The Enthusiasts

33

"Efficiency is my best understanding of this reality. Humans are effectively inefficient. Question: How may I serve? Answer: Efficiently" - Cornelius

Emerson heard something from off in the distance. It sounded foreign to him in this part of town. It sounded like the distant hum of a combustible drive engine, much bigger than the two gens they had running in camp, and those had been shut down after supper anyway. He listened again, and he was sure the sound ceased. Then he thought he saw a flash of red light reflect off the masonry of the guard tower planted at the south corner of the camp. It startled him. He pulled on his pack with The Tablet in tow and made his way out of his bedroom, down the stairs, and outside to the courtyard. He listened from the ground to confirm that he heard engines running somewhere nearby. But the noise coming from inside the Party House overlapped, dulling it to his infuriating annoyance when he tried to hone in on the sound. Emerson hustled over to the house and banged on the front door before opening it.

"Emerson, Keith's a troush'n dart shark! He's been hiding from us this whole time!" Sasha shouted exuberantly as he entered with a third half-glass of champagne in one hand, a purple wing-tipped dart in the other.

"I think I hear engines. And there are lights coming from outside," Emerson stated. Hearing his words, the house cleared out quickly and silently. The red lights Emerson thought he saw from his window were confirmed as real the moment the crew stepped outside. They grew larger as the reflection bounced back to the camp from the top of the lookout tower. The group stood silently together, listening closely as the engines came roaring ever louder over the quickening distance. Cheeco sniffed around the area, letting out several hurried barks toward the enemy at the gates as the lights and sounds continued to intensify.

"I'll take a look from the watchtower," Sasha stated, climbing the ladder cautiously, one rung at a time, against the stacked concrete block exterior wall of the tower. She knew there was a laser rifle placed at the top, in a shallow alcove hollowed out in the cement wall that went around the circumference of the open-air lookout. Sasha had almost reached the top when the low gurgle of fossil burning engines seemed to cease completely. Sasha held onto the second last rung of the ladder, looking back at Emerson, Teddy, Achak, and Keith watching her from the ground below. The atmosphere surrounding the camp was dead; any sound seemed to be vacuumed out of the region after an evening full of wispy Rocky Mountain air rollicking through the open courtyard. Cool darkness was all that remained as the team dreaded what threatened outside their walls. Emerson stretched to pick up any signals from outside the lair. He told himself it was just a close call, likely just some exercise that Spectra or maybe even a new, more organized area gang was doing. Our secrets are still safe, and there is nothing to worry about, he reminded himself.

Sasha looked to her left, unable to recognize any peculiar objects from her obscured, tactical view while remaining in cover overtop the lookout wall. The red light had ceased emanating, leaving nothing more of disturbance to be detected. She gingerly took two more steps up to the top, her body nearly planking down over the dusty concrete base as she moved. She searched the area, reaching and then retrieving the plasma rifle and a set of night vision goggles placed next to them with a methodically cautious ease. A deep pain was felt in her knotted stomach. She didn't want to look over the edge; she didn't want it to end. She was just getting used to things here. She didn't want to move on like this. Sasha's forehead peeked and then her eyes eventually peered over the side of the camp's outer brick wall like a precocious child listening at the banister to the dull silence left in the air after Dad finally admits to the affair that everyone in the family already knew about but never brought up, wanting to keep on living their dream. She saw objects, large objects, through a cumulus veiled soft moonlight. She threw on the night vision googles and was aided shortly by the bright green haze that shone through the lens and outlined her surroundings. A small army was parked in front of the camp's cloaked entrance.