s constant supply of the mind inhibiting drugs, they had already won. Even if they both went down in a hail of bullets when they rounded the next corner, the Cult would fall when the people woke up. It might limp along and continue to destroy for a while but they knew it was over. Even if they failed, they had still won. It made everything easier. Everything more black and white. It was their last fight and they were both ready. Scarlet was content, she would fix a part of the world she had helped break. She would even the score.
Jessie couldn’t go back to the hollowness he’d felt for all those months. The bleakness in his soul, the haunted eyes in the mirror or the taste of gun metal in his mouth. He wouldn’t go on without her. It felt good to be free from fear and he remembered an old poem he’d read years ago.
Someday they’ll go down together.
They’ll bury them side by side.
To few it’ll be grief, to the law a relief
But it’s death for Bonnie and Clyde.
He knew how Bonnie Parker must have felt when she penned those lines. The inevitable was coming like a freight train. No avoiding it, no getting away from it. No escape. Face it with a laugh and spit in its eye.
“You think most of the normal people will run?” Jessie asked. “Not the enhanced guards, the everyday people. Will we have to kill everybody?”
“Probably.” Scarlet said.
Far down the corridor, through the tunnels, they heard the sound of running footsteps. The guard were coming for them.
“This way.” Scarlet said as Jessie grabbed the dead guard’s rifle and they took off in a sprint towards the sound of stomping boots.
They ran towards the battle, not away from it and were slightly disappointed when they met only a half dozen unenhanced men running towards them. There was only one ribbon festooned black suit behind them, urging them onward. Jessie fired the rifle from the hip, spraying the tunnel and sending men diving for the floor. He lowered his aim to the scrambling men and kept running, ignored their panicked and chaotic return fire.
“It’s her!” their commander shouted into his radio. “The Heretic is back!”
Bullets from Jessie’s AR found their marks and bodies jerked as they were punctured and started spewing out their lives on the cement. The noise was deafening in the confined area, gun smoke hung in the air and overhead lights shattered, sending sparks of electricity crackling. Bulbs popped along the hallway as a stray bullet shorted out a thick cable. The man who had been urging the dead or dying squad to attack the interlopers dove behind an outcropping of concrete block the instant the bullets started flying. He crouched low and came out shooting, sending lead straight and true. Jessie stumbled with the impact of bullets slamming into his chest and Scarlets right hand was a blur of motion. The man barely had time to hear the whirring sound before the steel baton smashed into his face, breaking his nose and instantly causing his eyes to water. He brought his arm up barely in time to catch the brunt of the other baton, fully extended and being swung by a fury. He didn’t cry out when the arm shattered, he had the other moving at lightning speed to slice her wide open with six inches of a sharpened steel blade.
Scarlet saw it and deflected, slammed her forehead into the mans already smashed nose and heard him cry out. A thrust of her arm, a flick of her wrist and the baton broke his neck before he could counter. Jessie ran up as the soldier grunted and fell, stripped a few magazines from fallen men’s guns and started transferring rounds.
“Now they really know we’re coming.” he said as his fingers flew, topped off a mag and swapped a fresh thirty rounder into his rifle. Scarlet glanced at the fresh new holes in his leather and the smoking chunks of lead as he plucked them out of the Kevlar mesh then tossed them aside.
“Stop getting shot.” she said and shook her head. “What do I do with you? Worse than child.”
“Right. I’ll keep that in mind.” he said and topped off another mag then stuck it in his back pocket.
Men were moaning and bleeding out on the concrete floor and one of the
