The Drowned Cities (13 page)

Instead, he’d taken one impossibly fast and bloody swipe from a half-man and gone flying into a tree. No wonder the swanks who owned the scrap ships always used half-men. The bastards were deadly.

Ocho ran an idle hand over his bandages and stitches. Lucky they’d run across the doctor and his castoff. Those two had done a better job than any of the butchers in the Drowned Cities. The so-called doctors there barely knew how to tie a tourniquet.

He fingered the stitching. Tidy, perfectly even loops pulling torn flesh back together. Ocho’s eyes went to the doctor girl, now busily washing pots under Stork’s supervision. She’d been the one. The doc knew what to do, but she’d done the doing. Skills like that were good to have in a platoon, even if she was a castoff.

Ocho watched her as she moved around the area, doing her chores. Despite her missing hand, she did pretty good. Not hard to look at, either. Strong cheekbones and dark brown skin and those peacekeeper eyes. As far as Ocho was
concerned, she could have had her face burned off with acid and he would still have been interested in her. Not many people stitched skin as good as a machine stitched cloth.

Ocho made a mental note to recommend her to the lieutenant. Maybe burn her in. He’d have to keep Soa off her, though. Soa had some kind of special beef with the peacekeepers. Keeping him off the girl would be full-time hassle.

Even now, Soa was waving at the girl.

“C’mere, castoff. Polish my boots.” Soa was grinning and holding them up. “Spit-shine, girl. Get to work. Kiss my boots.”

Ocho watched, but didn’t interfere, curious to see how far Soa would push his authority. The soldier just didn’t let up. Undisciplined that way.

The castoff straightened from her washing. “You want me to scrub your boots?” she asked.

Ocho frowned at her tone, trying to focus through the swaddling blankets of his painkillers. Something about the doctor girl was wrong, and it made his skin prickle. And that weird ripe smell was getting stronger, too. It was all over. Not just coming from his dead soldier boys.

What the hell was it?

The doctor girl had started toward Soa. “You want me to do your boots right now?” she asked. “That what you want?”

Everything about her body language was wrong. She was standing too tall, looking too direct.

Ocho dragged himself upright, fighting the pain in his ribs. She’d lost her fear. The doctor girl had been terrified
of Soa before, and now she wasn’t. She should have been a frightened little war maggot, quaking and begging, and instead, she was striding toward Soa, and she was smiling.

Blood and rust
, Ocho thought.
What you up to, girl?

Ocho had once seen a nailshed girl go after a trooper with a knife, and she’d looked just like the doctor girl now as she walked toward Soa.

But the castoff was just carrying that bottle of antibiotic stuff she’d had with her all evening. No knife. Nothing dangerous. But she looked like she actually wanted to tangle with Soa.

So where was the weapon?

“Soa…” Ocho started.

At Ocho’s words, the castoff glanced over. Something flashed on her face and her step faltered. Hesitation.

Guilt? Fear?

It was weird. It looked almost like she felt bad, like she was apologizing to him for something. And then her expression hardened and she went after Soa, full bore.

Soa never saw it coming. All he saw was an amputated castoff, so he walked right into her trap, even as Ocho started to shout.

The doctor girl swung her arm. An arc of gleaming liquid sprayed Soa, top to bottom. Soa flinched away.

“What the hell?”

For a second, Ocho was sure she’d thrown acid. She’d gotten hold of hydrochlor somehow, and wanted to burn Soa’s face off for his hassling. But Soa didn’t start screaming
and clawing his eyes. Instead, the soldier was just standing there. Dripping. Looking nauseated.

“What
is
this stuff?”

A wave of stench rolled over Ocho, emanating from the drenched soldier.

So that was where the smell was coming from.

Soa was staring at the doctor girl incredulously. “This stinks!” He took a step toward her, glaring. “Get over here, maggot! Clean me up!”

But the girl was shaking her head and backing away. Soa took another step after her.

