Chapter 10: End of the line
The sky was a brilliant white, outshone only by the spot in the featureless clouds that was the sun, hanging directly above them. It hadn't been an hour before they were already reaching the last peak that stood before them and the Heart Lake ahead. Jamie motioned for Murphy to stop, and they both knelt a few metres away from the ridge.
"We have to be careful from here on out. As soon as we go over the edge, we'll be in view of the Heart Lake and whoever is near it. The binoculars you're carrying have a recording feature, so I'd suggest we poke that over the edge and scan the terrain first."
Murphy nodded and pulled out a small box from her backpack. She pulled on the box' edges and seams began to appear, which parted and twisted to give the box an elongated and flat shape. Around the edges, four circular lids slid under the surface, revealing the lenses within. Jamie activated his Cuff-Link and interfaced with the binoculars, streaming what its sensors saw through to its holographic display. Murphy pulled the lip of her hood higher up on her face and crawled towards the edge, sputtering a bit when a tuft of snow rolled in through the neck of her coat. Lying flat on the snow, she extended her arms, letting only the binoculars poke over the ridge.
"I see them," Jamie whispered. "Pan to the right… now to the left, slowly… Alright, you can come down."
Murphy slid on her bottom to where Jamie was, and they huddled together to look at the video recording.
Jamie chewed on his lip, frowning, "There's only five of them."
"That's good. They must´ve gone back where they came from," Murphy said with an upbeat tone.
"That's what worries me. Hopefully where they came from doesn't have a vantage point over these ones."
"At least it'll be easier to incapacitate them if they're fewer. We should take this chance. It might be impossible to get them all if they're more."
Jamie nodded, re-watching the video. He passed the binoculars back to Murphy, "I'm going to need you to spot for me. We have the advantage in that the rifle's shot won't make enough noise for them to find us, but if I miss, then they'll immediately know that something is going down. My scope will help with my aiming, but if you keep me posted on the winds down there, I can do the rest."
The two climbed back up together and stopped a few centimetres short of the edge. Jamie observed that there were no wisps of snow flying over, and that there wasn't any whistling. He took the rifle out of his backpack and tried to push in the button that would activate the expansion mechanism, as it was frozen solid. After a few seconds of struggling, he brought the rifle up to his face and breathed warm air onto the button. Murphy observed and nodded at him when she could see that the frost had gone. Jamie tried again, and this time, the rifle whirred to life. The stock folded out automatically, and the barrel extended out of the frame, becoming almost a metre long. Jamie removed the scope from its storage place, revealing the trigger and handle, and slid it into position above the receiver. A beeping noise came from the gun, and the inside of the scope lit up, tinting the glass red.
"Let's poke over and look at them again. We need to start with one that is out of sight of the rest," Jamie said before taking a slow, deep breath to calm his heartrate as much as possible.
They pushed themselves to the edge and looked down at the Heart Lake. The five terrorists were scanning the mountains towards Heartman's lab, and further North towards the path for Mountain Knot. As Jamie rested the rifle on the snow, he pulled his handgun from its holster and handed it to Murphy, who had just settled into the snow and rested her elbows on the edge of the peak to hold the binoculars steady. She gave Jamie a questioning look.
"If they realize that they're being shot at, they'll find us in a heartbeat. Take the gun and head down the ridge south-ward a hundred metres. We'll talk through short-range bursts. You can spot for me from over there." He whispered.
Murphy huffed and nodded, taking the revolver cautiously and shifting the grip so she was walking with the barrel in her hand and not the handle. She whispered back to Jamie, "Keep the map open on your HUD. The weather station could also help with wind direction."
With that, she crawled away. Jamie watched her go before putting his attention back on the terrorists below. They had arranged themselves into a loose single file, heading in the direction of Mountain Knot, perhaps to meet with MULEs in more neutral territory. Murphy was right about the weather station's input. Wind was minimal, but it was going North West, towards his targets. He'd have to account for less bullet drop than he had initially thought, even if the rifle's on-board computer would do most of the minor adjustments, which was just as well, since he had very small targets to hit.
"I'm in position," Murphy's voice crackled through his Cuff-Link. She had activated the short-range radio broadcast.
"Alright. I'm going for the one who's trailing behind, then I'll shoot the next one right away, so he doesn't get to hear the fall of the first. How's the wind?"
