original | to: kovylkino
Original | WIP | 2500 words | burn | unbeta'd.
For nekopyo, in continuation to the purimgifts treat-a-thon. The prompt was original verse, military-centric, hang the word count. Still a work in progress, liable to change. ILU BRO. ♥
To: Kovylkino
It started as a typical overnight trip, just dead hours whiled away freezing their asses off inside a transport truck, the last one in a long line driving into the Russian night, everyone cranky from lack of sleep and the cold. Only Karen the driver was in high spirits, telling them at great length how warm it was on her side of the driver’s cabin and what a shame it was they signed up to be pilots. Such a waste, really, because maybe they had degrees in three different types of physics and a monthly paycheck the size of Dubai, but she was the one in the air conditioning right now and it damn right weren’t her fingers being eaten away by frostbite in minus twenty C.
“I’m a paramedic,” Bravo protested, hands stuck inside his armpits and trying to blow on his own nose for warmth, or at least that’s what it looked like through the layers of his neck warmer and scarf. “My paycheck isn’t even the size of Cayman Island, and that’s barely ten miles across.”
“Well, that’s too bad, ain’t it,” Karen said, positively gleeful now. “Because you’re stuck in the cold just the same.”
“You could let us into the driver’s cabin?” Charlie ventured, curled up in a foetal position with her knees tucked under her chin. “I’m not a pilot either,” she added, just in case Karen had forgotten.
Karen was sympathetic for exactly two seconds. “Letting you in would require me stopping this truck, which HQ has told me to keep driving until either my gas runs out or I reach the destination point, whatsisname, which is close to another six hours away. That’s if the weather stays good. Not to mention I’ve got three more gas tanks left, with this fourth nearly full, so I wouldn’t count on either one happening any time soon, honey.”
“Kovylkino.” That was from Theodora, head on Shimon’s shoulder and eyes nearly shut, plainly on the verge of dropping off. “Our destination’s Kovylkino. ‘S wunna th’biggest mecha bases n’Russia.”
“It’s also a ridiculous distance away from everything else ever,” Shimon muttered; the first time he’d spoken in hours. “Hey, scoot over a bit, will you, tramp; your elbow’s digging into my gut.”
“Serves y’right, klezmer,” Theodora retorted drowsily, but she shifted slightly and Shimon instantly looked relieved.
“As cute as you two are,” Bravo said. “And don’t get me wrong, you are cute, disgustingly so, even-could you maybe break apart for one minute to climb into those delightful big robots of yours and turn on their air conditioning or something?”
“Did anybody say air conditioning?” Charlie poked up her neck from the mound of scarves it was currently drowning in, much like a bird peering up from its nest. “I approve. Whatever it is, I approve. Yes, lots, very much please. Karen, baby, did you hear me? Very much please.”
Theodora cracked open one eye to glare at them. “Cretins,” she mumbled. “Shutup yer mouths or imma bite’oo.”
“I think what Theodora is trying to say here-” Shimon stifled a yawn. “Is that firstly, mechas don’t have air conditioning as you know it, but rather an internal heating system which would pretty much fry us all to cinders were it to be activated right now-”
“Better dead warm than frozen,” Bravo muttered.
“-And secondly, you’d have to be some pretty unbelievable kind of fucking moron to activate a mecha while it was stored, fully armed, inside a transport vehicle driving at some two thousand miles an hour,” Shimon finished. “Approximately.”
“Barely ninety, you punk!” Karen hollered indignantly. “That’s downright slander. Besides, you're got some chutzpah, for someone whose job is to regularly pass the sound barrier on his fancy-shmancy killing machine. Pot, kettle, much?”
“Sorry, Karen,” Shimon called back, temporarily cowed. They all knew not to mess with Karen during long overhaul drives; she knew where the energy snacks were kept and everything. Instead, he turned back to face Bravo, who was sitting a couple of feet away and looking entirely too amused by the scenario. “Anyway,” Shimon said pointedly, “the bottom line is, we’re not touching the mechas. Nobody is, until we get to base. Bad enough that we’re on Russian territory and the whole op is so classified even the president doesn’t know about it-the last thing we need is an exploding suit. Charlie could’ve told you that, if her brains hadn’t frozen inside that scarf incubator or whatever she’s wearing.”