“I said—”

A scream ripped the night, coming from the far side of the perimeter. Gunfire chattered, then opened up full. More screaming, joined by a snarling that made Ocho’s blood run cold.

The half-man, he realized. It was coming for them. The gunfire and screaming suddenly cut short. Kilo and Riggs had been out there, and now there was nothing.

Ocho tried to get up and toppled over in his haste. He was more drugged than he’d thought. His head was dizzy with the painkillers. He waved clumsily at his troops. “Get out there!” He waved at his boys. “Dog Squad! Back them up! Don’t leave your brothers out there! Help them!”

More screaming and guns were going off, now from the North.

Fates
, Ocho thought.
It’s back
.
The dog-face is going to finish us off.

He cast about for his rifle, feeling suddenly vulnerable and alone. Where the hell was it? Where was his damn weapon?

Soa was unslinging his own rifle, shouting at the doctor girl. He was pissed off, but at least he wasn’t hurt.

“Soa!” Ocho ordered. “Get out there!” But Soa wasn’t listening. Or maybe Ocho just hadn’t said it loud enough. Either way, Soa was all about revenge on the castoff. The girl was backing away from Soa, but the weird thing was, she wasn’t panicking. Even as everyone else was shouting and grabbing for their guns and there was screaming and shooting all around the perimeter, the girl didn’t look surprised in the least.

She wasn’t afraid at all.

Alil’s squad dashed toward the sounds of fighting. “Light ’em up!” he shouted. More gunfire ripped the night. Muzzle flashes.

Ocho fought his way to his feet, ribs burning, dizziness washing over him. Where the hell was his rifle? From the corner of his eye, Ocho caught a flicker of movement. A shadow beyond the perimeter, faster than firelight.

“Incom—!”

A whirl of gray fur and fangs exploded from the darkness. Soa stumbled and went down, a beast tearing at his back. Another flashed past, tearing right through the center of the building.

Coywolv?

Blood poured from Soa as more snarling monsters piled
onto him. He was screaming and thrashing, trying to get the beasts off him.

Why the hell were coywolv attacking a whole platoon of soldiers?

The doctor girl dodged past Soa and slipped into the darkness, even as more and more coywolv emerged to tear into Soa.

Why not her?

She was smaller. The coywolv should have been going for her. She was the easy bait. Coywolv always went after easy bait. It didn’t make any sense. It was like some kind of strange drug nightmare.

“Get it off!” Soa was screaming. “Get it off!”

Reyes had his shotgun up and was trying to get a clear shot on the coywolv, but they were all whirling motion, and the scatter would tear Soa as well.

“Shoot it!” Soa howled. “Shoot! Shoot!”

He sounded like an animal himself. Reyes sighted again, and then more coywolv piled in and Reyes had his hands full. The soldier boy opened up. One of the beasts’ heads whipped back at the blast, blood spraying. Coywolv snarled all around, tearing through the camp, dragging dead soldier bodies out into the darkness, going after the living soldiers as they tried to assemble.

The LT piled down the ladder, shouting for a rally point, the doctor man coming down after. Out beyond the edge of the firelight, the jungle seethed with predatory shadows.

Someone let off a burst of auto.

“Save your shots, you maggots!” the LT shouted.

It was out of control. More and more soldiers were screaming and down under piles of tearing coywolv. Ocho caught a glimpse of the doctor man disappearing into the darkness at the far side of the building, a medical bag in his hands.

“We’re losing the doctor!”

But no one was free to go after him. Ocho started hobbling after the man, ribs searing. He fell to his knees. As he struggled to stand, he caught sight of the girl again. Crouched right on the edge of the darkness, watching him.

Why was she still there? Was he hallucinating now?

Ocho again searched for a gun. Finally saw it leaning against a wall, on the other side of Jones’s body. He started crawling for it, but a coywolv leaped onto the soldier boy’s corpse, blocking Ocho’s path. Ocho froze. Another coywolv joined it. They both bared their teeth and snarled at Ocho.