"15 knots, North by North-west. Distance is six-hundred metres, fifty metres elevation difference. My calculator is saying 5 points up and 2 to the left."
Jamie had one eye on the scope and the other on the HUD that was being projected into his eyes from the rim of his hood. The Cuff-Link OS listened in on their talking and displayed the calculations Murphy had made, "I have the same results. Can you spot for the second target? Aiming…"
Jamie let go of the air in his lungs slowly as he pulled the trigger, millimetre by millimetre. When he was sure that the next miniscule pull would fire the dart, he waited for the lull between heartbeats and squeezed with his finger. The vibration of the rifle rattled his shoulder, and he grunted to keep his muscles from reacting as he quickly lined up his crosshairs on the second target. The first terrorist was still in view of the scope, and Jamie could see out of the corner of his eye, that they had brought a hand up to the back of their neck, under the rim of their helmet.
"Six-hundred and twenty metres, 6 points up. 2 points left."
"Aiming. Next target?" He shot again, this time noticing how the rifle dug itself ever so slightly into the compacted snow. The next two terrorists where even further apart from each other. If the second didn't drop unconscious right away, he could take the third without a hitch.
"Seven-hundred metres. 7 points up, 2 points left."
"Blessed be computer-assisted aiming… firing."
Jamie's heart sank as a tuft of snow shot up into the air, a few centimetres to the left of the third terrorist's head. His heart started to race, making the crosshairs of his rifle bounce as Murphy said something about a lull in the wind. He heard her tell him to reduce the left-right offset by half a point when he saw the eyes of the third terrorists looking back at him. He pulled the trigger and the third terrorist's head whipped back as they fell into the snow. He hoped the fourth hadn't noticed as he took his eye off the scope and looked down at the valley.
The two remaining terrorists were now running towards their fallen comrades. At the speed they were going, there would be no way for Jamie to hit them, and all five would be fully alert in a matter of minutes. Jamie spoke up, urgency in his tone, "Murphy, give them one shot. If you manage to hit one, you're an angel."
The revolver's register reached Jamie immediately, and he pointed his scope at the fourth terrorist, now only a couple of metres away from the third terrorist. Both enemies stopped dead in their tracks when the sound of the revolver's shot reached them, and Jamie took the chance to shoot the fourth. The dart hit the terrorist's face, and they fell front first on the snow immediately.
"Shoot at the last one again. We can't have him wake the rest up!" Jamie shouted as he stood up from the snow and jumped over the edge. He activated his exo-skeleton's sprint function and ran down the slope, closing the distance between himself and the last terrorist, hoping Murphy's cover fire would keep the target from shooting back at him for a few seconds.
The snow around the terrorist erupted as revolver rounds flew wide, but only five shots came. Soon, Jamie saw the terrorist pointing his rifle at him. He dropped flat on the ground as the sound of a fully automatic rifle roared through the valley like thunder. He brought up his scope, lined it up with the terrorist's face and took the shot. The roar of the rifle stopped immediately.
Jamie stood up, gasping for air. He waved a hand at the mountain he had descended from, and he saw the small figure that was Murphy stand up and run down the slope. He put away his rifle and waded over to the first terrorist he had shot. As he got closer, he noticed no steam was wafting from the terrorist's face. He started to run.
Murphy saw Jamie kneel beside the first terrorist for a moment before standing right back up and running for the last terrorist he shot. She spoke up, knowing the short-range call was still active, "What's up?"
"They're frozen… the sedative was too strong in these conditions. I'm going to the last one. Check the others."
Her heart was threatening to beat out of her chest as she inched closer to the other terrorists, paranoid that they could be more awake than dead, but as soon as her gloved hand came into contact with their throats, Jamie's notion was confirmed. They had frozen eerily quickly. As she stood up from the third and fourth terrorist's side, she looked up to see Jamie hugging the last one.
Before she could say anything, his voice crackled through her Cuff-Link, "This one's alive! Bring the heaters!"
She sprinted over and dropped to her knees beside the two. Jamie was still hugging the unconscious terrorist, rubbing his hands furiously on their back. As she produced a heater from her backpack, he let go of the terrorist and pulled the magnetic zipper of their suit open. He pulled power cables from the small of his back, connected them to one of the heaters and shoved it into the terrorist's suit before zipping it back up. Now that the situation was more stable, Jamie took a moment to look at the terrorist. The dart's needle was lodged in the man's neck, to the right of the windpipe. Jamie pulled it out gingerly and sighed with relief, seeing that the wound didn't bleed much. Half of the dart's contents were still in there, so hopefully he would wake before long.