“N-Not listening,” Charlie said, without even bothering to poke out her head this time. “T-T-Too cold for words.”
“Does that mean you’re willing yet?” Bravo zoned in on her like a starved orphan spotting a bread stand, abandoning his mockery of Shimon in favour of staring at her hopefully. He looked almost on the verge of desperation.
“No way,” Charlie said. “L-like hell I’m gon-oh, g-goddamnit.” She lapsed into silence, swallowed by a brief yet vicious internal struggle: you could practically see the scarves quivering as she debated with herself. Eventually, it seemed the sheer cold won out. “C-C’mere then.” She opened up her arms pathetically and Bravo muttered a faint hallelujah, scooting over to her and gathering her up into his greatcoat with a tight bear hug. He pressed their bodies together, legs tangled and ankles locked, enfolding Charlie in his arms. “If t-this is a scheme to try and d-despoil me o-or something, I s-swear you’re gonna-”
“I promise not to try and despoil you, Charlie,” Bravo said patiently, his voice muffled against Charlie’s shoulder and the mess of scarves. “Just like the last eight times when I promised. I am, however, glad you’ve finally come to your senses. After nine years of medical training, trust me when I say shared body warmth is better than any number of layers.”
“It’s s-such a cliché,” Charlie whined, although she’d already stopped shivering quite as much. “Men tried to use it on me all the time when I was stationed in Alaska. W-Wasn’t nearly as cold as this, though,” she added defensively, as though Bravo might think her easy for agreeing.
Bravo said, “Of course, right,” and stroked her back, unruffled; Charlie heaved a small sigh and snuggled a bit closer, nose buried in the hollow of his throat. She was a bit like a puppy, Bravo thought, as Charlie snuffled against his neck warmer. A mecha-fixing, screwdriver-throwing, engine-oil-stained mechanic puppy. Sure.
“Next time, Charlie,” Shimon said gently. “Perhaps it’d be better if you ask to be stationed further south. You’re amazing tech support, but there are lots of bases in warmer climates, if you’re this sensitive to the cold...”
“Sensitive, my dead grandmother,” Charlie growled, and Bravo made a slight choking sound where she dug in her mitten-clad fingers into his kidney. “I’ve been with ME-14 longer than you have, flyboy; I practically learned how to unscrew bolts on that mecha. I patched it up after battles while you were still breaking your baby teeth on Mescaleros and and F-15’s. You can stick that patronizing tone up your ass, because I’m not getting separated from him.”
“Hey, don’ bite,” Theodora cracked open an eye again. “N’body’s raggin’ on yer skills or yer rank, mechanic, so cool’t. Klezmer’s jus’ tryin’ to make friendly.”
“That’s right,” Shimon said, pacifying. “Though I’m sorry if I came across as patronizing. Theo and I are never our best during base transfers.”
“Who’s side’a y’on, anyway?” Theodora grumbled, or started to, before she closed her eyes again and drifted off mid-sentence.
Bravo said, “I think the cold’s making us all a bit cranky. Or sleepy, in Theo’s case. It’s a long drive to base, why don’t we try and pass the time? Who’s up for a little game, eh?”
“I am,” Shimon said, and Charlie nodded against the wool of Bravo’s neck warmer, her short black hair scraping against the stubble on his chin.
“Okay,” he said. “I’m guessing nobody knows, er... Guess That Terminal Disease?”
Charlie snorted, which made Bravo bite the inside of his cheek hard; his chin was devastatingly ticklish. Luckily, she didn’t seem to notice. “Med student games, tha’s unfair. Why not play Guess That Operating System, huh?”
