Play 2 Wage: Linked

The tiny speck of a drone in the sky began to move erratically, before falling off to one side and disappearing behind the trees off to the West. Tevin lowered his rifle and tracked the octocopter as it fell out of sight, frowning and turning to look at me as it vanished from sight.

“They don't normally fall like that.” He commented, looking back to where the drone had disappeared and staring before shrugging it off and settling back in to tend to Kaylee’s wound.

Ali gave me a questioning look but thankfully kept quiet, and Captain Jorn grunted in agreement. Katie once again got everyone moving, ordering the uninjured girls and Rin to start searching for the weapons in the rubble of the house, and urging me to get busy looking for a vehicle. From the sound of things, it seemed that Andy had finally regained consciousness and started a short lived argument with Katie. I ignored the bickering and went with Ali to peel open the sliding barn door and scope out the dark interior of the polebarn.

The old building had dirt floors, and was musty and unlit if not for a few leaf strewn skylights built into the steel roof. There were a couple of beat up old pick-up trucks and a few generations of tractors, including one ancient looking machine that was set up on jackstands and had a pile of tools and bottles of solvents laying next to it.

A staircase followed up the wall to one side to a loft, partially stacked and cluttered with boards of various sizes that were leaned against the wall and bowed with time and humidity. Ali clicked on a bright little flashlight clipped onto the barrel of her rifle and swept it over the place, highlighting the cobwebs and piles of boxes and junk that lined the edges of the open space.

“I bet one of those trucks will start.” I commented, stepping over a tangled hose that lay on the ground, heading for the driver's side door of the less rusty of the two vehicles.

Truthfully, I didn’t really know how to drive. I’d seen it done in movies and such, and watched my parents drive us around as a kid, but since I’d come of age in the city I’d never had much of a reason or opportunity to learn how to do it myself.

I tried the door and thought it was locked at first, but after giving it a solid tug it popped open and a dim light built into the ceiling sprung to life. I pulled myself into the seat while Ali did a circuit around the edges of the room, checking behind boxes and opening the various cabinets and even a refrigerator that lay amongst the clutter.

While I might not have known exactly how to drive, I was confident that I knew how to start the old gas powered truck. I felt around, and turned the key that was still stuck in the ignition. I felt it click and the truck lurched forward and made an awful grinding screeching noise. I stopped twisting the thing before I broke it and instead stuck my head out of the open window and looked over to Ali, who was headed back to me after she had finished her search.

“How do I start this thing?” I asked.

“Not like that” She said with a serious look that had a ghost of a grin hiding somewhere within it. “Move over, I’ll see if it starts. I have a class 2 vehicle license.”

I slid over the long bench seat to the far side of the cabin to make room for her and watched closely to see how she did it.

“This one’s not an automatic, so it’s a little different to start than what you’ve probably seen.” She said, wiggling a little lever that came off of the side of the steering wheel and pressing one of the pedals all the way down to the floor and jamming the lever upwards before turning the key.

The engine sputtered for a moment, and she pumped a second pedal lightly with her other foot as the engine struggled to life. After a moment, the thing coughed and the whole truck started to vibrate, before jerking and letting out a loud bang that almost sounded like a gunshot and finally settling into a stable idle.

“There we go.” She said, before releasing both pedals and stomping on the far left pedal. It clicked a few times and stayed in place when she moved her foot, and she looked over the faded dials behind a dusty layer of clear plastic built into the dash.

“The dash might be broken, but it says it has three quarters of a tank of fuel and is holding RPM’s and temperature.” She said, before leaning back into the seat and looking over at me.

I smiled. “Epic, sounds like we’re in business. Most everyone will have to ride in the back though. I wonder if anyone else can drive, you should probably be ready with your rifle while we’re on the move.” I mused.

She gave me a long look while I contemplated our next step, and after a few seconds she quietly asked. “Sir, this might not be my place, but… why was that drone safe?”

I froze, feeling my face react to her simple question that had no simple answer. I looked away, chewing on my lip and taking a long moment before deciding on giving her a half answer.

“It’s… I can’t really explain, it would be too dangerous. Let’s just say, I have another ally that none of you know about.”

