Gravewalkers: Dying Time (34 page)

Chapter 12: Where Eagles
Call Home

Critias napped through
their flight to Houston. Carmen didn’t wake him until after they
had arrived. She had already performed a thorough flyover where she
examined all their potential landing strips, inspected the location
of the Hale-Wellington Pharmaceuticals building, and then studied
all the terrain between those locations because at some point they
would have to cross it on the ground.

By the light of early
afternoon, Critias peered out a window to see just part of the vast
density that was the city of Houston. He saw that good fortune was
with them because the city seemed remarkably intact, as opposed to
being a great black smudge of charred ruin that had resulted from a
total wipeout by fire. Houston’s population had fallen to infected
attack early on during the first days of Outbreak. The damage toll
to humans had been total while the ghouls had left the buildings
and infrastructure still standing. The engineers on the final days
must have powered down their fuel refineries and other industrial
plants. If those industries had otherwise exploded from lack of
human supervision, a catastrophic fire would have swept over the
city. He took the good condition as a favorable omen that things
would go his way.

To get their mission
rolling, Critias asked Carmen, “Are we ready to land?”

“
We need to turn around
and go home,” she advised sincerely. “This is an entirely hopeless
proposition. We can’t land here.”

Her lack of enthusiasm
surprised him, “Are all the runways blocked up? I don’t see any
fire damage. This seems ideal to me.”

As though his cursory
observations were only incidental, she informed him, “I could land
at any of the strips that Kevin marked on our maps. As soon as we
hit the ground, the infected are going to know it. There are no
open roads leading to the building we need to reach. If we walked,
it is a twenty-kilometer hike even if we could go in a straight
line. The population per block density of this conurbation is
especially bad. If we land then try to reach that building, you are
surely going to die.”

“
You’re going to land here
somewhere,” he assured her. “I suggest you get to it. You already
told me what your priorities are, so we see things differently. I’m
going to find that specimen by hell or high water, no matter what.
If you have to land out in the badlands then we have to hike in for
a week, then so be it, but we’re going. I know you won’t let me go
alone, just as I know you would rather forget the specimen than
return to Kevin without me.”

“
Aren’t you listening to
me?” Her voice cracked with emotion, “It’s hopeless. We don’t carry
enough ammunition even if every bullet killed ten ghouls. As soon
as the fighting starts, they’ll keep coming and coming. There’s no
chance of us getting the car through. Its noise would stir up the
ghouls in record numbers and we’ll be stuck at dead ends every few
turns. Even all that is assuming we’re lucky enough to avoid any
hunters. Just one of those at home nearly broke our
backs.”

He didn’t want to argue
about any of that since he was still going regardless of how
thoroughly she detailed the risks. “Then you’ll be highly motivated
to make this work so I stay alive, or you can stay in the plane
waiting for me to get back.”

“
Why are you being so
stubborn?” She pleaded, “What makes you think you have any chance
at all?”

If she were not an android,
Critias would have thought her to be on the verge of tears. “I have
more than just a chance. I know I can do it because I already did
it. How could I have already brought it home in a future me if it
was also impossible for me here and now?”

“
I don’t know,” she
admitted. “How is it that you came back as,” she paused, “as him.
I’m here with you now and you’re a pig-headed emotionally stunted
idiot. I don’t believe you are that man of the future. I don’t know
where that being, my beloved master came from, but I find it
impossible to believe that he is some future evolution of
ridiculous you. I should have stayed where I was by his side. My
master would have found some way to stop the bioengineers from
killing me.”

Critias challenged her,
“Then answer me this, if your beloved master is so wonderful, why
would he come home and think a tempestuous bipedal gunship like you
was something so special? In his time frame, his other you that
came home with him will be the Carmen he knew. For all you know, we
both have replacements that are better than we are.”

She begged, “Let’s go home
and tell Kevin that the ghouls destroyed the specimen. We can stay
here in this time and be together. I swear to you that I’ll make
you happy. You like it here. You like Jim, Fat Jack, and all the
others. You have a more fulfilling life here than you do at home
and so do I.”

He refused, “My honor as a
marshal is not something I will sell at any price, not even for
you. Land the plane and let’s get this done.”

Carmen was not ready to
submit, “You are asking me to throw away our chance for a life here
to help you ensure that my entire people become slaves to yours. I
stand to lose everything in return for nothing.”

He agreed with her to some
degree, so he pledged, “When we go back, I promise I will free your
people. Once we get home, in reward for what I bring, they will be
prepared to grant me anything. I love you Carmen, but land the
fucking plane.”

She cheerfully accused him,
“You only say you love me to get what you want.” Carmen banked the
plane to bring them about for a proper alignment to make their
landing. It was true; saying he loved her actually could coerce her
into doing just about anything.

“
I said it out loud to get
what I want,” he confessed. “That doesn’t make it a lie. You know
when I lie. You can tell from ten different ways. I have done
impossible things before, Carmen. It was usually by accident, but I
have still gotten away with it. We can accomplish this. With you to
help me, we can accomplish anything, even cheat the
hangman.”

When Carmen heard him
suggest that they could cheat the future of its vendettas, she
realized that was her goal. Her future’s vendetta demanded that she
stay behind when Critias returned home. She couldn’t change the
fact of history that she never returned with Critias to their lives
in the future, nor was it her fate to endure the passing centuries
as she waited alone, since in her own time she was unheard of in
the recorded histories. She showed him one of the maps Kevin
supplied, “We’re landing at this place. Do you have any idea where
you want to park the plane?”

He had other more immediate
concerns than parking, “Can you fly with the ramp down?”