"And now, we wait?" Murphy asked, half panting, half sighing of relief.
"I guess so," Jamie said, also short on breath. He looked around, making sure there wasn't any movement that they'd missed. "Weird to get some peace after what just went down."
"I could do with a beer."
Jamie chuckled, "There's a nice place in Port Knot. Maybe we can go there when this is over."
…
It wasn't long before the terrorist stirred with a groan. He was still hooded, but he brought his cuffed hands up to pull the ski mask off, revealing a cleanly shaved face, marred with thick, self-inflicted scars that shot outwards from his lips. His eyes found Jamie's and the Capital Security operative smiled and waved.
"Good of you to come back to us! Your friends weren't so lucky."
The terrorist trembled as he looked from side to side, his gaze finding the other terrorists laying on the snow. Slowly and without making a sound, he looked at Jamie again.
"We have a few questions, but you seem like a guy of few words. Do you wanna cooperate?"
The terrorist smiled ruefully, lips shut tightly together.
Jamie nodded with pursed lips, "Alright, I'll level with you. We don't have many options right now, since more buddies of yours could show up any second. My friend and I, we can do two things from here," Jamie raised a finger, "One: we can have a talk here and now. We'll ask you the questions we need answered, and we'll leave you here, immobilized, but with the heater. Two: you keep your mouth shut. To avoid facing more of your friends, we'll take you to Mountain Knot. I have people there who're really good at getting information out of people, and I can promise you, you don't even want to know what they do."
The terrorist remained silent. Jamie sighed, shaking his head, "I know Homo Demens seek the Last Stranding, but I also know Higgs didn't train you to resist torture. If we get going, we're not stopping for you to change your mind."
Murphy smiled to herself, looking at the exchange. The terrorist had begun to shake, and she could tell it was an anxious shake, unrelated to the cold. Not even ten seconds had passed before he opened his mouth to speak, teeth chattering, "You won't be able to stop what is coming anyway."
"That's alright, we just need to know where you're keeping Sam."
The terrorist sputtered and broke into a short laugh, "We don't know where he is. We are given his blood for keeping people away from the Lake. I don't know who supplies us with them. That's not even important."
"And what is important?" Jamie looked at the man with as puzzled a face as he could make to encourage him to tell his story.
"The last Reversal. If the blood of the repatriate doesn't kill you, then you're to become a herald of the Reversal," the terrorist smiled wickedly. "Sam Porter stopped the Last Stranding. But by using his blood and joining it with ours, we have created a Stranding of our own. Soon, with the help of my brothers and sisters, Homo Finale will bring about the real cleansing of the earth, the removal of all human life… and it will be spectacular."
"You're taking transfusions of Sam's blood?"
"Yes! And so, the Beached Things fear us, and we can keep this place safe while the bridge between our world and the Beach is completed!"
Jamie frowned for a moment and slowly stood up, "That's all we need. Thank you." With that, he zip-tied the terrorist's ankles, disconnected the heater from the small of his back, and reconnected it to the terrorist's suit.
"I hope they don't kill you fast," the terrorist called out as they started to walk away. "Death is something to be witnessed, to be worshipped."
With Murphy in tow, they continued walking away. She whispered to him once they were out of earshot, "What the hell was he talking about?"
"He wasn't making sense. They either brainwashed him, or he was completely delusional. The Reversal started at the same time that Sam had been kidnapped, so it couldn't have been caused by transfusions of his blood. One thing did make sense, though. They were tasked with keeping people away from the Lake… and I can only think of one place where we could find answers to the questions we have now."
The two looked North. Almost a kilometre away, they could see the prism-shaped laboratory, elevated above the snow on thick steel beams. Beside it was the observation tower. Heartman surely knew they were there. Perhaps it was then a good sign, that no more terrorists had shown up. Jamie stopped and turned to regard a perplexed Murphy.
"I didn't expect this to be where our journey ends, but I think your job is done, Murphy. You got me an audience with someone who might've known where Sam was located. Whatever's ahead is dangerous, and you really don't need to stick your neck out any longer," Jamie looked at the old porter with a sad smile. "I don't know what's going to happen from here on out, but you didn't sign up for fighting terrorists."