She nodded, and thankfully stopped staring at me and joined me in looking out into the dusty interior of the barn. “Understood, Nick. I trust you. If that's all you can tell me, then that's all I need to know.”

I breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you.”

“Careful there buck-o, that was pretty close. Your clingy shadow might be willing to accept that answer, but I doubt your other two friends would, especially the shut-in.” Max whispered into my mind. I shoved his distrustful thoughts to the side and pushed myself into action.

“Alright, let’s get the others and go, we need to keep moving.” I said as I shouldered open the truck's passenger door and stepped out. I turned and looked at her through the cab. “I’ll get the door opened the rest of the way, and ask around to see if anyone else can drive.”

When I left the barn and pushed the heavy sliding door the rest of the way open, I discovered the rest of the group busy clearing away enough debris from the collapsed house to give the truck room to back out. Everyone had heard the engine roar to life, and Katie kept everyone moving and motivated with her lashing tongue and threat of the ever looming Captain Jorn to stay on task.

I got an angry glare from Andy, a frustrated and stubborn look from Rin who was standing off to the side and clutching his laptop, and a ‘get your ass over here’ wave from Katie. When I went to see what she wanted, she got me working on moving pieces of the broken house out of the way for the truck.

Even though the power suits would have made quick work of clearing the way, Tevin and Jorn stood overwatch, scanning the sky and horizon for drones and pursuing forces while the rest of us struggled to clear the way. I was by far the strongest of the bunch, and found I had to make an actual effort to not show my nearly inhuman strength to the others.

While we worked, Ali backed the truck out into the area we had cleaned, and I asked around to see if anyone else knew how to drive. I got a scoff from two of the tower girls, and an apology from Kaylee who actually knew how to drive but couldn’t operate the truck with her now patched and slung arm.

In the end, although she was not happy about it, Katie was the one who ended up trading places with Ali in the driver’s seat. It turned out she owned all sorts of recreational vehicles that she drove around her family land in her limited off time as a hobby. She continued bossing everyone around as we inched the truck out of the barn and through the rubble, only now from the inside of the truck cab while using the smudged mirrors to keep track of all that went on around her.

With only one more section of broken wall with a hunk of still attached flooring to move, we were all startled by the back window of the truck cracking and Katie letting out a shriek, followed a second later by a distant clap of gunfire.

“Sniper!” Captain Jorn yelled out, “Everyone hit the dirt!”

I threw myself to the ground again, aiming for the tall grass under the trees, and everyone not wearing armor followed suit. Other than Rin, who calmly sat down and scooted into a bush he had been loitering next to after proving rather ineffective at hauling junk. Katie disappeared as well, laying down inside the truck and screaming for the captain to kill whoever had shot at her.

“They’ve tried sending more drones, which I’ve stolen and have in a holding formation sort of in the direction we need to go. The ground forces have finally caught up, they have some of the Shepherd’s MRAPs that I’ve managed to scramble, but they also have older vehicles that don't have enough electronics for me to connect with and shut down. I finally managed to catch some of them talking to each other when they were launching one of the drones though, it seems like a coalition. One of them wanted to bless the drone and the other argued that it would be a waste of time and that ‘the oppressors’ would get away unless they moved quickly.”

I grimaced at the intel update from Max, but was grateful nonetheless. We probably would have already been captured or killed without his help, and I cursed Katie and the rest of the city's leadership for letting things get so out of hand. They spent so much effort and caused so much inconvenience and suffering with all of their security measures, only for it to be entirely ineffective and the city to be overrun despite it all.

I lifted my head and looked around, hearing our shooters return fire back in the direction of the city. Tevin and Jorn stood tall and obvious in the cleared space, shooting controlled bursts into the distance, while Ali had her little rifle propped up on the side of the truck and was holding her fire while she looked for whoever had shot at us. A bullet zipped by and chipped a piece of Jorns helmet off with a bright spark as I watched, not even causing him to flinch as he blasted off a 5 round burst back at the hidden sharpshooter.

I chewed my lip some more, knowing we couldn’t afford to take the time to take out the sniper while the rest of the mob closed in on us. I pushed myself up into a crouch and stayed low as I moved over to the truck.