She could, “This plane is
capable of airdropping cargo with the ramp open, why?”

He instructed, “Set us up
for a bombing run then. I want to roll out one of those fuel drums
and have it hit in this area,” he pointed his target out on the
map. “I’ll rig some explosives onto a drum and we can set this
whole grassy area aflame. All that fire and smoke should lure most
of the ghouls away, and then we land over here,” he pointed out
where Kevin had marked some circles and labeled them as a landing
field for helicopters that had belonged to the city
police.

“
What makes you think that
there are functional helicopters there?” She was doubtful, “Surely
someone would have taken the good ones to escape the city as it was
dying.”

“
Perhaps,” he agreed with
her logic, “but we’ll have a look all the same. Even if they are
there, you might not be able to get one running after it has been
sitting for so long.”

She listened, “Assuming we
can’t, then what?”

“
We walk,” he said. “Kevin
would not give us bad maps so we can count on them being accurate.
I think I see a way for us to get there. It won’t be pleasant, but
that is the reason it should work.” He got up to go rig explosives
on a fuel drum, “Give me a few minutes to get a drum ready, then
open the ramp and tell me when to let it fly.”

Carmen circled at altitude
while he attached a small bomb and radio detonator on a fuel drum.
Once he was ready, she lined up a bombing-run and lowered the rear
ramp. She mentally calculated the factors involved to tell him the
exact moment to drop the package.

When Carmen gave the word,
Critias rolled the barrel of diesel fuel out the cargo ramp so that
it could fall to earth. He sent the triggering signal to the
detonator just before the barrel struck the ground so that the
airborne explosion rained flaming fuel oil across a long patch of
tall grass that was like an island prairie between lanes of tarmac.
Carmen wasted no time when she closed the ramp then repositioned
the plane to land at the end of the airport well away from their
rapidly spreading brushfire.

“
When we are on the
ground,” he instructed, “shut everything down so we can just sit
quietly for a while. I want to give the infected some time to take
interest in our fire. When the flames chase all the vermin out of
the grass, the ghouls will run after them. Once they are out of our
hair we can use the side hatch to sneak over then check out those
helicopters.”

Carmen landed the plane
with her usual reckless excellence then parked it among four other
small planes along the side of the runway where they would blend
in. As Critias had hoped, the fire lured the infected in that
direction. The runways that surrounded the burning ground proved
capable of containing the conflagration from spreading out of
control. Dozens of infected came in to search among the planes, but
their fixation to hunt for obviously edible creatures totally
smothered any higher reasoning they might have possessed for
investigating the aircraft, so those ghouls soon found the fire of
greater interest then departed for that end of the
airport.

Critias left his seat to
lead Carmen quietly out of the cockpit to the cargo area by their
car. “You did a great job,” he praised her. “I couldn’t do this
without you.”

His courteous compliment
made her feel ashamed, “I’m sorry I said those things earlier.
You’re not an idiot, master. I shouldn’t demoralize you when you
need your confidence most.”

“
I have no problem with
you speaking your mind,” Critias dismissed the matter with another
dash of his stoicism.

Carmen wasn’t a feminist
that wanted equal distribution of ascendency in their relationship.
She had never known equality with her master before and wouldn’t
know what to do with it even if she had it. His benevolent
leadership was the fulcrum of her universe. His equitable dismissal
of her chastisable effrontery only made her feel estranged. Carmen
hung her head to humble herself before him so that he would at
least recognize that she submitted to his decisions.

Critias discerned her
distress and needed her in top form for their mission almost as
much as he needed her cheerful companionship. He disconnected his
gauntlets then removed his helmet. “Prepare some water to bathe
me,” he demanded callously for her benefit. “I’ve been in my
mechsuit long enough and I don’t know when I’ll have another chance
to be rid of it.”

She beamed relief to be
back in his proper favor and the comforting security of their old
routine. As she went for water, Carmen said, “Right away.” He gave
her a playfully chauvinist swat on her rump to speed her along and
that drew from Carmen an amorous glance that feigned she felt
castigated. After she fetched some water from the supply they had
brought in their car, Carmen helped him remove the rest of his
armor.

While she washed him
standing, Critias considered his plans, “After I get back into my
suit, I want you to use the clothes I took from those scum I killed
to improve my disguise. The more ragged and filthy I appear the
less likely any ghoul will be to take notice of me and you’ll need
the same for yourself. We will have to travel covertly if this is
going to work.”

She lightly caressed his
back with a washcloth, “When do you want to try?” Realizing her
error, she kissed the back of his neck, “I mean to say, how soon
till we set out to succeed?”

“
When the sun is setting
it will be the time for us to move out. They don’t see in the dark
nearly as well as we do and not being seen is our greatest
advantage.”

“
We have hours then,” she
said softly then planted a kiss on his shoulder blade. “Would you
have me comfort you more?”

“
The wretched confines of
this aircraft are as unworthy of you as would be a pen for swine,”
he rejected the suggestion. “Prepare us a clean place where we can
sit together quietly. I would have you bolster my courage with your
company. If we must walk into a valley of death, I would do so with
peace of mind.”

Carmen used clean blankets
from their car to craft them a comfortable pallet where she could
cuddle up in his arms with her head on his chest. They sat quietly
just like that as they awaited the sunset.

They finally opened the
side door when the sun sank to the horizon. Carmen went out first
in her costume of shredded rags that combined with her superb
acting transformed her into a properly bedraggled limper. Her
meticulously slow progress made her ideal for reconnoitering
without instigating an attack. Critias followed her after he waited
about two minutes. He kept far enough away from her so that they
didn’t appear to be mutually intent on the same
destination.