Speaker for the Zone
Chapter 2
It couldn't have ended any other way. The fog cleared, and the sun came out. The lab was still burning, the thick pillar of acrid black smoke trailing off to the east, high above. The Duty man with his knee jammed in my spine, and his sidearm pressed to my head didn't say anything. In fact, there wasn't much to hear except for the helicopters, and the sounds of the wounded. Duty was only treating its own, naturally. They weren't executing Freedom's wounded, but leaving them to bleed wasn't much better.
A Duty officer struck a match and lit the pile of Freedom dead. Exile's body was in there somewhere, a dozen bullets in it. Soon there were two pillars of smoke.
There were barely enough Duty and mercs left alive to keep us all under control – but there were enough. I didn't struggle; there wasn't any strength left to struggle with. It had all left me the moment Slayer's body hit the ground.
The valley stank of blood and death, and there was no wind to carry it away. A Freedom man snarled something at one of the guards, who executed him without hesitation.
There was only one way this could have worked. Velvet's plans had been airtight. She hadn't planned for these numbers, but our perimeter security had been breached like it wasn't even there. Someone had turned. Duty couldn't have gotten the intel they needed to mount this operation without eyes on the inside.
And to bring in outsiders to do it for them… Velvet had never dreamed they would risk such shame – but they had, and apparently gladly. There had been a time when Duty had been a pure and noble ideal. Then there had been a time when it had still been noble, but misguided. Now it was just a tool for men who wanted the Zone to themselves, plain and simple. Duty was gone; now there was just this dictatorship instead.
Freedom was gone too. I could smell it burning behind me. Duty hadn't killed us yet, but they would. If they hadn't hesitated to do any of this, they couldn't leave us alive.
We had known this was a changing Zone, a whole new world. None of us ever thought it would be a world without factions. There had been nothing wrong with Velvet's plan; she had simply been too late to turn the tide.
As the past six months turned to ash behind us, I watched the Duty officers deliberating over Russett. They didn't know who she was, or what to make of her. Dressed in Freedom fatigues, she was clearly no stalker. Her refusal to leave the Zone had surprised no one. If they killed her, it was my fault. I should have left with her then, after Tyrian's death. But I couldn't leave, and it no longer had anything to do with my promise to Velvet. I'd begun to see how meaningless that had been.
But this had not been inevitable. I'd had a choice, and I'd made the wrong one. The officer pointed, and the soldier knelt her beside some of the disarmed rookies. It wouldn't be any better even if they didn't kill her. This wasn't the same Duty that had once been out to protect people from the evil of the Zone.
Another officer led Grigor out and forced him to his knees. The old man was gray and bloody. Crows circled overhead, and in the distance there was another helicopter approaching.
"When I killed your brother, I never imagined I'd be killing you too," the Colonel said. He took out his Makarov, pressed it to Grigor's head, and shot him. His body slumped over in the mud as the shot echoed around the valley.
He put the pistol away and motioned forward the two men holding Velvet. "The same for you," he said. "I never imagined you would be this foolish."
"I never imagined it would take you this long to work up the nerve," she replied, meeting his eyes. The man behind her struck her with the stock of his rifle, and she fell. The Colonel kicked her savagely until she vomited blood and lay motionless. No, not motionless. She wanted her postcard, which had fallen to the ground, and lay out of reach. The Colonel slammed his boot down on her hand.
"You should have run when you had the chance," he said, pressing down and twisting. Everyone in the valley could hear the bones in her hand breaking.
The Biker was passed out from blood loss. Sagaris had been tied up. Six men were holding down the Merc. I couldn't see anyone else.
"This doesn't hurt," Velvet said, coughing up more blood. "This doesn't hurt at all."
"Enough." He drew his Makarov again, but had to put up his arm against the sudden wind from the chopper overhead. It sank down, and a familiar figure in white leapt out, though Ever's fatigues weren't nearly as white as his face. The chopper lifted off, but Ever didn't move. His eyes slipped from Grigor's body to Velvet, to the prisoners, to the mound of burning dead, to the bonfires that represented our tents, buildings, and fortifications, lovingly built from the ground up over the last six months.
"Oh, what are you doing here?" The Colonel didn't sound pleased.
Ever didn't say anything, he just stared.
"Your plan worked," the Colonel added. Ever looked over so sharply that the older man actually flinched.
"I warned you," Ever said.
The Colonel's face hardened. "You don't warn me," he said.
"No," Ever said quietly, eyes distant. "Evidently not." The Colonel didn't seem to pick up on it. No surprise. He held out the Makarov.
"You want to do it?"
"May as well. It's not my first time." Ever took it and shot him in the face.
For a moment, no one knew what to do. The Colonel's body crashed to the ground. Another officer started to shout something, but Ever kicked him onto the burning pile of bodies, and shot him when he tried get off it. The third officer wisely didn't say anything, but that didn't stop a foolish Duty soldier from shooting Ever in the back.
He didn't even seem to feel it. He touched his chest where the round had punched through, looked at the blood on his fingers, and turned to give the Duty man a flat look. That was it. Until that moment, anything could have happened.
Very calmly, Ever made a few suggestions to the remaining officer, who wasted no time passing them on. Things started to move fast. Ever was doing a good job holding it together for a guy who'd just been shot in the chest, but it wouldn't last. It obviously wasn't a mortal wound, but Ever isn't the machine he wants people to think he is.
"Let me up," I said to the man holding me down. His focus was gone; I could've taken him out in a heartbeat if I wanted to. But I didn't want to. Reluctantly, he got off, and I went to Velvet. She was hurt worse than I thought.
The mercs cleared off right away. Without them, the remains of the Duty assault force were even more pitiful. At Ever's extremely frightening request, they left behind what supplies they could. But before the wounded could be treated, there was a general scramble to keep people from doing anything stupid. Freedom didn't want to let Duty walk, but they didn't see that it was the only way. A lot of Duty people weren't buying that they should walk away from what was clearly a victory, especially one so costly. And there were a lot of Freedom people that wanted to snatch up a gun with Ever in mind. We'd all heard what the Colonel said.
Many of the wounded died. We were in the open, without even tents, much less supplies. Ever had pushed his luck just to back Duty off; there would be no asking them for help.
Ever collapsed. Velvet lost consciousness, leaving only myself and Sagaris to take charge. We did our best, and with the Merc's incredible calm, somehow, we saved most of the wounded that could be saved. With Grigor gone, Russett was now the most experienced medic, and today justified the time she'd spent learning from him.
The Morton stalker and the stalker that had been accompanying him lately were there, but I had never been less interested.
Even the mutants knew to keep away from the valley now. In fact, I suspected it would stay clear for a very long time. Eventually, the fires went out.