Depraved by Trent Evans

Chapter 30

The rover bounced and shuddered as it rolled across a series of pockmarks in the pavement, likely mortar strikes, judging by the depth and patterning in the cracked asphalt.

“You okay back there, Tom?” Anson muttered it, the squad comm headpiece in his ear.

The soldier’s irritated tone crackled on the channel, but it was more than loud enough for Jon to hear it.

“Hot as fucking hell back here, but I’ll live—as long as this asshole stops going out of his way to drive over every goddamn pothole known to man.”

Jon smiled at that.

The cargo hold in the back—where Tom was currently curled up—wasn’t exactly designed for the human body, let alone one the size of the hulking soldier and his gear.

Anson was stuffed sideways directly behind Yulia in the passenger seat of the rover. Lyssa behind the driver’s seat. He assumed she probably had a sidearm out, the barrel pressed to the back of his seat at that very moment—just in case.

It’s what he would’ve done.

Yulia, wearing Lyssa’s only spare light blue jumpsuit—and looking distractingly lovely in it—was strapped into the passenger seat. The uniform fitted her surprisingly well, with the exception of the tightness of the fabric across her chest, Yulia being much more generously endowed than the athletic Lyssa.

Yulia’s head peered around now and then in wonder at the devastation of the west end of Old Vickers, most buildings, windows blown out, debris in the street looking like skeletons of their former selves, while others were either partially collapsed or little more than mountains of rubble.

“I’ve… I’ve never seen it up close like this before. It’s…heartbreaking.”

“This isn’t even the worst part,” Jon said. “The hardest fighting was at the city center. Nothing was left standing there. Not a single building.”

As they pulled out of the ruins of the city, he pushed the rover to a higher speed, both to make the ride a little easier on the occupants and because it would be expected.

TSS patrols were well used to his rover flying down even the worst roads, knowing the sophisticated nav and traction control system, along with the driver’s enhanced reflexes meant there was little danger of running the big vehicle out of control.

More than that though, in Jon’s world, speed was life. The slower one traveled, the bigger the target one painted on his own back.

It was just how it went.

His rendezvous with Yulia in the cell replayed in his mind, how incredible, how right, it felt to be inside her once again. That he missed her had been a singularly novel emotion… but he found he was beginning to get used to feeling all those new emotions.

Whatever it was that was happening to him, it wasn’t done happening.

He really had no choice in doing anything but simply rolling with it—because Yulia was in danger if he failed to keep it together.

She needed him—and he wasn’t going to fail her.

Ever.

As they made more distance away from the city, and drew closer to the Fen, he considered the best plan of approach. A straight in run directly from the east was the fastest, but it was also, by far, the most likely to be patrolled.

While it was eerily quiet, on both the comms channels the rover was patched into and on the ground—they hadn’t seen a single ground patrol, and only one or two aerial units far off to the south of them—he knew there was most definitely something happening. There was no way to know, of course, but Anson’s instincts were sound in wanting to get back to the base as soon as possible.

If something were to happen, that was the rebels’ best chance to weather it.

Sounds almost like… you’re on their side, Jon.

It wasn’t that simple though. He was on whichever side Yulia was. Luckily for their three companions sharing the rover with them, Yulia was on the rebels’ side.

But rather than approach via the most direct route, he had a hunch they needed to get a better feel for the situation first, and as such a reconnoiter—if only an observation beforehand—was most definitely in order.

Coming over the last rise on the roadway, the deep, lush green of the Fen spread out before them, seemingly endless as it stretched off into the distance.

“Going to skirt up into the hills rather than approach for now. I’ve got an observation unit stowed back there with 50x magnification. Should do nicely.” He glanced over at Anson. “You… might want to survey the place before we advance.”

Anson’s jaw tightened, but he gave him a little nod. “Agreed. Find us a good spot, and we’ll have a look first.”

Taking the first few switchbacks, he came upon a section, sweeping gently around a bend that was marred by huge craters, large enough to swallow up a vehicle. He carefully steered around them, having to slow down more than he liked. A tension steeled into his limbs as he picked his way through, but he had no idea why.