What was he supposed to do? Look them in the eye? Look away? Back off? Don’t back off? He couldn’t remember.

His questions evaporated as the two coywolv seized Jones’s legs in their teeth and dragged the limp body away into the darkness.

Why didn’t they go after me? I was right there.
And then the answer, as all the pieces of the puzzle fit together.
Because she didn’t douse me with that stuff the way she did half the platoon. She set this all up.

Soa was still screaming. “Get it off! Get it off!” But there were three coywolv on him now, and everyone had their hands full, and then Soa rolled right into the fire and his
screaming stopped being words. Coywolv leaped off his back, blazing canine forms, yelping and crazed.

Soa staggered upright, a human torch.

“Get him down!” Ocho shouted. “Roll him!”

But Soa was past hearing. He stumbled about, ran into the ladder, and then it was on fire, too, flames leaping up toward the squat, catching plastics and paper, and then suddenly half the building was on fire.

Ocho gave up on his rifle and started trying to crawl away from the roaring flames. His chest felt like it was being stabbed by knives. His arms and legs felt heavy and clumsy.

Suddenly the castoff was there, grabbing him, hauling him upright. Ocho stared at her, stunned. “What the—?”

She slung his arm over her shoulder. “I didn’t spend all that time stitching you up just to watch you get killed. Can you lean on me?”

Ocho felt something tear as she pulled him away from the fire. “You set us up.”

She didn’t answer, just dragged him into the darkness. Behind them, flames roared higher. Blazing heat. Ocho wished he had his gun, or a knife to stick her, anything at all, but the pain was too much and he was weak and she wasn’t stopping to let him catch his breath. “I’m going to kill you,” he panted. He tried to grab at her throat.

“Cut it out, I’m saving your maggot ass.” She jabbed him in his stitches with the stump of her hand. He gasped and doubled over. He felt like a baby, he was so weak.

“Why are you doing this?”

“Because I’m too stupid to know better.” They reached a tree, and she shoved him up against it. “If you climb, you’ll make it.”

Ocho wanted to turn back, to go to his boys, but she fought off his weak resistance and started lifting him up. “You can’t help them,” she grunted. She jammed him farther up into the tree. “I’m only doing this because you almost act human. Goes-around-comes-around, soldier boy. Now climb!”

“I can’t!”

“You climb or you’re coywolv bait.” She boosted him higher. “Get up there, you maggot!”

Fire had spread to the rest of the building; it was all going up. Ammo started exploding.
Rat-a-tat.
Probably his rifle on fire. Ocho felt his stitches rip wide as the girl shoved him higher. He almost blacked out from the pain, but he went up.

At last he made it into the crotch of the tree, gasping and sobbing. His side was full of flame, but he was up. Up and safe. Alive.

He looked down for the girl, expecting her to be following him up, thinking maybe he could still pigstick her for doing this to them, but the girl was gone. Swallowed into the jungle. A ghost, just like the coywolv she’d summoned.

Ocho let out a sigh and laid his cheek against the rough bark as the building went up in flames, feeling the knife burn of torn stitches all up and down his ribs. His whole body felt heavy. Maybe that doctor girl’s drugs were better than he’d thought.

More gunfire lit the night. Soldier boys doing what they did best. Coywolv were howling, but now the squads had their number and were starting to mop up. Paying back, UPF-style. Ten times over.

Ocho realized that blood was running down his side. He groped at his ribs, fingers clumsy. Too bad about that. It would have made a tidy scar. But then, that was the problem with pretty toy stitches. When real life got hold of them, they always tore out.

The building torched higher, blazing. A bunch more ammo exploded. In his stupor, it was almost pretty. Ocho looked out at the darkness, wondering where the girl had gone.

You better be running for the ends of the earth. If we catch up with you, that last hand of yours isn
’
t the only thing the lieutenant will take.

The warboys opened up, full-auto. More coywolv yelped and died.