“So, hey, guys,” Shimon said hurriedly, because Bravo frowned, opening his mouth to answer Charlie, and they both had a tendency to take rhetorical questions way too seriously. “Does anybody know Grounded?”
“What?” Bravo said, distracted by the question, and Shimon felt faintly triumphant at averting what could have evolved into the most insufferable transport-ride argument ever. Young recruits nowadays; sometimes you just wanted to punch them in the face. He was about to respond when Theo stirred next to him and raised her head enough to speak clearly.
“Grounded,” she said, and pushed her hair out of her eyes tiredly. “So named because that’s what pilots play when they’re grounded. It’s simple as hell, stupid as fuck, and it passes the time like you wouldn’t believe.”
“Sounds like just the thing,” Bravo said, and Charlie nodded agreement. “How’s it go?”
Shimon nudged Theo. “Why don’t you just start and show them? Theo’s crazy good when it comes to Grounded,” he confided to the other two. “She may not look it, but she’s wild.”
“Shut up, klezmer,” Theo said, but she was smirking a bit now. “Okay, here goes. Last time I was grounded...” She looked thoughtful for a minute, then grinned. “I ‘accidentally’ decorated the captain’s office with the entire girl dorm’s lacy thong panties. Every girl has at least one pair in the army, y'know, even the cooks.”
“That’s easy,” Shimon said, snickering. “True. I still have the pictures.”
“Wait, that’s not fair, by your standards we’ve been grounded our whole lives!” Bravo said, just as Charlie said, “Oh my god, it was you? I’m gonna kill you in your sleep, those panties are private property-”
“You’re supposed to say true or false,” Shimon said loudly, before Theo burst out laughing or did something equally outrageous, which would then lead to Charlie really trying to assassinate her. “The one who goes next has to outdo the previous claim. Like, if it were my turn, I’d tell you about that time I hotwired a training mecha and flew three laps around the base before anyone managed to call me down.”
“False,” Theo said easily. “And you should stop dreaming about it and just do it, klezmer, seriously. You're coming off as totally spineless. Okay, who’s next?”
“Me,” Bravo said. “But I’ve still been grounded my whole life.”
“Good,” said Theo, with a broad smirk. “That just means you’ve had more chances to outdo us. Trust me, you’ll need them-when it comes to Grounded, nobody can beat pilots.”
“Yeah, ‘cause they’re crazy as shit,” Charlie muttered, but quieted down as they started to play for real.
They went through Bravo’s most embarrassing practice surgery, where he accidentally poked the donkey’s hind reflex center and made it kick his tester in the face (false); the time Charlie managed to make one of the droid models at the mechanics’ training camp get up and do the Macarena (true); Karen’s longest cross-country drive, which lasted 52 hours straight and ended when she almost ran over her employer (true); Theodora’s night out when she saw the captain of the base in one of the night clubs, all dressed up in drag (false, though it would have explained the ensuing thong-decorations); and the one time Shimon’s klezmer family came to visit him during a visit to the city, bringing along their instruments so of course he ended up playing and singing Shabbat songs for his entire company (false, but only because he didn’t really sing, only play instruments. The rest was true).
“You’re shitting me,” Charlie gasped, trying to breathe through the spasms of laughter, nearly sobbing into Bravo’s shoulder with it. “Is that why they call you klezmer? Seriously? Oh my god, I cannot even-”
“Yeah, laugh it up,” Shimon said, making a face at her. “The name’s strictly off-limits. Only Theodora calls me klezmer now, isn’t that right, tramp?”
“Hush you, klezmer,” Theodora said benignly. She seemed to have roused a bit since they’d started playing, though she still leaned against Shimon in a sort of boneless exhaustion. They both looked completely wiped out, supporting each other like two rickety buildings about to collapse, pale and dark-eyed in the neon light. Shimon was still jovial, seeming to draw energy from the conversation and the banter, but Theodora looked about two minutes away from a total power outage. She leaned against Shimon, head resting on his shoulder, and his arm was wrapped tight around her like an anchor, even as his gaze was focused on the others.
