Ch18 Tips For Delivery

As it turns out, sometimes there isn’t room for dessert. Five hundred or so pounds of meat simply doesn’t compress into the body of an eighteen year old human. I harvested what I could, even increasing my height by two more inches and making my fake clothes extra baggy, but in the end I had to throw two half-eaten corpses into the nearest dumpster. Such a waste.

Even worse was that all three of them were non-mutated males, which meant I wasn’t getting any new genetic or anatomical information out of this. Searching the net for information on human anatomy was insightful, but images don’t compare to the real thing, especially since I don’t know many of the words for concepts I want to know about. For now I’m simply plugging words I do know in, and using the definitions it provides to search for more words. Having two phones for most of the afternoon helped with that.

As for the fight itself I did get some good practice in. I restricted myself to using human fighting methods and just the one arm (I wasn’t going to risk putting down the food) in order to keep it challenging. Got stabbed twice in the ribs because of it, but it showed my practice with Adder was worthwhile, I didn’t need to burn any extra resources to improve reflexes like I had when fighting the Espada minions on the subway. The biggest problem was actually keeping them from running when they realized they couldn’t win. I’d learned my lesson from the rats, no letting them gather reinforcements.

 

Pocketing the knives (they didn’t have wallets on them) I went back to searching for the street nearest Nicole’s den. It would have been nice if I could use my mask again, but map directions had to be approved by a lieutenant, something about a security risk. The minion masks had a lot of strange restrictions, and Socket said I could get a real mask if I decided to “don the cowl.”

Absolutely not. My life was dangerous enough as is, and I was quite satisfied with my rewards as a minion.

I wandered a few more blocks checking street signs, but I didn’t recognize any of them. Then I tried asking for help from what few humans passed by on the street. The responses were… disappointing, if they responded at all. The two humans who didn’t just ignore me or yell at me didn’t know the address I was searching for. Seems I’d just have to look for it myself.

The design of Fortress City actually worked against me in this regard. Since everything was arranged into equal blocks of similar buildings everything tended to look the same, the only real identifiers being where buildings had been modified or damaged, or where a non-housing structure was placed. I knew the general direction of where I needed to go though, and I headed south-west while keeping a lookout for any landmarks I recognized from my brief time south of Ashwood.

 

I strolled along, clicking words into the phones, and observing the few humans that were still out and about. Ever since Odd Summer was announced the streets cleared quickly after sunset, but there was still some activity until it hit the later hours. Some of which were the security soldier caste, or “cops” as the humans called them.

Ahead of me, on the other side of the street, two such cops were speaking with a mutant with horns outside of an apartment building. The mutant’s face was bloody, and every now and then it gestured up at the apartment while it talked to them. It was getting harder and harder to avoid cops lately, these incidents were becoming more and more commonplace. Tonight especially seemed somewhat bad, this was the third such patrol I had noted. It was a concern for me since there was a curfew in effect. Normally the curfew was ignored, but with this many cops around it was possible one might stop me.

After spotting the fifth patrol (this one currently unoccupied with a prior activity) I ducked into an alley.This was taking longer than I thought it would with all the obstacles, I needed a better method of travel. Streets were no good with the cops everywhere, and alleys were no good with the risk of ambushes. I considered the manhole cover farther down the alley but discarded the idea, if I couldn’t find my way aboveground I definitely wouldn’t find my way below in the tunnels. I needed to go higher, not lower.

The buildings on either side of me had metal staircases attached to their sides. I checked to make sure no one was around and then stretched an arm out to grab the bottom rung of a ladder, pulling myself up. From there I climbed up the metal stairs all the way to the roof. I spied the silhouettes of the larger buildings around Ashwood St. and was able to compare them with my internal map, so at least I knew I was heading in the right general direction. As for a route…

I measured the distance between the building I was on and the one next to it. It was only about sixteen feet, not a difficult distance to jump. I checked for humans again just in case, but I didn’t think this would stand out too much even if I was seen.

Now for the first test. I took a running start and jumped to the next roof. It wasn’t very difficult, but the extra density I currently carried meant I stumbled upon landing, and only cleared the gap with three feet to spare. I made some minor modifications and jumped the next gap, and the next, making minor modifications after each jump. Using the cement bridges that spanned major streets I made it seventeen blocks before I had to go back to the ground floor to cross to the next building.