“What are these?” Yulia said craning her head around to look at the biggest one as they passed it.

“Artillery? Maybe ambushes? Whatever it was, it was big,” Anson said softly. “Hard to tell, but they’re not new. Should be okay—but watch your asses.”

“As if we have any other option,” Lyssa quipped behind him.

Right up here should work,” Jon said, steering the vehicle toward the shoulder as the road began to sweep around a bend in the hillside.

The tires slid slightly as the rover came to a stop, a cloud of dust rising and drifting off over the drop-off on the crisp breeze.

He popped the hatch on the hold, the rover shifting as Tom immediately rolled out.

The soldier crossed back over the roadway, at a quick step, rifle up, scanning for anything that might be beyond that bend.

“Find us a position, Tom,” Anson called after him. “Defilade, if you can. And standby.”

“Roger that.” The big soldier took a knee at the base of the hillside behind a large boulder, just off the inner shoulder on the opposite side of the asphalt, his field of fire clear for anyone who might approach from further up the road.

Lyssa had already exited out Jon’s door, using the rover’s hood to set up her rifle, covering their approach from the east where they’d come from, in case they’d been followed.

“Stay inside,” Anson told Yulia, patting her shoulder, as he slipped out the open passenger side door. “You too, Rexall.”

He nodded at Anson.

There was no way he was leaving Yulia anyway, so that wasn’t going to be a problem.

For a minute or two, Anson scanned the entirety of the approach from their position, both easterly and from the southeast where they were at the moment.

“Definitely something’s been through there directly below us. Hundred and fifty meters? I’m seeing tracks, possibly wheeled, and… maybe an ambush strongpoint?”

“Shit, just what we need,” Tom muttered over the squad channel, the sound of his voice crackling.

“Could be nothing, but if I were to guess, that’s one of ours. I don’t know all of the ambushes we set up along the perimeter, but there are a lot of them. I’d expect we’d find it mighty hot in there if we rolled on them in this fucking rover.”

“Which means on foot,” Lyssa murmured. “Need to make contact with them if they’re one of ours. And hope they aren’t Carter Faction.”

“Sure as hell not TSS though,” Anson said, still scanning. “Gonna have to take that chance.” He handed the observation unit to Lyssa, who scanned it herself. “I’ll move straight in, downslope. Tom will flank, along the treeline. Need you covering us—and keep that fucking strongpoint in your sights. You seeing it, Lyss? Those felled logs?”

“Affirmative, Cap. That’s…gonna be ugly if it’s manned, and they think we’re hostiles. But I’ll keep it painted.”

Then the computer switched on, intoning the words that chilled his blood.

“MOVEMENT, unidentified, multiple vectors, 50 meters northwest and closing.”

“What the hell was that?” Yulia’s eyes had gone wide.

“Don’t know,” Jon said. “Definitely not TSS.”

He leaned out of the window, raising his voice. “We have company.” He chopped his arm down toward the bend. “Multiple contacts. Coming right up the road.”

Anson grabbed his rifle. “Tom, be ready.”

“Affirmative, Cap.”

“Lyssa, cover our right.”

“On it,” the woman said, wheeling around to aim down the outside shoulder.

Anson dropped prone right in front of the rover, aiming. Then several figures moved in along the road appearing from around the bend, following one another in tight formation, rifles up.

“If they fire on us, I’m getting you out of here,” Jon said, tightening Yulia’s belt.

“We’re not leaving them,” Yulia whispered, eyes fixed on the road ahead.

“We may not have any choice.”

Then, suddenly, the lead figure approaching them stopped and raised his rifle in the air.

There was faint yelling and rapid-fire talk from the approaching group, but even Jon’s acute hearing couldn’t quite make it out.

“Goddamn, am I happy to see that,” Lyssa said, standing back, slinging her sniper rifle across her forearm.

Even Anson was back up, rifle barrel pointed at the ground.

“What’s happened?” Yulia yelled out at Lyssa.

The woman looked back at her. “They’re ours.”

“Ours? What do you mean?” Yulia was already unsnapping her belt.

“I mean, they’re loyalists,” Lyssa leaned an elbow upon the door frame above Yulia. “Awakening.”