Go figure pilots: they were a tight-knit bunch, practically inbred, with no concept of shame or personal contact among themselves, but touchy as castrated bulldogs towards any outsider. Nobody but pilots knew how, why, and what to make of it. It was the special brain waves, or something.
“Alright,” Charlie said. “My turn again? How about the time when-listen carefully, Bravo-me and this guy at the Alaska base got snowed off during a blizzard, just the two of us in some remote cave, and he said, here, baby, you know body warmth is-”
Suddenly, a crash sounded from far up the line of trucks, near the head. Everyone stopped and listened, ears straining, like a bunch of rabbits hiding in tall grass, waiting for the first sign of an enemy. Karen even slowed from ninety to a respectable seventy-five.
A minute passed, then another, and nothing else happened.
“What the hell,” Karen said warily, peering into the dark night, hands clutching the steering wheel tightly. “Not sure what that was about, but at least the road’s still-”
Another crash sounded, and another, this time closer by. Karen slowed to a complete halt. Then the faint echoes of gunfire sounded, and an explosion lit up the horizon, bifurcating the sky in a jagged streak of smoke and flame, exactly like-
“Holy shit,” Theodora breathed. “They blew up a transport truck.”
“Everyone get the hell out,” Shimon ordered, voice hard; he was already struggling upwards, muscles stiff from the cold, and doing up the clasps and zipper of his suit. “Get the hell out, take the coats and run, wait within eyesight but not too close-Theo, let’s, come on-”
“Right behind you,” Theo snapped, doing up her own suit as she ran towards the darkened mechas. Another explosion sounded, incredibly close by, accompanied by the faint sound of shouting. “I’m taking ME-27, you take-”
“Alright, yes,” Shimon said, and they were just climbing into the cockpits, snagging the helmets from theirs hooks, when a deafening explosion shook the truck, flashing across the backs of their eyelids in blinding white-hot light-and that was when everything truly went down the shithole.
All content © miarr, rights reserved, whatever.
For nekopyo, in continuation to the purimgifts treat-a-thon. The prompt was original verse, military-centric, hang the word count. Still a work in progress, liable to change. ILU BRO. ♥
To: Kovylkino
It started as a typical overnight trip, just dead hours whiled away freezing their asses off inside a transport truck, the last one in a long line driving into the Russian night, everyone cranky from lack of sleep and the cold. Only Karen the driver was in high spirits, telling them at great length how warm it was on her side of the driver’s cabin and what a shame it was they signed up to be pilots. Such a waste, really, because maybe they had degrees in three different types of physics and a monthly paycheck the size of Dubai, but she was the one in the air conditioning right now and it damn right weren’t her fingers being eaten away by frostbite in minus twenty C.
“I’m a paramedic,” Bravo protested, hands stuck inside his armpits and trying to blow on his own nose for warmth, or at least that’s what it looked like through the layers of his neck warmer and scarf. “My paycheck isn’t even the size of Cayman Island, and that’s barely ten miles across.”
“Well, that’s too bad, ain’t it,” Karen said, positively gleeful now. “Because you’re stuck in the cold just the same.”
“You could let us into the driver’s cabin?” Charlie ventured, curled up in a foetal position with her knees tucked under her chin. “I’m not a pilot either,” she added, just in case Karen had forgotten.
Karen was sympathetic for exactly two seconds. “Letting you in would require me stopping this truck, which HQ has told me to keep driving until either my gas runs out or I reach the destination point, whatsisname, which is close to another six hours away. That’s if the weather stays good. Not to mention I’ve got three more gas tanks left, with this fourth nearly full, so I wouldn’t count on either one happening any time soon, honey.”
“Kovylkino.” That was from Theodora, head on Shimon’s shoulder and eyes nearly shut, plainly on the verge of dropping off. “Our destination’s Kovylkino. ‘S wunna th’biggest mecha bases n’Russia.”