She pursed her lips, and from the wrinkles that formed around her mouth, Jamie could again see that she was an old person, much older than he'd expect any Porter to be. She smiled at Jamie, and more wrinkles appeared on her nose as she did, "We've only known each other a couple of days, but I can't help but feel bad at the idea of sending you in there by yourself. You could use the help. Besides, I ain't ever seen someone could shoot a rifle and a revolver at the same time, so you'll need the extra pair of eyes."
…
A wave of warm air washed over Jamie as he walked into the Beach Scientist's building. The snow that came in under his boots melted immediately, and he stood on the mat at the entrance for a few seconds to let the water be wicked away. Murphy walked in a moment later, revolver in hand. The glass door slid shut behind them. Jamie had removed the long barrel and scope from his rifle, making it more appropriate for a short-range fight. Ahead of them was a yellow hologram showing the logo of the Bridges delivery corporation, and a long corridor extended to their right. They hadn't encountered a soul on their way to the building, and the interior seemed to be equally devoid of life.
Walking up the stairs to the lab had both of their hearts racing, and they knew straight away that they were walking into a trap. Heartman hadn't contacted them, and no terrorists had either entered the valley or descended from the mountains. The corridor that extended from the building's entrance had one wall made of ceiling to floor windows overlooking the Heart Lake, and the other was of volcanic rock slabs, tightly packed and stacked to the roof, a good four metres away. They stalked down the corridor to a single door they spotted at the end.
Suddenly and blindingly quick, the wall to their left slid open, letting five terrorists out. The assailants jumped on the pair, wrestling them to the ground. Jamie knew better than to try and fight back with his non-lethal pistol, so he let them cuff his hands behind his back, avoiding an unnecessary beating. Murphy, on the other hand, fought back. She managed to squeeze off a round that shattered one of the glass windows before one of the terrorists noticed the weapon and tried to wrestle the revolver from her hand. The second terrorist that was focused on her had already drawn his own pistol and wedged it under Murphy's neck, but she kept struggling.
Jamie shouted for Murphy to calm down, but a second shot made him quiet as he saw red dripping on the dark blue padded floor. The revolver fell to the ground, its barrel smoking, and Murphy dropped to her knees shortly after. The terrorists who had restrained Jamie took a few steps back, as did the two who were on Murphy. Jamie wormed himself to a kneeling position and went to the dying Porter as the terrorists stood back.
"Murphy, Murphy can you put a hand on your wound?" Jamie asked, his voice shaking as he used his forehead to roll Murphy so that she was facing upwards. The bullet wound was right above her left breast.
"I can't feel my hands, Coelho, maybe you can use your foot?" Murphy forced out a smile, baring bloodied teeth.
"I'll – I'll get you some help. I'll take you to Mountain Knot City and you'll get better," Jamie said, nodding and smiling through tears that he couldn't wipe away.
"No, I won't," she said sternly, then she smiled again, "There's no place for me there. What can I say, Jamie? I left the city shortly after the world started to function again… I'd lost my way after everything collapsed, and I couldn't bring my grandchildren with me into my depression."
She went into a coughing fit and blood spattered over her suit. She took a long, wheezing breath before continuing, "I left, to see if there was anywhere I could find peace again. I started finding joy in helping others, teaching them how to best survive outside. But now I'm old. I'm tired. I don't want to teach anymore. I wanted to do this last thing, be a part of my granddaughter's future, if I couldn't be there for them in the past. Now you have to see this through to the end."
Jamie tried to smile as best he could. He heard a pistol cocking behind him. Murphy spoke up again, "I hope you get to be as old as me, so you get to help as many people as you can. When you see my granddaughters, tell them I'm sorry I had to go, will ya?"
Jamie nodded as he felt the barrel of a gun come to rest on the back of his head.
"Don't shoot him," a familiar voice boomed through the corridor. Murphy's eyes fluttered and her gaze wandered around the building's ceiling. "Bring him to me."
Strong hands grabbed onto Jamie's shoulders and under his arm, hoisting him away from the dying Murphy. He screamed he would find her family as he was carried away, further down the corridor and in through the door at the end. He saw her smile once more before he was dragged into the darkness.