“More are coming!” I yelled out, smacking Rin’s foot as I skirted around him. “Everyone, get in the truck!”

After pulling open the passenger door, I found Katie laying down flat and hyperventilating on the floorboards. She gave me a scared look and I lowered my voice to a calmer speaking level. “C’mon, Katie. You have to move the truck.” I turned to look at the path we needed to navigate to get into the clear road that led away from the house. “It’s only another 15 feet or so, straight back, and we’re going to just have to run over whatever is in the way. Stay low, and we can have one of the armored guys direct you.”

She gave me a wild-eyed look and I really thought she would argue, but she set her mouth into a determined line and bobbed her head once before crawling back into the driverseat, slouching low to stay below the level of the window. I climbed in next to her, and felt the truck gently rock as Ali pulled herself over the side and into the truck’s bed right behind me.

I elbowed out the broken glass of the passenger door and yelled out “Tevin, direct the truck! Everyone else, climb in or you're getting left here!”

I stayed low, peeking over the back seat through the broken window and watched as Rin slid over the tailgate, followed by the rest of the group who helped a struggling Kaylee flop into the growing pile of people. Tevin walked up to the side of the truck and held onto the side, and I felt the truck lean heavily as he stepped onto the running board before the thing snapped off and the truck rocked back in the other direction, causing Katie to mumble a curse under her breath.

Tevin stepped back and resumed firing controlled bursts to the south east, opening his helmet's visor so he could shout directions to Katie. “Turn left and just run over that bush, if you get stuck I’ll push you through.”

I frowned, wishing Tevin could keep his visor closed while the occasional bullet pinged off of his thick armor. I thought it was supremely stupid that the suits prevented external communication through a speaker or something, and resolved to force an answer out of Katie once we were clear of our current situation.

“I could fix that! I’d just have to bypass some blocks and shut out the safety overrides they have built into all of those suits.” Max chimed in, but I shook my head in answer. Someone would definitely pick up on that and start asking questions I couldn’t afford to answer.

Katie let out a frustrated muffled scream-adjacent noise and gunned the engine, causing the truck to surge backwards. I could hear snapping branches and the vehicle rocked heavily as we bounced over the uneven ground under the trees.

“Turn back to the right!” Tevin shouted, causing Katie to spin the wheel hand over hand and the truck to sway to the side as we flattened the bush and curved into the cleared lot, arcing around until the front of the truck was facing away from the enemy gunfire and the collapsed house. Another bullet whipped through and punched a spiderwebbed hole in the windshield, causing me to flinch and Katie to let out another strangled noise as she slammed on the breaks.

I peeked over the back seat again, and realized I could barely see through the heavily cracked and abused rear window, so I punched out a portion of it and swept some of the broken safety glass to the side. Ali gave me an indignant look as I showered her with little sparkling cubes as she knelt behind me in the truck’s bed. I watched as Captain Jorn tried and failed to lower the tailgate before resorting to simply ripping it off of the back of the truck.

The armored Tevin and Jorn sat down on the end of the truck, causing the whole thing to squat and the aged frame to complain as thousands of pounds of armored trooper loaded into the back. Seeing everyone was loaded in, I turned to Katie and told her to get us out of here.

“I can't see!” she shrieked, so I turned to look ahead through the slightly less cracked passenger side of the windshield and guide her.

“Forward, and turn back to the left a little, then go straight until I say. Hard right on my mark.” I replied, keeping my voice calm to hopefully ease her own obviously peaking stress.

She nodded and gunned the engine, still huddled low and looking rather awkward with her long legs cramped by her low slouch, her skirt riding up as she desperately tried to remain concealed while driving the old truck. I ignored her and fixed my eyes on the road.

“Mark, mark! Turn right, 90 degrees. Farther!” I said with increasing volume as she nearly rammed us into a tree and bounced us through a shallow ditch. I reached over and jerked the wheel a little bit farther and we just barely made the turn. We took out a mailbox and lost a side mirror as we drifted onto a gravel road, kicking up a plume of dust as we puttered away from the army of dissidents and whatever it was they had planned for us.