“It’s also a ridiculous distance away from everything else ever,” Shimon muttered; the first time he’d spoken in hours. “Hey, scoot over a bit, will you, tramp; your elbow’s digging into my gut.”
“Serves y’right, klezmer,” Theodora retorted drowsily, but she shifted slightly and Shimon instantly looked relieved.
“As cute as you two are,” Bravo said. “And don’t get me wrong, you are cute, disgustingly so, even-could you maybe break apart for one minute to climb into those delightful big robots of yours and turn on their air conditioning or something?”
“Did anybody say air conditioning?” Charlie poked up her neck from the mound of scarves it was currently drowning in, much like a bird peering up from its nest. “I approve. Whatever it is, I approve. Yes, lots, very much please. Karen, baby, did you hear me? Very much please.”
Theodora cracked open one eye to glare at them. “Cretins,” she mumbled. “Shutup yer mouths or imma bite’oo.”
“I think what Theodora is trying to say here-” Shimon stifled a yawn. “Is that firstly, mechas don’t have air conditioning as you know it, but rather an internal heating system which would pretty much fry us all to cinders were it to be activated right now-”
“Better dead warm than frozen,” Bravo muttered.
“-And secondly, you’d have to be some pretty unbelievable kind of fucking moron to activate a mecha while it was stored, fully armed, inside a transport vehicle driving at some two thousand miles an hour,” Shimon finished. “Approximately.”
“Barely ninety, you punk!” Karen hollered indignantly. “That’s downright slander. Besides, you're got some chutzpah, for someone whose job is to regularly pass the sound barrier on his fancy-shmancy killing machine. Pot, kettle, much?”
“Sorry, Karen,” Shimon called back, temporarily cowed. They all knew not to mess with Karen during long overhaul drives; she knew where the energy snacks were kept and everything. Instead, he turned back to face Bravo, who was sitting a couple of feet away and looking entirely too amused by the scenario. “Anyway,” Shimon said pointedly, “the bottom line is, we’re not touching the mechas. Nobody is, until we get to base. Bad enough that we’re on Russian territory and the whole op is so classified even the president doesn’t know about it-the last thing we need is an exploding suit. Charlie could’ve told you that, if her brains hadn’t frozen inside that scarf incubator or whatever she’s wearing.”
“N-Not listening,” Charlie said, without even bothering to poke out her head this time. “T-T-Too cold for words.”
“Does that mean you’re willing yet?” Bravo zoned in on her like a starved orphan spotting a bread stand, abandoning his mockery of Shimon in favour of staring at her hopefully. He looked almost on the verge of desperation.
“No way,” Charlie said. “L-like hell I’m gon-oh, g-goddamnit.” She lapsed into silence, swallowed by a brief yet vicious internal struggle: you could practically see the scarves quivering as she debated with herself. Eventually, it seemed the sheer cold won out. “C-C’mere then.” She opened up her arms pathetically and Bravo muttered a faint hallelujah, scooting over to her and gathering her up into his greatcoat with a tight bear hug. He pressed their bodies together, legs tangled and ankles locked, enfolding Charlie in his arms. “If t-this is a scheme to try and d-despoil me o-or something, I s-swear you’re gonna-”
“I promise not to try and despoil you, Charlie,” Bravo said patiently, his voice muffled against Charlie’s shoulder and the mess of scarves. “Just like the last eight times when I promised. I am, however, glad you’ve finally come to your senses. After nine years of medical training, trust me when I say shared body warmth is better than any number of layers.”
“It’s s-such a cliché,” Charlie whined, although she’d already stopped shivering quite as much. “Men tried to use it on me all the time when I was stationed in Alaska. W-Wasn’t nearly as cold as this, though,” she added defensively, as though Bravo might think her easy for agreeing.
Bravo said, “Of course, right,” and stroked her back, unruffled; Charlie heaved a small sigh and snuggled a bit closer, nose buried in the hollow of his throat. She was a bit like a puppy, Bravo thought, as Charlie snuffled against his neck warmer. A mecha-fixing, screwdriver-throwing, engine-oil-stained mechanic puppy. Sure.
