Kill Machine by William Vitka

Author:William Vitka [Vitka, William]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction, Fantasy
Amazon: B013PR863C
Publisher: Permuted Press
Published: 2015-08-25T06:00:00+00:00

22. Kill Strangers or Kill the Ones You Love

I crash for six hours. Pretty much where I used to. Under a metal roof. In a tent. On a bigass sleeping bag. The Pegasus suit’s climate controls keep me comfy.

Sleeping in the middle of a war zone ain’t easy. But it can be done.

Especially when the parasite in your head slaps you into a coma.

Oh, boo-fuckin-hoo. Your ribs are still bruised. So’re your lungs. But you’ll manage.

Thanks.

I wake up to my parents.

Plissken’s playing Night of the Living Dead on one of the walls.

Jack and Catarina share what remains of my whiskey. Asses in two aluminum lawn chairs. Their backs to me. Hands knotted together. Like they’re a couple kids in a theater.

To be honest, the flick doesn’t have quite the same punch for me that it used to.

Can’t imagine it does for my folks, either.

But maybe it does. They’re quiet. Tense.

They jump when the camera cuts from Barbra’s panicky face in the farmhouse to the fleshless, bug-eyed face of the dead lady upstairs. The sting of music.

Then they laugh. Each takes another swig of booze.

Jack lights a cigarette. Blows smoke at the projection.

Catarina grabs his stogie. Steals a puff before handing it back.

I chuckle. Can’t help myself.

They are two kids at the movies.

My parents whip around. Then grin at each other. Then go back to me.

Jack says, “Morning kiddo.” He extends the bottle of whiskey toward me. “Breakfast?”

I sit up with a grunt. Pain ain’t so bad in my chest anymore. So I light a cigarette. Scratch my face. My beard. I cough. Only a tiny bit of blood now. Tell my dad: “Sure.”

He struts over. Hands me some alcohol. “How’re you doing?”

I gulp the whiskey. Swallow. Feel fresh burn. Open my eyes wide. Blink hard. “Shit, that brings me back.” I sniff. Look around the observation deck. “Can’t believe I’m here again.”

Catarina walks to us. Sits cross-legged near me. “We kinda can’t either. Any closer to home and we’d have to be—”

“In Bay Ridge. Yeah. Same.” I rub my face. It’s not as though being here again is a fuckin good thing for me. “Where’s DeVille?”

Jack says, “She’s back at the Beast. Resting up. The, uh...” He nods to Catarina. “I’ll let your mom explain. I’m terrible at it.”

“If something fuckin touched her while you were supposed to be protecting her, I’ll—”

My mother holds up a hand. “Slow down, little man.” She grabs the booze bottle from me. Takes a pull. “First off, DeVille can take care of her damn self. Even while carrying around two emergent babies in her belly.”

Jack laughs. “I swear, dude, your mom killed more motherfuckers when she was preggo with you than without. She was a terror.”

Catarina squints at my old man. “...Secondly, giving birth to a single pure emergent is not easy. Giving birth to two is...well, worse. Harder.” She cocks an eye at me. “Neither you or your dad are quite equipped to deal with it.”

I twirl my fingers. Breathe smoke. “Someone tell me what the fuck is going on.

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