This was working out much better, I could avoid the more problematic humans and practice designs at the same time. Now all I had to do was figure out how to fold the reversed knee and extra leg length into my normal disguise, maybe if the tibia sockets with the femur-

 

crack

 

I stepped in something.

 

My foot had landed on a round organic object that had been nestled in a bed of shredded paper, crushing its shell. I hadn’t seen it before I jumped because of the waist high barrier around this roof, causing me to land on it unknowingly. On the inside it was filled with nutrients, and a small, half-formed organism floated within. Some kind of incubation vessel?

I tested the composition and felt relief, it was just an egg, similar to those served at breakfast, and not a human egg. The definitions from my phone said humans have live young, but with so many mutant variations I wasn’t going to discount the possibility that some laid eggs. I was still getting used to the idea that all women doubled as progenitors. It seemed like an inferior system when compared to having a dedicated progenitor at first, but when I calculated the numbers I realized that they could effectively double their population count within three to four years or so at maximum production, and the death of a single progenitor wouldn’t put a scratch in those numbers. Obviously some kind of countermeasure towards all the dangerous predators around. Speaking of which…

I scanned the rooftop. There was an access door to the next level down, and a few ventilation pipes sticking out of the ceiling, but I saw no signs of life. Whatever had made the eggs wasn’t here right now, so I absorbed the rest of the broken egg and crossed the roof to leap to the next building.

 

I almost made it.

 

CAWwwwWWWwwwWWWwww

 

Error: balance decalibrated.

Recalibrating…

 

I stumbled and fell to my side right before I could jump, my limbs and balance both malfunctioning. That sound! The warbling cry had thrown my balance completely off. I scanned the vicinity and found what had to be the source. A large unknown organism was perched next to the nest I stepped on. It stood on two thin legs with taloned feet, its head had a strange claw-like mouth with two yellow eyes, and its body was covered in dark…scales? Or maybe fur? They seemed flimsy. At its feet was a dead human, a fresh kill from the looks of it, but currently the kill was ignored in favor of glaring at me. I tried to stand back up but-

 

CAWwwwWWWwwwWWWwww

 

Another warbling cry pierced the air, and again my balance failed me. I tried to avoid falling on my bag of food containers this time.

 

Estimated threat: High.

 

The cry ended and this time the dark-shrieker spread two limbs covered in scale/fur to its sides and flapped them, rising into the air! It dove for me, and I was forced to try and lamely fend it off from my prone position at the edge of the roof. Its talons were sharp, but the organism itself was quite light, which allowed me to bat it away temporarily.

I needed to get off the roof and down to the ground level, if this creature could fly then the flat roof of a building was a bad place to fight it. Peering over the side I saw there was a metal bar staircase, and I hefted myself over the small barrier to jump down.

 

CAWwwwWWWwwwWWWwww

 

I fell down, my malfunctioning limbs barely able to cradle the bag of food as I went tumbling, past the staircase and five floors down to the bottom of the alley. My modified legs might have been able to take a fall like this, but my malfunctioning joints couldn’t position properly, and I hit the ground with a crunch breaking one leg and parts of my spine.

 

This was one annoying organism. Physically it was inferior, but that cry turned my limbs into limp appendages every time.

 

“It came from over here! Quickly, someone’s on the ground!”

 

I turned my head to the alley entrance, where two humans in security uniforms were running over to me.

Great, cops…

Wait, cops! Great! I could use them as a distraction!

 

“Sir! Sir are you alright?!” said one of the cops. Both had their guns drawn, and they were scanning both myself and the surrounding alley for danger.

“There was a large, flying, monster,” I said, being careful to wheeze my answer as if critically injured.

“Don’t try to move… don’t worry, we’ll get you help soon,” said one cop, covering the alley while the other started speaking rapidly into a handheld communication device.

 

I was already healing, bone fractures weren’t a difficult fix, what I needed now was to finish recalibrating my balance to rely on vision instead of motion. Around me the world went silent as I destroyed my own sound sensory organs, hopefully if I couldn’t hear it the sonic attack wouldn’t affect me as much.

The two cops spotted the dark-shrieker first and started to fire upon it, but I could tell the moment when it used its sonic attack again. Both cops fell over in a limp heap, and while it didn’t throw my balance off as much, I could still feel the vibration of its cry in my bones, weakening my limbs. I would need to maintain a good distance.