“Next time, Charlie,” Shimon said gently. “Perhaps it’d be better if you ask to be stationed further south. You’re amazing tech support, but there are lots of bases in warmer climates, if you’re this sensitive to the cold...”
“Sensitive, my dead grandmother,” Charlie growled, and Bravo made a slight choking sound where she dug in her mitten-clad fingers into his kidney. “I’ve been with ME-14 longer than you have, flyboy; I practically learned how to unscrew bolts on that mecha. I patched it up after battles while you were still breaking your baby teeth on Mescaleros and and F-15’s. You can stick that patronizing tone up your ass, because I’m not getting separated from him.”
“Hey, don’ bite,” Theodora cracked open an eye again. “N’body’s raggin’ on yer skills or yer rank, mechanic, so cool’t. Klezmer’s jus’ tryin’ to make friendly.”
“That’s right,” Shimon said, pacifying. “Though I’m sorry if I came across as patronizing. Theo and I are never our best during base transfers.”
“Who’s side’a y’on, anyway?” Theodora grumbled, or started to, before she closed her eyes again and drifted off mid-sentence.
Bravo said, “I think the cold’s making us all a bit cranky. Or sleepy, in Theo’s case. It’s a long drive to base, why don’t we try and pass the time? Who’s up for a little game, eh?”
“I am,” Shimon said, and Charlie nodded against the wool of Bravo’s neck warmer, her short black hair scraping against the stubble on his chin.
“Okay,” he said. “I’m guessing nobody knows, er... Guess That Terminal Disease?”
Charlie snorted, which made Bravo bite the inside of his cheek hard; his chin was devastatingly ticklish. Luckily, she didn’t seem to notice. “Med student games, tha’s unfair. Why not play Guess That Operating System, huh?”
“So, hey, guys,” Shimon said hurriedly, because Bravo frowned, opening his mouth to answer Charlie, and they both had a tendency to take rhetorical questions way too seriously. “Does anybody know Grounded?”
“What?” Bravo said, distracted by the question, and Shimon felt faintly triumphant at averting what could have evolved into the most insufferable transport-ride argument ever. Young recruits nowadays; sometimes you just wanted to punch them in the face. He was about to respond when Theo stirred next to him and raised her head enough to speak clearly.
“Grounded,” she said, and pushed her hair out of her eyes tiredly. “So named because that’s what pilots play when they’re grounded. It’s simple as hell, stupid as fuck, and it passes the time like you wouldn’t believe.”
“Sounds like just the thing,” Bravo said, and Charlie nodded agreement. “How’s it go?”
Shimon nudged Theo. “Why don’t you just start and show them? Theo’s crazy good when it comes to Grounded,” he confided to the other two. “She may not look it, but she’s wild.”
“Shut up, klezmer,” Theo said, but she was smirking a bit now. “Okay, here goes. Last time I was grounded...” She looked thoughtful for a minute, then grinned. “I ‘accidentally’ decorated the captain’s office with the entire girl dorm’s lacy thong panties. Every girl has at least one pair in the army, y'know, even the cooks.”
“That’s easy,” Shimon said, snickering. “True. I still have the pictures.”
“Wait, that’s not fair, by your standards we’ve been grounded our whole lives!” Bravo said, just as Charlie said, “Oh my god, it was you? I’m gonna kill you in your sleep, those panties are private property-”
“You’re supposed to say true or false,” Shimon said loudly, before Theo burst out laughing or did something equally outrageous, which would then lead to Charlie really trying to assassinate her. “The one who goes next has to outdo the previous claim. Like, if it were my turn, I’d tell you about that time I hotwired a training mecha and flew three laps around the base before anyone managed to call me down.”
“False,” Theo said easily. “And you should stop dreaming about it and just do it, klezmer, seriously. You're coming off as totally spineless. Okay, who’s next?”
