The Last Reaper by J N Chaney & Scott Moon

Author:J N Chaney & Scott Moon [Chaney, J N & Moon, Scott]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Variant Publications
Published: 2019-02-08T05:00:00+00:00

14

“That’s your best idea?” I asked X-37.

“Yes, sir, it is,” X-37 said.

I hated heights. Thinking about the cable crossing made my hands shake. The only thing worse was complete failure and the real chance of death that would come with it. The doctor was a pompous asswipe, the type to put scientific research above humanity. His daughter was as annoying as any teenager I’d ever met. My best friend from spec ops was probably going to betray me.

My bones ached, my heart raced from whatever X-37 was doing to my hormonal profile, and the gray slime I’d eaten earlier was still talking to me. Now I was expected to run the rooftops of a decommissioned battle station with a failing gravity generator and sketchy atmosphere shield.

“I promise there won’t be any more cables or bridges. The schematics show one narrow walkway that is out of view of your destination, and thus not likely to be targeted by the enemy sniper.”

“You know they’re just trying to keep us here until their sodding super soldier catches up,” I said, climbing up the back of a building and crouching low as I moved across the first rooftop. The route X-37 had plotted for me circled the area with only a few deviations from what I might have picked myself.

The heads-up display in my left eye was necessarily small and limited. My right hand cramped each time I climbed a ladder. The cybernetic-enhanced left arm could mimic the discomfort of my natural right arm for the sake of coordination, but I asked X-37 to turn that feature off.

Having one arm without pain and one arm with pain might throw off my coordination, but I doubted it. I’d had the artificial limb long enough to know what I could and couldn’t do with it.

Phantom pain was another issue. It was worse when I thought about how I’d lost the arm, but I tried to put that image out of my mind. Unless I had a lot of time on my hands, like when I’d been confined to death row.

That woman holding my hand as she dangled from a bridge. Talk about a nightmare. It felt like a lifetime ago.

In a way, the worse this mission got, the better I felt. At least in my head.

I was on my third building before I saw the next major obstacle in the way of rescuing Hastings and his daughter.

The gangs of Dreadmax had found a way across the power plant exhaust trench. They had vehicles that must’ve allowed them to drive a considerable distance to the next actual bridge. No hand-over-hand cable shenanigans for them.

Lucky bastards.

I watched the RSG mob search and wasn’t sure if I needed to laugh or curse. They started off in organized groups but were easily distracted. Infighting, laziness, and homemade liquor further diminished their effectiveness. “I should be thankful they’re so unorganized, right?”

“The RSG search tactics are inefficient, which is good for us,” X-37 said.

“Are there any talk boxes up here?”

“None are shown on the schematics.

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