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Shakily I rose to my feet, the dark-shrieker passing overhead as it tried to attack the cops that shot at it. I lunged for the downed cops’ position myself and managed to land a good punch on the dark-shrieker before it could slash into the first cop with its talons, sending it off-course. It almost slammed into a dumpster, but managed to correct its course and gain altitude for another pass.

I dived for the guns the cops had dropped, both of them were still twitching on the floor and couldn’t use them anyway. The designs were a bit different for these guns, they appeared to be more advanced versions of the one I had disassembled, but the basics were the same. Grabbing one, I lined it up with the dark-shrieker and clicked the trigger.

 

Nothing.

I grabbed the second gun and tried again. Nothing. A small panel had lit up when I tried to fire the guns and I checked the displayed symbols.

 

Unauthorized User

 

Irritating.

 

The dark-shrieker passed overhead, and my limbs weakened as it strafed me with its sonic attack. When it circled and dived at me again I chucked the guns at it. Both hit its face, and in its surprise it forgot to scream as it passed overhead and out of the alley into the street. I needed something heavier I could throw.

I lurched to the dumpster nearby and opened the lid, grabbing the first large piece of garbage I saw. Out in the street the dark-shrieker circled and came in for another pass. I took aim as it got closer and-

A purple blur rammed into the side of the dark-shrieker, slamming it so hard some of its dark black scale/fur dislodged as they went out of sight around the corner of the building.

 

Magenta!

 

Time for me to leave.

 

I dropped the garbage and ran to the back of the alley, turned a corner, and then ran until I found a manhole. Pulling it up in a hurry I dived into the tunnel and slammed the cover closed behind me. Pausing to make sure I wasn’t followed, I regenerated the damage from the fight, and slowed down to do some important calculations.

 

…

 

Did I owe Magenta lunch?

 

…

 

No.

 

---

 

I followed the sewers for a while before going back up to the surface, I didn’t want to risk getting lost or running into any more rats. True there was the risk of Magenta and cops, but changing my coverings and face should keep them from recognizing me as the person the dark-shrieker was targeting. The surface had its risks, but so far the ground floor and especially the alleys had proven to be the least dangerous of my options. I should have stuck with them from the beginning.

I alternated between the sidewalks and alleys as necessary, trying not to attract notice, and just observing the night time activities of humans. Through one apartment window I saw a group of males around a screen that showed some sort of training exercise. Over at a street corner was a “Tex’s Taco Stand,” a mobile dispensary where humans were occasionally stopping and getting food (I bought one, tacos are tasty). One large building had a line of interestingly dressed humans waiting to get inside, where loud noises were creating a rhythmic pattern. All of these different places and people I had never seen before told me one thing:

 

I was kinda lost.

 

The taco vendor had told me I was going in the right general direction, but I still hadn’t seen any street signs I recognized. I decided to climb to the roof of a building (carefully) and check the skyline of Ashwood St. again.

Yep, I was going in the right general direction. Maybe… thirty to forty more blocks before I crossed the route I took to the safehouse? That wasn’t so bad, as long as this really was the right direction and I wasn’t more turned around than I thought I was.

I climbed down the metal staircase slowly, being careful to not spill the contents of my bag. After all the night’s activities it had started to develop a few holes and seemed a bit fragile. I started to gather mass to make a temporary pouch while I climbed down.

 

As I dropped from the bottom rung of the last ladder a small metal canister flew out from behind a dumpster. It landed right in front of me and exploded, creating a flash of light and noise so loud they damaged my sensory organs.

I fell into a crouch, and tried to run towards where I remembered some cover being.

But a spray of shrapnel pellets caught me in the head.

 

Error: Human.exe has crashed, hardware destroyed.

Estimated threat: Extreme.

EmergencyProtocol: PD;

 

---

 

The creature collapsed, the bag it carried dropping to the floor of the alley as it flopped forwards onto the ground. It twitched a bit as blood spurted from the crater of its face, propelled by the last few beats of its hearts.

A man rose up from behind the dumpster, dressed in dark clothing, with a red bandana hiding the lower half of his face. But his eyes glowed as they centered in on the creature he had been tracking all night. It wasn’t wearing armbands, but even if it had the half-eaten bodies he came across in a dumpster sealed its fate. Monster or cannibal, a maneater couldn’t be suffered to live. Not in his sector. Not by him.

He raised his pump-action shotgun and emptied the rest of his ammo into its torso. Never a good idea to hold back on Odd Summer horrors.