Terminal Fuse

{ELEVEN}

The Final Thoughts of Archibald McTaggart:

After a careful analysis of my resources, I've realized that — pardon the slang — I'm screwed. And I can say that with complete confidence since no great analysis needed to be made. When the blackout happened, I had in my possession: a water bottle, a cereal bar, and a box of chewing gum. I have been careful with the water but the cereal bar is long gone, and I'm down to my last stick of gum. Gnawing on it, like a cave person with a bone, does temper the hunger churning in my gut, though it's the equivalent of plumbing the depths of the cosmos with nothing but a dish and a spoon.

***

"Contact!"

I pop off a quick shot that shreds a tarnished shoulder, pitching the abhorex forward where it collides into a raised plant bed, sending up an eruption of dirt and fertilizer. 

Frick, how'd I do that? 

The other three abhorexes take glancing shots from my party but nothing damaging. A couple of the abhorexes dart away to slip between farther rows of vegetation — their meaty backs remain visible above the four-feet tall beds but only just, and Mia squeezes off a three-round burst after the last one but the shots rattle against an abhorex's spine without finding purchase.

"Fall back," Victoria commands, and we do as she says, backstepping without taking our focus from the door. Twenty feet away, we wait. Bitty tenses beside me, fangs bared. I drop to my knee, prepping for the earthshaking recoil of unloading my fully-automatic rifle. Damn my small stature. And then they come, fueled by my anxiety. Two abhorexes bash together in their struggle through the door, no longer moving as one. We're fresh meat, and they're starved predators.

"Fire!"

Fear twists me again, and I yank on the trigger. So does everyone else. Bullets spray around the door. I should have been taller, bigger — mighty like Victoria, then the gun's recoil wouldn't beat me like this. A lucky line of bullets bites into an abhorex's neck and face. The abhorex spurts black oil and blood, stumbles forward, and its engine crackles and dies. Was that my kill or my teams? Doesn't matter, cuz my other bullets are drawing a toddler's connect-the-dots picture on the wall. Our steady barrage of hot metal is enough to momentarily slow the beasts that rasp and snarl under the steady barrage. They try to climb over their dead comrade but two abhorexes simply won't fit through that door.

"Reload!" Someone yells while the rest of us maintain suppressive fire. Most slugs get caught in the dead abhorex, nothing lands. One abhorex rams its way forward, and I see the door's hinges buckle before they snap, leaving a gaping hole for them to file through. We release a spray of gunfire at the hole, blindly aiming at the mess of dark bodies there.

And my gun jams on empty.

"Shit," I curse, scrambling to reload my gun.

Like the devil himself, an abhorex tramps in, claws drawing shivering lines down the broken door beneath it, and it bellows, triumphant. Victoria unloads on him, aiming for its damaged leg. But it limps forward, lunges... I somehow sense the moment it dies. This close, its mental feedback chitters for a second in my brain, followed immediately by silence as a bullet cracks through its eye and shuts down its CPU.

The last abhorex is just behind. It's unhurt, not bleeding, and still I haven't gotten the next mag in. I'm jamming the new mag into the gun well but it won't lock. Either I'm too stressed, or this piece of crap gun's broken, or... it just won't work!

Screw it.

I drop the M16 to withdraw my Glock.

But it's too late.