“Me,” Bravo said. “But I’ve still been grounded my whole life.”
“Good,” said Theo, with a broad smirk. “That just means you’ve had more chances to outdo us. Trust me, you’ll need them-when it comes to Grounded, nobody can beat pilots.”
“Yeah, ‘cause they’re crazy as shit,” Charlie muttered, but quieted down as they started to play for real.
They went through Bravo’s most embarrassing practice surgery, where he accidentally poked the donkey’s hind reflex center and made it kick his tester in the face (false); the time Charlie managed to make one of the droid models at the mechanics’ training camp get up and do the Macarena (true); Karen’s longest cross-country drive, which lasted 52 hours straight and ended when she almost ran over her employer (true); Theodora’s night out when she saw the captain of the base in one of the night clubs, all dressed up in drag (false, though it would have explained the ensuing thong-decorations); and the one time Shimon’s klezmer family came to visit him during a visit to the city, bringing along their instruments so of course he ended up playing and singing Shabbat songs for his entire company (false, but only because he didn’t really sing, only play instruments. The rest was true).
“You’re shitting me,” Charlie gasped, trying to breathe through the spasms of laughter, nearly sobbing into Bravo’s shoulder with it. “Is that why they call you klezmer? Seriously? Oh my god, I cannot even-”
“Yeah, laugh it up,” Shimon said, making a face at her. “The name’s strictly off-limits. Only Theodora calls me klezmer now, isn’t that right, tramp?”
“Hush you, klezmer,” Theodora said benignly. She seemed to have roused a bit since they’d started playing, though she still leaned against Shimon in a sort of boneless exhaustion. They both looked completely wiped out, supporting each other like two rickety buildings about to collapse, pale and dark-eyed in the neon light. Shimon was still jovial, seeming to draw energy from the conversation and the banter, but Theodora looked about two minutes away from a total power outage. She leaned against Shimon, head resting on his shoulder, and his arm was wrapped tight around her like an anchor, even as his gaze was focused on the others.
Go figure pilots: they were a tight-knit bunch, practically inbred, with no concept of shame or personal contact among themselves, but touchy as castrated bulldogs towards any outsider. Nobody but pilots knew how, why, and what to make of it. It was the special brain waves, or something.
“Alright,” Charlie said. “My turn again? How about the time when-listen carefully, Bravo-me and this guy at the Alaska base got snowed off during a blizzard, just the two of us in some remote cave, and he said, here, baby, you know body warmth is-”
Suddenly, a crash sounded from far up the line of trucks, near the head. Everyone stopped and listened, ears straining, like a bunch of rabbits hiding in tall grass, waiting for the first sign of an enemy. Karen even slowed from ninety to a respectable seventy-five.
A minute passed, then another, and nothing else happened.
“What the hell,” Karen said warily, peering into the dark night, hands clutching the steering wheel tightly. “Not sure what that was about, but at least the road’s still-”
Another crash sounded, and another, this time closer by. Karen slowed to a complete halt. Then the faint echoes of gunfire sounded, and an explosion lit up the horizon, bifurcating the sky in a jagged streak of smoke and flame, exactly like-
“Holy shit,” Theodora breathed. “They blew up a transport truck.”
“Everyone get the hell out,” Shimon ordered, voice hard; he was already struggling upwards, muscles stiff from the cold, and doing up the clasps and zipper of his suit. “Get the hell out, take the coats and run, wait within eyesight but not too close-Theo, let’s, come on-”
“Right behind you,” Theo snapped, doing up her own suit as she ran towards the darkened mechas. Another explosion sounded, incredibly close by, accompanied by the faint sound of shouting. “I’m taking ME-27, you take-”
“Alright, yes,” Shimon said, and they were just climbing into the cockpits, snagging the helmets from theirs hooks, when a deafening explosion shook the truck, flashing across the backs of their eyelids in blinding white-hot light-and that was when everything truly went down the shithole.
All content © miarr, rights reserved, whatever.